"Daddy, I Made Pancakes!"

This whole conversation started the other night in the bathroom. Steven and I were getting ready for bed, and that is where I do my best talking. I don't know what it is about that space and that time of night, but I could stand there talking for hours. Over the course of the 10 years we've lived in this house, that little room has probably born witness to some of the most transforming conversations of our marriage. And, bless his heart, Steven has learned to love the late-night bathroom conversations almost as much as I do.

On this particular night, I had recently come home from sharing a quick "testimony" at an evening worship night, and I was JAZZED. I had prayed and listened and finally gotten my timid heart to say yes to the opportunity, and then I had walked on that stage with the confidence of the Lord and spoken with boldness and passion. As I later recounted to Steven (because he'd had to stay home with a sick kiddo), I had used my preaching voice. That's the voice that comes out when God wants to use my voice for His glory, and I let him. He anoints it and breathes life into it and it is amazing.

I had been so nervous. Yes, I'm a pastor, and yes, I'm a missionary, and yes, I'm supposed to preach and teach and speak to groups as if these things are everyday occurrences. But getting up in front of people and speaking forth words out of my head and my heart have never been something that I get excited about. Or look forward to. Or think I'm really all that qualified to do. Especially if there's a stage involved. I always feel that there's someone else who can do a better job, or has something better to say. Always. I always feel like I'm unqualified and not good enough and we better set the bar pretty low for her.

So when I feel like I do an even remotely good job, I get pretty surprised. When people come up to me afterwards and tell me that they really needed to hear what I said, I feel the urge to look behind me to see who they're talking to. When I'm standing on that stage, and that preaching voice comes out of me, I wonder who it is that's talking. But, gradually, I'm beginning to learn that that girl is me, and that that voice is mine. It is God-given, but He has given it to me. Wonders never cease.

So, back to the bathroom. Like I said, I was feeling jazzed. What a fun word to describe such a fun feeling, right? I was remembering and reliving and retelling and relishing. Because it had been so good. I had done it and people had been touched and truth was proclaimed and God was glorified. And the buzz was real. But while doing all that jazzed enjoying, I had this niggling thought in the back of my mind: Am I supposed to be this excited over something I did? Is it okay to feel proud of myself? Do I even have anything worth being proud of anyway?

"All of us have become like one who is unclean,
and all our righteous acts are like filthy rags..."
Isaiah 64.6

Even my righteous acts are like filthy rags compared to the righteousness of Christ. I bring my meager, pitiful offering of obedience, and Jesus - not me - is the one who multiplies it and transforms it into something beautiful that can feed multitudes. The gifts I have weren't even mine to begin with - they were given to me, and even when I try to use them I am like a small child learning to ride a bike. When I finally figure out how to stay upright, the wheels keep wobbling and I can't get very far before I topple and fall off again.

So how could my getting up on that stage and allowing God to breathe life into the words He had given me to share be cause for me being proud of myself, in any capacity? What do I have to even be proud of? It was only from God and through God that any of it was even possible.

So, as is custom for late-night bathroom talk, I outsourced the question: "Steven, is it okay to be proud of myself? Is it okay to feel this excited about something I did?" And, in typical Steven fashion, he answered with a resounding yes. According to him, the more excited we feel about ourselves, the better, and walking around patting ourselves on the backs should be an everyday, multiple times a day, exercise. At least, for him it is. While Steven is truly one of the most humble men I know, his confidence has never ceased to amaze me.

One of my favorite parts of marriage is that Steven teaches me new things every day. There are quite a few things that we see differently, and a couple things we outright disagree on. But I know my husband, and if he has a different perspective on something, it is either because he has thought and prayed and read and studied, or it is because he is a different person with different life experiences and a different personality with a different lens on the world. So I love to dig in and figure out what he knows and what he has learned and why he sees the situation in a different light. I always learn so much when I take the time to ask questions and listen, and I think maybe he has learned a lot from doing this with me too.

