Jenny Rollins

I got your letter last night.  I want so badly to sit with you now, hold your hand, look at your face, and hear your heart.  

You used our code word—a word that means no matter what I’ll get you, because you don’t feel safe.  It exists so that when you can’t be honest around others, I’ll still know that something’s wrong. Your letter said you feel anxious, stressed, homesick, and hot. That you’ve thought long and hard and have decided to come home, and that you are certain you won’t change your mind. Your letter tells me you are not in danger; you are unhappy.  

Unhappy, for a parent, is hard.  Because I want with all my heart for you to be happy.  Loving life, joy-filled.  Cozy in your bozy.  But I also recognize that a lot of good can come from hard things, or on the other side of them.  And quitting when things get hard, or uncomfortable, or unfun, especially when it’s new, may have consequences.  Here are some of the possibilities: 

1. The next time something is hard, you might be extra unsure if you can handle it.  You won’t have any experience with overcoming, but you will have experience quitting.  This might make you less confident. 
2. You might miss out on something that was going to be good if you stuck it out.  But at the very least, you’d miss out on knowing you were able to stick it out. 
3. You might have very, very few opportunities in life, very few experiences, very few loves, and very, very little growth, because all these things involve hardship. 
4. You told me you wanted your relationship with the Lord to be deeper, and richer, and more meaningful.  A relationship with God is built by spending time together, talking to Him and listening for His answers.  We do those things most often (sometimes only) from the midst of, because of, what’s hard. Camp is an opportunity to put yourself in a position to grow that relationship; quitting will make that growth less likely.
5. Learning how to cope, how to speak gently to yourself, how to respond to anxiety, how to quiet negative thoughts when you’re trying to sleep, how to lay your heart burdens down—ALL THAT LEARNING—you will put off for another day.  And odds are good, those same skills will only be harder to learn the next time. Why?  Because the size of the stuff grows with you.  Today it’s summer camp, but down the road it will likely be bigger: high school, job stress, your own family to raise, and more.
6. The unknowns will remain unknowns.  You know exactly what coming home looks like: Lucky Charms, taking care of your pets, games with siblings, ice cream, Mom hugs.  Those things are great!  But what if there’s something new to love? A sweet adventure, memory, friend, food, hobby, TREASURE, you’ll only know by trying? 
7. You take yourself out of a place maybe God wanted to use you, because life is as much about others as it is about you.  You right now are a God-gift to Cabin 2.  Where you go, God’s light goes.  In your smile, in your hugs, in your kind words, in your unique wisdom.  When you take YOU out of the world and into your room, the world misses your light.  Can God use another person?  Of course.  But I promise you this: 

NOTHING IN LIFE IS BETTER THAN SHARING YOUR LIGHT FOR GOD’S GLORY TO LOVE OTHERS.  NOTHING. 

Now, don’t misunderstand me.  Some things you have to, should, must QUIT! For example, unhealthy stuff.  Stuff that makes you feel icky (you know the feeling I mean).  We have to be very careful to walk away from people, places, things, situations that are not good for us or right by God.  But that is where God’s Spirit helps us.  He tugs at our hearts and helps us to understand the difference between good and bad, right and wrong, healthy and unhealthy, helpful and harmful. 

I made a decision today, as your Mom, and I pray it was the right one.  I trusted my friend at camp to sit with you and talk with you on my behalf, and I chose not to drive to you today, even though you used our word.  We get to talk together in just a few days, and if after reading all this you use that word again, then baby, I’m coming for you!   

You said in your letter that you’ve tried calming yourself down, and talking to people, and neither work.  And I SO get that!  But try this: 

In your head and heart, tell God all about it.  Let him be your Mom, your Dad, your best friend.  Ask for specific things, things where you will be able to know if He answers.  I know you don’t have your Bible, so with this letter is a chapter for you to read and re-read and memorize and keep close to your heart.  It’s a goody, Philippians 4, one of my faves!  The Bible is one way we pull God close, and give Him a chance to speak to our hearts. 

Now, a story. 

