Yesterday I did something that I can’t remember having done (to my shame) in the nearly eight years I’ve been a mother—I took my daughter out for dinner and shopping.

Now before you brand me the world’s worst mother, let me say a few things in my defense. I spend a tremendous amount of time with my children, homeschooled my daughter for two years, and even let her sneak into my bed while my husband’s out of town. But as far as dedicated, one-on-one time, I have to admit to being pretty delinquent.

I think it’s a combination of her being the oldest, the most competent, and quite frankly a girl--in a world where the squeaky wheel gets the grease, her brothers definitely get my attention. But when she “squeaks,” my first response is usually to want her to buck up, dig deep, and be a strong woman. At seven.

I suppose it’s also that I never was much of a girly girl myself, so I hadn’t thought to incorporate something like diner and shopping into our relationship. (For me, shopping carries overtones of Inquisitional torture. Forget the rack or burning at the stake, simply put me in a strip mall, with limited funds, and the need to find the perfect dress for a wedding. Yeah, the Spanish had no idea.)

But over the last few weeks, I began to notice that I was saying “no” to her more often than “yes.”

Her: Mommy, can we bake cookies?
Me:  Not right now, honey… Mommy’s busy.
Her: Well, then can we watch a movie together?
Me:  Tonight’s a school night.
Her: What about a craft?
Me: It would be too messy.

Ad infinitum. 

So with daddy out of town (and little brother with him), I decided I needed to finally make a date with my daughter. When I told her my plans, she melted and grinned from ear to ear in disbelief at her good fortune. I would have enjoyed it more if I hadn’t felt so guilty that it took so little to make her that happy.

So after school yesterday, we picked out our outfits, did our hair in hot rollers, and pulled out the Lip Smackers. Once we dropped littlest brother of at a friend’s house, we were on our way. Now, I completely left the agenda and restaurant choice up to her, but to be honest, I did try to guide her to something a little more elegant than McDonalds. After significant discussion about the pros and cons of fast food, dine-in restaurants, and buffets, she solved our dilemma with one question: “Where can I get a hot dog?”

We ended up at Steak ‘n  Shake.

This wasn’t what I had in mind. I’d have preferred someplace where I could have at least entertained the thought of a nutritionally balanced meal—if not for her, for myself. I wouldn’t call myself a whole foods freak, but after a breakfast of greek yogurt, fresh mango, and tea; a lunch of European multi-grain bread slathered in homemade hummus, cantaloupe, and a handful of raw almonds, my psyche wasn't exactly prepared for a double steak burger with a side of fries. But this was her choice. So we went.

Once we got there, she ended up picking the macaroni and cheese plate, baked beans and a chocolate-chip cookie dough milkshake. I resigned myself to a burger, arguing to my thighs and stomach that they shouldn’t hold it against me because I was doing it for the right reasons. I also promised them that I would feel guilty the whole time.

But the funny thing is that I didn’t.

I don’t know exactly when it happened, the moment when I let go of my food insecurities. Maybe it was when she asked me to help her with number #2 of the crossword puzzle on her place mat. (“What do you use to carry water and sand at the beach?—Mommy, I can’t figure it out--the word “pail” doesn’t fit. The word has to have a “U” for the second letter.) Or maybe it was when the waitress brought our food and she dove into her (obviously boxed) macaroni and cheese, declaring it the best thing she had ever tasted (“Oh, Mommy, you have to taste this *reaching across the table to put a forkful up to my mouth*—it’s just sooooo good!”)

But somewhere along the way, I decided to put aside my nutritional angst and receive that burger and fries with thanksgiving. Not because they were healthy for me, but because they enabled me to be with her. All that salt and fat and carbs—even those sips that I stole from her milkshake—allowed me to sit and experience joy with her. And in those moments, I finally understood how a simple prayer of thanksgiving can sanctify any food. Because although it wasn't what I would have chosen, it was good for me. And it tasted good too--like love and joy and blessing.  So I savored each bite the same way she savored her institutional mac and cheese.

Because it was just sooooo good.

