parenting | Elaine Olsen

Unseen Glances

May 23, 2008

“Therefore we do not lose heart. Though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day. For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all. So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal.” (2 Cor. 4:16-18).

She captures my thoughts today. My Amelia Jane.

I probably don’t have to tell you why. A tragic ending to a fragile young life has made the national headlines, stunning the Christian community and forcing a family to deal with the unexpected and unwelcomed intruder named death.

Maria Sue Chapman, five-year-old daughter of singer/songwriter Steven and Mary Beth Chapman, has left the arms of her earthly parents to make her entrance into the arms of her heavenly Father. A life gone too soon. Five years of loving a child is simply not enough. It is a grief that struggles to reconcile fact with faith. A hard reckoning in my opinion, but one that becomes necessary for all who walk its candid and cold embrace.

My mind and my heart cannot frame it. It strikes a chord within me, as it has with so many of you. Death does that. It strikes. It resounds. It penetrates the silence with the deafening chorus of a truth better left unsung, or so we think. It is a truth that follows our entrance into this world. A truth that will mark our exit from it. A truth that simply and poetically scripts …

We were born to die.

From the moment we first breathed the air of our temporal, we began our journey home to our eternal. It is the way of things. Always has been. We shouldn’t be surprised by death’s arrival; still and yet, it almost always strikes an unexpected chord with a precision that leaves us to grapple with its certainty.

And unless the Lord returns in our lifetime, death will be our required portion.

The Apostle Paul asks us to keep our focus in times of trouble. To understand that our temporary afflictions are achieving, accomplishing, and producing an eternal glory that far exceeds are pain. To perceive the unseen and to believe that the unseen surpasses our current fracture. To keep heart, even though our hearts shatter and scatter with the winds of adversity that howl loudly and break hard.

Good truth.

A difficult striving.

For in our flesh, death always limits perspective. Our flesh cries out for the temporary…for the immediate…for the right now. A tomorrow’s work will have to wait because today’s tears are all that can be absorbed.

How can anyone begin to walk in an understanding that limits the “current” to seemingly nothing more than a monument to learning…to becoming…to moving on to a yet to be grasped perfection? How can death be parametered into a pill that swallows smoothly? What do we do with a grief whose bite seems lethal and whose gnaw continually chews? How do we fix our eyes on anything but the casket that currently cradles our sorrow?

How indeed?

Paul doesn’t ask us to turn away from a casket’s gaze. He doesn’t ask us to quickly get over our grief and move beyond. Instead, he simply and poetically asks us to gaze deeper into death’s frame. His thoughts are not callous or removed…a script meant for a stage some 2000 years ago. No, Paul’s words are exactly the words of comfort we need in times of sorrow because a human life is more than flesh and blood. Our fragile frames embody both the seen and the unseen…the temporal and the eternal.

God has created us in his image (Genesis 1:26-27) and set eternity into the hearts of all people (Ecclesiastes 3:11). This sets us apart from all of his other created works. So when Paul asks us to fix our eyes on the unseen and the eternal in times of momentary affliction, he gives us permission to mourn our loss. So does our Creator, for with our tears we acknowledge a human life for what it is.

A created flesh covering an eternal pulse. The seen cloaking the unseen. The momentary shrouding the never-ending.

This is why our grief is real.

This is why we can say good-bye to “things” with little fret, but when it comes to people, our fret is palpable and deep.

This is why we can find hope, even in the midst of a tremendous grief (1 Thessalonians 4:13-18).

For when death visits a life, perfection finds its home. The unseen begins when the seen embraces its end. The eternal breathes its fullest when the momentary breathes its last. The glory finds its brilliance when the temporary finds its dull. The heavens chorus its applause when the earth silences its song.

And while it’s true…we were born to die…the greater and final truth is this.

We die so that we can fully live.

Eternally. Without restraints. Without affliction. Without sorrow. Without endings. Without good-byes.

