Lisa notes

Do you welcome it or resist it? One Word 2016

By LisaNotes January 4, 2016 Welcome 49 Comments

Welcome-OneWord2016-LisaNotes

Although the last week of 2015 was good in many ways, it was also troubling.

My body was taking me down. I had to change plans twice to just stay home and rest. Severe abdominal pain that had been knocking on my door for months, coming and going, had decided to just stay.

But I was resisting seeing a doctor. Only after much persuasion did Jeff convince me to go. I subjected myself to an IV and chest scan and drinking the mysterious cup of liquid.

The diagnosis? Unknown. Perhaps gall bladder. Just take this steroid pack and hope for the best for now.

On New Year’s Eve, the pain began subsiding again, praise God.

Just in time to welcome in the new year. And my new One Word for the year: “Welcome.”

Already, God? (He knows how to work our One Words from the get-go, yes?)

So instead of attempting to ignore the pain and complaining about a lack of diagnosis and resisting getting help, I’m trying first to be accepting of it.

To practice the spiritual discipline of welcoming.

Welcoming Prayer Thomas Keating

That doesn’t mean I have to like it. I don’t like pain telling me what I can and can’t do.

But I do need to listen to it (whatever “it” is). To welcome it in a broad sense. Not in a “I’m glad you’re here! Come in and stay!” kind of way, but in a “If you keep ringing my doorbell, eventually I’ll answer” kind of way.

  • Consciously acknowledge.
  • Willingly accept.
  • Release it back to God.

Can we find peace even in this?

If we catch and release. Not just with abdominal pain, but with all of life. How else can we let go of something until we see what we’re holding onto?

“Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.”
– Jesus (John 8:32)

I’ll be working this year through the ten guideposts in Brené Brown’s book, The Gifts of Imperfection, for monthly exercises in welcoming and letting go. Where she talks about “cultivating” attitudes for whole-hearted living, I’ll substitute “welcoming.”

The Gifts of Imperfection

January is my month to welcome authenticity and let go of what people think. Including myself.

As I share my own thoughts and life with others—without judging myself for them, including any perceived weakness for having undiagnosed pain—I also hope to intentionally hear others’ opinions and ideas without passing judgment.

“Until we can receive with an open heart, we are never really giving with an open heart.”
– Brené Brown

So God, welcome to 2016!

May I first receive what you’re going to give. Only then can I properly decide what to do with it next—embrace it, work with it, or just let it pass on through.

Life is best lived when we see God’s presence in it.

“I am where I need to be. Everything around me includes and hides the sacred.”
– Mary Mrozowski

Welcome, welcome, welcome.

* * *

Do you have a One Word for 2016? It’s a process that continues to amaze me—how God works through these words—so I’m learning to welcome them each year and not resist. Please share in the comments.

See all the posts on Welcome here.

Related:

Links, books, and other things I love – January 2016

By LisaNotes January 1, 2016 Life updates, Links I like 13 Comments

1 SECOND EVERYDAY – December edition

[click here if you can’t see the 30-second video]

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AROUND THE WEB

• 11 Ways to Write Better. Like it or not, everyone is a writer these days. So these tips are good for all of us.

• A Simple Phrase that Can Prevent Arguments and Resentments. Important insights here from the awesome Dr. Brené Brown.

• How to Choose a Word for the Year. Have you picked One Word yet for 2016? Good advice from Jean.

• The simple way doctors can make their patients feel understood. I’ve had several doctor’s appointments this season, and I’ve yet to be asked this.

• Can you read my lips? This is impossible for me to do! [Click here if you don’t see video]

~ * ~ * ~

ON READING

• 2016 Reading Challenges. Are you doing any in 2016? You won’t believe this list. There’s a challenge to fit everybody.

• I’ve crazily chosen these 6 groups, but I have a lot of overlap so it’s not as scary as it looks. I may be looking forward the most to these Red Couch selections with She Loves Magazine and Leigh Kramer.

Red Couch Book Selections

• Books I recommend from my December reading, including one of my new favorites, Rising Strong, by Brené Brown.

• My 10 favorite books of 2015

Top-10-Books-2015-LisaNotes

• Currently reading:

  1. The Irrational Season (Madeleine L’Engle)
  2. Better Than Before: Mastering the Habits of Our Everyday Lives (Gretchen Rubin)
  3. Son (The Giver Quartet #4) (Lois Lowry)
  4. Dirty Faith: Bringing the Love of Christ to the Least of These (David Z. Nowell)

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THINGS I LOVE

• Of course, Christmas with family

Burgess family 2016

Morgan’s husband didn’t get to make it this year, but Jenna’s boyfriend did.

 

Coates siblings 2015

Me with my brother and two sisters; we make our picture together every Christmas. Love them!

• A new Bible Chapter Memorization challenge begins Monday! Visit Do Not Depart on January 4 for details on which chapter and to sign up. Memorization begins January 18.

new bible memory challenge 2016

• Excited that Serial podcast is back for season 2.

