Category Archives: writing

"You are Beautiful in God’s Eyes" by Lisa Shaw (a give-away)

Several months ago, I wrote a post on solving the problem of pain. In it, I talk about the idea of personal creativity and its direct connection to helping heal the wounds of others. Musicians play instruments. Singers sing. Bakers bake. Teachers teach. Planners plan. And writers… well we write. We give our words to others in hopes that something we’ve written might resonate with readers in a positive way, thus fostering heart health—body, soul, and spirit.

Lisa Shaw is one such writer, and she delivers a message of healing in her first book release, You are Beautiful in God’s Eyes. I’ve read the book through a few times now, even keeping it on my nightstand. Why? Well, I like the cover. Seeing Lisa’s beautiful smile reminds me of the loving investments she’s made into my heart over the years. Secondly, I keep her book handy because every word contained within is a continual reminder for me to look beyond the flawed perceptions I harbor about myself and, instead, to begin to see myself as God sees me.

Beautiful. Created by God’s hand. Thought about. Considered. In God’s image. On God’s heart.

Indeed, a message easily forgotten by me on days when I’m tempted by the enemy to focus solely on my imperfections. Each chapter in Lisa’s book rings with a clarion call to get back to the basics… back to the beginning when Father God sat with the idea of me on the front side of Genesis and called me very good. The idea of me when he walked his Son to a bloody grave. The idea of me when he walked his Son out from the grave and into the folds of heaven. The idea of me when he sent his Spirit to dwell in the hearts of his people. The idea of me when he tucked my life inside the safety of my mother’s womb. The idea of me some forty-five years later when it’s sometimes easy to forget that I’m still God’s very good idea… warts and all.

Perhaps you understand. Perhaps there are seasons when you’re easily swayed by personal opinion rather than God’s opinion. Times when you let down your spiritual guard to entreat the lies of the enemy that label you to a lesser degree than God’s very good. If that’s you (and it’s certainly been me), then You are Beautiful in God’s Eyes is a good starting point for redefining who you are in Jesus Christ.

Lisa writes like Lisa lives—authentically and passionately for the kingdom cause. She is a strong encourager of God’s people and an even stronger advocate for the transforming work of God’s Word. Lisa doesn’t let her readers off the hook easily. She calls for greater discipleship on the part of her readers, a willingness to dig deeply for the “beautiful” that belongs to each one of us as God’s children. I am grateful for her deliberate prod and for her obedience to take the Father’s message to the world. In doing so, she is helping to solve the problem of pain.

Thank you, Lisa, for writing these words. You are beautiful in God’s eyes and in mine. As always…

Peace for the journey,
elaine

PS: For a chance to win a copy of Lisa’s book, please leave me a comment expressing your interest. In addition to Lisa’s book, the winner will receive a set of Cindy’s handmade note cards as beautifully promoted at her Etsy shop.

Please take time to review Cindy’s craftsmanship and let me know some of your favorites. She, too, helps to solve the problem of pain with her creativity! The winner of Lisa’s book and Cindy’s note cards will be announced with my next post. Shalom.

a well-lived word {a lesson from "Frindle"}

I finished reading the book Frindle with Jadon and Amelia last night. It’s been a family favorite since my first reading it to Nick and Colton many years ago. I don’t remember shedding any tears the first go around, but this time was different. Last night, I cried with Frindle’s conclusion.

There wasn’t a reason to cry. The book is humorous, well-written, and delightfully entertaining. It finished well. Happy endings. The way I like it. But there was something about that final chapter and the way it ended that ministered to me, pushing my tears downward to drop as wet comfort on the pages I held in my hand. It was a note, written by Mrs. Granger to her bright and challenging fifth-grade student, Nicholas Allen. Nicholas wouldn’t receive that letter until he was a junior in college, even though the note was written in those beginning days of 5th grade.

A lot of history passed between his being a boy at eleven and growing into manhood at twenty-one. That’s really not the focus of the book, but I suppose I brought that meaning to the story. Something about watching a decade pass between my own two generations of kids. Something about reading that book in an earlier season to a fifth grade boy named Nick and a third grade boy named Colton. Something about the growth that’s taken place and the notes that they might one day receive from a teacher or two who took the time to value them and believe in them beyond the challenges they brought to the classroom.

