Cindy DeBoer

Trusting God

My Broken Family

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While living overseas, our family had several fortuitous opportunities to experience and explore both Europe and Africa. Unfortunately, traveling as a family of six on budget airlines with minimal luggage allotment meant almost ZERO space for souvenirs.

One time, however, we just had to make an exception. During our two years living in France, we were offered a chance of a lifetime to attend a conference in South Africa. Although still a 10-hour flight south across the entire African continent, we lunged at the opportunity positing, “Well, we’ll never live this close to Africa again –  let’s go for it!” (Geeesh! How wrong that assumption turned out to be!)

We stayed in the eerily deserted post-apartheid city of Johannesburg, visited the shanty towns of Soweto and the mostly white Afrikaans capital city Praetoria, and scouted for the “Big 5” on an African Safari in Kruger Park. I’ve been told I use the phrase “life-changing” too often, but South Africa truly WAS life-changing! (And now that I think about it, why would I want to participate in anything that doesn’t, in some way, change/improve me???)

Because South Africa soaked deep into our bones, I simply HAD to find a way to bring home some kind of tangible thing from that country.

After scouring the open-air market, I opted for a sculpture made from ebony wood. It’s a carving of a six-member family embracing one another in a circle. To me, nothing symbolized our family’s unity via our unique path in life better than that carving.

I gingerly hauled that unwieldy, lead-like, behemoth in my hand-luggage all the way “home” to France. It faithfully watched over us from its perch on our mantle for two years. Then I carried that hulking thing back to America in a padded handbag where it again found a home on our fireplace mantel. Three years later, the sculpture was one of very few decorative items to make the “cut” for our limited luggage space and accompany us on our move to Morocco. It was THAT special. Strangely, it felt like that carving carried some power of actually holding our family together as we bounced around the world.

Although ebony is wood, it’s extremely heavy, shiny and smooth so it looks and behaves more like stone, or even dense ceramic. And so, when someone accidentally knocked it off our fireplace hearth in Morocco, it crashed onto the tile floors and broke into at least 20 pieces.

For weeks, I mourned the loss of a “treasure.” But once I got a hold of myself, I decided that even if it’d look ridiculous, I’d glue the many pieces of my sculpture back together. And then it fell and broke into pieces again. And again. And again.

Today, my beautiful sculpture has more fault lines than the San Andreas.

However, I continue to proudly display this special carving in my home. It will always remind me of another place and another time when our family lived in faraway places and was as unified and whole as a family can possibly be.

I was dusting recently when I picked up the sculpture and the “Mom-piece” snapped off in my hand. My heart skipped a beat. I immediately felt this was a foreshadowing of my imminent death. For someone with a nasty lung disease, those thoughts are not entirely irrational. Pummeled with intrusive thoughts of how a dead mother would be better for my kids than a needy, sick mother, I moped around for days waiting for a lung to collapse (common with my disease) and death to ensue.

Which, (obviously) never happened.

I squelched those negative thoughts with a reminder that the sheer fact I wake up each day means I’m definitely supposed to still be here. In spite of this stupid lung disease that originally thrust a 10-year life-expectancy in my face, in a medically baffling twist, my life keeps drumming on rather normally 11 years later. I looked down at my pathetic ebony sculpture – which now looked like total garbage that most normal people would have decidedly chucked by now – and decided that I MUST, both literally and figuratively, stay attached to my people.

So, in a death-defying act, I grabbed the glue.

As I glued myself back onto the others in my family, I ran my fingers over all the cracks, fissures and holes and became overcome with emotion. I suddenly realized that this – THIS UGLY MESS OF A SCULPTURE – is eerily representative of our family today in REAL time.

I’m still not entirely sure how it happened, but over the last several years we’ve been battered, stretched and tested and I think every one of us has felt akin to this sculpture when it landed splat on the hard tile floor and broke into bits. We, too, have been feeling very broken. No longer representative of who we once were, and unsure of who we’ve become.

Of course, sometimes things break. Of course, relationships will take hits. Of course, we will find ourselves splayed open at times. Of course, we will not always be as shiny and polished and new as a freshly carved ebony sculpture sitting in a market in Johannesburg. That “shiny” moment, that “new-beginning” feeling, and that “unmarred” occasion is gone and cannot return. Similarly, life is always pushing us forward and beautiful new beginnings disappear in a breath. And there’s no rewind. Just forward. Just like life pushed our family forward from continent to continent, it also now moves us forward through changing seasons of relationships and our polish is getting worn down. Whenever we take the risk of relationship, we must accept there will be some falls that result in cracks. We’ll inevitably get hurt and we’ll inevitably hurt others.

If we’re alive, there’s no escaping the cracks on this pilgrimage.

Unexpected Cracks

No one tells you that this parenting gig gets harder when less “parenting” is actually involved. No one warns you that as middle-agers you don’t, in fact, get to just “hang out” until Jesus comes because the hardest relational work is still before you. As we attempted to figure out what life should look like at this juncture (Are we still parents? Are we just peers? Should we call? Should we give them space? Can I bring them lasagna?) and walk the thin line between overbearing and uninvolved, our kids described a sense of disorientation and disillusionment. We’ve had to work our way through difficult changes, challenges, and seasons of life that none of us anticipated or prepared for.

