Pearl

Yesterday was a very important day for me - I had to see my inaugural client. Yes, I actually got to the point in my program where I get to counsel living, breathing people who are dealing with life.

I was so excited and nervous at the same time; I felt as though there was a load of responsibility on my shoulders, but at the same time it felt it belonged. It felt like the load that I had been expecting and hoping for the past few years as I have taken classes. It all felt right.

Before I left the house yesterday morning, I was trying to calm the butterflies fighting for attention in my belly. I happened to glance at my pearl ring and realized that it was just what I needed to help me.

My pearl ring is very special to me. I got it a couple of years ago for Christmas, and it was actually something that I had been wanting for awhile. I am not much of a jewelry adorner (except for my multitude of feather earrings :)) but I have always been drawn to pearl jewelry.

As cheesy as it sounds, it is because my name means "pearl".

Growing up, I always hated my name. I longed to be called by something cute and feminine - Nicki or Tiffany or Kelly Kapowski - something like that. There isn't a lot of room for cuteness or femininity in Gretchen.

But my mom had prayed for one more baby, a little girl that she could name Gretchen who would look cute in braids. She never even told my dad what they were naming me until after I was born - it was her little secret. Maybe she was afraid someone would try to talk her out of it? :)

I wore a lot of braids growing up.

I didn't really start to embrace my "Gretchen-osity" until I was in my early 20's. It was then that I really latched onto the meaning of my name. Pearl. That which starts as an irritant invading an oyster's shell, becomes a lovely pearl. At that time in my life, I was trying to define who I was and why I was. Embracing my name meaning was a part of that, as it made me feel that if I could learn to welcome the irritants of life, they would work me into something beautiful......eventually.

It was for that very reason that when we were looking at baby names, I was dead set on finding names that meant something. We decided on Finn not only because we love the name, but also because it means small, fair soldier. I remember that when we first saw his ultrasound picture and decided he would be Finn, Matt said, "David was a small soldier too!". Every time I would get anxious about his well-being in my ever-expanding belly, I would tell myself, "No! He is a soldier, a fighter; he is just fine!"

So anyway, I like pearls. When I see a pearl, it reminds me that I am still being made beautiful.

As I was gearing up for my client session, I would touch my pearl ring and remember who I am and that I am called to do this very thing: listen, help, encourage.

There's a certain peace that comes in knowing I am doing what I am meant to do.

O The Blood

Gosh, it feels like forever since I have written here. Two weeks ago was a crazy busy week trying to fit things in and get ready for Minneapolis and Dave Barnes. This past week we have all been sick, sick, sick and blogging has been near the bottom of my to-do list. And at the top? Keep breathing, take more meds, drink more water.

But I feel compelled to write today. I was driving home from church today and was listening to one of my favorite new worship songs: "O The Blood". I have been wanting Matt to do this song on a Sunday for a couple months now, and last week he finally obliged :). There is just something about this song, an anointing, that makes me cry almost every time that I hear it. So today, as I am shamelessly driving and sickly singing and ugly crying to this song, I began to wonder about how the lyrics might sound to someone who did not grow up in church.

After all, to those who aren't familiar with "church lingo" or know nothing of Christ's sacrifice, singing about blood(?) might seem a little.............strange.

O the blood, crimson love
Price of life's demand
Shameful sin, placed on Him
The hope of every man


O the blood of Jesus washes me
O the blood of Jesus shed for me
What a sacrifice, that saved my life
Yes the blood, it is my victory


Savior Son, Holy One
Slain so I can live 
See the Lamb, the Great I Am
Who takes away my sin


O the blood of the Lamb
O the blood of the Lamb
O the blood of the Lamb
The precious blood of the Lamb
What a sacrifice, that saved my life
Yes the blood, it is my victory


O what love, no greater love
Grace, how can it be
That in my sin, yes even then
He shed His blood for me

I talk a lot about God on this blog, because this blog represents my life and God is the center of my life. The characteristic I am most attracted to writing about God is His incredible love. To me, it is His most defining characteristic, the driving force behind everything else.

