“You will be published if you keep writing”

A speaker at a writers conference said this a few years ago.  Super obvious. I probably paid way too much to attend that conference, right?

Wrong.

It’s true. But you just have to actually do it.

You have to sit down, open up the computer and write.  And then you have to pitch articles and books and write proposals. You have to hone your skills when someone tells you your writing stinks. You have to take criticism  and edit and start over sometimes. You have to throw out whole paragraphs and chapters and rethink the structure.  When you don’t have time, you have to make time. You have to do what it takes.

This goes for most things.

You want to have a good marriage?  You want to be a worship leader?  You want be an effective communicator?  Then you have to do what it takes.

Find out what it takes, and then KEEP doing it until it happens.

I can call myself a writer and even write a whole book, but if I don’t let anyone know about it, if I’m not willing to be the best at my craft then it will go nowhere. If I want a good marriage and have the best intentions, but I hold on to my bitterness and selfish heart, then I will be stuck in that same horrible marriage forever.  I can be a great guitar player and even have a great voice, but if I don’t work at daily intimacy with God, the music will be just a bunch of nice songs. And if I have a story to tell but I don’t practice telling it well, then no one will listen.

God has given us talents for a reason and many of our callings go unused because we simply are lazy, distracted or let life get the best of us. We settle.

I’m not published yet, but I’m not giving up. Never.  I’m not going to settle either.  If I believe God has called me to do this, if it’s right and good and if there is evidence that I have some skill in it, then it will happen.

I have to do what it takes.  And actually get out my computer and write. And I didn’t pay too much for that writers conference. It was the single most useful thing I’ve learned in a long time.

What are you called to do? Are you having trouble fulfilling that calling?

“Are we going riding today, Mom?” Hope asked as the jumped in van’s sliding door after school on Tuesday.

I nodded and smiled in the rear view mirror.

“YES! Because I bought something for Miss Fran today at ‘store.’  It took all of my money but I just had to get it for her.  She’ll love it!”

She unwound the cheap-looking silver bracelet from around the strap of her  backpack.  It’s glass “sapphires” and “diamonds” sparkled as she handed it to me from the back seat.

“You spent all your classroom money on this?” I asked her.

“Yup.  I only had four dollars left and I used it all. I know it’s not real but I think its so pretty. Can we wrap it at home?”

As we drove home I thought about the metal bracelet in my hands which I’m sure was worth no more than 79 cents in real (not classroom) dollars. But to Hope it was all that she had.

She’d earned that money from behaving well, being kind and going above and beyond in her second grade classroom. While some kids hoarded their money until their paper wallets were thick with fake photocopied dollar bills, Hope blew it all yesterday afternoon on someone she loved.

Her generosity overtook any thought of herself.  She might not earn anymore classroom money buy the time weekly “store” came around again.  She might sit there and wait while the other kids file up to purchase brownies and dollar store-castoffs.

At times Hope’s generosity has been immature (the year she bought three things for me for Christmas and nothing for her father) but now she seems to have graduated into the selectively selfless. And yesterday, her generosity made her do something that might seem foolish, but was in actuality right because it was fueled by love.

I  usually count on my own generosity. Chad and I love doing things, buying things, providing things for others.  But how often do I spend EVERYTHING on somebody else? Even if I spend a LOT I always have extra for me.  I never spend it all.

Is this really generosity? Or is it just good will? Giving everything for the sake of someone else, even if it amounts to a trinket, is the ultimate gift.

Five minutes early for her lesson Hope ran across the dirt road and past the horse stalls, the gate clanking closed behind her.

“Miss FRAN!” she yelled. “I have something for you!”

“I bought it just for you,” as she deposited the small red package into her hands, “with my own money!”

Her teacher opened it, took it out and smiled. “Thank you, Hope,” she said. “I have at least 3 outfits I can wear with this.”

Hope beamed and ran off for a horse brush to begin grooming Lilly.

She didn’t care about the future. She didn’t even care about the present, but only thought about love.

