No, this isn't Toby. But it sure looks like him!

There are some phases of life that are all about cleaning up messes. Oh, they are beautiful phases — make no mistake — but they are so messy. Babies create nothing but messes, which is hard to understand since they can’t even move around on their own power! Toddlers expand that mess-making to an artform. As the kids get older, their messes get, well, messier. Your house may stay cleaner, but oh there are so many other kinds of messes. All of them, however, are messes that are important to becoming the grown-up they were meant to be. And as parents, we scurry about trying to clean up the messes and teach the principles that we need to keep life running smoothly. We pick up the toys, we do the laundry, we wipe the bottoms, we listen to the late night chats.

There are other phases of life that are all about creating messes. Those are the times we watch our kids step out in a burst of courage to a project that may, or may not, be over their head. They are the times that we feel God stirring in our souls to create something new, and so we try.

Lately, my house has been full of mess-creating. It’s just one of those phases. We’ve added two hedgehogs to our animal repertoire. And a turtle, who has recently disappeared (that’s a long story…well, not so long but still…). On Wednesday my daughter Jillian is expecting the delivery of a micro teacup poodle. All these new residents came with their “STUFF. And we’re also hosting a wonderful graduation party on Saturday for Laurie, the superbly crafty girl who has been living with us while she finished up that degree. Laurie’s party is exploding all around us and onto nearly every available surface, although the OCD among us tend to coral the mess once in awhile so we can breathe. It’s all about making glorious messes.

Today, in church, I was thinking the same thing. As the body of Christ, part of our creative nature comes out in making and cleaning messes, doesn’t it? We try one thing for a season, then sense the Spirit prompting us to switch directions and make adjustments. We give each other the freedom to make a creative mess in our lives and stand in awe when — once in a blue moon — God creates something that leaves us breathless.

Sometimes, of course, we are breathless but more in that gasping for breath how am I going to survive kind of way. And that’s ok, too. We step out and start that Bible study for women we don’t even know only to find ourselves swinging in the breeze hoping someone comes. We let a friend down and realize we need to apologize before our relationship suffers. Perhaps we ( and I mean this in a general sense…certainly not me…) even lose our patience with the messes other people are creating faster than we can clean them up!

In the last few days I’ve come to really appreciate the whole cycle of making a mess and creating. I’m seeing God work out his image in us in ways I never would have been able to plan on my own. I see it in my friends; I see it in my own little family. It’s making me smile.

Life is so messy!

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I got home this week.

It’s odd, really, because I’ve also been home all month. I’ve been home in our condo in Lexington, or on the lake in New Hampshire where I’ve spent nearly every summer of my life. I breathe in the fresh air of those places and my inner sense of being profoundly at home is magnified.

And then I arrive back in Palm Beach Gardens, my own home, my real home.

I love the process of wandering through my rooms to see the bits and pieces of my life. I enjoy seeing what has changed (lots of people in and out of our home, even when we are gone!) and what has stayed the same. I smell the scent of the air, which is a limited-time opportunity because I know my nose will habituate in an hour or so. And then — if schedule permits — I leave.

Because part of my home is the Third Place, the places in my community that feel like home to me.

Contrary to popular opinion, Starbucks is not my first stop. Whole Foods is. If I can cook a meal and know there are good things to eat in my kitchen, my little universe is set right on its axis. And then comes Starbucks. Yesterday David and I sat here in my preferred corner of Sbux and watched the regulars float in and out. I was particularly struck with the sense of community yesterday. We were greeted like old friends by staff and customers alike, and then we learned that a barista’s father had passed away suddenly. There were sympathy cards to sign, and the story to repeat. Everyone had time to hear the story and send good wishes to the grieving barista, who is due back at work today. She misses her support system, and working behind the counter is where she wants to be.

A few minutes later I was listening to a businesses woman who regularly sits in the chair next to the best electrical outlet talk to one of the more eccentric men who wanders in and out. He hums as he walks, almost involuntarily, and repeats every sentence at least twice. Conversations with him take awhile, but she was enjoying time away from her cell phone and computer.

