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When the Nativity Let Loose

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In the story of Jesus’ birth, it says an angel appeared to Mary and told her the Holy Spirit was going to come to her, and she would become pregnant and give birth to the Savior. I read this in preparation to share it with a group of teenage moms and I confess, I paused at this point trying to figure out a way to make it sound more palatable. I even remember praying and asking God, “Who is going to believe this”, which is funny because I wholeheartedly believe it, but if you haven’t heard this story, it seems preposterous right?

Then I read John 1:10 “…the world did not recognize him. 11 He came to that which was his own, but his own did not receive him. 12 Yet to all who did receive him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God—13 children born not of natural descent, nor of human decision or a husband’s will, but born of God.”

That verse brought a whole new perspective for me. I relate to what happened to Mary because it is the same thing that happened to me. No, I didn’t miraculously become pregnant and give birth to a savior, BUT what did happen was a rebirth in me that was not natural and didn’t happen because of my parents but happened in a supernatural way through the Holy Spirit. I have seen this same process lived out repeatedly in the lives of people close to me. Friends in the middle of completely impossible situations which God miraculously turned around for good. I have watched addicts so weary and hopeless, put their trust in Him and completely live out this chrysalis process of rebirth into something wholly different. They were not empowered on their own and neither was I. It was evident there was something more that came to them and gave them peace in moments where there should not have been peace, release from oppression, and hope right in the middle of hopelessness. I have seen release and healing from such a traumatic and abusive past it seems ridiculous that anyone would have survived it, but God…

Nicodemus was a Rabbi who came to Jesus one night and he is told this very odd thing, that no one will see the kingdom of God unless they are born again. To Nicodemus this seems obviously strange and he asks, John 3:4 “How can someone be born when they are old?” … “Surely they cannot enter a second time into their mother’s womb to be born!”

5 Jesus answered, “Very truly I tell you, no one can enter the kingdom of God unless they are born of water and the Spirit. 6 Flesh gives birth to flesh, but the Spirit[b] gives birth to spirit. 


Jesus was both flesh and spirit sent on a supernatural mission. His mother Mary was a young woman around 14 years old, whose parents had arranged her marriage to a man named Joseph. This was the tradition in her culture and typically the groom or his parents would pay a sum of money for the bride. It would be equivalent to what you or I would pay as a down payment for a house. It was a big commitment. During this process, the groom offers the bride a cup of wine (this would be like a fiancé offering a bride-to-be a wedding ring) and her accepting and taking a drink of the wine means she agrees to be part of his family. The groom would then begin working on building a home for them under the supervision of his father. Only his father can say when the home is finished. The bride waits in expectation, she doesn’t know when the time will be when he will come for her, and she just has to be prepared. Only when the groom’s father says it is finished, can he go and get her. When he does, his friends go with him, and they begin shouting and making loud noises when they come near her home. It’s a very celebratory time. [1]

Even though the marriage ceremony had not taken place yet for Mary and Joseph, since he had made a contract with her parents, they were officially considered married during this time.
Before the marriage ceremony happens for Mary and Joseph, while she is still a virgin, Mary becomes pregnant by the Holy Spirit. Jewish law stated if a woman was pregnant before coming together with her husband she could be stoned to death. Her husband, under this same Jewish law, would be the one to have to bring the charges. Joseph knew that the child was not his and it had to have felt like the ultimate betrayal. He was a good man, and he did not want to subject Mary to a trial and punishment, nor did he want to disgrace her publicly, so he decided to break the engagement quietly. While he is considering this, he falls asleep and an angel appears to Joseph in a dream and tells him “do not be afraid to go ahead with your marriage to Mary, For the child within her has been conceived by the Holy Spirit. You will have a son, and you are to name him Jesus, for he will save his people….”[2]

A Savior is something they had been looking and praying for. They were living under great oppression by the Roman government. The families were heavily taxed by both local and faraway rulers who, some scholars believe, demanded as much as 50% to 60% of what the common people grew and owned. Unlike the American system, which uses a portion of taxes to help the less fortunate, all these taxes were used to boost the wealth of rulers.[3] If the workers couldn’t pay then they ended up with no land, or no animals, or worse, they could take their daughters or sons as slaves.

For years Mary’s people had prayed for a savior that would conquer this oppressive system and bring freedom. It wasn’t just the political system that was oppressive, it was the religious leaders at the time as well. They were pretentious and believed themselves superior because of the self-righteous way they followed the law.

