Falling in Love

Krys and Dave

A week ago today one of the top 10 Google searches was “first day of fall 2010.” Who would have thought? Fall arrives right on time each year whether we look for it or not.

A recent piece in the Chicago Tribune claimed that everybody loves autumn. “Some allergy sufferers hate spring,” pointed out columnist Mary Schmich. “Some heat wimps hate summer. Some people hate winter because they can’t stand to shovel snow. Everybody loves autumn.”

Guess I’m not everybody then. I’ve never been fond of fall. I don’t welcome the waning of light, the chill of autumn evenings, the fading of flowers that were brilliant under the summer sun.  Fall has always seemed like an ending more than a beginning.

 It’s lovely to be wrong.

This past Saturday I stood beneath maple trees in the Boston Public Garden as our niece and her fiancé repeated their wedding vows.  This first Saturday of fall, the bride’s clergyman-father reminded those gathered, was truly a gift from the One who loves us all. The air had the tang of apple cider warmed to room temperature. The bride, slim and elegant in a column of champagne silk, stood facing the groom, his blue eyes mirroring the clear New England sky. A single leaf drifted down.

“Do you purpose in your hearts and minds to live together in a fashion consistent with God’s design for marriage?”

“Do you purpose to establish open, honest, and loving communication?”

“Do you purpose to love one another, honor one another, and be faithful to one another in times of personal blessing as well as personal need?”

We do, the couple responded. We do, we do, we do.

And they will.

At the wedding dinner that evening relatives sat together catching up on family news. But when the music started, both families were out on the dance floor. I sidled over to the DJ and whispered a request. The downbeat began, and as the Pointer Sisters belted out “We are Family” my brother-in-law started a conga line.

 A light mist rose over the Charles River. The autumn air cooled and the light faded, but indoors there was laughter, candlelight, and the birth of new beginnings.

And we danced in celebration nearly till midnight.

Freebie Friday: Focus on Fiction

Congratulations to last week’s giveaway winner: Charlene Dennen of Cotuit, MA!

Ever wondered how these covers are produced? I watched the photo shoot.

Now that fall has officially arrived, it’s a great time to curl up on that rare evening home with a good novel. This week I am giving away a historical novel that just released this month: Whisper on the Wind by award-winning author Maureen Lang. Maureen is a favorite writer of mine. Her intensive research gives her historical novels depth that transcends the genre.

Set in Belgium in 1916-17, Whisper on the Wind follows the story of Isabelle Lassone, a Belgian-American socialite whose parents whisked her to safety at the start of the war. Yet at great personal risk, Isa sneaks back into the country to rescue those dearest to her: Edward and his mother. But Edward refuses to go, and soon Isa is drawn into his secret life working on the newspaper – and into his heart.

I’ve had the privilege of working with Maureen on several of her previous novels. When I asked her what inspired her to write Whisper on the Wind, she enthusiastically told me about the real-life origins of the Belgian newspaper La Libre Belgique, which began as an underground news sheet published during the German occupation of Belgium in the First World War.

Author Maureen Lang

  “The Germans ordered every legitimate Belgian newspaper to submit to censorship—and so sprang up the secret press La Libre Belgique,” Maureen told me.  “It was one of the few voices of opposition to the propaganda the Germans circulated. Their goal was to bring hope to a suppressed nation, and in so doing many people lost everything from their freedom to their fortunes, and some even their lives. With so much material, it was easy to create a romantic tale of adventure and intrigue!”

 

If you’d like to win a copy of Whisper on the Wind, just leave a comment after this post. The winning post # will be chosen on Thursday, September 30.

Making the Most of My Third Trimester

Enjoying the fall - leaves and life!

The Facebook message that came today from Terry made my day. “I am in my third trimester too,” she wrote, “and I am excited!”

