Not Too Deep for Bare Feet

I'm feeling it, the tug, familiar except it has that broken-in feeling like the weathered rope which young boys shimmied up the pecan tree and rigged there some twenty years ago. Back then the rope was young and taut just like the suntanned little boy chests puffed out all proud, "Look daddy!"

And daddy, well I think his chest puffed out a little proud, too. He strutted, yeah strutted, to his garage with two sweaty boys in tow, following his every move and mannerism. "Now, men," he looked several feet down his 6'4" frame at the men.

"Yes, daddy," the men jumped like grasshoppers.

"Think you can can roll that tire on out to the rope?"

The 3'2" men flexed and that tire, wobbley, rolled round about and maybe daddy steered it just a little bit. Maybe he made the tire just a little lighter-just enough for his little men to think they did it all by themselves. Maybe. It depends on who tells the story.

These days the old rope seems to long for the day when it can set the tire down on the grass a few inches away, and rest.

Sometimes I straddle the tire and lean back till my hair sweeps the ground and my eyes sweep the sky and the wind sweeps, too.

Sometimes I tug that tire swing up to the trampoline, hold on tight, and I don't know which of us gets the bigger thrill, the tire or me, but we gasp together in swing and spin; and because a crash to the ground is about as far away as a freshly mowed blade of grass is tall.

"What is this broken-in tug I'm feeling?" I've tied a few knots in the rope to shorten it because though it's ready to stretch out full and retire on the grass, I'm not ready for it to do that just yet.

I'm not ready for me to do that.

I'm broken-in, and it's a comfy kind of feeling to wear my skin loose because four children sort of stretched me this way and that in the tug toward their adult years.

There's still some stretch left in me. Still enough slack to make more notches and I don't mind that the hips I supported babies on just aren't there anymore, because I don't need them anymore.

Joy applauds blessings. It does.

I hear applause when pecans pop-pop on the ground, loosed by scrambling squirrels, old tire swing sway, an autumn rain, and claps of thunder, too,

Joy applauds like that.

Once two small barefoot boys in matching swim trunks ran into the summer rain and sailed their paper boats down the alleyway where rain water swirled high toward storm drains just right here behind the house.

I wonder how often joy is so near-if we would only run through the rain to get it. Blessings, too.

Joy and blessings-they're not too proud for back alleys, paper boats, and bare feet.

Two little boys splashed-just splashed into joy.

Tires splashed, too; but not into joy. Cars stalled in bothersome rainwater coming down faster than storm drains could swallow.

Funny how the same rainfall engulfed tires, but wasn't too deep for bare feet.

Thing is, joy and blessings aren't missed because they've gone missing but because they're not met. Are they overlooked because they're not looked for? Not found because who thinks to search the alleys? In the rain?

Curious George and the man in the yellow hat, they raced paper boats. 

My two little boys, they heard the rain on the sky light just above the green couch where paper boats raced across pages; and they applauded, "Can we make paper boats?!"

That's how it began, meeting joy that day.

Maybe it's how to begin meeting joy everyday.

Maybe delays and stalled out engines and sometimes even umbrellas-inconveniences and conveniences alike-hint at joy so near it nearly tugs our shoes off, turns umbrellas inside out, soaks through dress suits worn by those kicking the tires on their stalled vehicles till they look down an alleyway and would give anything for a pair of swim trunks and a paper boat.

Maybe joy begins like that sometimes.

I wore flip flops that day.

I ran through the rain; chased my two boys, paper sailboats, joy. I chased joy down the alley to where it was deep.

"Let's race our sailboats!" The boys called to each other across the river, and the rain applauded.

They splashed and joy soaked them. Soaked me.

And blessings, the everyday kind? They're deep enough to stall a line of cars, but not too deep for bare feet.

I'm kicking my shoes off!

Where's my paper boat?

Back alley blessings and deep joy. Today.



written by: Carolyn-Elizabeth Roehrig

The Serenity Prayer-A Song

God grant me the serenity

To accept the things I can’t change.

God grant me the courage and peace

To change the things that I can.

God grant me wisdom to see

The difference between- 

God grant me the miracle of serenity.

chorus-

This prayer is mine,

Take it one day at a time,

‘Cause ev’ry single minute I breathe

I pray for serenity.

