Vitamin Furrow - CHRISTMAS POST!

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The field accosts me as I jog by. Empty and still, it spreads a pallor over the once-fertile hills. In summer, its harvest waved high: Plush green leaves surrounded sturdy, wheat-topped stalks. The golden smell of sun-ripening grain filled our valley. 

Now only this blank canvas remains, the silent foundation upon which a riot of productivity once waved. I exhale as I pass by: I'm awed by this empty expanse. The vastness. The potential. The change. It seems at once sacred and terrible, monumental and mundane. 

But it's the furrows that stop me cold. Some machine has mapped them, touching every inch of this field with precision. Like the texture of paper or finely-sewn cloth, the furrows march in perfectly-spaced rows across the land's open face. The soil waits exposed, these silent rows a testimony to utility, to purpose, to plan.  

The soil waits.

A catch in my throat surprises me.  I start to jog once again. It's beautiful, this empty sameness. Beautiful like a promise. Like the squares of a ready-to-be-filled calendar. Like the rhythm of season and sun, hunger and sleep. Like the simple beat of a song.

"It's hard to remember anything about this year," my teenage daughter recently observed as we concluded a quiet dinner at the end of another quiet week. "Nothing makes one month different from any other." She spoke this with sorrow, and I agreed: This year has brimmed full with mourning. 

But it's brimmed full with wonder, as well. Days still dawn. Birthdays still come. People still marry. Babies still arrive, beautiful and wrinkled and wailing with surprise.  We lay down our furrows, or God does, or both. I gaze at my silent field, drinking it in with reverent eyes. I'm passing it now, headed toward home. 

This season will pass, too, I am sure, replaced with havoc and hurry and all things pertaining to growth. Beneath it all, the furrows will stay, ready for their next emergence someday. And when that day comes, I hope I will welcome them more fully, as friends. They hold my place. They shape my days. They help me be patient. 

Together, in these beautiful, God-given furrows, let us wait.  

Photos of our year, mainly mundane:

Chris and Sarah snowshoed together  - first time in 20 years!

Ethan waxed artistic to burn off quarantine energy

Someone officially graduated!! 

Minty grew hairier - Chris grew more handsome

Summer carved a new friend 

Chris and Sarah were pencil and paper for Halloween

Vitamin Filter

 

The Gospel and The Twelve Rules

Jordan Peterson’s book, Twelve Rules For Life, offers practical and psychological help to those seeking a better life – or Peterson puts it, Life (existence for the whole planet across time). Taken as they stand, Peterson’s rules provide protection against chaos and wisdom upon which to lean

The rules, however, fall short. As Christians, we understand that real Life originates in and is and upheld by Christ. The Gospel, not personal will or ideals, provides our only hope. Without a Gospel foundation and Gospel support, trial and time erode the wisest of ideals and the strongest resolve into dust. Success comes not through more effort, but through God’s effort – effort expended at Calvary – effort affecting us still.

Filtering Peterson’s rules through the lens of the Gospel transforms them into statements of hope that convict, encourage, and ultimately, reveal the Cross as the only root from which a truly better Life can sustainably grow.

1.      Stand up straight with your shoulders back because YOU ARE A CHILD OF GOD.

Peterson makes a strong point: Carry yourself well, adopt the habits and mindsets that people espouse, and your likelihood of success will rise. However, to the Christian, success begins and ends with Christ. In Gospel culture, our success rests on the dignity, innocence and worth we obtain the moment we identify with Christ. Whatever success we achieve after God restores us becomes an extra benefit instead of our reason to strive. Christ in us, our Reason and our Reward, matures us and offers the only assurance of current and lasting success.

 

2.      Treat yourself like someone you are responsible for helping because ALMIGHTY GOD HAS ALREADY HELPED YOU.

Christ’s sacrifice gives us a moral obligation for self-care. Since Christ has called us beloved, we must act like the beloved we are. Anything less cheapens His gift and the unarguable value He’s given us. Anything less is a farce.

