In Honor of "My Only Love"

I know it’s not November yet, but it’s not too early to be thankful. In fact, every day is an opportunity to be thankful. Today, I am thanking God for my husband. Today, I traveled with him on his “missions” to a few of the nineteen Safeway stores he works in, in the Portland area. It’s something I normally don’t do, but I didn’t have anything big going on today, and to be honest—I really just wanted to be with him.

I got to do a bit of writing and some computer filing (i.e., recycling and reorganizing documents) while he was doing his various projects, so I wasn’t bored while he was working—and in between each job I got to ride beside him in the car, talk with him, laugh with him, and hold his hand.

Not every guy would want his wife tagging along while he went to assorted job sites, but mine was more than appreciative for my company. I found myself feeling very grateful today that he is my husband and not someone else’s—and after 27 years of marriage, beginning to take to heart his reminiscences of when he met me, the day we got married, etc. He actually makes reference to things like that quite often, always with an emphasis on how beautiful he thought I was—and still am—and how lucky he has always felt for getting me to be his wife. I’ve just never truly appreciated how very cool that is. But as God does a new work in my heart…I’m starting to.

My husband looks for little ways to bless me—buying me a coffee; doing the dishes; doing a project he knows I’ve been wanting finished (like when he and our son built a fire pit while I was at the women’s retreat); giving me regular massages; fixing problems I incur on my computer; bringing me a clean, warm towel for my shower; even making me breakfast. He’s simply super sweet and thoughtful.

My wonderful man is always telling me how He can’t believe God blessed him with me; today I find myself full of gratitude that God chose to bless me with him. I don’t think a more loving, doting, capable, talented, intelligent husband could be found. And what’s more—he supports and encourages me in all my endeavors; he truly believes in me—and many times, his belief in me has far outweighed my belief in myself.

I have a spouse who loves the Lord and wants to follow Him in whatever steps—big or small—He may want us to take. We are a team, and I sensed this in my spirit in a very big way today. Of course, we were joined in marriage 27 years ago…but there’s a new “joining” that is taking place that goes far beyond that initial “I do.”

Speaking of marriage, Jesus said in Mark, chapter 10, “But at the beginning of creation God ‘made them male and female.’ ‘For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh.’ So they are no longer two, but one flesh. Therefore what God has joined together, let no one separate.” I believe Jesus was making an important declaration about marriage here that went deeper than just answering the crowd’s questions. To separate means “to keep apart or divide, as by an intervening barrier or space; to put, bring, or force apart; to set apart; disconnect; dissociate.” Jesus knew that our enemy would want nothing better than to divide and conquer in marriage—that he would use lies and trickery, and even our own minds against us. 

Jesus emphasized the holiness of this union by going all the way back to creation to describe God’s perfect design, followed by the miracle of becoming “one flesh.” He was saying “don’t let what God has ordained become less than what He intended. To “separate,” after all, doesn’t just mean that you’re breaking up or getting a divorce—it can also refer to a barrier that exists between a husband and wife, causing them to be separated in spirit.

And that’s the “new joining” I see God doing in my marriage. We are being joined in a way that doesn’t leave room for the enemy; we’re learning to fight what comes against us together instead of battling each other; we’re taking our questions to the Holy Spirit as “one flesh” and receiving insight and direction for our unique union. We’re learning to move together, like partners on the dance floor—and I have to say, it’s a beautiful thing. And there’s no other person I’d rather be sharing this dance with than my husband, Byron Kephart.

So today, as I got to spend hours by my loved one’s side, it felt natural; it was comforting; it was unifying. I am astounded at the kindness of God in allowing me to share my love with such a man as the one I said “I do” to all those years ago. I love you, Byron, and you are the one I want by my side as my hair turns gray (grayer) and I discover wrinkles appearing. You are the love of my life, and I’m proud to be yours as well.

Written On Their Hearts: A Call to Love Deeply

 

I’ve always been a writer—I love writing poems for people, writing letters, writing funny little stories…but perhaps the most important writing I will ever do doesn’t involve a pen, paper, or a computer keyboard. Instead, it is the messages—the impressions, memories, and shared experiences—the best of myself that I’ve left with others in this life.

I am able to “leave a mark” on those I love because of the love and grace that was poured out to me when Jesus came to fulfill an un-keepable law, forever making His mark on this one He calls His own. He replaced rules and regulations with a “new covenant,” by which I became joint heirs with Him and have  a brand new nature! The new nature is like God’s—and so as I walk closer and closer alongside Him, I desire to do what He does—and He loves like no other.

