Stories of Hope: Alison Gibson

This is part of the series "Stories of Hope," in which ordinary people share how hope makes them live differently. To read the introduction, click here. If you have a story of hope you'd like to share, why not send me a message?

Alison Gibson is one of my dearest friends. We grew up in the same small town in the Northwest Territories - her mother was my kindergarten teacher! Our slightly different ages meant that we didn't actually spend time together in our youth, but all these years later we have settled not five minutes from each other here on Prince Edward Island. I'm thankful for her friendship and her insight into life lived with God, and life lived with hope. She says, "hope is about Jesus, not about me!"

The word "hope" can be thrown about recklessly. I do it all the time. "I hope it is sunny tomorrow." "I hope Sobey's has butter on sale soon." "I hope that warning light on the van doesn't mean anything serious."

I have hoped more desperately for many things, things that truly mattered to me. Two years ago, when I was almost 11 weeks pregnant I hoped that the signs of miscarriage were wrong. I have hoped through 14 years of marriage that my husband would be healed of the mysterious illness that plagues him. I have hoped for relationships to be mended, for stress to decrease, for more time, for more money when income and expenses just didn't balance out. I have hoped for stability and a 'home' for my children through many moves across 3 countries and 3 provinces.

None of these hopes is wrong, but as the circumstances of life play out there is inevitably grief and disappointment when some hopes are not fulfilled, if we have set our hearts on them. As if this isn't hard enough, like the grief over a baby I will never hold, I have discovered that even a hope fulfilled can feel... empty. If I hope for years that I will one day have a 'home' and then finally arrive, only to discover that the home has its flaws, what then? If I hope for the new job, the new baby, the husband, the holiday and then those things happen, or they come and go, and I still feel a gnawing discontent, what then?

In all earthly, human hope like this there is a sense of waiting. This is the hope that says, "One day... If only...." But there is another hope. This hope is a gift from God. The waiting is completed in Christ Jesus. As the Israelites in the Old Testament hoped for deliverance, they looked to the day prophesied when the Messiah, the Saviour would come. All would be different then. If only He would come! As Christians this side of the resurrection, we look back on hope fulfilled. We can live in the present of hope fulfilled.

We need this true hope. It doesn't fade. It isn't swayed by the winds of circumstances. It is always fulfilled. Not later. NOW.

We almost need a different word for this kind of hope. Hope that is so real it supports us. It is not a mild mannered hope. It stands defiantly against the suffering thrown at us. It is a bulwark standing firm against the enemy attack.

How do we live in hope, immersed in a place of contentment? Romans 5 says, "Therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. 2 Through him we have also obtained access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and we rejoice in hope of the glory of God. 3 Not only that, but we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, 4 and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, 5 and hope does not put us to shame, because God's love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us."

We have a choice when suffering hits us. We can choose to walk through the suffering with God and allow Him to shape us through it, or we can struggle on in our own strength. True endurance is not picking ourselves up time and again when we get knocked down. It is continuing to believe that God is good. God is faithful. God is our ever present help in times of trouble. If we choose to seek God in times of suffering, we encounter a shift in perspective. We begin to hope less for our own comfort and hope more for the glory of God to be revealed in our lives.

My hope can be summed up in one word. It is always fulfilled. It is sustaining. It is true. It is eternal. It is "Jesus."

But how I hear you say. There is only one answer that I know of. No shortcuts. It is to look for the presence of God in all your circumstances. He is there, but you need to see Him. Praise Him. Thank Him. Listen for His voice.... and crucially believe that He is good even when everything around you feels so, so bad. His presence changes everything.

I am writing this the day before the 2 year anniversary of my baby, at 12 weeks gestation, being born. When I was having labour pains, lying alone and afraid in the spare room of the house we were living in, I cried out to God, "This hurts so much, but the pain is for nothing!" God answered, "The labour pains speak of life. Your baby is not dead, she lives with me."

That same day, as the labour pains progressed, I prayed about the baby I would never meet this side of death. I believed God had said the baby was a girl but prayed for a name. I wanted the baby to have a name that meant "love" for I already loved her so much! I thought that later, I could search for such a name. A few hours later, my brother was praying for me over the phone and the name "Amanda" flashed into my mind. When I looked it up, I found that it means "She who must be loved." God himself had named my baby.

Do I continue to grieve? Yes. I have experienced deep sorrow. Yet somehow, God's voice spoken into the darkness brings assurance. I have thrown myself into God through this pain and He has answered. If tempted to doubt His goodness, I read Scripture that speaks otherwise. I pray with a soft heart.