Terry is a woman about my age whom I met at Monadnock Bible Conference in NH this past weekend. I was the speaker for a regional women’s retreat, and after the retreat coordinator introduced me to the group on Friday evening, I answered a few questions women are generally curious about but are always too polite to ask:

     57

     5’5” (I used to be 5’6 and I think the inch I lost relocated around my middle).

     100 and too-much (You don’t think I’m putting that on a blogsite, do you?)

And then I shared with them the most exciting news of all: I’m in my third trimester.

I’m not being disingenuous here.  I know people typically use that term in reference to a woman’s pregnancy. Having carried three children to term, I was always relieved when I reached the final trimester.  It meant that I was two-thirds of the way through the pregnancy, and the baby’s birth was now just a few months away.

But here’s the deal: the excitement of the third trimester is one that everyone can share, not just pregnant mamas. With the average life expectancy now hovering at about 85, someone in their late 50s is at least two-thirds of the way there. The birth of life eternal is closer than ever. I’m in my own personal third trimester!

A quick Google search confirms my point. The final third of a pregnancy and the last third of life here on earth have a lot in common:

Third Trimester

The third trimester begins at the 28th week of pregnancy and lasts until birth. This is usually a time of growing excitement and anticipation of the baby’s …
http://www.netwellness.org/healthtopics/pregnancy/faq9.cfm – Cached – Similar

All About the Third Trimester | Pregnancy Information, Pregnancy …

You enter the third trimester filled with energy, but as your body continues to grow and change, you may start to feel tired and experience new aches and …
http://www.fitpregnancy.com/…/all-about-the-third-trimester-40730277.html -

Third Trimester Pregnancy | 3rd Trimester of Pregnancy | BabyZone

The third trimester of pregnancy means you’re almost there!

One of the most significant things Mike and I brought back from our summer sabbatical was not a bag of souvenirs or an album of photos. It doesn’t have a shape or a sound or an easily identifiable symbol. It’s not even an experience we can describe or the memory of a location we’d like to revisit.

Instead it’s something that sounds boring and bland but is anything but. It’s perspective.

We are in our third trimester of life, and that’s exciting.  Life is a marathon. None of us knows how  many more laps we’ll have before we reach the finish line. But when you round the bend into your late 50s, you realize you are free from all the muddling around that characterizes midlife.  You look up suddenly and there it is; the finish line is practically within sight.

And you know what? I have no intention of cruising to a close.

This Week’s Giveaway: The Devil in Pew Number Seven

The winner of last week’s “Freebie Friday” giveaway copy of Beth Moore’s So Long, Insecurity is Kristi Stoughton of Hudson, MA. Congrats Kristi! The winning post # was generated by Random.com (Yes, there really is an internet site for just about anything.)

This week I am giving away a copy of another non-fiction book: The Devil in Pew Number Seven by Rebecca Nichols Alonzo. Becky’s book, written with Bob DeMoss, reads like fiction but every word is true, and it’s one of the most gripping stories I’ve ever read. It just released last month and is already going into its fourth printing.

Becky never felt safe as a child. In 1969, her father, Robert Nichols, moved with his family to Sellerstown, North Carolina, to serve as a pastor. There he found a small community eager to welcome him…with one exception. Glaring at him from pew number seven was a man obsessed with controlling the church and determined to get rid of anyone who stood in his way.

The first time the Nichols family received a harassing phone call, they dismissed it. The same went for the anonymous letter that threatened they’d leave “crawling or walking…dead or alive.” But what they couldn’t ignore was the strategy of terror their tormentor unleashed, more devastating and violent than they could have ever imagined. Refusing to be driven away, Becky’s father stood his ground until one night when an armed man walked into the family’s kitchen…and her life was shattered.

Rebecca Nichols Alonzo

Why do I find The Devil in Pew Number Seven so compelling? It’s not just because it makes every painful thing my husband and I have been through in ministry seem like a Sunday School picnic. It’s simply this: that if anyone had reason to harbor hatred and seek personal revenge, it would be Becky. But instead her story is not just one of deadly betrayal, but more importantly of divine forgiveness. You really need to read this book to believe it.