“My baby girl, my baby girl, that’s her right there,” he said, pointing at a car pulling up outside.

“She’s your girl? I know her!” business woman says. “Hey,” she continues, poking another regular who uses headphones seemingly to drown out conversations like this one. “Hey, you know that mom with the kids that come in here all the time? She’s his daughter!” The two of them remarked over this for a few minutes, to the joy of the proud papa.

“She is all I have left in the world,” he said. He went on to describe how his wife of 38 years had died a year or two ago in a horrible, quick death. He sat and mumbled “Unbelievable” ten or fifteen times while the two regulars said how sorry they were, but how much they always enjoyed his grandchildren when they were in the store. He brightened again, and stood up to hug his daughter.

I’ve done a lot of thinking about Third Places in the community, and the need for the missional-minded among us to be out and about in the community. Yesterday I realized that “out and about” can also feel a lot like being at home. And at least for a few minutes, this Third Place felt as if it were functioning an awful lot like the body of Christ, rejoicing and comforting and being there for life’s journey.

Even if it’s only for a short time, it sure felt good to be home.

Twelve years ago. Unbelievable.

David and i walked into the Marriott World Center and found ourselves in a parallel universe. In this world there were families wandering around laughing, little ones dragging teddy bears, kids who seemed…happy. It was my first homeschool convention, my first stop at Florida Parent Educators Association, or FPEA. We were entranced.

Twelve years ago. Jillian was dragging her blankie around and learning that the world could be unkind to kids who had their own dreams for life. David and I were in the unsure stage of the homeschooling decision. Could we? Should we? How? We knew we wanted our two daughters to forge their own ways of looking at life, and we had a good idea that homeschooling was how we were going to accomplish that. But…really? Twelve years ago there were an awful lot of denim jumpers walking around that hotel. I am not a denim jumper kind of girl.

Then we stepped foot into the curriculum hall and every doubt fled away like worries on Christmas morning. I was energized by the amazing options. Squished and pushed on every side (the FPEA was already outgrowing its home in the Marriott and contemplating the Gaylord Palms…oh those were the days!), I felt like I’d stepped into my comfort zone. Let other moms be shell-shocked and overwhelmed, I was happy.

Twelve years later the journey ends this weekend. Three years ago we graduated Kylie. This year our baby Jillian walks down the aisle to Pomp and Circumstance. In all those years I have loved every moment in the curriculum hall until. quite frankly, last year. That’s when I realized I didn’t need any of it anymore. Even as early as last year I could see this day coming. Our curriculum buying was over. Sometimes the curriculum hall feels like a graveyard of failure (“Tried that, didn’t work. Tried that, tried that, tried that.”) Other times it feels like the magic ingredients that added up to our unique, amazing girls (“Little bit of that, some of this, we threw in a whole lot of that.”).

Twelve years.

It’s been an incredible ride. I’ve quit homeschooling every February (burnout…take a week off it will go away.). I’ve developed new ways to teach old information (mall school is still my favorite: architecture, nutrition and consumer science wrapped into a shopping experience that reset Momma’s happiness quotient!). I’ve been through 4-H and more music lessons than I can remember.

Jillian walks down the aisle on Sunday morning, but I’m also closing a chapter in my life. I’m proud of her. I’m proud of all of us. But tonight I felt a bittersweet longing to conquer the curriculum hall just one more time.

Sometimes it all seems too good to be true. God takes all the crap, all the smuttiness and grittiness of life and hits the delete button for us. Wow. Stop and think about that for a moment: He turns to a fresh notebook page, writes our name across the top, and starts to fill a blank page with mercy, grace, beauty, trust.

I found myself reading in Hebrews today. It was the next thing to read, but I wasn’t excited about it to tell you the truth. Let’s face it, Hebrews can be a tough read once in awhile. But today God did that divine weaving trick of his, pulling together a recent experience, my emotional state, and one of the stops on our trip to Israel. With scripture (active and living).