So, this night, I dug in. I decided to listen to why he believed it was ok to be proud of ourselves. I have always felt that being proud of myself in any capacity was dangerous, sinful even. I mean, self-pride is never spoken of well in Scripture, and it never seems to lead to anything good, so how could it be ok to be proud of myself?

We talked for a while, back and forth, listening and learning - not just about pride and behavior, but about each other too. There were many good thoughts and perspectives, and I know my husband better today than I did the morning before this chat, but nothing seemed to shake the hold I had on the idea that I have absolutely nothing worth being proud of, and no right to take any pride in my stepping onto that stage.

But then he made a connection that I couldn't wiggle around to look at any differently than how he had displayed it. He talked about our littlest kiddo....

Our 3-year-old, Jesse, LOVES to come hang out in the kitchen while we are cooking. When Steven is cooking eggs or pancakes, Jesse is there. When I'm baking banana bread or cookies, Jesse is there. When Steven is mixing and forming hamburger patties, Jesse is there. When I'm putting together a soup or a salad, Jesse is there.

And even more than being there with us, Jesse LOVES to help. Anything we will let him do, he loves. Dumping in the teaspoons and half-cups, mixing together the dry ingredients, stirring the pot, adding the chocolate chips. And he's so proud when the food is ready, too.

"Daddy, I made pancakes!"

Daddy, I made pancakes. The words ring in my heart even now. Did Jesse create or purchase the ingredients? No. Did he come up with the recipe? Determine the proportions or the flavors that would go best together? No. Did he set the griddle temperature or decide how long to wait before flipping them over? No. But when he brings the plate with the golden, steaming, delicious pancakes to the table and says, "Daddy, I made pancakes!" we smile and exclaim and glow because we are so proud of him.

And he is proud of him too. And we celebrate that, we encourage it. We delight when he delights in himself. Did he earn it? Does he deserve it? No. He couldn't have done it by himself, not yet. And we definitely have a bigger mess to clean up now because he helped. But, at the same time, yes. He did earn it, through joining in with us and listening, responding, following our guidelines, sticking with it until the end. He does deserve it, because he said yes, and because he is ours, and because we say he does.

Daddy, I made pancakes.

Daddy, I made pancakes. I said yes. I prayed and listened and made cutting room floor decisions. I walked on that stage and took that microphone and looked into the lights and opened my mouth. I used my voice, Your voice, the voice You breathed life into and anointed and gave to me.

And You were proud. Proud of my yes and proud of my trembling hand and proud of the words that you gave and I chose and you anointed and I spoke. You were glowing with delight and calling me your own and brimming with pride. And somewhere in there, the line between You and me got blurry and I was proud of myself. And you were proud of that too.

Allure Me

Shards of broken and bleeding 

Everywhere I turn 

The chaos in my heart 

The churning in my thoughts 

Constant betrayal 

Is there nowhere safe? 

Is there no one safe? 

