Tag: joy

Seeing the Light

I had a wonderful weekend. What made it so wonderful was the fact that we didn’t have to go anywhere. Minimal running around. Just doing chores around the house, homework. My husband worked on chopping wood in the yard. The younger kids did chores and then went outside to help their dad. Older kids buckled down to finish book reports that are due at the end of each month. I got my shopping done and put away. Got to practice some Christmas music with my husband. Just our family hanging around peacefully together. On Sunday we had a small potluck at our house and practiced more Christmas music with a group from our church. I got a phone call from my son who is in the army now. Sunday evening we sat around the fire and I read a big stack of books to my little kids. Just an all-round wonderful weekend. 

When I was a child and a teenager when I thought about adulthood, if I did at all, I thought about adventures. Travel. Movement. Now, as an adult, I still like travel and adventure, but those are more like fancy decorations on the cake. The cake itself is the main event. And I have found that the main event for me is the everyday living. Getting up in the morning, turning on the lamp and feeling warm and cozy in my bedroom. Rubbing my little boy’s head as I wake him up for school. Listening to the sweet chatter of my kids as they get ready for the day. Sitting in a quiet clean house and reading my Bible. Talking on the phone with my oldest daughter and laughing together over silliness. Going to the grocery store and recognizing the people that work there, having a friendly conversation in the checkout line. Exchanging text messages with my husband throughout the day.

How priceless is your unfailing love, O God!

    People take refuge in the shadow of your wings. 

They feast on the abundance of your house;

    you give them drink from your river of delights.

For with you is the fountain of life;

    in your light we see light.

Psalm 36:7-9

In my younger days when I would hear things like, “The abundance of your house”, “river of delights”, “fountain of life”, I think my mind went to material things. Wealth. Abundance of stuff. Experiences that only money can buy. I never thought about it as peace in the everyday living. Contentment with the path you are walking. The ability to see beauty and wonder in the normal world around you.  I am learning that when we walk with Jesus we are given the ability to see things through a completely different filter. “In your light we see light.” 

This morning my kids were getting ready for school. My son had finished his book report project which included making a board game out of legos for the book, “Journey to the Center of the Earth”. His siblings were very impressed and he took the time to explain it to them. And I sat there and watched them and I felt overwhelmed with how wealthy and rich I am. My children are like treasure chests full of costly jewels. They are incredible! Beautiful! Wonderful! And I have the amazing wonder of getting to be their mom and spend regular Monday mornings with them, eating breakfast, getting ready for school. My life is so rich in blessing. I don’t think there are sufficient words to describe how blessed I am. 

This isn’t a brag fest. It’s encouragement to take a look at your own life. The treasures are there, surrounding you. Take some time to see them! Walk in Jesus’ light so you too can see light. 

Living in the “Before”

The other day it was a warm spring afternoon and I went out on our trampoline in the yard with my five year old. I was just laying there on the trampoline, eyes closed, absorbing the sunshine. My five year old was rolling around, stopping every couple minutes to come and cuddle up with me before he got restless again and rolled some more. And I had this thought, “Am I living in the Before?” “Before”, that time period that comes before the storm, before the flood, before the tragedy, before the war. That time that we look back on and say, everything was great, Before… 

I saw a meme yesterday that brought this all back to mind. A young girl saying, My life will begin when I grow up. A young woman saying, My life will begin once I get that promotion. An older woman saying, My life will begin after I retire. And then the final picture, the woman on her deathbed, wondering where her life went. 

All of these things point to the need to live in the present. Today. This is the day that the Lord has made, Let us rejoice and be glad in it. Today. 

I am very guilty of getting caught up in the future. Just have to make it through this season then it will be better. Just get this last kid potty trained, then life will be easier. Just need to get through this school year with the kids. Just need to get through this summer break. Just need to get this kid graduated. And I totally lose track of the fact that today is what life is about. Not tomorrow. Today I am a wife and a mother. Today I am a friend. Today I am a child of God. Today is something to be celebrated. We’re alive! We’ve got opportunities all day long to show love to other people. Right now I can talk to God, worship him. Right now I can serve the people around me. Right now I can notice the earth around me and be thankful for it. 