The Messiah or a Savior was something God’s prophets had spoken about over 300 times in scriptures of the Old Testament. What the people, in general believed was that this person, this savior would come in the way of a great military leader certainly not a baby.

The Roman Emperor wants a census to be taken so he can make certain he is getting all the taxes he should, and Herod wants to have a census because he is expecting to have to take care of this person who the Jews keep talking about as the “King of the Jews”. From the Torah, he knows about the prophet Micah’s words that the Messiah would be born in Bethlehem. Everyone must go back to the hometown they were born in and for Joseph and Mary along with him, this means Bethlehem. This journey, at that time, would have normally taken around 4 days but could have taken as long as a week. It was 90 miles they walked.

So, imagine this time for Mary. What would have started as a time of coming age for her and a time of celebration, had to have also been laced with incredible fear, the fear of not knowing how Joseph would react, would he reject her, would she be on her own, would she face a trial, would she be rejected because her family would perceive this as disgrace…? It must have been the ultimate bittersweet moment because she had no idea how all of this was going to play out but through it all, she knows she is carrying a great gift! She is expecting. That’s such a great word. Are we expecting? She didn’t know how this thing was going to play out. All she knew was a savior was coming. We don’t know how each of our situations is going to play out either exactly yet, we know a savior has come and we can rest in hope because of it.

When they arrived in Bethlehem, she was in the process of labor and there was no place for them. She ended up giving birth in a stable, surrounded by animals. She literally gave birth to Hope. I want to take a little pause here to say that sometimes moments of hope, just like this, are unexpected, and they don’t necessarily look or feel like moments of hope. It was labor. It was painful. It was messy. There was the smell of barn animals.

God whispers are different than what our world or culture whispers as greatness. They weren’t wealthy people, or necessarily beautiful or successful, Mary didn’t give birth in a palace with a midwife surrounded by satin… but their hearts… their hearts were pure. The moment was divine, and it was a beautiful moment.

In the second chapter of Luke, it describes that an angel appears to the shepherds and sings with an entire choir in the middle of a field. It says, “God’s glory blazed around them.” I love God’s plan of announcing the birth of Jesus with the ones whose primary duty was safety, protection, and guidance for a vulnerable population (sheep). They were not political powerhouses or Hollywood elite; they did not even have a platform, at least not until now.

“Angels announced Jesus birth to shepherd’s that were in a nearby field. The word says they couldn’t believe it and, “They left, running, and found Mary and Joseph, and the baby lying in the manger. Seeing was believing. They told everyone they met what the angels had said about this child. All who heard the sheepherders were impressed. Mary kept all these things to herself, holding them dear, deep within herself. (What beautiful affirmation to her to hear the shepherd’s stories) The sheepherders returned and let loose, glorifying and praising God for everything they had heard and seen. It turned out exactly the way they’d been told!” Luke 2:15-19msg

Also, as a side note, I remember learning when I visited Israel that the fields the shepherds were tending their flocks in that night were Boaz fields. If you are familiar with the story of Ruth, then you know that Boaz acted as a kinsman redeemer for Ruth. He saved Ruth and her mother-in-law. Together they had Obed who was father to Jesse, who was father to King David. All are in the family tree of Jesus and here we see a re-visitation to the past years later and God’s redemption for His people as a story that plays out over and over again.

In Israel, there are many places called a “Tel” like Tel Aviv, or Tel Jezreel and ultimately these are mounds of earth created over centuries as successive layers of civilizations are built one over the other. Typically, cities would be built in strategic locations where they would put them on a hill so that the city was more defendable. Wars were fought, cities were obliterated, new cities were built on top of the old, and repeated over centuries. Tel means a hill both a literal hill and a hill of archaeological remains.[4] We stand on all these incredible multi-layers of history. Our own story laid upon stories upon stories… and yet what happened that night in the field with the shepherds is just as important to our story as it was to theirs. A rescuer was sent.

Nothing temporal changed for the sheepherders that day. Not their position. Not their responsibilities. Not their family. But everything changed that day. They experienced hope like nothing they had ever experienced. God’s presence changed everything. Several years ago I was diagnosed with cancer. Before all the facts came in, I thought am I stage 1 or stage 4 is it in other places do I need to start thinking of my life in months vs. years is this where I am now? Then I met with one of the mentors for our nonprofit group and she started sharing with me her story of overcoming cancer, and her daughters’ story of overcoming a type of cancer which had spread throughout her body and what she shouldn’t have overcome. She prayed so powerfully that I walked around in a stupor of joy for three days. Nothing changed in my situation, I didn’t have any answers, I still didn’t know how things were going to play out, yet everything changed by His presence in it. No matter what, even through hardship I knew I was going to be ok.

