for the love

So my sister sent me this book for my birthday.  She read it and thought of me.

But ain't nobody got time for that.

So it's been sitting in my drawer for a different kind of day.

And then this morning, one of you read the first chapter and thought of me and sent it to me in pictures, all highlighted up.  I recognized the name at the top, "For the Love"...that same Jen Hatmaker book my sister sent!

So I read the first chapter through email.  Tonight, a few more, brought to a pause halfway through by a chapter "On Calling and Haitian Moms."

I mean, for the love.  Even I am now thinking of me as I'm reading.

This is good.

It's about that grace I admitted to calling an excuse not all that long ago.  It's about that freedom I'm always wanting to press my palm against people's foreheads with a hearty "JUST BE FREE!"  It's about the stretch I'm always trying to stretch...that the kingdom cannot be filtered through our culture, through our class, through our color, through our experiences and privileges, through our denominational lens but must be something that is true for ALL to be true.

If it isn't also true for a poor single Christian mom in Haiti, Jen figures, then it isn't true.

It's about living a worthy life..."loving as loved folks do, sharing the ridiculous mercy God spoiled us with first, restoring people in ordinary conversations and regular encounters.  A worthy life means showing up when showing up is the only thing to do."

She talks about loving all our people and being released to love them as if it is our job.  Talks about being free to run our races well; to live wide generous days; to practice the wholehearted living we were created for.  She reminds me that it's not POSSIBLE to balance an overloaded balance beam...but that...

"If we stop fearing a no will end the world, if we pare our lives down to what is beautiful, essential and life giving, if we refuse to guilt one another for different choices, if we celebrate the decent accomplishments of ordinary good hard life, then we'll discover that God's kingdom never required a balancing act."

THAT is good true stuff.

And a good reminder of good news for me exactly today.

Another friend emailed today and said, "You are probably not afraid of anything, ever!"

I've spent all day trying to think of what I am afraid of so I could tell her, and you know the only thing I could honestly think of (after people touching me with those weird thin foam covers that used to come on hangers) was "not being enough."

not being enough!

How absolutely insane is that moment of clarity!  A woman who rocks her baby to voodoo drums and walks quickly past tarantulas and boards planes to disease-y countries with infants and eats foods she doesn't even want to know and sends her girlies off to foreign school and houses strangers (some of whom...there are stories) and drives in the middle of complete and fast-paced Haitian market-day chaos.  And home schools! (the scariest thing on this list.)

I am not afraid for a moment of what man can do to me, nor the powers of darkness...and yet as I work and balance and cook and clean and teach and serve and help and listen, at the bottom of myself I am afraid I may just not be enough.

My fear, the one thing He has spoken to and proven more strongly than any.thing.else.

I am enough for Him to DIE for.  I was enough for the Father to send His very Son.  

How arrogant in my insecurities can one be?

Stacey, be free.  I'm enough, it's enough, and I've nothing to prove.  He proved.  And He is Enough.

Be released tonight to love your people as if it was your JOB.  It is.  And it's enough.

Live wide and generous days, today, the wholehearted living we were made for.  

God's Kingdom never requires a balancing act.

Scripture instructs us to live presently and joyfully, resisting worry and believing Jesus set us free for freedom's sake.  His good and perfect gifts are staring us in the face today...

join me?