Yet, as I smeared Gorilla glue into the seam of the sculpture where “Mom” belongs, it hit me what a beautiful thing glue is.

When it comes to relationships, Gorilla Glue is “grace.”

Apart from grace, all people and all relationships would be laying in a big heap of ebony shards.

Grace means I see you, I know you, and I know your heart. And no matter how I’ve been hurt, I still want you in this circle with me and want to keep you glued on.

Grace means I do not have to fear making a mistake. If I do, I know you’ll pick me up and glue me back on.

Grace means if we disagree, there’s no risk of permanent separation because we have this glue. We will hold tight to one another agreeing that God gives us grace SO THAT two imperfect people can, in fact, get along.

Grace means if you forget my birthday or I forget yours, or if we don’t hold the same value to a family holiday or personal event or informal gathering, it’s okay – we’ll hand each other the glue.

Grace means that if I don’t text back soon enough, I won’t be exiled because we’ve got glue.

Grace is the substance that holds us together EVEN when the world suggests we walk away to “find ourselves” or tells us relationships are “toxic” when, in reality, they’re just NORMAL and require the NORMAL amount of hard work.

Grace says, “I know you didn’t mean it. You were just having a bad day.”

Grace says, “I know you love me. Even if I’m not feeling it today, I know it’s true.”

When your head hurts due to ugly crying from a conversation gone awry, or from a door-slamming fight, or from an overwhelming feeling of abandonment from someone close to you, grace is the calm that washes over you and gives you the strength to just let it go, or to make the phone call, or to offer the olive branch and go out for beers together, or to apologize (even if you’re 100%, without a doubt, absolutely sure, it’s not your fault).

Glue puts us back together no matter WHO snapped off and no matter WHY the break happened and says, “We’re better off together WITH cracks, then not together at all.”

Apparently, the Japanese figured this all out long before me:

Kintsugi is the Japanese art of repairing broken pottery with a concoction of lacquer and gold, resulting in pottery covered in a web of gold cracks. The philosophy behind the practice says when a vessel breaks, the brokenness should never be disguised or give reason to cast off the piece, but instead, it should be recognized simply as a part of the history of the vessel. In fact, Japanese tradition posits pottery with lots of Kintsugi actually INCREASES in value.

Today, as a family morphing into a new season, we are less certain about who we are and what, exactly, our roles are in this stage of life. But we are seeping glue (grace) out of all our collective seams, and I’m pretty sure that means we’re worth more now than ever.

It’s Been Ten Years… So Why Am I (still) Alive?

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On the day before Thanksgiving, 2013, in a closet-sized, moldy-smelling exam room, a University of Michigan pulmonologist confirmed my fear: the shortness of breath I’d been experiencing was due to a rare, progressive, degenerative, and often terminal lung disease, Lymphangioleiomyomatosis (LAM). Paul and I sobbed the entire drive home from Ann Arbor.

Not surprisingly, a rare disease doesn’t draw the research dollars compared to something like, say, cancer. I get it. Why put out a toaster fire when a whole city is burning down the street? Lack of research funds translates to a lack of up-to-date information as well as a cure. So even though sources were minimal, I scrambled to learn everything I could about this unwanted guest residing in my lungs. Most everything I read at that time suggested women with LAM (it’s a sexist disease – only women get it) had, on average, 10 years to live from the time of diagnosis.

Attempting to make sense of my imploded world after learning my years on this planet would be reduced, I wrote a blog about it and it kind of went viral. You can find that original blog here. And now, as someone shocked to still be alive, I feel compelled to revisit that original blog. Although it reads like a re-imagined list of life priorities, in actuality, it was a simple attempt to find the meaning of life. I had to. I’d been handed an “expiration date,” and I would never again have the luxury of NOT thinking about how I’d spend my precious days.

A humbling and unexpected experience these past 10 years has been watching from the sidelines as many, many other women with LAM have passed away. Especially during COVID. What a gut-wrenching time as numerous LAM-sisters lost their lives (don’t even get me started on how I believe society failed us, the vulnerable…) And for mysterious reasons most likely tied to hormones, LAM tends to spread more quickly and be more severe for women under the age of 40. This means that often, the deceased are younger than me. These precious ones are taken to heaven during child-bearing years – often leaving young children behind.

So what the heck am I still doing here?

Why them and not me?

New Thoughts for a New Decade

It seems to me God chose the wrong “mama” to take home. Why wouldn’t he take the one who has lived more than half a century and watched all her children enter adulthood than the one in her 30s with small children at home? Did God goof?

This line of thinking has kept me up at night and given me many a migraine these past 10 years.

NOT the reasons I’m still alive:

I always believed our single most important purpose here on earth was to bring God glory. I think, like the good Calvinists we were, we learned about “saved by faith alone” at a very, very young age so that we didn’t freak out about trying to please God and think our salvation depended on it. But simply glorifying God can NOT be why God keeps me (and you) here on planet earth. Because, if he truly just desires our praise and glory, he’d receive it even MORE PERFECTLY and MORE ABUNDANTLY from us in heaven. Here on earth, we fall short and screw it all up much of the time. God would have us all at his feet in heaven if glorifying Him is all we were created for.