The last few months have highlighted a supposedly growing trend among young Christians who are fed up with Christianity as they know it— apparently they don’t want cultural battles; they want peace. They don’t want religion; they want Jesus. They don’t want Church, they want community. And while there is still the reasonable debate as to whether this new-found angst actually signals something distinct or is simply the result of ours being the first generation wired for sound without having to work within the confines of the establishment, this much is obvious: young people don’t want the Christianity of their parents.

So when I ran across the following in the preface of John Stott’s Basic Christianity, it sounded eerily familiar.

“‘Hostile to the church, friendly to Jesus Christ.’ These words describe large numbers of people, especially young people, today.

They are opposed to anything which savors of institutionalism.  They detest the establishment and its entrenched privileges.  And they reject the church—not without some justification—because they regard it as impossibly corrupted by such evils.

Yet what they have rejected is the contemporary church, not Jesus Christ himself. It is precisely because they see a contradiction between the founder of Christianity and the current state of the church he founded that they are so critical and aloof. The person and teaching of Jesus have not lost their appeal, however. For one thing, he was himself an anti-establishment figure, and some of his words had revolutionary overtones. His ideals appear to have been incorruptible. He breathed love and peace wherever he went. And for another thing, he invariably practiced what he preached.

But was he true?

An appreciable number of people throughout the world are still brought up in Christian homes in which the truth of Christ and of Christianity is assumed. But when their critical faculties develop and they begin to think for themselves, they find it easier to discard the religion of their childhood than make the effort to investigate its credentials. [emphasis added]

As true (and timeless) as Stott’s observations are about the relationship between young people and the church, what struck me more was the fact that he wrote them first in 1958--the generation of our grandparents—and then reissued them in 1971--the generation of our parents.

Trust me, I’m not dismissing the concerns of millennials, just trying to offer a bit of historical perspective and the caution that maybe we’re not as special as we think we are. Maybe we’re not the first generation to have metaphysical angst and maybe, just maybe, the very people we are fighting against have a bit more perspective than we think they do.

I didn’t have a mother’s day post this last week because like most mothers I was busy… mothering. The funny thing about this holiday—especially when you have young children—is that you really don’t get a break. The funnier thing is that you can’t really imagine taking one.

Because mothering is the kind of work you celebrate by actually doing it.

It took me a while to figure this out, but I don’t think I’m alone in this. On Sunday, after I had fed, dressed, and dragged three children to church--only to have one of them wildly run down the hallway screaming “NOOOOO!!!!” as I tried to deposit him in the nursery--I found myself talking with two friends who are also mothers of young children.  I asked what they had planned for the day and the first said she was hoping that the ground beef had thawed out because she was going home to make dinner; the other had a sick husband and child, was juggling two other children, and trying to figure out how to attend a family funeral over two hours away.

But no on seemed to care. None of us seemed put out that our Mother’s Day was spent mothering.

Don’t get me wrong—we were all tired. We would have loved to have had breakfast in bed, a spa retreat, or even the day to ourselves. But somewhere on the road to becoming the mothers we were, we had learned something. As wonderful as those things are, they really aren’t the point. You don’t mother to be praised, you don’t mother to be rewarded, you don’t mother for the recognition. You mother because you love.

But unlike common wisdom, this love doesn’t magically appear when you hold your first child. No, becoming a mother that loves happens incrementally, it happens through the sleepless nights, the temper tantrums (yours and theirs), and shared joys. It happens through the daily grind, from changing out winter wardrobes for spring, and extracting chewing gum from baby-fine hair. And through it all, motherhood changes you—in the sacrifices, you become braver and in the loving, you become kinder.

My sister-in-law and I were talking about this a couple days ago—we’ve been friends since college, friends before husbands, friends before children. So we’ve seen a lot of changes in each others lives, and we definitively, undeniably agreed that being a mother has been the most excruciating, most productive spiritual exercise either of us had ever experienced.

