I recently told my niece (over a lovely phone conversation that caught us up on all things old, new, and current in our lives) that I like order.  Not in all things, but I do like a sense of knowing what is to come, having a vision, and predicting what may transpire due to careful planning.

"What is it You want me to know about You?"
"What is it that You are trying to teach me?"
"What needs to grow bigger in my life since You are leading me down this path?"
"Where are the lessons You need me to see?"

Yesterday I read a well-written and reflective blog by a friend who is facing a Season.  I've met with so many women this past year with the same issue of entering into or coming out of a Season.  They - Seasons - are inevitable.  You can try to hide, deny, ignore, run away from it's impending presence but facts and truth collide in the shape of a Season.

If you live in Oklahoma, perhaps a weather illustration is not a good one since Winter resembles very little of itself and puts on the alluded guises of Spring and Summer.  But ... for the rest of us ... Seasons make sense.    I know that when September arrives in my beloved Vienna, it's going to be the optimal time of year affectionately known as Altes Damen Wetter (Old Ladies Weather):  cool in the morning and evenings but warm in the day.  Perfect.  Upon the ending of September I brace myself for the fleeting Autumn and know that my down coat needs to be put in the batters box because soon and very soon Winter will make his debut ... and stay ... usually for a long, long time.    But come April"ish" ... I get itching to pull out lighter jeans and dispose of the fleece uniforms I've been wearing for months.  July and August I suck it up and deal with the warmth inside my apartment that has no AC because I know ... this is for a Season.  September is coming.

Seasons change that which was our reality.  Seasons take time to mourn.  Seasons should cause us to reflect.  Seasons come and go ... and come and go ... until we meet Jesus.

I find myself in a Season that I really don't know how to define in terms that are either comprehensible or proper for a good girl like to me to put in black and white.  I know the title of this Season:  Menopause.  Other brave women who I now respect more than most Rock Stars, Brain Surgeons or Barista's in any coffee shop worth it's grinds encourage me that this Season will end ... and I will survive.  I have my doubts.  But I trust their words.

As a young Mom, I was so insecure.  I was afraid most of the time.  I was so afraid that what I did wouldn't count.  I was afraid I'd get something so wrong in the raising of my beautiful offspring that they'd never recover.  I was afraid that they would "pick up" on things that I did, said, believed - oh yes believed - and have the same struggles I did.  Fear was a constant companion.  I loved God.  I learned His Word.  I tried my darndest to "get it right".  I rarely shook the Fear.  Until ...

Until that day when God used Anxiety to break the Fear Season and show me a Healing Season.  The good news is that the Healing Season still continues!  If you know Jesus and read God's Word which is alive and powerful and full of good stuff and relevant and flat out inspires and thoughtful and challenging and seeps into all the soft spots in your heart - but more importantly into the hard spots that crave attention and then the Word speaks ... with loud speakers ... then... THEN you will always have a Healing Season.  Always.

As a not-so-young Mom, I'm not insecure.  I'm not afraid - most of the time.  I am not afraid that I what I did didn't count.  I'm not afraid that what I got wrong they won't recover from.  I'm not afraid that they picked up on anything I did, said, or believed and suffer from my same struggles.  Fear is no longer a constant companion.  I love God.  I am learning His Word.  I'm not trying any more to get it right.  I have shaken Fear.

Sound arrogant? It would if I were speaking from the vantage point of being my own Healer.  But I'm not!  I can confidently say these things because the Spirit of God's Wisdom has opened my eyes - through many Seasons - to show me that when I make Seasons self-focused I will always fear.

Let me illustrate by using this current Season of my life:  Menopause.  Self-focus navigation tells me that I must find the right doctor to give me the right meds, hormone replacement therapy, food lists, creams, Valium to make it through.   Self-focus navigation urges me and often shames me into gathering all the information I can to be well-informed.  Missing vital information could harm me.  Self-focus navigation keeps everything in this Season all about what I can do, should do, should not do, could do, must do until I'm just flat worn out.  It's not enough to carry the weight (literally) of this Season but I must also carry the burden of the exit of the Season.

It's stupid. It's stupid to ask Winter to be responsible for bringing in Spring.  It's stupid to rely on ourselves to navigate our own Seasons.

