Category Archives: Sacred Mundane

You’ve often heard me say that in many ways Corvallis still feels like home.  Perhaps because that’s where my romance with Christ really took off, where my walk with Him deepened. Perhaps because that’s where Jeff and I met, married, and worked side-by-side in full-time ministry.  We labored there. Truly labored, for hundreds of college men and women to know Christ more. I feel like my heart is poured out there, on the sidewalks and the streets and the coffee shops. There are little bits of me here and there, memories as strong as if they’d been today.  The old fraternity where Jeff proposed.  The Red Horse coffee shop where I met with every college girl I could get to open a Bible.  There are people there with whom we’ve walked through great tragedies.  We’ve cried together, prayed together, waited together, battled together.  We’ve been on our faces together, desperately seeking God for His kingdom to come.

We drove down Saturday for the bridal shower of…my daughter. Yes, beautiful Sarah Westfall, soon to be Mrs. Ian Nelson.  Almost five years ago she played my daughter in the play Tilly.  That production and the ministry that went with it was probably one of the most impacting and significant things I’ve ever done in my life.  And now, my little daughter is marrying the guy who played my son (her brother)!!  But at the shower I sat in a room filled with girls I’ve watched grow, with women I’ve watched, emulated, gleaned from.  I sat with women whose faith in Christ is so remarkable it’s only something I can dream of.  I sat with the producer of the plays, who I worked with all the years in Corvallis (whose husband just sold our house!).  We spend countless hours praying, planning, crying, blocking, choreographing, picking music…oh my goodness.  So much history.

Then we spent the afternoon with some of our dearest friends, Adam & Grace Poole, and their four boys.  Grace and I were best friends in college, and now Adam and Jeff have become closest friends. They are probably two of the most likeminded guys; Adam challenges Jeff in all ways. They read books together and challenge each other.  A kinship that is so rare and so precious.

Then Saturday night we stayed at our old house (that just sold! We figured it was silly to get a motel when we own a home there!) It was our first home, and we hadn’t stayed there for more than five years.  We brought sleeping bags and camped out on the floor, memories sweeping over me as I lay trying to fall asleep. The night we got the keys, and drove over with paint cans and sparkling cider, painting the walls into the night, sipping cider and dreaming about our life together.  Our first Christmas morning, snuggling by the fire.  The phone call that invited us to move to San Jose. The day we walked away from the house, pulling away in our Uhaul, tears silently slipping down my cheeks as I tried to be brave. 

And this morning we went back to our old church home, Calvary Corvallis.  Though now somewhat foreign, in a new building with many new people, after checking the kids in I walked outside and the familiar voice of Ryan Smith floated through the outdoor amphitheater and carried me back to hundreds of worship times, and carried me forward into the presence of God.  We found our dear friends, Aaron and Candi (the couple who moved to San Jose with us), who had brought a blanket for us to sit on (knowing that we’d forget), and within moments I was there, sitting in the presence of God, lost in Him.  Though the service was nothing special, it was powerful: just Ryan alone on his guitar, Pastor Rob simply preaching the Word chapter by chapter and verse by verse, with more resolute conviction than ever, communion, offering, an invitation to receive Christ (with several people responding!), and the service closing with a baptism for anyone who wanted to come right then, dressed in their clothes, and make a public declaration to follow Jesus.  Of course afterward I felt like we had a hundred people to see, but soon Heidi was hungry and I snuck away to feed her in the car…then saw another dear friend, now a missionary to Indonesia but home on furlough, and she snuck into the car and caught up while I fed Heidi.

And then we left.  Tired, hot, hungry…but full.  So refreshed. So filled and ministered to.  So blessed.  So reminded of our glorious Savior and His amazing love for us.  So reminded of His glory and His kingdom and how He wants to come down and change us.  So aware that everything on earth sings about the glory of God.  As we drove, the kids slept and Jeff and I turned on the worship music and listened to one of my new favorite songs, My Romance by Melissa Wise:

Look at the way the flowers bloom for You
They want to show You their beauty Lord
Running waters dance, You and I romance

Chorus:
Unto You be all the glory.
Unto You be all the glory (repeat)

Bridge:
The angels dance around You
The earth it sings about You
Open up the heavens Lord
Let Your Kingdom come to earth

my praises all surround you
my soul can’t dance without you
open up the heavens Lord
let Your kingdom come to earth

—-

Don’t get me wrong.  Jeff and I are exactly where we want to be and exactly where God has us. You couldn’t pay me enough money in the world to leave the work God is doing, to leave our family at WCC.  I love it. And I love them.  But I’m thankful for little times of refreshing where God takes us away from our usual routine, and gives us a glimpse of His glory. Using people, using scenery, using memories, using music.  The earth sings about Him. He is so glorious. The angels dance around Him. The flowers bloom for Him.  My soul can’t dance without Him.  And my prayer is that God would open up the heavens and let His kingdom come to earth.