I think it's because mothering forces you to recognize things about yourself that you’d rather not have known: your helplessness, your inconsistency, you selfishness. All in one typical day, you discover that you can't make the fever break, you can’t make this child obey you, you are feeding them chicken nuggets while reading the blog post telling you how terrible chicken nuggets are, and you routinely think about all the things you’d rather be doing than cleaning up poop.

And in these moments, you have to cry out for something bigger and better than your own ability to be a “good’ mother. You have to cry out to Him. You have to find His strength and His patience and His love. You have to have His courage and His determination in order to parent like He does.

And that is what changes you. He changes you. He uses this temporary relationship with your children to produce eternal and lasting joy. He uses it to make us like Himself. So that in the end, I don’t know if I can guarantee my children will be better people because of my mothering. But I do know this—mothering them has made me a better one.

One year ago this month, I began entertaining the idea of blogging. My first post didn’t see the light of day until July, but the months leading up to that nerve-wracking moment were full of stops and starts, doubt mixed with dreams. I set up an account. I checked books out of the library (yes, even Blogging for Dummies) and I researched all the possible ways that I could fall flat on my face. I wrote and re-wrote content while whining to my husband about my insecurities. And until I actually clicked “publish live,” I took a great deal of comfort in knowing that I could always turn back.

I don’t like to think of myself as having a fear of commitment; let’s just say that I like to keep my options open. I like to play it safe. I like to act with… discernment. Still, being the complicated creature that I am, even I know that my “wisdom” often masks private fears and allows me to avoid things that make me uncomfortable.

One way this has expressed itself at SAL is that I have purposefully chosen a tone that is uplifting, reflective, and non-controversial. In a world where a lot of blogs (even Christian ones) are driven by debate and real-time responses, I wanted to hollow out a different kind of space. A place of thoughtful reflection, a place of quiet, a place where light could gently filter through the shadows.

And yet, if I am honest with myself, there was another reason that I took this approach as well.

Those of you who have known me for any length of time know that I can quickly become opinionated, obnoxious, and aggressive with my views. (Meaning, mine should be yours.) It has taken me a long time to understand this about myself and a much longer time to learn how to let the Spirit control my responses. So when I began to think about blogging, one of my first concerns was whether it would unleash the beast in me and lead straight back to that tenser, angrier version of myself.

Another thing that I was worried about (and something that took me equally long to figure out in my life) is that people don’t generally like it when you're opinionated. So if you do have strong views and vocalize them as strongly, you are essentially taking a red marker to your shirt and drawing a bulls-eye on it. These fears—both of my own tendencies and whether people would accept my opinions—have led me to want to avoid controversy altogether. In life and on the blog. And so, except for a few notable exceptions, that’s what I’ve done.

But I’ve realized something about this last year; I’ve realized that I’ve been practicing abstinence instead of temperance--I’ve been walking in fear instead of maturity. And as a result, by restricting myself to certain topics, I have also lost the opportunity to speak to many things that I observe and feel passionately about. Many things that you feel passionately about as well. Because in the end that’s what makes something controversial--not the issue itself, but how it touches our lives.

I also forgot that our greatest weaknesses are often our greatest strengths. So that while my personality can tend toward outspokenness, it is this same outspokenness that enables me to speak with conviction and passion about the very things that so many of us are struggling through.

So I’ve decided to stop being afraid. And so you shouldn't be surprised if you periodically see more postings on controversial subjects. But because I know that many of you don’t come here for that kind writing, I'll be sure to flag them under the heading "My Take." Feel free to skip those posts with my blessing. But if you do care to engage them, also know that I have no plans to change my fundamental approach here at SAL. Wisdom still dictates that this be a place of warmth and welcome, only now with perhaps a bit more depth and nuance.

Because I’m also learning something else: in the end, avoiding certain topics doesn’t make for mature friendship--wrestling through them together does. And so that’s what I hope we can do—with large doses of grace, sufficient love, and the confidence that He is able to guide us through even the most difficult conversations.

Well, the wedding season has begun. Already I’ve gotten three invitations, attended one, and listened via webcast to another. (Who knew, right?)

