TeamDavis

musings on marriage, faith and life

Brothers and Sisters July 27, 2009

Filed under: books, music, media,faith — hokiecaryn @ 3:22 pm
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sisters_web

[A journal entry from Oct 7, 2007. I ran across it and it was a good reminder for me; thought I'd share it.]

As I read 1 John (in the Bible) this week, I was impacted by John’s distinction of Christians being known for their love, especially towards their brothers and sisters. I realized that in the past, I have read that as “love the brothers and sisters in your church.” Sometimes that can be hard enough!

But I was challenged how my attitude and cynicism can build up towards other believers, most of whom I have not even met. For example, I have heard stories of people being deeply wounded by pastors or church leaders to the point of turning away from God.  One example I was recently challenged through was in reading the journey of Sheila Walsh through serious depression, and taking steps to pursue healing.  On this journey, as shared  through her book Honestly, she conveys things that were said to her when she was at the end of herself in emotional mess, and finally reached out for help. When reading the words of some of her colleagues and friends who said stupid and unloving things (mostly out of ignorance and fear of emotions), my reaction could be “those idiots!” or “I want to punch them.”  The things they said cut deeply. But the reality is that they are believers, (or at least professed). And the world watches how we treat them.

Obviously, for all recorded history, people have done horrible things in the name of Christ. Healthy distance from those who are damaging souls and some distinctions are necessary.

Yet looking at what John writes, and knowing the “world” does lump Christians together; even if we bristle at being combined with some of our relatives.

John (who’s closest ministry partners were slaughtered, mind you) says that those who have hate towards his brother are living in darkness.

I know I have traveled down this path of animosity, bitterness, and speaking ill of my brothers and sisters in Christ. How then do we pursue life and the integrity and unity of the Church?  For starters, I have watched the example of leaders I respect, calling out non-Christ-like behavior, without completely destroying the person they are referring to. Sheila Walsh went back to some people who hurt her and had very restoring, healing conversations.  While some conversations did not pan out, many of her colleagues and friends confessed their inadequacy to respond well, and their expression of sorrow for hurting her. Sheila found healing as she released her own anger toward them that could have destroyed her.

What a beautiful thing Christ can do in his redemptive way.

May we be open to His workings and not our own judgments and standards.

 

The Davis Veggie Garden July 10, 2009

Filed under: around the house — hokiecaryn @ 10:12 am
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So I know there’s a lot of hype about sustainability, going green, and organic food. We’re not ones to jump on bandwagons, and I think a lot of the “popular” routes of living green and organic and all that are kind of false.  Like electric cars that require mining of rare earth elements, or “organic” produce that’s grown and shipped from overseas.  These oxymorons of sorts are not true green and sustainable living.  So anyway, without just jumping on the wagon because it’s hip, Scott and I have decided we’d like to do some things to be more self-sufficient.  Local is good, sustainability is good, and growing things is good for us in many many ways.

We decided we’d like our children to know where our food comes from.  While I’m not quite ready to slaughter my own meat, yet, I thought growing some tomatoes, beans and cucumbers could be a good start!!

We started putting Josiah to bed earlier and found ourselves having time together again and wanting to spend it well.  When Scott’s not studying his Greek, we’re often kind of wasted from the day and not sure what to do.  Doing the garden in the evenings and on weekend mornings has been a really enjoyable way to share something together, besides Josiah.   We’re growing a vegetable garden from seeds, trying to get some seedlings going

Growing things in Florida is pretty hit or miss, but so far, so good.  They are actually already much larger than these photos!

We set up a little mini-irrigation system for our seedlings in containers through the intense heat of the mid-summer.  We’re hoping to sustain the little guys until late summer, so we can plant and get a harvest this fall/winter.  The growing season in Florida is very flip-flop from most places in the country, so that’s been something to learn!

We look forward to seeing these guys when we get back. I’m half worried that the cucumbers will have born fruit the size of our house at the rate they’re growing.  But mostly I hope they’ll be healthy little plants that we can plant in our new boxes when we come back and see some harvest later.  We’ll have lots of different things so we can see what does well and what we like.  We’re planning to build “square foot garden” raised beds.  Its’ kind of a new trend, but it’s really smart and I think will work well for our sandy soil to help give them some decent stuff to grow in.  Most square foot garden beds recommend using wood; since we’re in Florida and even pressure treated wood disintegrates after a year, we’ve come up with a creative idea to try to form the beds. If it works, we’ll talk about it here!