If you’d like to win a copy of Becky’s story, leave a comment below.

Riding the Rails

As far back as I can remember railroad tracks have intersected my life.

  The Illinois farm where I grew up perched on prairie so flat I could actually see the lights of trains piercing the country darkness four miles away.  Dozens of freight-trains passed daily through the town where my parents retired, and on trips to visit Mom and Dad the urgent blasts entered our sleep.

During seminary years Mike and I lived on the north shore of Boston in a spacious apartment made affordable by the Boston & Maine tracks running noisily through our backyard. Cape Cod, home for our young family for 13 years, had a tourist train not taken seriously by the locals.

Still, a train has tracks and tracks always take you someplace, intended or not.

In 2002 we moved back to Wheaton, exactly 25 years since Mike and I had a newlywed apartment here three blocks south of the Chicago & Northwestern tracks that carried me to my first job near the city. Our present home is in the historic district just north of the tracks, and we can hear the rumble of the Metra disgorging commuters downtown.

But I’m thinking about rails of a different sort today – the sort of tracks that intersect all our lives. In the three weeks since we returned from sabbatical, our extended church family has experienced five deaths. Two families lost a mother and grandmother; three others, their father and grandfather. Sometimes death rides the rails.

 Several years ago, pastor and author Rick Warren spoke reflectively of his wife’s cancer diagnosis occurring around the same time that his mega- bestseller The Purpose Driven Life was published:

“I used to think that life was hills and valleys – you go through a dark time, then you go to the mountaintop, back and forth. I don’t believe that anymore. Rather than life being hills and valleys, I believe that it’s kind of like two rails on a railroad track, and at all times you have something good and something bad in your life.”

The funerals we’ve been attending have been a poignant reminder that there are two rails on life’s track and at all times they carry both joy and sorrow, blessings and burdens. Joy because our faith tells us our loved ones are safely home. Grief because we miss them so much. Death brings sorrow, even to the One who is Lord over death (John 11:35). Jesus wept.  So do we.

A shoe store in downtown Wheaton has a toy train in its window that cheerfully chugs its way around the same prescribed track day after day. Real life isn’t like that. Real rails carry cargos of pain and problems as well as payloads of bliss and beauty. But here’s the thing: the hard times and the supremely happy moments of life both work together for good in our lives and to bring blessing to others.

 Have you ever stood on a railroad track and stared into the distance? The rails converge. The cargo they carry – joy or sorrow, blessing or burden – is eventually delivered. It reaches its destination.  It accomplishes its purpose.

 And so will we. The One who engineers our lives has promised to take us safely home.

 “The Lord will deliver me from every evil attack and will bring me safely into his heavenly Kingdom. All glory to God forever and ever! Amen.” 2 Timothy 4:18 NLT

Freebie Friday: So Long, Insecurity by Beth Moore

Introducing something new…Freebie Friday! What’s the fun of working in publishing if I can’t tell you about the books that have most impacted my own life plus give you the chance to win one?

This week it’s So Long, Insecurity by Beth Moore. To enter the contest, leave a comment right here on the blog about why you want to win a copy. The winner will be chosen at random and announced on the next Freebie Friday.

Some of you know I had the pleasure this past February of traveling with Beth when the book released. Here’s the link to a little video greeting we did for the women of my home church who were doing one of her Bible studies: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Aamw8R0HbOQ

But knowing and highly esteeming Beth doesn’t explain why I have read her newest book three times, or why I chose to lead a group of college women through a discussion of So Long, Insecurity this past winter and spring.

I have wrestled with people-pleasing my entire life, and frankly, my dear (apologies to Rhett Butler), I am sick to death of it. I am 57 years old, for goodness sake – it’s time to get over it. Many years ago the Lord spoke straight to my heart when he told me there is  a huge difference between being eager to serve and being eager to please. The first is biblical; the second is idol-worship.