When you were a newborn, only one week old, the doctor thought that maybe you were very, very sick, so we had to take you back to the hospital so they could draw some of your blood.  To do that meant to stick you with a needle and find a blood vessel, but you were SO SMALL, they kept poking you with the needle but not finding a vein.

IT BROKE MY HEART watching you wiggle and scream, so they made me wait me in the hall.  And you know what? I handed you over. Knowing they would hurt you, knowing your little baby heart was crying for me to rescue you, knowing I wouldn’t—at least not yet.  

Why?

Because I knew what you couldn’t possibly: that that fleeting moment—that stinging prick or two or three—was worth it for your long-term health and life and well-being. 

You are no longer a newborn.  You can now listen for the Spirit within you.  You are now old enough to understand with better vision what is for your good.  And again: one more code word, and I’m there. 

Choose wisely, my love.  You are braver than you know.  Stronger than you feel. 

“You are over the edge of the wild now, and in for all sorts of fun wherever you go.”  -J.R.R. Tolkien

Love, 

Mom

 

2023 was a particularly hard year for many of my loved ones.  Start to finish, this past year seemed to hammer relentlessly on their bodies, hearts and minds.  Yes, beauty found its way in too, but it was heavier than most.

Last week my family and I crossed off a bucket-list item by dog sledding along the half-frozen Granite Creek in Bridger-Teton National Forest, outside Jackson Hole.  Its glacier-fed water was a surprisingly deep teal that swirled into solid masses of turquoise and powder blue ice, flanked by silent evergreen trees and snow.  

Peaks rose up on the opposite embankment, the rank and file of the Grant Tetons.  As we mushed past, the mountains stood at attention, decorated in spruce, fir, and pine—forests so dense they turned the ridgeline black against the white winter sky.

Dense, at least, until it wasn’t.  Almost instantly, the thick forest on the far hillside turned to toothpick trunks, trees stripped bare of leaves and life.  There the earth was sick and frail. 

“What happened there?” I asked Monica, our guide and musher.

“There was a fire in 2016,” she answered.  “You can see where they put it out, but we lost over 20,000 acres of trees.”  Confidently, she added, “it’ll come back though.  The trees were lodgepole pine.”  

Every year, the lodgepole pine produces an abundance of the familiar “open” pinecones.  However, because this seedling requires considerable sunshine and almost always falls in the dense shadowy stand among the forest, these seeds rarely grow into mature trees. 

But I learned that the lodgepole pine also makes a second type of pinecone: the “closed” or serotinous cone.  From the Latin serus meaning “late,” serotiny is a botanical term for delay.  For years the tree holds these special cones with their seeds sealed shut inside, covered in a protective-if-uninviting resin, waiting. 

Waiting, it turns out, for fire.  Specifically for a fire that burns at 113-140 degrees, just intense enough to melt the resin encasing the seeds buried deep within its closed cones.  A fire hot enough to strip the canopy bare so sunlight can penetrate the once-dark forest floor where the emergent seeds now lay exposed and hopeful. 

The fire that kills also brings life. 

For centuries, we humans have depended on the lodgepole pine.  Its tall, straight trunk has supported our dwellings (cabins, fences, and firewood), and its thin bark has been used to nourish and to heal us (consumed by Native Americans, fed to horses, and chewed for medicinal benefit). While highly adaptive, the tree is also vulnerable, especially susceptible to the ravages of forest fires.  

But by God’s design, the fire isn’t an end, but a beginning.  According to the Colorado State Forest Service, “the prolific regeneration that naturally occurs in the open, sunny areas left in the fire’s wake often results in dense stands of 20,000 or more trees per acre.”  Built into the forest’s greatest weakness is a hidden strength—an insurance policy for the future, the key to its own long-term health and survival.   

And the same God who manages the pine forests is looking after us.  

I see no point in naming what we’ve lost over the recent years, individually or collectively.  But we’ve not been the same for quite some time.  Maybe it’s the pandemic.  Maybe it’s politics.  Maybe it’s that now I’m a pastor and I’m hearing more about others’ lives: the sacrifices and struggles.  Maybe it’s age.  Whatever it is, I carry grief with me now.  

