Goin' Down to Mama's

Sunday Morning Serenity

I love Christmas Day, when all the to-doing is over, and we can just enjoy being together.

It’s quiet this morning, and my last dish of the holiday season is in the oven. We’ve opened all our presents and cleaned up the wrapping paper. Our church is having a casual service with no fuss. We’re getting together with a small group of family—who’ll be firing up the grill. (I absolutely love that. Grilling on Christmas. It’s great to live in the Deep South:)

Right now I’m nesting on the sofa, with a cat and a MacBook on my lap, listening to the oven make those “I’m getting it done” noises. I’m so thankful for the family that I have, and I’m remembering those who aren’t with us any more. I’m saying a special prayer for friends who are going through their first Christmas without a loved one they lost this year. And I’m enjoying one of the few Christmas decorations I really love putting out every year—a Nativity scene that my mother gave me. It’s a beautiful reminder of the promise of Christmas—that separation from those we love doesn’t have to be permanent. Reunion and communion are coming.

Merry Christmas!

Sunday Morning Serenity

For sometime now, I’ve found myself ducking and dodging the Story Shack, which is odd because it has always been my favorite place to be (next to the Gulf Coast, of course). Recently, in a rare fit of house cleaning, I decided to get to the bottom of it. I took it on like Mama would. And it didn’t take long to figure out what was going on: I had let my job and my cats take over my space.

Everywhere I looked, there were files and stacks of papers related to Southern Living stories. And everywhere else I looked, there was evidence of Hank and Cheeto’s issues. Cheeto tries to eat everything in sight, and Hank won’t touch anything that smells like Cheeto. So all over the Shack were scattered paper plates and water bowls, etc.

No. More. Big Mama went to Target. Now the boys have one watering station that looks like a mini water cooler. Each kitty has a treat bowl, and I won’t let Cheeto near Hank’s. The floor has been vacuumed and mopped. The shelves are dusted. All the old candles that had burned down to a wax wafer are gone. All those stacks of paper have been bagged up and loaded into my car, ready for their return to Southern Living, where they belong.

Cheeto still won’t set foot onto his favorite nap chair until I remove the cat bed I bought to protect it. (Baby steps.) And I still need a Christmas-scented candle to burn while I write, but I’ll get that today. The Story Shack feels like its old self again—and so do I.

My whole day o’ cleaning made me think about our individual material worlds. Things don’t make us who we are, but they can affect how we feel about who we are, whether we like it or not. New clothes can give us confidence (and old ones can give us a fright when we realize how tight they’ve gotten). A new car that doesn’t spend half its life at the repair shop takes away stress we didn’t even realize we were feeling every time we put the key into the ignition of the old one and hoped it would start.

Most of the time, I think of personal change/spiritual growth as something that happens from the inside out. But it can also happen from the outside in. Somewhere in the cobwebs of my college memories is a famous quote—and if I weren’t so old, I could remember who said it—but it’s basically this: If you aren’t where you’re supposed to be, you can’t be who you’re supposed to be.

And the really good news? We can change our material worlds—fast. So look around. What’s cluttering up your space, your mind, your heart? Get rid of it and make room for some Christmas decorations. Scratch that. Make room for Christmas.

[Apologies for the vintage Story Shack image; I could not persuade my iPhone to send the one I shot this morning to my computer. Technology. Ick.]

Sunday Morning Serenity

The first round of revisions for my book came in recently, and one of the suggested changes reminded me of what I was trying to do when I first started writing it. First of all, I just wanted to tell a good story. I wanted a rural Southern setting that I felt I could accurately "draw" with words; realistic characters whom readers would care about and invest in; and a plot that could happen only here in the South. I didn't set out to tell a Christian story, but it just so happened that the characters who appeared to me were small-town, church-going Christians. (Writing coaches alway say "write what you know," and I guess that's what I did.)

Once I had Christians—some rich, some poor—in my story, it was extremely important to me to portray them the way I know them to be. People of faith—all faiths—that you see on TV or in the movies are usually presented one of four ways: sanctimonious, self-righteous, preachy people who think it their duty/right to sit in judgment of everybody else; crazy fanatics; flawless saints; or evil hypocrites. 

Most Christians I know are none of those things. We're not saints—we're sinners, and we know it. We're not here to sit in judgment; we're meant to approach the throne of grace and show others the way there. We're committed but flawed people trying to follow and share the light of Christ, knowing that we'll stumble daily. I've always seen the light of Christ not as a blazing torch that demands to be noticed but a flickering candle that naturally draws us to it. Why? Because that particular glow is beautiful and warm and peaceful. It breaks up the darkness in the most wonderful way. 

The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light;
Those who dwelt in the land of the shadow of death,
Upon them a light has shined.
Isaiah 9:2

 

[Image by Jack Moreh @ Freerangestock.com]

Sunday Morning Serenity

I've seen fire and I've seen rain. That James Taylor classic—and all the displaced families in the Smoky Mountains—have been on my mind this weekend. Despite extraordinary human efforts to contain the Chimney Tops fire, what they really needed to put it out was rain.

A fire chief in Tennessee told me something I've been thinking about all weekend. He said that some fires are so swift and powerful that you can't take them head-on, and you can't outrun them. Firefighters have to make sure they have on all their protective gear and basically let the fire line roll over them. Then they can head in the opposite direction—into "the black"—where the fire has already consumed all of its fuel and can't return.

How's that for a life lesson? When you're faced with a problem so big that you can't outrun it and you can't face it head-on, put on your protective gear and trust it to keep you safe from whatever fire you're walking through. Have faith that the healing rains will come.

Stand therefore, having girded your waist with truth, having put on the breastplate of righteousness, and having shod your feet with the preparation of the gospel of peace; above all, taking the shield of faith with which you will be able to quench all the fiery darts of the wicked one. And take the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God; praying always with all prayer and supplication in the Spirit, being watchful to this end with all perseverance and supplication for all the saints

Ephesians 6:14-18

[Image by Geoffrey Whiteway @ Freerangestock.com]