Throughout history, God has provided us with direction and road signs along the way. Promises and prophecies. We don’t have to see the whole picture. If we did we probably wouldn’t be able to handle it, but there is incredible comfort and confidence in knowing that what He says He is going to do He does. He is trustworthy. His plans are always bigger than what we can see or envision. It takes courage to trust that His plans are good especially in the middle of difficult circumstances, when our situation doesn’t look like the image we had in our head.

Many times, in the bible we are called the bride of Christ. When we look at this in the light of Jewish wedding tradition, we see that Jesus ended up paying a steep price for us. He went to prepare a place for us in heaven. Only the Father says when it’s time for Him to come back but He is coming, and it will be celebratory and with the sound of a loud trumpet! Each time we take communion it’s us reliving this contract of commitment with Him it’s Him asking will you be part of my family? You accepting, is you saying yes.

In the movie The Nativity Story, Mary meets one of the shepherds before she gives birth and he tells her “The greatest gift is the one you are carrying inside you”. When we open the door and invite God into our lives then we experience what Mary experienced, a partnership with the supernatural. Then the greatest gift we have to give is inside us as well. He is light for dark places, a restorer, healer, joy, peace, acceptance, He brings belonging. He loves.

Romans 5:3-5 says, “There’s more to come: We continue to shout our praise even when we’re hemmed in with troubles, because we know how troubles can develop passionate patience in us,… keeping us alert for whatever God will do next. In alertexpectancy such as this, we’re never left feeling shortchanged. Quite the contrary—we can’t round up enough containers to hold everything God generously pours into our lives through the Holy Spirit!”   

His glory is ablaze and His presence Unleashes Possibility.

A prayer: God thank you for preparing a place for us. If we have never opened the door to partnership with you let us open our hearts today. Let us trust that you are going to finish the good work you started in us and During this busy distracting season we want to clearly see you for who you are. We long to be transformed by the abundant and overwhelming love you have to give. Let us shine in dark places and LET LOOSE with praising and thanksgiving for all you have done on our behalf. We celebrate you and your son, and we move forward in alert
expectancy.  




[1] Feasts of Faith, Dallas and Carl Paetzold copyright @2011

[2] Matthew 1:30 NLT Tyndale

[3] http://articles.latimes.com/1994-12-24/local/me-12520_1_social-climate

[4] What’s in a name? – The Jerusalem Post (jpost.com)

Written on my daughter’s arm

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We talked for a long time about getting mother-daughter tattoos. We thought it would be a bonding experience before she left for college, and we looked at everything from arrows to infinity symbols trying to find “our thing.” It just never happened, and then she started college last fall.

After going through a very rough patch the second semester, she said, “Mom I think I want to get, “you are enough,” tattooed on my arm as a reminder when I go through difficult things. I love to write and immediately asked her if it could be in my handwriting. She loved the idea, and it morphed into her handwriting the same quote which I, in turn, had tattooed on my wrist… let the bonding commence.

It hurts. I’m just saying. I love that we did it. I love what it represents. I have a whole new respect for those who have full sleeves tattooed on their arms. I am uncertain I will ever fully “get you,” but alas, I admire your grit. As I was thinking about the whole experience this morning what I thought was, in the middle of dark seasons, I am glad my daughter has this reminder on her arm. I love that it says she is enough, I love that it’s in my handwriting, but I also realized I am far more at peace that she knows of the depth of the power of God that is far beyond me, or beyond anything that sits on the surface. If I am a voice calling from a boat to “just keep swimming,” I know He is the depth of an ocean of water beneath her, holding her up, allowing her to float, requiring her to swim and tread and trust. I know these are the things he uses to help us grow, gain muscle, wisdom, even find healing. So many times it doesn’t seem to make sense, this process, and as a mom, it’s tough to watch your kid swimming in the middle of a storm. It requires trust on our part too.

There are many voices on the surface causing us to question how we measure up. But we have to go deeper to the true depth of who we are. We cannot live on the surface or we will never understand our full value. There are those with tools I have never seen that have measured the depths of the ocean at 14,000 feet and more. I’m not sure I can fully wrap my mind around that depth, yet I believe this to be an accurate measurement and have incredible respect for the enormity of it. I believe in God in this same way. I don’t feel like I can ever seem to wrap my mind around him fully. But the force and power and enormity of who He is to me leaves me completely awestruck.

