Lift Me Up Before You Go Go

Reading Assignment Days 36-38:
Exodus 21:22-28:43
Matthew 24:1-26:13
Psalm 29:1-31:18
Proverbs 7:6-8:13
James 1:2-12


I am not a negative person but when the crisis comes, I take it to the worst possible scenario in my head and convince myself of the impending doom.  Like the time my granddaughter, Morgan, fell face down on a speeding treadmill.  Her mother, my Abbie, knew that playing it cool was the answer since Morg's has a bent for the dramatic.  It was Easter and just as we were ready to sit down at the dinner table we heard a scream that could bloody an eardrum.  Abbie got to Morgan first and was evaluating the seriousness of the injury... a bloody lip.  I arrived in the room and seeing a lip that resembled raw hamburger, I started screaming, "CALL 911!"  Through gritted teeth my daughter cheerily ordered me out of the room.

It seems like I am always waiting for the other shoe to drop.  Rather than being uplifting, the philosophy I hand down to my children is "When God closes a door, He also slams all the windows as well."  Or,  "What doesn't kill you makes you wish you were dead."  I simply am not one for rosey cliche's.  Last year when my sister-in-law was preparing for a dreaded family gathering after her father's memorial, trying to encourage her, I lovingly said, "Well just think, for as badly as you feel right now, this time tomorrow you're going to feel way worse!"  We had a great laugh over it.

My daughter Lindsay and husband CJ and their three boys are living with us.  They moved in the first of July and since their arrival it seems like whatever could go wrong, has gone wrong.  Their oldest son, 4 year old Sawyer, is autistic.  When they got the news that 22 month old Thatcher may be autistic as well, they put their house on the market and headed for home in order to have family support as well as practical help. Since the move they have endured so many disappointments.  From financial challenges to health issues with Thatcher, and countless things in between.  To top it off, the house has not sold.  Moving your family in with your parents is its own lesson in humility but with all they have endured, so far, that may be the easy part of this journey.

In the second verse of the first chapter of James (yes I saw a squirrel and ended up in James, get used to it) it says:  Consider it pure joy, whenever (not IF) you face trials of many kinds, because you know the testing of your faith develops perseverance.  It is probably no accident that James is one of my favorite books of the bible.  When I got home from a three day trip yesterday, Linz was feeling anxious and we had a conversation about the many challenges she is praying about now.  If I have learned anything about grown children moving home it is to take the burdens straight to prayer as opposed to handing out unsolicited advice....and I have learned this lesson thee very hardest way.  In fact, it is safe to assume that I haven't actually mastered this one.  Just ask Lindsay.  But when your kids are hurting, you hurt right along with them and want so very badly to fix it.

Yesterday afternoon when little Thatcher was playing on the trampoline with his cousin, I heard him cry.  Thatcher cries often with the many things that frustrate him on a daily basis.  He has few words to help us understand his needs, so Thatcher's crying is nothing alarming.  But hanging with his cousin Matt is one of his favorite things in the world and he rarely cries when Matt is around so the crying caught my attention.  Within a minute I was sure something was seriously wrong.  Linz, just out of the shower, hair dripping, and no make-up headed to the ER.  Thatcher's leg was broken.  Not a "buckle fracture" that can happen at this age.  Children's bones at this age are likened to a green branch of a tree, and when stressed, the bone "buckles".  Thatcher's bone just below his knee is broken, not buckled.  'A clean break,' the doctor said.  He is in a splint from the top of his thigh to the tips of his toes, and he is miserable.  He will see an orthopedic doctor this week for a full cast.

It was late last night before things got back to any kind of normalcy.  Linz was pretty exhausted from the ordeal and she laid her head on my shoulder just needing a hug.  This was my cue for some encouragement.  "See," I said earnestly, "things really can get worse!"  I'm not insensitive by any stretch of the imagination, we just needed a laugh.

If I were writing the application for this verse in James, I would say: "Give thanks for the trials you have, because when they get worse it makes you wish you had the first set of troubles back again!"  Evidently that is what separates me from a bible scholar.  Continuing in James, verse 12 says:  Blessed is the man who perseveres under trial, because when he has stood the test, he will receive the crown of life that God has promised to those who love Him.

This one is for Linz who, like me, is a hater of all things cliche'.  To say 'Let go and let God' can send us both into fits of uncontrollable, as well as inappropriate giggles- depending on the circumstance.  So to her I will just say:  "hang on baby."

                                                -The cliche' is dead poetry-
                                                                            Gerald Brenan