This is the perspective I need today as I live and breathe the truth of a family’s grief. Maria Sue has found her life, even as her fragile frame has found its death. It is the same for each one of us as we draw ever nearer to tasting a similar portion.

Let us not shrink back from dealing with our grief. Let us not hide from its bitter taste. Instead, let us bravely acknowledge the hope that pulses beyond every death. Let us fix our eyes on the Creator who created each person to breathe an earthly life’s span and then to breathe an eternal life forever.

He is where I’m headed, friends. And should we never meet face to face on this side of forever, I will meet you there where we will share in our Father’s happiness for always.

In the name of the Father and of the Son and of his comforting and abiding Holy Spirit, I ask and pray and believe all these things in my heart. How I pray you believe them too.

Amen.

Peace for the Journey

May 20, 2008

“On the evening of that first day of the week, when the disciples were together with the doors locked for fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood among them and said, ‘Peace be with you.’” (John 20:19).

For the past decade or so, I’ve been closing my letters and cards with the phrase, Peace for the Journey. I’m not sure as to the reason behind its beginning, but I think it had something to do with the fact that my journey, in that season of living, hosted a fragmented peace. It still does. Little pieces of peace here and there, but rarely my constant.

My life, I like to say, is a blessed chaos. Calm is not my norm. My externals preclude it, while my internal recoils with its dressing. Not because I don’t crave it. I do. But when peace arrives upon the soil of my heart, it is an unfamiliar seeding, and what is unfamiliar is sometimes a difficult sowing.

Peace that falls on thorns and rocks and hard…

Never remains.

Peace that falls on good…

Grows. Flourishes. Embeds and transforms.

Peace. Eirene in the Greek. To understand its depth, I look to its contrast. For with its contrast, I find my familiar. Multiple words in the Greek which mean…

War. Fight. Conflict. Narrowness of room. Anguish. Distress. Restrained anxiety. Fear. Distraction. Disturbance. Confusion. Tumult. Uproar. Split. Division. Schism. Strife.[i]

Indeed, these are the seeds of my “often” when my often is rocked at unsuspecting times by unsuspecting offenders. Rather than rooting my response in the truth and peace of Jesus Christ, I default to a worldly response that is rooted in my need for self-preservation and protection. I find my retreat, adorning it with the locks and doors of an intentional fortification that leaves little room for peace’s penetration.

God never intended for me to live this way. His intention breathes a far more sacred existence. He intends for me to find my preservation in him, no matter the rhythm that rocks my often.

That rocks my now.

Recently, we have learned that my young son processes life through a different set of lenses. Not broken ones, but ones that require an alternate approach to learning. This is unfamiliar territory for me as a mother, and if there is one rhythm that will always rock my world, it is the one that involves the welfare of my children. I would rather not walk this road. Still and yet, it is road that I have been allowed. No amount of wishing and hoping and yes, even praying, is going to change the diagnosis he now wears.

What can change, and in fact is guaranteed to change through the power of prayer, is my response to this rocking. I need some peace. A penetrating through doors kind of peace that meets me at the point of my fear and confusion and disturbance and distraction. A sowing peace that embeds and transforms my perspective in the matter. An upper room peace where Peace enlarges the narrow and silences my uproar with the whispers of his calming grace.

I need a John 20:19, Jesus intervention, for like the disciples, I have cloistered the unknowns about my future behind a locked door. I know that my Savior is alive. I have tasted the truth of his resurrection. I have witnessed the empty tomb, and still I run to my hiddenness. Why? Because with the hiding comes a season of postponement. Denial. A delayed dealing with the truth that confronts my familiar, and the truth is…

Some seeds aren’t welcome in my soil.

The greater truth is…

My Father understands my struggle and offers his hands for the tilling.

He mediates his way through the door’s wood to find me in my brokenness. He doesn’t wait for my emergence into goodness. Instead, he enters into my chaos and puts his scarred hands to the gentle plowing that readies my soil for the receiving. My rocks and thorns and hard aren’t enough to keep him from what he came to do.

