Looking Forward to a New Order of Things

It was difficult. 

Last night. 

Hard to feel good finding joy when I knew there were families an hour away who found only sorrow.

I watched my boys sing and act in the school's Christmas musical, my heart swelling with love and, yes, a touch of pride.

I knew I had them for that moment. 
But that's all I knew.

 I have to embrace it all.

I can't take a single moment for granted.

So we cried. 
A whole lot of us there.
And we prayed. 
Because that's the only solution in this whole tragedy. 
God is the only hope that shines through this war with evil.

 John Stott wrote: “I could never myself believe in God if it were not for the Cross. In the real world of pain, how could one worship a God who was immune to it?” 

And Tim Keller responded: "Do you see what this means? Yes, we don’t know the reason God allows evil and suffering to continue, but we know what the reason isn’t, what it can’t be. It can’t be that he doesn’t love us! It can’t be that he doesn’t care. God so loved us and hates suffering that he was willing to come down and get involved in it. And therefore the Cross is an incredibly empowering hint. Ok, it’s only a hint, but if you grasp it, it can transform you. It can give you strength."

Keller's entire post on suffering can be found here. 

There is comfort there, 

in God's word. 

In His promises.

“The LORD is close to the brokenhearted and saves those who are crushed in spirit.” (Psalm 34:18, NIV) 

"He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away” Revelation 21:4 (NIV)

Looking forward to the new order of things.

In memory of...

Not only am I short, but also I am not a black belt like my husband. 

Still, this post is not about me. I was downloading pictures of our Christmas tree hunt (which was more like a perusal) when I found this on his iPhone. I had to download it. It reminded me of that all-important night when he tested for his black belt and earned it. What a night.

Our taekwondo school in Greensburg, Pa., had some serious tests. There was indeed the chance that you would NOT earn your belt after the night. Mess up your form in front of the judges and not ask for a redo. Miss your board break. Puke. (OK, the puke part was a figment of my own testing nightmares.) Nevertheless, there was no guarantee you'd actually PASS the test. Failure was an option. 

But for Curt on this night, he nailed every move. He sparred right. He did his form right. He broke his boardSSSSSS. And he looked like a black belt in every way. 

This was a proud night. He felt overwhelmed when it was over, tears leaking out of his eyes. I felt immensely proud of his work - three years of dedication to this one night. And though this school doesn't exist here in our neck of the woods, he's still a black belt. Nobody can take that away from him. 

Picture this, if you will...

I'd give my eye teeth to have pictures to go with this post. I'm sure I have some stored up somewhere, but that was before the digital age. And though I'm willing to search my Shutterfly account for old photos, I'm absolutely not gonna go digging through a stack of boxes for a picture I can't even be sure exists anymore.

In my mind, however, I can see everything clearly. There's the dining room table set for twelve (extended with a card table, but covered with one giant Christmasy table cloth and matching cloth napkins). Mulled wine simmers in the crock pot; the Blue Willow teacups are waiting to be filled. Curt is cooking because it was just safer that way. 

This was a tradition back at 618 Walnut where we lived till Benjy was born, not long enough. Every December we hosted our own Old Southwest Christmas Parlor Tour dinner. We invited friends and told them to dress warmly and be ready for walking. And then we'd feed them, fill their flasks, and be off. The tour is, to this day, an annual fundraiser for the historic district neighborhood we called home. Roughly 10 homes were on the tour every year, and we'd traipse through each of them ogling their decorations and wood trim and original windows and impossible kitchens. Every house smelled of Christmas - all cinnamony and apply and sprucey. Candles floated in bathtubs. Fresh greens stretched from room to room. And polite oversee-ers stood in every room keeping watch.

And then we'd turn into the last room and tumble out the door, whisk our flasks of mulled wine out of our pockets, and sneak a sip before heading to the next house. The entire tour took about 3 hours. And by the time we got home, we were convinced we had the shabbiest house in the city. Our fake greenery and aged decorations surely wouldn't attract a rat, much less a $10 ticket. 

What I know now, almost 10 years later, is that my aged decorations look just as good in the dim light as the ones I saw on the Parlor Tour. And I can float candles in water as well as anyone. But I don't think it's the decorations that make the house, in fact, as much as the love that fills it. Whether the houses we paid to see were filled with love of family or love of the season or love of kitchens, each and every one had somebody filled with a love of something fixin' them up for the rest of us. 

This teeny-tiny house we live in now has tons of that love. So much love we're a muffin-top kind of home. We love each other fiercely. We love the anticipation of the season. We love the Christmas lights  shining in every room. We love the good smell of Glade candles that masks Ein's litter box. The bottom line is, we love. 

One day, with God's blessing, we will make it home, and we'll resume our Christmas Parlor Tour dinner parties. But until that day, we'll happily count our blessings that we've found the real beauty of a parlor tour in our own living room of our rented 1950s Cape that's just right for us. If you want a tour, we promise not to charge you.