Lisa notes

Do You Have to Spell It Out for God?
—Grace & Truth Linkup

By LisaNotes November 19, 2021 Grace & Truth Link-Up, Prayer 10 Comments

The Curse of Knowledge

“Mom, you’re not always clear. If you know what you want, it’s okay to ask for that. Be specific.”

My daughter Jenna is right. Sometimes I don’t make myself clear to others.

When I already know what I mean in my head, my words can take a shortcut. We all do this occasionally. It’s called the “curse of knowledge” bias.

I assume others are at the same starting point about the situation as I am. So I leave out details. I forget to add, “and can you please call me?” after I say, “I am hurting.”

Wouldn’t everybody already know that?

No. Of course not. It’s too much (as well as impossible anyway) to ask of each other. None of us are mind readers.

Well, except one.

He Already Knows

God knows us inside and out. We don’t have to explain ourselves to him. Or justify ourselves. Or try to convince him of anything.

Because God made us out of love and sustains us out of love, he is always acting out of love for us already.

Love is God’s default position toward us.

Granted, we might get in our own way of receiving his love. Or other people may try to block it. Or life itself can make us doubt it.

But his knowledge of us and his love for us are always there.

Because of this, when we talk with God, we can pray with confidence that he needs no backstory. We may go into detail if WE need to talk it out for ourselves, but we don’t have to fill in every detail for God’s sake.

We don’t have to get our wording just right for him to understand. Or to persuade him to act.

He knows. He loves. He acts.

We may need to continue spelling it out for each other (wise advice, Jenna).

But we don’t have to spell it out for God.

Featured Post—“Help Me, Jesus”

Lois explains it all so well.

“We don’t have to reiterate to God what we’re fretting about. He already knows.”

It’s okay to simply say, “Help me, Jesus.”

Read all of Lois’s post here at her blog, then link up your own blog posts below.

“HELP ME JESUS”

Are you an over- or underexplainer? Share your thoughts in the comments.

READ MORE:

I’m linking at these blog parties

1. Share 1 or 2 of your most recent CHRISTIAN LIVING posts. (No DIY, crafts, recipes, or inappropriate articles.) All links are randomly sorted.

2. Comment on 1 or 2 other links. Grace & Truth linkup encourages community.

3. Every host features one entry from the previous week. To be featured, include this button or link back here on your post (mandatory to be featured, but not to participate).

We encourage you to follow our hosts on their blogs or social media.

MAREE DEE – Embracing the Unexpected
Blog | Facebook | Twitter | Instagram | Pinterest

LAUREN SPARKS
Blog | Facebook | Twitter | Instagram | Pinterest

LISA BURGESS – Lisa notes
Blog | Facebook | Twitter | Instagram | Pinterest

TAMMY KENNINGTON – Restoring hope. Pursuing peace.
Blog | Facebook | Twitter | Instagram | Pinterest

Now Let’s Link Up!

You are invited to the Inlinkz link party!

Click here to enter

My Antidote for Uncertainty

By LisaNotes November 17, 2021 Uncertainty: My One Word 2021 13 Comments

She’s Going to Fall…

Where is she?

I can’t find my little girl.

She was here just a second ago, but now she’s gone. I hear steps and look to my left. I see her blond hair swinging as she walks toward an outside staircase.

I begin running and call out to her.

But she doesn’t hear. She keeps walking.

Up the steps she goes. I know she’ll fall.

I must run faster.

The Invisible Nets

But she reaches the top of the staircase before I do. She does indeed fall, but she is caught. She is safe.

There is a net for such occasions.

I had not known of the net. It was hidden from my view.

I feel immense relief. Such as I’ve never felt before.

And I awake.

It has all been a dream, a nightmare, really. There was more (isn’t there always more in our dreams?), but the gist has stuck with me for over 30 years ago when I first dreamt it:

God has set up multiple safety nets around us, unbeknownst to us.

God is always loving our loved ones, even when we aren’t around. Our children, anything in our care really, aren’t our responsibility alone. They aren’t loved only by us. God loves them even more than we do.

And while yes, he primarily uses us to tend to those in our care, he also uses others. Sometimes we each step up and do our part.

But sometimes we don’t.

In those times, we pray the invisible safety nets will hold.

Uncertain of What, Not Who

As I reflect this month on my One Word of the year, UNCERTAINTY, I am reminded of that dream I had when my firstborn daughter was a baby.

It has brought me great comfort in my life.

But has it not promised any guarantees.

Life still happens. And death. Many types of deaths.

Sometimes someone has cut a hole in the safety net. Or the fragile body rejects being caught. Or we crawl out of the net ourselves.

Thus, uncertainty still frightens me (I believe; help my unbelief). I still long to fully understand each mystery, to find the complete instruction manual, to flood the whole path with light instead of one step at a time.

But I’m discovering my antidote to uncertainty is not more certainty.

It’s simply trust.

Not trust in what will happen next, but trust in who will be there when it does.

I can’t know the what. But I can know the who.