And I started thinking about my teaching years. The ones I spent in a third grade classroom. The ones I’ve spent and continue to spend in other classrooms. Every single place I’ve left a boot print. The words I’ve spoken, the lectures I’ve given, and the actions that speak a witness all their own. After time slips away into history, what letter will remain for the kids I’ve taught, the family I’ve raised, and the friends I’ve loved? A decade or two or ten from now, what of my witness will serve as an encouragement to those who walk behind me?

Perhaps Mrs. Granger says best in her letter to Nick. Perhaps the reason for my tears last night:

“The world has changed in a million ways. That is why I have always tried to teach children something that would be useful no matter what. So many things have gone out of date. But after all these years, words are still important. Words are still needed by everyone. Words are used to think with, to write with, to dream with, to hope and pray with. And that is why I love the dictionary. It endures. It works. And as you now know, it also changes and grows.” (Andrew Clements, Frindle, Aladdin Books, 1996, p. 100)

Oh the power of a well-spoken, well-written, well-lived word! We’ve all got a few left in us. Some more valuable than others, but all them… every last one of them, are writing a story and leaving a witness. Our story. Our witness. Our letter left behind for the world to read as time slips away into history.

Last summer, I wrote a letter to the world about my cancer—some 60,000 words in the span of forty days. They’ve been simmering at a low boil these last six months. Today, I had them bound at Office Depot and shipped them to a dear friend for his assessment. They’re going to print in the near future, and I’m counting on them mattering to someone down the road. In Mrs. Granger’s assessment, some “words to think with, to write with, to dream with, to hope and pray with.”

If that happens—if the words I’ve written causes others to think, write, dream, hope, and pray—then this chapter in my story will have served the kingdom well. To discard them, not include them, not give them to the world as a witness to the strength and healing from Jesus Christ that I’ve experienced, is to finish my race lesser than how God intends.

Some words are meant to breathe. These are some of mine. By God’s grace and in his timing, I will give them to you.

In the meantime, keep writing your stories, friends. Keep living and speaking words of truth to one another in love. Make them count. Words are still important. Words are needed by everyone. As always…

Peace for the journey,

PS: Sassy Granny, because of your affection for Webster’s and all things word-related, a copy of Frindle is on it’s way to your doorstep. Maybe you can read it with your grandkids!

when the words don’t come…

You know the feature at the bottom of blogging posts… the one that suggests other posts “You might also like”? Well, every now and again I go there—click on previous posts I’ve written, some dating back to my beginning days as a blogger in 2008. There are a lot of posts to choose from, nearly 500 of them. Hard to believe. Where did all those words come from?

Sometimes it’s fun to look back and reflect upon a certain situation that fostered my creative juices; sometimes, incredibly painful. Regardless of the emotions that surface with the remembering, one certainty emerges for me each time I read one of my older posts.

Words came more easily for me back then, sometimes effortlessly. Today I have to fight for them—so much so that I sometimes question whether my writing days are coming to an end. It’s hard for me to type that. I suppose I don’t really believe it, but this I do believe. What was once the absolute passion of my heart has now been stymied by a season of pain and physical struggle. Prior to my cancer diagnosis and even in the midst of my cancer journey, writing was surprisingly easy for me. But now, as I’m cycling back toward health again, there is an ever-present struggle in me to be creative. To write what I feel, what I learn, what I truly want to say. Words get lost somewhere between my thinking of them and my putting them down on paper.

I grapple for the “want to.” Sometimes it all feels very hard, and I cannot express to you how incredibly painful this new reality is for me. So here I am tonight, caught in the darkness, praying for the light to dawn and to lead me back to what once was—a writing life that I enjoyed. A writing life stoked by the fires of creativity that once burned as strong passion in my bones.

For all the time I’ve spent writing and talking to you about the ways that cancer has given back to me, I’m wondering if just maybe this is one area of great depreciation… great reduction. It hardly seems fair. I’ve given so much to this cause… to this healing. Why must my words now also pay the price of my cancer?

God and me? Well, we’ve talked this one over. A thousand times over. Perhaps this is one of my “Why’s?”. Not, “Why did I get cancer?” I’ve never asked that question. Never. But just maybe I’ll ask it as it pertains to my words. “Why this, Lord? With every other surrender I’ve made, why now must I suffer with this deficit? Where have the words gone? Why have they abandoned me? Why does it have to be so hard?”