When I think about explaining the lyrics of this song to someone who did not grow up in church, I hope that what they would most sense would be God's abiding and infinite love. However, to be brutally honest, I don't have a lot of experience talking through my faith with those who aren't Christians. Since I rededicated my life to God when I was 14, I have dwelled in a large, comfy bubble of Christian family and friends. In high school, my best friends were my youth group and the Christian group at school. In college, a Christian university, the vast majority of my friends - except for a few, special friends I met while serving at Old Spag - were Christians. Arkansas? All friends I met while working with Chi Alpha, a Christian ministry. Alaska? All friends I met at church.

For that reason, I have never really had to share my faith. It was already shared. A couple of meager attempts that I made as a self-righteous teenager resulted in a wounded relationship with my brother and  feeling pretty puffed up about the whole situation. I wish I could take that back.

All of that to say, looking through those lyrics and singing them whole-heartedly, I know what they mean to me. I feel the aching love course through my bones with each word.

But how do I explain the blood? How do I share the meaning of the cross and sacrifice that Jesus made for us? How do I express the pull of my heart, the peace, the power, the love?

I don't know.

Maybe it will come in time. When it does, I pray that the self-righteousness of my high school years has been completely stripped away so that all that meets the person I am speaking with is the pure, unbridled love of God.

Until I can explain myself better, I guess this blog is the best source I have for expressing my faith.

More than anything, I just want people to know that God loves them. God loves them enough to send His Son to die in their place so that they could live with Him in heaven forever. Even in the utter depths of our human uglies, God loves us all enough to do whatever needed to bring us to Himself.

Maybe its best to keep it simple.

Ungraceful Teetering

I can't say this with 100% certainty, but I think that everyone has an issue or two (or three, four, five) that they seem to deal with over and over again. Try as we might, there are some inner battles that we continue to wage year after year.

Anger. Depression. Insecurity. Pride. Lust. Jealousy. I could go on.....

One of these struggles for me is anxiety, which I have talked about through this forum many times. Writing about it helps me to keep my wits about me and helps me to focus on what really matters: God, His plan, and His many blessings to me.

I was reading this article earlier today about anxiety and I found myself identifying with the author more than I would have liked. I, too, have dealt with anxiety on and off throughout my life.

I remember when I was 9 years old and we had just moved into a new house after my parent's divorce. For the first time, my bedroom was upstairs, away from the action on the main floor. Kiki's room was right across the hall, but as she is 7 years older than me, we didn't exactly go to bed at the same time. Once I was "put to bed", I remember that I would lie awake and wonder what I would do if our house caught on fire and I was stuck all by myself upstairs, forgotten, with no one to hear me. I pictured myself tying all of my sheets together to fashion a rope to reach the ground. I envisioned trying to jump from my window and receiving broken bones in the process. There were even times when my dramatic mind would get carried away and I wondered if someone in my family might even start the fire and leave me alone. Heavy stuff for a 9 year old.

Another example that remains clear in my memory is from when I was in high school. We had moved again, across town. My mom had since remarried and she and my stepdad, like most couples, had frequent date nights. If they would not be home at the time they said they would, I would sit at the front window and stare down the street hoping to catch a glimpse of their car. This was before the age of cell phones, so I couldn't reach them that way, however I did call a restaurant once or twice wondering if they were still there or if they had left and how long ago? I would picture these terrible car accidents and police cars pulling into our driveway to deliver the bad news. I would work myself into a tizzy, crying genuine tears and tied up in knots not to be undone until I heard the roar of the garage door.

A vivid imagination does not serve an anxious spirit well.

To this day, my mind can get carried away with the "what ifs" of life. There are certain circumstances that I face from time to time that seem to trigger a greater level of anxiety in my heart and mind.

God keeps bringing me back to this verse:

"Don't be afraid. I've redeemed you. I've called your name. You're mine. When you're in over your head, I'll be there with you. When you're in rough waters, you will not go down. When you're between a rock and a hard place, it won't be a dead end - Because I am God, your personal God. The Holy of Israel, your Savior. I paid a huge price for you...That's how much you mean to me! That's how much I love you! I'd sell off the whole world to get you back, trade creation just for you. So don't be afraid: I'm with you."