When I close my eyes and walk the landscape of my heart, I find pockets of it tucked here and there, like smoldering embers of what was.  

But perhaps in these dead spaces are new seeds.  Warm to the touch, still sticky with melted resin, broken open and laid bare, but already on a course to glory set for it long ago.  

Do you observe Lent? If so, what do you hope for during this season?

I want to change so many things.  Things I dislike about family members.  Situations I want to be different at work.  Self-improvements.  Home improvements.  I wrestle with a desperation—an itch to fix things, to tweak or remake things, according to my liking. 

I want to make Lent about that.  In fact just yesterday I started thinking about how I might use Lent to focus on and pray about those things. 

Then I sat with this verse:

”Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is—His good, pleasing and perfect will.” Romans 12:2

Obsessing over, worrying about, and striving after what I want to see change, that is the pattern of this world. In fact, Jesus likened the worries and the obsessions of this world to thorns that choke out our seed of faith. 

Please don’t misunderstand me: praying for and working toward change can be a powerful and righteous act. But I’m guilty of calling it “praying for” when what I’m really doing is complaining about. And I’m guilty of calling it “working toward” when what I’m really doing is nagging and fretting.

I have found that when I obsess or worry, or when I work as though it all depends on me, I feed my illusion of control.  

But Romans says, Do not conform.  Do not put on the fashion of this world: its habit, manner, or lifestyle.  Do not focus on the fleeting things.    

But be transformed.  In an essential way, an eternal way.  Cultivate change within—inside YOU. 

Truth be told, if my wishlist of changes came true, I’d likely just replace them with new ones. So maybe my focus for Lent shouldn’t be everything I want to change out there, but rather a willingness to surrender myself to the changes God wants to make inside me. To my desire for control. To my tendency to worry rather than trust. To my striving toward, rather than submitting to. To my susceptibility to prioritize fixing things over intimacy with God.

A seed is a symbol of transformation. A packet of hope. It is a tiny capsule containing everything required for life.  Inside the seed’s hard outer shell is a tiny plant that already has within it what God intended it to be. But that hard outer layer will not break open until the seed is in a safe place.

Each type of seed requires specific conditions in order for them to germinate and grow.  Some may need a few months of cold. Some may need a wildfire.  Some seeds can sleep for years before waking up.

But when the conditions are right, the seed will swell with water, and the water will crack its shell.  Then it will develop a root, and that root will enable it to grow upward toward the sun. With proper nourishment, it will completely transform into the full and glorious life it was always intended to be. 

Much like the seed, our transformation does not come through our own strength, effort or force of will. Nor does it come by fretting. The word for renewing in Romans 12:2 is the Greek word ἀνακαίνωσις or anakainōsis, and it means “a complete change for the better.” This complete change for the better comes from God when we position ourselves in conditions suitable for growth.  When we allow the living water to infiltrate our tough outer shells.  When we accept that the work to be done begins with us. 

For me this year, Lent is that opportunity. I want to spend the next six weeks submitting to that process in its fullness: in the waiting, in the discomfort, in the unsettling nature of surrender, and in the vulnerability of hope.

I would love for you to join me. Let’s detach our joy from outcomes, and return it to being in God’s presence. Let’s shift our speech from worrying words to whispered prayers. Let’s relax our grip when we feel our hearts tighten around what we most desire, and choose instead to desire most to be like Jesus. And let’s see what grows.

A couple weeks ago, Riverbend hosted a flower-arranging event at the women’s monthly meetup.  I took my teenage daughter, planning to let her put together our box from the gorgeous spring blooms around the room.  She hopped from bucket to bucket of flowers, pulling bundles of hydrangea and stems of bright roses in every color.  She bounced around the room like a bee among the flowers, and she wasn’t alone.  As the buckets emptied, the energy shifted to the tables as all the women turned their attention to arranging.  