On the surface of my daughter’s arm is a quote that whispers keep going, you have everything you need, you are enough. Under the surface of that arm, is life surging in veins carrying fully coded individualized DNA that is evidence of a strategic plan and purpose the depth of which I have the utmost respect for and that is what I want her to remember when she sees this new message. Depth of faith is an endless source, trust that everything you need is already inside you.

Pick up the fire, leave the ashes.

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“Pick up the fire and leave the ashes.” This quote was part of a sermon I heard in preparing for the new year. The point was if our focus is looking back, we miss the good that is coming. We are to pick up the things that are useful and good and leave the burned out remains of what isn’t.

When my daughter was very young, I went through really rough season and I had a dream I was living in the home I had grown up in. I had hired a giant moving truck to come in and take away the garage. Immediately afterward my cousin comes to visit and sees me standing in this enormous amount of space which was left behind where the garage had been. She clearly doesn’t understand what I have done, while I am excited and kind of in awe at the vast expanse in front of me. She says, “why did you have it moved, it was a good garage.” Immediately there is a flood of doubt. I really have no idea why I had moved it. I start questioning myself and thinking out loud how I probably was going to want to park inside during bad weather, it was a good garage, and my dad, after all, had built it with his own hands. That was the end of the dream, and that last statement hung loudly in the air even after waking up.

During this same time, I am also reading the history of King Solomon. In it, he is explaining to an ally how his father, David, had it in his heart to build the temple in Jerusalem but it was not possible during his reign because he was at war on all sides. God tells him it will be his son who rebuilds and then during Solomon’s reign, there was peace so that he is able to do this.

The temple becomes a solid, stable place for the arc of the covenant to reside, and for the people to come and worship God. There is an incredible celebration over its completion and the moving in of the arc. Solomon praises God saying, “You have kept your promise to your servant David, my father. You made that promise with your own mouth, and with your own hands you have fulfilled it today.” I Kings 8:15niv These words made my heart jump because it echoed so closely the words in my dream. With your own hands… I felt like He was reaching up through the pages and saying look, I build things too, there is so much more I have for you, you are going to have to clear space for what I’m teaching you.

Then there was this, Solomon goes on to say, “Can it be that God will actually move into our neighborhood? Why, the cosmos itself isn’t large enough to give you breathing room, let alone this Temple I’ve built.” I Kings 8:27-32msg

How often do we look at our family of origin, work, friends, money, physical appearance and more to value ourselves, find our stability and worth? All the while God is trying to move into your neighborhood with something so much better, the cosmos isn’t enough to contain it. Let that sink in a minute. We have in our minds a list of what we think we need to stand stable. My dad was a great provider, and what he built was good. I needed more and I felt guilty for wanting more, it felt disrespectful. It felt like saying what I had been given by my family was not enough. When the truth is they needed more too. We may both value and respect all of what we have and were given and dream of even more. We need to align ourselves with those who challenge us to a higher level of thinking and achieving our next level whatever this may be. If God is as big as the cosmos, I want more!

“Pick up the fire and leave the ashes.”

Getting Real, Mentoring Advice from the Velveteen Rabbit

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The Velveteen Rabbit is a classic children’s book about a stuffed rabbit becoming real through the love of his owner. He is given as a gift to a little boy for Christmas and ends up in a toy room set aside and forgotten. The book says, “no one thought very much about him (the rabbit). He was naturally shy and being only made of velveteen, some of the more expensive toys quite snubbed him. The mechanical toys were very superior, and looked down upon everyone else; they were full of modern ideas, and pretended they were real…”

Between them all, according to the book, “the poor little Rabbit was made to feel himself very insignificant and commonplace, and the only person who was kind to him at all was the Skin Horse. He was wise, for he had seen a long succession of mechanical toys arrive to boast and swagger, and by-and-by break their mainsprings and pass away…”

I laughed when I read this because I thought mmm hmmm, Margery Williams Bianco just described people she knew. I imagined her seeing actual faces behind the “boast, swagger and pass away” line and the humanity of it all is humorous to me.

The horse explains that “Real isn’t how you are made it’s what happens to you when you are loved for a long, long time. It doesn’t happen all at once. . . You become. That’s why it doesn’t happen often to people who break easily or have sharp edges or have to be carefully kept. Generally, by the time you are Real, your hair has been loved off, and your eyes drop out and you get loose in the joints and very shabby. But these things don’t matter at all because once you are Real you can’t be ugly except to people who don’t understand such things.”