Other Christians tell me that we’re supposed to just be grateful and bask in God’s beauty and goodness. They say that by doing this, we please God and that THAT is the meaning of our existence. Be HAPPY, Be THANKFUL, and WATCH more sunsets, they say.

I find that sorrowfully lame as well. For one, I’m not so sure how I feel about the “goodness of God” anymore anyway. I think, as is clear in the Beatitudes, that HIS definition of “good” is not the same as OURS. For another reason, I feel like we wealthy, privileged, and first-world Christians love to use thankfulness as our panacea. We dodge the responsibility of leveraging all our “#blessings” to help “the least of these” by incessantly repeating how darn thankful we are.

What would SHE say is the reason I’m still alive?

I can’t stop thinking about what one of my younger deceased LAM-sisters (that’s what we call each other) would say to me. How would she, as one who passed away in her 30’s and left behind several young children, feel about me and my choices, as one whom God spared and has made it to 57 years old?

If it were possible that this LAM-sister could watch me from heaven, would she be pleased that I spend all kinds of hours feeling sorry for myself? Would she say I’m living my best life as I watch more HGTV or reruns of Friends? Would she want me to obsess more about shopping – buying new cars, better clothes, and bigger homes with my bonus years that she was robbed of? Would she think the hours I spend taking care of all my “stuff” and buying more “stuff” is honorable? Would she be supportive of God’s decision to take her home early yet spare me as I hold grudges, argue with my husband, gossip with friends, or spend hours trying to change someone’s political bend?

Just the thought of all the ways I cheapen this existence – this ONE PRECIOUS LIFE, while she, my LAM-sister doesn’t even GET an existence, sickens me.

When I wallow in self-pity and pilfer away my days in meaningless activities, it feels to me, that in some way, I’m dishonoring the legacy of my LAM sisters – or of anyone who has gone before me who really should still be here on earth. I feel that if I’m not living my best life, I’m basically saying to those deceased: I don’t like the gift of life I’ve been granted. I’d rather be you.

The Good Life

It’s such an existential question: what are we here for? As I write this blog, I’m finding it much easier to identify all the things I am NOT placed on earth for. But when I parse out those things, I’m left with a conclusion that makes me tremble. I’m left with the conclusion that there IS STILL SOMETHING LEFT FOR ME TO DO. Not to just simply be, but to BE fully alive and DO something. Which begs the question: How do I know if I’m fully alive?

I don’t know.

I often think I’m really living and living abundantly. But then I see other people (Christians) who are doing it so differently from me and are as equally convinced that they are the ones actually really living.

But what I do know – and you know this, too – is that there are these holy-moment times when we feel very much alive and we don’t want them to end and it’s almost as if we can feel God smiling down on us. For me, those moments are when I:

  • Sit with a patient at my psychiatric hospital who may be battling things like suicidal ideation, anxiety, depression, anger, fear, hopelessness, or helplessness, or any number of mental struggles, and just listen to them. Not necessarily speak – but just sit with them in the moment.
  • Sit oceanside and get all caught up in the mystery and massiveness of a God who holds the oceans in his hands and cry my eyes out for at least an hour.
  • Scoot my 2-year-old granddaughter down the sidewalk in her Little Tykes cozy coupe and pretend we are going to Costa Rica to sell strawberries, but then abruptly stop because she sees a yellow wildflower and yellow is her mama’s “favowite.”
  • Watch a sunset over a small inland lake in the middle of Michigan with my high-school sweetheart whom I’ve now been married to for 37 years.
  • Give with extravagant generosity – more than the world would say is prudent.
  • Soak in the chatter when all four kids, their partners, and grandbaby have gathered in our home and I hear them cover things like Israel/Gaza, refugees, which breed is better: weaner dogs or Bernadoodles?, who’s the best SNL character ever, a new book release by Jedidiah Jenkins, best practices in sourcing quality coffee, the takeaway from the morning’s sermon, and does anyone want to go to the border and learn about the crisis firsthand from a non-bias, NGO?
  • Walk. Whether in the flower greenhouses in the spring, Meijer Gardens in the summer, the woods in the fall, or our neighborhood in the winter after a fresh fallen snow. I FEEL God when I walk.
  • Spend time with the six junior high girls in my small group at the Potters House School
  • Tell Alexa to play a random favorite worship song and instruct her to “turn it up” so loud that the walls of this old former crack house just shake in worship along with me.

So while I may have failed at planting more trees and visiting our local nursing home regularly (goals from my blog 10 years ago), I’m learning there are definitely some actions that bring light and life (either to me or to the life of others) and, in return, make the world a better place to be.

I want to be all about ACTIONS that bring LIGHT and LIFE. I want to do more than just “be” and kill time until Jesus calls me home. I want to DO some things.

WAIT A MINUTE! Can Saved-By-Faith Christians actually SAY THAT???

There was a time when Paul and I sold just about everything we owned, packed up the four kids, and moved abroad to just live for Jesus in a place where not many others do. Somewhere during that time, someone told us we were “works righteous.” In other words, they suggested our actions indicated we were trying to EARN God’s gift of salvation. That accusation stung hard and burned deep. And I still reflect on it. Why does it still hurt? Because for the life of me, I can’t NOT DO things. It’s what gets me out of bed every day. It’s what I feel deep down in my bones – that whenever and wherever it is possible, we have been called to DO something that matters.

