Love Rises

My mom and dad have what is surely the best example I know of what an enduring marriage relationship looks like. When I look at their relationship with each other, I see that the strength that holds them together is the inclusion of God. I love the quote by Tennessee Williams, "The violets in the mountains have broken the rocks." Those words paint a miraculous picture of the fragile thing overcoming the hard thing, of beauty and life surviving in the crevices of dark and difficult circumstances. I myself have experienced that marriage is not easy, especially in the face of the ongoing trauma that surrounds having a family member with extensive medical issues. My parents have experienced those circumstances in their marriage, my younger brother having been born with a rare form of muscular dystrophy that compromised his physical health and development throughout his 22 years of life. The experience of chronic trauma in our family was compounded by the additional heartbreak of my brother’s death. My parents’ response to such difficulty and sorrow always has taught me well about the paradox of suffering. They showed me that the pain of suffering brings about the gift of learning to love with no regrets, and learning to limit your focus to the most important things in life. My mom and dad’s example has helped me to understand that the very thing that feels like it is threatening to tear a family apart, can actually be a catalyst that brings deep unity to that family instead. Their example of faith has shown me that by choosing to trust God in circumstances that are unthinkably terrible, I am allowing him the opportunity to turn what seems tragic into something more beautiful than I could ever have imagined. In their marriage, my parents allowed God to carry them to places where they surely never would have chosen to go on their own. They have trusted God through many situations which anyone could not possibly choose to embrace, and which many people would even bitterly say called for resentment. Yet, here they are today, truly living in gratitude for the dark valleys they have journeyed through. Here they are today, privileged to experience a glimpse of a present and a future that is not framed by the lack of what they have lost, but rather by the love of what they have grown. I know that their love today does not exist because they have spent the last 50 years gazing at themselves, or even at each other. I know that their love exists today because over the last 50 years, they have consistently chosen together to look in the direction of God. I am so thankful for their example that the most important thing a husband and a wife can do in their marriage relationship, is to cling to love for God and for each other. My parent’s marriage and their lives are truly evidence that love will always rise when given the opportunity.

“And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.”

‭‭1 Corinthians‬ ‭13:13‬ ‭NIV‬‬

"...I pleaded with the Lord to take it away from me. But he said to me, 'My Grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness'"

2 Corinthians 12:8b-9a NIV

This Flower Called Marriage

Dear Jason,

I love this handmade anniversary card that came in the mail for us from my parents today. I appreciate more and more my mom's talent as a nature photographer. This photo she sent to us is so beautiful - with the flower petals overlapping, one blossom resting on the other, the centers of the growing flowers filled with life-giving pollen. 

This photo reminds me of our marriage on the days it is at its best, but ironically, it is often-times that those good marriage days are some of the hardest "life" days. 

I think about how we are entangled with each other, our lives woven together over the last 28 years since we met, our history overlapping like these flower petals. We are steadier in a storm because we are standing together, even in the times we ourselves feel like pushing or pulling away, even when our circumstances attempt to push or pull us away. Being interwoven almost forces us to persevere together, in order to survive at all. I reminisce about how we each have had in the past and will again have in the future, our stronger times and our weaker times. (Thankfully, usually not at the SAME time!) During those times, each of us knows we can lean on the other, lay our head against a loving shoulder and feel supported, even in the times when there are no words to help. Sometimes, just being able to rest on each other renews our strength to continue the climb.

I gaze at the yellow center of the flowers, where the pollen's purpose is to give life. I know you will agree we discovered early on that we will surely fail each other often - that neither of us are perfect, and that neither one of us can be the other's savior- no matter how much we desire to rescue each other. I believe we have both learned that putting each other at our center is as destructive as putting our own self or our children or our finances or our health in that most central place. More importantly, I believe we have learned individually, and as a couple, to keep God at our center, because God is where our marriage draws its life from, and God is the source for our relationship to create seeds that grow fruit such as love, consideration, patience, and faithfulness.

I sit here journaling on this night before our 22nd anniversary, contemplating this beautiful photo, my mind flooded by this entire garden of thoughts accompanying the sweet sentiment from my parents. I am overwhelmed by the glimpses of truth revealed in such a small piece of creation. I am fully graced by God's love for both of us and for our family. I am grateful for the gift He has blessed me with by planting you and me together, so that we may share deep roots in the rich soil of His goodness. I know that we will continue to weather the fierce storms and the burning heat of each drought, and I know that we will also continue to soak up the gentle rains and life-light of the sun. I know that we will thrive together, all the while leaning on each other, and faithfully keeping our faces hope-filled and upturned to gaze at Him. 

