the turkey was on fire!

We had a smorgasbord of people at our house for Thanksgiving. International couples, five small children, married couples, single ladies (ahem, me). It was great. But probably the best part was right before we sat down to eat. The children had gone through the line---

which, side note, it's still foreign to me to not be considered a child. So, let that be said when it comes time to recite the four questions at Passover. I don't go through the dinner line with my parents holding my hand. I don't stand up and sing Ma nishtana. That's how life works.

---and they were sitting innocently at the table gnawing on Turkey legs and other tasty nom noms that my Mom prepared. And all of a sudden a small voice cries out, "Fire! Fire!" My first thought: "Sweet! He's never seen a fireplace before." Luckily, we had some Moms and Dads on the scene to realize, rather logically, that the 9-year-old was holding a FLAMING paper Turkey centerpiece. I responded approximately 45 seconds too late with a towel and a cup of water.

My rationale: Never mind the fire extinguisher! I'm going to put this sucker out with a dish towel and 4 oz of water!

Into the fireplace went the flaming Gobbler.
Into the tummy went the food.

And there was plenty of reflection.

In our dining room, the windows face the street. I imagine that looking in at the tableux of family and turkey fare would be rather Norman Rockwell-esque. It struck me as I sat cozily between the 80 year old and the 9 year old that I was dang thankful to be on the inside and happy to report that the feeling was just as warm and delightful as it would appear from the street, because of Jesus' love.

There was a gentle gnawing that started on Tuesday night, that I haven't really let turn into much of anything just yet- I'd rather have not thought about it. But when we went around the table saying what we were thankful for, the same thing poked me in the little soft spot in my heart:

Why wasn't my salvation the the first conscious thankful thought in my head?

I got choked up talking about my parents and everything that they do, their marriage, their ministry, their parenting, their friendship (here I go again...) but then when someone mentioned Salvation and we all nodded enthusiastically, even in my whole hearted agreement, my eyes were drier than a matzoh ball soup from a south Florida deli.

Why doesn't this thankfulness, this eternal gratitude and indebtedness that I have not translate into water works?
I'm still pondering it. But I want it to be there.

This love is real.

revelation

You know what?

This might sound really shallow, but I think this makes sense.

You don't wear shoes you don't like, right? You don't style your hair so that you're embarrassed to go out in public, right? (Unless you're my sister ca. 2001-- "Perm"). You aren't going to be amped to go into work with a tattered brief case or man bag...

So, you're probably not motivated to bring your Bible out in public if it has some weird graphics of Jesus as a fair skin clean shaven man in a bed sheet ensemble on the front cover, nor will your fingers itch to leave through the pages of a book that you highlighted with 58 different colored jelly rolls when you were 12...

You're probably not eager to bust out that bible that you had doodled your crushes name on every blank page--- or strategically written on that page where it lets you list marriages, your name with that boy that took you to homecoming your freshman year.

just sayin.

Invest in a nice Bible. An attractive Bible. A Bible that will make the people in Starbucks wonder what that darling little book is that you're reading with the cool fabric on the front and the shiny gold edged pages...Get a Bible that you're excited to reach for off your shelf and tote around. One that's practical for traveling and having in your purse or "mag" (man bag) and then the five-pounder for when you're doing some major exegesis.


You can look at nice Bibles here.

Read your Bible.
All the cool kids are doin' it.

can you tell me how to get to sesame hood?

Sesame Street. You are classy. Always.

xanga throw back

Getting back to my blogging roots. Wrote this entry about 4 years ago. Excuse the malpracticed punctuation.

Saturday, October 07, 2006
Even though sleeping in an extra hour would have been sweet, I woke up and went for a walk.

It was gorgeous.

Like seriously... this morning made me like fall. And I told one of my friends that I hate the inbetween seasons becuase it's not like... a done deal. Things are changing, and we're saying goodbye to one phase of life, and getting ready to enter into another even if it's not the best... and I don't know.

I think we've already agreed that I'm not very good with change.

Let's take last year for example. Well. My grandparents moved in with us, exactly a year ago and I went into this crazy hibernation phase where I was out of the house as much as possible, having as little as possible communication with parents, and everytime I was actually home I'd come upstairs to my room and shut the door and listen to music all the time. I hated meal times, and I hated having to be with my family. In my sophomore mind (no wonder why sophomore means foolish) I thought everything that happended was a total invasion of privacy, and part of me seriously loathed my grandparents.