After everyone had settled into their seats and started working, a friend asked me, “Would you like to do one of your own? We have plenty of supplies.  Take a box!”  Delighted at the opportunity, I went to see what flowers and greenery still remained. I walked among the mostly empty buckets containing what might charitably be called “the leftovers.” Some had small or wilted blooms, others dull or drooping, a few stems broken to the point that their flowers hung sadly downward like a Charlie Brown Christmas tree.  Much of what remained lacked a bloom altogether but was greenery—“filler”—with a spindly, wild flare.  Thrilled at the chance to participate nonetheless, I happily scooped up what remained and began assembling my box. 

Perhaps because I wasn’t expecting the most colorful, the blooming, the best—I wasn’t expecting anything—I was delighted to find in each choice something beautiful.  I found that crooked or half-broken stems could be stood up next to stronger greenery.  Single blooms that had appeared dull in the bucket now popped brightly when positioned against dark spots in my bouquet. The collective effect of individual blooms that may not have been my first choice, this ragtag band of leftovers, was one of celebrated contrast, of imperfect and wild nature. As I walked out with my personal treasure, a woman stopped me and said, “Of all the different arrangements, I think yours was my favorite.  There’s something really special about it.  It’s art.” As someone who has killed more plants than she has grown, it meant the world.

Lately, I’ve felt tired and burned out; if I’m being honest, I haven’t felt particularly “Christian.” In fact, if someone were to come around and pick out those of us with the best, most Jesus-like attitude, I’d be left in the bucket.  But what I love knowing is that Jesus is the kind of savior who DELIGHTS in finding beauty in the rejects. He walks among the uninvited, the broken, the crooked, and sees the potential in us all. Isaiah 42:3 says,

“He will not crush the weakest reed or put out a flickering candle.  He will bring justice to all who have been wronged.”

When life crushes us, when we feel broken, when our blooms hang limp and dull from our stalks, He doesn’t snap us off and throw us out, or leave us where we lie.  With tender love and care, He takes us in His hands, sees the beauty in our break, and creates art.  Sometimes He leans us against one another, so that one’s strength is the other’s salvation.  Sometimes He sets us against darkness, so that our light might pop against the backdrop.  But it is my prayer that wherever you may be today—full bloom or otherwise—you see your value as He sees it.  Even when the world casts you aside or when your own attitude leaves you feeling unworthy, Jesus deeply loves and pursues you.  You are and have always been His pick, a part of His bouquet, just as you are.

God I’m busy. 

This is a declaration, my first response when someone asks me how I am.  When I ask myself how I am. 

I know I’m not alone.  I’m not the only one falling into bed depleted, exhausted, playing that cruelest of jokes on my heart by asking, “What’s left on the checklist?”, as if it ever ends. 

As if every item isn’t replaced by three.  As if anyone ever finally crosses through Laundry. 

Every day is triage.  What’s hemorrhaging the worst?  A work deadline, a child, something for church, the house?     

I know it’s a season in my life.  The Juggling It All season.  And that one day, I actually will pack for a trip a day or two in advance.  And maintain an herb garden.  And meal prep on weekends.  And keep a clean car that doesn’t smell faintly of sour milk.   

But this afternoon I said my go-to phrase aloud to myself: God, I’m busy.  And I realized this was more than a fact.  Today it was a prayer.  

Tugging at the corner of my mind all day was this thought:

It’s December 1^st. 

The start of elves hiding on shelves.  The start of children opening tiny advent boxes that I’ve filled with treats.  The start of the over-stuffed social calendar, weekends out of town, visits with family, school nativities and piano recitals.  The start of office galas, and fundraisers, and potlucks.  The start of shopping (and more checklists).  And trying to declutter, anticipating all the unwrapping of more stuff.  

From somewhere deep inside—past all that so much MORE vying for my attention—my heart whispered, “Let’s please not miss it.  I love this season.  Can we please not miss it?  I really don’t want to miss Him in it.  I can tell that’s where we’re headed, but, please let’s not.”