We look to God, who is wise and who's thoughts are way higher than ours and we breath and we calm down and we put down our banner that says "Me" on it ... and we sit.  We sit because we are tired.  We sit because it's in our weakness that God, who is strong, speaks to us in soft tones because we've become overwhelmed.  It's in those soft tones we feel empowered.  And then when we hear enough in the soft tones, we get up and we do what He told us to do and we navigate from a new place that takes "Me" of the top of the organizational flow chart and puts "God" in my place.

If He tells me to go to a doctor, I go.  If He tells me to gather information, then I gather.  But I don't do anything other than what He tells me.  If I hear nothing, I don't sit in shame and guilt.  There is no place for shame in guilt in the lap of my Father.  Hearing nothing may mean I need to just sit awhile.  I sit until I hear and then I go and do ... and do with more confidence that this is a Season who has an Author and it's author is not me.

Walking in a Season,
Christina

This blog was born out of a few resources you mind find helpful:
The well-written blog by my friend
Dr. Henry Cloud on Seasons

I love the aging process.  There is a wisdom that comes with living years on the planet.  Granted, if one lives in a way that keeps eyes and minds closed, perhaps the wisdom that could have invaded their soul is not received but ... alas! ... that's another story for another time.  My wisdom comes by way of an unlikely (or likely) character - fear.

At Christmas I find myself mostly - afraid!  I'm afraid that the gift I thought was "perfect" will disappoint.  I'm afraid that moments I set out to create will flop.  I'm afraid that the things I thought I had to get accomplished beforehand - in order to relax and chill without guilt - may rear their ugly heads and demand my attention during the holiday.  I'm afraid that what I'm doing in the moment is second-best to what I just heard someone else say they are doing.  I'm afraid the picture in my mind of what I think this time of year should look like isn't going to match what really happens.

I've got a dear friend who can't look at Facebook right now because the past is too hurtful to revisit.  I've got another friend who sits in a hospital room with a son who's fever won't break.  Another dear one has lost a job contract and another had emergency surgery.  One parent is in a rehab center recovering from a stroke.  A sister is overworked and exhausted.  Despite these being less than perfect circumstances, we all let fear discolor the moment and deceive us into thinking that we are going to miss something "perfect" because of our circumstances.  Then, we wallow in a sense of deficit thinking the present is so much less than what could have been or should have been.  Fear gets another victory.  Another victim has been taken down through the stronghold of fear.

This year, Libby wanted to make Taffy during the holidays.  I've never made Taffy.  Eaten Taffy I have done.  Made it, with my own two hands, never.  I decided that I would create a lovely Christmas memory and we'd have a family Taffy pulling night.  We'd wait until Addison was home to join us.  It would be a "perfect" night.  The stage was set.

Libby and I followed the directions, the first time, and the mixture was too runny.  Failed attempt.  We pushed through the disappointment and tried again.  To no avail ... with a mixture hard enough to injure a small animal.  The problem was cast to the lack of proper tools.  The mixture required a specific boiling temperature.  And, to ensure the proper temperature had been achieved, one must have a candy thermometer.  I have a meat thermometer.  We "guessed" at what would be 270 ... and our guess what sorely mistaken.

We laughed.  We threw our Taffy, resembling shards of glass, away.  Boo.  No Taffy memory to lodge into the history books of "perfect Christmas memories".

That's when it hit me:  NO ONE HAS A BOOK OF PERFECT CHRISTMAS MEMORIES!  

From the very beginning, virgin Mary got some news that she would be a pregnant bride.  Obviously upsetting, the circumstances were less than "perfect".  Yet ... for whom?  Imperfect for the receiver but perfect from the Giver?

I'm letting go.  I'm trusting the God of the Universe to be the same "perfect" God that He was to virgin Mary to be the same "perfect" God for me.  He set events into motion that were "perfect".  He made the circumstances "perfect" by His presence.  When I choose to invite His presence into every detail of my holiday, every moment becomes put into perspective by a loving God who desires all things for my good, to prosper me - not harm me, to give me hope.  When I set aside my fear of what could, should, might be ... "perfect" peace rushes in.  Whew!