My prayer for you this next year, my husband, is from Ephesians 3:14-19, "When I think of all this, I fall to my knees and pray to the Father, the Creator of everything in heaven and on earth. I pray that from His glorious, unlimited resources He will empower you with inner strength through His Spirit. Then Christ will continue to make His home in your heart as you trust in him. Your roots will grow down into God’s love and keep you strong. And may you have the power to understand, as all God’s people should, how wide, how long, how high, and how deep His love is. May you experience the love of Christ, though it is too great to understand fully. Then you will be made complete with all the fullness of life and power that comes from God."

And my prayer for our marriage follows in verse 20, 

"Now all glory to God, who is able, through his mighty power at work within us, to accomplish infinitely more than we might ask or think."

Happy Anniversary,

I love you always.

“I have heard all about you, Lord. I am filled with awe by your amazing works. In this time of our deep need, help us again as you did in years gone by... remember your mercy.”

Habakkuk 3:2 NLT

"They are like trees planted along a riverbank, with roots that reach deep into the water. Such trees are not bothered by the heat or worried by long months of drought. Their leaves stay green, and they never stop producing fruit."

Jeremiah 17:8 NLT

“I will send you the seasonal rains. The land will then yield its crops, and the trees of the field will produce their fruit... I will walk among you; I will be your God, and you will be my people.”

Leviticus 26:4,12 NLT

                    June 11, 1994

Another Anniversary Post:

http://ofwildernessandrockyplaces.blogspot.com/2014/06/i-will.html?m=1

Beauty in the Broken

A broken tree does not heal. It's true - a tree does not replace wounded or broken fibers with new wood. Instead, the tree permits the broken part to die and the tree moves on, growing around the wound. The tree allows its wound to simply scar over and exist, like a flaw that is present but no longer acknowledged as actively significant.1

"All this pain

I wonder if I’ll ever find my way

I wonder if my life could really change at all.

All this earth

Could all that is lost ever be found

Could a garden come up from this ground at all"2

One year ago yesterday, my husband was undergoing brain surgery. I can look back in my heart and remember I was afraid. I can look back in my mind and remember I was hopeful. Most importantly, I can look at today and know that even though the road from that experience has been difficult, has been dark, has been depressing - I can look at today and know that today is the one that matters.

Once a tree is injured, the wound will eventually become encased in a "knot", and new growth will simply begin on the perimeter of the wound where the healthy tree tissue is situated. Wounded trees can be freely observed most anywhere here in Northern Wisconsin.1 The "knot" of the wound is just a part of the tree. A tree steadily continues growing around its wound and moves on from it over a period of time.

A tree steadily continues growing 

around its wound and moves on from it over a period of time.

I look at my husband today, and I can see the faint scar that has formed over the four inch surgical incision that was made on the day of his brain surgery a year ago. I know that underneath, the physical malformation is still present. I know that a highly skilled and trustworthy surgeon applied a patch to passively prevent the anatomical defect from causing further damage as life goes on.

The knot in the tree is not a healed wound. It is a flaw, an imperfection, a part of the tree which essentially is not active - a scar. Yet, if the tree was able to recover properly with good support, whether natural or facilitated by a human, the existence of the knot will not cause more harm to the tree.1 

Sometimes wounds occur accidentally to a tree, but there are also times when a tree is cut intentionally, or pruned. The pruning is done for the purpose of health or for artistry. According to the Washington State University Extension, pruning of fruit trees is important to establish a firm structure, and to provide light channels throughout the tree so that the tree's fruit can mature well. It is important that a knowledgeable arborist does the pruning because improper cuts are potentially life-ending to a tree, while the correct ones will ensure the best access to sunlight so that an optimum harvest of fruit will result.3

The pruning is done for a purpose.

I see my husband in my memory of that day a year ago, in the hospital neurosurgery ICU - struggling to sit up, struggling to keep the world from spinning, struggling to tolerate the piercing invasive pain that had been inflicted with his own permission. What I remember most clearly, though, is the hope. The hope that sparked through the struggle, as we recognized a return of different physical aspects back to normal that had been suppressed by the compression of his brainstem for quite some time prior to the surgery. The hope that life was about to grow upward once again.

An arborist knows when and how and where to make pruning cuts on limbs, so that the tree has the best potential to close them with its natural defenses, and so that growth can continue beyond the wound, in the direction which the arborist deems best. Sometimes, however, the ensuing direction is unexpected, perhaps because the wound being cared for is not the only wound present1, or sometimes perhaps because the arborist is actually a designer... a visionary who sees the bigger picture... a creator who sees beauty in unusual places.