Hebrews 8:12

I will be merciful when they fail, and I will erase their sins and wicked acts out of my memory, as though they had never existed.”

Hebrews 10:19-23

So, my friends, Jesus by his blood gives us courage to enter the most holy of holy places. He has created for us a new and living way through the curtain, that is, through His flesh. Since we have a great High Priest who presides over the house of God, let us draw near with true hearts full of faith, with hearts rinsed clean of any evil conscience, and with bodies cleansed with pure water. Let us hold strong to the confession o f our hope, never wavering, since the One who promised it to us is faithful.

I was standing as close as possible to the holy of holies while in Jerusalem last month. With all the other worshippers, I put my prayer request on a slip of paper and crammed it into the rock of the Western Wall. I put my hands on the wall and prayed. Later, walking under the tunnels that surround the base of the Temple Mount, we saw the stones that are the foundation of where the holy of holies would have been. It was awe inspiring, and it stilled my heart. Even more so when I realized that through Jesus, we don’t need to cram pieces of paper on a rock: we have direct access to the Holy of Holies. If that doesn’t knock you off your feet, I don’t know what does.

Yesterday I had the chance to see what happens when the notebook page changes and the slate is wiped clean as we crawl to the feet of Jesus in the Holy of Holies. Yesterday I sat with three amazing women of God. I listened to their hearts pour out as they talked about their children, their pasts, the fresh notebook page that God’s given to them. All three of them had been drug addicts — in one case it only took three days to get so addicted to crystal meth that this woman was willing to throw her entire life away. All three have been clean and sober for years now.  I looked into the eyes of these women as they described blackness and evil, situations they had been in for years. And what I saw was purity of heart, singleness of purpose and an overwhelming thankfulness that the Holy of Holies is a place where sins are forgotten, pasts are in the past. You see, each of these women also spent horrible portions of their lives being abused and later prostituting themselves for the drugs and the money.

But that was not who they are.

In Christ, they are free, pure, fellow travelers in the journey through the kingdom. These women offered their stories to me as a precious, precious gift. It is a way of redeeming the years “the locusts had eaten.” In other words, God demonstrated his ability to love extravagantly through them.

I’m so humbled by the faith of the three women I met yesterday, my sisters in Christ. I’d pray for the grace to walk as well as they have. I’d fight anyone who tried to hurt these white-robed ones. And I’m inspired to remember that God’s done the same for me. He’s turned that notebook page…why can’t I remember that?

They are restored.

I am restored.

The Holy of Holies…

My computer has a horrible speaker system. David and I used to try to watch movies and podcasts on it. Not a chance. It’s too soft. The sound has to be directed toward your ears, usually requiring a hand cupped around the speaker. It’s annoying. My computer obviously needs an amplifier, something to make the sound easier to hear.

I’ve decided that being an amplifier is one of the roles God has called me to in this next phase of life. There are stories out there that need to be amplified so we can hear them. There are people all over this world working for the kingdom. These stories would and could inspire us if we just knew about them, right?

I don’t know how this is going to play out in my life yet, but for now I thought I’d share some links to people and events that are inspiring me these days

Plywood People is a collective blog that profiles people going out there to make a difference in the world, the people who would show up with plywood and nails in hand to actually pitch in and get the work done. I was inspired today by their profile on Coury Deeb, a photographer who went out to capture the lives and plight of the Sudanese. He has a new film, The New Sudan. Go to the site and read about him.

Sometimes small actions can add up to huge results. The Body Shop is one company that consistently champions the causes of human trafficking and child trafficking. Right now they are running a campaign to donate cash to stop trafficking in response to tweets. Make those tweets count! Read about it here, then click through to the Body Shop to participate. It’s a small things to do. Do it. While you are at it, take some time to browse the rest of the Change.Org site. Good stuff.

Do you want a picture of what trafficking actually looks like here in America? Go to Kristi Stephens’s blog and read her Redeemed series, a series of blog posts to raise awareness. I was shocked by some of the stories. Yes, the stories of the Cambodian girls or Eastern European women touch my heart, but the stories of young girls HERE IN OUR OWN CITIES who are tricked into virtual sex slavery just wreck my heart.