It was such a desperate plea.  So childlike and so sincere, that I actually listened to it for a moment.  I took a short break, and I read the first day of an advent devotional.  And it said: 

“ This, this, is the love story that’s been coming for you since the beginning.  

It is possible for you to miss it.  

To brush past it, to rush through it, to not see how it comes for you up over the edges of everything, quiet and unassuming and miraculous—how every page of the Word has been writing it, reaching for you, coming for you.  And you could wake up on Christmas only to grasp that you never took the whole of the Gift, the wide expanse of grace.  So now we pause.  Still.  Ponder.  Hush.  Wait.  Each day of Advent, He gives you the gift of time, so you have time to be still and wait.”  

Ann Voskamp, The Greatest Gift

And I cried. 

Truth is, even though busyness feels so new—so Today—it’s as old as time.  

Jesus came into the world on a night much the same as ours.  The innkeeper was very busy at the inn.  Bethlehem was busy about the census.  Herod was busy at his palace.  People were busy with work and busy with politics: fighting taxes, collecting taxes, fighting Rome, befriending Rome.  Some of them were busy about God’s work, at the temple and in study.  Busy in service and in charity, with family and with flocks.   

Truth is, the checklist will always be there.  And as long as we’re just busy enough to shush our hearts when they tug at us, then we’ll likely miss it.  

The busyness isn’t going to change, we’re going to have to.  

We might have to set off without knowing exactly what we’ll find, like wise men who travelled far.  Or we might have to loosen our grip on our livelihood, let go of some control, trust someone else to watch our precious sheep, like some shepherds did.  

We might have to gather round, even if it’s just some barn animals and us—even all the wayward parts of ourselves who come kicking and screaming and calling it a waste of time. 

We’ll likely have to be willing to let it be a little awkward.  To be okay with the silence, with not knowing what to say.  With the fact that who we find there might not be the messiah we had imagined, the kind who swoops in to fix it all in an instant.  We just might have to be okay with starting out as infants like He did, and letting our growth look like the messy, slow yield, steady and intimate long game God designed. 

We might even have to confront the truth that even if we brought Him the most precious commodities in all the world—gold, money, charisma, Bible knowledge, public service, frankincense or myrrh—he’d still just be longing for our hearts, and some of our time.

Honestly, I’m not really sure what that looks like. How or where it fits in exactly. But I’m not sure anyone who’s done it before us knew either. I imagine it started with the simple thought that they couldn’t afford not to. So they saddled up, took a deep breath, and set off into that silent night.

It’s been seven months.  

In the three years since I started this blog, I’ve not gone longer than three months without writing.  Until now.    

Seven months is a long time for a writer not to write.  You have asked me where I’ve been, and I’ve asked myself the same.  I feel as though I owe you some kind of explanation. 

I’ve still been up to my favorite things: studying, pondering, crafting.  But this year I poured that energy, for the first time, into sermon construction.  And into overcoming fear and anxiety about sermon delivery.  Allow me to give you some backstory. 

Roughly two years ago, I was invited to speak at a women’s event at my church.  The topic was rest, and I’d spent my free time for a year studying Sabbath. I was over-the-moon about getting to synthesize all I’d learned.  I wanted to talk Sabbath with anyone who would listen, so the opportunity to do exactly that was priceless. 

Immediately after that event, my pastor suggested to me that there was a calling on my life to teach.  If I was willing to consider that, he said, then he would like to help: to guide and develop that skill for whatever God might have planned.  

A little over a year ago, we started meeting regularly: my pastor, another mentee like myself named Travis, and me. I listened intently, furiously scribbled notes, and wrestled with this new proposition: preaching.  I was terrified.  

I’ve always been prone to worry.  I’m naturally risk-adverse.  I prioritize safety and anonymity.  And public speaking isn’t writing.  You can’t edit the work, hitting “publish” when it’s just so.  To speak is to perform a live act, and it violates hundreds of my personal preferences.  It takes courage; something I really have to work up. 