As I flounder through my current season of uncertainty, I’m finding a measure of peace in knowing God throws safety nets out here. For me. For those I love. And for all those he loves, which is everybody.

Even when I can’t see him, I can see we are his safety nets of love for each other.

May we each be found safe there.

Who are your safety nets?

Share your thoughts in the comments.

Read More:

sharing at these linkups

Three of the Best Books on Writing I’ve Read This Year

By LisaNotes November 15, 2021 Books I Recommend 25 Comments

If you’re a writer of blogs or books or even social media posts, you may also be a reader of writing books.

Here are three favorite books on writing I’ve read this year.

This is Week 3 of Nonfiction November. The topic is Be/Ask/Become the Expert, linking up with Veronica at The Thousand Book Project.

1. Charitable Writing
Cultivating Virtue Through Our Words
by Richard Hughes Gibson

This book isn’t necessarily about HOW to write, but about WHY you write.

It presents writing as a spiritual discipline for you and as a blessing for those you write for.

2. Murder Your Darlings
And Other Gentle Writing Advice from Aristotle to Zinsser
by Roy Peter Clark

This is a vast collection from the best of 50 of the best books on writing. Not only does this book contain great writing advice, but you’ll end up with even more books about writing to add to your to-read list.

3. Storyworthy
Engage, Teach, Persuade, and Change Your Life through the Power of Storytelling
by Matthew Dicks

Technically this isn’t a writing book at all. Rather it’s a book about oral storytelling. But isn’t writing also about telling stories? This is a fabulous and motivating book not only about sharing your life stories, but also about collecting and keeping track of them in the first place.

Do you read books about writing too? Share in the comments.

READ MORE ABOUT READING:

sharing at these linkups

What Is a Normal Reaction to Being Falsely Accused?

By LisaNotes November 12, 2021 Book reviews 17 Comments

I Did What???

We’ve all had this happen to us: a false accusation.

Someone has said something about us or to us about a flaw in our character or our behavior. And we know it’s not true.

How do we respond?

The normal reaction (which recently was mine, too) is anger. Sometimes a lot of anger, depending on the accusation.

And does that help resolve the situation? Rarely.

I Take My Coffee Black

In Tyler Merritt’s new book, I Take My Coffee Black: Reflections on Tupac, Musical Theater, Faith, and Being Black in America, Tyler tells about being falsely accused of sexual misconduct when he was a youth minister at a church.

He knew it was not true. And it made him angry.

But even though he was innocent, he couldn’t shake the voices who accused him. Or even the voices in his head fueling more shame.

It took his mama’s voice to shake him awake to his true identity:

Tyler writes,

“My mom said, ‘Do not believe those lies. Do not let this man define you. Do you hear me, son?’ I could hear her, but only barely, because I was sobbing. This was the first time in weeks that anybody had confronted that loud voice of shame and dared to shout back.
Quiet, you.
Shut up!
You are a liar.
This does not change Tyler’s life.
This does not change Tyler’s effectiveness.
This does not change his worth.

I sat on that bench, soaking it all in, gulping it down like a man emerging from a desert. Sometimes, you just need to hear your mama’s voice reminding you of who you are.”

Tyler recovered by listening to voices of hope.

Before You Call the Cops

Tyler’s memoir continues with other stories about bad times and good times and everything in between. He’s brutally honest in his book about what it’s like to be six foot two and black with dreadlocks.

Tyler also writes about a time he was walking down the streets of Nashville wearing his wireless headphones, his sunglasses, and a bandana around his head. As he approached a crosswalk he saw an older white woman in a truck ahead of him.

And he knew. When he got closer, she would be afraid of him. Just because of who he was.

So before he approached her, he took off the hood of his sweatshirt to expose his face, he removed his sunglasses so she could see his eyes, and he put on the biggest, brightest smile he could.

But it didn’t help.

When the woman saw him, she still lost it. She was terrified.

If she’d only known she had nothing to fear.

Tyler was sad about it. He was angry about it, too.

And eventually he made a video to tell the world to see him, really see him, so they wouldn’t be so afraid.

Watch all 3 minutes here of “Before You Call the Cops.”

It’s incredibly moving.

Have you been wrongly accused? How did you handle it?

Share your thoughts in the comments.

When It’s More Than an Empty Hole

By LisaNotes November 10, 2021 Pain, Uncertainty: My One Word 2021 15 Comments

Cut It Down

They’re cutting down the tree today.

Buzzzzzz. That’s the sound I hear through my ears.

But the sound I hear through my heart is louder. Children laughing. Leaves tossing. Dogs being petted. Bubbles being chased.

All under the shade of that tree.

But now? Gone. Replaced with tears. Loss. Emptiness.

With every limb that drops, a memory drops with it.

But it’s more than the tree that’s breaking me.

Two Trees

We have (well, had) two trees in our front yard. One is the required Yoshino cherry tree per our neighborhood’s original covenant. Everybody used to plant one. In the spring the neighborhood was lit up with beautiful light pink cherry blossoms. It was fabulous.

But times change.