Just today a friend told me a fun story, about how she was getting her eight-month-pregnant self out the car and trying to extricate her sleeping toddler from the backseat when a huge bee came buzzing dangerously near them.  As she bent down to get her daughter she prayed, “Please Lord just let that bee just go the other direction!”  As she hefted her daughter out of her carseat and straightened, she looked on the roof of the car. The bee was creeping toward them, stopped, and fell over dead.  What?!  Later she walked back out and sure enough the bee was still dead on the roof of the car.  It seemed that God went a little over the top with His answer to her prayer, perhaps just as a little way, in the midst of some hard times they are going through, to remind her of His extravagent love and watchful care.

Sometimes right now I feel like God is going over the top with us.  I just went back and re-read my posts from this time last week and it appears that this time a year ago was a particularly difficult time.  In fact, in one post I was trying to write out the “good things” that I saw during that difficult season and ended up writing this:

The truth is that I just can’t see it yet.  I’m still too far in the midst of the circumstance to even see it right.  The fact is right now as I sit there trying to think, I can think of ten bad things for every good thing.  It’s been SO hard on our marriage.  We have less money and more debt than ever before.  I feel discouraged and depressed almost all the time, like it takes a supernatural measure of courage to do everday things.  We have no close friends nearby.  We’ve invested a year in a place where it now seems likely we won’t be long term.  We have nowhere to live. We have no job.  There are a million three-generation-household-living dynamics that are driving me insane (and I know we drive my parents crazy!).  And the worst is that this was my choice, and I should be thankful, I know that, but I’m not. I’m miserable, and every time I think of one thing to be thankful for, there are five things that bombard my mind that are depressing. So, sorry to get so real and raw with you, but what this has taught me is that I don’t think I’m going to see this one very clearly until later. Time will have to tell what those “good things” are.

It is later now.  Even as I read that I shake my head with my eyes full of tears because that was exactly right, time would tell what good things God was working.  He strengthened us, refined us, deepened us.  That same week we visited WCC for the first time.  Little did we know…

And now, a year later, I feel like God is having this fun game, going over the top in showing me how much He loves to bless us.  These are perhaps “small things”–but every single little kiss takes me back to a year ago and reminds me that all along, God had sweet, rich blessings in store.

For one, I cannot put it any other way but that our new home is BEAUTIFUL. I had no idea.  When they told us about it, it was hard to picture, and we knew we were getting the “budget” version of it and so didn’t have high expectations.  Oh I was so wrong.  We got to sneak through the other day and it is 100 times more beautiful that I’d ever imagined.  Little ridiculous things like the garage doors are my favorite style. Who cares about garage doors?! I guess I do, and perhaps God does because His ridiculous daughter does. 🙂

Secondly, because of a dispute with the CC&R’s (long story–our house is technically not up to the CC&R code because it’s smaller than the rest of the houses in the neighborhoo), our builder, DR Horton, has to upgrade the exterior of our house to the highest level of stonework at no cost to us.  That’s an upgrade that’s worth thousands.  Plus, there’s a good chance that they will also (because of this same dispute) be leaving the lot that is next to ours (a corner) vacant so that the subdivision isn’t overcrowded.  Um, greenspace next to us instead of another house? Yes please!!  And we had no idea. In fact I find it funny because all along we felt like this was THE lot we were supposed to buy. Even though the houseplan wasn’t exactly my favorite we felt like the lot was what we were supposed to have. Now of course I think the house is gorgeous, and I’m shaking my head at God’s over-the-top-ness.

Third, a week before our Corvallis house sold I found out that a professional home-stager (stages high-end luxury homes for sale) was going out of business and allowing the church to buy her high-end decor items at ridiculous deals on July 26th.  At the time I was committed to not getting anything for the house because our house hadn’t sold and we were still firm that we wouldn’t go forward with the new house unless our Corvallis house sold.  Well, as you know–it did, just a week before.  In fact, two days after our house sold Jeff preached at church and she was so touched by the sermon that she met with him afterwards.   While they talked she found out about our house story and so allowed me to go beforehand, all by myself, and shop her 4,500 square foot warehouse and get incredible deals on rugs, towels, decor, candles, even a model ship for Dutch’s room, all for a song.  As I walked through her warehouse, filled with beautiful home items, all by myself, my eyes filled with tears.  My heavenly Father was throwing me a shower. He was lavishly pouring out his love on me, giving me a private shopping party for the house He had provided.  I never in a million years could have forseen any of that.  And yet He did. He knew all along how He would go over the top to show me His love.