The past year has been exactly that.  Working up.  Listening, praying, wrestling, questioning.  This path dovetailed beautifully with a heart change—an inner transformation—I was experiencing in a spiritual formation class at church called Deeper Journey.  The two things worked together on my soul, filled the pages of my journal, and drove me over and over again to prayer.  My faith—the strength and reality of a real relationship with Jesus—felt as though it was in the forge.  A season of fire and heat, of being pounded out on an anvil, and of being put back in the fire again.  

It’s been so personal, and so hard to explain.  I didn’t know where to start to even try, but I also didn’t know how to write about anything else, and so—silence.  A post here or there, but mostly quiet.  

I spent the first half of this year counting down the days to my first sermon.  I’m not going to lie, I obsessed a bit.  I studied, worked, crafted, and reworked.  I spent creative time on little else.  I preached my first Sunday morning on Father’s Day, June 20^th, and my second three weeks later on July 11^th.  I’m now done for a season, not scheduled to speak again for several months.  

In some ways, those two dates in June and July felt like jumping out of an airplane, trusting God to be my parachute.  Now that I’m on the ground in one piece, I’m experiencing an unusual mix of emotions.  There’s relief, but also the question I can’t help but ask: “now what?” 

I’d like to find my writing rhythm here again.  There are so many things I want to share with you, not the least of which is the heart journey I’ve been on: the Deeper Journey curriculum and its profound insights into Biblical truths; the neuroscience, spiritual disciplines, and Bible stories that helped me cope with my fear and anxiety; and even the sermons themselves, as their content and verses, at least for now, are still turning themselves over in my mind and heart. I’m not sure where to start.

But I tend to overthink things.  I know this about myself. So I think for this I simply need to take my Dad’s advice: just start writing, the rest will follow.  

So, here we go.

Hello again.

Derek and I studied abroad in England in 2005, which gave us a great opportunity to travel around Europe whenever we weren’t in school.  We made a point to pick up a Christmas ornament from each place we visited, which was usually easy enough.  An Eiffel tower from Paris, a golfer from Edinburgh, etc.  But for whatever reason, we struggled to find “the” ornament from Barcelona—until a cab driver excitedly told us about “the shitter.” 

In Barcelona there is a beloved Christmas tradition called “el caganer,” which roughly translates to “the shitter.”  Since sometime in the late 17^th century, Catalans in northeastern Spain celebrate the birth of Jesus with a defecating figurine, a nod to their agrarian history.  With pants around his ankles, el caganer is shown squatting, caught in the act.  Traditionally he wears the red cap, white shirt, and black trousers of the Catalan peasant.  Parents hide him somewhere in the nativity scene for children to find as a game, usually tucked modestly behind a tree, barn or animal.  We’ve kept this tradition alive in our house by hiding him in our tree for Derek to find, with a prize for him if he does.  

While some foreigners consider this addition to the manger distasteful, if not sacrilegious, Catalans wouldn’t think of leaving him out, as he symbolizes fertility and good fortune for the year to come.  But there may be more behind el caganer.

At the time of Christ’s birth, el caganer is busy being human, a gentle reminder that Jesus arrives when we least expect Him, while we are fully engaged in the mess of being ourselves.  Which brings us to the other truth: Jesus was fully human, too.  In the very scene that depicts the divine incarnation, Catalans have an all-too-real depiction of exactly what that means: our great and glorious God came not just to be with us, but as us, in every sense of the word.  God didn’t shy away from our humanity, but embraced it, poop and all.  

The wise men brought baby Jesus gold for kingship, frankincense for deity, and myrrh for death; el caganer gives his own fragrant gift for a bountiful harvest in the coming year.  In his humility, in his humanity, he gives his raw and authentic self, possibly the greatest gift of all.  

There is an old Spanish proverb that says, “Dung is no saint, but where it falls it works miracles.”  The tradition of el caganer confronts us to acknowledge that some of life’s greatest glories are born from messy circumstances.  I have no doubt that this truth was not lost on the very real virgin Mary, who on that holy night would have endured great discomfort and pain, surrounded by the sounds and smells of barn animals, her own cries delivering up an all-too-real, all-too-messy infant into her arms, and into the world.