I don’t know what the future holds. I just read a news article from a mainstream media site talking about the fact that nuclear war is becoming a real possibility again. And stuff like that can send you over the edge into despair and worry and fear. I think about the everyday people in Ukraine who perhaps are thinking about the Before times in their lives. Longing to go back. People in my own country that just survived mass shootings. People who just surived tornados. All thinking of that Before time. 

As a Christian I look forward to Jesus coming back. Come Lord Jesus, Come! Come bring an end to all this suffering and pain. But when he comes back, if I am still alive, I want to greet him with confidence. Yes, I took every day that you gave me and lived it fully. I delighted in you daily and sought to do the work you gave me, daily. I did not bury the talents you gave me because I was afraid, but I used them to the fullest. 

I think using our talents to the fullest is not this big complicated thing we make it out to be. It’s simply living, present, engaged, listening to the Holy Spirit moment by moment as we savor the day that is around us. 

Whatever you do, work at it with your whole being, for the Lord and not for men, because you know that you will receive an inheritance from the Lord as your reward. It is the Lord Christ you are serving. Colossians 3:23-24

We serve Christ today. Not tomorrow. We serve by going through our ordinary day doing our ordinary things with joy and thankfulness. We reach out to the people that are around us. Share kindness and hope. Today. Not tomorrow. This is our Before. Before Jesus comes back. Let’s live this Before as fully and joyfully as possible. 

Paradise

I was about to start supper this evening and went to my stove and it was covered in some thick, clear, sticky stuff. I have no idea what it was or how it got there. I was kind of mumbling to myself as I got a rag and started scrubbing on it. And then, while I was scrubbing away, I suddenly thought about the moms in the Ukraine. And I thought, I bet they wish the only thing they had to do right now was clean their stove and make a meal. And I remembered again how, when we are in a stressful/dangerous/hopeless situation, all we want is normal. I just wish I could have a normal day. I wish I could just hang around with my family doing ordinary things. And once again I realize that this ordinary life that I often grumble about, is actually paradise. Living the dream. My family is around me. I have food to eat. A home to live in. A complacency that each day is going to unfold in a familiar fashion. 

I have to admit though, the last couple days my heart rate has been going up as Russia talks about raising their nuclear status. What does that even mean? When someone starts talking nuclear weapons we leave the arena of regional politics and it becomes something that affects our entire planet. And suddenly it feels like my ordinary is being threatened. 

Today my kids had Drill Day at school. They had fire drills and tornado drills and drills where they had to learn how to be silent so a shooter wouldn’t find them and kill them. And my 2nd grader calmly told me how they had to practice because they didn’t want to be shot. And in my head I was yelling NO!! Why are they telling my 2nd grader this??? THIS IS INSANE! But at the same time, I could imagine a frantic teacher trying to protect a room full of children and somehow having to convince these kids that they had to be silent. And I don’t want this to be part of our ordinary. But it is.

The last couple years our ordinary has turned upside down several times. Pandemics, riots, protests, crazy elections, more pandemic. Afghanistan. Now Ukraine. We are all feeling on edge as life just continually refuses to go back to normal. Yes, we have our daily routines that keep on going, but they keep getting shaken up. 

I’ve been reading through the Bible backwards this year (starting at the end of the Old Testament reading through the last book, then the next to last book etc, and the same for the New Testament). Cause I never seem to make it through the Bible when I start at the beginning. This means that I am smack in the middle of all the prophets in the Old Testament. I do not pretend to understand the books of the prophets. At all. But what I do understand from reading them is that God is the same yesterday, today, and tomorrow. World events do not surprise him. His faithfulness extends before, during, and after crisis. He is trustworthy in the ordinary, in the extraordinary, in the tragedies, in times of prosperity and times of great loss. 

I am beginning to feel that my life and my children’s lives might not ever have that wonderful thing called ordinary life. But what we can have is Jesus. In us, working through us, surrounding us with his peace and joy. And that is true Paradise. 

Grief, Joy, Christmas

It’s Christmas Eve and I find myself wavering back and forth between joy and happiness and guilt and worry. 