 

3.      GOD WANTS THE BEST FOR YOU. Befriend people who feel likewise.

Christian friendships suffer pitfalls similar all others. “Rescuing” friendships, shallow friendships, selfish friendships, or fragile friendships all fall short of the healthy relationships God intends. While Christians should, and do, befriend others with an eye for serving them, the Gospel compels us to seek out friends who mirror God’s care. He gives us hard, loving truths – and also His constant presence, both of which help us grow. Because of this friendship, we’re empowered to seek and become friends who do the same – not to the exclusion of other, less ideal relationships, but with a clear-eyed discernment that ranks certain friendships as better than others and eschews other friendships entirely.

 

4.      YOU ARE UNIQUELY CREATED TO INHABIT TIME, so compare yourself to yourself, over time – but never forget your Creator.

Peterson’s argument deepens in the light of our identity as creatures, created by God. In Him we find motivation to strive for excellence as well as humility to recognize and grow past our weaknesses. Failure or success can easily derail us even when we’re not comparing ourselves with others. Recalling our Creator reminds us of our identity within His larger story and helps us retain the dignity and humility (both required) for healthy maturation.

 

5.      BECAUSE GOD DISCIPLINES YOU IN LOVE, do the same for your children.

God’s guidance and consequences, both given in love, shape our characters. To deny our children the same advantage, especially when they are young and still unable to recognize God’s chastisement for themselves, is to participate in their own destruction. Christ has loved us, and we must love our children – not for the purpose of making them loveable to ourselves or others, but because they are God’s beloved. When we treat them as such, employing all the restraints and blessings that belovedness implies, loveableness is likely to follow. But rather than being mistaken as our greatest priority or an end unto itself, it will be a beautiful by-product of their security in our love, and in God’s.

 

6.      Set your house in order before you criticize the world, because GOD HAS GIVEN YOU A SPECIFIC SPHERE OF DOMINION.

As God’s redeemed people, we have been ushered into a Kingdom that exists now and into eternity. It is expressed and expanded with every surrendered thought, emotion, and act we perform. We participate in this expansion in our own location, bound by time. Our impact dissipates, however, when we focus on farther realms at the expense of our own. To care for our bodies, our homes, our yards, and our businesses is to beautify time and eternity. To ignore them for the sake of a more public “cause” cheapens the Kingdom and dishonors its King. We must not do this. We must uphold His kingdom as holy with every mundane or monumental task that we face. We must approach our house and our sphere, however mundane, as if it were God’s, for it is. In doing so, we build a platform from which we may rightfully approach and beautify other, larger spheres, too.

 

7.      Pursue what is meaningful, not what is expedient, because GOD INHABITS ETERNITY.

Peterson proves that small, wise choices create grand, generation-spanning Good. The Christian motivation for such choices, however, runs deeper than the knowledge that self-denial now means better Life later. It rests upon the eternity of God. Zoom out on any decision and include the truth of the Gospel, and you discover a paradigm that necessarily places meaning over expedience, generosity over selfishness. Because His gift transforms our deepest nature, we’re compelled to invest in a better present, a Life-filled future, and a Kingdom that extends into eternity. Yet again, God’s love, not human ideals, informs and empowers our behavior.

 

8.      Tell the truth – or at least don’t lie because GOD’S TRUTH HAS SET YOU FREE.

Christians experience painful, transformative proximity to Truth every day. Truth reminds us of our calledness, our belovedness, and our sin. Truth also speaks, as a Person, from His residence within our renewed spirits. As earthen vessels containing this divine treasure, we accept our frailty along with our worth, and telling the truth becomes a natural response to the Truth we have received. We speak difficult truths (when prompted) in love. We speak delightful truths because they overflow us. Because both kinds of truths have set us free, and because Truth (Jesus Christ) makes us freer over time, we speak truth with our lips and lives.

 

9.      Assume whoever you’re listening to knows something you don’t because ONLY GOD IS INFINITE.

Perhaps the only thing the stranger on the bus or the ranting lunatic knows is their own story. But still, it is new information. Jesus Himself walked the earth as a stranger. He, the all-knowing Divine, frequently queried others about their thoughts and motivations. How much more might we, wrapped in our own limitations, do likewise? This posture of humility opens hearts, both others’ and our own, to connection. It creates possibilities for knowledge and relationship that serving solitude never could. It allows us to incarnate, like Christ, into the lives and experiences of those we encounter. It creates space for Grace to unfold, and this is our greatest goal.