Then yesterday we found out that the inspection is done on our Corvallis house and they want nothing repaired.  What?!  Again, that is amazing.  That means we can basically walk away, close September first, and be done.  Jeff and I were just shaking our heads in amazement. Really, God?  Then also yesterday, as I was being my ridiculous coupon-clipper self and buying cheap toilet paper at Target, I found these storage baskets that were exactly what I was looking for.  I’ve been searching high and low for some pretty square storage baskets, with lids, so that we can keep the kids toys contained in the living room without it looking like we live in toys-r-us.  Well Target had these two beautiful, perfect-sized baskets on clearance marked down from $60 each down to $30 each.  I didn’t feel comfortable buying them without talking to Jeff so I went home.  But today Jeff said, “Go get them! That’s perfect and it’s a great deal!”  I still hestitated. I know, I’m ridiculous, but it’s hard for me to spend money on new stuff like that.  So this morning I prayed and asked God if He wanted me to spend His money on them.  And I felt like I should go, but as I drove away I told God, “I don’t know if I’m doing the right thing, I’m just doing my best, so please show me if this is how you want me to spend your money.”  I decided to first check at Goodwill to see if there was a better deal.  Nothing there, so I went on to Target, found two baskets the perfect shade and went to check out.  To my amazement when she rang them up they were 1/2 off even THAT price, so they were only $15 each!  I shook my head and laughed to myself as I gave her my card.  Even baskets, God? You even care about baskets?  I don’t know that God cares about baskets, but apparently He cares about me. 🙂

This is the God we serve.  I deserve none of this, and I know there will be (and are right now in other areas) difficult things that arise.  There will be seasons of joy and seasons of sorrow.  But for right now, I just have to tell of how my God is extravagant.   He showed us on the cross, and He’s showing me through seemingly insignificant things like baskets and garage doors.   My God is over the top.  He’s crazy in love with us.  Let’s give this extravagant God the best of our love in return.

The other day Jeff came home and said, “Guess what I found? Hagar!”  He had somehow misplaced the CD from the women’s spring luncheon, a lesson from the life of Hagar.  A few people had asked me to post the audio, and I obviously have not since it was nowhere to be found.  So although it’s now almost three months later, and I’m pretty sure it wasn’t anything spectacular, here it is.  Maybe it will bless you.

[podcast]http://www.detheos.com/media/mp3/Hagar-kari-patterson.mp3[/podcast]

And, best of all…

“It is not only prayer that gives God glory but work.  Smiting on an anvil, sawing a beam, white-washing a wall, driving horses, sweeping, scouring, everything Gives God some glory if being in His grace you do it as your duty.  To go to communion worthily gives God great glory, but to take food in thankfulness  and temperance  gives Him glory too.  To lift up the hands in prayer gives God glory, but a man with a dungfork in his hand, a woman with a slop pail,  give Him glory too.  God is so great that all things give Him glory if you mean that they should.”  St. Ignatius Loyala, p. 70

Amen and amen!

[On our aversion to mundane repetition] “The paradox may be unraveled, I think, if we remember that when human beings try to “do everything at once and for all and be through with it,” we court acedia, self-destruction, and death.  Such power is reserved for God, who alone can turn what is “already done” into something that is ongoing and ever present.” p. 42

[on lofty religious language] “…language as this, lovely and resonant as it is, can cushion the radical nature of our intimacy with God and make Christian discipleship sound far too easy. What seems terribly spiritual, holy and mysterious can lull us into an unholy complacency, and lead us away from probing the areas of our lives that need the most attention if we are to be faithful to God and to each other…such religious language requires us to be vigilant and to guard against spiritual vainglory, against anything that would allow us to dis-incarnate our faith and escape into the ether of gnosticism.”p. 52-53

“I sense that striving for wholeness is, increasingly, a countercultural goal, as fragmented people make for better consumers…things exercise a certain tyrrany over us…I recall St. Teresa of Avila’s wonderful prayer of praise, ‘Thank you, God for the things I do not own.'” p. 35