We’ll see and we’ll keep you posted!

 

Filling the hole July 9, 2009

Filed under: faith,Parenthood — hokiecaryn @ 1:23 pm
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Besides all the talking that Josiah is doing these days, he’s definitely for the past few weeks wanted everything in his mouth.  For many years, I’ve heard people glean life lessons often from small things that their children do.  The overwhelming experience we’ve had while we’ve enjoyed the presence of Josiah in our life is the overwhelming love we have for him, and just holding and squeezing him and knowing our Father in Heaven does the same for us.  I have learned many other things, but my latest is God just revealing a picture to me.

As Josiah stuffs his thumb, his elephant’s ear, a toy ring, the burp cloth, our finger if it’s passing by his face — or any

Favorite Blue Elephant

Favorite Blue Elephant

combination of the above into his little mouth, his whole body sometimes wriggles and writhes trying to smash it in more it seems.  It’s like he can’t quite fill his mouth, and get everything he wants in there.  Sometimes he’s content with just his thumb and the burp cloth wrapped around his thumb.  Or some other solitary object.  But it’s just funny those times that he wriggles and stuffs and tries different combinations. [by the way, the elephant is a favorite toy]

It reminds me of me. Of us.  Trying to almost violently stuff things into our hearts to (1) make us feel better and less lonely, (2) fill our need for “stuff”, or (3) help us feel satisfied and self-sufficient.  While she’s not the first to have penned these words, Plumb’s singer/songwriter’s lyrics come to mind…

There’s a God-shaped hole in all of us
And the restless soul is searching
There’s a God-shaped hole in all of us
And it’s a void only he can fill – Plumb, “God-Shaped Hole”

That stuffing that Josiah does, the wriggling and restless-ness to meet his need….that’s a picture of me.  It’s cute for a baby, not as cute for me.  It kind of is like one of those moments of remembering the campaign advert that was out around the time I was in high school by the anti-smoking council or whomever.  It showed a girl tarred and gross all over her flesh.  It said something like “if what happened on the inside showed itself on the outside, would you want to smoke?”  it was pretty effctive for me, I’ll tell you what.  But I feel like sometimes with a baby in his innocence, he reveals his true flesh-nature in just being himself.  It’s fine, he’s learning, and that’s what babies do.  But his acts are just a version of how we are, we just manage to package it better most of the time!

Anyway, I want to think on what I’m trying to stuff into my God-shaped hole, and where I need to just let go and ask God to fill me more.  How can He get in when we’re cramming a bunch of drool-soaked toys in there?!

 

Can I buy a vowel? July 9, 2009

Filed under: family,Parenthood — hokiecaryn @ 12:58 pm
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100_6733So I guess as babies, we start off developmentally with a LOT of vowels, and just start to add consonants slowly to the front of them.  Our little guy is so content to ahhhh ohhhhh uhhhhh all day long.  It’s kind of fascinating to watch language develop in a child.  I’ve seen pieces here and there, but it’s so interesting to watch it day to day.   Some days he’s very vocal, and some days he’s much more quiet.  I haven’t found the rhythm to that mystery.  A couple of weeks ago when he started really becoming more vocal, he did it for a while and then took a break from vowels and just blew raspberries all day.  He’d wake up, and it was the first thing we’d hear from his room.  It was delightful.

Then, at some point, he just kind of switched back to vowels.  And now it’s kind of like a singer practicing because he does this whole range of volumes with the sounds he can make.   The other day, we were visiting his friend Jake, who’s a few weeks older.  He and Jake weren’t quite talking to one another, but at about the same language ability.  Each would rattle off some sounds, and some shrieks of glee.  When Josiah made a really loud one, Jake would kind of look astonished.  But later he would do the same and kind of startle Josiah. It was very amusing.

Josiah seems to like when you talk at the same time as he’s cooing and making his sounds.  He hasn’t figured out the “taking turns” of conversation yet, but really likes us to talk to him, and repeat his sounds.  It makes his day.  It’s so thrilling to hear his shrieks of glee, even if they are a bit piercing.

(more…)

 

 
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