This is True Love

It's official. I have seen true love and now know that my dad is still, after 52 years, completely and totally in love with my mom. How do I know this? I've seen it demonstrated in the most self-sacrificial ways over the past six months. He never complains, never gets down, never whines. He is gentle, upbeat and never shies away from the difficult tasks of caring for her. But now I know the extent of that love reaches further than I had imagined. How do I know this? I know this because yesterday he bought a mini-van. Actually, it's call an Entervan. It's a wheelchair accessible van with an automatic lift and a lowered floor. I had no previous knowledge of these kinds of vans. I've seen them here and there but mostly thought them to be an aberration of the "normal" mini-van like the one I drive. I've not once given them a second thought. But that's the way these things work, so the nice salesman who sold us the van said. "Until you need one, you never think about one." So true. Now, suddenly, I know more than I would ever want to about Entervans - wheelchair accessible doors, the Braun lift system, the E-Z Lock tiedown system. I would rather not know these things, but now I do. And so does my Dad.

He said he would never buy a mini-van...too clunky...didn't need one...liked his Buick, etc. In one day, we arranged to sell that precious Buick and walked on the lot of the National Car Rental and bought this van. My Dad has never in his life bought an automobile that way. He shops cars like he does grocery stores - traipsing from one dealer to the next in search of the Deal of the Century. And he usually finds it, then bargains his way down to a price that he can brag about. I do believe this way of buying cars is in the Dad Handbook. So this is love - to walk onto a lot, buy a vehicle (a MINI-VAN!) in just under one hour, and pay-off the Buick and arrange to have it sold in the same day.

Tough times should change us, grow us, make us better and draw us into a deeper relationship with God. I am working on not being afraid and I am stifling the urge to turn and run from it all. Someone I respect greatly who has studied the Bible and meditated on it a great deal says that: "Learning to suffer well just might be the most important part of the journey of faith." So I am trying to learn what it means to suffer well. We all are. Is buying a mini-van part of this learning process? I guess that's a theological question for someone else, but I do know this: My Buick Dad is excited about this mini-van - this vehicle he said he would never buy. He's not grinding his teeth about it or grumbling about the price. He's proud of this new van, and he hasn't blinked once about selling the Buick. That's true love.

There's Just Something About That Wall...

I'm sitting here watching a Discovery Channel special about the Great Wall and remembering what an amazing experience it was to be "climbing" the wall. And yes, it is a climb. The incline is very steep in places and we were groaning and panting while Chinese men and women decades older than were sprinting up with hardly a whimper. The Chinese are people of great fortitude and endurance. It took over 2,000 years to build this wall - which is not one continuous wall as most people think, but many walls built over many centuries. Peasant laborers were used, but no modern-day machinery. Instead, bricks were laid by hand. Just to give you an idea of how many bricks and stone were used in just the Ming Dynasty portion of the wall, they could circle the earth at five feet high. Millions of Chinese died during the construction of just the portion of the wall built during the Qin Dynasty. During that time, 70 percent of the population was involved in building the wall.

It's amazing to think about how crucial the wall is to the identity of China and its people. Everyone knows that it was built to keep people out of China...now the wall brings people into China. It truly is a wonder. Alison, who has never seen the wall, always tells people it is her favorite thing about China. I don't know what it is about the wall, but it seems to embody everything that is amazing about the Chinese people and their complicated and magnificent history. A group of us are going back in 2010 to bring our beautiful Chinese daughters back to their birthland, and yes we will climb the great wall again. I want Alison to see it. Tonight at dinner she said, "China is such a cool place," and I agreed with her as I always do because I want her to be proud of her birth country and the Chinese people. But I have to wonder what China really means to her, this place that defines her in so many ways, yet a place that is lost to her memory. This place called China is a mystery to her...as it is to all of us.

These photos of us at the Great Wall were taken in 2001, two days before we held Alison in our arms for the first time. The next time we climb this wall, she'll climb it with us.