When I first went to emergency at the start of the miscarriage, I continued to "hope" the baby would live. I prayed desperately, "Lord, let her life make an impact and glorify God."

This prayer has been answered... in the true hope that has been birthed in me. Jesus' presence changes everything.

Stories of Hope: Judy Gillis

This is the first in a series of "Stories of Hope," in which ordinary people share how hope makes them live differently. To read the introduction, click here. If you have a story of hope you'd like to share, why not send me a message?

Judy Gillis is someone I am honoured to call friend, someone who has been into the valley of the shadow of death and has come out the other side somehow radiant. If you've ever dealt with deep loss, her story will resonate. You'll find out what hope looks like to her. Thanks for sharing, Judy! 

Today, I saw someone I hadn’t seen in quite a few months. As we were catching up, we got to talking about the car accident, the one that instantly took our youngest daughter’s life back in October 2013, the one that turned all of our lives upside down. My friend had seen the notice in the paper and wanted to know a few details. I'm okay talking about it... now. 

Of course, whenever I talk about it, I still have to kind of separate myself from the fact that I’m talking about my baby girl. She was 21 … far from home, living in her car, trying to make  her way in the world, and trying to find a place to live. She was so tired; she fell asleep at the wheel … and losing her was harder than any one event I’ve ever had to go through. And yes, there are times – many times – I long to feel her arms around me, to hear her laughter or to see some of the zany facial expressions she used to come out with.

But … so many amazing things have happened that we could never have predicted – so many people have been touched and helped by her story that there is a part of me that understands (in some small way) some of why God welcomed a homeless girl into the best home she could possibly imagine!

I often thank God that He reached down into her heart and showed her that He is real, that she embraced Him only a little over a month before she died. We were able to share wonderful things with each other in those last 35 days. She still had a lot of rough edges (but then again, so do I. So does everyone.) Her conversion – her “white light” experience as I sometimes call it - has given me such comfort. Knowing that right now she is happier than she ever could have been here, and that I will see her again, helps me get through the tough times when I see someone who looks like her, or I hear a song she used to sing off-key on purpose just to make me laugh. The tears spring to my eyes … and that’s okay. It’s okay to miss her. It’s okay.

I get to tell her story often, and in the telling, I heal a bit more because her story reminds me that no life ever goes unnoticed. Every person has great worth. God is still in control, even when it seems like life is crazy and the pain is so great and so senseless. The very areas in which I have been wounded - those self-same hurts, that grief, those tears – God takes those and turns them around for good … so that when someone else is going through a hard place, I can empathize and come alongside that person with assurance that “He’s GOT this.” It’s not just words. It’s real. He is really there.

That’s really what hope is. It’s not the “I hope I win the lottery” kind of hope. It’s a knowing, a settled feeling, a sense that all is well. It’s a deep-seated assurance, based on a personal and vital experience with God. She had that. She had such a child-like faith, a calm assurance that everything was going to be all right – and I believe that if she wanted to leave a legacy behind, it would be that “I-know-so because He-said-so” kind of rock-solid confidence. That’s the kind of hope that is an anchor for the soul. He gives that.

So many times, I hear people say to me that God took our little girl (for one reason or another, maybe He needed another angel … or whatever the case may be). My hope, my trust in Him is not based on some arbitrary version of a God who would “take” someone, who would rob a parent of a beloved child. It might be seen as a matter of semantics, but I believe that God didn’t “take” her; He knew she was coming and He welcomed her home.

More than ever I believe that He is love. More than ever before, I believe that He is in control, that He works all things – even the seemingly horrible ones – together so that we can be more like Him (which is the best good there is!) I’ve seen Him do way too much in too many people’s lives (including my own) to believe otherwise.

Like today – my friend heard me talk about the accident, how the peaceful and tangible presence of God was in that car that night, and she felt what she described as “goosebumps” all the way down to her feet. I was able to give her my blog address on one of her appointment cards, and tell her how to find the posts I linked to, above, so that she could find out more about the few weeks prior to the accident. She thanked me and put the card in her pocket after writing my name on it beside the blog address.

This kind of thing happens quite a bit. God opens doors for me to share how amazing He is, and I just walk through them. And I am so very glad He does it.

You can read more about Judy's journey at her blogs Get Unwrapped and Iconoclastic. 

~lg

Sharing Stories of Hope

"One who has hope lives differently." (Pope Benedict XVI)

Hope.