God grant me the strength I need

To lean on You when I don’t understand.

God grant me the ability

To stand up when I know I can.

God grant me the humility

To confess and make my amends-

God grant me the miracle of serenity.

chorus

written by Carolyn-Elizabeth Roehrig

http://songsofachristianhomemaker.blogspot.com

Seven Bags of Blessings, and Two Cubed Potaotes

Some mornings I get the feeling that the Lord has been waiting since before sun-up in my prayer closet, just busting at the seams excitement over the bags of blessings He's prepared and stacked in His courts for me to come by and receive.

It took me longer than usual to come into my prayer closet this morning. I had seven bags to stack on the front walkway for the Salvation Army to pick up. Seven bags of blessings! Seven bags!

This husband of mine, the Canadian-born Bavarian? He's a polo shirt and shorts kinda guy. All year. Except when he must wear a suit, but thanks to his new career the full business suits stay on the hangers.

"Oh, sw-e-e-et heart," I call from his closet just all sugar with a feather duster in hand. "Can you come here a moment?"

I hear him come from the next room and the melodramatic in me strikes a pose I Love Lucy would be proud of.

He peers into the closet and I begin dusting the shoulders of his suits with flourish. I sorta hope he sneezes.

He just looks at me.

I move to the next suit. The passive- aggressive in me waits for him to say something.

He doesn't.

But the next day I hear him from across the house. He's singing in the closet.

He doesn't sing in the closet, I think to myself.

But then, I answer myself, I don't dust suits.

And something else-what is that other sound?

The man's been working out. His arms look to be about the size of the dumbbells he pumps, the polo shirts look to have shrunk and the shorts to have grown, or something.

Once I folded and stacked the polo shirts he's had hanging in his closet for, I don't, fifteen years? I did it again recently. Thing is, he's never been keen to cull his clothes. To him, if it was good fifteen years ago, it's good as new. To me, it's all a jumble of relics any thrift store 'round about these part would be thrilled to have.

I decide not to interrupt his singing and whatever else he's doing. What is that sound? I wonder a second time.

I sip my morning coffee. Text my mother. Load the dishwasher. Start the washing machine-and he bounds into the laundry room grinning like a goof, "I have a surprise for you."

"Really?" I love surprises.

He takes my hand and leads me toward the closet at the far end of the bathroom. "Careful there," He steers me around about seven bags of clothes stacked between me and the closet.

He preempts what he knows I want to ask, "What's this, you ask?"

I nod, silent.

"I organized my closet." He folds his barbell-ish arms and rocks back on his heels about as nonchalant as I was with the feather duster.

"Mm-hmm," I try to keep from whooping a ya-hoo, "Is this your closet then?"

"Mm-hmm," He teases; and I do a little jig right there because this is a beautiful moment.

The Salvation Army truck came this morning, and I can hardly wait for some unemployed man to try on one of the suits bouncing across town just now in the back of the truck. This man, he'll look in the mirror and stand a little taller in one of my husband's suits, and like that he'll go to a job interview.

In the meantime, here in my prayer closet? Mr. Salvation Army Himself is opening what I'm calling bags of blessings before I can open the Bible. It sounds like this-phone chirps every few minutes.

Bag #1: A friend I haven't heard from in a couple years sends me a thinking of you message.
Blessing: We schedule right here and now to meet for coffee next week.

Bag #2: A woman from Missouri contacts me about one of my LilBit Books-n-Boutique handmade journal. She wants to donate it in exchange for some good reviews.
Blessing: Well, someone found my shop and wants to order a journal!

Bag #3: I discover that I misread the time of my appointment today.
Blessing: There are more bags and I have the time to see what's in them. And, seems there's a theme happening here in my prayer closet this morning-something about donating blessings.

Bags #4 and #5: Two more friends text me, "Are you free to visit next week?"
Blessing: Friendship!

Bag #6: "Can you come by to visit today, and maybe bring some soup?" She can't get out of bed by herself and has been craving her favorite soup for two week!
Blessing: Obvious

"Lord! Six Bags!?" I'm making a mental ingredient list for potato-leek soup.

"Seven," He responds.

Bag #7: Some man is going to go to a job interview, shoulders squared in one of my husband's suits.
Blessing: Donating seven bags.