Who to trust, where to turn 

I stumble 

Even the sacred is defiled 

The ear-splitting screams of rending 

The rending of the heart in two
My screams

Desperate 

Gasping for the quiet vastness 

The stillness of the wilderness 

Take me to the wilderness 

Lead me to the wilderness
Allure me

My hand in Yours 

The quiet bleeding of heartbreak 

Unstaunchable flow 

Cracked open and silently spilling forth 

Life flowing out 

Emptied in the wilderness 

The still of nothingness 

Dreams unraveled 

The quiet of brokenness 

Busted wide open 

Exposed in the wilderness

The quiet of abandonment 

Straining for a whisper, a breath 

Silence 

Burning for a drop, a taste 

Dust 

The withering thirst, 

The gnawing hunger of the wilderness 

Parched 

And at your mercy 

Desperate surrender
Allure me

Quiet stillness, all around 

The quiet of being 

Broken, yet set free 

Empty, with space to be filled 

New-life stirring in the wilderness 

Breath 

Breathe 

The quiet wonder of being seen 

In the most exposed places 

The perfect beauty of being known 

In the most broken-empty pieces 

Found 

In the wilderness 

Discovering 

Breathing in 

The richness of presence 

The vastness of grace 

Undeserved 

Unearned 

Undeniable 

Uncontainable 

Unbreakable 

Unquenchable

The quiet stitches of healing 

Made strong by grace and truth 

Feet planted and rising again 

On sea-legs made strong by the storm 

The way before me lit 

By the light filtering through the cracks 

Pure and resplendent 

In the beauty of the wilderness 

~~~~~ 

“Oh, that I had wings like a dove; 

then I would fly away and rest! 

I would fly far away 

to the quiet of the wilderness.” 

Psalm 55.6-7

Numbered Christmases and Greasy Pigs

There is a web to be woven here. Not one of deceit, but one of beauty and cherishing and healing and wholeness. But right now I just have the individual strands, and I'm trying to discern which thread to pick up first, and to anticipate how they will all join together.

Family can be so hard. Being in a family is hard. Coming from a family is hard. Finding your place in a family is hard. Brene Brown, in her book Rising Strong, says:

"I can't think of a better way to describe what it feels like to try and get your head and heart around who you are and where you come from than wrestling a greased pig in the dark. Our identities are always changing and growing, they're not meant to be pinned down. Our histories are never all good or all bad, and running from the past is the surest way to be defined by it. That's when it owns us. The key is bringing light to the darkness - developing awareness and understanding."

Wrestling a greased pig in the dark. She's right isn't she? That's what it feels like. How do we truly come to know ourselves? How do we learn to separate our individual self from our family of origin and figure out where they end and we begin? Is it even possible to truly exist as an individual in isolation from our families? When so much of who I am and how I react and the ways in which I view the world and how I choose to exist in it - it all stems out of the person I was growing into as I was simultaneously growing out of this collective identity of family. Wrestling a greased pig in the dark, for sure.

It is so easy to blame every thing I don't like about the human I am today on the flaws and failures of the family I grew up in. As if none of it could possibly be my own fault. And coupled with the pain from the wounds inflicted by family, which somehow plunge the deepest yet are the slowest to heal, I now have a cocktail of blame and bitterness and resentment towards those who first gave, and shaped, my life. At best, this cocktail is 'simply' explosive in its retaliatory wounding; at worst, it is lethal to the relationship.

Jesus, forgive me.

It took a Christmas song to wake me up. Sleeping At Last wrote a beautiful Christmas song called "Snow." There's no way I'd be able to describe it with any measure of justice, so you should just go listen yourself. It is absolutely beautiful, and it is beautifully sad. As I listened to this song, I found myself grieving a loss so deep and soul-shifting that I couldn't keep the tears from streaming down my face. And I haven't even experienced this loss yet! There was no single lyric that jumped out and caught my attention; rather, it was several phrases in the song, and the feel of the song, and the author's shared thoughts on why he wrote the song (podcast here) that touched my heart so definitively.

And woke me up to the realization that I have a finite number of innocent Christmases left.

One day, Christmas will bring with it a heartbreak so great that I may not even want to celebrate at all. How many have known a grief so unbearable that they felt like just canceling Christmas altogether? Whether it is the death of a parent or sibling or spouse, or family brokenness that rends the heart in two, or the loss of a child even through something as beautiful as marriage? Right now, everyone I love still has a place around the table, and a stocking hanging from their hook, and gathers with us around the tree. I haven't lost a single one, and I don't have to share them either.