 

10.  Be precise in your speech because GOD KNOWS YOU INSIDE AND OUT.

Precision, like Truth, can protect us. Without clarity, how will we (or anyone else) know us (or our desires) from any others? This rule speaks to the necessity of speaking specifically rather than hiding behind “safe” generalities. What, exactly, do we want? Who are we, exactly? What, exactly, makes us angry, or happy, or sad? God spoke these truths clearly through His Word – both the written Word and the Word of God when He walked this earth. The clarity of His speech informs our own, empowering us to use specific, difficult words without fear. Our fearlessness comes not only from His good example, but primarily from His goodness – a goodness that guarantees our security no matter the difficulty of the our particular words.  

 

11.  Do not bother children while they are skateboarding, because GOD ENCOURAGES ALL THINGS TO GROW.

Growth – ours and others’ – involves danger, daring, and discomfort. In allowing us free will, God asserts our freedom to explore and expects to grow wiser as a result. Why, then, would we hamper that freedom in others? Developing comes at the cost of our safety: not developing costs so much more. Over-protected individuals destroy their spheres of influence rather than edifying them. Worse, they’re denied the dignity given to all children of God. Because God gives us the right and responsibility to grow, we must give the same gift to our children. Protecting children’s freedom to mature is part of our divine calling and displays our own adulthood in Christ.

 

12.  Pet a cat when you encounter one in the street, because THE KINDNESS OF GOD STILL LEADS YOU TO REPENTANCE.

Peterson’s final rule is the greatest: all acts of love transform Life. This is true; but this is not why Christians perform them. Our motivation springs not from the hope of betterment, but from the knowledge that betterment has already taken place. God’s act of love has already transformed Life – our own lives, Life across time, and the eternal Life of this planet. His gentle act – more costly and condescending than petting even the most dangerous cat on the street, makes us New. From this newness, we extend ourselves, too – petting cats, washing dishes, saving lives, speaking truth – and Life continues to transform. There is no other purpose. There is no other cause. Rules won’t protect or redeem human lives, but Love will. And Love is a person. God is Love.

Vitamin Outside

Gertie is a cat with a home body. Round, affable, and slow-moving, she seems incapable of climbing a tree, much less stalking a rabbit or engaging in feline warfare. During her few waking hours, she meanders the house in short bursts, pausing frequently to flop on one side and recuperate. She purrs easily, samples all laps for softness, and wears such a sweet expression that she seems perpetually at peace. An anomaly of a cat, always content. She's the perfect indoor pet.

Last night, she proved me wrong.

I stumbled downstairs around eleven, unable to sleep. After arranging myself on the couch and waging further warfare against insomnia, I  slipped into dreamland until sometime around 3:00 am. 

At this point, a curious noise awakened me. I roused and listened momentarily before recognizing the unmistakable "tunneling" sound of small paws brushing the full-length window of our front door. Although darkness obscured her, I imagined gentle Gertie, "digging" furiously to escape this safe house. 

The sound shifted slightly, and Gertie gave several soft meows. She moved to the other side of the double front door, then tried the side door, as well. 

"Pssst!" I whispered across the dark room. Her efforts were ruining my rest.

She paused for a moment, then resumed scratching.

And I? I lay still and marveled. Our obese house cat, so serene during the day, displayed such desperation at night! What did she want? Why did she dig?

She kept at it for what felt like hours. Finally, I retreated to the silence of my bedroom. I'd considered squirting her with water. I'd even tossed a poorly-aimed pillow her way. But I just couldn't fight any harder. The moon filtered in, its luminosity diffused by the day's smoky haze. Outside, the grass and trees seemed to glow. If I were Gertie, I'd strive toward that beauty, too ... even if it put me in danger. 

And so I left her to it -- to her quiet, unobserved struggle. She must have known it was futile; she'd never even extended her claws. Yet there she sat, long after I left, expressing an urge deeper than her domesticity, truer than her overweight state, stronger than her desire for safety. 

Oh, how deeply I could relate. Perhaps you can, too.

On the surface, my life bends to certain themes. Nurture. Comfort. Peace. Farther down, my silent needs lie. Adventure. Exploration. Full, freedom-filled life. When the moon rises and the haze hangs just right, these needs arise. They stir my soul, driving me to dreams and to action that surprise even me. Impatient, I push at the boundaries of my danger-free life. Like Gertie, my truest self drives me to just get outside.

