Sowing

I call my mother every day.  Yes.  I do.  Sometimes we chat for five seconds...five minutes...an hour.  I just love my mom.  When my mother doesn't hear from me for a couple of days, she gets worried.  She isn't worried that I've fallen off a cliff or anything.  She's just worried that I'm vacationing in the depths of despair.

She feels she is paranoid, but I'll let you all in on a little secret.  90% of the time when I get an "Are you OK?  I'm sorry for being paranoid" email from my mom, I am not OK.  Silence isn't always a tell for me, but most of the time it is.

I say this because although I've had a lot of legitimate excuses and hindrances from blogging this summer, the reality of the fact is that they aren't the main reason I've been so quiet.  I'm just not OK.

I've been on a semi-sabbatical all summer, supposedly resting but in reality spinning my wheels and feeling purposeless. I've struggled to put my finger on why I feel so creatively constipated, but can't...which frustrates me.  As a writer I feel it necessary to identify and own everything going on inside myself.  I don't care so much about fixing it, just naming it.  The ambiguity of my emotional state makes me restless.

Somehow I have a sneaking suspicion that much of this has to do with not going to Uganda this spring.  Until I was without it, I never appreciated the dramatic refueling effect those regular trips had on my soul.  What I am struggling with is disconnect within myself.  And I can't help but believe that prolonged disconnect with the people and place of my heart and the tangible impact of the work I do has caused me to wither up a bit and wilt, like a cut flower without water. 

This cut off feeling becomes even more complex when I hear less than thrilling reports about how some of my children are behaving these days.  It seems many of my babies are now young adults and I am watching some of my precious jewels cheapen themselves and others.  A handful of them are making poor choices.  Others just aren't making great choices.  They're acting like they're well...15 or something! 

At the age of 26, I feel too young to be parenting adolescents.  I've only just recovered from it myself.  Yet somehow I expect so much more from them.  The mistakes I made are so fresh in my mind and I can't bear for any of them to walk down destructive paths.  I want to reach across the ocean and preserve them.  But I can't.


There is an exhaustion in it.  Of being so far away.  Of loving them so much.  Of experiencing their messes and being faithful through the resulting trails.   I simply cannot contain them.  It is impossible to control them.  I have so much I want to convey, but feel trapped by language, culture, and distance.  My limits are obvious.  I have a fear for what will become of my kids.  I do not worry about their success or failure.  I worry mostly about failing them.  There are some days it becomes so heavy that I want nothing more than to vanish like a vapor into thin air.

Then several days ago, when I had the radio turned up in the background of our home just to tune out my depressed brain, God dropped a reminder into my world like a ration box on the end of a parachute.  I wasn't paying much mind to this preacher on the air, reaping...sowing...something or other..., but when he started discussing those who pour into children, I sat down to listen.  I don't know who the man was or what his text even was, but God sent a little flutter of hope through the waves to me with "those who sow into the lives of children have the longest to wait before they reap."


It was as if all my joints unfolded and I breathed the first full breath I'd inhaled in weeks.  He continued to talk, but all I needed was that one pure sentence.

"Those who sow into the lives of children have the longest to wait before they reap."

 

I've been avoiding this space, my words, my thoughts because my thoughts said that I was failing somehow.  I was failing my children.  I was failing those who trusted me to love them.  As if somehow the stories of their lives are finished at 15.  Here I stand in the middle of a battle thinking it is the end.  I lost hope in who God is because I was hoping in myself. 

The seasons can feel long in the life of a child.  Those who are wise look to God and never stop looking for the fruit.  Sometimes it takes time to come, but when it does, it's sweetness can't be compared.

I don't think I've fully dealt with whatever demons are pressing in on me, but I've stopped wanting to vanish and I've determined that I need to stop avoiding.  I may feel limited in what I am able to accomplish now for my children, but I will do what God has placed in my power.  And until I can be with them I will pray, pray, pray, never underestimating the value God places on the quiet, fervent words cast earnestly upon Him for others.

I continue to sow my seeds and wait the way every mother must do.  I wait loving them no matter what they may do or not do, holding out hope for them even if every other soul should feel it a lost cause.  This is, after all, what mommies do.  It is what my mother did for me in all the years I gave her such trouble and torment.  I sow and sow and sow and sow and beg the Lord to water so that in time I can see the harvest of grace spring up in their lives just as I need it to spring up in my own.

Yard Sale Time!

It happens at the end of almost every summer, the GIANT yard sale for Ranch on Jesus.  As I wrote about last year, this yard sale is how I began my entire ministry with Ranch.  It was over six years ago now, but the folks at my home church, Carriage Lane Presbyterian in Peachtree City, GA are still going strong!  This year's enormous (it fills the fellowship hall and several classrooms) sale will be held:

Friday, August 13 from 7am-2pm

and

Saturday, August 14 from 7am-1pm

at

Carriage Lane Presbyterian Church off of Hwy 54 in Peachtree City, GA

All proceeds from the sale benefit the children at Ranch on Jesus!  If you're in the Atlanta area and would like to donate items to the sale, we'll be receiving donations beginning this Monday, the 9th from 8 am to 8pm.  Once you're at the church signs should direct you to drop off points.  All donations are tax deductible.  You declare the value of your goods and may request a letter for that purpose.

Past sales have raised upwards of $8,000!  Please, please, please be in prayer for this special event.  Summer is a dry financial time for most ministries and proceeds from the yard sale are greatly needed to get our Ranch kids resettled in school and fed for September.

I am a little sad as Scott and I will NOT be attending this year's sale.  Our family will be on VACATION.  Yes, I can hardly believe it myself, but we'll be in Michigan that week resting together (and probably still working a little bit.)   Although I'm a little disappointed to miss out on all the action, I know our family and friends at CLPC will see that this year's sale is executed as marvelously as it has been in past years. 

I'll make sure my sis takes photos so I can update you all after the big event!