Hebrews 10:15-17 says: “…And the Holy Spirit also testifies to us; for after saying, "THIS IS THE COVENANT THAT I WILL MAKE WITH THEM AFTER THOSE DAYS, SAYS THE LORD: I WILL PUT MY LAWS UPON THEIR HEART, AND ON THEIR MIND I WILL WRITE THEM," He then says, "AND THEIR SINS AND THEIR LAWLESS DEEDS I WILL REMEMBER NO MORE.””

He’s not talking about the laws of Moses—He’s referring to the superior law of love Jesus has provided for us—this law is all about relationship. And just as Jesus has “signed” His love into us (with His blood), we also have something to give as we live out His purposes on the earth. Those He’s placed in our lives get to be the recipients of the specific grace given to each of us—to be who He’s called us to be.  

“Above all, love each other deeply, because love covers over a multitude of sins” (I Peter 4:8). We are to follow Jesus’ example of love. He never focused on the sin but on who a person really was. In our relationships, we have an opportunity to be that person who truly sees the gold within a loved one—and because we do, our actions leave a unique deposit of grace in their hearts.

When I think of my mom, I know that I will always be different because of how she loved me, believed in me, laughed with me. Her “loving deeply” left a signature on my heart that is hers alone—something no one else could do. Many other relatives and friends have reserved heart-prints as well; each one is unique—and priceless.

Invest in others. Be that priceless gift to someone. We who are called by His name have been given a deep capacity to love. I am reminded of the words to an old hymn by Frederick M. Lehman, “The Love of God.” The first verse and chorus go as follows: 

The love of God is greater far
Than tongue or pen can ever tell;
It goes beyond the highest star,
And reaches to the lowest hell;
The guilty pair, bowed down with care,
God gave His Son to win;
His erring child He reconciled,
And pardoned from his sin.

Refrain:
Oh, love of God, how rich and pure!
How measureless and strong!
It shall forevermore endure—
The saints’ and angels’ song.

How measureless and strong is the touch of one heart upon another. Go forth empowered by His love today—that years from now the mention of your name will evoke gladness and thanksgiving in someone’s heart, because you chose to love deeply—and be written there.

My Child Said He Hates Me: Choosing to Make Room for God's Best

Right up there with a parent’s most wounding experiences is that moment when your own child says “I hate you.” If it’s never happened to you, count yourself fortunate--it's an awful experience. But if it has, there is a perspective God wants us to have—that the enemy would like to keep secret. Ready?

That hatefulness didn’t come from your child—it’s not who he or she really is. It’s a spirit coming against your son or daughter that he or she has made temporary agreement with. Later, your child is going to feel terrible for spouting such venom at you. Because it’s a lie. In a state of frustration and vulnerability, your child took things one step further and used the enemy’s very own words to hurt you.

The enemy wants to do even more damage too—he wants you to entertain this thought: Maybe he or she really does hate me. This thought is sure to be followed by what may seem to be “self” accusations, but they really originate from the Accuser of the Brethren.

Satan is looking for our agreement. If we agree that our son or daughter must hate us, we’ll also be inclined to agree about what a terrible parent we must be—a complete failure, in fact. Do you see how quickly one can enter a downward spiral?

Yes, hearing your child say something like that hurts. But instead of allowing the enemy to beat you up over it, use it as an opportunity to pray. Ask Him to heal your heart and to also heal whatever is wrong in your child’s heart. Ask the Holy Spirit to give you discernment as to what that might be and wisdom on how to address it. Approach “what the enemy meant for evil” proactively—with hope and expectation of God’s healing and restoration.

Identity is a powerful weapon—the enemy hates it, because when God’s people possess it, they aren’t easy prey anymore. John 10:10a says, “The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy;…” He wants to steal our hope of a good relationship with our son or daughter, to kill our self-worth as a parent, to destroy all manner of peace within our home.  But if we know who we are—and who our child is—we won’t be so quick to abdicate our authority in Christ. “He has now reconciled in his body of flesh by his death, in order to present you holy and blameless and above reproach before him,…” (Colossians 1:22, ESV). Holy and blameless and above reproach! Don’t let God’s enemy blame you when God has declared you blameless!

Obviously, words shouted at a parent in anger need to be addressed, but it needs to be after everyone has had a chance to process what happened—to chill out and take stock of what the truth of the matter is.