• I loved having such a warm Christmas in the south this year, but the flooding was terrible. Watch this interview with one of my friends to see how flooding really affects the homeless.

heavy rains batter homeless

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ON THE BLOG

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What are you looking forward to in January? Please share in the comments.

Linking at Leigh Kramer’s
My previous posts

 

On the blog – December 2015

By LisaNotes December 31, 2015 Archives No Comments

Grow by recapturing your awe

By LisaNotes December 31, 2015 Book reviews 10 Comments

“Spiritual growth is about recapturing your awe.”

What is something that every person does, that’s not bound by family, culture, or geography? Paul David Tripp says it is feel awe.

And looking at what stirs awe in each of our hearts is the theme of his newest book, Awe: Why It Matters for Everything We Think, Say, and Do.

Awe by Paul David Tripp

Here’s the breakdown of what Tripp says about awe:

  1. Awe is everyone’s lifelong pursuit.
  2. God created an awesome world.
  3. God created you with an awe capacity.
  4. Where you look for awe will shape the direction of your life.
  5. Awe stimulates the greatest joys and deepest sorrows in us all.
  6. Misplaced awe keeps us perennially dissatisfied.
  7. Every created awe is meant to point you to the Creator.
  8. Awesome stuff never satisfies.

Tripp continues by showing how we often are in awe of the wrong things (ministry, materialism, parenting, work, etc.). He calls this is our core spiritual disease.

He says we too easily become “awe amnesiacs,” forgetting that God is the source of our awe and instead focusing on these other things, even good things, God-created things.

And when we are more in awe of other things than we are in awe of God? It gets ugly.

“We preach and teach love, but we aren’t examples of love. Why does all this happen? The answer is simple, but it will sting you. It happens because we are full of ourselves. We have replaced awe of God with awe of self, and the harvest is not pretty.”

To become more aware of our awe-problem, Tripp proposes five questions to ask ourselves:

  1. Is God good?
  2. Will God do what he promised?
  3. Is God in control?
  4. Does God have the needed power?
  5. Does God care about me?

How we answer those questions determines the amount of hope—and awe—that we have of God.

What brings us back to awe of God? The grace of God.

You pick up this main point early in the book—be in awe of God. I admit the reading grows laborious after awhile—Tripp believes in excessive repetition, giving you example after example of the same thing, rewording the same points in slightly different ways over and over. Sometimes I like that; sometimes I don’t.

But is this book worth reading anyway? Definitely.

More quotes from Awe. . . .

“If awesome things in creation become your god, the God who created those things will not own your awe. Horizontal awe is meant to do one thing: stimulate vertical awe.”

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“If grace does not transform my motivation, it will not alter my living.”

~ * ~ * ~

“Your life is simply not a list of priorities but rather the coming together of three inescapable dimensions of calling. You are called to relationships, you are called to work, and you are called to God. Each of these is a significant expression of how God calls every one of us to live.”

~ * ~ * ~

“Awe is a longing. Perhaps that doesn’t seem too thunderous to you, but it is. The capacity for awe that God has given us fundamentally explains the endless variety of human dissatisfactions.”

~ * ~ * ~

“Whether we know it or not, the awe of every human being—that desire to be amazed, blown away, moved, and satisfied—is actually a universal craving to see God face-to-face.”

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What has prompted your awe of God this year? Please share in the comments.

My thanks to Crossway
for the review copy of this book

Books I recommend – December 2015

By LisaNotes December 29, 2015 Books I Recommend 12 Comments

books-i-recommend-december-2015-lisanotes

I’m excited about upcoming books for 2016! Here are the 2016 Reading Challenges I’ve joined.

My favorite 10 books from 2015 are here.

And from December’s reading, here are the books I recommend for What’s on Your Nightstand.

BOOKS I RECOMMEND

1. Rising Strong
The Reckoning. The Rumble. The Revolution
by Brené Brown

Rising-Strong

My review of Rising Strong

We all fail. That matters, but what matters more is what we do next. Wonderful insights here from Brené Brown about rising again and stepping into new stories. I love how Brené thinks and how she uses research to back it up.

“Courage is contagious. . . . Rising strong is a spiritual practice.”

2. Every Little Thing
Making a Difference Right Where You Are
by Deidra Riggs

every-little-thing-deidra-riggs

Author and blogger Deidra Riggs reminds us that we each make a difference. She shares from personal experiences that when God calls, answering is the best option.

“God loves you, exactly the way you are, period. You have a right to be here. You were created on purpose. Regardless of what anyone else may have to say about it, you being here is a good thing. A very good thing.”

3. Wonder
by R. J. Palacio

wonder

This may be *just* a novel, but it’s an important story about accepting differences and about fighting bullying. Ten-year-old August—a child with severe facial abnormalities—begins attending public school for the first time and narrates his story, along with the stories of those closest to him and how they are each affected.

“I wish every day could be Halloween. We could all wear masks all the time. Then we could walk around and get to know each other before we got to see what we looked like under the masks.”