We adopted a tag line at the beginning of our program for teen moms, it reads “belong, beloved, become. . .” This seems to be the process; feeling a sense of belonging opens the door to feel loved and creates the courage to become everything you were created to be. Sometimes we feel forgotten. We are surrounded often by others who do not appear at all like us or to struggle in the way we do and by comparison, we always find ourselves lacking. We need to be reminded that unconditional love exists and that we hold inherent value because of the unique way we were created. These places we are called to are not for the faint of heart, “real” doesn’t happen often to those who break easily. So, here’s to those feeling lose in the joints and a little shabby today. The ones who are fighting to “get real” and loving unconditionally like the little boy. This is the place where we become the most authentic part of who we were meant to be because it reflects the one who both created and loves us unconditionally.

“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.” (Ephesians 3:19-20)

Making New Things From Ruins

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“I knew.” “Excuse me?” “I knew.” She drew the words out long, venomous. “I really am sorry, but I don’t know what you are talking about.” “You tried to cover up a crisis, but I knew!” She delivered these words like she had uncovered an adulterous affair, harsh and disgusted. She was seething. It wasn’t the first time. This time had to do with tablecloths, yes that’s right, and it was a memory that became an icon for many others to come of crazy chaos and difficult situations that did not feel redeemable.

Fast forward, I attended the wedding of a precious young woman I had mentored years earlier. I met her as she was transitioning out of jail and working through a program. She was in the middle of placing a child for adoption and working towards healing and recovery. It was an intense time and she did not finish the program. Her addiction leads her back to prison. She did her time, moved to another city and is now flourishing.

When we arrived at her wedding, I went behind the scenes to pray over her. Her daughter was sitting on a couch, the adoptive mom was sitting beside her. She was now nine years old and was dressed beautifully, waiting to accomplish her role as a flower girl. That goodness alone was almost more than my heart could handle. Her presence there was one of many symbols of redemption. My friend, looked at me shaking her head and asked, “Who in the world would have ever thought I would be getting married?”. My response, me! She burst into tears saying, “Yes, you so did, thank you for believing in me even when I didn’t believe in myself”. The makeup artist was not pleased, so we immediately began making jokes to pull it together again.

When I sat in the chapel that day and watched everything unfold, it was a continued fight to keep it together. All I remember repeating to God was “You Knew”. You knew this whole time, in the middle of heart-wrenching brokenness, full-blown addiction, prison, and quite frankly circumstances that were so overwhelming the ability to see how they could be turned around for good were but a flicker. You knew.

At that moment, He took words that had been spoken over me, ones that I had made to symbolize other actions and pain and gave them new life. For my friend, when she asked, He gave a new life there as well. He did it for her, He did it for me, and He will do it for you too. I am on the other side of so many things in this season of life. I dropped my daughter off at college and drove home thinking about how terrified I had been to be a mom, especially a single mom, again I told God, “You Knew”. He knew the whole time that we were going to make it and how He was going to provide. He knew how hard it would be, how inadequate I would feel and how incredibly beautiful a young woman my daughter would become.

I heard a song yesterday by Apollo LTD, and the lyrics of the bridge said,

“…the beautiful thing that you do is making new things out of ruins”

This I can adequately confirm is true. Time after time the situations that I thought were an absolute disaster were simply the rubble He used to rebuild something amazing.

You don’t have to know how He knows.

The Stilling Basin

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Summers growing up always included time at the lake. One of my favorite places was actually a stilling basin. If you are unfamiliar, a stilling basin is engineered to reduce the high kinetic energy that builds at the bottom of a dam. It’s a release of sorts and protects the foundation of the dam from erosion and scouring. Our lake is on the Canadian River about eight miles from our small West Texas hometown, 37 miles from Amarillo. The stilling basin has a great sandy area at the far end. It boasted lifeguards, and a food truck (before they were such a great culinary indulgence).

We would grab our beach towels and sunscreen and meet up with our aunts and cousins for a whole afternoon of catching minnows in paper cups, swimming like mermaids and building sandcastles. These were the purest moments. Occasionally, we would get to witness the release of water into the stilling basin and watch it rush over the edges of the jump with incredible force and into the reservoir.

I had three aunts in my early years, picture the “ya ya” sisterhood minus the alcohol. They loved to have fun, play games and most of all, they loved to laugh. They taught us to have adventures. When my grandmother was still living, the sisters would kidnap each other, have slumber parties and take weekend trips together.