Maybe that is the key to ultimate generosity.

Is generosity hard or easy for you? Have you ever “spent it all?”

The winner of the (in)courage Pleated Poppy giveaway is Kristen.  She said:

Hey Sarah,
I really enjoy your blog but I am also a fan of boundless.org which is a webzine by focus on the family with tons of articles and blogs about singleness, dating, marriage, and faith. Lots of good stuff on there and is updated regularly.

Thanks Kristen!

From 39 thousand feet in the air, the Rocky Mountains look like the topography on a toddler’s train table. The foothills look like crumpled paper bags dusted with snow and forests are thick and black puddles of oil on faded concrete.

Everything looks different from almost 8 miles above the earth.

I live in a big town. And I go to the same small church I’ve always gone to.  My friends are moms.  My girls will do the same things this week as they did last week. We’ve lived in the same house, given to the same charities, eaten the same whole wheat bread for a while now.

I fear change.

I’m scared to do simple things like change the girls’ gymnastic class times because they might miss their friends or instructor.  I’m scared to change dentists, doctors or the girl who waxes my eyebrows.

I read the same blogs every week.  I follow the same people on twitter.  Sometimes I even shy away from looking for new (worthy) ways to give our money away because maybe I’ll feel compelled.  A cause, a child, a need will pull my heart in a way that I know will hurt.

And then I take a short walk outside my church and my town. I look at the big world from 8 miles up.

I’ve always known that things are different. I’ve travelled in Europe, ministered in a third world country, gone to church in Massachusetts. But being in a different place and letting the differences affect me are two very different things.

Different doesn’t always mean better. But I think for my whole adult life I’ve been headed toward making myself more comfortable. And for me, routine and sameness is comfort.

But I think I might be ready to pray a brave prayer. I might be ready to be uncomfortable.

I’m ready to let God take me where He wants to take me, use me how He wants to use me, and wreck me how He wants to wreck me.

I want to look with clear eyes at the world that is outside my town and my church.  I want to see the world from 39 thousand feet.

That might mean everything might have to change.

I’m going to take that risk.  Are you?

One of my favorite things around the web (at least since August) has been (in)courage. I am proud and honored to be one of their monthly writers, and let me tell you, I am in the company of some serious greatness.  I feel so humbled.

So, two exciting things today:

1. Via (in)courage I am proud to be able to give away some of their beautiful handcrafted products today as part of My Favorite Things: Six Weeks of Free Stuff series. I’m giving away three pieces by the amazing Lindsey Cheney of the Pleated Poppy to one of my readers.

One of you will win a Crisp Posy Pin set, a Grow in Grace tea towel and a Trees of the Forest tea towel.  They are so so cute, I promise!

2. Today, my December post for (in)courage is up.  So, after you are done leaving your comment to win some of Lindsey’s great stuff, go on over and read.

Joy is a Symptom

The times in my life I’ve been the most joyful, it hasn’t really been a choice.

It has been against my will.

People say that love is a choice and I’m confident that’s true.  And I guess that joy can be a choice in the same way.  For example, I choose joy over self-pity, happiness over sullenness and delight over disdain.

Yes, sometimes joy is a choice.

But more often for me, joy has often been a symptom…

To read the rest, click here.

To be entered in the random giveaway, leave a comment HERE ON THIS BLOG before 9pm on Tuesday, December 15 telling me A BLOG OR WEBSITE that you’ve found lately that you think the rest of us might like.

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When my husband Chad was in Junior High school, he was a tad overweight. He likes to refer to those years as “husky”.

His mother would buy him a new pair of pants in a size too small as an incentive to “lose a little”. It would hang on the hook to the closet for weeks. A month.  A year. Gathering dust in the crevasses of the tags and on the edges of the belt loops.

(It wouldn’t be until the summer between his 10th and 11th grade years that he would lose 60 pounds in three months, biking to and from the beach every day and playing volleyball in between. By the time he walked through the high school doors as a junior, he was a new person.)