"You make beautiful things
You make beautiful things out of the dust

You make beautiful things

You make beautiful things out of us"3

God is an arborist - a tree gardener, a planter, a grower, a caretaker. He sows and waters and feeds and prunes. He creates, protects, shapes, and transforms. He invites us to gaze at His majestic work with wonder and praise and quiet awe. His vocation is poetic and authoritative and precise. He creates beauty in paradox, nurturing our souls to grow by finding freedom through the very act of becoming captive to His desires, shaping our spirits to be uplifted higher than we could ever fathom simply by bowing down before Him, renewing our lives and our perspectives even as we allow our selfishness to die in recognition of the perfect authority of His plans.

I see in my mind my husband's view a year ago. A view colored by the beginnings of hope, colored by the perspective that life would be moving on in a sensible and predictable direction, colored by a limited understanding that failed to see that everything will be alright even when it's not all right. And suddenly, I know that what I am seeing in my memory of his outlook is actually a reflection of my own finite vision.

“This is what the Sovereign Lord says: 

I myself will take a shoot from the very top of a cedar and plant it; 

I will break off a tender sprig from its topmost shoots 

and plant it on a high and lofty mountain. 

On the mountain heights of Israel I will plant it; 

it will produce branches and bear fruit and become a splendid cedar. 

Birds of every kind will nest in it; 

they will find shelter in the shade of its branches. 

All the trees of the forest will know that 

I the Lord bring down the tall tree and make the low tree grow tall. 

I dry up the green tree and make the dry tree flourish. 

I the Lord have spoken, and I will do it.” 

(Ezekiel 17:22-24 NIV)

I don't know why God chooses to move our lives in directions that seem long and shadowy and wearying. I don't know why this is the place we have journeyed to in pursuit of His plan and His wisdom and His care. It is not a place I have ever envisioned or would have chosen on my own... but I do know that sovereign means God has supreme authority. I do know that His compassion and goodness are never-ending. I do know that nothing in the universe happens that is outside of His influence.

"All around

Hope is springing up from this old ground

Out of chaos 

life is being found in You"3

I can look at today and know that this is the day that matters. Our knots may help shape us. Our knots may be a portion of who we have become. They may remind us of what we have been through and may have influence over where we are going. But our knots do not define us. What defines us is decided by the One who defines us... the One who created us... the One who tends to our wounds and covers them with a part of Himself... the One who sees the beauty and the value of our knots and who makes good grow out from all around them. The One who sees the individual tree and also sees its place in the greater forest.

"You make beautiful things

You make beautiful things out of the dust

You make beautiful things

You make beautiful things out of us"3

"But I am like an olive tree flourishing in the house of God; 

I trust in God’s unfailing love forever and ever. 

For what you have done 

I will always praise you in the presence of your faithful people. 

And I will hope in your name, for your name is good."

(Psalm 52:8-9 NIV)

I am like a tree fluorishing...

I trust in His love...

His love never fails...

I praise Him for all He has done...

I hope in His name...

for His name is GOOD.

1 Stringer, Larry A., and Jim R. LaBerge. "We Know Trees." How Do Trees Heal?Golden Rule Tree Service, 2012. Web. 04 Sept. 2014.

2 Gary, Moulton, and King Jacky. "Pruning Tree Fruit – The Basics." Pruning Tree Fruit. WSU Mount Vernon Research & Extension Unit, n.d. Web. 04 Sept. 2014.

3 Gungor. Beautiful Things. Brash Music, 2010. MP3.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OR7VOKQ0xJY

I Will...

In days of old, God's people built altars to acknowledge and to remember the places where He had performed a miracle, or had saved them, or had revealed Himself to them in a significant moment. 

Twenty years ago yesterday, my husband and I recited our wedding vows at an altar in the church of my childhood. This specific altar represented not only the heritage of my faith, but also the miracle of the moment when that heritage became the beginning of my own legacy, as I made the choice to have a relationship with Jesus because I desired to, rather than because my family told me to.

Throughout the day yesterday, I found myself contemplating the marriage vows I had made at that altar, the same altar where the cornerstone of my faith had been laid. 

Will you take this man to be your husband... Will you love him, respect him, defend him, honor him... Will you keep him in sickness and in health... Will you seek his joy and share his burden... Will you cherish him with a womanly love and affection... Will you seek to understand him and support his faith with your own faith in Christ?

It is apparent to me in my reflection of our wedding ceremony, that while I repeated the words contained in those vows with the utmost sincerity and a heart overflowing with love for the man whom I spoke them to, my inexperience and naivete shielded me from the truth of what honoring my vows would require of me. 