"Now that's a truck load!" It is.

I sense His Spirit waiting with an unspoken, "And?"

"And, Lord," I know what follows. Blessing from blessing, that's what. "And, it's more blessed to give than to receive-to donate, too."

Isn't this wonderful?

Wonderful that one item from seven bags, one suit in a thrift store, might hang from the discouraged shoulders of a man-and square them?

Wonderful to be led by my grinning Bridegroom to this prayer closet and then discover why He's grinning wide as my husband grinned when he led me around the bags on the bathroom floor? I wonder if my Lord began grinning right about then because maybe He put my husband up to this as a hint at what was to come. Maybe.

To me, this is big potatoes!

I wash the potatoes and leeks.

Cube the potatoes and, guess what? Math happens in my kitchen. Two potatoes, cubed to the second power = a pot of soup. One pot of soup divided by two = blessing on blessing multiplied by blessing.

Isn't this wonderful!

Well, at the moment, I'm certain I haven't cubed enough potatoes in my life; and that I've missed some blessings before in my prayer closet. I've probably even tripped over them-tripped over blessings. It's what happens when I'm more aware of my prayers than of God's presence.

Today I'm going to cube potatoes, divide a pot of soup, pack it into my truck and deliver a bag of blessing.

I'm going to package a journal and tuck a note into it:

For-
the Dreams you dream
the Thoughts you think
the Plans you plan
the Journeys you take-
Blessings!

And then I'm going to  bounce along Main Street to the post office.

Seven bags of blessings, two cubed potatoes, a pick-up truck and my grinning God?

Yep.

written by: Carolyn-Elizabeth Roehrig

When the Only Platform That Counts is the Foundation

So, I'm not politically engaged, and I'm beyond miserable at knowing what's in the news, but I do listen to people. And in my little world I hear from a narrow group of people–sisters in Christ.

Today this little group has been vocal and emotional. Maybe the angry words spoken by several new moms against Trump and his character would be much the same against Hillary were she voted into office, but I suspect that the anger and "I don't know how we came to this as a nation," confusion stem from fear. After all, aren't confusion, anger, and fear relatives-except for the righteous fear of the Lord!

I relate to this group looking at a frighteningly uncertain future as they wrap their protective arms around their little ones; because I've wrapped my arms around my little ones like that way back when. I have no idea who the Presidents were during those years because as I said, I'm basically checked out when it comes to politics and news. I know, I shouldn't be. I could ask my husband, the Canadian-born Bavarian. He'd know, but at this point I can't say I care much about politics past. 

What I do care about today is what I've been hearing and what I hear behind the words.

Thing is, we didn't get where we are overnight while votes were being counted. We've been here, a godless nation, for a very long time. We really have.

I wonder, maybe we've misinterpreted God's patience to mean that all the warnings and examples of His promised righteous judgment on unrighteous nations don't apply to us. He's so merciful and generous with His blessings that it might be easy to forget that His mercy and generous blessings run deeper than what we might call favorable circumstances. 

Is His mercy less when a nation comes under His righteous judgment than when He's extending patience beyond imagination? It's not. Neither are His generous blessings. 

Sometimes we can see through hardship enough to say with sincerity that it's a blessing in disguise, but occasionally all we can say is something like, "Lord, I know You well enough to know that one day I'll see through the disguise, even though right now it seems impossible."

What if we, as women and mothers prone to surges of emotion especially where our children are concerned, chose to manage and channel our fears as God has told us to?

Mrs. Proverbs 31, she isn't afraid of snow-winter seasons-for her household because she's prepared for it.

Mrs. Abraham, Sarah? Her daughters aren't afraid of any terror.

Thing is, when we choose to fear God, and God alone, our emotions are held in check. That's just the way it works. 

When we rightly fear God-when our fear of God isn't based on our emotions but on His perfect word-law, then we are freed from lesser fears. And compared to fearing God, anything else we could possibly warrant as worthy of our fear and trembling just ripples till it smooths out as water on a pond ripples when disturbed and then is smooth as glass moments later.

I would say to women who fear the future of this nation on the behalf of their children, "Prepare for the snow on behalf of your children as Mrs. Proverbs 31 prepared for her household. " Then I'd say, "Go get your Bibles and open them to Hebrew 4:12.'"