And God, Who created this truest self in the first place, must smiles. He beckons me beyond, rather than imprisons me within, my four walls. He calls me forward into the mystery of dependence upon Him instead of my skills. He calls me into faith, into life.

I wonder how many nights Gertie visits those tempting glass doors. I wonder what  would happen if they opened, and she could step outside. Would she? 

Would you? 

And will I? We've got the Maker of all nature, the Upholder of eternity on our side, which means there's nowhere really outside His protection. But still, the world seems so wide. Excitement still surges each time I decide. I take one step, and then two, and with my great Maker, I smile. I'm anxious to see what I'll find.

Vitamin With

“With is … God’s plan for our lives.” (Bob Goff)

A year ago, I started the practice of sitting still. Through many trials and much error, I’d come to realize that I spent the majority of my time running, striving, scrabbling, sweating, and fomenting unrest – all in the first several minutes of my day. When I learned about the practice of centering prayer (that’s meditation for Jesus people), I knew I had to step in. My current blood pressure, my future psychotherapy bill, and my present loved ones would all thank me.

And so, I sat still. Twice a day, several days a week. I closed my eyes, settled my hands, selected a centering word, and breathed deeply. I tried not to expect instant results. I chased my errant thoughts back towards stillness. And I waited.

It was slow going at first. My thoughts wandered. I changed my sacred words like an athlete changes his socks. I developed twitches, itches, and excuses to help me avoid those 20-minute sessions. But bit by bit, I experienced a level “success.” set my to-do lists to one side, at least sometimes. I found favorite places, like the driver’s seat of my parked car, to sit still. I began to look forward to my sessions. I relaxed.

Some time later, about nine months into this experiment in stillness, we welcomed a new member to our family. Gertrude, or Gertie the Hut as my husband has dubbed her, arrived just days before Washington state’s quarantine took effect. Hailing from who-knows-where, aged somewhere around three years, this C.O.U.S. (cat of unusual size) claimed my daughter’s heart the moment she saw her online photo.

“Mom,” Summer breathed when we met Gertie at the Humane Society the next day. “She’s so beautiful!”

I looked around. Several normal-sized cats lounged nearby, displaying several states of beauty. The only visible part of Gertie, a nondescript portion of what may have been her back right quadrant, spilled through one side of the “cat house” where she had been hiding since we arrived. It rose and fell with each breath, confirming that she was, indeed, alive. But beautiful? I had my doubts.

Still, I reserved judgment. Carefully, we coaxed Gertie into our presence. 

Noncommittally, she allowed us to stroke her vast girth. Summer’s devotion increased, and so did her tugs on my heartstrings. Finally, after a hurried consultation with my spouse and a trip to the store for supplies, we stuffed Gertie into a too-small cardboard carrier and brought her home.

Would she survive? I had my doubts. Outside our doors lurked coyotes, foxes, and various birds of prey, still salivating over their memories of our former cats. Summer instructed us to keep Gertie inside; we humbly agreed.

But would we love her? Could she love us? I doubted that, too. Our dog, Minty, struggles with social boundaries. Our lifestyle involves frequent guests. And we immediately put Gertie on a crash diet. What newcomer could feel welcome in such conditions?

Initially, my fears seemed well-founded. Gertie spent the first month of her new life with the “I’m nervous” patch of fur on her back perpetually upraised. She traversed the house with her paws clenched and her legs stiff. She did a low of meowing. My husband guffawed each time she walked by. Summer’s older brother, Ethan, found her simply offensive.

“She’s so ugly,” he sniffed. “I can’t stand her!”

But slowly, our home climate has changed. Minty gives Gertie a wide berth (claws demand a certain respect). Ethan allows her to sit on his lap. Despite frequent binges, Gertie has lost several pounds (and gained them, and lost them again). Today, I have to admit it: Gertie’s become one of our clan.

Gertie seems to know this, as well. She sleeps in my favorite chair. She’s stopped yowling. And now, when I practice sitting still, she wants to join me. I settle my spirit, lay my hands in my lap, embrace my inner quiet, and hear her soft meow. Her purr starts to rumble, there’s a grunt and a whoosh, and suddenly, my lap’s full of kitty.

