Category Archives: Sacred Mundane

I’ve been swallowed up.  This must be what it’s like to be my Grandma, or any really really old person who has to leave their home and take a puny boxful of their life’s belongings to a retirement home, where they are taken care of and treated like an child, patted on the head and told to do crossword puzzles or knit washcloths no one will use.  They must wonder what to do.  No wonder they watch TV all the time.  They must cry a lot and think about the years when they were young, valued, busy.  When they had the freedom to drive, to go out with friends, to clean their own homes or plant a garden.  It must feel frustrating to have nothing but a potted plant to water or at best a tomato plant on their allotted 2-foot square plot of garden in the retirement home courtyard.  No wonder they’re grumpy all the time.  Although the advantage they have is that at least maybe they’re so tired by that point in their life that they don’t care as much.  Their bones ache so much perhaps they’re happy, sometimes at least, to have their life taken care of for them.  It must still be hard.  So hard.

That’s how I feel right now.  I’ve been swallowed up.  Somewhere in the last year Kari was swallowed up and now she sits inside someone else’s life.  I still get glimpses of what it’s like to be me.  On Friday when we hung out with Aaron and Candi in Corvallis and I saw my friend Grace—I got to be me.  On Saturday when we went to McMinnville and saw precious friends and laughed and drove and played with Dutch—I got to be me.  Last week when I drove up to my friend Melissa’s and went for a hike around the lake by her house—I got to be me.

But last July I drove away from me—at least that’s how it felt.  I really just drove away from our home, but we entered a new life.  We now live with my parents.  We eat off my parents’ plates.  We eat food from their refrigerator. We park in their garage.  We sit on their couch.  We also live in a new town.  It is their town.  The town is full of their friends.  We also attend a new church.  It is their church.  The church is full of their friends.  Jeff teaches a class on Tuesday nights.  The class is largely a group of my parents and their friends.  In July I went from being Kari Patterson, to being Bill & Karen’s daughter.  I went from being wife and mother to daughter … again.  Not that I have ever quit being a daughter, but I have, until this point, been a grown daughter.  Now I am not quite grown anymore. I am living with my parents again, surrounded by photos of my childhood, feeling as if I’m awkwardly suspended between two lives—one where I am wife and mom, one where I am still a child.  Dangling—that’s how I feel—dangling, never quite sure how to act and how to be because I am no longer me.  I’ve been swallowed up.

And in this new church I have no fit.  There appears to be no Kari-shaped hole that I can discern.  There is a huge Jeff-shaped hole, which has been filled, and Bill and Karen shaped holes that have already been filled, and I am standing outside the front door, watching, pretending to be busy … but I’m really just watching and wondering where I went.

Dutch provides great joy—but really my role of irreplaceable mommy isn’t that big anymore.  Oma and Papa provide a lot more fun, and since I leave him with them one day a week, somehow it feels that lifetimes go by while I’m away and I’ve missed a significant chunk.  “He’s dong such-and-such now,” they say.  “Oh, I see,” I reply, “I see I must have missed it.”  But this time, this one day away, is the one golden, glorious, beautifully crafted portion of my life where I get to be me—school!  At school I am wholly and completely Kari Patterson.  I have value, purpose, vision.  I have meaningful work to accomplish, goals to achieve, deadlines to meet.  At school I am not swallowed up!

So if only, I tell myself, if only we could move out.  Somehow I could create a haven, a home for our family where we could be a family again. Somehow I could be me!  Somehow I could be all grown up again. I could cook meals for my family and we could eat off our own dishes!  I could decorate and clean and beautify our home, or I could make a mess and not clean it up for three days—because it’s home!  Home home home!  We could come home!  I could be ok not having a place to serve at church just yet, if only I had a place to rest my head where I could somehow just be myself.  It’s as if I’ve spent ten years developing into a woman and then all of a sudden I’ve been told that those ten years didn’t happen, and I need to forget everything that’s taken place during that time.

But we can’t move out until we know if Jeff will have a job at the church.  We have no income; we can’t move out until we know if we will have an income.  So we wait.  “Soon,” they say.  “Soon.”  So every stupid Tuesday, as Jeff goes into the church office for his meetings, every stupid Tuesday, I tell myself to not get my hopes up. Every stupid Tuesday I wait for him to call—at 2:45—and tell me how his meetings went.  Every stupid Tuesday I hope they will give him an answer—that they will give him an answer that will give me my life back.  And I convince myself—every stupid Tuesday—that it doesn’t matter and that I’ll be ok no matter what.  And every stupid Tuesday he calls and I listen as he says, “Yeah, my meetings went great …” and he begins telling me the details of the staff meeting and then my stomach does that thing—that thing where I feel sick and where that stupid lump comes up in my throat and I realize I’ve done it again: I’ve gotten my hopes up.  And then I do what I know I will do. I ask, “Did he say anything about …?”  and Jeff knows what I mean and he gets quiet then says, “No, Sauce, no. I’m sorry.”  And then I get silent and cry, and I feel stupid all over again because I realize I’ve done it again—I’ve gotten my stupid hopes up that sometime, one of these times, we’re going to get some good news that someone will give him a job and we’ll get to move out and I can have my life back again.  And I do it every stupid Tuesday.  And every stupid Tuesday I chide myself and say “You’re supposed to wait on God, not on them.  Those who wait on the Lord shall renew their strength, they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not faint.”   And then I sit and wonder when the strength will come and why I’m weary and fainting.  Every stupid Tuesday.