“Our culture’s ideal self, especially the accomplished professional self, rises above necessity, the humble, everyday, ordinary tasks that are best left to unskilled labor. The comfortable lies we tell ourselves regarding these “little things”–that they don’t matter and that daily, personal, and household chores are of no significance to us spiritually–are exposed as faleshoods when we consider that reluctance to care for the body is one of the first symptoms of extreme melancholy.” p. 40

[On doing dishes] “It is precisely these thankless, boring, repetitive tasks that are hardest for the workaholic or utilitarian mind to appreciate, and God knows that being rendered temporarily mindless as we toil is what allows us to approach the temple of holy leisure.  When confronting a sinkful of dirty dishes…I generally lose sight of the fact that God is inviting me to play.”  p. 27

“And it was in the play of writing a poem that I first became aware that the demands of laundry might have something to do with God’s command that we worship, that we sing praise on a regular basis.  Both laundry and worship are repetitive activities with a potential for tedium, and I hate to admit it, but laundry often seems the more useful of the two.  But both are work that God has given us to do.”  p. 29

For those of you who might wonder if and when my proposed book, The Sacredness of the Mundane will actually be written (I am included in this group), today I came across a quote that perfectly articulates how I feel:

[speaking of the writing process] “And it always seems that just when daily life seems most unbearable, stretching out before me like a prison sentence, when I seem most dead inside, reduced to mindlessness, bitter tears or both, that what is inmost breaks forth, and I realize that what had seemed “dead time” was actually a period of gestation.”

I am gestating.  What I mean is, I am living.  I am living the sacredness of the mundane, learning, aching, crying, laughing,  growing.  I am finally creating significant margin in my life and able to soak in the Word and prayer.  I’m running and musing and walking and worshipping.  And, quite honestly, I’m hurting.  Jeff and I are talking through some things that have been brewing for some time, things that must be worked through (not with each other just personal things in general).  And, I am beginning to see that first this idea, this vision, is much larger than writing it all down in book form. In fact, I don’t know that I have the writing talent to even compile my ideas into a book that will make its way past my family and faithful blog-followers. But that’s not the point.  The point is that God has asked me to make my life be all about enabling women (and men, Lord willing!)to live out the sacredness of the mundane.

This began to make sense more as recently sat in a women’s ministry meeting.  Joy and I have recently begun to fulfill a leadership role for the women of our church, and as I articulated my heart for women’s ministry–this vision was what flowed out of my mouth.  I hadn’t even planned on sharing it, but I soon realized that if you poke me hard enough I will bleed The Sacredness of the Mundane.  My heart beats, It all matters, it all matters, it all matters.  Upon hearing my heart for this topic, a friend suggested I read a short book entitled The Quotidian Mysteries.  Wow.  It has broken the water and I feel like so much of what was gestating is finally being birthed in my heart and mind.  Of course I’m including the disclaimer that the book certainly isn’t gospel-truth in every regard. But it certainly spoke to my soul. I’m simply including some quotes, mostly so I don’t forget them!  And, so you can savor them rather than scarfing them down like fast-food, I’ll only include a few each day:

“As a human being, Jesus Christ was as subject to the daily as any of us. And I see both the miracle of manna and the incarnation of Jesus Christ as scandals.  They suggest that God is intimately concerned with our very bodies and their needs, and I doubt that this is really what we want to hear. Our bodies fail us, they grow old, flabby and feeble, and eventually they lead us to the cross. How tempting it is to disdain what God has created, and to retreat into comfortable gnosticism…[Christianity] views he human body as our God-given means to salvation, for beyond the cross God has effected resurrection.”  p. 11-12

[On creating spiritual disciplines of prayer, study of the Word, meditation,worship]:  “Workaholism is the opposite of humility…I know from bitter experience that when I allow busy little things to fill the precious time of early morning, when contemplation might flourish, I open the doors to the demon of acedia (spiritual torpor).  Noon becomes a blur–no time, no time–the wolfing down of a sandwich as I listen to the morning’s phone messages and plan the afternoon’s errands.  When evening comes I am so exhausted that vespers (evening prayer) becomes impossible. It is as if I have taken the world’s weight on my shoulders and am too greedy, and too foolish, to surrender it to God.” p. 25

Do I look happier?  A little more rested perhaps?  Can you tell my son had 12 hours of uninterrupted nighttime sleep last night?

I’ve discovered the secret to my naptime/bedtime woes: a child-safety doorknob lock.  Now before you shake your head at me and think I’ve gone all soft on discipline, let me just say I really tried to hold out. I didn’t believe in getting one of the door-things because I wanted Dutch to exercise self-control.  We never bought the cabinet locks, and I still think that it’s better to train the behavior rather than change the environment.