In general, I find it is the Christians who would rather not DO anything difficult or unsavory, who like to call “foul” on their fellow believers in action.

It seems to all come down to this: Love God, Love others. The Bible seems very clear to me on HOW we are to love others – to care for the poor, the widow, the orphan, and the alien in our midst. To love our neighbor as ourselves. THIS, to me, is the life well lived. Not necessarily the easy, comfortable, feel-good life – but a life that matters.

Don’t get me wrong. I do not think God demands us to live a life void of pleasurable things that simply exist to make us happy (think sports, entertainment, food, etc.). I think he maybe even takes pleasure in watching us be pleased. BUT… WHAT IF… WHAT IF we were most pleased by our actions of loving others??? Then, our “pleasurable experiences” would be the ACTUAL things he has CALLED us to do in this life!

Maybe we need to recalibrate what brings us pleasure and joy.

Maybe THAT is the intersection of our great joy and God’s great joy.

 God-Breathers

Our pastor once taught us about YHVH – the Jewish name for God. It was a name so sacred, that Jews couldn’t even say it out loud, they only breathed the word. And, ironically, YHVH is the actual translated word for BREATH. So, the name of GOD, which they dared not say, but only breathed, is the word BREATHE!

So, if I’m still alive and every single breath I take is actually me breathing in and out the very name of GOD, I can also conclude that as a God-breather, I am to blow my breath towards all those who do NOT know God and do not know from where their breath comes.

Now THAT is a reason to still be alive!!!

God-breathers, WE are God’s plan for this earth, we have a purpose, and we’ve been called – oh, so clearly – to bravely breathe the message of God to others. ALL the others. And love them. Love them with a costly, extravagant love for as long as we have breath.

Do You and I Have Blood-Dripping Fangs?

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Paul and I have a Libyan friend who, despite growing up in nearly 100% Muslim Libya and being raised by a devout Muslim family, converted to Christianity as a young adult after learning about Jesus on Christian satellite radio. Our friend, whom I’ll call Mourad, (his life would literally be in jeopardy if his Christianity were revealed) shared with us his account of the first time he ever traveled outside of Libya.

Paris train station

Mourad had been invited to a Christian conference in France to share his experience of life as an “underground” Libyan Christian. He told us he was both thrilled and terrified to leave the comfort and safety of the only home, city, and country he had ever known. After successfully navigating the airport in Paris, Mourad stumbled his way around the city until he found the train station where he’d board a train to his final destination. With an hour to burn, Mourad eyed a coffee/food kiosk and decided to grab a bite to eat.

Concerned the barista wouldn’t understand his French (he had only used online tutorial sites for a few weeks now), Mourad practiced his order while waiting in line: “short black coffee” and a “croissant almondine.” He was so surprised when she understood him! But he was even more surprised when he understood the barista’s response when she brought him the two items, looked at his credit card and said, “I’m sorry. Cash only. Our card machine is broken.” Mourad panicked. He didn’t have any Euros – only Libyan dinars. His eyes darted around the train station hoping to find a hidden ATM. He saw none. He felt his cheeks redden and worried the growing line of people behind him were frustrated. He silently chastised himself for choosing to wear his Libyan jellaba which was a clear indication of his religious affiliation, not to mention his nationality. He was contemplating just walking away when he felt a light tap on his shoulder. Mourad described it this way:

“I turned around and here’s this tiny little lady – maybe 80 or 85 years old. She didn’t even reach my chest. She smelled like roses and coffee and her eyes sparkled when she talked. She smiled at me and said, ‘Let me pay for it. You appear to be new to France and I like to welcome new people. I’ll pay this time and maybe someday you can do the same for someone else.’ I thanked her but then told her I didn’t accept money from strangers. So, she extends her tiny worn hand to me and says, ‘Hi, I’m Elsa Benowitz. Now I am your friend. Now you can let me pay!’ Then she actually winked at me and told me to grab my food and have a good day!

.

I was flabbergasted. I knew immediately she was a Jew. A name like Benowitz can only be Jewish. But as I looked at this sweet, tiny, generous woman before me, my mind pounded like a jackhammer. I couldn’t make any sense of it. My whole life I’d been told that Jews have blood-dripping fangs – that their blood-lust toward Muslims is so profound they will lunge at you. I was told their eyes are so full of evil, you can identify them simply by their glare. Muslims in Libya believe Jews have a certain smell – the smell of blood – and that when they meet Muslims, they will either spit at you, hurt you, or kill you. This sweet woman in front of me was the antithesis of all that. I’m sure she assumed I was Muslim, but she emanated kindness and love. She even shook my hand and paid for my lunch!

.

I’m an educated young man. I’ve graduated from university, have a prestigious career and now I am a Christian. I know how to think logically and rationally and make sound deductions from evidence. I know how ridiculous it must sound that I believed Jews were ‘blood-thirsty pigs’ whose primary goal is to kill Muslims and eliminate the Islamic faith. I know now it is unfathomable that I truly believed Jews had fangs and wanted to suck our blood – but I did. For 25 years, that is all I had been told and I had every reason to believe it based on hearsay. I had never met a Jew. But in that moment, at that little coffee stand in a French train station, my world of beliefs came crashing down. I was forced to reconcile everything I’d been told to what I was seeing before me: a kind, compassionate human being.”