I have to admit to having a funny relationship with weddings. Growing up, they were a significant part of my extended family--my grandfather was a minister, my aunt made wedding cakes and even perfected the art of the cheesecake wedding cake; my brother's been a wedding photographer; and not to be outdone, my grandmother ran a business selling engraved wedding invitations. To this day, she looks askance at those invitations (so-called) that are the product of desktop publishing and laser printers. (If I remember correctly, she had ours chiseled out of marble.) So weddings--and the proper execution of--have been a part of my life for a long time. Still as much as I love the satin and seasonal flowers and string quartets, I have a hard time sitting quietly through the ceremony.

It takes everything in me to not jump up and scream at the top of my lungs, “You have no idea what you’re doing!”

I’m a great advocate of marriage (see here and here) but married life holds a lot of surprises. It’s much harder than it looks, some days it’s more struggle than gift, and just like war, no amount of boot camp can properly prepare you for what happens in the field. And that’s a good thing, because if we really knew what we were getting in to, few of us would. At the same time, I also find myself quietly smiling when a bride or groom says things like “Today I marry my best friend.” And again, all I can think--this time with a gentle confidence—is, “You have no idea.”

On my wedding day, I thought I was marrying my best friend. And in one sense, I did. There was no one I liked spending time with more, there was no one I had invested so much emotion in, and there was no one who knew me as well as he did. But when I look back on that friendship--as it was the day that we gave our vows to each other--it seems paltry and immature compared to the friendship that we have now. True, nearly eleven years ago, I married my best friend.

But today we are better best friends.

And it’s the kind of friendship that can only be gained through laundry and bills and moving boxes. It’s the kind of friendship that is strengthened by arguments and flourishes in reconciliation. A friendship says I still love you when you mess up—and better yet, I still like you. And ultimately it’s the kind of friendship that only comes from committing to live life together.

Fifty years from now, I’ll probably look back on my thirty-something self and laugh at even my current naïveté. Because by the time we reach that milestone, by the time we have grown old together, maybe I will have finally learned that even the best is yet to be. So to myself and all my newly and soon-to-be married friends, I have just this word of advice: you have no idea what you’re getting into.

Hallelujah, you have no idea.

Blogging is a fairly recent form of expression--the pacing, the topics, and the real-time interaction present writers with distinct challenges and temptations. Especially if you're one who is prone to have an unhealthy relationship with your stats. *whistling nonchalantly to herself while avoiding eye contact* Thankfully though, wisdom is timeless. And this wisdom is precisely what I needed to remember today. Thank you Brother John!  (And thank you to Tony Reinke for compiling it for us.)

15 Tips on Blogging from John Newton

  "A ship is safe in harbor, but that's not what ships are for." --William Shedd

Yesterday my youngest son turned 3.

Our Peter has lived these last three years the same way he came into the world--bold, loud, and larger than life. He’s the family clown willing to do anything for a laugh. He refuses to let his age or size leave him out of what the rest of us are doing.  And at three, he already knows two-column addition… as long as the answer is always “69”.

Peter: Mommy, let’s do numbers.
Mommy: Okay, Peter, what is 5+64?
Peter: 69!
Mommy: Good! What is 33+36?
Peter: 69!
Mommy: What is 27+42?
Peter: 69!

I have to admit, it’s pretty rewarding for everyone involved.

And while these last three years have often been tumultuous for us as a family, our Peter has always been a source of joy and comfort. Even in those moments of colic and RSV, he has forced us to take our attention away from external pressures and focus on what really mattered. And in these last three years, he’s stolen my heart just like his older brother did.

There’s a bond between mothers and sons that’s hard to codify. The closest I can get is the memory of breaking down and crying the day after my first son was born nearly six years ago. Blame it on hormones if you like, but I felt a distinct desolation at looking down into those blue, blue eyes and realizing that one day he would love another woman more than he loved me.