To be honest, it’s distracting. I’ve read the manual these kinds of things. Nowhere does it mention leaving room for a love-hungry cat.

But it doesn’t mention rejecting one, either. Once again, my heartstrings are singing. I clutch my sacred word in my mind, asking it to wait just one second. I lift my hands and rearrange them around Gertie’s soft form. Her purr kicks into low gear, and the rumble fills the stillness as, together, we practice our rest.

Maybe true stillness, like the other disciplines of grace, cannot be threatened by the presence of one lonely cat. Maybe her presence enriches it. Maybe togetherness unfolds the true beauty of every good gift, the way the wind lifts a flag to unfurl its full glory.

This virus and the isolation it creates has affected our togetherness so deeply. We feel the impact now. We’ll feel it far into the future. How can our rhythms shift? How can our actions accommodate the with–ness we must offer (and accept) in order to stay whole?

We’ll have to dig deeper, that’s certain. We’ll need to look wider than we already have. We’ll need to include our pudgy pets, and our stinky ones, too. We’ll reach out to our awkward neighbors, our annoying spouses, and the children who twang on our every last nerve. We’ll find ourselves leaning over other lines, too: Lines of routine, of expectation, of hostility. Together, as we learn to give and receive with-ness, I believe we’ll find ourselves, and our stillness, too.

One simple, shared sit-down at a time.

Vitamin Hope

I started wearing contacts when I was five. I have single vision and low visual acuity in my one sighted eye, so prior to the contact-lens phase, I sported massive, frog-eyed glasses strapped to my face at all times.

I’d like to report that the sensation of freedom relieved me – and it did. But it also gave me a healthy dose of fear. I required a high-powered contact lens, which meant that each delicate disc cost quite a lot. More than once, I recall accidentally rubbing the lens of my eye, enlisting my friends to help find it, then running home with the tiny treasure balanced on the tip of one grubby finger. Those contacts were so floppy! I needed help to put them in, help to remove them, and a whole lot of reassurance when they disappeared.

Because let me tell you, losing a lens was the worst. After I got older, I’d stand over the sink to remove my lens for the night. Occasionally, it would slip through my fingers, and poof – tumble right down the drain.

Oh, the clutch in my heart when that happened! Oh, the horror of telling my folks! 

We’d carefully remove the drain plug and peer around with a flashlight. If my dad was home and felt hopeful, he’d get under the sink and disassemble the pea trap, just in case. One time it worked, too. The lens had nestled safely in that humble, U-shaped bend, from whence we received it with all the fanfare of a Lazarus newly emerged from the tomb.

Although all my contact-losing escapades didn’t end so joyfully, I must have retained a scrap of that childhood hope. Recently, while changing the belt on our vacuum, I discovered a new diagram in the manual.

“No way!” I exclaimed. “This thing has a secret compartment!” The blue-printed picture depicted an easy-to-access chamber just below the machine’s bag. This space, the manual informed me, would collect all items too heavy or too large for the main receptacle.

“Do you mean to tell me,” I wondered aloud, “that 20 years of treasures have accumulated, right there?”

Eagerly, I pulled on the handhold. Anxiously, I carried the assemblage upstairs. From across the room, my teenage son’s gaze followed me. Everything around us grew silent.

“What could be in there?” I all but whispered. I gave the thing a gentle tap; then, with images of forgotten jewelry and priceless coins filling my mind, I began shaking it in real earnest.

“Here it comes!”

A small cloud of dust blocked my view. I held my breath while my mountain of treasure took shape.

One nickel, three pennies, and a few twisted nails.

“That’s it?” My heart sank. “Twenty years, and that’s all?”

My son Ethan, weighed in, guessing that my husband had already emptied it several times. But this provided scant comfort. I’d at least expected a bobby pin! I reassembled my machine, feeling bitter.

But the feeling could not last for long.

What have you discovered? A small voice repeated as my day recommenced. List out the treasures you’ve found.

I grinned, remembering the high-five with my son after my successful belt change. I chuckled over the likelihood that my husband had rescued countless coins through the years. Maybe enough to buy a new vacuum! I celebrated the simple pleasures, too: The moment of discovery, my sweet childhood memories, and the delicious anticipation I’d just enjoyed.

