When I think about my memories of Christmas, I can't remember a single one on which I did not wake up on Christmas morning at home with my grandparents - until this year. We didn't have tons of traditions, but we were always together on Christmas day. Maybe not doing a whole lot, but together and usually eating a meal of some kind! I miss that. I miss waking up in a house with people that i love and that know me and don't care if I stay in my pj's until noon.
I am realizing that when family members are no longer with us, especially matriarchal family members, traditions can be lost too and leave you wondering what to do on Christmas and even other holidays or special days. So, in remembering and cherishing the traditions I had with my grandmother, I'm seeing that I get to make some new ones up for me and maybe for a family I might be part of one day. It's not so much that I must have traditions, but I think traditions help us, well at least they help me, to remember the little things and to celebrate being together.
Among those traditions, I want there to be a great cooking of breakfast! Breakfast is my favorite, and it's so much more fun to cook a big breakfast for lots of folks you love. So, breakfast it is. Another tradition I want to start is doing an advent wreath and devo at home. We do it at church, but I would like to do a personal/family one. A third possible tradition is the giving of new pajamas at Christmas. I'm sort of borrowing this one from friends, but I think it's great, and who doesn't like pajama pants? And last on my list of traditions to try out is doing something on Christmas that is memorable and that is giving of myself to another. I hear about people going caroling at a retirement home on Christmas day or visiting people who can't get out, or maybe inviting someone to Christmas dinner...whatever it is, it will be about remembering God's gift to us at Christmas and then sharing that gift of Love and Grace with another.
I've enjoyed reading through Advent and Christmas Wisdom from Henri Nouwen lately...tonight even: "Christmas is the renewed invitation not to be afraid and let him - whose love is greater than our own hearts and minds can comprehend - be our companion."
I'm remembering something the pastor from my church said a few Sundays back. It went something like this: Christmas is a time for those who have drawn away from God and who have been drawn away to come back to Him.
This year I will wake up on Christmas morning in my apartment in Oxford, just me and my canine roommate, and I will celebrate the birth of the One who saved me and who gives me hope for this life and life eternal. I might be tradition-less for now, but not for long :-)
Merry Christmas...
25 December 2009
21 December 2009
Jennifer Knapp is back!
I think Jennifer Knapp was one of the first singer/songwriter types i listened to as a kid. Her songs were so meaningful and really formative for me as I started to pursue God...I remember wondering early in college why she had disappeared from the music scene. Just glad she's back and writing and singing from the heart again...looks like from her website the new album will be out next year. take a listen. http://www.jenniferknapp.com/music.html
15 December 2009
What's the point of this blog?
I was walking my dog a few days ago, as I do everyday - twice a day (dogs without a yard equal a lot of human exercise). So, while I was walking I was thinking about what I could do to document the journey I've been on the past year and a half. I could become a blogger, I thought! But what would I write about if I had a blog? I am currently not doing anything blog-worthy with my life like living in a foreign country or graduate school or having kids. I am in between things, in transition, in the middle, and honestly, I'm often unhappy being here. I work a part time job and I am a nanny part time for a few families. I live in a small Mississippi college town, I have a dog, and I live in a loft apartment above a campus ministry house - the one I used to attend as a college student. I spend most of my days going to and from nanny jobs, to work, and like i said, walking the little pup. This doesn't sound so bad - I mean, I have a job and a home, right?
This is my life and it's my story right now, and I've spent way too much time fighting it like crazy and thinking I'm wasting time and that my life should be different and why isn't it different. Could it be possible that there's something valuable, something beautiful to learn in the difficult, seemingly unending, and often confusing middle ground? So, that's what I will write about: i will write about being in a place where I can see everything behind me and nothing in front of me - what's in front is wide open: painfully, gloriously open. A place I've been so afraid to leave because it means everything will change and I have no idea what it will be like. I will write about what happens as I journey out of this place and trust God for more. Like Sara Groves says on her new album, Fireflies and Songs, "From this one place I can't see very far/in this one moment I'm square in the dark/ these are the things I will trust in my heart / you can see something else/something else"
How i got where i am (if you're interested enough to keep reading): After a tough first year of teaching in Jackson, MS I laid down my dry erase markers and lesson plans and decided to look around for something else - the second graders scared me away :-) I worked several jobs after that and then moved home to say goodbye to my grandmother, the woman who raised me, when she was living her last days with cancer last year. I moved in with my grandfather and tried to help him as he learned to live without her (which is a great story in itself). Not what I expected for my twenties, but here I am. The past year and a half has been quite a journey as I've learned so much and felt so much.