And after they read it, I'd say something like, "Earnestly ask God, 'What do You mean? What's the difference between soul and spirit, and why do they need to be pierced and divided?'" 

I'd encourage them to ask the same thing about the joints and marrow, and about the need for the thoughts and intents of our hearts to be discerned by the sword. isn't this the preparation of the gospel that our hearts, minds, and souls need as we love Him with our entire beings? As we prepare to trust His Spirit more than we trust our worry prone souls?

Seems to me that when we are rightly divided, we are rightly prepared to hear what God means rather than to hear what we might want to think He means. 

When He tells us to fear Him, maybe He's also saying something like, Don't be afraid of the future of a godless nation or it's ruler. 

Mothers, even if this nation refuses to repent, your children aren't beyond redemption. 

Show them by preparing your heart with the truth of Godly fear what it looks like to fear God. One thing for certain, it's not going to be communicated by way of grumbling, complaining, insulting and a train-wreck of emotion. 

Communicate to your children by way of the grace God gives you to be to them what He says you are to Him-the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus-and guess what? You may be as certain as anything that your children will be equipped to know the true battle and how to fight it with the kind of Godly determination that times of desperation call for.

The other group of women I've listened to today? I can relate to them. I'm their generation. We may have raised their children but now we're mother-in-laws and grandmothers and we would never have voted for Hillary, but for the "life" platform because, as one woman put it "Please understand, we've been forced to vote by platform."

Forced by whom?

And isn't the only "platform" for life the foundation of Life?

Maybe it's better to stand on that foundation rather than on an iffy platform that is built by those who fall of it with regularity?

I can't help but think about when David was given the choice “And David said unto Gad, I am in a great strait: let us fall now into the hand of the Lord; for His mercies are great: and let me not fall into the hand of man” (2 Samuel 24:14).

David was given three choices, and he chose the third-to fall into the hand of the Lord.

Somehow this sounds familiar to me today. It's why I, (uh), didn't, (ahem), vote yesterday. Because we're really not forced to vote for the lesser of two evils. We Christians have the same basic third choice that David had-to declare by vote to the Lord that we choose His righteousness even if it means judgment. Isn't it better to be judged by God who is mercifully fulfilling His promises than by platforms that don't seem to know what a promise is?

I came across this yesterday written by Benjamin Franklin: "I have lived, Sir, a long time, and the longer I live, the more convincing proofs I see of this truth- that God governs in the affairs of men. And if a sparrow cannot fall to the ground without His notice, is it probable that an empire can rise without His aid? We have been assured, Sir, in the sacred writings, that 'except the Lord build the house they labour in vain that build it.' I firmly believe this...."

Well, I'd say that I firmly believe this too.

It's real.

written by: Carolyn-Elizabeth Roehrig

The Reckoning Mirror

A sister shared, "I don't like who I've become." Another put it, "I feel like I lost myself somewhere between babies and retirement." And still another, "I'm so distracted I can barely hold a thought down long enough to write a sentence!" And I wonder why the epidemic? At least it seems epidemic, lately-soul ailment.

I've said it before, in the midst of pain. And I've wondered at the face I recognize in the mirror as my own when it doesn't look like what I'm feeling inside-and also when it does.

There have been times when I would have just declared myself an orphan of my own guardianship-gladly.

Is that possible?

Well, somewhere along the way I found that I'm a miserable guardian of my own soul. I am. All I have to do is look at what my actions, words, countenance reflect on bad days to know it's true.

So, it's true. Why doesn't it feel as bad as it sounds? I've wondered about this, too.

And I wonder it now because I'd like to say to these sisters, "You are wonderfully made in the image of God!"


And then I'd like to say, "So, you don't like what you see in the mirror? You're looking in the wrong mirror."


And then? I'd put a Bible in their hands and say, "See what you look like in the reflection of God's eyes."


The eyes of God are all the mirror I need. Or want. 


If I look deep and long enough to find the face of my soul reflected in the light of His eyes, then I must agree with what's there.


What's there?


A mysterious reflection, that's what. 


A resemblance of me-enough to know it's me-and an image the likes of which I only believe because it's in God's eyes.


