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Kristen Anne Glover

Five in Tow

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Let it Be

Let it Be

It was a little too dangerous to be out on the roads that had just claimed the life of a young father.  Great, treacherous flakes floated down from the clouds that hid the heavens.  But that didn’t stop them from coming.

Beautiful saints, every one, they came to give a soft place for the tears to fall, to embrace the broken, and to mourn with those who mourned the most.

Bonnie, who had been widowed younger than my mother—was my mother a widow?—was one of the first to come.  She came in, soggy from the snow, and grabbed my mother’s hands without stopping to take off her coat.  Her tear-stained eyes searched my mother’s face for the pain she knew was there and the pain she knew was coming.

They sat together in the steel light of the feather-frosted window, and Bonnie sobbed.  She sobbed for her dead young husband and she sobbed for my tall, handsome father, and she sobbed for my mother because Bonnie knew.

She sobbed because there was nothing else she could do.

There was nothing else anyone could do, and so, like Bonnie, they came in, silent as snow.  Dear friends from church, relatives, even neighbors–everyone came.  Some came for a minute, heaving a potted plant into my arms or pressing a fold of money into my hand for my mother before they flurried away so as not to be a bother.

Others stayed until the shadows grew and melted into the freshly-fallen snow.  They did not know how to leave a woman who had just been left all alone in the world with three young children and a house that needed fixing.  So they lingered.

They lingered until the little green house in the middle of the forest was filled up with the scent of the saints.  Even with the drafty windows and a wood stove that wasn’t quite up to the task, there was a warmth in that place unlike anything I had known before.  It was warm enough to calm the shivers that convulsed through my body, warm enough to stop my teeth from chattering, warm enough to help me believe that somehow, it would be okay.

I watched from the corner of the couch, from my little refuge behind the tall-backed adults and the nodding heads and the sad voices, and I saw Him.  Jesus.  Jesus in real hands and real feet and real tears crying over our Lazarus- grave when it was too late and there was nothing else that could be done.

How beautiful He is.

I rested my head on a couch cushion.  It smelled like my Sunday school teacher, who didn’t have any children but who loved children more than most women who did.  She had been there with me, and her fragrance lingered and filled up my space like a slow, parting embrace.

The entire house smelled like Jesus, in the remarkable way that Jesus smells like Dial soap and Old Spice and a kitchen full of casseroles.

Had He been there that day?    

In my mind, I went over all the faces.  Some old, some young, some full of their own agonies and some who were just learning how hope could be shattered.  Each with a story, but each willing to step in to the day when my story fell apart.  Just like Jesus.

It left me breathless.

Somehow, Jesus had come to my living room garden, and He had whispered to me, “Child, child.  Why do you weep?”

He said it in words that came through other lips, chosen messengers, but it was there all the same.  I clung to them as the bitter sleep drifted in and I thought to myself, if this is what it takes to see Jesus, then let it be.

I think of it, all these years later because we are in a hard bit of the road, right here.  I have told you about it, dear saints, and you have come in with arms that ache to hold me up and tell me it will be okay.  Some of you have cried with me because you know.  You have called and you have written and you have prayed for me even when you do not know me, not really.

You have been Jesus to me.

And I weep because it is so beautiful, I do not know that I could ever trade these moments even for all the answers I ever wanted that did not come.  I am surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, and it is you, dear friends, who cheer me on.  It is you, dear ones, who minister Christ to me in real hands and real feet and real tears that cry over my Lazarus-grave.

You have shown me Jesus.  I cannot wish for any other.

I am left with nothing more to say in my prayers but this: If this is what it takes to see Jesus, then let it be.

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The Trouble with Rest

Day of Rest

*100 Beautiful Days of Motherhood: 33

Two.  That’s the number of times this week I set the tea kettle on to boil and walked away, only to return some time later to find it bone dry and smoking.  The second time, the handle, which was made to be impervious to absentmindedness, melted off in slow agony and dropped onto the burner.