In other words, I am fully human. Even though I somehow think I will get superpowers when holidays come around and I will cease to have stress and grief and daily troubles. After all, it’s Christmas! Right? 

This Christmas I have all my children home, the first time in three years. My heart is full. Our house is cheerful, we were able to get presents for everyone, we have everything we need and a little extra. We’ve had a great advent season of daily bible readings with the kids. We’ve had great church services helping us bring our focus on Jesus. It has been a good Christmas season. 

And then, at the same time, a friend of mine unexpectedly died a couple days ago. Another friend of mine is in the process of losing her mom to cancer. Another friend just lost a famly member unexpectedly. So much grief. So much heaviness. 

Kind of like the first Christmas. 

Mary, pregnant and unmarried, having to deal with all the presumptions people are making of her. Joseph with a new wife, but in name only, watching her carry someone else’s child, not the way he was planning on starting his marriage. A trip to Bethlehem because of the whims of a conquering nation. Bad timing, Mary is about to give birth. Then, they get to Bethlehem, the baby is definitely coming, right now. No place to stay. No warm welcome. No comfortable place to settle in. Birth. Mary’s first. First labor, not knowing what to expect. Not knowing if you will survive the process. And then the baby is here. But no proud grandparents to announce the news to friends and family. No friends and family. 

But then a bunch of shepherds come running in. Telling stories about angels and heavenly hosts. And I’m sure Mary and Joseph remembered vividly their own encounters with angels. And there is of course this brand new baby filling their hearts with joy as only a new baby can. 

Grief and Joy. Suffering and Hope. Christmas.

We are in good company. 

This season I pray that we can have peace. That we can accept our grief but give ourselves permission to have joy as well. That we can have happiness and not feel guilty for feeling sad at the same time. 

In the end, we cling to the hope that All is Well. 

“All is well all is well

Lift up your voices and sing

Born is now Emmanuel

Born is our Lord and Savior”

Michael W. Smith

Emmanuel, God is with Us. We go through our trials here on earth, but we are no longer alone. We have hope for a future with Jesus where every tear will be wiped away. No more sorrow. No more grief. 

Until that time comes, we move forward. Tears in our eyes. A smile on our face. Grief, Joy. Christmas. 

May you all have a Merry Christmas filled with joy and may you have peace to feel all the emotions that face you this season.

Happy Thanksgiving!

It’s Thanksgiving morning and my heart is bubbling over with contentment and wonder. The last several days my mind has been taking a walk down memory lane and I’ve been really focused on God’s protection over me over the years, and how he used specific people in every phase of my life to offer me that protection and care. 

I think about past teachers who offered me friendship and encouragement…a certain Ms Iutzi comes to mind, my English teacher in Bethel, Alaska. She genuinely loved her students, opened her classroom as a hangout place, was always handing me new books to read, laughed at my jokes, and has continued to be an encouraging person in my life, even now, twenty-five years later. 

I think about my dear friend Louima who became my big brother in college and still is someone I count as family and someone I continue to learn from as he shares his wisdom in his writing. 

I think about my dear friend Telena who became my friend and mentor when I first moved to Tennessee. We’ve shared a lot of life together and her wisdom and common sense helped me a lot as I first started on the path of marriage and motherhood. 

I think about my dear friends Francie and Rob whose ministry has led me to a place of wholeness and healing in my life. 

I think about my pastors at our church who have offered counsel, prayer, and a helping hand over the years. 

My parents and my husband’s parents who have continued to be there for us through thick and thin. 

My friends on Facebook who take the time to write encouraging notes that brighten up my day. 

Strange as it might sound, those friendships represent to me God’s care for me. His protection. His sovereignty that knew I needed those people at those times to help carry me through. 

This is only the tiniest sample of people that have blessed me. I’m thankful for all of you. I’m thankful for God’s care for me. I’m thankful that we have this day to stop and name what has brought joy to our lives. 

Happy Thanksgiving everyone! May you have a blessed day!

“Ravished”

Several years ago my older kids learned a dance to a song called “Ravished” by Jesse Cline and Ashleigh Brison.  It’s from the album “Breathe Ultimate Call”. I love this song. Every time I hear it I cry. I remember watching my children worship as they performed this song and it was like a foreshadowing of heaven. Watching your children worship Jesus is the ultimate goal for parenthood. 