I wish I had the answer, friends. I also wish that I was more adequately able to express my heart to you with creative and powerful prose. I want the words of my heart to move you closer to the heart of the Father. My heart certainly resides there… in close proximity to God’s, but as I’m wondering and thinking and turning things over a thousand different ways in my head, for whatever reason, I seem to struggle with leading you there. And I am not at peace about it, not yet.

Yes, this is my why for this season. Maybe you harbor one as well. Maybe what you thought would be your case has, instead, become your question, your struggle, your wrestling with God. You want nothing more than to step back a few paces and recapture the magic of yesterday’s passion, yesterday’s dream, yesterday’s up-and-coming “sure to be.” Instead you hold your confusion out to Jesus and whisper the frustration of your heart—your “Why?”

I don’t know the “Why?” behind your “Why?”, but I believe the asking of it is relevant, is worthy, and is needful for each one of us to get back on track and to stay on track with Jesus. At least with the asking, we’ve opened up the dialogue. A good “Why?” is never wasted with Jesus. God always enters into our questions, and I believe that, in time, our hearts will resonate with an answer that allows us some measure of peace. Maybe not perfect understanding but at least enough peace to push us past frustration toward contentment. Until I arrive there, I whisper this prayer of strong hope…

Bring my words back to me, Lord. Cycle them back around to warm me. To comfort me. To write my life into remembrance. To write your truth into remembrance. Loosen their silence and fuel my pen with their refrain so that the meditations of my heart might be found acceptable, profitable, and beneficial for the kingdom. Let my laboring feel less like obligation and more like privilege. And when I am tempted to stay stuck in my “Why?” answer me with the truth of your promises for me. Let your words flow through me, not be hindered because of me… because of my cancer. I want to survive beyond this surrender. Walk me past this moment, past this famine, and let me thrive in the land of the living. You have saved me for a purpose. Please use me accordingly. Amen.

~elaine

on solving the problem of pain…

“There are different kinds of gifts, but the same Spirit. There are different kinds of service, but the same Lord. There are different kinds of working, but the same God works all of them in all men. Now to each one the manifestation of the Spirit is given for the common good.” –1 Corinthians 12:4-7

Take time to consider your creative side. We all have one—a creative edge to our personalities. Some of us writers, painters, musicians, chefs, singers, cooks, sewers, teachers, marketers, photographers, scrapbookers, gardeners, planners. The list is endless, and while you might not consider yourself particularly creative, you cannot escape the label. Why? Because you’ve been created in the image of God. Accordingly, there’s something about you that resembles the creative pulse of the Creator.

Along these lines, I have a question for you. It didn’t originate with me. It belongs to Jeannie Burlowski. She first asked it of me a couple of months ago during a pre-conference seminar for She Speaks. The session was designed to better prepare writers for their upcoming publisher meetings at the conference. Part of the preparation included writing a book proposal—a thirty-forty page document detailing an idea for a book, a marketing plan, and a few writing samples. As Jeannie was discussing the various components of the proposal and how it should be presented to publishers, she said something that interrupted my note-taking and forced my thinking.

“How does your book … your words help solve the problem of pain?”

Sit with that a minute. I did. In fact, I’ve sat with this question ever since first receiving it. It struck me back then; it strikes me still. The problem of pain and my words as a healing agent therein.

Really? Seriously? Apparently.

You see, no matter how I turn it, consider it, and think about it, I think she’s right. Not just as it pertains to me as a writer, but to all of us who create. We’re all in the business of solving pain. We may not realize the importance of our roll in the matter, but at the root of all creativity is this idea that art solves pain. We create because it brings us pleasure; in doing so, it brings others pleasure as well. Otherwise, why bother to pick up the pen or the paintbrush or the cookbook? Creativity helps to heal the wounded. And who of us haven’t felt some pain? Who of us haven’t “created” in an attempt to salve the pain of others?

And so, as you consider your creative bent, I ask you the same question I’ve been asking of myself over these past months. How does your creativity—whether in music, words, pictures, recipes—help solve the problem of pain? I know. It feels weighty, almost too much responsibility attached to our giftings.

Nonetheless, we cannot escape the reality that our “art” is a direct reflection of our God-given talents. The generous dispensation of creativity that Creator-Father has seeded into each one of us requires that we share it with others. In doing so, we bring joy to the earth. Whenever we create we sow eternal life, goodness, and hope into the temporal soil of pain.