So, this is just me—raw and unedited, trying to sort through these thoughts and feelings.  I guess the question I have to wrestle with is this:  If it brought glory to God for me to never “have my life back” again would I embrace that?  If it glorified God for me to never again have my own home or niche or place to fly, would I obey?  Theoretically the answer’s always “Yes, God.”  But is it really?  I guess that’s the question for me today.

• Blowing bubbles in the sunshine, kids running here and there chasing floating globes.
• Sitting with Heidi, silently forming playdough, cutting stars, lining them up along the table. It’s great to have a girl.
• Sipping decaf tea in the late afternoon.
• Kids sick, still sick. Still homebound and still enjoying it.
• A free gift, like a grace.
• Justice and mercy.
• Your kind words.
• Connections, real connections, the 3-D kind.
• Filling in my blank.
• Local fryers on sale.
• Tiny green shoots, growth, emerging from the soil.
• Hating hating hating discipline, knowing knowing knowing it’s the right thing to do.
• My first “workout” after six months. Oh deary I’m out of shape! But so good to start back up!
• A friend, “Can I bring you dinner tonight?” Umm… yes!
• Heidi’s starfish hands carefully rolling out playdough, intent, absorbed, creating.
• Wooden rolling pin.
• Billowy clouds, brilliant blue sky.
• Whole house filled with aroma of roasting chicken.
• “Chance” encounters.
• Eight beautiful smiling faces at morning prayer.
• Sunshine!
• Snuggled next to my 4-year-old self-proclaimed “shark scientist” watching ocean documentaries.
• A glimpse of summer! Warm sun, kids in swimsuits, kiddie pool filled with water. Splashing, laughing,
• Blowing bubbles.
• Heidi trying to blow bubbles, putting soapy wand up to her mouth then pressing her lips through the ring, blowing. Pulls her face away, face scrunched up in disgust as soap lines her lips.
• Washing the car. Letting Dutch hold the spraying hose. Something distracted him and in classic kid fashion he turned his whole body to look, completely unaware, and sprayed me straight in the face.
• Daddy coming home early.
• Fresh produce.
• Stepping Up.
• Free lunch.
• A welcome rainy day to water all the new vinca we planted.
• Setting all my tiny seedlings out in the sun, little green shoots with faces upturned to the sky, happy.
• Heidi wearing sunglasses.
• A blessed day out with my friend and discipler of almost 13 years.
• Looking eye-to-eye with a boy who I saw born. How can he be almost 11 already?
• Dutch in seventh heaven hanging with “the big boys.”
• Curry chicken salad, apples, pears and almonds. Yum!
• Date night at home with my man: Planting over a hundred little seed starts for our vegetable garden. Standing side by side, dirt under our fingernails, sipping tea, miracle of life.
• Sleepytime tea.
• Morning walk in the rain.
• Farm fresh eggs.
• Feeling like a celebrity for a day! Free lunch at a fun restaurant, treated to coffee and a deluxe car wash and a spa pedicure by a generous friend. Then, beautiful dinner out with two lifelong friends. I kept shaking my head and thinking, “who’s life is this??”  So fun.
• So thankful for my man who invested in our kids as I was away.
• Thankful to come back to “real life” and hang in my sweats with my kids playing Legos on the floor. This is my life and I love it.
• Sitting at a table with two friends, known more than 20 years. There’s nothing quite like a shared history….
• Wilted spinach salad with goat cheese and prosciutto. Whoa! So good.
• Blast Burger quarter pounder with fresh cut fries and a few sips of an oreo milkshake. So unhealthy. So delicious.
• Settling into bed Friday night, reflecting on an amazing week packed with relational gifts. Gifts with skin. The best kind.
• Bedside lamp.
• Friends who cheer.
• Possibilities.
• Perspective.
• Life.

How are you doing reading through the Bible? I pray God’s blessing your efforts, no matter where you are or how consistent you feel. Getting ANY of God’s Word in our hearts is better than none.  I read 2 Kings 7 this morning and was reminded of this fun story from last fall, about this very passage.