This Girl's Family

Four nights ago we met my Dad at Steak n Ale because they had a special on prime rib. I think he just wanted to get away from the hospital for a little while so he could feel somwhat normal again. We had a great dinner. He told stories - some we had heard, some were new - and the teenagers actually enjoyed listening along with the rest of us. We laughed and skipped down memory lane. I drove him back to the hospital, and on the way there he said, "There are those times when it hits you how much you need your family." My Dad is a tough old guy. He doesn't like to admit that he needs anyone's help. He is determined, and if you tell him something is impossible, he'll do his best to prove you wrong. But he knows that he'd be lost without his family. So would I.

They say you can choose your friends but not your family and this is true. But I believe that God has blessed me with people that I would probably choose anyway. We're all a little quirky, none of us perfect, but we all seem to fit together as if it were divinely ordained. Imagine that. During my turbulent teenaged years, I convinced myself that I just didn't fit into this family because they were not my blood relatives. I felt as if I were the square peg in a family of round holes. But so many people have been grafted into this family of mine over the years and I have realized that God has placed us together to hang on to one another whether we share the same genes or not. My Dad is right, we need each other, even if some of us are so independent that we often don't realize it. So here is my family. I love them. And I'd choose them all over again if God hadn't already given them to me as a precious gift.

An Invitation

I don't really like to write a blog post that means absolutely nothing to certain people, so I'm not going to do that. But for some of you, portions of this post will mean absolutely nothing. But please keep reading. At this point I don't know how long I'll ramble and there just might be something for everyone.

If you have a Senior High student at Asbury Church in Tulsa, your student has been asked to bring art supplies for the patients at a psychiatric hospital in Central Asia. I can't get anymore specific than that since this post will travel far and wide. But if this part of the post applies to you, you'll know the details of the place.

In Luke 14: 12-13, Jesus, while dining at a Pharisee's house, tells the guests that when they have a banquet it really doesn't count if they invite friends, brothers, relatives or rich neighbors because those people can always return the invitation. Instead, he says, invite the poor, crippled, lame and the blind because they can't repay you - and your reward will come from God, not from man. So the Senior high students at Asbury are inviting the psychiatric patients to the banquet. They are doing something practical for them that most people would never do because most people have decided that these people don't matter...they don't count. But they matter to God, and they count in the kingdom of God, and so they deserve an invitation. So the students are collecting art supplies to send with two of their own when they travel there in the Spring. The patients take art classes, and create beautiful works of art, and our students want to encourage them to continue to develop their talent. The students are learning that the kingdom of God is open to everyone - even (especially?) those that society has tossed aside. As teenagers, they are tempted to put people into categories of those that matter, and those that don't matter. If we can get them to think upside down (because the kingdom of God is all about upside down) then they can help change the world. Sound dramatic? I don't think so. We'll see.

So anyway, if you have a Senior high student, ask them about the list of art supplies, tell them to go shopping and bring the supplies by March 9. Help us help our students invite these precious patients to the banquet. It's going to be a great party.

And Now For Something Completely Different

My mom is stil doing well. Thanks again to all of you who have prayed, visited, sent food, flowers and cards. We have such awesome family and friends!!!

Sometimes you just need some comic relief. My friend Donna posted some photos on her blog of her kids playing in the Mac Photobooth. I agree with her that the Photobooth is one of the great things about having a Mac. So I'm posting some photos of our kids playing in Photobooth. It seems like I never am able to post photos of Colin, because he can't keep a straight face in a photo. So here he is, although as you can tell, these are certainly not straight-faced photos. When our Internet was down, Colin and the guys spent part of an evening taking photos of themselves. After the last several days, it seems like a good time for something mindless, and no one does mindless better than teenagers!!