Without art, we all suffer. Without creativity, we tend to forget the Creator. Without vision, we remain as we are, and left as we are, we’re unfinished.

There’s a whole lot of pain in this world yet untouched by the creativity residing in you. Your giftings are meant to be applied to that pain. Don’t underestimate your creativity just because it looks different from your neighbor’s. We shouldn’t measure our artful reflections against the artful reflections of others. It’s not fair to our DNA, and it certainly undercuts the witness of our Father’s fingerprints on our lives.

He made each of us unique, different, and with a specialness that can only display its worthiness through the skin delicately designed to hold its beauty. You are the owner of that skin, and you are given the rich privilege of unveiling your creativity as a healing agent to the problem of pain.

Take your creativity seriously, friends. Live it wildly, and share it liberally with the world. I, for one, have been the direct beneficiary of your giftings; they’ve have gone a long way to help solve the problem of my pain. Keep to it. I will endeavor to do the same. As always…

Peace for the journey,
~elaine
PS: What does your creativity lead you to create? How does it help solve the problem of pain? I’d love to hear from you.

a little "manna" for your weekend…

I had an experience yesterday… not unlike the ones I had with her. I’ve spent the better part of my morning thinking about my experience, writing a few words to memorialize our encounter. I’m not sharing the fullness of that writing in a post, but I thought I’d give you a few thoughts to chew on over the weekend. You may want to re-visit the backdrop for my thoughts as found in Exodus 16. In this piece, I work with the idea of our not “taking more than we need”–about living within the daily boundaries of God’s daily provision. I realize this reading it is not in its full context, but I wanted to:

1. Say “hello.”
2. Tell you that God has been mighty good to me over the past few weeks in regards to my preparations for She Speaks. His daily manna has been just enough for a day’s worth of doing. I pray you know the witness of his manna in your life this weekend. 

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Never take more than you need.


I have a feeling this has been a guiding principle for her throughout her life. Receiving help as she needed it, but declining it when she had enough. Oh for a heart like hers to know when to take and when to give back. When to say “yes” and when to say “I have enough for today. You keep it for your family.”

Our spiritual ancestors had a difficult time discerning that balance. Manna from God was a daily dispensation, their gathering of it as well. A daily obedience not to be taken advantage of, but rather to be celebrated. To say back to God, “Yes and this is enough for today.” When they didn’t—when stocking the pantry took priority over receiving the daily provision of God—the resulting consequences didn’t allow them to imbibe their hoarding.
 
“However, some of them paid no attention to Moses; they kept part of it until morning, but is was full of maggots and began to smell. So Moses was angry with them.” (Exodus 16:20)
 
Could it be the same for us in our hoarding of blessings? Could we, in the receiving of blessing upon blessing a few thousand times over, get to the place of keeping them for ourselves? Worse yet, of coming to expect them as our right rather than to humbly receive them as a grace from God? When is God’s “enough” enough for us? Why does abundance sometimes breed greediness? Why can’t God’s daily provision settle down within our hearts as faith rather than as distrust?
 
I think this is it. I think we are afraid that God’s goodness has a limit. We falsely reason that even though today it’s raining manna, tomorrow it might be raining famine. So we collect and hoard and relish our abundance; in doing so we break ranks with God’s mandate to live daily beneath his provision. We cultivate a deserving attitude because, after all, we are God’s children on the road to the Promised Land. Before long, the stench of maggots have replaced the once, sweet smell of God’s “enough,” and the odor emanates upward to the nostrils of heaven. And we wonder where it all went wrong. When did the manna turn to maggots, and why do we feel so empty on the inside?
 
Manna begins in its disintegration when we take it upon ourselves to manage the blessings of God. Certainly, we need them, especially the witness of God’s love to us through others in our times of great trial. When the need is great, the manna rains down proportionally—maybe with a generous dispensation to last us beyond the borders of a single day. But when our need is less, we must relinquish our expectations for more and live within the boundaries of day’s worth of manna. When the need is but a day’s worth, the manna will fall accordingly. Out of his abundance, the Father gives to us what we need. We must receive it with thankfulness and then we must release our expectations.
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For what it’s worth, there you go. Love to you each one!

Peace for the journey,

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