But one day my innocent Christmas will be destroyed by death or loss. No matter how viciously I fight the thought, our perfect Christmases are numbered. And one day they will be tainted with the stench of death and loss. Maybe they will usher in with them a new kind of beauty, but the stench no doubt will continue to fill our senses too.

Why did no one tell me this sooner?

How many Christmases have I wasted? How many do I have left?

And how many other perfect moments do I continue to waste on bitterness and blame and resentment?

I know, 'perfect' may not seem like the right word to use. Because rarely are any of our Christmases perfect - much less our everyday moments. But I wonder if one day I will remember them as perfect simply because we were all present. Because our world hadn't shifted off its axis yet. Because I'd take hearing them say just about anything if it meant I got to hear their voice just one more time.

So, today, and with the moments I have left, what if somehow I could learn to show up and be present myself? Wrestle my own greasy pig in the darkness of my own shame and failure and vulnerability and fear, and then show up, bringing the light of awareness and understanding with me, the light of grace. Keep wrestling my way through the bad in my history and choose to embrace the innumerable moments of good. And treasure the fragile moments I have each every day with each and every one I love. Before these numbered Christmases run out.

Lord, as I wrestle my own greasy pig, and try to capture the threads of my own who I am and where I come from, may the web I weave become a masterpiece of gratitude and grace. And may I show up for every moment of the mess.

Abundance and Enough

I can't remember who said this, which podcast I heard it on, or even if this is actually what they said...so maybe I'll just claim it as my own. Haha, if I actually got it right and it's yours and you somehow end up reading this, please let me know because I'd be happy to give you credit.

"I can't be a perfect parent, but I can do my own work."

I want SO MUCH to be a perfect parent. I want to be intentional with every moment, and perfectly handle every conflict, and make the most of every opportunity, and plan the perfect balance of fun, training and relationship, and find the perfect structures for discipline and responsibility, and model perfectly life with Christ, and live out the perfect marriage, and perfectly order my priorities...and all the other versions of perfect that you can think of.

No really. I live every day trying to hit all these things.

And I live every day feeling like a spinning top, the speed of my spinning carrying me in wandering circles of too much and not enough, until, overwhelmed and empty, my spinning runs out and I fall. Spent, yet with so little to show for it.

And maybe that's not fair. My kids are incredible. Clearly, by the utter grace of God, something has worked. Something is getting through. And though my efforts fall far short of the perfection that I'm aiming for, the effort is paying off.

But when I heard these words: "I can't be a perfect parent, but I can do my own work," I wondered if maybe I was approaching my parenting from the wrong side. Maybe instead of finding all the right ways to DO parenting, it would be more effective (and probably more efficient) to find the right way to BE a parent.

Sure, I've heard it before. "[Fill in the blank] is caught, not taught." Responsibility is caught, not taught. A relationship with Jesus is caught, not taught. Character is caught, not taught. I get it. But I think when I considered this motto, I always thought it meant that I had to get my mess together so that my kids could catch all that right stuff from me. But I still set my standard for perfecting my living so that my kids could see and therefore catch it all.

But what if, instead of perfecting my living, I simply have to work on my heart? Okay, I said *simply* work on my heart. HA, there's nothing simple about heart-work, but maybe it will feel like less senseless spinning.

Could this work? Instead of trying to perfect my chores routine and fit this routine into my current daily rhythms of work and family and play and rest so that I can model it for my children and then subsequently work a daily chores routine into their rhythms too so that they can one day leave home contributing members of society who know how to clean their own toilets and do their own laundry...what if instead of ALL of that I could *simply* work on decluttering my heart and detaching from materialism and simplifying my lifestyle choices and disciplining myself to spend 30 minutes a day cleaning and decluttering instead of binge-watching or overeating?

Really??? This is the choice?! That doesn't seem like it could work...AT ALL!

[hysterical laughing]

There's no chance I have enough energy - or time or attention - or, did I say, ENERGY to do that kind of work as often as I'd need to in order to make a difference in my home, much less in my children's lives. I don't have nearly enough...

. . .

Sneak peak into my writing style. Most of the time when I sit down to write I have an idea or two, but I don't really know where they'll take me or even sometimes, how they'll connect. That was the case today. Two ideas, with a sense inside that they were connected, but that I'd have to explore a bit to discover the connection. So I start writing, and the process of getting my thoughts and feelings on paper brings clarity and order and illuminates connections. This is my process of discovering truth.