That’s probably enough for today. My own heart is heavy even researching some of these issues! But God’s been dropping a thought into my heart lately: we aren’t responsible to change the world. We’re only responsible to sit at his feet and do what we hear him telling us to do. The goal of prayer, of the gospel, of our churches is not to “save” the world or feed the world or free the world. The goal is to become like him, so that HE can use us to do all those things. That makes it a little easier, doesn’t it?

The Dome of the Rock on the Temple Mount in Jerusalem

You may have noticed how quiet Coffee Shop Journal has been for the past few weeks! I’ve sat down to write more times than I can count, but the peace and quiet only lasts for a few moments these days. And above all else, I need silence or white noise when I write.

Honestly, there’s been another reason to be quiet, as well. David, Jillian and I have been on a trip with our church to Israel. We returned last Friday, and have been living in jet-lag induced brain fog ever since. I’m slowly starting to climb out of it! I had my computer in Israel, but was competing for internet time with Jillian. I lost. As you know. And then I discovered that posts I was writing in Jerusalem were sailing off into the ether, rather than landing on my page. I gave up the idea of blogging my way through Israel.

I think I lost something precious in the process of giving up. I lost the ability to share the journey with you. And to me, sharing the journey is really the only point. On the other hand, I gave myself the time to just process what God was saying to me on the trip. That was valuable.

So here’s the weird secret about my trip to Israel. I expected a spiritual high. I expected that His voice would be clearer in that land he so clearly loved. I expected to be close to my traveling companions, and to make life-long friendships. I was excited about hanging out with John Maxwell and Tom Mullins and busloads of people I’d not met yet. And all those things kind of happened. There were spiritual moments, and some friendships that were new. But somehow that part of the trip fell short in my mind, as if God doesn’t make a command appearance to speak in a new way. On my tour schedule. “Lord, there are 45 minutes of free time in the Garden of Gethsemane. Please be prepared to speak then.”

He spoke differently. He spoke by enlarging who I am in my spirit, by making me more comfortable about my place in the world and more uncomfortable about my purpose in the world. He spoke through memories made with Jillian, Melissa and Nick (our traveling companions) and Todd (our neighbor and pastor). He kind of spoke in the absence of speaking, if you know what I mean.

It’s kind of like this: I have no plans to renew my wedding vows on my 25th anniversary or any other anniversary. Why? Because I’ve never forgotten my original vows for even a moment. Why renew what has never been tarnished? (By the way, I’ll happily take new diamonds..jewelry is exempt from that discussion.). In the same way, I didn’t feel a fervent spiritual renewal in Israel partially because He’s been doing a lot of speaking and poking and prodding in my life anyway. I didn’t meet Jesus anew in Israel; I took the trip with him in the first place.

I’m sure that I’ll be writing more about this or that experience in Israel. It’s inescapable. And the trip really did change my worldview and outlook more than I realized at first. But in the meantime it’s just good to be home on my couch, wrapped up in the throw I bought in the marketplaces of Jerusalem and watching the videos on Facebook posted by team members.

This past weekend Christ Fellowship hosted over 400 garage sales all over the county. We did it to raise funds and awareness for the issue of human trafficking. So in our own yards, in our own neighborhoods we all did what we could. In the end we have raised thousands and thousands of dollars that are going directly to help free people kept in slavery all over the country and the world. That’s pretty amazing!

What amazed me more, is that apparently that’s not a big deal.

We couldn’t get any local news organization even interested in the fact that the Freedom yard sales were going on at all. In fact, trafficking in general is apparently not a very popular topic. It’s time to change that.

