Carpe Diem (seizing the day with my dad)

Carpe Diem. Seize the Day. It’s one of my daddy’s favorite sayings ever since viewing one of his favorite movies, Dead Poet’s Society. I reminded him of it yesterday in our visit together. I’m not sure if he remembers the movie, but he remembers the shirt. Even more so, he remembers the sentiment; daddy always wants to seize the day even as he struggles to remember what day it actually is.

Dad loved that movie; I think he saw a lot of himself in Robin Williams’s portrayal of John Keating, an unconventional teacher who used poetry to inspire his students to greater heights of expression and creativity.

Like Keating, my daddy is known for his story-telling. “One of the best” they say. Sometimes his stories are hand-made; sometimes, he borrows from others. As a child, I assumed everybody’s dad had that same capacity to spin words into magic. It never occurred to me that his ability was, in fact, a unique gifting from God. Over the years, I’ve come to realize and appreciate that uniqueness about my father, especially now when his words have started to fade.

These days, daddy doesn’t tell me many stories; instead, I’m telling them to him.

“Daddy, remember when …?”

Thankfully, he still does to a degree … remember when. He simply needs a prompt or two or ten therein. Eventually, we get there together, to a memory that brings the old sparkle back to his beautiful blue eyes. And when that happens, the magic returns; for a few minutes, I’m able to set aside my new role as a care-giver in exchange for my old role as simply a child of a story-teller.

Carpe Diem. Seize the day.

Life shifts like seasons.

Winter’s retreat. Spring’s new. Summer’s heat. Fall’s release.

A cycle of transformation. Sometimes swiftly; sometimes more slowly. Almost always, simultaneously.

Moments have the capacity to hold so very much – a full cycle of seasons that grow a heart in all the right ways. And maybe, in the end, that will be the greatest story ever told –

a heart transformed in all the right ways by a full cycle of seasons.

Indeed, very magical.

Carpe Diem. Seize the day.

So…

Thank you, Daddy, for telling me your stories – for capturing shifting seasons with just the right words. For doing so with flare, with imagination, with sparkle, and with understanding. For seizing the day, the moments in so many rich, “Chuck Killian” kinds of ways. You’ve come full cycle, living the words you’ve spoken … a heart transformed in all the right ways.

“One of the best,” they say.

One of the best, I know.

In the end and by God’s grace, I hope to hold one too –

a great story of my own … a heart transformed in all the right ways. 

I can’t think of a better legacy for either one of us to leave.

Let’s keep telling stories; let’s keep seizing our moments. Let’s keep walking home together.

The best is yet to be. 

I love you, 
Lainse

“The Freshman 20” in 2020

The Freshman 20.

Do you remember yours? Those infamous extra pounds that suddenly found their way onto your frame during your freshman year in college?

I remember mine. I haven’t given them much thought in the nearly four decades since initially collecting them, but early morning inclinations have taken me there … back to that place of gathering pounds.

The Freshman 20.

Extra weight. Not anticipated. Not welcomed. Not particularly fetching.

Looking back, I should have seen them coming; after-all, getting heavier begins to feel … well … heavier over time. A quick glance in the mirror or a stepping into my clothes should have been good indicators of my freshman folly. Still and yet, I barely noticed them. They simply slipped in over the course of a year, one late-night, pizza delivery at a time.

Forty years ago, it was easier for me to bounce back from The Freshman 20. These days, not so much.

These days. The accumulated poundage of my freshman year has now been replaced by the accumulated poundage of a weightier year … this year – 2020.

Extra weight. Not anticipated. Not welcomed. Not particularly fetching.

Unlike the folly of my freshman year in college, I am quicker to look into the mirror these days; I’m stepping into my clothes, and I am realizing that the recent, personal baggage I’ve been collecting is a clear indicator of the storm that’s been unleashing its fury upon the earth for these past seven months.

I’m not alone.

We’re all heavier now than we were at the beginning of 2020. Heart, mind, body, soul and spirit. We’ve never been so thickened by a year. As the losses have accumulated on the pages of the calendar, so has our poundage. Day after day; week after week; month after month. The scale ticks higher; the clothes get tighter. The burden grows greater.

With labored steps and labored breaths, we awaken with the dawn without embracing its warmth; we’ve forgotten what it is to move lightly through our days. Instead, our steps are heavy, each one of them reverberating with the witness of a costly season.

I don’t imagine it will soon be over – this year of unwanted accumulation. Something tells me that our scales will get heavier before getting lighter. It seems that some years have to run their course before reversing course … before getting us back to a place of leanness that better enables us to embrace the dawn.

But as we tarry for these leaner years, let us not forsake our mirrors. Let us look outwardly and inwardly at the burden that’s been added to our souls. Sometimes, the extra pounds are the best indicators of what needs trimming. And if that’s the case – if a temporary addition ultimately leads to a healthy and final subtraction – then perhaps all is not loss with The Freshman 20 – this, our 2020.