Now, as I interact with my adult children and other people in the same age range, fresh, just starting out into the world, I feel like this song says everything that I want them to know. 

These are the words from the Bridge: 

Bridge 1

Whеn I was broken

When I was wounded

Like a hero, You saved the day

Your love has rescued me

But now that I’m made new

I found new life in You

And I’m never going back

Oh, You have my heart

You have my heart

And I found it all in You

And I’m sitting here crying because I want everyone to know this. Jesus is the answer. That’s it. There is no other way to get through this life. There aren’t any shortcuts. There aren’t any other paths that lead in the same direction. Jesus. That’s it. Accepted on his terms. He is Lord. He is Savior. Give your life to him. Surrender completely. It’s the only way to have happiness in this life. The only way to peace. The only way to Joy. How do you make it through this crazy thing called life? Jesus. How do you survive anxiety and depression? Jesus. How do you figure out what to do with your life? Follow Jesus, he’ll show you. How do you fix the brokenness in your life? Jesus. How do you become the best version of you possible? Jesus. 

I don’t know how to convince people of this except to say, Look. Here is my life. Here is how I’m getting through. Jesus. Everything I do, He is the only way that I’m doing it. And I would never do it a different way. I have found everything I need in him. 

Jesus answered, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. John 14:6

And my heart sings, “I found it all in you.” And I want everyone to have this same peace and confidence. Jesus. He is the answer. 

Unneeded Distractions

I haven’t written in a week. Which is weird for me. Not a sign of good mental health. Writing = thinking and processing. When I don’t write, it usually means I am avoiding thinking and processing. Now, some of this week was busy with seeing out-of-town family, and that was a great break. But, the past four days, I’ve kept thinking, I should sit down and write, and then I don’t. Instead my brain has been grasping for distractions. Let’s read a book. Let’s get in some extra exercise. Let’s zone out on social media. I’ve even found myself re-visiting old stories I used to play out in my head for entertainment. And I found myself faced with this question. What are you looking for? What is it that you are so desperately seeking in all these distractions? 

Good question. 

What am I looking for? 

Validation. I’m not just an invisible maid and caretaker that keeps the house running and keeps the kids alive and happy. I’m an individual whose feelings matter and who brings value to the table. 

Recognition. I want to be seen. I want to have people in my life who seek me out and find my presence to be important to them. 

Security.  I want to feel safe and cared for. To not feel like my existence and lifestyle is in any way fragile. 

Purpose. I want to feel like my daily actions have meaning. What I’m doing counts. 

Achievement. I want to feel like I am heading towards a goal and every day I am getting closer. 

Peace. I want to feel like no matter what happens, I’m good. Nothing’s going to rock my boat. 

Joy. I want each day to be a celebration of life and creation. A journey of thankfulness. 

I’m not wanting too much, am I? 

Here’s the thing. I think I have most of those things already. Perhaps not in a steady stream. But, if I look back at even just the last couple months, I can say, yes, there have been moments where I have had each of those things at different times. Sometimes all at once, sometimes just one or another. But they’ve been there. 

I think awareness is my problem. Life starts to get overwhelming and my vision gets really narrow. All I can see are the problems in front of me. The exhaustion I’m feeling. The weariness. And my eyes just sit and focus on what is wrong. This is wrong. And that is wrong. And here, let me make you a list of everything that is wrong and hard in my life right now. And all those good things, all those things on my list that I want and HAVE, they just kind of fade into the background. I forget they are there. And eventually, focusing on the bad stuff robs me of hope and energy and I just kind of melt into a useless puddle. 

So what am I going to do about it? 

1 Thessalonians 5:16-18. Rejoice always, pray continually, give thanks in all circumstances; for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus.

These are not simple platitudes. They are more like death-defying challenges. Can you rejoice always??? Pray continually?? GIVE THANKS IN ALL THINGS??? Not an easy path to choose. Which is why it’s a good thing we have the Holy Spirit as our helper. 

John 14:26  But the Helper, the Holy Spirit whom the Father will send in My name, He will teach you all things, and remind you of all that I said to you.