Recently I've been waiting on ideas and a fresh wind of inspiration to come to move me (which I've learned is not very productive), all the while with the intention of giving myself a rest from the intensity of life. I have also unintentionally isolated myself from my friends and even struggled with depression over the past 15 months or so. I have often felt I was a burden to my friends, and so I withdrew, but only to find I lost something I needed most to survive: community. Depression lends itself to isolation because one can become so inwardly focused, but then isolation only worsens the depression. It is a dangerous cycle to fall into. At this point, the frustration and hopelessness have tapered off, and I have hope growing in my heart that God will use me for good in His Kingdom, that He has and will continue to show grace to me in this place AND that this life, this story, is about Him and His MUCH BIGGER story, not mine...I just have to take some steps, maybe even some big steps, and keep moving toward Him.
So, this blog's purpose is many-fold, but those I can name are: 1)Accountability for me as I try to have more faith and less fear and take a good risk with my life. 2) To encourage other people who might currently be in a transition time or just feeling stuck in life. 3) To do things I am afraid of doing, like blogging, for example, and to document those things. 4) Just to share what I'm thinking with anyone who wants to read.
Books, Music, and People that are helping me and encouraging me:
A Million Miles in a Thousand Years, Donald Miller
Crazy Love, Francis Chan
Life of the Beloved, Henri Nouwen
If You Know Who You Are...You'll Know What to Do, Ronald J. Greer
Keep a Quiet Heart, Elisabeth Elliot
Psalm 37
Proverbs 3
Friends at the Orchard
Anna
Leigh Anne
The kids I get to hang out with that make me smile, especially Isaiah, Ezra, Annabel, and Briella!
Sara Groves
This is my life and it's my story right now, and I've spent way too much time fighting it like crazy and thinking I'm wasting time and that my life should be different and why isn't it different. Could it be possible that there's something valuable, something beautiful to learn in the difficult, seemingly unending, and often confusing middle ground? So, that's what I will write about: i will write about being in a place where I can see everything behind me and nothing in front of me - what's in front is wide open: painfully, gloriously open. A place I've been so afraid to leave because it means everything will change and I have no idea what it will be like. I will write about what happens as I journey out of this place and trust God for more. Like Sara Groves says on her new album, Fireflies and Songs, "From this one place I can't see very far/in this one moment I'm square in the dark/ these are the things I will trust in my heart / you can see something else/something else"
How i got where i am (if you're interested enough to keep reading): After a tough first year of teaching in Jackson, MS I laid down my dry erase markers and lesson plans and decided to look around for something else - the second graders scared me away :-) I worked several jobs after that and then moved home to say goodbye to my grandmother, the woman who raised me, when she was living her last days with cancer last year. I moved in with my grandfather and tried to help him as he learned to live without her (which is a great story in itself). Not what I expected for my twenties, but here I am. The past year and a half has been quite a journey as I've learned so much and felt so much.
Recently I've been waiting on ideas and a fresh wind of inspiration to come to move me (which I've learned is not very productive), all the while with the intention of giving myself a rest from the intensity of life. I have also unintentionally isolated myself from my friends and even struggled with depression over the past 15 months or so. I have often felt I was a burden to my friends, and so I withdrew, but only to find I lost something I needed most to survive: community. Depression lends itself to isolation because one can become so inwardly focused, but then isolation only worsens the depression. It is a dangerous cycle to fall into. At this point, the frustration and hopelessness have tapered off, and I have hope growing in my heart that God will use me for good in His Kingdom, that He has and will continue to show grace to me in this place AND that this life, this story, is about Him and His MUCH BIGGER story, not mine...I just have to take some steps, maybe even some big steps, and keep moving toward Him.
So, this blog's purpose is many-fold, but those I can name are: 1)Accountability for me as I try to have more faith and less fear and take a good risk with my life. 2) To encourage other people who might currently be in a transition time or just feeling stuck in life. 3) To do things I am afraid of doing, like blogging, for example, and to document those things. 4) Just to share what I'm thinking with anyone who wants to read.
Books, Music, and People that are helping me and encouraging me:
A Million Miles in a Thousand Years, Donald Miller
Crazy Love, Francis Chan
Life of the Beloved, Henri Nouwen
If You Know Who You Are...You'll Know What to Do, Ronald J. Greer
Keep a Quiet Heart, Elisabeth Elliot
Psalm 37
Proverbs 3
Friends at the Orchard
Anna
Leigh Anne
The kids I get to hang out with that make me smile, especially Isaiah, Ezra, Annabel, and Briella!
Sara Groves
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