You might think that’s cruel, what his mother did.  I don’t.  Because I’ve done that very same thing to myself.

I’ve hung a dress on a door that I would like to fit into. I’ve taped a photo of myself when I was at my thinnest in a place where I can see it.

Oh, but that’s not all. I’ve told myself that when my kids are in school full time, I’ll __________. Or when my book is published I can do _________.  I’ve even said to myself that I won’t be a real writer until I have a publisher.

These are all reminders that I won’t let myself wear a bathing suit/enjoy life/minister to others until something else happens.

In essence, sometimes I feel that  I won’t let my life start until I attain some unreachable or far-in-the-future goal.

It traps me.

And I know it traps you too.

You’ve said to yourself that you won’t have a good marriage until your husband stops _________, or that you’ll never make things up with your mom until she __________.  You’ve even told yourself that you won’t go on vacation until you lose ____ pounds or that you can’t start working out when your kids aren’t in school yet.  You’ve said that you can’t go back to school, can’t quit your job, can’t get married, can’t give your whole life to God until _________ happens.

Fill in your own blanks.

I know you do.

I’ve done it too.

So what are you going to do about it today? What are you going to START?

Do you think this California girl will be able to handle 12 degrees Fahrenheit in Oklahoma City this weekend?

And do you think this California girl will be okay when the plane will probably have to de-ice during our layover in Denver?

Yeah. I’ll be fine.

I was fine when I went to visit Mandy in Boston last October. Brrr.

Because finally, after two years, I finally get to meet Cindy Beall.

Cindy and Chris Beall have a similar story to Chad’s and mine (except flip-flopped) and I finally get to meet her this weekend. This trip has been planned for half a year and…

I. Can’t. Wait. To. Hug. Her.

So today, I’m packing up the kids to spend time at my mom’s, making sure the housesitter knows to bring in the mail, and getting on a plane with my husband headed for Oklahoma City.

(The last time I was there was when I drove across the country in the back of my parents’ Chevy in between the fourth and fifth grades. I’m pretty sure it’s still flat and windy.)

Why? To spend time with a friend as good as any I know in person but I’ve never put my arms around her neck.

If you’ve never read Cindy’s blog, please hop over there. You’ll realize why this California girl loves that Oklahoma girl (or Texas?) so much.

Who do you want to hug in person you’ve never met?

We’ll try to twitter as much as possible.  Follow us:

Sarah

Chad

Cindy

Chris (but Chad says he never updates, so we’ll see…)

Sometimes my husband and I seriously don’t get along.

We’ve been through this, we’ve gone to marriage counseling, we’ve sat in billions of Bible studies and listened to enough sermons to fill a 64 gig iPod.  We even counsel other couples and speak to groups about marriage.

But more-than-occasionally we miss each other. Like really miss.  (Picture unathletic college-me taking tennis as a class and missing the fuzzy green ball over and over again.  That kind of miss.)

We talk loudly and even hang up the phone. We glare and growl sometimes too.  We flop over in bed and turn toward the wall.  We sulk and scowl.  We expect the worst and live in the past. We think mean, selfish things.

Why can’t he just…

What would be the harm in him….

I’ve told him this a hundred times…

But, even so we have a covenant.  We have binding promises.  We didn’t say Until One Of Us Wounds The Other. Or Until You Get Really Mad At Me.  Or even, Until We Really Really Hate Each Other. We said Until Death Do Us Part. It’s forever.

What makes the difference is this: we are learning to live in the gap of the covenant. Because sometimes only one of us is upholding our promises. Love. Honor. Respect.

When he doesn’t hold up his end, I hold up mine. When I fail miserably and say something un-take-back-able, he stands still as my husband, unshaken by something as fleeting as a word in the face of a promise. Even though it hurts and it takes time to get over, we are learning to practice this.

But our example for this isn’t each other (we are far from skilled even at this) or even another couple we admire. Our example is the first Covenant Maker.  The One who stands strong in the face of our adultery, our hatred, our selfish words and actions.