And what Christ came to do…comes to do…is to be my Peace. To be yours also. To remind us that we walk this journey with company. That his yoke is easy. That his burden is light and that our hearts were never meant to shoulder such heaviness.

God’s peace is the thread that anchors our hearts to his. Jesus Christ is that Peace (Ephesians 2:14). On any given day, behind any shut door, our lives our knitted to our Maker. Our hearts cannot know chaos without it pulling on the heartstrings of our Father, for our Peace sits at the right hand of our Father, interceding on our behalf (Romans 8:26-27; Hebrews 7:25). We in turn, can know the full measure of God’s peace because Peace lives within us (Galatians 2:20).

Jesus Christ is the sacred connection between Creator and created. Between heaven and earth. Between life and death. Between our “often” and our next. Between Chapter One and Chapter Forever. And his offering to us for the pages written in our now? Well, it sounds something like the one thing that I have been after for over a decade.

Peace for the Journey.

Thus, I will continue to write it as an offering from my heart to yours until it arrives upon the soil of our chaos and sows its calm within our souls. And so I pray…

Seed my heart with your peace, Father. Find your way through my shut door and speak your calm within my confusion. I’m conflicted, Lord, about a great many things. My distress is apparent and my anxiety is barely restrained. You, alone, can shoulder my need. Let me not refrain from offering it to you. Thank you for your abiding presence that walks this journey with me and that scripts a lasting peace into every step. Embed this truth as my constant…for now and for always. Amen.

[i] Spiros Zodhiates, “eirene,” The Complete Word Study Dictionary (Chattanooga: AMG Publishers, 1992), 520.

Copyright © May 2008 – Elaine Olsen. All rights reserved.

The Pain of a Shut Door

April 14, 2008

“He went to Nazareth, where he had been brought up, and on the Sabbath day he went into the synagogue, as was his custom. And he stood up to read.” (Luke 4:16).

Her wail was undeniable. The piercing scream reverberated from the second floor, and I knew that my baby girl was in pain. My mother’s instinct also revealed the probable culprit behind her pain. Her brother.

Quickly, they made their way downstairs to offer their explanations. She howled inaudible utterances, while he echoed his apologies…fearing the worst. She was quick to offer up proof of his misdeeds—a tender, red, right-handed thumbnail, which apparently landed itself in the wrong place at the wrong time.

The crease of the bathroom doorway.

She wanted in. Her brother wanted her out, and in the brevity of a single moment, Amelia felt the wounding of her brother’s intentional exclusion. She experienced the pain of a shut door.

He didn’t mean to hurt her, but he didn’t deny his culpability in the matter. He meant to shut the door. He simply did not calculate that his means of exclusion would cause a wounding at a deeper level. And therein lies my contemplation.

The pain of a shut door. The taste of exclusion served up on home turf…a place where security and safety should abound. Where doors should remain open and acceptance greets with arms spread wide. A place, unfortunately, that often hosts doors that swing hard and close tightly.

Jesus knew about such exclusions. And unlike my son, those that wanted him “out”, swung with intentional and calculated motives.

Jesus had returned to his familiar. To the place of his nurturing. Nazareth was his home, and the synagogue was his custom. He came to reveal the truth of his identity. To fulfill the prophetic renderings of Isaiah’s sixty-first chapter. To preach, to proclaim, to restore, and to release. To announce to those who knew him best, that indeed, the year of the Lord’s favor had come.

It was a truth they were unwilling to receive. Their eyes were as blind. Their ears were as deaf. Their minds were as dull, and their hearts were as hardened.

“All the people in the synagogue were furious when the heard this. They got up, drove him out of the town, and took him to the brow of the hill on which they town was built, in order to throw him down the cliff. But he walked through the crowd and went on his way.” (Luke 4:28-30).