It's been a red letter word for me. When God first spoke it to my soul over a year ago, it was whispered into a place of disappointment.

I took heart. I took it as a promise that things would change. And they did, but not in the way I first expected. In fact, those circumstances remain unaltered. Yet God's word still stands. Because of that, I've been holding on to hope. I've been listening for it other ways. I've been looking for it in unexpected places. I've been noticing how "one who has hope lives differently."

The world around me abounds in hopeless, or, at the very least, hope-shrunk, situations. But hope is a watchword for our time, a banner unfurled, streaming down the mountainside with beautiful news.

The more I look, the more I see it. People who have every right to be discouraged, disappointed and downtrodden, yet continue to live with this buoyant hope. They live differently. This is good news worth sharing, and I'd like to share some of their stories with you.

Tomorrow I will introduce my first guest blogger in a series of "Stories of Hope." She is someone I am honoured to call friend, someone who has been into the valley of the shadow of death and has come out the other side somehow radiant. If you've ever dealt with deep loss, her story will resonate. You'll find out what hope looks like to her.

If you have a story of hope to share, why not send me a message? Maybe you'd like to add your own red letters to the blog series.

"Hope does not disappoint, because the love of God has been poured out within our hearts through the Holy Spirit who was given us." (Romans 5:5) 

~lg

Confessions of the Real Prodigal

Father,

Could it be that you come with a tender word, even for the likes of me, long steeped in the economy of law and merits of righteousness?

How many times have I stood out on the back step, all too aware of my failings, waiting for my "time out" to be over, when all the time you are waiting for me inside?

How many times have I stared at my own stumbling feet, fearing your furrowed brow of disapproval, when I could have looked straight into your eyes and seen mercy reflected?

How many times have I tried to earn my way, prove my worth, and pass the test? You gave me a playground, and I made an obstacle course. You gave me grace and I rationed it so I would have enough for the next mistake. You gave me a home and I tried my best to be the perfect housekeeper.

But, oh, I don't have enough rugs to sweep the crumbs under, and I live like Cinderella in the ashes when you are kneeling before me with a basin to wash my feet. Why is it so hard to put down the broom, the score card, the record of my wrongs?

You give love, and I need empty hands to receive it. If it were a wage to earn, I'd work myself into the grave, but it's an inheritance that's given on the basis of a family name.

And here you call me little child.

You have every right to scold and berate and throw in my middle name for effect, so I know you mean business. But it's not business at all, and the only transaction in this whole equation is the one and only life you gave for me so you could give me your name forever.

"All I have is yours," you say.

No rationing, no interest fees, no conditions.

Pure gift, pure love, pure family.

So I can truly let go of my tarnished earnings and take your hand, come into the house where I will always have a home, be still and know you are Father.


(Luke 15:11-32)

~lg

When the Snow Crunches

At minus twenty, the sound of snow beneath my boots changes – it's the sound of my childhood.

When the snow crunches, winter has settled in, and no use fighting it. Its tune is infinitely more joyful than the slushy shuffle-step of warmer days. It is the sound of Dad splitting chunks of spruce and pine on the big chopping block, of chickadees seed-diving and scolding the squirrels, of a cardboard Polar Express racing through the backyard after dark. It is the sound of my fingernail scratching peepholes in the frost of my bedroom window, and the breathless hush of northern lights over the Slave River. It is a single sigh – the beauty of resignation.

When the snow crunches, we have an understanding, winter and I. Our friendship goes a long way back, to the dimmest of infant remembrance – me and my red parka tumbling off the toboggan in the shadow of Bear Rock. It embraced me from the start, and I had no reason to let go. There is freedom in bringing out the long johns and Sorels, which is the only real way to dance with the season. For after resignation comes delight. When the snow crunches my toes still tingle with the frostbite of our more intimate moments.

At minus twenty, the sound echoes in some deeper soul chamber, formed by a reality that chose me before memory, and shaped me like fast water flowing under the ice. No use fighting winter when the snow crunches. 

~lg 

Relational Homemaking

This was a post I wrote back in June 2012 over at Little Hearth & Homestead. This is where the rubber of deep theology hits the road of daily life. 

Homemaking.

I have the choice –

Is it a series of chores, or a sacred career?

Am I biding my time, or building the kingdom?

I need some kind of framework on which to hang the fingerpainting of my days.

I need a vision that puts the mundane into perspective.

I need the why behind the what.