4. A Geography of Time
The Temporal Misadventures of a Social Psychologist, or How Every Culture Keeps Time Just a Little Bit Differently
by Robert V. Levine

a-geography-of-time

How we perceive time is a mainly silent undercurrent that strongly affects many aspects of our personal lives and our culture. Levine shares his research of studies in various countries about how time is viewed. It’s more complex the deeper you look.

“Still today, the idea of living by the clock remains absolutely foreign to much of the world. One of the most significant differences in the pace of life is whether people use the hour on the clock to schedule the beginning and ending of activities, or whether the activities are allowed to transpire according to their own spontaneous schedule.”

5. How We Got to Now
Six Innovations That Made the Modern World
by Steven Johnson

how we got to now

A fascinating look at the historical significance of innovations in six areas (clean, time, glass, light, cold, and sound). I haven’t seen it, but there’s also a corresponding PBS documentary.

“If you worked for an hour at the average wage of 1800, you could buy yourself ten minutes of artificial light. With kerosene in 1880, the same hour of work would give you three hours of reading at night. Today, you can buy three hundred days of artificial light with an hour of wages.”

6. When to Rob a Bank
…And 131 More Warped Suggestions and Well-Intended Rants
by Steven D. Levitt, Stephen J. Dubner

when-to-rob-a-bank

Because I love the Freakonomics podcast, naturally I have loved the Freakonomics books. This one is a series of posts from their economics blog at Freakonomics.

7. Women, Food and God
An Unexpected Path to Almost Everything
by Geneen Roth

women-food-and-god

I didn’t get everything Roth said because my problems with food aren’t always what she was talking about. But I get the gist. Don’t use food for rewards or escapes. Enjoy it but don’t depend on it.

“There are many ways to deprive yourself: You can deprive yourself of cookies or you can deprive yourself of feeling well after you eat them.”

8. Americanah
by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

americanah

I didn’t always like the plotline of this novel, but I liked being in the head of the author/character as she wrote about being a non-American black in America (she’s from Nigeria). In the book the main character is also a blog writer, so you get to hear the story from different angles.

“’Thank you.’ Ifemelu wanted, suddenly and desperately, to be from the country of people who gave and not those who received, to be one of those who had and could therefore bask in the grace of having given, to be among those who could afford copious pity and empathy.”

9. Messenger (The Giver, #3)
by Lois Lowry

messenger-lois-lowry

I loved novel #1, The Giver. So-so on novel # 2, Gathering Blue. And now returning to total enjoyment again with this 3rd book in The Giver quartet. This story ties the first two books together a little. And now I’m waiting for # 4, Son, to become available at my library so I can finish the series.

10. Awe
Why It Matters for Everything We Think, Say, and Do
by Paul David Tripp

awe by paul david tripp

The concept is true: Our lives are more satisfying when we live in awe of who God is and what he is doing. When we lose that awe, our lives suffer too. Although the book is good, it was too long (to me), repeating the same message over and over, just using different words.

Currently reading: 

  • Better Than Before (by Gretchen Rubin)
  • 10-Minute Digital Declutter (by S. J. Scott)
  • Dirty Faith (by David Z. Nowell)
  • The Power of a Whisper (by Bill Hybels)

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What are you reading this month? Please share here.

Related:

Whats-on-Your-Nightstand-at-_5-minut

My books on Goodreads
Previous reading lists

When to break the rules

By LisaNotes December 28, 2015 Compassion, Homeless 16 Comments

break-the-rules

Some people have the gift. Some don’t. Fran does. She runs Manna House, a food distribution center. (Well, she and God—she gives God all the credit so God gets all the glory.)

When the poor and homeless come to Manna House, Fran sees the person hiding underneath the need, underneath any scam. She loves. She listens to sob stories then says, “Sure we can help. Let’s see what we have.” Especially when kids are involved. Fran has the gift of mercy.

But others aren’t so generous. . . .

I’m a rule-follower from way back. I like to do things right, in order, as they should be.

So when the rules at Manna House are one toothbrush, one shampoo, one deodorant per family representative, that’s what I *try* to give out on the Wednesdays I volunteer.

But sometimes I just can’t.

A few Wednesdays ago two people side by side asked for a roll of toilet paper each. But a fellow rule-keeper handing them out got suspicious. Perhaps these two people were in the same family, she thought, in which case they should only get one roll, not two. She questioned the couple, “Aren’t you two together?”

Really?
It bothered me.

Even if they were together, there stood two bodies that had already stood in a long line in the cold to get help, so hand over two rolls! (It’s one reason I started buying extra toilet paper myself to give away. If somebody asks for tissue, I want to be able to say, “Yes!” even if it’s only for an hour until we run out again.)

I need to remember this lesson:
People are more important than policies. That’s what Jesus teaches me. He chose people over the Sabbath. Relationship over rules. Love over laws.

The only reason we have rules and policies is to better love people, right? But if occasionally those need to be broken to keep the greater law of love, then break them.

And if that means now and again giving away two rolls of toilet paper to two people even in the same family, I think Fran would approve. Because I know Jesus would. May I remember to do likewise.

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Do you ever struggle with knowing when to break a rule, too? Please share in the comments.

revised from the archives