Perhaps there is gain – an eternal goodness that will outweigh the harshness that we now hold as baggage in these jars of clay.

That is my prayer. That is my hope. That is the warmth of this dawn embracing my soul. May it embrace yours as well. As always…

Peace for the journey,

10

Ten years ago, my prayer was simple. Even typing the word “simple” feels traitorous, as if I’ve already cheated … cheapened the depth of that moment. There was nothing simple about it. The words were simple, but their implications were far more complex. God was going to have to do something miraculous, something that only he could do–

Save my life.

Again.

This time not from sin but, rather, this time from the cancer that was eating away at my flesh.

“God, let me live long enough to get my children grown.”

That was my prayer then. And here I am, living this decade-long miracle that was surely wrought from the very heart and hands of the Life-Giver. Ten years of living beyond a diagnosis that, left untreated, would have hastened my earthly departure.

Dr. Habal’s words echo in my mind today as clearly as they were spoken to me a decade ago–a response to my burning question … the “What now?” … I asked of him just moments after hearing my diagnosis.

“You’ve got young children, Elaine. We need to attack this with everything we have.”

And therein my prayer and my will were solidified–a full frontal assault via my flesh and my faith to get the job done … to get my children grown.

Thanks be to God, we’re mostly there.

When Amelia climbed into her eldest brother’s hand-me-down car (the one that carried him to college) two weeks ago to begin her college career, I stood paralyzed in the drive-way, not out of sorrow for the temporary sadness of seeing her go but, rather because I realized that the simple prayer I had prayed ten years ago had now come to fruition.

My children are grown.

As I turned to go back into the house, I smiled, laughed a little, looked up to heaven and uttered another prayer…

“Maybe just a little more time, God?”

In that moment, I felt his pleasure – some holy laughter between a Father and daughter. He owes me nothing – not a single heavenly favor, not another day, not another ounce of grace, not another prayer answered on my behalf. He never has … owed me anything. But he continues to give to me in inexpressible measure.

Ten years ago, I didn’t fully understand what would be required of me and my God to get to this point of witness today. There have been many personal sacrifices; but what I have had to give up in order to extend my earthly tenure is nothing in comparison to what I’ve been given in return–

A decade’s worth of seeing my children grow up.

What a generous God!

I am humbled by this extension of years. I pray that I have lived them well and have grown my children accordingly. They are my legacy–Nicholas, Colton, Jadon, and Amelia. Their lives will continue to write the witness beyond me.

So, here’s to me; here’s to them; here’s to God; and here’s to the grand and grace-filled miracle of getting kids grown.

We are all SURVIVORS walking the road home together. Let’s keep in step with one another for as long as today is called today. Keep moving forward, family; the best is yet to be. I promise.

Peace for the journey,

PS: If you or someone you know might benefit from the witness of my story, “Beyond the Scars” is available for purchase through Amazon or by contacting me personally for a signed copy. 

Rehearse Your History with God

“Rehearse your history with God.”

This was my recommendation to my family last night as we sat around the dinner table. Our discussions lean toward the “heavy” these days. So much going on in the world. Chaos, confusion, concerns. You know. And out of that deep well of heaviness, I drew forth these words:

“In times like these, family, we need to rehearse our history with God. Trace his faithfulness. Trust in his goodness.”

Billy acknowledged my words with words that my father used to say to me … “You know, Elaine, that’ll preach.”

A smile passed between Billy and me, and then the internal gnawing began within my soul … the rehearsing of my history with God.

There’s a lot to recall, to reflect upon, to remember. Instead of focusing on recent memories, I dug further into my past – twenty-five years in retrospect.

As a single mother of two young boys, I made the decision to return home to Wilmore, KY. If “home is where the heart is,” then I definitely made the right choice to move back to the Bluegrass. Wilmore is the place where I first trusted God and began my long obedience with him. Most importantly, Wilmore was where my parents were living, and I needed the safety, acceptance, and love afforded me therein.

I also needed a job. After a disappointing interview with a Christian school down the road (one where the questions were centered more around the reasons for my divorce rather than my qualifications as an educator), I decided to apply for a job at Asbury Theological Seminary – the vocational home of both of my parents. Dr. Kenneth Kinghorn was looking for an administrative assistant; he’d known me as a child, and now he would better know me as an adult. The interview process went forward, and within a week, I had a job. And while I mostly didn’t have a clue what it meant to be an administrative assistant, I did know that, for the first time in a long while, I was safe. Dr. K had given me a chance to start over, to further “grow up” and mend my heart in an environment that had earlier shaped my beginning days of faith.

For three years, I sat under the great favor of Dr. Kinghorn. He protected me, challenged me, walked alongside me while never judging me. He stocked the supply closet with Diet Dr. Peppers, and he lovingly allowed me long lunches with the Beeson girls (you know who you are), as well as daily walks to my mother’s office on the other side of campus. When the bi-weekly chapel hour came, he put the closed sign on the office door and said, “Let’s go.” When my boys showed up at my office after getting off the bus from school, he ended my work day early. When asked for his counsel, he wisely engaged. He daily prayed over me and, on occasion, trusted me with campus “intel” reserved for the privileged few. He didn’t micro-manage my work nor meddle in my personal affairs. Instead, Dr. Kinghorn allowed me the privilege of personal healing according to God’s time table and his immeasurable grace.