A family is important, they also taught us that. They did not do this through words alone, but through their actions, by connecting, having dinners together, celebrating life, and taking care of each other during difficult moments. Last year one of the sisters passed away, and I’m not sure I have adequate words to describe the loss. It felt like a chink in armor I didn’t even know existed. My own mom has Alzheimer’s now, so memories feel more important than ever. It is so special when she calls me by name. A strange truth, I know. In my head, I celebrate with a giant YES! she still knows me. It is good to be known by her.

The passing of my aunt made me contemplate my own mom’s mortality. The heaviness was tangible. Then, one night, singing at a local worship conference, my mom’s face came to mind, just a flash of her really, but in the flash, I was singing through my mom’s face instead of my own. I had this instant deep realization that I will never lose my mom because I am her. I hold her DNA, her love, and her nurturing. Every meal she taught me to cook, every prayer she prayed, every time she made me feel special, called to check on me, wrote me a card, believed in me, those moments make up who I am. Every time she sang silly songs with me in the car, took me hiking in the woods, read to me. All of it is in me.

This is what love does. It makes us. It is foundational because it is the type of support that is transformational. I think the power of Romans 8:38-39 is the reminder that we can never be separated from His love either. It says, “…I am convinced that nothing can ever separate us from God’s love. Neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither our fears for today nor our worries about tomorrow—not even the powers of hell can separate us from God’s love.”

God’s love is an engineering marvel like my favorite stilling basin. When we rest in Him, choose to trust the process, it acts as a release. He sees you rushing forward and crashing against the rocks. His words are “Be still.” His love releases us into peace and generally changes our perception.

We know scientifically that energy, can never be created or destroyed; it can only be transferred. So, when we take our story to God, He transfers the built-up harsh kinetic energy of moving through life, dissipates the pressure of it and prevents it from eroding our foundation.  All the stored-up pressure of holding onto things that we shouldn’t, replaying situations and conversations in our heads, worrying if we are enough and if we have enough, walking through betrayal, illness, fear and loss… and it changes everything without destroying or creating anything. It’s simply a transfer of burden. Even in the turbulence, He reminds us we are not alone.

I have prayed for God to bring release, screamed for it when I thought it should come. I discovered He doesn’t operate on my time frame but every single time He stands with me in the middle of it. He sees us and calls us by name. Every moment in prayer, everything we have already walked through, every hair on our head, every song He has sung over us, makes us more like Him. A family is important, and He has shown us through His words and through His actions. He knows us, and it is good to be known by Him.

Releasing Joy

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My daughter graduated from high school (which seems very surreal). I would like to say for posterity sake, I kept her alive, I still have my hair, and I did not mow down one single person in a school drop off line. I definitely think this is award-worthy behavior and I also decided my favorite new mock job title would be “Single Mom Survivalist”. I did it! 

I posted on social media that I think as most people were seeing this (see pic below)

Cap and Gown

I was seeing this! (see pic below)

Being a mom has been the most extremely difficult thing I have ever done. It has also been my greatest honor, and my deepest joy. Her name (Addie) means “Spirit of Joy”. Last Fall as I was trying to brace myself for her last year of high school and my pending empty nest, processing the letting go… I see a plaque that says, “Unleash your Joy”! I sucked in a lot of air and I planted my feet and gave a loud (internal) shout back, NO! I do NOT want to unleash my joy. I bought the plaque anyway and it has become a kind of mantra to me ever since. It would be criminal if I didn’t “unleash my joy” because this girl, she’s amazing. It would be a tragedy to limit her because guess what, this world needs her, she is extraordinary. Really she is. She’s leaving home and living on her own now and I cannot even.

So I’m writing about all those surprising moments we find ourselves in, especially the ones which we weren’t really ready to be thrown headlong into. Sometimes, we experience situations that unleash us from what’s familiar and send us catapulting, arms flailing, into an unfamiliar destination. It may be as simple as a life transition, or it may be as complicated as loss, betrayal, illness, rejection, addiction…These moments, they rarely feel like instances of possibility or potential but hidden in the unfamiliar instability is a potential that didn’t exist before. It’s welcoming to a deeper relationship with God, a deeper level of trusting Him in which He calls us to a higher level.

This blog is a reminder to myself and to you, about unleashed potential, genesis moments, and restoration. These are our moments of welcoming an unleashing of possibility and learning to live in a new season, even sometimes in the awkward terrible, until we dig out grace, beauty, and peace. You are not alone momma.