Isaiah 43:1-5 (MSG)

The reoccurrence of this issue reminds me of the waves in the ocean: a wave comes, then passes. Then another comes...and passes. And so on. There are times that I feel like I may get sucked under the water when I call on the promise of the verse above: "When you're in over your head, I'll be there with you. When you're in rough waters, you will not go down." These words give me the power and strength that I need in order to learn how to face and ride these waves. And the next time a wave comes, I will be even better at riding it. Pro surfer, baby. Riding the waves will become more natural the more that I do it. 

In dealing with the waves, I have teetered ungracefully from frustration to sadness to surrender. Though I am tempted to recoil in fear from what ails me, I know that it needs to be faced head on. What I fear needs to be dealt with, otherwise it keeps the power and I am a scared little girl in the corner of the room. But "God is strong, and he wants you strong." Ephesians 6:10 (MSG)

So today, I do not shrink back. "But we're not quitters who lose out. Oh, no! We'll stay with it and survive, trusting all the way." Hebrews 10:39 (MSG)

Because I am more than a conqueror in Christ: "But in all these things we overwhelmingly conquer through Him who loved us" Romans 8:37 (MSG)

No more recoiling. I am a fighter and I do not go into battle alone. "For I am the Lord, your God, who takes hold of your right hand and says to you 'Do not fear; I will help you'." Isaiah 41:13 (NIV)

How to Multiply Tears

Regular readers of this blog know that I love to compare the things I am learning by being Finn's mom to the relationship that I have with God.

For example: here - and here - and here. This is going to be one of those.

I wrote once about the delight that I took in my son. He was perfect, he was sweet, he was loving. At the time, I wondered if I would continue to feel that delight in Finn even once he got older and wasn't so easily..........lovable.

As he is delving deeper into that toddler stage and has begun to challenge me in numerous ways, the easy answer to my ponderation above is: yes. I still delight in him. More than I can say really. Although I do get frustrated more often than I did when he was an innocent baby, I actually find that despite that frustration, my delight in him grows every day. I think this is because he is developing more of his personality and I love every piece of it. Yes, even the tough spots. The tough spots just mean that there is some training that needs to be done because he doesn't know any better.

Sometimes, however, it isn't so easy to deal with my frustration or his limit testing. Sometimes my patience hits its ceiling. Sometimes my cool goes up like a puff of smoke.

I have found that when this happens, it only makes it worse for Finn. For example, if he is fussing and whining and crying and my tone of voice is gruff and harsh, it only makes him cry all the harder. This is heartbreaking to see - that I caused my son to cry harder because of my impatient reaction. It amazes me, but sometimes he can even tell that I am frustrated by the way I say, "Stop", or by the look on my face; sometimes these are all that are needed to multiply his tears.

However, when I am able to push past my frustration (easier said than done) and respond to him in love - with soft tones, soothing touches, and infinite patience for his woes - his response to me is beautiful. He calms, he rests, he ceases fighting.

As he was sitting in my lap today I was thinking of this and it hit me: when I act in a wrong way, a way that is prideful, selfish, angry, I sometimes use guilt as an umbrella which to hide under. When I do this, I picture God being angry with me, speaking in gruff, harsh tones to me, maybe even giving me little eye rolls as I try to correct my behavior: "Yeah, nice try, Gretchen. Let's see how long it is this time before you mess up again...tick, tock....".

My mind has tried to mold God to fit an image I have of myself as a parent. Why do I compare God to the worst parts of me when really, He is all of the best parts of me, except a bajillion times magnified? He's the only reason I am loving, or kind, or gracious at all. How small I have made God and how presumptuous to think that although I am able to control myself and offer grace and love to Finn when he is crying at me, that when God hears me crying He turns His face in impatience.

Where I am merciful, God is infinitely moreso. Where I am patient, God's patience knows no end. Where I offer love in the face of a cry, God offers love and healing and rest.