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Have I mentioned I love the sacred mundane? I may not like all the lessons of daily life, but I cannot deny that they are there.  The latest one? It was delivered to me in a big cardboard box.

Last week, when Jeff and I were talking about a new commitment to giving, changing our lifestyle, etc. I was talking about clothing. It is unbelievablehow much clothing we all have, amen?  I mean, I could probably go the rest of my life without buying another article of clothing and never actually “run out”.  I may not be fit for a runway, but I’d probably be just fine.  The kids obviously grow out of their clothes rather quickly, but they certainly don’t need much. So just last week I told Jeff, “Ok, I do laundry once a week, so really the kids only need enough clothes for one week.  That’s 7 outfits.  Yes, some days are dirty, so toss in one extra, but we’re talking 8-9 at the most.   I want to keep reminding myself we need less than we think.”  So, Heidi really was growing out of all her clothes, and one of the things I prayed and asked God for was winter clothes for Heidi. Dutch is fine but Heidi-boo definitely needed some, including a jacket.

Of course, in classic God-style, He provided.

That night someone at church flagged me down and told me she had something for me, which turned out to be a HUGE box of hand-me-downs from her daughter. Did I mention HUGE?  I was laughing out loud at God’s provision because it was so interwoven with what He was doing in our adventure of faith.  It was like He was saying, “Worried about your kids provision? Yeah, I got them covered!”  Not only were there lots of clothes, there were FOUR jackets! I was hoping for one!

As I sat in my living room, surrounded by little pink outfits, I of course had thanked God and was now sitting around folding and sorting sizes.  Then as clear as anything, right in the middle of folding a pink turtle-neck, I thought of the words of the four starving lepers from 2 Kings 7:9 “We are not doing right…“.  The story is long, but basically during a time of great famine,  four starving lepers (as prophesied by Elisha) discover the camp of the Syrian army, abandoned because the Lord had made the Syrians hear the sound of chariots and they had fled away in the night (vv.6-7).  So these four starving lepers stumbled upon a multitude of food and supplies, miraculously provided in the middle of a famine. And while they are in the middle of pigging out (v.8), they stop and look at each other and say,

“We are not doing right … let us go and tell the king’s household.”

In other words, “It is not right that we are sitting here stuffing our faces and plundering all of this gold, while the rest of our land, our people, are starving in the middle of this famine. Yes, God miraculously provided it for us, but we do wrong to sit here and eat without sharing with others.”

God was the one who provided the food and supplies by miraculously making the Syrian army hear the voice of chariots and flee in the middle of the night.

God used the four lepers to be his discoverers. The purpose of giving them the whole camp of Syrian supplies was not so they would eat a whole army’s worth of food or take a whole army’s worth of supplies.  He showed it to them so they could be faithful distributors, so they could go tell the king’s household and therefore alert all the people to the miracle of food.

Of course as I sat in the middle of my living room sorting through piles of clothes, I thought of the leper’s words and knew what to do. I got busy and text messaged some fellow ministry-friends, who have daughters the same age, and found out their specific size and needs.  Then that night Jeff and I sorted all the clothes into piles for each of us based on size and preference.  Something so simple as hand-me-down clothes made me cry, because I knew God was showing me what He wants for his people, the people of America, who have so much.  We must be faithful distributors.

I realized that we, I, still have a such a spirit of entitlement. Even though Isay everything belongs to God, I still somehow think that MY income, MY stuff, MY house first and foremost belongs to me. When I receive something, whether it’s a gift or a regular paycheck, I automatically assume that God wants me to have it all (except maybe 10%, right?).   But what if God gave us a large income so that we might bless those in need, sponsor children, fund business ventures in developing countries, the list goes on.  What if He only wanted us to keep half?  I think it might be possible for us to tithe our whole lives without ever really asking God if the other 90% was ours in the first place! He might have intended it for someone else!

So as I sat there sorting clothes, it all came into focus.  Having less is so much simpler.  As I took Heidi’s small “keep” pile up to her room, (and yes, she’ll have plenty for one week’s worth of clothes), I was so glad I didn’t have to figure out how to find space for all those other clothes.  It was easy to tuck the new items into her drawer. I didn’t have to get more hangers, didn’t have to stuff things in. A great reminder that less is more.

All it took was a little time and it was SO fun to be able to deliver clothes to the other girls.  And of course they were thrilled. I felt most blessed of all, and now all our daughters have clothes for the winter for free.  And, as I sorted the clothes, I did feel God’s sweet reminder that there were some definite advantages to being a faithful distributor–if we are the faithful distributor, we get to have first-pick of the cutest clothes!  Among other things, Heidi ended up with a polka dot rain jacket,  a puffer jacket with fur lined hood (beyond cute), and a pink sweater dress that fits her perfect. I knew that I didn’t need to feel guilty for Heidi having beautiful cute clothes–God provided them and gave me the privilege of hand-picking what she’d keep.