Today, in fact, was “Freedom Sunday” all over the country. Churches were preaching freedom for the captive, hope for the hopeless. I love that. David and I were worshipping at Ascent City Place this morning. I don’t know if it was the temperature (warmer than usual in the venue) or the crowd (more people crowded in than normal), but in the midst of worship I had a huge claustrophobia attack. If you’ve ever had an attack, then you know what it feels like to be stuck in a place (front row!) when your heart is pounding and the sweat starts pouring. I’ve dealt with these every so often, so I have a few tricks up my sleeve. None of them worked. I kept praying that I would be able to quell the rising panic and return to worship. I needed to worship. I needed to worship even in the middle of the panic.

I made it. In a few moments the attack faded, and I was able to go back to singing and standing next to David as usual. It’s been quite awhile since that happened to me, so I was surprised. And more surprised moments later, when God used it for an object lesson. You see, we began talking about the 27 million people in slavery today. People in bondage. People who feel, as I just had, utterly trapped and unable to breathe. With my heart-rate barely back to normal, I suddenly had more empathy for girls stuck in crowded brothels, never seeing daylight.

My attack passed, but theirs will only pass when we do something about it.

A scene from our garage sale on Saturday keeps running across my mind. In South Florida, you see, it is common to find Haitian women at garage sales, buying large amounts of clothing to send back home. This situation is even more pronounced now, in the aftermath of the hurricane. So often, we’ll drastically cut the prices of the clothing to help these women help their own families. But this sale was different: it was a charity sale. Knowing that the day was early and we didn’t want to cut prices too steeply, we were busy negotiating with the women. Sometimes these negotiations got firm, and lasted awhile.

One of these women drove a hard bargain. She wasn’t our toughest customer of the day, but she was close! She needed help hauling her treasure to her car, and we gladly jumped in. Half way down a long driveway she stopped and began hunting in her purse, her pockets, her back pockets. We assumed she was hunting for her keys, and began looking about for the set of keys. She kept digging. Eventually, this woman pulled out a folded up bill from some deep pants pocket, turned back and put it in the donations for “Hope for Freedom.”

I realized two things: she had negotiated down to nearly her last dollar, and then she had turned around and donated that last dollar to do what she could.

The news may not have thought that the Freedom garage sales were a big deal, but I did. I can hardly wait to see what’s next.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=7jYU9meVXKg

We are busy collecting all our old stuff around the house for our yard sale on Saturday. This is why.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=f7MJVQJnHcM

If you don’t have time to watch the video above, or if you don’t think trafficking happens here in the United States, please, please take the time to watch this short piece.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=EsQZg3-fS_s

Research the issue and take the time to donate whatever you can: time, money, awareness.

• Love 146
• International Justice Mission
• Not For Sale
• The Sold Project
• Restore International

It’s been kind of quiet on the blog-front this week, hasn’t it? Life has been moving along full tilt for me and mine these days. In brief:

• This week we are preparing for a yard sale, something I promised NEVER to do again! But Christ Fellowship has chosen to stand strongly against the tremendous injustice of human trafficking. As a way to raise both funds and awareness, church members are hosting yard sales for Freedom this week. The idea is simple: we sell of our junk and donate the money we raise to one of several ministries that work in the trafficking area. We have hundreds of homes all over the county hosting these yard sales so pray for a nice weekend and lots of eager treasure-hunters!
• These are some of the ministries that we hope to support. If you have a few moments, go look up their websites. Love 146, Not For Sale and International Justice Mission.

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David teaching one of our homeless guests how to play Bingo

The Super Bowl for the City party is in the history books, and though I may not remember who won it in a few years, I’ll remember how I spent this Super Bowl. It turns out that hanging with the homeless for the game is a whole lot more fun than my usual guest list!

The first few minutes are always the toughest. That’s when you realize that this isn’t just another party, these aren’t just nameless people, and the gulf that divides us is both broader and narrower than you can imagine. Those first minutes are terrifying: talk to them? Do they want me to? As it turns out, they do. They really do.

My first conversation with a guest was with a man named Charlie. He was a white guy with gray and black hair. I first spied him getting a hair cut at our hair cutting station (manned by a local stylist school students). The cut gave me the opening I needed. “I like your new hair cut.”