It’s a battle. A daily battle. In Christ, we already have all that we need. There is no reason to go searching for fulfilment in empty distractions. But it’s really easy to forget. When we focus on rejoicing, praying, thankfulness; we quickly get our vision back. 

Now, I’m going to go put on some worship music and try practicing what I preach. 

I am Unsinkable

The other day someone asked me how I was doing and an image came into my mind. Me as a rubber ducky out on the big ocean in the middle of a storm. Waves crashed over me and I bobbed in and out of the water, raced up and down monstrous waves, tossed every which direction. But I was still floating. I couldn’t sink. I was made to float and while I got dunked a lot, I always came back to the surface.  We recently watched the movie EndGame again. Thanos, the villain, has a line where he says, “I’m Inevitable”. And I find myself saying, with the same confidence, “I’m Unsinkable”. 

I can also tell you with certainty, that my confidence does not come from myself. It comes from a lifetime of following Jesus, and seeing time and time again, that he never fails me. It is being faced with crisis after crisis, hardship after hardship, and having the Holy Spirit fill me with His power so that I can press through. Survive. Thrive. It is standing up at Testimony time and saying, my testimony is that I don’t have any dramatic stories of how I fell to the depths and then God lifted me up. My testimony is that he kept me. Kept me from looking for love in the wrong places. Kept me from dangerous addictions. Kept me from being on the wrong side of the law. My testimony is saying, Look what God can do when you give him your life from a very young age. 

We were talking at our housechurch this past Sunday about hindrances people have that keep them from wanting to follow Jesus. I personally know people who feel like becoming a Christian is too big a sacrifice. There are too many things to give up. I would say the problem with this mindset is that they aren’t seeing the big picture. The following is an often-quoted excerpt from C.S. Lewis.

“It would seem that Our Lord finds our desires not too strong, but too weak. We are half-hearted creatures, fooling about with drink and sex and ambition when infinite joy is offered us, like an ignorant child who wants to go on making mud pies in a slum because he cannot imagine what is meant by the offer of a holiday at the sea. We are far too easily pleased.”

― C.S. Lewis, The Weight of Glory, and Other Addresses

I think about the richness of my life. I am not wealthy in worldly riches, but my treasures are uncountable. Eleven beautiful, amazing children who add worth to our world. Extended family and friends who love me. A husband who is 100% committed to our marriage and our family. A warm, peaceful home. A meaningful life that is full of purpose. A job that is so varied and complex that I can never grow bored and only rarely feels like drudgery. A church family that comforts, encourages, and constantly pushes me to grow. I am blessed beyond measure. 

There is no sacrifice in following Jesus. I have given up nothing of worth to walk this path. I have in fact gained unimaginable riches. My prayer, my hope, my longing, is that those who don’t have this confidence would be able to take hold of this truth. Jesus is the Way and the Truth and the Life. 

I pray that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened, so that you will know what is the hope of His calling, what are the riches of the glory of His inheritance in the saints, and what is the surpassing greatness of His power toward us who believe.

Ephesians1:18-19b

Come join me. You too can be Unsinkable. 

For more information, here is a great article you can click on. https://www.faithward.org/how-do-you-become-a-christian/

Sunrises, Andrew Lloyd Webber, and My New Piano

Sunrises. I love sunrises. For many years I have been too tired to get up and enjoy them. Nowadays, though,  I am driving my kids to school early every morning and during the winter I have been enjoying a lot of sunrises. My kids’ school is only about two miles away. It takes us maybe five minutes to get there. Part of the drive to the school involves going up a big hill and then we crest at the top and suddenly we have a big view of mountains and mist and red orange light peeking through the clouds. It’s amazing. Every morning I can’t stop myself from exclaiming to the kids, “Everybody look at the sunrise! It’s amazing!” And the kids have learned to oooh and aaahh right along with me. Thanking God for the sunrise is part of our morning prayers. I have always imagined God standing at an easel, throwing paint on left and right, painting the sunrise every day. God the Creator. The Creative One.

The other day as I was driving along, enjoying the beautiful colors, I thought about how we are created in the image of God. I’ve always wondered about that, what it means exactly. I thought about God painting the sky every morning, making art and it occurred to me that when we create things, make our own art, we are, in a small sense, being like God. We were made to create because we were made in the Creator’s image.