Not pulling Taffy,
Christina

You can't tell, but under this bridge, about 4 minutes walk from my apartment, sleeps a homeless man.  I hardly recognized him as being human until I closely examined him.  As I walked by during my routine, morning walk, there he slept.  Under the bridge.  Accompanied by the smell of urine.  The traffic rumbling overhead.  His dirty socks were airing out on a ledge.  His shoes neatly aligned next to his body.  He slept in a sleeping bag.  His other belongings were gathered in a tidy form serving as a pillow.  Out of respect, I took the picture after I passed him.  I somehow wanted to preserve some sense of his dignity - one human to another.  I could give him that.

Lately my family and I have begun to struggle - for the first time since living abroad - about the concept of "home".  Where is "home"?  Honestly, we feel a bit in transition mode.  I always pay attention to this mode, knowing there is probably a healthy tension that is going to come to the surface.

I've come to believe that tension is always a way of God moving you from one comfort zone to another.  What once seemed foreign, odd, strange, awkward, not doable, impossible, really scary - becomes "normal".  Comfort zones are like invisible circles that get drawn around you.  When you expand that zone, your circle increases in size.  You are now prepared to handle another circumstance that will force you to make yet another choice.  Embrace another thing that caused you at first to tremble, allow it to be walked through, and then encounter achievement OR ... don't.  Your circle increases - OR it doesn't.

Home.  Right now it's where I am.  As I explore what that looks like - or may look like - and freak out a little about the possible expanding of a comfort zone - I will remember my fellow human.  His home is under a bridge.  It puts everything into perspective.

Grateful for clean socks,
Christina

... And I'm not the only one.  Take, for example, two gals named Mary.  They go on Sunday after Jesus had been crucified - early risers they must have been - as the day was beginning to dawn to the tomb of Jesus.  They had certain expectations.  Jesus would still be dead.  The big rock would still be laying in front of the tomb.

Being a lover of great dramatic tales (understatement), I love how God chose to show these gals that He is a keeper of promises and that His Son tells the truth.  Suddenly.  (I just love that word.  It suggests that normal was being experienced and then - SHAZAMM! - a new thing happens.)  So, suddenly, there is a great earthquake.  So violent, this earthquake, the stone that had covered the entrance to the tomb was now rolled away.  But - again I love the flare for the dramatic - an angel is discovered sitting on top of the boulder! Ha!  And, come on folks, this was no ordinary angel.  This angel had a face that shone like lightning and his clothes were white as snow (fashionably appropriate since it was now Spring)!  So fantastic was this angel that the guards surrounding the temple fell to the ground as if dead (they fainted).  Poor tough guys - frightened by an Angel.

Then the Angel addresses the two left standing - the girls (hee, hee). He tells them a few things:

1. Don't be afraid.
2. Jesus isn't here.  He rose from the dead just like he said he would.
3. Go quickly to tell the others that followed him.
4. You will see him in Galilee.

I love how God gives me words to chase, to research, to ponder, to pray, to write, to study, to sit on and stew a little.  INTEGRITY is one such word that is popping about the inner workings of this female brain of mine.

Last night, My Chris and I went to see the movie "Bridge of Spies".  Excellent movie.  It's been the diving board of many of my INTEGRITY thoughts.  The character played by Tom Hanks was a man of ...drum roll please:  INTEGRITY.  Ironically, so was the "criminal" he defended.  Neither one of these men caved under pressure.  They had strong convictions and they acted upon them.

This morning, words have led me on more chasing, researching, pondering, praying, writing, studying, sitting and stewing.  "For we live by faith and not by seeing" (2 Corinthians 5:7).  Bottom line:  I live what I believe.  What I believe determines how I live.  Could this be my personal definition of INTEGRITY?

Now, if you'll hang with me for a few minutes of rabbit chasing which will lead us back to INTEGRITY ... The words of Christ in Revelation 2:8-11 have intertwined with what's been rumbling about regarding INTEGRITY.  Christ, in response to hearing about the suffering and poverty of a group of people He loves, tells them not to be afraid ...despite also telling them more suffering and poverty is in their future!  So, naturally, another word comes to mind and takes center stage on this intellectual dance party I have going on in my head:  FEAR.

FEAR seems to be the biggest obstacle to keep God's people down, from obeying, acting in faith, and believing God's promises to be real.  