Mourad shared that story with us nearly 10 years after it occurred, yet he still choked back the tears as he recalled the moment his heart was forever changed toward Jewish people by simply encountering one elderly Jewish woman.

I think this story serves as a powerful reminder for those of us who strictly adhere to a narrative that we’ve only been told – something we’ve never questioned, explored, or researched. Sometimes, without even meaning to, we end up on a path that we did not choose but others put us on.

For way too long now, major news outlets – Fox News, CNN, MSNBC, all of them! – have been telling us what to think and believe about those who disagree with us. They spend more time telling us how “evil” the other side is than they do telling us the news. If you don’t believe me, take just 15 minutes during primetime to watch the channel that is opposite of what you usually watch. Within minutes, you will be cringing because the narrative insists “the other side” (which is talking about YOUR side) is hateful, deceitful, heartless, and selfish and whose goal is to destroy America and destroy “the other.” Sound familiar? Cable news may not be suggesting “the other side” has fangs and will suck your blood, but it’s not too far off.

Maybe – just maybe – we need to think (critically) for ourselves and draw our own informed conclusions about people, issues and problems and not listen to a group of people who make money from building a viewership.

When our kids were young, we always told them to think for themselves and to not decide how they felt about someone until after they’ve had personal experience. Kids are notorious for telling other kids how to think and act: “Don’t play with Susan. She’s mean.” “Don’t sign up for that teacher. She isn’t fair.” “You’re gonna hate that coach, he plays favorites.” We’d often remind our kids that the perceptions of others DO NOT HAVE TO BECOME YOURS. We would say, “Decide for yourself how you feel about these people.”

I bet you’ve told your kids the same thing.

“When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put aside childish things.” 1 Corinthians 13:11

So why do we find ourselves today conforming to a culture of hate and divisiveness based on what news sources are peddling? Even now as adults, we are listening to voices that insist they have the corner on the truth – these “kids” on the playground of life who are saying, “Listen to me! I know what you should feel and think!” I cannot imagine I’m making a revolutionary statement here, but I feel I need to say it: NO media outlet has the corner on truth. None.

I know this because of personal experiences that refute the narrative of hate that BOTH sides are trying to propagate. The only thing I can know FOR CERTAIN comes from what I’ve actually experienced. And in my experience, it has been unanimously true that whenever I have met someone who is unlike myself – whether that be in religion, politics, socioeconomic status, ethnicity, or sexuality – it altered my previous belief and feelings that had only been “handed” to me from someone else.

God became BIGGER to Mourad the day he saw Jews as actual image bearers of the one true God and I think the same awareness is available to all of us when we meet and engage with others who are not mirror images of ourselves.

May we all be a little more like Mourad.

It’s Time To Turn In Our Shoelaces

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I am a psychiatric nurse at a mental hospital.

The single most important objective at the hospital – one that every single employee can tell you verbatim – is to keep people safe when they are at risk to harm themselves or others. We offer many other helpful services beyond that one objective; but primarily, we keep individuals safe from self-harm or suicide and we keep the society safe by removing those who could potentially harm others (dangerous psychosis, homicide, aggression, uncontrolled substance abuse, etc.)

There are two primary ways a psychiatric hospital keeps patients safe. First of all, we have what is called, “checks” where every single patient has a staff member lay eyes on them a minimum of 5 times an hour to “check” that they are okay and not exhibiting any dangerous behaviors.

Secondly, in addition to “checks,” a psychiatric hospital keeps the environment as safe as possible with things like: beds nailed to the floor, heavy, solid chairs and tables that cannot be broken or thrown, unbreakable windows, etc. But most importantly, keeping every patient safe requires psychiatric hospitals to have a list of contraband items which are prohibited in the hospital. Contraband includes obvious things: knives, cigarettes, lighters, drugs and alcohol. But it also includes less obvious items: pens, mirrors, belts, any clothing item with a string, notebooks with wire binding, and shoelaces. Basically, it’s anything that could be used to harm themselves or others or that could be used in a suicide attempt.

Every time I admit a new patient to the hospital and I explain contraband, they usually say to me, “But I’m not a risk. I won’t do anything dangerous with these shoelaces. I promise. I’m safe.”

I tell them, “I know it doesn’t seem fair that everyone must turn in their shoelaces. But the primary objective of this hospital is that everyone here is safe. And because this unit operates in community – where you will share meals, group activities, the lounge area and in some cases, even sleeping quarters, the only way to assure everyone is safe is to make sure no one has access to potentially dangerous items.”

When I explain this to my patients, they typically understand. They realize they chose (in most cases) to come and they don’t want to be responsible for their personal contraband getting in the hands of someone who might do harm with it.

Now, there are exceptions to the shoelace rule. Sometimes, a patient who is not a high-suicide risk needs good shoes for balance, or has diabetic foot ulcers, or achy feet. In those cases, the doctor makes an exception. Sometimes the doctor says, “You have proven a need for shoelaces. You have a sound mind and you will either keep these shoelaces on your being or make sure they are locked up when not in use so that they never end up in the hands of anyone else. You can keep your shoelaces.”