God bless America–It IS true that we in America are blessed.  We are blessed with the fun and honor of being faithful distributors. We get to receive so much abundance from God, and then we get the FUN and THRILL of picking where to give all the extra (and there’s so much extra!). We get to sort and delight in giving–we get the fun of seeing those joyful faces as we give out God’s resources. And…sometimes we even get to pick the cutest pink rain-jacket for ourselves.  🙂

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(As I reread this I’m convicted all over again about how much stuff the kids have accumulated just since writing this post! Time to sort and give some away!)

How can you be a faithful distributer today? Thanks for reading.

• Waking up Easter morning to find fresh cut white tulips and a note from my man.
• A resurrected day.
• An amazing Saturday of sunshine! “Feels like” 73 degrees!
• Morning spent down at the river, throwing rocks, “fishing” for salmon, catching sharks.
• Afternoon spent on lounge chair in the sun, reading. Bliss!
• Long walk, alone with my man. No stroller. Praying God graces us with enough years to live empty-nested together. Love my children but oh, I love that man.
• Holding hands.
• Winco prices.
• Triple-layer chocolate cake (Easter is for celebrating!).
• My Little Ponies.
• Encouragement from a friend.
• Women’s Ministry Team. Love those ladies.
• Community Group friends.
• A friend who understands–really.
• Structure.
• Surprise baby shower.
• Banana cake.
• Reading through past year’s posts–God is so faithful!
• Planting seeds with Heidi. Dig, water, wait for the miracle.
• Watching kids rake and dig and til the ground, busy workerbees.
• Leftovers.
• Shampooing carpets.
• Long talks with my man.
• Reminiscing about Dutch’s Boudreaux’s incident.
• Debra’s coffee.
• Pulling weeds.
• Newly designed couch-fort. Better than ever.
• Strawberries and fresh pineapple.
• White tulips fanning out in every direction.
• Potted tulips outside making “S” shape to always lean toward sun. Amazing.
• Garbage service. Also amazing.
• Staying light longer!
• Getting light earlier!
• Sharing embarrassing moments. Really embarrassing moments. Laughing til we cried.
• Nine beautiful ladies at morning prayer. Love that time!
• All living things leaning toward the Light.
• My sick boy falling sleep on my chest–deciding it was a perfect afternoon to kiss his cheeks and smell his breath and read a book with my one free arm.
• Sick kids actually means super-productive day for Mommy as they camp on couch with books and movie. Feel bad for them but it’s a nice change of pace!
• Morning walk by myself.
• Aspirations for getting back in an exercise routine. I think the ankle I injured almost six months ago is probably more than healed! 🙂
• Anticipations of summer.
• Almond milk.
• Crockpot beans.
• Planting basil.
• The Experts’ Guide to Life at Home, by Samantha Ettus.
• Generous Justice, by Timothy Keller.
• Slowing down. Three nights in a row, home as a family. I could get used to this!
• Good reports.
• Watching Jeff & Heidi together, in the backyard planting vinca. Jeff big shovel in hand, Heidi tiny pink trowel in hand. Heidi watching Daddy, mimicking his every move. Pink boots. Wispy curls blowing across her face.
• My sick boy calling from the couch, “Mommy, I love you.”
• A friend reminding me to keep writing these down, persist in thanksgiving even when my heart can’t seem to keep up.
• Gratefulness by faith.
• Generous Groupon gift to Spicer Brother’s produce.
• God’s creative provision.
• Veneer. A great book.
• Pressing through the blahs, knowing they never last forever.
• Cutting wheat grass with scissors. Eating it like a cow; kids thought I was crazy.
• My steady man.
• Simplicity.
• Sovereignty.

[Just because I can’t get this old gospel song out of my mind. And because He is risen! Because He lives.]

Because He Lives

God sent His son, they called Him Jesus
He came to love, heal, and forgive.
He lived and died to buy my pardon,
An empty grave is there to prove my Savior lives.

Because He lives, I can face tomorrow.
Because He lives, All fear is gone.
Because I know He holds the future,
And life is worth the living just because He lives.

How sweet to hold a newborn baby,
And feel the pride and joy he gives.
But greater still the calm assurance,
This child can face uncertain days because He lives.

Because He lives, I can face tomorrow.
Because He lives, All fear is gone.
Because I know He holds the future,
And life is worth the living just because He lives.

And then one day I’ll cross the river,
I’ll fight life’s final war with pain.
And then as death gives way to victory,
I’ll see the lights of glory and I’ll know He lives.

Because He lives, I can face tomorrow.
Because He lives, All fear is gone!
Because I know He holds the future
And life is worth the living just because He lives!