When I was speaking to our Tuesday Morning Tapestry leaders this past week I had them read a verse from the book of Jonah that has pierced my heart of late: “Those who cling to worthless idols  forfeit the grace that could be theirs” (Jonah 2:8). When we think we can meet everyone else’s expectations, and our own sense of self-worth is determined by their approval (or lack of it), that is idol-worship, brothers and sisters!

Beth was speaking straight to me when she writes: “You and I are going to have to come to a place where we stop handing people the kind of power only God should wield over us. Change will not come easy. Old habits die hard. But we can make the radical decision to rewire our security systems.”

I’ve put dozens of my favorite quotes from So Long, Insecurity on the Facebook page for the book; if you’re interested you can find them there. And if you haven’t read this New York Times bestselling hardcover yet and want a chance to win a copy, leave a comment below.

God is installing a new security system in my heart; how about yours?

Sacred Symbols

Laurel's wedding present

No one, I suppose, tears up at the sight of an old wooden ice cream maker. No one has reason to but me.

I found it in a corner of our basement after the water receded from the July floods that declared five counties of Illinois a disaster area. We had been away when the rains came, and when we arrived home ten days later most of our choices were simple. Sodden storage cabinets, molding mattresses, college yearbooks with pages stuck together? Toss, toss, toss.

A helper picked up the ice cream maker from a damp corner and looked at it dubiously. “Looks like it’s drying out but it’s pretty rusty…had this long?”

“Exactly 34 years and three months,” I answered. “It was a wedding present and…it means a lot to me. It was from Laurel.”

Laurel was my college roommate. Strong-willed Laurel – the one who coerced me to take rock-climbing classes with her because she had a crush on the instructor. Crazy Laurel – the free spirit of the 70’s who got cited by Campus Security the night Mike and I got engaged for honking her horn while joy-riding in celebration all over campus at midnight.

Laurel in 1972, Fischer dorm

Decisive Laurel – who agreed enthusiastically to stand up at our wedding but neglected to admit she lacked the money to travel from her East Coast home to Chicago.  The day before the ceremony I was startled to suddenly find her at the door of our farmhouse, grinning broadly, her bridesmaid gown thrown over one shoulder and an Army Supply knapsack bulging on her back.

“I didn’t hear your car!” I exclaimed as we hugged.

“Don’t have one anymore,” she said nonchalantly. “I hitchhiked. Wouldn’t have missed the wedding. And here, take your gift! Couldn’t wait to get it off my back.”

It was a brand-new ice-cream maker: a five-quart RCW Frost King model with wooden slats and a hand-crank. The thing must have weighed ten pounds, and fiercely loyal Laurel had hand-carried it all the way from Long Island.

It is my last vivid memory of my impetuous friend. The following year she was descending from a climb on Oregon’s Mount Hood with that same instructor, now her husband. When the cry came: “Rock!”, Laurel ducked left while the rest of the group ran to the right. Her head was crushed. Critically injured, Laurel lay in a coma for six months. Her body eventually recovered. Her mind never did.

So when I look at that ice cream bucket in a corner of our basement, I don’t see an impractical, impossible wedding gift rendered useless by rust and damp. I don’t remember its cold refreshment when it was new.  I see instead a curly-haired young woman of 23 banging on my door in the spring of 1976, dropping her dusty gown in a heap before grabbing me in a hug.  I remember the day I learned the meaning of sacrifice.

On Sundays I sit in the sanctuary at church and gaze up at the cross suspended above the platform. We sing about it sometimes. And when I see that old rugged cross I don’t see a chapel decoration. I don’t remember how the worship crew hoisted it into view. I see instead a symbol of love and fierce loyalty. I remember the day I learned what it meant to have a Lord who loved me enough to sacrifice himself for me.

That old ice-cream maker and the cross have something in common, and it’s not just the wood they’re made from.