True, the compartment hadn’t contained all the treasures I’d hoped. But it had provided three pretty pennies, not to mention a nickel. And who knows? Maybe next time, it’ll give me something more. I can always hope, anyway. And that’s greatest treasure of all.  

Vitamin Solace

There’s a sacred solace

found in simple, mundane tasks:

A comfort that extends beyond

the bounds of each small act.

When days loom long and pressures throng

and strength becomes fatigue,

sacred solace enters in

with work I can complete.

The counter? Scrubbed. The dog? Well-loved.

The several dishes? Clean.

I may not mend life’s larger ills,

but I can tend these things.

And when they’re done, I take my cup

of coffee, tea, or pain,

and sit with it and make the most

of what I can’t explain.

I find the work of finishing

small things can make a way

for larger cares to shrink; and then

I face them, unafraid.

Vitamin Soothe

There’s something about the pounding of my feet on solid earth that soothes me. I’ve needed more of that, lately – the soothing. I keep finding myself drifting outside, tennis shoes laced, embarking on a walk or a jog or a lope, all unplanned. I wander my neighborhood. I circle city parks. I trek the grid of gravel roads that drapes the contours of the Blue Mountains like a shawl. Inevitably, I return feeling cleansed.

Most days I walk quickly, relishing the rhythm of breath through my lungs and blood through my veins. These days I thank God for my ability – the miracles of health and sight, and the freedom to travel safe paths without fear.

Other days I move slowly. I talk with my dog, examine flowers, search for birds. On these days, I often feel a different rhythm – the pulsing headaches that have become my companions this year. These days, I move gently, keeping the throbbing at bay. But these days, too, I thank God. I thank Him that I can still move. I thank Him that my pain is so small. I thank Him for the simple things that slowness reveals: Cloud shapes. Sounds of children at play. Sun and shadows sweeping the hills, silent travelers moving with a will and a destination I cannot comprehend.

On other days still, I move with near-mindless passion. Somewhere inside, I may relish my pumping muscles, my beating heart. But these days, I’m walking to survive. I scarcely take in my surroundings. My thoughts bump in a jumble, up and down in my mind and I make no effort to sort them. They are the reason I’m here, after all; they are the things I must soothe.

Eventually, the miracle always happens. In one mile or in seven, the pounding pace perseveres. My speedy steps slow, my focus returns, my breath and my thoughts flow freely once more. My thoughts may still be in a jumble, but they’ve been jostled to a manageable size. Thus subdued, I can pick them out one by one, examine them, and decide what I want to do.

Perhaps that’s the real reason I walk. Perhaps this movement provides a stand-in for all the actions I wish I could take. It offers a preliminary satisfaction that tricks my mind into a cease-fire, a lull just long enough for me to regroup, rearm, and reengage, feeling renewed.  

Whatever. It sounds like a good reason to me. All I really know is this: Walking works. I no longer judge those people I see on the road, the ones talking to themselves, swinging their arms way too high, their gaze focused inward or perhaps outward, far away. Those people are me. They’re walking their way to inner peace. I send them a mental salute whenever I pass them by. We travelers need all the support we can get.

This may sound wild, but maybe if more of us took to the roadsides and hills, allowing ourselves to look a little crazy, we’d find our own inner peace, too. Maybe that’s the first step toward healing: Giving ourselves a place and a way to process our troubling thoughts … one soothing footfall at a time.  

Vitamin DEPTH

FINDING YOU

I cannot find the depths of You.

Though childlike, still, I try.

I think I’ve seen the best of You

And then new heights arise

You’re ocean-deep and heaven-wide

You’re mountain-strong and steep.

You’re undertow and avalanche

And nights of deepest sleep.

You’re clear-reflecting water-glass

You’re headlong-rushing stream

You’re tiny mosses, holding fast

To cliffs unscaled, unseen

You’re unrelenting desert heat

You’re tender sun in spring.

You’re garden roots and fresh green shoots

You’re songbirds. migrating.

You’re yesterday with all its joys

Tomorrow, still unknown

You’re fields of grass all tossed in waves

Of worship, mute, windblown.