Sometimes the discovery of truth is like a sun rising - gentle and slow and steadily growing brighter and brighter until it, at last, peeks over the horizon and radiates warmth and light.

Other times my discoveries are more like barreling smack into a glass wall that you didn't even realize was there. One minute you're walking along, minding your own business, and the next minute you're picking yourself up off the floor.

Today is the latter.

So pardon me while I finish brushing the dust off.

"The opposite of scarcity is not abundance; the opposite of scarcity is simply enough." ~ Brene Brown, Rising Strong

Let me remind you what I was saying...before I hit my glass wall: I don't have nearly enough.

I walk around with this mentality that I don't have nearly enough. Sometimes (when I'm being honest, so don't tell) I admit that I walk around believing that I am not nearly enough. I live this one life I've got believing the lie that I have a scarcity problem. That if only I had more time - an abundance of time - or more energy, or more mental space...if only I had abundance, then I could find that place of not just doing, but of being enough.

If I had abundance, I could do my work, and give my kids the enough that they deserve.

But Brene says that the opposite of scarcity is not abundance - it is simply enough. And her words have the sting of truth to them, don't they?

"And God is able to bless you abundantly, so that in all things at all times, having all that you need, you will abound in every good work." 2 Corinthians 9.8

"And my God will meet all your needs according to the riches of his glory in Christ Jesus." Philippians 4.19

Oh snap. Abundantly...all things...all times...all that you need...abound...in every good work. All your needs...according to the riches of his glory.

I will *never* have abundance. I don't have the capacity for it. I'm a leaky vessel and all the good just keeps seeping out.

But I do have enough.

Because God has met my need in abundance, I can have enough. Because God has met my need in abundance, I can be enough. Enough for my children. Enough for my husband. Enough for my friends. Enough for my mom and my sister and my dad. Enough for my students and co-workers and teammates. Enough for my chores and systems and mess. Enough to do my heart-work.

Is the right way to do parenting the systems-and-modeling method, or the do-your-work method? Heck, I have no idea. Honestly, it's probably both. I cannot rely solely on the systems method - and I definitely won't model the right stuff - if I'm not willing to do my own work. But I don't think just doing my heart-work is going to get my kids very far in the practicals of learning responsibility for their own space and their own bodies, either. But what I do know (now, thanks to that glass wall) is that in all things, I have enough...and I am enough.

Because Christ meets me in my failing systems with His abundant mercy. And Christ covers my flawed modeling with His abundant grace. And Christ shows up to my valiant efforts at doing my own heart-work with His abundant transformational and healing power. Because of His abundance, I can live in the place of always enough.

Lord, help me to always lean into your abundance and live in this place of always enough. Correct me when I try to stand in my own strength and catch me when I crumble under the weight. Teach me to rest in your abundant grace and wait on your transformational power. Give me wisdom to know when to teach systems, when to rely on modeling, and when to "simply" do my own work. And when my efforts and ideas fail, I trust you to faithfully and diligently teach my children all they need to know to live their own lives of abundance and enough.

Tattered Trust and Fragile Hope

Just over a year ago, I went through one of the hardest things I've experienced thus far in my life. I've had a pretty easy life, compared to many - most, if we're talking the whole world - but just because it is a "privileged," "easy," or "normal" version of pain and heartache doesn't make it any less painful for me. And so I get to work my way through it just like anyone else.

I'm reading Rising Strong by Brene Brown right now as part of my working through it, and she wrote the following:

"Once we fall in the service of being brave, we can never go back. We can rise up from our failures, screwups, and falls, but we can never go back to where we stood before we were brave or before we fell. Courage transforms the emotional structure of our being. This change often brings a deep sense of loss. During the process of rising, we sometimes find ourselves homesick for a place that no longer exists. We want to go back to that moment before we walked into the arena, but there's nowhere to go back to."

These thoughts resonate with me so deeply that it brings tears to my eyes. I can never go back. The Beth that existed is no more. The Beth that showed up to the table with something to offer will never show up again, or bring the same simply beautiful offering. The Beth who believed wholeheartedly and hoped unwaveringly and obeyed enthusiastically now believes with a bit of trepidation and hopes with a little more desperation and obeys with a little more hesitation. This past year brought death to not only hopes and dreams and innocence, but also to the entire person I used to be.