Lessons in Goodness

It was a moment of irony. About an hour ago my mother - with what is left of her right leg bandaged and on ice - looked at me and said, "God has been so good to me." And she meant it. Earlier today, she had most of her leg removed. She will most likely never walk again. And on top of all that, she is an insulin dependent diabetic who is on kidney dialysis three days a week, is receiving radiation for breast cancer every day, has lost much of her hearing and must have oxygen to breathe well. How could someone like this possiby utter the phrase, "God has been so good to me" and mean it? I guess I don't really have a pat answer (I hate those anyway) but here are a few things I am learning as we journey down this path with my parents:

Lesson #1: God gives you enough grace for one day.
I'm learning that jumping ahead and trying to put all the pieces in place for tomorrow, or the next day, or next month just isn't possible right now. God wants us to trust him enough not to worry about tomorrow. My precious friends Mike and Sandy sent me an e-card with this verse included: "Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own." So I'm letting tomorrow worry about itself. God is giving us all we need for today.
Lesson #2: God reveals Himself in the most beautiful and real way in the midst of the most ugly situations:
Of course, this only happens if I can stop my whining and worrying and obsessing over myself long enough to have eyes to see it. God did not spare Himself from suffering. And he did not spare those who were bound to Him from it. There is something about trials and tribuations that chisel us into the people God wants us to be. I usually don't like this process at all, and have been known to run at full speed from it. Sometimes, though, there is no getting away from it. And so I am learning that God helps us cut through all the crap at times like this and see Him with new eyes.
Lesson #3: You never stop learning from your parents:
I thought they really had finished the "teaching phase" of their parenting. Not so. I am watching them closely and learning what true selflessness looks like. It's a rare thing. I don't have it. But I'm watching closely to see what it looks like, and it's really very beautiful.
Lesson #4: God's goodness doesn't have anything to do with our circumstances:
God is good, even when all the evidence would point to an otherwise conclusion. My mother truly believes that God has been good to her because she knows that He loves her with a boundless love that protects her, even when everything around (and within) seems to be falling apart. This is not an easy place to get to. We might say we believe this, but then some junky stuff start showing up in our lives and we're not so sure. But even in the middle of junky stuff - God is good...all the time.

Restored Bodies

My mother is having the the lower portion of her right leg amputated tomorrow. I sat with her in the hospital yesterday and we talked (she has also lost her hearing in the past couple of weeks, so this makes for challenging conversaton), and I thought about the leg. I know she is nervous, anxious...and grieving. She's had that leg and foot since birth. Mom isn't a pedicure kind of gal, but she's had a few compliments of a gift certificate from my Dad. She has stubbed the toes on that foot, and has worn countless shoes on it over the 71 years of her life. She used that leg and foot to walk me around the house when I was a colicky baby, and used it to drive herself to Gibson's Grocery store, Hancock Fabrics, lunch with friends, work; she used it to drive me to school, extracurricular activities, church, and friend's homes. The last bit of driving she did, which was months ago, was to McDonald's on Saturday mornings so that Alison could get her fill of pancakes and hash browns and the icky playground. And I'm sure my mother used that foot to nudge my Dad out of snoring a few times. Yesterday, I sat and thought about how grieving this foot and leg is normal, and in some way we are all doing it. We are also grieving a way of living that will never return for my mother - and least not on this earth.

If I didn't love God for a thousand other reasons, I would love Him simply because he is going to take my mother's little broken-down body and restore it to something absolutely magificent. As I looked at her foot yesterday, I realized that I could let it go, and I said goodbye to these body parts that were doing her no good. My mother will have a foot again, and a leg. And they will be better than the ones she started out this life with, because on the other side of this life my mother will have a body that won't wear out. I remember hearing words like these from the "old-timers." My parents came from large extended families, and so I've been to a few funerals in my life and listened to the old folks speak longingly for the day when there is no "sorrow, or sickness." They spoke because they knew suffering, and pain, and bodies that betrayed them. Now I sound like one of them as I speak longingly of a day when my mother will dance on two legs, walk long distances without getting dizzy, breathe deeply without the aid of an oxygen tank and have arms that are not black and blue from the dialysis and insulin needles. Yes, God will restore all things back their original glory -the way that He intended things to be. But in the meantime, the doctors will keep trying to patch up my mother, and take away the parts of her body that are causing her harm. They will work hard at their own restoration as long as they can, and for this I am thankful. But I have peace in knowing that beyond what I can see, there is a place where true, eternal restoration will take place. And for this, I am forever thankful.
"Be at rest once more, O my soul, for the Lord has been good to you." (Ps. 116:7)