Sick, yeah? Well, that's what it was. It took almost a full year to get to the place where I've accepted my grandparents as a part of my life, but seriously.. change like that, completely alterred my personality. And for a while things were just not good inside of me.
The scariest part was, that after my grandparents moved in with me, I associated fall with some depression and a complete and full void in my life that I couldn't ever seem to fill. God felt distant, but at the same time I did very little to try to contact him.... and you know? Everything was like fjkdlajdfklajfklda. Just pounding down on the keys not making any words.

I feared fall.

But this morning changed it for me.

The leaves fell down around me while I was listening to some song by Jill Phillips, and well.. it all felt right. And I knew that these in between phases are not like THE big change. But more like the prologue to a new chapter... enticing, slightly profound,sometimes difficult...but just enough to pull you in to continue in the big story.

And so it begins...

My blogging has reached an all-time high. Three posts in one week? Who do I think I am? Some world-traveler that's got exciting stories to share?

Here's my new mantra: When the going gets tough, the tough get blogging.

See what I did there?

...Anyways. I'm about 8 pages into this Old Testament paper, and hardly through 1st Samuel. So, I'm off to immerse myself in all things coffee-shop and let my skin slowly graft to my chair and not leave until this paper is done.

Or at least until I have to come back and get ready for work.
That's right. Return of the full tuxedo tonight.

It's been so long.

meredith gray moment.

I can't believe I'm about to do this. I mean, this pretty much goes against every code of anything I've ever thought of blogging and journaling in general. But sometimes, you need to do a little outlandish on the blog to snap everybody's attention.

Ha, no. I see what you're thinking. No nudee photos here.

ew.



Ready for this? Entry from my PRIVATE journal dated from October 29, 2008...exactly two years ago.


"I need to become super productive. This really needs to happen. I need to do my homework. Study like crazy and get really awesome grades. That is super important to me. I just am not sure what to write on..."


Observations:
1) valley girl.
2) i woke up this morning and thought this exact same thought... my how I've [not] grown.
3) what am i doing? i'm blogging. clearly being "super productive" is not as "super important" to me as I swore it was
4) awesome grades? can grades even be awesome?

Anddddd, there was a lot more dirt in there but I do have some sense of self-preservation.

stay tuned. entry dated 10/24/08 started out with:

"i feel like i'm on crazy pills."

cyclone warning.

Apparently, some mad gusts of winds are coming into the Windy City (go figure) and people have been asking me if they'll cancel school.

Probably not. You know why? Because Moody won't cancel class unless the rapture is happening--at which point, if the whole of the campus is not already caught up with the Lord, then I'd be concerned.

So. We're alive in the Windy City. And no windows have fallen out of buildings. Yet.


Unrelated to the wind blowing, I... feel like a monster. Today, especially. But not like a Cyclone monster or anything that does huge damages to structures and buildings. More like the monster that lurks under your bed and grabs your ankles as you try to dart from bed to bathroom. Or I feel like the little old lady from Hansel and Grettle, that lured the children in with gumdrops and candy canes and sticks of sugar- things that looked good, and ended them up in a load of trouble.

"You seem like you've got it all together, though. I don't really understand why you feel like that."

Because you don't see my heart. You don't see the sin that I struggle with. You don't see the way my mind races and I give over into anxiety, and telling the Lord, "I AM RIGHT. LET ME DO THIS ON MY OWN!"

It's like, my whole life I'm playing this tug of war game with the Lord, and we're wrestling back and forth and I'm screaming and tugging with all my might, and occasionally it seems like He'll give a little. But then He fastens His grip tighter still and I've lost, and I'm getting pulled over the boundary line. But I'm not spinning into the fireplace and splitting my eyebrow open. Instead, I've somehow been pulled right into His arms, which have managed to stay open and waiting all the while strong and defiant against my sense of self and entitlement.

So there I am. The pulling is done and I'm weak and tired, and my hands are blistered from holding on too tight. And as He lifts my hands open to survey the damage from this struggle, He tells me:

"You are no monster. You belong to me... and besides. You don't have half as many warts as that that Old Witch in Hansel and Gretel."

And then as I sit in His lap, a small child in the arms of a big Father, He sings to me:

Hope. Peace. Love. Forgiveness.

Oh, Forgiveness.
Amen.