He IS the gap in the covenant. He even stands at the altar with us knowing we will become distracted and trip over our own desires.  He knows we will not keep our promises. He knows we are destined for cheating.

But He lives there, right in that place where we don’t keep our end of the bargain. He doesn’t flop over in bed or think mean things. He doesn’t glare at us and live in our past mistakes.

He wants us to live the way we were designed to live. The way we vowed.

But until then, He’ll live in that gap unshaken by us in the face of unmet promises and He’ll make up the difference when we can’t.

Are you living in the gap in your marriage?

AND THE WINNER OF THE NECKLACE AND CD is Sarah at Sometimes Sarah Writes. She says:

I think I would tie the two giveaways together with one word… beautiful! Hmm… or maybe breathtaking? how about just plain awesome? (: Ok I’ll just go with my favorite christmas song! I love the words of ‘O come O come emmanuel’ but adore the almost’s version of ‘Little Drummer Boy’. Call me a sucker for some good drumming!

Congratulations, Sarah.  And I LOVE your name! =)

Its been raining all day and the tap tap tap of the drips from the sky on some unknown corner of the roof is all I can hear in my bedroom. When rain comes to us here its like the whole world turns black (we’re so used to the almost-desert sun) and all the people hide inside their houses.

Rain might melt them like the Wicked Witch of the West.

Or melt me.

And even though I love the rain, I’m angry today because it seems to have stolen my energy. All I want to do is eat cookies and wear sweats under the fuzziest blanket ever made.

I look out the window and I can only see the first hill because a heavy wet cloud hides the ones beyond.  And then right when the drizzle becomes a torrent and I have to leave to pick up my oldest from school.  Dragging to get up from where we’ve curled up on the sofa. Dragging to pull a sweatshirt over pony tails.  Struggling to pull on shoes that only want to wear socks and slippers.

And Southern Californians don’t own umbrellas. Not because we brave the elements like Pacific Northwesterners but because it so rarely rains. I shuffle through the downstairs closet and the back of the van. I open the door to the garage, take one look at the mess and then close the door again. Another time.

“We are going to have to make due without an umbrella,” I shout to Naomi over the sound of rain as I buckle her car seat. Both the roads and the drivers are so ill-equipped to deal with precipitation that I can hardly see the car in front of me on the freeway. We flood. We swerve.  We grip the steering wheels with strong hands and turn the radio music down. But even the adrenaline does nothing for my motivation. I still want to simply pick up my daughter take her home and fold us all into the family room with happy pants, an ordered pizza and a movie on TV.

I don’t want to work out.  Or write. Or do the dishes or fold the laundry.

In the brief time I’ve gone up the stairs to collect her from her rainy day classroom (stuffy and smelling like corn chips), the sun has come out.

And its bright. Like a film crew has set up a light rig at midnight to mimic mid day.  Mom’s are fumbling for sunglasses in purses, kids are squinting, and my sweatshirt suddenly feels heavy.

Then we see it. I knew we would. Or maybe I just hoped we would.

“A RAINBOW!! Look girls, a rainbow!” I yell at them from inside the car (no one thinks I’m crazy if they can’t hear me). And I point like a toddler at Disneyland.  Huge and complete, like Hawaiian rainbows, this one that stretched over North Orange County was enough to completely change my afternoon.

Like a shot of caffeine (that I should have partook of earlier) seeing something as simply beautiful as that rainbow lets me glimpse perfection and promise against the grey. But it’s gone as quickly as it appeared and I can’t see it anymore as I turn toward my house.

A silent hope.  A change in the light.  A tiny split in the storm clouds. The rainbow.

Sometimes it’s in the form of a kind email in the middle of a stressful day.  A smile from someone you thought didn’t care for you. A request from your oldest daughter to read a book to her when you thought she was past that stage.  Stopping to talk to someone you usually walk right past. A small vision of sunshine when there are usually storm clouds.

But I had to look for it. And hope for it a little too.

There is a rainbow today. Are you going to look for it?  What will keep you from finding it?

It’s Monday again!