I look back at myself as a young woman contemplating marriage to the man who held my heart in his hands, and I can see that I had formed a sparkly ideal of what our life together would be like. I was bold in my determination of how our plans would unfold. I believed our choices and our love would lead us to the perfect fruition of the dream my six-year-old self had imagined back when I had pretended that my Grandma's filmy scarf was a wedding veil and that my little cousin was my attentive bridesmaid carrying a basket of torn paper "rose petals". At age twenty-three, I did not have the wisdom or experience to know that it was not our plans that should have been the focus of the marriage relationship, but rather a willingness to be obedient to God's plans. I did not foresee that often in the next two decades, our choices would lead us to places far away from perfection. I did not understand the truth that no matter how much love for this person seemed to exude out of my every pore as a seventeen-year-old girl, and even more so as a young newlywed, love would not always be so obvious in the face of real life "stuff".

Today, when I read the vows we made on our wedding day, it is with the addendum of ancillary notes and thoughts scribbled in the margins of my mind:

Will you take this man... 

this one right here in front of you, as well as the one he will grow to be as he faces continual changes and struggles and is molded a bit more each day, each month, each year into the person God intentionally created him to become. 

Will you love and respect him... 

and discover the very important lesson that, for him, the word "love" is contained within the word "respect", and that he would choose the latter over the former, were he asked to make that choice?

Will you defend him and honor him... 

even when that means defending him from yourself, from your own emotional ups and downs, from the moments when you think you need and deserve to be selfish and get caught up in having your own way prevail... even when choosing to honor him means walking with him in a direction that you may not have chosen for yourself?

Will you keep him in sickness and in health...

learning to understand that "keep" means to remain, to stay, to care for... not settling for merely tolerating the circumstances, but instead choosing to thrive in the midst of them even when sick days stop being the exception and instead become the norm? 

Will you seek your husband's joy...

even during the seasons when the treasure of it can only be discovered in small moments that are achingly transient... even when those moments overwhelm you with a nostalgic longing for what had seemed so beautifully effortless to the people you both once were?

Will you carry his burden...

Will you carry his burden to Jesus when the weight of it is too much for either of you to bear on your own? Will you be a part of the sustenance which God has promised to provide? Will you support and encourage him to not give up, to lean on Jesus in order find the hope to live courageously? Will you trust God as He purposes to cultivate a spiritual strength in both of you, and allows in your lives the miraculous paradox of burden ripening into the fruit called blessing?           

Will you cherish him with a womanly love and affection... 

even on the days when you would rather run and hide... even when that means simply being grateful for his hand to hold and shoulder to lean against as you sit and silently contemplate the challenges tomorrow will bring?

Will you seek to understand him and support his faith with your own faith in Christ... 
choosing to have compassion for him when all you want to do is close your eyes and cry for yourself... choosing to believe that all things - ALL things, truly do work for good in the plans that God has for your lives... choosing to believe that the rain and the clouds and the valleys and even the desert journey has a purpose... choosing to trust that this path will lead to the perfect fruition of a portrait that at this moment in time, you cannot even fathom in your imagination?

Twenty years later, as I ponder these vows made with idyllic innocence and wholehearted faith, I realize that my marriage itself has become an altar: a place where God has performed many miracles, a place where He has saved me from my own selfish inclinations, a place where He has revealed Himself to me over and over and over again, a place where I have learned to trust Him with every detail of my life - to trust Him enough to view the past with triumph, to live today with gratefulness, and to step forward into tomorrow with a promise to persevere in the waiting as two words flow in an abiding whisper from my lips... I will.

I Will Love You

by
Daniel Haughia

As long as I can dream, as long as I can think, 
as long as I have a memory, 
I will love you.

As long as I have eyes to see, and ears to hear, 
and lips to speak, 
I will love you.

As long as I have a heart to feel, a soul stirring within me, 
an imagination to hold you, 
I will love you.

As long as there is time, as long as there is love, as long as there is you, 
and as long as I have a breath  to speak your name,
I will love you...

because I love you more than anything in all the world.


Cast your cares on the Lord and he will sustain you,
 he will never let the righteous be shaken.
Psalm 55:22 NIV

And we know that God causes everything work together for the good of those who love God and are called according to his purpose for them.
Romans 8:28 NLT

Carry each other's burdens, and in this way obey the law of Christ.
Galatians 6:2 NIV

Wives, understand and support your husbands in ways that show your support for Christ.
Ephesians 5:22 MSG

I pray that God, the source of hope, will fill you completely with joy and peace because you trust in him. Then you will overflow with confident hope through the power of the Holy Spirit.
Romans 15:13 NLT

David built an altar there to the Lord and sacrificed burnt offerings and peace offerings.
And the Lord answered his prayer...
2 Samuel 24:25a NLT

I will send you the seasonal rains. The land will then yield its crops,
and the trees of the field will produce their fruit.
Leviticus 26:4 NLT