And I must grieve.

Beth Moody was good. Fallen, yes, but also good. She was quick to see good. She could turn any situation around and see the good in it, and she could look at any person and see the good in her or him. She believed that people were redeemable and that no situation was ever hopeless, that it was never too late nor the work too hard. She was quick to say yes, both to God and to people. Maybe to a fault, Beth would bend over backwards to help someone, even at great cost to herself. And she was quick to say yes to God. Phrases like, "It's not about me" and "Here am I! Send me!" characterized her obedience to her Heavenly Father. She wasn't one to chase the spotlight, but in a crowd of people she could find the one that needed a listening ear. She was innocent and sometimes naive, but there was a beauty in her that drew others, and left them encouraged and hopeful once again. She left behind husband, Steven, and four young children. She served her family sacrificially and spent herself in showing Jesus to them and making her home a place where all could know Christ and He would be glorified.

There is a deep sense of loss when I think about the person I used to be. And still some bitterness that I can never get her back. Homesick, yes, that too. I still get homesick for the place I used to live as my former self. A place of not knowing how hard life could be or how deeply one can hurt. A place where God's goodness was never in question. A place where I possessed the childlike faith that I could trust God, without hesitation, in all things.

Brene goes on to say:

"What makes this more difficult is that now we have a new level of awareness about what it means to be brave. We can't fake it anymore. We now know when we're showing up and when we're hiding out, when we are living our values and when we are not."

 So now it's time to walk into what is next: the next version of Beth and the next place I'm to make my home (both figuratively and literally). The old has gone and the new has come. It's time to walk into it, no matter how hard it might get.

And as I take my first steps, I now have a new level of awareness of what it means to say yes to God - what it means to be brave. Being brave is a lot more scary when you know the taste of dirt in your mouth, when you know the gritty grief of self-death. And as tempting as it will be to show up only half-heartedly as a means of self-protection and self-preservation, I will not fake it. I will not hide. I wish I could introduce you to the new Beth Moody, but I don't actually know her yet. But even still, whoever I am now, I will bring my full yes to God, knowing the price He might ask me to pay. Knowing that I might bring Him my yes - give Him the absolute best of my creativity and energy, choose trust and hope and bravery, step into the arena and fight for these dreams - and find myself face-down in the dirt again with my tattered trust and fragile hopes in shattered pieces all around me.

And it would still be worth it. Even in failure, it is still always worth it.

Living a life of bravery has less to do with final victory and more to do with living the victory of saying yes to every moment, to every battle. To every opportunity to hope and dream and believe and fight alongside and for the person next to you. The victory is not hiding. Not hiding from the fear or the pain - or even the failure, but standing back up and stepping back into the arena and lifting your sword yet again.

I will live this life of victory.

.
.
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I could stop right now in this post. It would probably be better if I did. But there's one more place I must go.

One year ago I experienced the death of a dream. And like anyone who has lost someone knows, death is not a one-day event. Stepping from last summer into the school year, I knew it would be a year of death. It sounds morbid, I know, but it was a reality for me. I would spend an entire year mourning the loss of my dream and watching every last vestige of it die and fade away. I would be asked to hand over my dream to another and then walk away.

But sometimes there is a cost to obedience, and this was it, so I walked straight into it. Others may have walked away, but my obedience required walking into it. So in I went.

It was one of the hardest years I've ever walked through, but what completely blindsided me was that it was also a year of some of the most explosive new life I've ever experienced as well. Hand in hand, I walked through the year with excruciating death on one side and brilliant new life on the other.

Isn't that just like Jesus and His upside down Kingdom?

"Very truly I tell you, unless a kernel of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains only a single seed. But if it dies, it produces many seeds." John 12.24

"Then Jesus said to his disciples, 'Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. For whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for me will find it.'" Matthew 16.24-25