I thought about music. I love music, but I have struggled with music over the years. As a teenager I used music as an emotional outlet. A way to vent, a way to express emotions, a safe place to feel emotions. As life got more and more complicated, harder, I found myself shying away from music. As I look back, I can see where I struggled to keep depression away, and one of my solutions to not dealing with depression or anger or a bunch of other unresolved feelings, was to shy away from feeling any emotion. Just stay neutral. Calm.

The only problem with this approach is that when you don’t allow yourself to feel bad emotions, the really good emotions go away as well. I don’t think you can fully live in joy if you don’t also allow yourself to mourn. You can’t have peace if you don’t go through the conflict first. You can’t have happiness if you don’t deal with the anger. I think that as I shut myself down emotionally, I also shut down music. I just couldn’t do it. Music was too closely tied to emotions. I could sometimes sit down and play through some Bach or Mozart in an attempt to make my brain feel orderly, but I wasn’t feeling it. And so I mostly avoided it.

Lately, I have been looking at getting back into music. My husband, excited that I was showing an interest again, went out and got me an old 1935 Wurlitzer Baby Grand, for a really good price off Craig’s List. I went with him and helped him move it. It’s a perfect fit for our house.  It’s got some history, apparently it’s original owner was a violinist with the Knoxville Symphony and she died after a long happy life at the age of 103. It’s also a bit dinged up and scratched here and there which means we won’t have to freak out if our kids add another scratch or ding. I rearranged our entire living room so that I now have a Music Room at one end. I have started practicing a bit every day. Scales, warmups, old songs I played in high school. Just easing myself back into it. I have really been enjoying myself, but I’ve wondered about the emotional side of it. Can I relax enough to let myself play with feeling? Can I let myself feel the sadness in the song? Can I let myself feel again? I’ve been a bit worried that maybe I can’t any more. Maybe that part of me is gone. 

Today I was working on getting my piano music moved to a different bookcase and I found a piece of music that I didn’t even know I owned, “Pie Jesu” from Andrew Lloyd Webber’s REQUIEM. My copy was a vocal duet with piano accompaniment. It’s a beautiful, simple song written in latin. The English translation that is written on the music gives the words as this:

Merciful Jesus, who takest away the sins of the world, grant them rest.

Oh Lamb of God, who takest away the sin of the world, grant them eternal rest.

I sat down and started to sing it and play along. Alas. I am not a talented soprano and there was no way I could sing that high. My voice couldn’t bring justice to the beauty of the song. I stopped playing for a minute. And then I remembered my piano teacher, Ms. Wong, telling me to make the notes sing, make the melody sing. And I realized, I can’t sing the song, but I can make the piano sing it. And I did. And my fingers made the melody sing and it was beautiful. When I finally finished I sat there, feeling fidgety, like I needed to get up and do something. I stood up and went over the other side of my living room where I was still rearranging other books onto a shelf. (Moving my living room around created a couple projects I hadn’t been anticipating.) I was putting books back onto an empty shelf and I picked up my old Bible from years ago. I flipped it open and found myself in the book of Job, and I suddenly just wanted to read this chapter. Job 9. In this chapter Job talks about how powerful God is and how unworthy he, Job, is. In verse 33-35 he says,

“If only there were someone to arbitrate between us, to lay his hand upon us both, someone to remove God’s rod from me, so that his terror would frighten me no more. Then I would speak up without fear of him, but as it now stands with me, I cannot.”

I stopped reading and thought about how horrible that would be to have the full burden of your sins on your shoulders and no way to approach God because He is too Holy. And I suddenly realized that the song I had just played was an answer to Job’s predicament. Jesus takes away the sin of the world, and grants us rest. He removed God’s rod of punishment from us.

I went back to the piano, stared at the music again, and with fresh wonder, played the song again. And while I played, some tears fell, and I felt just a bit like my ice wall around my emotions started to crack a bit more. And I felt hopeful. Excited. I have missed music and I hadn’t even realized how much I missed it.

Here is a link to a recording of “Pie Jesu” if you’d like to hear it.