Dr. Kinghorn wasn’t the only one. There were many moments throughout my three years at ATS filled with similar privilege. Dr. Ellsworth Kalas’s mentoring moments – his sermon and directives from Moses on Mt. Nebo. Dr. Steve Seamands’s Ash Wednesday service where a quote from Omar Cabrera took center stage in my heart. The day Reg Johnson handed me an envelope with cash inside – the exact amount I needed to cover an unexpected bill. Bill Goold’s after-chapel walk with me, asking me how my “desert season” was going. Maxie Dunnam – a president never too busy for a hug or a word of soul-stirring encouragement. Albin Whitworth’s exuberance, laughter, and invites for the boys to come and swim at his pool.

The list goes on – I suppose not enough room (or time) in this space to record my thoughts. But in my time of remembering today, in rehearsing my history with God from this limited segment of my past, a tender truth is emerging:

Not all men cast stones. Some men carry them instead.

Stones not to harm the guilty, but rather stones to heal the broken-hearted. To stack and to build a better future rather than to hurl and to re-injure a wounded past.

In that season so long ago, I couldn’t fully appreciate the stones that those giant men of faith were carrying on my behalf. But in rehearsing my history with God today, I am overwhelmed with their willingness to do so. Perhaps they did it, in part, out of their great love for my dad, Chuck Killian. No doubt, because of their great love for their heavenly Father. And just maybe, there was a little part of them that knew something of grace because of their own histories with God. Regardless of their reasons, twenty-five years later, I am stunned by their intentional generosity toward me.

Not all men cast stones. Some men carry them instead.

Indeed.

So today, friends, if you’re feeling heaviness of heart, if confusion is creeping in and around your spirit, I encourage you (even as I am encouraging myself) to rehearse your history with God. Look for the stone carriers from your past, your present. Remember them; be grateful; do likewise.

There’s a broken heart nearby who needs the benefit of your strength and the grace of your history with God.

Those who have ears to hear, let them hear. As always …

Peace for the journey,

(7.11.2020. All rights reserved.)

James: Recipe for a Living Faith by Leah Adams (book review)

Over a year ago, my friend, Leah Adams, shared with me her excitement at being asked to write another Bible study, this time on the book of James. For her to be entrusted with this privilege brought great joy to my heart. I was further delighted when, about a month ago, Leah sent me a preview copy of her study, James – Recipe for a Living Faith. After a cursory run-through of the study, I called Leah and, through tear-filled eyes, uttered the deep confession of my heart:

“I didn’t know how hungry I was until I read your study.”

And while this Bible study does include some of Leah’s signature recipes alongside in-depth scripture study, Leah knew I wasn’t talking about my stomach-hunger. Instead, I was referring to my soul-hunger, that all-too familiar, raw ache that comes to believers who understand that the Word of God is, in fact, the Bread of Life, the sustenance that fills and that cries out for a steady supply therein.

Sitting alongside Leah’s words about God’s Word from the book of James is a veritable buffet for the hungry soul. It fills our plates with generous portions of grace, practical instructions for living the Christian life, and godly wisdom, all ladled out to us from the hands and heart of one who knew Jesus best, his brother James.

James 1:1 says, “…To the twelve tribes scattered among the nations: Greetings.”

Greetings, scattered pilgrims.

I like that way of introduction. Perhaps, like no other season in our lives, this is a time when we need the greeting of an old friend. We need a letter from the past to reach out from the pages of holy history to feed us, to teach us, and to remind us that in our scattering, we are God’s holy remnant for such a time as this – the living, breathing witnesses of our Lord Jesus Christ.

Since the time of the writing of James almost 2000 years ago, Christians have been physically dispersed and scattered across the globe; in recent days, perhaps it’s more of a feeling of scatteredness in this time of worldly upheaval and unrest. But in that dispersion, whether physical or emotional, we must remember that we have not been displaced from the family of God. Instead, we have a seat at the table of grace, alongside Jesus and his brother James. The Word of God is the great equalizer in our fight to maintain the balance between our faith and our function.

James: Recipe for a Living Faith is a good place to start. Leah’s heart, via her pen, has been given to us in this season to both fill us fully and to equip us mightily. Like me, there are many souls out there who don’t even know they are hungry. Maybe you’re one of them. If so, then I say to you what James said to those so long ago…

Greetings, scattered pilgrims. Pull up a chair; come and dine. Jesus, James, Leah, and I will meet you at the table. As always…

Peace for the journey,

To pre-order a copy of James: Recipe for Living Faith at a great price or to read a free chapter, click here. I’ll be leading this Bible study in the fall at the Benson United Methodist Church. 

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