Then there’s what happened just a couple days before Peter’s birthday. A close friend got news that her son’s platoon serving in Afghanistan had just lost two guys--her son was okay, but he lost two strong, brave friends. And two mothers lost their strong, brave sons. When I initially heard, my heart was heavy for them but it completely broke in two when Peter came rushing into the kitchen a few moments later to retrieve a toy car he and his brother wanted to play with. In the moments that followed, all I could do was stand my kitchen bawling and thinking how only twenty-odd years earlier those sons had probably been doing the same thing.

People often say that if women ruled the world there would be fewer wars. That somehow our love for our families and our ability to talk through a problem would supersede the testosterone-laden response of military involvement. Apparently those people didn’t go through junior high. But I think this sentiment misses something else as well.

Women already rule the world.

We rule the world every time we love and correct our children. We rule the world every day as we guide them to who they will one day become. We rule the world when we teach them to love others and fight to protect the weak. We rule the world right from inside our own walls. And that’s why despite the politics and the questions surrounding this current war—trust me, I have plenty—I’m grateful for these kinds of moms. I’m grateful for mothers who have raised their boys, not to go looking for a fight, but to have the courage and fortitude to stand their ground when the fight comes. Mothers who have raised their boys to serve and not simply to be served. Mothers who have raised their boys to sacrifice for the good of others. Even if that means losing themselves in the process.

I don’t know what God has planned for my boys— at a three-year-old birthday party, I like to imagine a bright, pain-free future full of joy and dreams fulfilled.  But realistically, it’s probably not going to be that way. Probably throughout their lives there will be many times that a sword will pierce my heart too. Especially if I’ve done my job well. Because if by God’s grace, these boys become strong, good men, they will chose to sacrifice themselves--both in little and great ways--for the benefit of those around them. They will stand up for the weak and suffer because of it. And they will serve others, not because they are forced to, but because they understand that this is what real men do.

And then, if our boys grow up to be men like that, we will have changed the world.

There are seasons in life where you learn to just hang on for the ride. My family’s in one of them now.

For several weeks, we’ve been in the middle of preparing for an interstate move (with husband there and me here), trying to find the “perfect” house (which apparently doesn’t exist), finishing all the end of school year activities for two kids, and trying to occasionally write interesting blog posts (although at this point I’d settle for adequate).  And through it all, the one major take away has been learning that human beings were not intended to subsist on six hours of sleep a night, diet coke, and chocolate.

I confess I'm pretty much an idealist. In my world, if I want something badly enough, if I work hard enough, and if I just commit to making sure it happens, it will. Food, sleep, rest? What are those? They’re simply props for the weak. And yet, what I’m discovering--once again even after several decades on this planet--is my own weakness. I’m learning about my inability to do it all, how quickly stress affects every part of me and my tendency to be really mean when I’m overwhelmed.

But thankfully, this week I re-learned something even more important.

This last Sunday--after wrestling three kids into dress clothes (which included discovering that child #2 cheekily grew out of ALL his pants overnight), brushing teeth, combing hair, and screaming at them to get out the door so we wouldn’t be late (which we were)-- I finally sat down in church. Only to be confronted about thirty minutes later with this verse:

“Six days you shall work, but on the seventh day you shall rest. In plowing time and in harvest you shall rest.”

Our pastor didn’t spend a lot of time on it; but the Spirit did. "Hannah, even in plowing and harvest, you need rest. Even in the busiest times of life—the times that would make the most sense for you to keep working—you must rest."

Many of us probably grew up acknowledging Sunday as “the Lord’s Day” but I’m not so sure that an equal number of us grew up with the idea of Sabbath rest. We were not under such law. We were “free” in Christ. But unlike a lot of people think, Sabbath isn’t rooted in archaic blue laws or spiritual legalism. It’s rooted in trust and faith. Because when you take a Sabbath, when you take time to rest, you express your faith in a God who works for you so you don’t have to. And you show that you trust Him enough to stop. Stop all the rushing. Stop all the worry. Stop all the chaos.

And you allow tomorrow take care of tomorrow so that you can do what you need to do most—nothing.