“Pie Jesu”

Joy and Purple Houses

I watched a TED Talk by Ingrid Fetell Lee the other day on Joy. What is it, how do things in the physical world create an emotional response… It was very interesting and I’ll put a link in for you if you want to watch it:

Where Joy Hides and How to Find It

In the talk she was emphasizing how color brings joy and it got me thinking about how I love bright colors so much. I recently bought myself a bowl from the Pioneer Woman Collection at Walmart. The bowl was less than $5. I was so excited when I bought it. I brought it home, filled it up with cut strawberries and had a moment of bliss. It was so beautiful! So colorful! I sat in a chair, nibbled on strawberries and felt decadent in my colorful splurge.

bowlofcolor

My husband and I often have differences of opinion  when it comes to color. About 7 or 8 years ago we were getting ready to paint our house and my husband asked me what color I wanted to paint it. My answer was Purple! He raised an eyebrow, laughed a second, and then said, really? You’re serious? YES! I want a purple house! Which purple?  I told him I didn’t care which shade of purple or how he wanted to go about it, he was the design/color expert, he could pick out whatever would look best. How could he argue? He would have preferred a more standard color but the color I wanted was tied into emotion..Why did I want a purple house? Because it made me happy, joyful!

So why on earth did purple houses make me happy? Ok. A tiny bit of backstory. I attended Biola University for 2 years, right after I graduated high school. My parents lived in Alaska and I would fly down to Southern California each semester by myself and live in a dorm. Though I made some good friends in college, it was still a bit lonely. My second year my dorm room was at the end of a very long hallway. Some kind soul had decided to try and cheer up the hallway and they had tacked up a bunch of prints of Thomas Kincaide’s paintings. You know what I’m talking about? Fuzzy, cozy houses, with beautiful light spilling from the windows. I would stop and look at these pictures as I headed for bed, late at night, after spending hours practicing piano at the music building. Looking at these pictures created a longing I had never had before. A longing for a home, somewhere stable, cozy, warm, inviting. Up to this point in time I had thoroughly embraced my parents’ nomadic lifestyle. My entire life I had never stayed in a home longer than 2 years. I assumed that I would continue this same pattern as an adult. I would move around, have lots of adventures, never settle too long in one place. When I saw these pictures I suddenly found myself wanting something completely different. I didn’t understand it, I just knew that one day I wanted a home that reminded me of these pictures.  

Later, when I had children, I read them a story called “Mr. Pine’s Purple House” by Leonard P. Kessler. It is a story about a man who wants his house to look different from his neighbors. He finally ends up painting his house purple. I loved this book. When I read it, I would think, Yes! I want a purple house too! But I would imagine a Thomas Kincaide -type purple house: fuzzy, lots of lights on the inside.

So, my husband asks me what color I want my house and I am ready, I’ve been saving up this answer for years…I want a purple house! My husband loves me. He is also a brave soul. He started looking at paint samples of all the millions of shades of purple that exist in the world. He finally came up with a plum purple on the top half of the house matched with a heavy cream on the bottom half. Looking at the paint samples, it looked great. We told the painters which colors we wanted.

We drove up to the house after the painters had finished one side. We both gulped, hard. Wow. That’s really purple. Really purple. We looked at each other, laughed nervously. My husband said, This was YOUR idea. I nodded. Yes, I would take full responsibility. Even though I was feeling nervous, seeing the purple still made me happy. I had an overwhelming urge to just laugh and dance. As the painters added the cream on the bottom of the house and finished everything up, it looked a lot more balanced, not quite as startling. I loved it. Every time I saw it I would start grinning. Why did I want a purple house? Because it makes me happy, joyful!

fuzzypurplehouse

Years down the road, the paint has faded, it needs to be redone soon. But I, the unobservant person that I am, still notice the color of my house and it still makes me happy. I am thankful for a Creator God who made all the colors around us and then also put a desire in us to be around those colors. I am also thankful for my husband whose color choices tend to favor tan and khaki and muted grays who nevertheless lets me indulge in my fits of color. You want to know how much he loves me? He just let me paint our bedroom an interesting shade of orange. Why? Because it makes me happy, joyful!