They shut the door on their native son. They closed off the possibility of him being God’s Son. And in the end, Jesus’ wail was undeniable, as his tears wept a painful rejection. It was a rejection felt at the deepest crease of a sacred surrender which landed him in the right place at exactly the right time. They offered no apologies for their intentions. Instead, they offered him nails for his tender flesh, and the misdeeds of their heart wounded red for all the world to witness.

The pain of a shut door.

Indeed, Jesus is familiar with all of our griefs and sufferings. With all of the “shut doors” that slam hard and wound deeply. Some swing with intention. Some swing with little thought. Some swing on home turf, and some swing on the soil of an unfamiliar earth. Regardless of their hinge, they swing, and with their exclusion comes pain.

Jadon did not mean to hurt his sister. Not really. But he knew that by shutting the door, he would maintain control of his surroundings. And when control becomes an issue, almost invariably there is a wounding of another who is caught within its crease.

I have stood on both sides of a shut door. Receiving its pain. Initiating its pain. Either way, there is no kingdom profit from its closure because a shut door equals exclusion. Shut doors separate. Shut doors isolate. Shut doors eliminate the possibility of relationships that were meant for our shaping…for our deepening…for our understanding of what it means to walk and to live in sacred community.

God has determined for us to live our lives as open. As instruments of his intention and his invitation. His door swings wide and was never designed for exclusion, but rather for the inclusion of all peoples…all races…all humanity for all eternity. We are given the privilege of monitoring its swing. We stand as its hinge to make sure that no one is caught in the painful crease of its closure.

When my daughter brought her wounding to my attention, I did what all good mothers do. I offered her a band-aid. She declined and told me that her “blankie” would suffice as her comfort. It did, and today her tears run dry. Her wounding from her brother’s “shut door” is well on its way to healing.

Oh, that all of us could recover so quickly from the pain of a shut door. Band-aids alone are not sufficient. It requires a deeper work. A greater salve. A warmer blanket that covers the entirety of our wound and speaks peace into our suffering.

It requires Jesus. He is our Peace, and through him we come to know healing as healing was meant to be known. Safely, securely, and with an open acceptance on his home turf that greets our pain with arms wide open. And so this day, I pray…

Cover me, Lord, with the healing blanket of your love. Heal the open wounds that have come to me through shut doors. Heal the wounds of others that have come to them through my culpability. Keep my hands to inclusion…never exclusion. And when I am tempted to shut a door on my brother or sister, remind me of the “exclusion” that you embraced so that a door would be opened for all of us to come and walk in salvation’s freedom. Amen.

A Cradled Surrender

April 5, 2008

“I declare to you, brothers, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, nor does the perishable inherit the imperishable. … When the perishable has been clothed with the imperishable, and the mortal with immortality, then the saying that is written will come true: ‘Death has been swallowed up in victory.’ ‘Where, O death, is your victory? Where, O death, is your sting?’” (1 Corinthians 15:50, 54-55).
Momma, does it hurt to die?

Yes, baby, I think it probably does.

Why?

Because anytime something in us dies, we hurt.

Why do we have to die?

Because our flesh is the one thing that is keeping us from living with God, face to face.

But I don’t want to die, mommy. I don’t want to hurt.

I know baby. I know. But you will grow in your understanding, and one day your tears won’t taste so sad…

I cradled her in my arms as tears enveloped her tender cheeks. I understand her question. It is one that caught my attention when I was her age. It has kept me wondering ever since.

We are having a lot of these discussions lately. Heart talks. Talks about the indwelling presence of God within our flesh. It has taken on greater meaning for my five-year-old daughter because two weeks ago, she asked Jesus into her heart. On Good Friday. A perfect day for such a sacred embrace.

We knelt beside my bed where she offered her Creator the greatest summons of her heart. An invitation for him to come and to take up residency within her fragile frame. A decision that will profoundly affect the rest of her days.

Some would say that she is too young…too limited in her understanding to make such an important decision. I would say that her tender youth is the perfect beginning for her understanding of all things sacred. Her mind and her heart are fertile soil for her Father’s tilling, and the seeds that are sown in this season, will grow into full bloom in a season yet to come.