This was the haircutting station

“It’s good, it is,” he responded. “You people are doing something amazing. You’re gonna be blessed.” This felt backwards to me. Wasn’t he the one supposed to be blessed? I sat down and chatted with Charlie. Turns out that he had studied to become a priest, before deciding the Catholic religion wasn’t for him. I was surprised he’d lasted that long. When Charlie was six a nun accused him of lying. “Stick out your tongue,” she said. “See…it’s black. I can tell you are lying and God’s going to get you.”

“My tongue isn’t black, I’m not lying, and I know this much: God isn’t going to get me. He loves me and you don’t.”

Charlie’s eyes were yellowing and kind of watery. He looked like he’d had a rough couple of years. But he told me he wasn’t there for the Super Bowl (“Don’t care who wins”) or the meal (“I can eat anywhere”). He was there to talk to people, normal people. It was one of the few chances he has to sit with people and strike up a conversation.

Charlie and I sit and chat

So simple to sit and talk. So simple and so hard.

The night was filled with little conversations like that. There was the dancing woman who seemed determined to show everyone each layer of her clothing, causing a little drama when she got to the last layer. There were the die-hard football fans in the front row. Two guys argued about why in the world we’d want him to wear a nametag with his name on it. “They just want to address you by name! It’s ok. No disrespect.” There were the foodies thronging at the table and stashing whatever looked like it would travel. All over the stadium there were back packs and bags, bicycles stuffed with stuff, and even a stroller stuffed with at least three dogs, though I honestly couldn’t tell if the dogs belonged to a guest or a volunteer! By the end of the night it didn’t much matter.

Ben Hood, one of our volunteers, serving during the game

And oh yes, there was Paris.

Paris was an outgoing black guy who liked nothing more than to sit and watch both the game and the goings on. He gave me an education. I sat with Paris for quite a long time, getting treated to his Barry White imitation and his monologue on life. A highlight may have been the moment he introduced himself to my husband as “I’m her lover; now don’t get mad and fight me.”

Paris and his buddy Eugene.

In the end, it was Paris who taught me the deepest lesson of the night.

As part of our outreach, we’d collected blankets to give away to our guests. This was vaguely prophetic as the temperatures (for Florida) plunged into the low 50’s and it was COLD! So our guests, ironically, were wrapped up in their various new blankets while we volunteers had a taste of what it was like to be cold. Sitting with Paris, he kept asking me if I was cold. I finally admitted that I was, and he tossed me one of his three blankets he had scored. “Well silly white girl, put that blanket around you.”

Oh! That’s when I realized it. If I put that blanket around me, I’d look like a “Guest.” With little else to distinguish us, those blankets were the easiest way to tell who was a guest and who was a volunteer. And while some of the volunteers would know me, certainly not the majority.

What will you do in that moment? You have a choice to be identified not with the helpers, but the helped. Not the powerful, but the humble. I wanted a badge, a wrist band, an identifier. I wanted to keep my identity. I turned down the blanket. For awhile. But I got cold and I had been thinking about why I wouldn’t take that blanket. So I finally accepted Paris’s hospitality and charity, and borrowed his new blanket. Sure enough, it wasn’t much later that one of our volunteers sweetly asked me my name and if I’d like some chips or crackers. I smiled, said “No thank you!” and resisted the urge to say “By the way, I’m a volunteer. Elder’s wife. I’m just cold.”

Paris seemed to get that. And if he didn’t, I sure did. God was speaking furiously to me. He was talking about how it feels to be identified with the people you are trying to help. To take on the outer clothing of the homeless for just a minute or two. It was a powerful lesson, only partially learned.

Super Bowl in the City. It didn’t make much lasting difference in the plight of these folks. It didn’t change much except to provide a few services they may have needed and a night of pure entertainment in lives that rarely indulge in such a thing. The addicted left mainly addicted, the homeless left homeless but with a new haircut perhaps. But it was a bridge. It humanized the stories. The party brought together people who needed to learn from each other. And hopefully, that Super Bowl party may have planted a seed of God’s love and life in the kingdom.

And we’ll always have Paris.