We do fear man.  And because we fear, we give into pleasing "man".  We give up to not be singled out as different by "man".  We place great significance on the temporary approval/disapproval of "man" rather than on the eternal approval/disapproval of God.

Now, lest you think me to be a synical being, let me address that we do, also, fear God.  We fear God will not keep His promises and fail us.  We fear that if we totally surrender God will not show up.  We fear pain.  We fear that if we follow God then there will be pain.  We equate pain the with absence of God's pressence.

Hmph.  How's that for a "pick-me-up"?

Alas, have no fear!  God loves us so much ... He continually whispers in our ears ... "Don't be afraid!".  Now, I failed to mention one thing about the group of people in Revelation.  Christ told them ... "I know about your suffering and poverty".  He knew.  He cared.  And, He had a solution:  "Do not fear!"

He knows our hearts are prone to fear when we have not securely anchored our beliefs on Him!  When we choose not to fear - and it's always a choice - we will act out of our belief!  When we choose not to fear, we will accept the possibility of pain/loss/hurt because we know that God knows ...and cares ...and will be present in every single minute.  Then ...knowing all that yummy goodness ...we can and will act out of ... INTEGRITY!

Now, let your ears hear ...
Your mind ponder ...
Your soul seek ...
Your fingers write ...
And your heart not fear.
He's with us ...
Christina

Since my days and nights of writing my last post ("Gloves and Fear") I have fought the monster of fear.  The occasional default of this emotion might raise it's ugly head, but when I read that this child we celebrate came to rescue the poor, the oppressed, the weak, the violated ... I think the very ones I may fear are the very ones He came to save ... fears fades. Immanuel.  God with us.  All of us.

Just a nice thought ...
for a nicer season ...
christina

I really like people. I really like to observe them, to meet them, to get to know them.  Usually, most usually, I am not afraid of people.  There is the occasional thuggish looking person in the Ubahn (subway) but they are drunk and harmless.  There may be the occational "weird vibe" from someone on the street but I usually have this sense of peace about me that keeps me from freaking out.

Until of late.  Until I listen to the media about refugees and ISIS and terrorist attacks and calls to bear arms by American politicians and preachers.  Just yesterday, I read where my country is constructing a barrier to bar refugees from entering; I read about 25 young men (16 - 18 yrs. old) arrested after fighting at a Refugee center about 2 hours away due to ethnic differences; I read about a Swedish teenage girl (17 yrs. old) who was arrested at a local train station (just 15 minutes from my flat) in connection with ISIS; I read about the Austrian Minister of Integration declaring that 150 local Kindergartens cater to Muslim children and parents and claims they are teaching radicalization of a culture that refuses to integrate into it's Austrian hosts.  This ... this makes me afraid ... of certain people.

I hate it.  But I can't shake it.  And then ...

Yesterday, I meet my little beggar woman who I've come to know (the one that sells papers outside my grocery store).  I've wondered about the young men in her family ... are they potential terrorists?  She wears a head covering.

I saw her and wanted to avoid her.  I forced myself to meet her eyes.  She always greets me with a familiar sense of "friendship".  We engaged in our ritual primitive communication and I noticed her hands.  Big, worn, cracked hands exposed to the cold.  I asked her if she had gloves.  No.  I then knew what the One who drew me to her in the first place wanted me to do ... give her mine.

• Let me interject a little ironic story about my gloves.  My dear step-mom ... whom I love as my own Momma and affectionately call my Momma ... always gives the best gifts.  Good quality.  Much nicer than I would buy for myself. And, because of her Mother's heart and knack for shopping, she keeps us warm with good gloves, hats, sock warmers, and these other things ... that I have no idea what they are called ... but they are like heavy-duty socks with fluffy stuff at the top that you can wear inside your boots ... but part of it sticks out ... the fluffy stuff ... and looks really cool but feels really warm.  All that to say ... I thought I had lost one of my fancy gloves that she had given to me just a few days ago ... only to be delighted way too much over a lost glove discovered.  These ... these black, fancy, with fur that I secretly think is mink ... or something ... these were the gloves I knew I must depart with ... to give away ... to a potential family member of a suspected-in-my-mind terrorist.

I slipped them off my average-sized, clean, and manicured hands, exposing them to the cold.  She shook her head in total defiance.  She would not take my gloves.  I would not take her rejection and tried to put one on her hands.  She joined me ... to no avail.  They were too small.