The children smelled the burning plastic and asked if I was making dinner.

I was not.

I stared at my tea kettle.  The heat had caused the metal to swell abnormally.  It was as fat as a little piggy and much more likely to explode.  Black smoke drifted lazily up from the tar-like goo on the burner.

This was concerning to me, not just because of the fact that I very nearly gave my children an unplanned lesson on shrapnel, but because it said something about me that wasn’t good.  A woman who burns her kettle dry two times in five days has issues.

My issue is this: I have trouble resting.  I have so much trouble resting, I can’t even slow down long enough to brew a cup of “Quite Moments” tea.  I run around like the house is on fire (which, ironically, was very nearly a reality) because I feel like I have to work my way to a place of rest. 

But the work is never done and rest is always elusive because I live at work.

My “office” is strewn with socks and dirty dishes and way more Thomas the Tank Engine tracks than is professional.  And while my coworker is cute and my boss is great, the subordinates tend to run around half naked and spill milk.  Everywhere I turn, I see reminders of the things I have yet to do, have not done well, or have not done at all.

Sometimes, I just want to put on a pair of heels and commute.  Preferably to Hawaii.  Perhaps then I could find a way to be done at the end of the day.

But of course, being done is not the point and work is not the problem.  The problem is not the dishes in the sink or the floor that needs mopped.  The problem is I lack the faith to rest the way God commands.  I lack the faith to be still, to be quiet, and to pursue the things that are more important than dusting the furniture.

I lack the faith to trust that my identity in Him is secure, even if my work is not done.

There will always be work.  But here in the middle of the mess, I am commanded to rest.  Rest, true rest, is what I need.  Not like when I go to bed and dream about cleaning my kitchen.  Not like when I finally get all the rooms straightened up on the same day and I collapse into the couch, exhausted.  Not like when I finally check everything off the to-do list and feel like I’ve earned it.

True rest is a grace.  It sees the work left to do and nourishes me anyway.  It sees that I am not yet done and rewards me with strength for the course.  It resets the priorities that have gotten scrambled and brings my focus up from the temporal to the eternal.

I forget that sometimes, and I fight against it.  I act like God is punishing me, somehow, by calling me to a place of rest.  I kind of think that if He wants me to rest, He should find a way to clean my kitchen first.  But He doesn’t do that.  He leaves the mess, and asks me to leave it too.

So I put the kettle on, but I struggle with the fear that if I take some time off, my entire world is going to descend deeper into chaos and disorder.  Who is going to do the dishes while I sip my tea, God?  I sneak off and try to put away some laundry while I wait for the water to boil and pretty soon, I find myself face-to-face with a charbroiled kettle.

The truth is, I can never work my way to rest because rest is an act of faith.  It requires me to act on the  promise of God that one day, the meaningless repetition of earthly work will end.  All that is lacking in me will be filled up, and all that is undone will be completed.  I will no longer live at work.

I will live at rest.

So tonight, I am putting the kettle on.  It’s a little rusty now and I can’t quite pry the lid off because the knob burned off.  I am not done with my work.  I guess that’s why it’s the perfect time to act on the belief that even in my imperfection, God’s promises are true.  Not being done is the best reason to practice being at rest.

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Don’t Rush the Season

Beauty in the season

It is October, which means my son has been working on his Christmas list for a few weeks already.  He began the rough draft on April 12, when the buzz from the birthday cake wore off and he realized he still didn’t own a BB gun or a boa constrictor.

“Jonathan,” I said to him when he presented me with his working list, “it’s only October.  There are pumpkins and leaf piles to enjoy, and you’re thinking about Christmas!  Don’t rush the season.”

But at eight years old, it’s hard to be happy with pumpkins when Christmas is just around the corner.   In fact, it’s hard to be eight when it would be much neater to be ten.  It’s hard to be content with riding bikes and shooting Nerf guns when it would be so much more awesome to drive a car and shoot a rifle.