I cannot deny my daughter the gift of her salvation…no matter what others might reason. My God is an unreasonable God. An unfathomable, mysterious, yet attainable Savior, made available to all…especially to those whose faith is simple and is not yet overly tainted by carnal perspective.

So when these questions come up…questions about life and death and the surrender that exists between the two, I tell my daughter what I know to be true. Truths like…

This life is but a breath. God has determined her days. (Psalm 39:4-5).

Every step in her journey of faith will be filled with moments of surrender. Times when she will experience the pain of the “letting go” of her flesh so that she can fully live as her Father intended for her to live. (Romans 8:12-18).

Following Christ means embracing the cross, and the cross always requires a difficult obedience. (Matthew 16:24-26).

The sting of death has been swallowed up through the salve of Calvary’s victory. (1 Corinthians 15:50-54).

The One who awaits her on the other side of her surrender will be worth her every tear. (Philippians 3:7-11).

When her time on this earth is over, she will not walk her final steps alone. Her Father will come and usher her feet into her “next.” A “next” prepared for her by the nail-scarred hands of her Groom. (John 14:1-4).

Her tears are meant for this side of eternity, and her Father holds the Kleenex for her final cry of surrender. (Revelation 7:17; 20:4).

Truths like that. Not made up answers to soothe a daughter’s fears, but real truth as contained within God’s Word. And God’s Word is always true and will be the guiding light to grow her in her understanding of the Savior who now abides within her heart.

The truth is…death hurts for all of us. Until we surrender our last bit of flesh to its embrace, we never really live as our Father intends for us to live. And our God means for us to live. Abundantly. Fearlessly. Faithfully, and thoroughly. Within the boundaries of his abiding grace.

When I was my daughter’s age, I, too, began my walk of grace. Over the years, I have grown in my understanding of its mystery. I have needed its depth. Long and wide and high and deep. Indeed, God’s arms of grace have extended beyond the reach of Calvary to embrace me in seasons when my tears of surrender nearly drowned out my resolve for the process.

His arms still reach, and when I come to my moments of a deeper submission—moments of a difficult dying—like my daughter, I bring my tears to my Daddy and ask him this question.

Why do I have to die? Why does it hurt so much to die?

Like I did with my daughter, my Father cradles me in his love and whispers his truth into my painful why’s.

I know child. I know you have questions, and I know you hurt. But you will grow in your understanding of all things sacred, and one day soon, your tears won’t taste so sad.

I don’t want to be sad about my surrenders. I don’t want my daughter to cry about the envisioned pain she is soon to encounter. But I am sad and she does cry, and through our tears our Father’s cradling words are salve enough to soothe our dying aches. For he is well familiar with the dying process. It is what he came to do. To model for us a death’s embrace and to rise victoriously over its hellish sting. He did, and so we can. Thus, I pray…

Father, you have conquered the sting of death, and while I don’t wish for its embrace, I willingly accept its grip because I know that it is bringing me one step closer to complete intimacy with you…heart to heart…face to face. For all of the “deaths” that are required of me in the flesh, they are nothing compared to the surpassing greatness of knowing You. They are life. They are gain. Keep me to my surrendered cross, and keep me to your truth so that I am equipped to lead others to do the same. Especially one little girl who needs to grow in her understanding of all things sacred, and one big girl who needs to follow her lead. Amen.

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A Weary Doing…A Worthy Return

March 28, 2008

“Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up. (Galatians 6:9).

I had to call him. Had to hold down speed dial #7 just so I could hear his voice. A voice I have been listening to for almost nineteen years now. A voice I call son. A first born named Nick.

I did not call him out of worry or out of loneliness for his presence. No, I called him because I needed a reminder. A reminder of the eventual reality that children will, in fact, emerge from their toddled state of neediness to one day embrace upon a walk of independence. It is a walk he has embraced well…with grace and with a level of maturity I never thought possible all those years ago. All those almost 6,935 days ago.