I slipped them back on my hands, grateful, relieved, and on mission to find the biggest gloves I could find and return to present them to my ... friend ... who I still may be afraid of ... and of her fellow countrymen ... and others like her ... and her part of the world ... but for one act of courage ... I beat the fear.

Not Reading Anymore Media Today,
christina

I have the vocabulary down ... in my circles.  Faith is a word that is tossed about ... a lot.  When I was 19 years old, I stepped into this great unknown subject ... leaping into with eyes wide open ... this very real yet very unknown life of ... FAITH.

As with most things in life that we make long, committed, decisions about I knew the risks of choosing FAITH.  I had, afterall, been in the right environment to embrace it.  It wasn't so much the fear of the embracing of FAITH ... for me it was the fear of NOT embracing FAITH.

I'm 47 years old.  I'm not having a mid-life crisis ... (I don't think) ... but I am discovering that FAITH looks really different at this stage in my life.  FAITH at 19 took some guts.  FAITH to cross that invisible and tangible all at the same time boundary of committing my life to a Person and a World System that went counter culture to my ... well, my culture.

FAITH as a mature* adult (*no poll taken to proove the adjective I just self-prescribed ) at times takes more guts.  My enemy is experience and self-reliance.  At my age, when the One who I committed my life to at 19 calls my name ... I use experience and self-reliance as my filters.

This morning, as with most mornings, I sat in my cozy chair with my coffee and read some statements that started my pulse racing, my palms to get clammy, and my head to nod in up and down motions of silent agreement.  I'm afraid.  When new things come my way ... I tend to see the outcome of the new thing on one side of a fence ... and me, with all my trying and tiredness and catching up to get it right ... on the other side of the fence.  Here's what's weird.  Usually, I see God on the side I'm trying to get to ... waiting for me to do my trying and get all tired and get it all right before I can come to Him ... to where He is ... to His side.

Wait for it ... this is where my new 47-year-old FAITH comes in ... kinda like a super hero ... and barges down the door of my wrong thinking.

• "I will help you learn to follow me confidently rather than fearfully."  (Jesus Lives by Sarah Young, pg. 356).
• "If the Lord delights in a man's ways, he makes his steps firm; though he may stumble, he will not fall, for the Lord upholds him with his hand."  Psalm 37:23-24

I wish I had had my camera last night.  There was an awesome storm that moved through town.  We could see the dark clouds, the lightning, even smell the rain.  The winds picked up.  The temperature dropped.  Then, the rains came.  It was beautiful!

Being a self-proclaimed Oklahoma native, I recently told my mother-in-love that one of the things I missed during the Spring season was the storms!  The whole scenes that proceed the main event of a storm just do something to me!  I have secretly and now publicly stated that I could easily be a storm-chaser!


We had just picked Libby up from a birthday party.  We ran to the van through a light rain shower.  Minutes later, the skies opened and the rains fell.  Despite it being early evening the skies were black.  On every direction all we could see was black, rain, lightning, wind.  Even with the windshield wipers adjusted to full speed, we could barely see out the front window.

As my blood pressure elevated loving this most unexpected storm, my sweet Libby was ... freaking out!  She doesn't remember storms like I do.  Since this is not so common in Vienna, this was new and frightening.  She kept asking us if rocks were gonna fall from the sky or if the lightning was going to hit our van.

One of the things we have been doing as a family in the last few weeks to help fight a spirit of bickering between the girls or put fear and stress in it's place is to begin singing.  It's kind of comical, actually.  I hear Libby raising her voice to precious Parker and I intervene with ... "OK Libby ... let's start singing." She looks at me like I'm a crazy person, listens to my very off-key voice sing a few bars of a praise song and before I know it she is joining in on the chorus.  This has been our routine ... and go figure --- it has worked!

Now, back to the van ... and Libby's fear.  Funny how God uses our kids to teach us ... and give wisdom.  Through her fear she said, "OK guys ... let's start singing."  We did.  We sang at the top of our voices.

As we approached the bridge that crosses over into the 2nd district, near our home, we saw the tiniest ray of light struggling to reveal itself through the storm.  Without any wise planning on my part, Addison begins to sing "Praise You in the Storm" by Casting Crowns.