God knows the power that love has. He knows that it can disarm; it can soothe; it can replenish. That is why God always approaches us in love and with love. He knows it does more for our wounded hearts than scolding us ever could. "God told them, 'I've never quit loving you and never will. Expect love, love, and more love!'" Jeremiah 31:3 (MSG).

To be clear, I am not talking about flaunting open rebellion in God's face here. That kind of thing isn't handled in quite the same manner; He has other ways to deal with that bizness.

I am talking about well-intentioned screw ups. I am talking about trying our very best to do the right thing and still never getting it right. I am talking about humanness.  Psalms 103:14 states, "For He Himself knows our frame; He is mindful that we are but dust." (NASB). When I was searching for this verse, I read through the entire psalm. It basically says what I am saying.....only better. David was almost as effective with a pen as he was with a sling - am I right or am I right? Eh? Eh? Or am I right?

"O my soul, bless God. From head to toe, I'll bless his holy name! O my soul, bless God, don't forget a single blessing!

He forgives your sins - every one

He heals your diseases - every one. 

He redeems you from hell - saves your life!

He crowns you with love and mercy - a paradise crown. 

He wraps you in goodness - beauty eternal. 

He renews your youth - you're always young in his presence.

God makes everything come out right; He puts victims back on their feet. 

He showed Moses how he went about his work, opened up his plans to all Israel. 

God is sheer mercy and grace; not easily angered, he's rich in love. 

He doesn't endlessly nag and scold, nor hold grudges forever. 

He doesn't treat us as our sins deserve, nor pay us back in full for our wrongs. 

As high as heaven is over the earth, so strong is his love to those who fear him. 

And as far as sunrise is from sunset, he has separated us from our sins. 

As parents feel for their children, God feels for those who fear him. 

He knows us inside and out, keeps in mind that we're made of mud. 

Men and women don't live very long; like wildflowers they spring up and blossom, 

But a storm snuffs them out just as quickly, leaving nothing to show they were here. 

God's love, though, is ever and always, eternally present to all who fear him. 

Making everything right for them and their children as they follow his Covenant ways

and remember to do whatever he said.

God has set his throne in heaven; he rules over us all. He's the King!

So bless God, you angels, ready and able to fly at his bidding, quick to hear and do what he says. 

Bless God, all you armies of angels, alert to respond to whatever he wills. 

Bless God, all creatures, wherever you are-everthing and everyone made by God. 

And you, O my soul, bless God!"

Psalm 103 (MSG)

He knows that we are human and fragile. In the face of endless screw-ups, He uses love and mercy that know no end. Because He is love and mercy and there is no end to Him. 

Cookie Success of 2012

I have not been shy or negligent in admitting to my supreme lack of baking skills. I can account for that with many excuses, all of them leading up to the simple truth that I simply never learned.

When I shared my last cookie baking experience, the mistake made seemed to have been one of two things:
1) I used "melted" butter rather than "softened" butter
2) I greased the pan when it said not to (whoever heard of NOT greasing the pan??)

Anyway, all of that to say that the other day, I try tried again. I channeled the little engine that could: "I think I can. I think I can. I think I can."

I righted my wrongs. And these were the results:

Suffice it to say, I was pleased. And so was my husband, who has stated on numerous occasions that they are delicious. I know he is an encouraging person, but we are talking NUMEROUS times here!!!

I was so encouraged by this recent outing, that the very next morning I woke up early and baked these:

Blueberry muffins? Oh.....................yes. 

 Thinking about liking it...

You want some, mom? 

Finger lickin' good

Two successes in a row? Maybe I will be a baking housewife yet :). 

Valentiney Ooey Gooey Love

My first real Valentine's Day was the first one that Matt and I spent together in 2008. It was a doosey, too.

He got me flowers, several gifts - all wrapped with white tissue paper and colored with red marker - and he sang me a song he had written for me. We had a heart shaped pizza from Pizza Hut and watched "Across the Universe".