I remember the admonishment of others back then.

Cherish these moments. They’ll be gone before you know it.

Really? I suppose in the broad brushstrokes of a life lived, indeed those years seem minimal. But while we were living them…I felt every one of them. Every sleepless night…every temper tantrum. Every strong willed expression that challenged my mothering patience. Every program. Every load of laundry. Every first day of school. Every soccer and basketball game. Every report card. Every milestone. Every question. Every tear. Every bedside chat. Every joy. Simply…everything.

Nick has been with me for almost half of my life, and in many ways we have grown up alongside one another. There have been good seasons and seasons that have pushed me to the outer edges of my understanding. Through it all, faith has been my guide, and what has emerged is a bond of sacred proportion.

A good harvest at a proper time. A time like today, when I need to know that what I am doing on a daily basis really does matter. That the seeds I am currently sowing will one day bloom into a blossom called adulthood. That the motherhood mantle that boasts my shoulders is, in fact, one of the highest privileges I will ever wear.

And so I called, and I received the verbal confirmation that my faithful sowing and good training has yielded and will one day again, yield a gracious and Godly return.

It is a guiding hope for me, as I continue to shepherd and shape the minds of three others that remain under my roof. I have not always been thankful for the job, but I have always been mindful of the sacred responsibility.

Parenting has been hard for me. I am not certain as to the exact reason why, but I am pretty sure it roots back to my bent toward selfishness. Selfless living has not been my portion. Instead, I am prone to my needs…my wants…my desires. So when routine breaks (like Spring break), and my mothering skills are put to the test, I cry out to God for help. For more of him to come and to replace the more of me. For more of a “First Corinthians Chapter Thirteen” kind of agapao loving that reaches beyond self to put others ahead of self.

I deeply admire those who mirror such a love for others, especially for their children. Who parent with ease and receive its calling as the most treasured one they will ever know. I wonder if they, too, have ever felt the pull between selfish living and selfless loving. I imagine that they have, but somehow they have come to a quicker conclusion in the matter. A conclusion that hosts a peaceful rest, full of a faithful trust for the parenting process.

I want to be that parent. I want to come to some quicker conclusions of trust…of believing that God has shaped me with the sacred capacity for the shaping of my children. That the seeds I am sowing, whether in tears or in joy, will one day reap a harvest of good growth and seasoned maturity.

Perhaps that is why I picked up the phone today and speed dialed #7. He is my kindling hope. What I couldn’t have imagined 6,935 days ago, I now witness in full bloom. Dirty diapers and temper tantrums could not hold him…could not keep him from becoming the man of God I now see emerging. This season…this seeing it all come to pass…is by far the greatest joy I have known as a mother.

So when I get overwhelmed with daily parenting—with spelling lists, and sippy cups, and the ever constant “Mommy…mommy, mommy, mommy,”—I look to my first born and remember that all of my answers to my little ones’ neediness will one day emerge into a season of glorious remembrance and abiding joy. I can cherish these moments now, because I know that there is a greater moment yet to come.

A moment of reaping, when my hard years of parenting yield a harvest of young adult men and one woman who still answer the phone calls from their mother to remind her that all is well. All is good. And that all my weary doing has been worth the return. And so, this day, I pray…

Father, keep me doing. In tears and in joy, keep my feet to the path of sacred parenting. It’s not always been easy, but it’s always been right. It’s been good because you give good gifts, Father. Forgive me when I consider my children anything less than your divine abundance and grace in my life. Seed in me a 1 Corinthians 13 kind of love. Grow me toward a life of selfless loving. And when I am weary in my good doing, bring me to a quicker conclusion of trust…a peaceful rest, that reminds me of the harvest yet to come. Amen.

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OK…time to weigh in with your thoughts. Where have you struggled in your weary doing? What have you learned along the way? Teach me, friends, for my heart and my will is ripe for the learning.

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