For most people that’s a sad fact. But for all of you, Monday means My Favorite Things: Six Weeks of Free Stuff is here again.

Today I’m giving away two special things. Okay, and here is a window into my crazy brain: I was trying trying trying to figure out a way these are related but I just can’t. So I’m going to tell you about each one individually.

A couple months ago, I was introduced to Adrienne and Gina over at The Well Radio program (which, incidentally, I will be on later this month!!), and at the same time introduced to Adrienne’s beautiful jewelry. She agreed to design a one-of-a-kind necklace just for one of my blog readers!  Amazing.  And the the necklace she created exceeded all of my imagination  and when she sent me the pictures, it seriously took my breath away. So I’m so honored to offer it to one of you.  (Thank you Adrienne for being so generous!)  It’s called Autumn Sunrise and one of YOU will win it.

Secondly, I’m giving away a CD copy of Chris Tomlin’s new Christmas album called Glory in the Highest. Chad and I love music so much we should probably relocate to Nashville. So when people we love tour here, within reason, we try to see them.  Several months ago Chad and I had the privilege to watch Chris in concert in LA and it was by far the most amazing concert experience of my life (so far).  I wrote about it here.

So one of YOU will win both of THESE amazing gifts.  Leave a comment and tell me about your favorite Christmas song OR the best concert you’ve ever been to.  Leave it before 9pm PST on TUESDAY night (not Wednesday) to be entered. Only one comment per person, please.

Favorite Christmas song please? Favorite concert?

When I was a little girl I witnessed the aftermath of one of my uncles in an accident with a chainsaw.

I looked from inside the protection of the house and peered out through a tall window.  I saw him come around the side of the house with a white towel around his hand, now soaked with blood. They were going to take him to the hospital and I would stay home with the rest of the family members.  That was the first time I remember my stomach feeling queasy at the sight of blood.

But that was an exception, because with normal everyday emergencies, I click into action mode. I take care of the problem.

When a little girl disobeys her mother and splits her chin on the cement in the yard, I don’t scream. I quickly get ice and a towel to stop the bleeding and calmly call my husband to meet us at the Urgent Care.

When one of my girls wakes up unable to take a breath with a bronchial attack just a hair this side of asthma, I jump out of bed, locate the nebulizer and administer the breathing treatment on the bathroom floor while she’s falling back asleep in my lap. I don’t get upset, I just act.

When my water broke in a restaurant bathroom 8 years ago with my first daughter, I walked quickly and directly back to table where my husband and friends sat and informed them we needed to go to the hospital. NOW.

The fear and tears might come later, but these are all manageable stresses.

What about the bigger things?

When the 3 inch stack of papers comes from the attorney that took Chad all of 9 minutes to decipher.  “They’re suing us” was all he could say as his face crumpled into his hands,

When our marriage falls apart in the space of an hour and I don’t know if he’s taking our little girl forever; when I understand the only way back is to crawl back bare-kneed through broken glass,

When there is death close, or disease nearer or a lost future,

These are the things that constrict my chest, catch my breath in my throat and close it with and turn my intestines inside out like gravity. These are the things that let me hear my heart in my ears and wrestle a sob back to the floor.

The Big Stress. The Unending Pressure. The Semi-Suffering. This is what makes me faint at the sight of blood and reminds me of a red-soaked bath towel.

But the older I creep, the more I feel like I’m able to treat the bigger problems like the everyday emergencies. Because the world watches us. They see what they do with our pain, circle around us even, watching to see if we crumble.

Anyone can handle a split lip or a broken tooth with grace, but what about the bigger things?  Can everyone stand up under a disintegrating marriage? A death? A drawn out illness?

The fact is, Christ-followers have more at their disposal to handle pain and suffering than anyone else on earth. One might even argue that we were designed for it.

The way we face head-on, stand with feet dug-in, set our shoulders to gracefully handle the weight of suffering or pain is a louder and more effective message than anything we can ever say.

Do you faint? Or do you handle trials with grace? In the past? Lately?