“The Lord is close to the brokenhearted and saves those who are crushed in spirit.” Psalm 34:18

Years ago Riverbend hosted an art show displaying pieces made by homeless artists in a rehabilitation program.  I fell in love with one of the small ceramic pots.  It had a blue-green glaze washed over its grainy surface.  It was beautiful and it gave me joy, so I bought it and put it on my shelf.      

One day my children accidentally knocked it down, shattering it into pieces.  Knowing how much I loved it, they gathered the shards and tried to glue it back together.  They brought me the bad news and the patched-up vase at the same time, along with heartfelt apologies.

It was not as good as new, not anywhere close.  Thick globs of glue held its geometric pieces roughly in place.  Its many breaks appeared from every angle as deep gaps.  My children stared at me with upturned faces, studying my expression for a sign.  I smiled. 

Before its break, my vase told me a single beautiful story of rehabilitation and hope, that of the woman who made it.  But after the break, it told me two.  It told me of the time my children filled my house with play and laughter, and of the time their earnest little hearts tried to right a wrong and keep me from feeling sad.  My tiny ceramic vase was more valuable to me than ever before.    

When my kids chose to fix my vase instead of throw it away, they were unknowingly following the centuries-old Japanese tradition of kintsugi.  Kintsugi, meaning “golden repair,” is the Japanese art of mending broken pottery.  Rather than try to disguise the breaks, kintsugi accentuates them, using gold or silver lacquer to highlight the veins of repair.  In kintsugi brokenness is celebrated; the unique lines of breakage make the piece more beautiful, more rare, and more storied than before. 

Kintsugi incorporates three Japanese philosophies: that of wabi-sabi, which embraces the flawed and imperfect, that of mottainai, which regrets waste, and that of mushin, which accepts change.  Kintsugi finds value and beauty in the object’s history of use and wear.  Rather than signal the end, a break indicates a good story and signals a new beginning.

When our worlds unexpectedly shatter, all is not lost.  We can bring the broken pieces to our God who, like a kintsugi craftsman, delights to bring unique beauty to each fault line.  Where we may see irreparable damage, He sees an opportunity.  Our many fragments don’t deter Him.  Rather He lovingly and patiently gathers, fits and smooths us into vessels of greater worth than ever before.  And in His hands, the very lines along which we fractured—those edges dark and deep—become our strongest and most lovely features, seams of light paved with gold.

Ten days ago, my family and I drove to the Oregon coast to escape the Texas heat and the monotony of home. I was starting to feel a bit trapped.

The beach here is not like the beaches in Texas. The Pacific water is ice cold, and a bone-chilling wind whips at your hair and coat. It is violent and loud. Each day with the tide the sand is littered anew with strange, oceanic finds: driftwood, seaweed, seashells and shellfish, and here and there, whole crab shells.

The first one I found took my breath away with its perfect symmetry and intricate design. Its reddish orange hue faded to brown at its crimped edge. It was beautiful, fragile and thin in my hand. I loved it and immediately started looking for others, an activity my kids were quick to catch onto. It didn’t take long for Ellie to ask the obvious question: “where’s the rest of it?”

Crabs, I’ve since learned, undergo a molting process that is essential for growth. About once a year, a crab will shed its shell by casting it off. First, they grow a soft shell underneath, then they swell with water to break the outer shell, eventually backing out of it and leaving it behind. For a few days, the crab will be particularly vulnerable as its new shell hardens. But in this period the crab rids itself of parasites and grows stronger, even growing back missing limbs. Then, in a year’s time when its new shell starts to prevent its growth, it will be time to molt again.

This reminds me of a word I learned recently and loved: liminal. It comes from the Latin word limen for “threshold,” and it means “relating to a transitional or initial stage of a process; occupying a position at, or on both sides of, a boundary or threshold.” Anthropologically, liminality refers to people being in the ambiguous, disorienting middle part of a rite of passage, or societies in the midst of political or cultural change. Liminal times are marked by uncertainty and doubt, but they also offer opportunities for great transformation and unprecedented change.