When I am willing to let go of all that I dreamed before, and all that I was before - when I am willing to live through my own death and release all that I had clung to so tightly - it is in that kind of obedience that the Lord works the miracle of new life in, and through, me.

Brene also adds:

"Our new awareness can also be invigorating - it can reignite our sense of purpose and remind us of our commitment to wholeheartedness. Straddling the tension that lies between wanting to go back to the moment before we risked and fell and being pulled forward to even greater courage is an inescapable part of rising strong."

 One day maybe I'll be able to introduce you to the new Beth Moody who I am becoming. I have this sneaking feeling that there might be a lot of similarities between her and the former me. That maybe things like my sense of purpose - my belief that people are worth fighting for, that it's never too late to keep fighting, and that one of the best strategies in the battle is to listen - will not be absent but rather sharpened and honed to greater effectiveness. And one day I will share with you the new dreams that have had new life-giving breath breathed into them.

And, oh by the way, those dreams will be BIG. So get ready.

Because, while my trust is tattered and my hope feels fragile...

"...he [says] to me, 'My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.' Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me." 2 Corinthians 12.9

Jesus, make me brave. Stitch back together my trust and restore my hope. Comfort me as I grieve loss and plant me in a new place of belonging. And as you do these things, help me to keep saying yes. Help me to choose victorious obedience over self-preservation. Let everything die in me that you don't want to remain, and let everything experience new life in me that you don't want to die. Let me choose honest weakness over false strength, and let me boast in my weakness as you show yourself strong. And let my rising strong be a display, not of my strength, but of your incredible power in me. Amen.

One Lifetime of Moments

I was chatting with a friend today. She had just flown home from a missions trip and found out once she landed that the flight *literally* right before hers had crashed only six minutes after takeoff - and every person on that first flight had been killed. It's one of those experiences that makes you realize how close we walk to death every single day.

We only get one lifetime on this spinning ball of earth. One lifetime with those we love. One lifetime with those who have never felt love. One lifetime of laughter and tears and holding hands and sharing stories. One lifetime of knowing and being known and living broken and holding one another up in the midst of heart-splitting pain. One lifetime of truth-telling and life-speaking and dream-chasing. One lifetime to fight for what is right and protect what is good and spend ourselves in rescuing one another from the clutches of the enemy. Whether our lifetime is long or short, we only get our one.

I'm in a season of goodbyes right now. I'm transitioning away from a position in ministry that I love with a group of students that I am crazy about at a campus that has burrowed down deep into a special little spot in my heart. And the clock keeps ticking off the seconds that are stealing away the last of my precious moments with them all. My heart is raw with the ache of it, and the tears come often.

I didn't want to leave.

And I don't want to be forgotten.

But the reality is that most of us will, one day, be completely forgotten. How many generations will it take for my own children's children's children to forget even my name?

But for vanity's sake, I am so thankful that my children will never forget my name. Like, never. Ever. Nor will my husband. And I have a few friends who are just stuck with me. I've told them that it doesn't matter where I move or where they move, they're stuck with me now. No matter what the future brings, we're just going to keep being friends - because I've decided I can't do life without them. They won't ever be able to forget my name (even if they wanted to). And you know what? Maybe there are even a couple others - maybe - who I've made some small imprint in their lives and somehow their lives will be forever altered, even if just slightly. Maybe some of them won't forget my name either.

And that's the thing, isn't it? We only get one.lifetime.each. But each of our lifetimes is made up of a million moments.

A lifetime of moments.

And each moment has the potential to make a difference. Each moment carries the potential to impact another - to touch a heart, to share hope, to ask forgiveness, to speak light into darkness, to breath life into a dream, to break down a wall, to alter the trajectory of the life of another.

We each get only one lifetime, but it is a lifetime of moments. And each moment is precious. Each moment is holy. Each moment has the potential to leave an imprint in someone's life that they will never forget.

I am asking myself: How am I using the last of my precious moments in this place and with these people? Am I running from the ache of goodbye and the pain of being replaceable? Or am I seizing the last of these holy moments and speaking truth and life and beauty into the hearts of these precious souls?

Even with tears running down my cheeks, I will not waste a single one.