The first time I saw it, this mysterious reflection, I wrote "Grace" on the frame of the mirror-in the margin of the scripture, "Likewise you also, reckon yourselves to be dead indeed to sin, but alive to God in Christ Jesus."


And then I wrote, "Reckon it even if it doesn't look like it."


Maybe His eyes are, to me, a reckoning mirror.



I kept reading as a woman dying to know life; and as a child born to be adopted and as an ailing soul.


I found that what I really wanted, no, needed, is a guardian who loves me more than I possibly can.


Who loves like that?


The Spirit of adoption, that's who.


"Look at Me," He says; and then He holds my eyes to the reckoning mirror, "I made My begotten Son who knew no sin to be sin for you, that you might become My righteousness in Him."


I want to look away, but He holds my eyes and continues, "You received the Spirit of adoption by whom you cry out, 'Abba, Father.'"


Well, now I don't want to look away! Still, "Hold my eyes steady on Yours, Father," because I know that if I blink, I surely will look away.


Thing is, I can't deny what His eyes witness.



Boston Ivy drapes her tresses a little thinned out, a lot colored in all dark shades of red, worn-out greens, browns and I half expect to see some gray beneath the tendrils lifted in windy toss. It's because this ivy and me, we're okay in our autumn do's. We're okay with the color changes, she with hers and me with mine all shades brown to blonde to gray because I'm a brunette who's lived in the sun long enough to be half blond and, yeah, gray too.


"Father," I tuck loose strands of hair behind my ear and feel His eyes hold my soul still.


Right now, in the slant of autumn, the only thing that matters about me is whose child I am.


I'm done being my own guardian.


Pecan leaves twirl the air yellow. They're okay, too, as they nearly spring right off the branches with no seeming regrets about the good ol' days because, guess what? The best days weren't when they were bound in green too immature to be beautiful in unbound liberty. No, the best days are the I'm free to fall because the truth about me isn't about me, days.


Well, isn't this wonderful? I think it is, because in this freedom there's true grace-the kind which is full of the life from Whom it comes. Any other grace is an empty shell.



I gather a handful of pecans. Oh, there's a tree load ready to fall.



I snip a bundle of basil and snap five more bell peppers from the plant. And there are more to come, while the ivy fades a few paces away.


I, who have suffered myself my sisters have themselves, choose to spend my time gathering pecans meaty full and calling them a testament of true grace. No excuses; no empty shells.


There are days when I don't exactly like myself, but so what? I choose to look unblinking into the reckoning mirror.


I choose to see what my Father witnesses just there.




written by: Carolyn-Elizabeth Roehrig
























 

The Rock Who Skipped-revised :-)

A man skipped a rock.

It skidded across 

The surface of the pond-

Of course, it sank;

Ran out of strength.

But as the man watched,

He praised the Rock of

Ages who walked
The waves, and sought Him

For Salvation.

The Rock behaved as stone,

Sank to depths unknown,

Yet dragged my sin below-

Christ, my joy today,

Skips with joy this way.

He drowned sin's woe

In fire, hell's sulpher home.

 Praise the Lord, my soul!

I'm not drowned, but washed, whole,

And clothed in whitest robe

Of Salvation.

Sing His praises, and lift

The Rock of Ages who sifts

Our sins away and gives-

He gives! He laughs, sings,
And plays the wind's strings!


The Rock, He skips,
And the joy on His lips
Is the strength which gripped
My sin and stripped me of it
For Salvation

He's coming; the great

And awesome Name

Who reigns, unchained-

 

Death could not keep down

The King and His crown.

Oh, enter His gates,

Lay hold of His claim,
Center your praise,
Walk on the waves with the Rock,
Of Salvation.

written by: Carolyn-Elizabeth Roehrig

Shot by the Pillsbury Dough Boy



Pigs in a blanket and applesauce. I'd wrap them Lil' Smokies in crescent roll dough straight from the cylindrical canister every now and then, and I'd wonder how these ingredients got into my shopping cart. Prob'ly by accident, on account of 'cause two accident prone little boys were in my shopping cart, too. 

The same boys who "accidentally" chewed toast into pistols and had a shoot-out across the breakfast table.