The Forsaken Children

Kyle met these children in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. They are precious children who live on the streets or with siblings or relatives. Most of these children have lost their parents. An organization called Forgotten Children's Fund (click the title of the post to go there) funds Children's Home Ethiopia, which ministers to these children. It's a small ministry, on a shoestring budget, but they do incredible things for the few children that they can afford to minister to. They would like to minister to 50 children, but at present can only minister to seven. After meeting these children, we can't help but be involved also. If you are interested in more information and a way to get involved, click on the title. Joe Bridges lives here in States and runs the Forgotten Children's Fund. He is in Ethiopia right now meeting the children he has been raising money for. Here is his email:

Thoughts From Ethiopia
January 12, 2008 - Week 1
Today I was privileged to participate in Children's Home Ethiopia's Open House program. For the first time I met most of the children that CHE ministers to. There was Suraphel, the spunky boy who kissed me every chance he got. There was Edalawit, the beautiful little girl who loved the special dress she received for the Open House program. There was Linken, the extremely well behaved boy who loved to show off his karate moves. There was Nibiyu, the smallest boy, who despite his size could hold his own in a wrestling match. There was Nibirate, his crooked smile warmed a room as soon as he showed it. Sadly, I have yet to meet Desse, because he was sent to live with his grandmother in the countryside for some time. Hopefully he will be back soon.

I was also encouraged to meet the children's guardians who also attended CHE's Open House program. Each took a turn sharing about how CHE has helped their family. All of the guardians were women, which is very common here in Ethiopia it seems. Poverty has left each of them looking older than they actually are. Despite their impoverished conditions, they bombarded me with invitations to visit their homes. I am excited to visit each of them, yet part of me wants to stay away as I know they will likely spend more than they can spare to make my visit a special one. Such is the culture of Ethiopia.

How do I feel now that I have finally met the children I have been raising funds for? Happy - these children would bring joy to anyone who gave them a chance. Sad - all of these children face hardships that no one should have to endure. Motivated - I have come face to face with the reasons for The Forsaken Children Fund, I will never forget these little lives. Bold - I am ashamed of my apologetic approach to raising funds thus far. I will no longer apologize for giving people an opportunity to help the helpless.

Please pray for my brother, Jonathan, and me as we will be in Ethiopia until February 8. Also pray for Suraphel, Edalawit, Linken, Nibiyu, Nibirate, and Desse. Thank you!

Joe Bridges
The Forsaken Children

Riding Shotgun

I'm in the passenger seat of the car quite a bit these days. Erin has her learner's permit, on her way to the long-awaited driver's license and she is is begging to drive me anywhere I want to go. Colin wasn't such an eager driver, and for some reason Kyle was in the passenger seat more with Colin than I was. Erin prefers to drive with me - I have no idea why. Kyle is good, and patient, and he only grabbed the wheel from Colin once. But I seem to be the parent who is riding shotgun these days. I usually take several deep breaths as Erin is starting the engine to calm and remind myself that I must let go. I go through the mental checklist of all the ways that we are covered if we get in an accident - we're wearing seatbelts, we're driving in the safest kind of vehicle possible (Volvo), we have insurance, and we won't be on the highway. Then I lean back and trust my life and my daughter's to her still evolving driving skills and all the other people that are accompanying us on the roads we travel. And then I take a few more deep breaths.