It was delightful - everything that I had longed for while I was waiting and single. Since then, Valentine's Days have still been special. This year was no different; thanks to a couple from church, Matt and I were able to go out for a nice dinner at Spezia's and thanks to my mom for the free baby-sitting, we were able to have a focused conversation without pausing to tear food apart or disinfect surfaces. Best of all, Matt's gift to me was tickets to a Dave Barnes (my FAVORITE!!!) concert in Minneapolis. So, not only will I get Dave Barnes, I will also get Chipotle, good shopping, and time alone with my husband. Perfection!

However, as good as the Valentine's holiday was this year, last night was the most aware I have been in  a long time of how much I love my husband, how blessed we are.

We had been watching my mom's dog, Kody, for the past week. About 9 p.m., Kody throws up. Matt, after a quick dog scolding, cleans it up.

About 10:15, Finn throws up. The two of us jump into action: I grab Finn and dunk him through a quick bath and get him clean and fragrant and then hold him close and rock with him and sing to him. Meanwhile, my valiant husband is downstairs scrubbing vomit out of Finn's sheets and pajamas.

About half an hour later, right after I laid him back in his crib, Finn throws up again. We both activate again and clean the mess up by working together. A little while later, I am holding Finn when he starts to heave and cry again, and Matt grabs a floatable tub (yes, this was readily available in our house) and I move Finn and at least the throw up is contained this time.

As I am holding Finn and rubbing his head and back, Kody throws up two more times. At this point, the whole situation is somewhat comical! While I am cleaning up doggy ick, Matt changes the laundry and hauls an extra mattress up from downstairs and places it on the floor in Finn's room for us to sleep on for the night. After all, there is no way that we can sleep across the hall in our room and risk Finn throwing up again.

We settle in for the night, unusually close together on the full-sized mattress (thank heavens for Queen-sized). Again, about half an hour later, we hear Finn make a familiar sound; rising off the mattress, Matt grabs the bowl we had placed aside for such a purpose and I grab the paper towels to wipe off Finn's face. Once he is back down, we discover another previously unnoticed pile of doggy ick. So Matt cleans it up.

I high five my husband.

As we lay back down and I drift off to sleep, I give thanks for the team that we make. I think of how much I love him and how cleaning pukey sheets speaks so much more to me than a bouquet of flowers (although, flowers ARE nice too :)).

And although I am more tired than usual this morning, I have extra pep in my step and joy in my disposition because I have been fortunate to be reminded of my blessings through a throw up kind of evening. This morning I am thankful for my son who is now healthy and for the partnership that my husband and I have.

It doesn't say in the Bible that true love cleans up puke, but I'm pretty sure its inferred :).

Galentine's Day

Galentine's Day Gifts

It is Galentine's Day today! For those who don't watch "Parks and Rec", it is the day before Valentine's Day that is set aside to celebrate the female friendships that help to keep one sane :).

It hit me as I was trying to process my birthday retrospectively, that one of the reasons that I was so disappointed was because it was all a verification of a gnawing sense of loneliness that I had been feeling lately.

Since I like to evaluate and psychoanalyze every single emotion that I have, I started picking apart why I was "all of a sudden"............lonely. Without going into too many gritty details, I think that it ultimately comes down to the fact that I have spent the last few years investing heavily into my relationship with Matt and, this last year, Finn. My whole life circled around my boys. It was wonderful. And I don't regret a single moment; I truly believe that is what God wanted me to be doing.

But I believe that I am now coming to the surface a little bit and realizing that I have fallen short when it comes to my sustaining my friendships. My strongest friendships are still strong. My friends are still my friends. But there is a longing for female relationship in me that has not been met over the last couple of years.

During this past week, I have reflected a bit on times in my past when I have felt lonely like this. Two times spring to mind: Alaska and Arkansas.

When I spent a semester in Alaska, separated from my college support system and longing for friendship. And when I moved down to Arkansas and had to start over entirely.

I look back at those times, and while they were extremely difficult at the time to go through and I spent more than one night crying into my pillow, in retrospection I can see the amazing things that God brought out of those lonely times. And He didn't leave me lonely for long.

Therefore, although I feel pangs of loneliness now, I am believing fully that God will bring good out of it.

So this day, this Galentine's Day, I am celebrating the female relationships in my life that I am grateful for. And I am eager with expectation for what God will bring forth from this season!