God used liminal periods throughout the Bible to grow His people. For example, forty years passed from the time Moses fled Egypt to when God called him to return as Israel’s leader. In that desert time, he learned to shepherd. Fifteen or more years passed from the time David was anointed as Saul’s successor to when he was actually crowned king at the age of thirty. In that time, he hid for his life, but also learned to lead men and to trust God. Similarly, the Israelites spent forty years wandering the wilderness, having passed out of Egypt but not yet entering the Promised Land. In that time of hardship, they dealt with sin. We also see similar liminal periods in the lives of Jacob, Joseph, and many others–times when God used a particularly uncomfortable, disruptive, and vulnerable time for necessary growth and development.

Sometimes called “the crossing over space,” liminal times are seasons of waiting. While frightening or frustrating on their face, these are times believers can trust that God is at work. Richard Rohr, Franciscan friar and author, wrote that the liminal space is where we are most teachable, and described it as: 

“where we are betwixt and between the familiar and the completely unknown.  There alone is our old world left behind, while we are not yet sure of the new existence.  That’s a good space where genuine newness can begin.  Get there often and stay as long as you can by whatever means possible.  It’s the realm where God can best get at us because our false certitudes are finally out of the way.  This is the sacred space where the old world is able to fall apart, and a bigger world is revealed.  If we don’t encounter liminal space in our lives, we start idealizing normalcy.” 

Idealizing normalcy. That sounds familiar. No doubt 2020 is a liminal space.

But now I think of the Dungeness crab whose shell I hold in my hand. I can picture it now: the icy cold water rushing into her home, bursting it open at the seams, forcing her to crawl backward out of its confined spaces. She is deliberately pushed out and made vulnerable by the very same Creator who fashioned the one-of-a-kind pattern on her back. And what feels like certain death is really just a requisite for growth, as she leaves all she’s known for the space between.

“I can’t wait for things to go back to normal.”  

I’ve heard this—and said this—a lot lately.  I’m terrible at waiting, and I don’t think I’m alone.  We live in the “I want what I want when I want it” era, and expect instant gratification.  I like swift results for my effort, whether that’s learning a new stay-and-shelter hobby or losing my newfound quarantine pounds.  When time is our most precious commodity, isn’t faster always better?

I suspect past generations were better at waiting, largely because they didn’t have much choice.  New clothing started with a needle and thread.  Fresh bread meant grinding wheat into flour, shaping and leavening dough, baking.  If you wanted fruits or vegetables, you planted a seed.  Even just twenty years ago, watching a movie required a trip to Blockbuster.  Now we can get all of the above delivered and streamed in under an hour.    

What sounds like inefficiency now was in fact the design of a deliberate God who isn’t “slow to fulfill his promise as some count slowness” (2 Peter 3:9).  Throughout the Bible, His revelation unfolds methodically.  We see this in his oversight of the Israelites:

“I will not drive [your enemies] out ahead of you in a single year; otherwise, the land would become desolate, and wild animals would multiply against you.  I will drive them out little by little ahead of you until you have become numerous and take possession of the land.” Exodus 23:29-30

I presume the Israelites would have preferred wiping out their enemies in a single blow, but God played the long game, just as he continues to do with us.  It is a lesson in faith.  We learn patience and what it means to surrender as we put in the work and leave the results to God.  Our character develops in the waiting.  Though we may feel as though we’re treading water, sowing but not reaping, we enjoy the knowledge that:

“Since ancient times no one has heard, no ear has perceived, no eye has seen any God besides you, who acts on behalf of those who wait for him.”  Isaiah 64:4

God works for us while we wait.  He knows the end from the beginning and slows the pace between, taking time to develop our character, readiness, and our relationship with Him.  My dear friend and fellow Riverbender, Audrey Parker, once said: “Root-building doesn’t look like much above ground.”  She’s right, it looks like nothing; it looks like waiting.