One of my children was diagnosed with ODD (oppositional defiant disorder) at a fairly young age. Difficulty controlling impulses and emotions is a hallmark of ODD. I’ve heard some pretty mean things, but I knew that wasn’t my child’s true heart. As parents, it is our job to speak to the spirit of our child. The flesh may be agreeing with the enemy, but “The Spirit Himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God,…” (Romans 8:16). That’s why we speak to the regenerated part of our son or daughter about who they really are. “You’re a child of God. You love people. You’re full of compassion. Remember that time you gave your balloon to a friend because she’d lost hers? Those words you said to me earlier are not you. I know who you really are.” Then let the Holy Spirit lead you in the process of leading them to repentance—that is, if it hasn’t already occurred. Many times, our child would come and apologize, having been convicted and having realized that what had been said was truly hurtful. Loving embraces generally followed.

God is the same way with us. No, we may not have ever said, “God, I hate you,” but when we disobey Him or act in ways that are contrary to who we really are, we show contempt for our Maker. We show that we don’t believe what He says about us.

Satan would love to use ‘I hate you’ situations with our children to put a wedge between us and them, to break down the relationship so that in the teen years there will be a complete disconnect. He wants to sow discord and lack of understanding. My encouragement to parents in dealing with this or any other type of hurtful conflict is to remember who your enemy really is. “For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms” (Ephesians 6:12).

Allow God’s love for your child, even in the midst of tears and prolonged difficulty, to be perfected in your heart. “Love bears up under anything and everything that comes, is ever ready to believe the best of every person, its hopes are fadeless under all circumstances, and it endures everything [without weakening]” (I Corinthians 13:7). Love believes the best. Choose to believe for the very best of what your child will become, and speak that word over his or her life. The circumstances may not match destiny for a while, but have faith—the best is yet to come.

Cat Tales

Garrett loves on Josiah--a sweeter cat would be hard to find.

In our first apartment building—the first home I remember— my mom and I found a kitten that had been abandoned and was sick. Its eyes were goopy—and it was obviously in need of nourishment. It is possible that it hadn’t even been weaned from its mother. Try as we might, we couldn’t nurse the poor thing all the way back to health, and it died the next day. But during that time, we showed it love and kept it warm. I saw the compassion in my mother’s eyes and how desperately she wanted to save that small creature. I remember crying but still being glad that we had rescued the kitten from the cold, dark stairwell. I was five years old, and this was a life lesson I would never forget.

At the age of six, I moved with my family from the city of Portland to the coastal town of Florence. My parents, me…and our lively orange Persian, Cricket Elvis. (We had tacked on the middle name because of a distinctive series of movements Cricket would perform while standing on his back legs and batting at a toy on a string.) Cricket was an indoor kitty in the city, but in the slower-paced town of Florence, we began letting him outside. Unfortunately, he didn’t quite know how to deal with Highway 101—and one day he tried to cross it. My first official pet was suddenly gone, and I was heartbroken. I remember my dad digging a very deep hole—and crying. We all did. We loved Cricket, and he had brought much joy into our lives. Those fond memories would always stay with us.

I missed Cricket a lot. A few months after losing him, my dad and I went to deliver some wood to a customer—I decided at the last minute to accompany my dad. It just so happened that these customers had a cat for which they were hoping to find a good home. I immediately fell in love with the very friendly male cat, who was white with orange only on his tail (in a tabby-type pattern) and the tips of his ears. And he had blue eyes. I begged my dad to allow me to have him. Defenseless to the persuasive tactics of his animal-loving little girl, Daddy soon caved. And we arrived back home with our new family member, whom I named Powderpuff.

Life with Powderpuff was just as entertaining as it had been with Cricket, if not more. He was extremely affectionate—and we taught him to “attack” using a stuffed Snoopy dog, a hilarious endeavor to say the least. But the one thing I treasure most about Powderpuff is how he responded one time when I was very sick. I had a fever and was simply weak. All I could do was lie in bed. Being a side-sleeper, I remember facing the wall in my bed. Powderpuff quietly joined me, lying back to back to with me and did not leave my side until I was better. It brings tears to my eyes to this day to recall what a loving cat he was. He died when I was nine, we think of Distemper, and joined Cricket in kitty heaven. Of all the pet cats I grew up with—and there were many—he was my all-time favorite.

It was maybe a year later that we decided to take on another pet cat—this time it was a female, black with a bit of white. We got her from some folks who’d had her long enough that she knew her name—Baby—so we kept it. Baby was a smart cat. She seemed to know her p’s and q’s around the busy road and stayed where it was safe. Baby was the proverbial mama cat. Since my family couldn’t afford to have her spade, I soon got to learn all about the “circle of life.” She had some awfully cute kittens, and we managed to find homes for them.