“BUT WE’RE NOT SICK LIKE YOUR PATIENTS!”

I believe America can learn a lot from my psychiatric hospital.

Some might think it’s absurd to compare a psychiatric floor at a mental hospital with America. But the two are more similar than you might think. Both are communities in the truest sense. I think our denial of this truth is at the core of this gun issue.

One of America’s most unique distinctions is our elevation of the self and our “free to be me” mindset. We call these liberties. For the most part, we do not elevate the preservation of the family, the necessity of community, and our God-given role in society as much as other civilizations do. We’re fiercely independent and proud of it.

This is what makes it so much harder for us to wrap our minds around our responsibilities to the WHOLE, not just the self. No matter who we are and where we live, we are part of something bigger. We are a part of a community and the way we choose to live our lives most definitely affects the lives of those around us. Community members make decisions every day that affect those around them: How/when/where we drive, smoke, drink and do drugs; how we vote; what we buy (affecting availability for others. Think: toilet paper and baby formula); using restraint (think: running naked through a mall, a peeping Tom, or shooting firecrackers onto the property of a veteran); going to public places or events while sick with a communicable illness; and how (or if) we take care of our garbage, our elderly, and our parks. Even things as mundane as the way we treat the grocery store clerk, the children playing in the street, and the pizza delivery boy ALL MATTER because we live in community.

We’re hearing a lot about blaming mental illness to the gun violence problem in America. Of course, this is true. Mentally stable people don’t go shoot 19 children and two teachers in a school classroom. But what is also true is that never before in the history of America have we been so saturated with mentally unstable people. We’ve never been sicker and wearier. From wars, violence, famine, drought, abuse, COVID, sex-trafficking, and extremist views pushing us farther apart from one another – to some extent, we are all “cracking up.” We’re a hurting, angry, broken, and confused people, and things are only going to get worse (the Bible tells us so). In hospital terms, we’d say, “The acuity is very high.”

This translates to an unprecedented number of people looking for the “shoelaces.” Of course, shoelaces don’t kill people, people kill people. But when shoelaces are so prevalent in a community that is not well, people will die.

An inconvenient truth for gun supporters (those holding firm to a position of little to no restrictions) is that in America, 6 out of 10 deaths from guns are deaths from suicide, NOT homicide. (click here). We’re experiencing the tragic and unnecessary loss of life at a dizzying pace and guns are the method of choice to get the job done.

So when these pro-gun adherents suggest solutions like, “arm the teachers,” or “more good guys with guns,” or “increase school security,” or “one entrance” – these things don’t do squat to solve the bigger problem with guns: suicide.

As Americans and certainly as Christians, I think it’s absolutely proper to be freaking out over a mass murder of school children by an unstable young man with an assault rifle. I can’t believe the whole country didn’t just stop in its tracks and spend at least a week in pure shock and lament. BUT, IN ADDITION to the lament necessary for mass shootings, let us not forget that those same weapons – those shoelaces, if you will – are ending up in the hands of those who want to take their own lives, too.

“BUT WHAT ABOUT MY FREEDOMS? THIS IS AMERICA!”

After web-surfing for hours searching for the best definition of government and its purposes, I struggled to find one concise purpose. To be honest, I was looking for proof that our constitution primarily protects our safety as a people, not our liberties. But that’s not true. It’s not one or the other, it’s both/and.

The purpose of our Federal Government, as found in the Preamble of the Constitution, is to:

“…establish Justice, ensure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general Welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity.”

And James Madison, our 4th president and author of the constitution said:

“[t]he powers reserved to the several States will extend to all the objects which, in the ordinary course of affairs, concern the lives, liberties, and properties of the people, and the internal order, improvement, and prosperity of the State.”

These reserved powers have generally been referred to as police powers, such as those required for public safety, health, and welfare.

I know that those who wish to disagree with me on this will point out the word “liberties” in both the above quotes and insist owning a gun is their American liberties expressed. I agree. But if our “liberties” trumped our safety, both quotes could have been much shorter and simply stopped at: “The government exists to ensure no one is ever told what to do.”

We simply can NOT separate the safety of our people from our liberties. They were never meant to be mutually exclusive.

So when the two polarized viewpoints of gun control insist on making their “thing,” – either safety or liberty – the ONE THING, we run into serious trouble. We’ll never come up with a solution (as is the state of our current affairs.)

I’ll never stop believing that if we could put to rest our political posturing, we could find a solution to the massive amounts of death in country via the use of guns.

“BUT I’M SAFE! WHY SHOULD I GIVE UP MY GUN?”

It may seem a breech to our liberties to have an (even limited) ban on guns simply because some in society are mentally unstable. But the reality is we are IN COMMUNITY together and guns are just rampantly finding their way into the hands of those who wish to do harm to themselves or others. When we understand that we ARE a community, we understand that sometimes rights and privileges (liberties) must be restricted to keep everyone safe (like shoelaces in a psychiatric hospital).

Not everyone should have to give up their guns. Sometimes those in charge (like our doctors) will say, “You have proven that you need your gun. You have a sound mind and you will either have this gun on your being or make sure it is locked up when not in use so that it never ends up in the hands of someone else. You can keep your gun.”