However, after a week of this ridiculous, time-consuming, frustrating naptime and bedtime ritual, I started to wonder if maybe this was a bit silly.  Dutch wasn’t getting any sleep so he was extra cranky. We weren’t getting sleep so we were extra cranky.  Not a good combo.  We just weren’t getting anywhere.  Then I mentioned to Jeff, “You know we could just get one of those child-safety doorknob locks.”  It was classic. Jeff looks at me as if I’ve been keeping the biggest secret in the world. It was right out of Dumb and Dumber when Lloyd says to Harry, “You want this extra pair of gloves I have on? My hands are getting a little sweaty.”  A doorknob lock!  Who knew?

Well, I knew.  So with the hearty approval of my husband, we drove to Target last night with Heidi and the Monkey in tow. I have to admit I felt a little guilty when we had this conversation: “Dutch, you want to go on a fun adventure tonight?!”  “Yeah!” he shouts delighted and runs to the door.  And then even guiltier when we were walking through the store, picked out the lock, and Dutch’s eyes lit up because he thought it was a toy for him.  We didn’t lie. It was for him.  And it’s kind of a toy in a funny sort of way.  So all the drive home he played with his new “toy” in the backseat, sweet naive boy–like giving a man handcuffs to play with.

Now before you think me completely cruel, please finish reading. This was for his good!  We put the lock on, did our bedtime routine, read books, snuggled, prayed, then left the room as usual.  Then waited.  Sure enough, 30 seconds later we hear the click of him trying to get out.  And then, as he realized what had happened, he went ballistic and started crying. My heart broke. “Mommmmmmmmmmmmyyyyyyyy!  Mommmmmmmmmmyyyyyyy!”  After a couple minutes I couldn’t take it so Jeff said he’d take care of and I left and went running.  Jeff happily reported that 2 or 3 minutes later, Dutch gave up and went right to sleep.

This morning, when we went in at 8am to get him up, he jumped out of bed with a huge smile on his face and exclaimed, “I happy!”  Oh, dear boy, not as happy as me…

I suspect that after a few weeks, we won’t even need the safety lock anymore. In fact a friend of mine just told me she used one for a few weeks and then took it off and hasn’t needed it since.  The habit is learned.  I guess sometimes we just need a little intervention.

And not to overspiritualize everything (although we could never overspiritualize, in my opinion), I think the lesson is well taken.  Don’t we all sometimes, when struggling with an issue in our lives, need some external internvention to help us walk a path of righteousness?  Yes, only God can change us from the inside, but that certainly doesn’t mean we shouldn’t use every means possible to help us live the most godly lives possible.  If your eye causes you to sin, cut it out!  I think of the scene where Kirk Cameron takes a sledgehammer to his computer in Fireproof.  When we’re weak, we’re WISE to use whatever means possible to help us flee sin.  And, Lord, willing, as we grow and mature we’ll no longer need those external interventions.

Back in college and before I got married I used to struggle with food.  I was first too skinny then not so skinny.  My freshman year I weighed 105 lbs. and when I got married I weighed 142 lbs.  Now I’m a happy 125 and seem to bounce back to that no matter what–just my natural weight.  But as I worked through that difficult season I had to set up external boundaries to keep myself in check. Not weighing myself too often, not keeping certain foods in the house, having an accountability partner.   It feels kind of embarrassing to admit now, because that season is so long gone.  By God’s grace now food just seems like necessary fuel to help me keep up with chasing my son around, or a way to bring people together for fellowship, or a sweet treat in the midst of a mundane day.  I don’t even weigh myself anymore, and I enjoy exercise for fun and to be healthy and because it makes me feel good and relieves stress, not because I’m obsessing over my weight.  I’m free now, but I wasn’t always. And in the beginning, I had to have those external interventions to help me get on the right track.  I’m certainly not perfect in this area, but I do believe that God blessed my wholehearted efforts to honor Him with my body.  Whatever area of struggle we have, it’s worth the drive to Target for the child-safety lock in our lives.

So, I hope that someday my son has the freedom to stay in his room when he’s supposed to, without a silly door-lock. But for today, we’ll use the lock, and enjoy the freedom…and the sleep.

*NOTE: After I wrote this I was thinking that it might sound like I’m implying that anyone struggling with their weight is not honoring God with their body…Not true! I know many people who are WAY more careful and diligent in their diet and exercise than I and just still battle.  I know it’s not that simple. Just using that as an illustration from my own life. Hope that makes sense…