There were other "accidents" too, and many of them were blamed on the mysterious "Nobody." Once Nobody tried to swing from the shower curtain and somebody,  the likes of me, catapulted herself upstairs in hopes of catching Nobody in the act. 

I've never cared to eat the other white meat, and while I've never ground wheat in a denim skirt and combat boots, I'm flat out too health conscious to have developed much of a relationship with the Pillsbury dough boy.

Maybe that's why he shot me.

He did.

Just this evening with the metal lid to the crescent roll canister.

The lid shot off the mouth of the canister, and maybe the dough boy would  claim it was what's called an "accidental discharge," but that canister was loaded with dough, aimed at me, and I have no idea how that kind of pressure builds inside crescent roll packaging,  but I'll tell you it's a little startling to be shot in the backside bent over an oven rack while checking the Beef in a Blanket. 

Startling.

Yet graphically a tad familiar. Familiar. Is this word related to another word-family? Immediate family, extended family, brothers and sisters familiar by Christ, and the human race family? 

The lid shot off the canister, half the dough rifled with it, and I know I've seen this somewhere else before. It's startling when you get shot in the back by a trusted family member, isn't it? Isn't it startling when what's been building inside a friend or coworker, a fellow Christian or a complete stranger pops a lid, shoots off the mouth, and you get to see what comes out? 

I looked at spilt dough on counter top and, "As we think in our hearts," came the verse, "so we are." It's written somewhere in Proverbs 23. I remember because "23" rhymes with "so are we." I know, but it works.

I take a picture, and my daughter looks at me like, "Really, mom?"

Then I reach for my Bible. I want to know where the other things about what comes out of the heart are written-where it's written what just can't help but flow with the power of joy building behind it in the canister of my being. My heart, which holds what's put in it.

"He who believes in Christ, as the Scripture has said, out of his heart rivers of living water" (John7:37).

And rivers of expanding dough, I think to myself.

Thing is, if it's not something like holy joy, or kindness, or wisdom all rolled up in my heart and just waiting for the moment to flow out on the current of love, then I don't want it filling my heart. No sticky Pillsbury crescent roll dough, thank you. I don't want processed, pre-cut, packaged anything filling my heart. Just flowing river sweet water of life, please.

I know only one way for this to happen. It's called transformation by the renewing of my mind.

It's called pray without ceasing and give thanks in all things.

It's called repay no one evil for evil, but have regard for good things, family.

It's called if it is possible, as much as depends on you, live peaceably with all men; and isn't it also called, love your neighbor, for love is the fulfillment of the law, and maybe it's also called, let's stop thinking of ourselves as victims.

Here's a thought. There might not be any lawyers if we loved our neighbors, and if we overcame evil with good, and if we weren't so ready to avenge ourselves but really trusted God when He said "vengeance is mine, I will repay." Perhaps this is the strongest defense we have against feeling victimized. Guaranteed God's not going to go off at the mouth as many of His children who call Him Father might do. 

I pick up the canister lid from the floor, step over the dog who's licking the floor where the lid landed, and I unroll the spilt dough.

"What do I do with it, Lord?" I'm really not asking Him what to do with the dough, but, "What do I do when someone in this family called humanity is ready to explode and I'm in the line of fire?"

"Make cinnamon rolls." I don't know if that was God or subliminally prompted by the scrumptious photo a friend of mine posted the other day and wrote, "Cinnamon rolls last about five minutes in our family."

He says, "Make cinnamon rolls," and I hear, "Sugar and spice and everything nice-extend grace."

Grace. Isn't that a family trait for those who are brothers and sisters in Christ? It is. Grace is family trait.

Is it always given? I wish I could say that it was, but it's not. Yet, none of that changes the fact that grace is a family trait and I don't want to be a traitor to it.

Adopt a victim mentality, and be a traitor to grace. Seems to me that's the way it works.

So, I butter up the exploded dough, subdue the precut triangles with sprinkled cinnamon-sugar and raisins, bend over the oven rack once more and look forward to breakfast in the morning.

Coffee and a cinnamon roll on a cool fall morning. Yeah, that's what I do with what shot from the mouth of the crescent roll canister. 

I choose not to be victimized.

I choose to make cinnamon rolls.

Eat your heart out Pillsbury dough boy.

written by: Carolyn-Elizabeth Roehrig