Baby moved with us twice, finally taking up residence in Mapleton—with more country-ish surroundings. There she had a gray and white male in one of her litters that my dad took an instant liking to. He claimed that this cat was “very intelligent” and dubbed him “Professor.” It seemed to prove true. Professor would shake hands, and sometimes he would respond in meow with uncannily human-like inflection when spoken to.

Baby was with our family for many years. I was in my teens when she began to show signs of decline, including a lack of interest in eating. A rather private and aloof creature, she one day wandered off and never came back. She was an alpha kitty of many, strong-willed and dignified—in many ways, respectable. She would be missed but not in the same way as Cricket and Powderpuff had been.

Professor remained, even long after I had left my parents’ home. He followed in his mother’s pawprints, becoming the leader of “the pack.” By this time, my parents lived up a country road, surrounded by trees and bordered by a creek. There was a lot of territory for a cat to roam about in. There were somewhere around five or six cats, but Professor clearly stood out as the “top cat”—adventurous yet deeply attached to his human masters. He was, as my dad always said, “quite a cat.”

When Byron and I moved into our first apartment, we brought a kitten with us. We thought it would be humorous to give him a dog name, so we called him “Scooby.” We had a couple other kitties after him for short periods of time, but Scooby was one that left an impression on our hearts. He was playful, and his eyes had a sort of “pull-at-your-heartstrings” quality. Even if he did naughty things, we simply couldn’t stay mad at him. Not even when he climbed up the trunk of our first Christmas tree and knocked it over, globe ornaments rolling everywhere. Through sharing the responsibilities of caring for Scooby, Byron and I were drawn closer as a couple—and we gained some insight into what might be some of the other’s strengths and weaknesses down the road—as parents.

By the time we had children, Byron and I had both decided we were “cat people” rather than “dog people.” So once we lived in a large enough house and our little girls wanted a pet, we made a trip to the Humane Society to find the perfect kitty. We ended up deciding on two, a brother and sister—gray tabbies. The tag on their cage said “Renny and Randy.” We didn’t care for those names, so instead let the girls name the kittens. The boy was to be “Koko” and the girl “Biranda.”

Biranda was very skittish—she would rarely let any of us get close to her. We wondered if she’d been abused. Koko, on the other hand, was extremely loving and cuddly—he reminded me a lot of Powderpuff in that way. Biranda passed away from unknown causes during the first few months that we had her. I am confident that with more time we could have helped her to overcome her fears. Biranda, to me, will always be a reminder of what fear does—it pushes us away from those who care most about us and causes us to dwell inwardly on our anxious thoughts. God wants to set us free from all fears and to know His perfect love, just as we wanted Biranda to know ours.

Koko made two moves with us over the course of the next few years. When we moved to some apartments—our first residence in West Salem—he had to adjust to being an indoor-only cat. This proved to be easier said than done, and he did get out a few times. But he always came back. Until one time.  We searched high and low—but no sign of Koko. He had been a friend to all three of our kids, adjusting quickly to a rambunctious, roving Josiah and not balking when carried incorrectly. He never scratched or acted hostile. He never even clawed the furniture! In the spirit of Professor, he was an intelligent feline and could actually open doors!

Since Koko, our family has been blessed with the likes of Precious and Garrett. Garrett is highly affectionate—to the point of being “needy,” and Precious, who is several years his senior, is a bit more choosy with whom she decides to love on. She is also generous though, as she had to deal with Garrett joining the household where she’d been the only cat for several years—she was a bit crotchety at first but has adjusted well and seems more than willing now to share her position of honor. In fact, she looks out for Garrett—and if he’s off roaming and she doesn’t know where he is, Precious expresses obvious concern. Precious is adept at killing bugs, especially spiders, while Garrett is a pro at dispatching rodents. Through Precious I am reminded that one’s character can change—and that vulnerability leads to increased relationship. Garrett’s persistence in “getting to know” Precious encourages me to not give up on others—to keep on loving and believing for good things.

Why have I bothered to tell you all these details about family pets? My point is this—each pet (speaking of the four-legged varieties) has a unique personality and brings a one-of-a-kind element to one’s life. I would go so far as to say that God uses them to minister to the heart in key ways, just as He uses various people to minister to us at critical points in life’s journey. Each one leaves a mark, an imprint on the heart that enriches our lives and echoes the goodness and providence of God.