It's an interesting feeling to put your life in the hands of your child. She's put her life in my hands for 16 years now, so it seems fair that it's my turn. It is on these little driving jaunts that I fully realize how much I like to be in control. Putting myself at the mercy of a hormonal, often preoccupied and daydreamy teenager forces me to open my hands and stop holding on so tightly. I'm not an overprotective or hovering mom - just one that likes to share my opinions on how things should be done. Fortunately, the teenagers are both laid back and stubborn, and this is a good combination that keeps us all sane and somewhat balanced. So Erin's motivation for driving well is not really to please me, or to keep me from grabbing the wheel from her (I have grabbed the wheel from her only once, so Kyle and I are even), but because she knows I won't let her take the driving test until I think she is ready. So she is on her best driving behavior and driving like an 80 year-old woman. Cars are passing us with fury as she putters down the road averaging about 15 miles under the speed limit. She turns with slow precision and signals in parking lots. She comes to an excruciatingly long stop at four-way, three-way and two-way stop signs, and she gets a fair amount of cars honking at her, although when she asks "is that for me?" I always tell her no.

She's coming along. I have nothing to complain about and I have no reason to worry. But it's a parent rite of passage - this riding shotgun. I'm doing my best to enjoy it, and remind myself that once she gets the license, she'll be gone...puttering around town at 30 miles an hour all on her own. Something tells me she'll speed up.

A Few 2007 Favorites

These were not all released in 2007, but I discovered them all in 2007 and am so glad I did. If you love books, movies and music, I highly recommend these:

BOOKS
Fiction:
A Thousand Splended Suns by Khaled Hosseini
The Good Earth by Pearl Buck
Non-Fiction:
There is No Me Without You by Melissa Faye Green;
The Divine Conspiracy by Dallas Willard (I have almost finished this book, but I can already give it a hands-down favorite rating.)
Infidel by Ayaan Hirsi Ali

MUSIC
Derek Webb - Mockingbird
Bob Marley and the Wailers: Gold

MOVIES
Born Into Brothels (I love movies, and I saw a lot of them this year, but couldn't think of one that even came in at a close second. It's a documentary, but doesn't watch like one).

New Year 2008: Dry Erase Boards and Hanging on to Hope

It was a good day. Different, but good.
My mother lost her hearing in one ear about ten years ago, and a week ago she suddenly lost the hearing in her other ear. We thought it was temporary because she has had a touch of some upper respiratory thing. We found out Monday night that it is not temporary. The doctors will try steriods, but the most likely scenario is a four-hour surgery to insert a Cochlear implant. It restores hearing, but my mother has myriad of health issues which I would list here, but it would be a long and rather unbelievable list. Her heart doctor will have to OK the surgery. We're praying that he will because right now, she is mostly deaf. Which brings me to New Year's Day. I woke up feeling a little down, wishing we were going to have our usual, normal, New Year's Day lunch. Just fun. All good. Happy times. I wasn't sure how we were all going to be jovial now knowing that along with all the other health issues, Mom's hearing is more than just temporary, and will require another surgery (just how many surgeries CAN one body endure?)

Kyle went out this morning before everyone came over and bought two dry erase boards and announced that we were going to have a good day - that we were going to enjoy every moment of it, because, as he reminded me, life is short. No need to grouse around when there is life to be lived. So, we armed ourselves with writing boards and scribbled notes to Mom all day. Some of them were about plans for the new house, some of them were poems, some were a simple "I love you," and Alison wrote such wonderful notes as "I love flewers" (flowers), and "I want to be a vet." We sent one dry erase board home with Dad, but honestly I think he prefers the challege of charades and getting her to read lips. She's pretty good at it and I think he's proud.

Kyle is right. Life is short, and there is too much of it to be lived to mope. But I think Kyle didn't come up with this all on his own. I think he's been watching my parents. I am 42 years old and I almost came to the point of thinking that I had nothing left to learn from them, but I was wrong. We are watching them, and we are learning what it means to keep faith and hold on to hope. We are learning how God sustains us when we think we can't walk any further. And we are learning what it means to love someone through it all - "in sickness and in health."

So we had a good day with our dry erase boards and black-eyed peas and talk of plans for the New Year. As I look at my new, clean calendar for 2008, I don't know what the days will look like, but I know that each one of them is a precious gift.

Happy New Year.