You are these things; You’re in them. Yet

You’re more. You’re not contained

By mass and light and sound and sight.

You’re Glory, unrestrained.

Vitamin Morning

Morning comes early,

comes with sharp pain;

comes for your wedding,

comes when it rains.

Morning comes simply,

comes with delight;

comes though you dread it,

awake, through the night.

Morning comes quickly;

morning comes slow.

Morning comes.

Darling,

that’s all you need know.

Vitamin Jared

Last night the unthinkable happened. Jared did not complete his video for the Breakthrough Youth Challenge. This eliminates the possibility of obtaining a life-changing scholarship. College, already an iffy proposition, has become even more difficult to imagine. He applied at one school, where he was denied (too white? Too male? Too academically average?). He abhors the idea of accruing debt. And he has barely scratched the surface on researching other financing or school options.

Still, Jared hasn’t been idle. During the school year, he pursued five educational streams, including courses at two separate colleges. For the last half of the year, he spent most evenings with a whiteboard at our kitchen island, banging out solutions to math problems that looked like novels written with hieroglyphs. As soon as he completed his most difficult class, he moved straight into planning his scholarship video. Too tired to enjoy his own graduation, he fell asleep before the follow-up coverage even aired on TV.

And that’s not all: In the midst of this maelstrom, Jared’s been working to secure a better lifeguard position at the local pool, maintaining a positive and influential attitude at home, and engaging with friend online and in person. He’s attended several dances, taken a few trips to the mountains, and cheerfully engaged with church and family. In short, his busyness hasn’t turned him into a bear.

Despite all these right and good things, a horrible setback still occurred. Jared had the desire to succeed, but he simply couldn’t finish on time. Was it a deficit in preparation? Distraction? Inexperience? Bad luck? Probably a combination of all four. Living in a home with other teenagers, hosting multiple guests in the spring and summer, and being inclined to procrastination probably lent a hand, too.

If only we could have foreseen Jared’s crunch at the end! Perhaps we would have limited our house guests. If only he could have known his microphones would perform poorly, the wrinkles in his green screen ruin his background, his spaceship take extra days to complete.

If only, if only, if only. The wishes that follow these words threaten to chain us to our failures. Although we must embrace grief in order to achieve closure, fixating on the past prevents healing. These things exist behind us now, far outside our control. We must examine our past with acceptance, not anguish, in order to achieve healthy growth.

Replacing “if only” with “what if” moves us toward progress, but only slightly. “What if I had stayed up two hours later? What if I had purchased a better costume?” These questions invite us to fabricate outcomes based on events we can no longer change.

Better still, may we meditate upon the gifts our experience has provided. Because of our failure or disappointment, we now have/know/feel …. what?

Jared has a fantastic astronaut costume and a sweet yellow cape. He knows how to protect a production studio (aka tin-roofed shop) from the sound-destroying influence of heavy rain. He understands the value of margin when building a schedule or plan. He realizes how deeply his family and friends care. Perhaps he’s gained a hint of his next career move, his preferred educational pursuit, his hidden talents or faults.

However, naming the gifts of our failures only activates half their power. Next comes a commitment to action. Will we pick up the pieces of our failed project, tossing them away in disgust? Will we complete it with gritted teeth - or with a good-natured grin? 

Will we speak of our failure? Will we thank those who cared?

Whatever Jared chooses, whatever we choose when we fail, too, let us only sit still for a few moments. Taking great risk implies we are people of action. Though we need not “prove” ourselves with immediate success, we must find an active outlet – even if that outlet is a trip to the woods.

Failure. Success. Both offer gifts that can enrich us. We must do the work to identify these gifts, and we must do the work to respond. But God, ever true to His Word, does the providing. He provides strength for the hard work, strength for the journey, and companionship and insight along the way. He promises to live in us and with us as we walk toward excellence through both failure, success, and the long paths in between.

Congratulations, Jared, for traveling so well. Blessings to you as your journey goes on. You are complete. You are enough. You are loved.

Even youths grow tired and weary,
    and young men stumble and fall;
but those who hope in the Lord
    will renew their strength.
They will soar on wings like eagles;
    they will run and not grow weary,
    they will walk and not be faint.

Isaiah 40:30-31