It is in our nature to be discontent with where we are, and ever to wander ahead of where we should be.  In our striving to be somewhere we are not, we trade the beauty of the moment for a restless kind of rushing toward a place that may very well come, soon enough.

I have made the same mistake in my journey as a mother, more times than I care to admit.  It seemed I was always pressing hard toward the next stage.  I longed for my newborn to sleep through the night, for my six-month-old to sit up on her own, for my one-year-old to feed himself.  I longed for my husband to have a stable job and or our income to be sufficient for our needs.  I longed for a home I could call mine, and for the freedom that came with having older children.

I wish someone had told me, Don’t rush the season.

Maybe then I wouldn’t have struggled to potty-train a child who seemed to be ready, but wasn’t.  I would not have attempted to take newborn twins on a family vacation.  I would not have missed the blessings in the lean times or refused to grow in the places where God had so obviously placed me.  I would not have been jealous of a season that had not yet come.

Everything is beautiful in its time

Every season has a beauty and a difficulty all its own.  It is not always easy to walk through a valley of longing or grief.  Most of us do not relish the uncertain times when jobs are lost or children are ill.  We might struggle against the endless afternoons when our children are small and not easily occupied and it seems like we are wasting ourselves on the mundane tasks of changing diapers and sweeping up Cheerios.

But even the difficult seasons serve a purpose.  When my husband and I were in seminary, we were dead broke.  It was Christmas, and the only presents I could afford were those from a little shop on campus where students could give away unwanted items for other students to take.  I had found some free toys and books for our daughter and wrapped them up.  Even though she was not old enough to care, it grieved my heart that I could not give her a real gift.  I worried about how we were going to pay our rent and felt guilty every time I bought groceries.

One day, when I was feeling particularly pouty because I had to take an extra cleaning job in order to make ends meet, we came home to find an envelope stuffed under our apartment door.  It contained $200 in cash.  Tears of gratitude and shame filled my eyes.  I knew this was a season of growth, but I had been too busy complaining to be concerned about growth.  I had been too busy longing for what we did not yet have to realize that we had something now that we would never have again.

At no other season in my life could $200 mean so much to me.  At no other season in my life could I learn humility and gratitude from having to give used gifts as presents.   At no other season in my life could I have nothing and everything all at once.

If I had gotten my way, I would have missed it.  If I had gotten my way, I would have pushed passed the struggle in my desire to get to the easier years to come.  That envelope was like the voice of God shouting at me, Don’t rush the season.

A time for every purpose under heaven

Our family has come to another season of uncertainty.  We do not know where the path will lead.  After December 15th, when my husband’s military orders end, we will be without full-time employment.  It is scary, to be sure, but I have found a certain rest and contentment in this period of waiting and trusting.  I am not always patient.  Sometimes, I worry and long for answers.

But by God’s grace, I have also been able to see the beauty in this season.  This is the hard place that lets us see the hand of God.  This is the place where doors open, not because I pushed, but because He turned the handle.  When it is over, I will be thankful.  But for now, I am appreciating the purpose and significance  of this time.

This time, I am not rushing the season.

 

“There is an appointed time for everything. And there is a time for every event under heaven—

A time to give birth and a time to die;

A time to plant and a time to uproot what is planted.

A time to kill and a time to heal;

A time to tear down and a time to build up.

A time to weep and a time to laugh;

A time to mourn and a time to dance.

A time to throw stones and a time to gather stones;

A time to embrace and a time to shun embracing.

A time to search and a time to give up as lost;

A time to keep and a time to throw away.

A time to tear apart and a time to sew together;

A time to be silent and a time to speak.

A time to love and a time to hate;

A time for war and a time for peace…He has made everything appropriate in its time.”  Ecclesiastes 3:1-8, 11a

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I believe you can find grace for the mother you are and help to become the mother you long to be—a mom who has the freedom to choose the better things and enjoy her kids right now.

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