So that’s what we did this last Sunday after coming home from church. Despite having a messy house (no, I mean a disastrously messy house) and needing to have it cleaned by 3:00 the next day, my kids and I took the day off. McDonalds, books, long naps, a walk around town--hey, I even got crazy and put up a tent in the middle of the living room floor just for the fun of it. All in an effort to teach them and myself that God expects us to relax and rest in Him. I want them not only to see a mommy who is driven to reach her goals, but a mommy who trusts Jesus enough to let Him be the One to get her there.

Because ultimately the stakes are that high. While Sabbath is about physical recuperation, it’s more than that. Sabbath is a lifestyle. Sabbath is Gospel. It’s a view of the world that says I don’t have to work because Christ already did. I don’t have to fret and fuss and get my righteousness in order, because Christ already did. I can rest. His yoke is easy and His burden is light.

And just so we won’t forget that, God reminds us once every seven days. Because in some sense too, Sabbath is practice--practice for that long-awaited, glorious day when there is no more work, no more tears, no more sighing. And so we learn to rest in Him today so that one day, we can rest in Him for all eternity.

Here's some helpful advice for those moments when you feel like blowing your top and screaming at a person you disagree with. Remember...

"...there are no ordinary people. You have never talked to a mere mortal. Nations, cultures, arts, civilization—these are mortal, and their life is to ours as the life of a gnat. But it is immortals whom we joke with, work with, marry, snub, and exploit—immortal horrors or everlasting splendours. This does not mean that we are to be perpetually solemn. We must play. But our merriment must be of that kind (and it is, in fact, the merriest kind) which exists between people who have, from the outset, taken each other seriously--no flippancy, no superiority, no presumption. And our charity must be a real and costly love, with deep feeling for the sins in spite of which we love the sinner--no mere tolerance or indulgence which parodies love as flippancy parodies merriment... your neighbour is the holiest object presented to your senses. If he is your Christian neighbour he is holy in almost the same way, for in him also Christ vere latitat—the glorifier and the glorified, Glory Himself, is truly hidden."

C.S. Lewis, The Weight of Glory

In church yesterday, our pastor was teaching through Exodus 33 and 34.  Towards the end of his sermon, he stopped on Exodus 34:6-7 where God reveals His glory to Moses and describes the kind of God He is. The verses read this way:

The Lord passed before him and proclaimed, “The Lord, the Lord, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness, keeping steadfast love for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, but who will by no means clear the guilty.

Our pastor shared that this particular description of God, sometimes even the exact phrasing, is one of the most repeated texts in the body of Scripture. It’s found in as disparate places as the Psalms and the Epistle to the Romans. As an aside, he challenged us to see how many other places we could find it.

So as he was speaking, the wheels started turning. My brain does that sometimes – just starts moving entirely of it’s own accord and I’ve learned that I pretty much have  just hang for the ride until it’s decided it’s found what it’s looking for.  (I suppose having admitted this, I should cut my daughter some slack when she responds to me with that same starry-eyed look and says, “I’m sorry Mommy--I just keep getting distracted!”) Anyway, this phrase in Exodus echoed something for me yesterday. I could sense it in the back of my mind… and yes, it was coming… if I pause long enough….. and…. There! I had it.

All those attributes strung side by side--like pearls on a necklace--reminded me of I Corinthians 13.

Now probably like you, I am no stranger to the “Love Chapter” as we call it. But yesterday, for first time in my life, with Exodus 34:6-7 in one hand and I Corinthians 13 in the other, I finally saw it for what it was.  For too long I had been reading it simply as a standard to be lived, an expectation of how I should relate to other people; and all along I had been missing that it could only be that because it describes how God already loves us. Of how He loves me. And how He loves you.

So with apologies to the ESV, here’s something of what Moses heard when God passed by:


God is patient and kind;

He does not envy or boast;
He is not arrogant or rude.
He does not insist on His own way;
He is not irritable or resentful
He does not rejoice at wrongdoing
He rejoices with the truth.
Your God bears all things.
                         Believes all things,    
                                    Hopes all things
                                                Endures all things.
And He never ends.


Not bad for a Sunday morning. Not bad at all.