Unless we can accept that this is in no way an infringement on our liberties, but simply putting safety on the same, equal page as liberty, we’ll never be safe.

As things now stand, we have more guns in America than people. (click here)

If my psychiatric hospital allowed for more shoelaces than actual people, we would have dead bodies everywhere. Every day.

Sound familiar?

Same Kind of Wounds as Me

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I noticed her and those tell-tale marks on her face from far across the room. At the first break of our writer’s conference, I ran over to her, breathless with anticipation.

“Hey, I don’t mean to be weird or anything, but I notice that you have nasal cannula indentations on your cheeks, and I know that means you wear oxygen at night. I usually have those marks on my cheeks, too, but I didn’t have a portable tank to take with me, so I’m sleeping without it here at the conference.”

She didn’t even hesitate. She reached out and lovingly – knowingly – hugged me. We had an instant bond. We chatted non-stop for 20 minutes. We both have debilitating lung diseases for which there is no cure. We were both feeling a bit discouraged at this conference because it was set in the mountains at a high elevation and the campus was very hilly – two things that make people with sucky lungs cringe.

It has been a hard two years for both of us. We were both told by our physicians that COVID would not be kind to us, and we needed to avoid it if at all possible. We both felt isolated, lonely, bored, and angry after two years of this COVID nightmare. We shared sadness about strained relationships. We admitted feeling unloved, devalued, and discarded when people we loved diminished the devastation of COVID and refused to take precautions on our behalf.

The tears flowed uncontrollably and I think I made a blubbering scene for onlookers.

As two people with lung diseases amidst the worst pandemic in the modern world, we both also suffered from PTSD and I know, for me, I desperately NEEDED her. But here’s the thing: I didn’t know how much I needed her. I had open, oozing, un-attended wounds and didn’t realize  it until she walked in the room. Seeing her just made me acknowledge I am hurt. I am suffering and I need someone who gets me.

I didn’t know how deep my wounds were until we started talking and shared all kinds of bottled-up emotions.

Later that day, I mused how my view on those nasal cannula indentations had changed. I’m no longer embarrassed by them. I’m glad I have them so that others who are oxygen-dependent can recognize me as someone who shares their wounds. I also mused that it would be kind of nice if people wore baseball caps emblazoned with a logo of the wounds they carry to help us all identify one another. I’d like the people with the following wounds to wear identifying ball caps so I could find them more easily:

  • Not loved all that well by my daddy.
  • Spent our kids’ college funds and our retirement funds on living overseas because we refused to raise support just to live like Jesus, for Jesus’ sake.
  • Gains weight even if I swallow my own spit.

It is through the sharing of our pain and truly being known and understood in that pain, that we can begin to find healing.

And what about you, my friends? What wounds are you carrying that no one can see? Who is it that you need to meet just to feel that you are not so alone in your woundedness? Therefore, what kind of logos would you want to see on someone’s ball cap that would make you want to run to them, hug them, and say, “YES! Me, too! Me, too!”

Ball caps that said:

  • Abused as a child. No one knows.
  • My spouse is cheating on me.
  • I drink my troubles away. Every day.
  • We want a child, but can’t get pregnant.
  • My business partner takes advantage of my hard work ethic.
  • I don’t think I love my husband anymore.
  • I don’t have any friends.
  • I’m six months pregnant and just found out our baby has Down’s Syndrome.
  • I secretly dream about running away from it all.
  • I’m depressed and have fleeting thoughts of suicide.
  • I have a prodigal child.
  • Had an abortion in high school that no one knows about.
  • I have cancer and I don’t feel like fighting it anymore.

Finding someone with the same kind of wounds is good, life-giving, and necessary. It’s also biblical:

“Bear one another’s burdens, and thereby fulfill the law of Christ.”  Galations 6:2

“A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another.” John 13:34

“Be completely humble and gentle; be patient, bearing with one another in love. 3 Make every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace.” Ephesians 4: 2,3

“Do not withhold good from those to whom it is due, when it is in your power to act.” Proverbs 3:27

So here’s the deal, fellow sufferers – unless we get real with one another and share our woundedness, NO ONE WILL EVER KNOW and the healing that is available to us, through Christ and his people, won’t be known in its fullest form.

Unless we have nasal cannula marks on our faces or choose to wear a baseball cap with a bold logo, NO ONE KNOWS OUR WOUNDS.

So, may you, by the grace of God, find the strength to share your wounds with a few trusted souls. May you find that the sharing of your wounds exposes those hurts and pains to the light where the light can chase away the darkness. May you find some inner peace as you let out that which has always been bottled in. May you know that the God of all creation created other individuals WITH YOUR SAME WOUNDS to be there for you when you are feeling alone – you need only to reach out to them.

Don’t be ashamed of your nasal cannula indentations. They may be the very thing somebody needs to see today to bring about their healing.

Ode To A Lumpy Body

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Hairy legs and sun-burnt nose
When at the beach, anything goes.
Unbrushed teeth and happy-hour drinks
This much I know: my breath stinks.
Fish for dinner plus a fruity potion
Diet be damned, I'm at the ocean.
Sand in my bed, and in my salt-fried hair,
Sir, what is the time? Wait. Why do I care??
It's here that I feel no virus, pain, or LAM -
Must be the thick presence, of the great I AM.