As the years went by, either the neighborhood covenant was no longer passed around, or the residents discovered no one enforced it, so why bother planting a cherry tree.

There are still enough cherry trees in the older yards to make it worth your drive through the neighborhood though. I’m glad about that.

But the second tree in our yard was a water oak. It’s the tree nearest my daughters’ two bedrooms.

We bought the tree as a sapling when we moved into the house in 2001. It was a little crooked, a little malformed, so we got it cheap.

It started small, but after 20 years, it’s grown straight and tall and round. And big.

So big that its limbs brush against our roof. Its leaves clog the gutters. Its roots threaten the foundation of our house.

It took a lot of convincing, but I finally agreed. Okay. Cut the tree. Take it down.

No Turning Back

But now that it’s happening, I want to change my mind. I know it’s not reasonable.

Seeing the bareness left behind is too much because I’m in a season where other things have also been cut out of my life.

Things I didn’t agree to lose. Things I have no control over. Things that are far more important to me than any tree.

But now it’s done.

The spot where the tree once grew is now empty.

Empty is how my heart feels too. The front yard is a visible reminder of it.

In time, maybe we’ll plant something else. Something further from the house. Something that won’t cause us damage one day. Smaller. More manageable.

But today’s not the day. Today is the day we pay the tree trimmers our money and they take away our tree.

I feel the cuts in my heart. But my heart is still beating. I still have multiple joyful reasons to live and laugh and love.

I change my gaze from the front to the back yard. The back yard has so many trees I can’t count them. We planted very few of them ourselves. Most are here as gifts of time and grace and God. Strong, healthy, beautiful.

But one day they will be gone, too. Nothing here is forever except Love. Refusing to accept the impermanence of everything else in our daily existence only causes extra suffering.

As I grieve my losses, I’ll take in the fuller picture, both front and back, both things that have changed already, and things that surely will change later.

And say thank you for the blessings of today, the ones still here in this moment.

There are many.

Share in the comments.

READ MORE:

Why Fiction and Nonfiction Books Are More Alike Than You Think
—4 Book Pairings I Recommend

By LisaNotes November 8, 2021 Books I Recommend, Reading 18 Comments

I’m nearing the end of the latest novel I’m reading (That Summer). I can’t wait to see what happens next, to see how it will all turn out.

You don’t always get tidy conclusions when you read nonfiction books. In real life, things don’t always come to a final conclusion like they do in a novel. Life goes on and on.

But in novels the story doesn’t always conclude either (I don’t like those kind of novels, btw!).

So what else do fiction and nonfiction books have in common? They are more alike than you might think.

While we often read nonfiction to learn more about the world and other cultures, we can get the same benefits by reading fiction. Through the stories in fiction, we can learn to increase our empathy levels as we put ourselves in the shoes of the characters, understanding different cultures and different personalities than our own.

Also, as with nonfiction, we can also be encouraged through fiction. The stories can inspire us to be kinder, more courageous, and more loving in our real lives, just like characters in a book.

So whether we’re grabbing a novel or a nonfiction book, with either one we can be entertained, be encouraged, and be educated. You choose.

Week 2’s focus for Nonfiction November is Book Pairing with Katie at Doing Dewey.

See Week 1’s focus here: 7 New Nonfiction Books to Make You a Better Person.

4 Sets of Fiction and Nonfiction Books That Go Together

Here are 8 books I’ve read this year that go well together.

PAIR 1

• FICTION

11/22/63
by Stephen King

This suspenseful novel goes back and forth in time surrounding the JFK assassination.

• NONFICTION

Zero Fail
The Rise and Fall of the Secret Service
by Carol Leonnig

This is fascinating look at how the Secret Service responded to the JFK assassination and every other major Presidential event in the modern era.

PAIR 2

• FICTION

American Dirt
by Jeanine Cummins

This is a moving story of a young Mexican mother and her 8-year-old son forced to escape Mexico due to horrific gang violence.

• NONFICTION

Abuelita Faith
Women on the Margins Teach Us about Wisdom, Persistence, and Strength
by Kat Armas

A second-generation Cuban American shares how faith is shaped through generations of everyday women both in own lives and in women of the Bible.

PAIR 3

• FICTION

The Book of Longings
by Sue Monk Kidd

This is the fictitious story of Ana as Jesus’s wife, and her journey from a curious girl in a wealthy family to Jesus’s death and resurrection.

• NONFICTION

The Making of Biblical Womanhood
How the Subjugation of Women Became Gospel Truth
by Beth Allison Barr

Beth teaches us about “biblical womanhood” by taking us on a tour throughout the history of religion.

PAIR 4

• FICTION

Black Buck
by Mateo Askaripour

Twenty-two-year-old Darren is a Black salesman on a mission, starting out at Starbucks but rising to the top of a tech startup through a crazy set of events in New York City.

• NONFICTION

Becoming Kareem
Growing Up On and Off the Court
by Kareem Abdul-Jabbar

Learn about Kareem’s childhood in New York City and his rise to basketball stardom as a young Black man.

* * *

What fiction and nonfiction book would you pair? Share in the comments.