.

Just a couple of days ago I slipped into my new bikini and Brenda and I headed out for a walk along the Gulf of Mexico in Puerto Vallarta. We felt so important – staying at a swanky resort where budding American accountants and their wives went to feel more successful than they actually were.

We turned the heads of both the locals and tourists. We heard the comments – the catcalls – and laughed at the power of the female anatomy. Perhaps we did stick out – both young, fresh blondes in our little bikinis. And Brenda is tall – really tall – and her long, lean legs stop somewhere around her neck. I’m not tall, nor would anyone ever describe me as “lean,” but I don’t think people gouge their eyes out when they see me either. Some of our admirers even followed us into the bars at night and tried to dance with us. Our husbands just laughed – knowing they alone held our hearts.

Then a few days passed.

Today I slipped on my Grandma-style black bathing skirt and floppy top – a two-piece ensemble designed to masquerade the wrinkles, bumps and lumps of old ladies. When I finally put down my reading glasses and book on racial reconciliation and headed out for my daily beach walk, I had an indescribable sense of peace. There was no need to “suck it in,” apply lip gloss, or make sure my skin was shiny with tanning oil because nothing I do at this point improves the situation anyway. I don’t turn heads anymore and I’m not mad about it. It’s so much easier and freer these days. But as I watch all the bikini-girls walk on by, I think to myself, “Oh I remember those days. That was just a couple of days ago for me.”

And in between those couple of days this body did a couple of things. It grew five babies in its womb. Three of them made it out alive, two went directly to heaven and we never even knew their gender.

And both the joy and the sadness of each of those babies resulted in wrinkles and a little less “perk” to this body.

This body wiped about a million butts. Between my own babys’ butts, butts at the nursing home, and butts at the hospital, a million could be a bit of an exaggeration, but it’s a ridiculously high number.

And all those many, many nights of getting up with babies coupled with the graveyard shifts at the hospital working in the ICU and caring for precious souls whose actual LIFE hung in the balance just piled on the wrinkles, the eye-bags and overall “sagging.” Some days it was as if I could physically FEEL my body sagging as I drove home from the hospital, bearing the burdens of deep sadness experienced in the ICU.

This body packed up four children and an entire household 11 times. Four of those times were to and from far away countries. This body has slept in tents, in negative five-star hotels, under the stars and on the floor of the Sahara Desert.

And all those achy muscles and bones from asking this body to go above and beyond its normal strain left this body a little more worn and limping. More bumps, more bruises, more sagging.

This body has cried alongside Syrian refugees and widowed Guatemalan women. It’s heard the stories of Jews living in a kibbutz and Moroccans living in shantytowns. It’s befriended the homeless and the helpless, those that have much and those that will never have any. It’s worked tirelessly to bring peace and comfort to the psychologically challenged. And currently, it grieves for Afghanistan and her people, those picking up pieces of their lives after a natural disaster, those affected and infected by COVID, and those who have misplaced their peace because of internet lies. But this body has never given up hope that the shalom of Christ is possible here on earth.

With each new discovery of the world’s many crises, its needs and its sorrows, this body sagged a little further. It sagged even as it considered all the possible ways to help make a difference. Believing change can happen and working hard to BE that change, no doubt, is exhausting.

This body has held the hands of many people as they took their final breaths – patients, close friends, and dear, precious family members. This body – specifically the heart and soul – has suffered more grief and loss than I thought a body could bear.

And I’m quite certain the most wrinkles, the most wear and tear on both the inside and the outside of this body have come from the sorrow. Sorrow, I believe, ages us the most.

Then a new shock sliced me open. This body somehow developed all kinds of holes in its lungs and now this body doesn’t breathe very well anymore. This body sometimes tells me it’s wearing out (like on the hot, humid, Michigan summer days, or when faced with more than 20 stairs) and it doesn’t feel like putting up a fight anymore.

And with each labored breath, I feel the work of this entire body doing its thing. Pumping its limited supply of oxygen where it’s needed the most. The work, the strain, the fatigue = more wrinkles, more sagging, more bumps and lumps as I sometimes eat my way out of the despair.

This body has served me well and I sure hope it doesn’t sound like I’m complaining. None of these bodies we inhabit were made to last forever and perhaps my temple expiration date is just a little sooner than others. This body has also lasted much longer than forecasted and the reality of that miracle is not lost on me.

Today, THIS body has earned its wrinkles, its sags and lumps and bumps and proudly walks the beach in the Grandma bathing suit because – OH WOW! – I’m alive!!! I would never want to go back to the woman who wore the bikini. My life is testimony to the beauty of the hard work done by my body.

Let’s celebrate these masterfully made bodies, friends. These are miraculous gifts that – in spite of things like cancer and cerebral palsy and limb difference and high cholesterol – house our heart and soul and allow us to breathe and love and care and serve. We may not have been given the body we wanted, or the body that’s as healthy as we’d like; but if we’re alive, then at least we HAVE a body and whatever it looks like, it’s a freakin’ miracle!

Let’s give God glory for these glorious bodies today, shall we???