At the end of the day, my home is a gift from God, and I am its steward. It is not an end in itself, and I am not the Master. I am a servant, and all we have belongs to the King.

My home is the environment and atmosphere in which my family grows, and so its design is crucial to the direction of our growth – toward or away from God, into or out of love.

Here the physical should mirror the spiritual. This is a place where what is most important should be most visible.

And I have decided that my goals as a homemaker are inextricably connected to my relationships. All my homemaking efforts should be directed toward four main relationships, which are also gifts from God.

It is what I call Relational Homemaking.

God

How does our home nurture my and my family’s relationship with God?

How does our home reflect the unconditional nature of God’s love?

How does the shape of our home form us into the shape of Christ?

How does our home point us to seek God’s kingdom first?

Marriage

How does our home contribute to love and unity in our marriage? 

How does our home make room for intimacy?

How does our home bring us together in mutual activities and a shared vision?

How does our home promote co-labour as co-heirs of the grace of life?

Children

How does our home encourage my children to know and follow God?

How does our home provide opportunities for loving nurture?

How does our home provide order and wonder for my children?

How does our home facilitate in the training of my children?

Hospitality

How does our home enable me to offer hospitality to others?

How does our home provide peace to others?
How does our home foster deep friendships?

How does our home point people to Christ?

~lg

Book List 2014

I feel quite sure I've left something out! But here is what I remembered to record:

Les Miserables (Victor Hugo) – On last year’s list, but I think it should count for 2014 too!

The Snow Queen (Hans Christian Andersen) - The original "Frozen" 

Anything (Jennie Allen)

The Birth House (Ami McKay) - Library book club

The Sisters Brothers (Patrick deWitt) - Library book club favourite 

Water For Elephants (Sara Gruen) - Library book club

Too Busy Not To Pray (Bill Hybels)

Anne’s House of Dreams (L.M. Montgomery) - Perennial favourite

Capital (John Lanchester)

Follow Me (David Platt)

Meditative Prayer (Richard Peace)

Toilet Training in Less Than A Day (Nathan H. Azrin & Richard M. Foxx) - truly life changing, ha! 

The Hobbit (J.R.R. Tolkien) - Re-immersion in Middle Earth 

Desiring the Kingdom: Worship, Worldview and Cultural Formation (James K. A. Smith) - excellent

The Mystery of Marriage (Mike Mason) - Highly recommended

Dared to Believe (Andrew Barron & Lindsey Gallant) - Revisiting what I wrote 7 years ago!

Rilla of Ingleside (L.M. Montgomery) - I cried this time

The Midwife (Jennifer Worth) - The real story behind the Call the Midwife series

Shadows of the Workhouse (Jennifer Worth)

Documents of Christian Worship (James F. White)

What's the best book you read in 2014? Any suggestions for must reads in 2015?

~lg

Prayer for a New Year

Let us walk over the threshold of this day with new hope.

Let us leave behind the shadows of a dying year, and journey in the light.

Let us press on to what lies ahead, and to the One whose hold will carry us through. 

Let us rise each day to the dawn of His countenance. 

"The Lord bless you and keep you; the Lord make His face shine upon you, and be gracious to you; the Lord lift up His countenance upon you, and give you peace." (Numbers 6:24-26)

Happy 2015!

~lg

Christmas Lights

We drove to North Rustico to look at the lights, and ended up out on the point, past the lighthouse and up the dirt track, with the water on our right and darkened summer cottages on our left. Up to where the dunes parted for the boat launch and the row of rocks stretched out into the sea. We put the windows down and turned the engine off. The kids put their heads out the windows, and so did I. There it was – the sound of the waves.

Sometimes I forget that sound in winter. We don’t think to go to the beach in December. But tonight I’m glad we did. The old roving light illuminated the rocks in its steady sequence from somewhere behind us. We could just make out the white of the breaking water on the sand, and from there out all was dark and the sea and thy sky seemed one dark mystery save for a few stars overhead. Where are the boundaries between heaven and earth anyway?

There are nights when the veil is thin. Holy nights kissed by the salty air. Hushed nights when we turn our revving, striving, sputtering engines off and look out to sea.

We sat eclipsed for just a few minutes, silence peppered with the questions and exclamations of small children out past bedtime. Transcendence can creep up on you when you least expect it. Before we rolled the windows up, the kids called a goodbye to the ocean. “See you in the summer,” they said, and Arden blew a kiss into the night – “I love you.”  

~lg

Solstice

On this the darkest day, the longest night, I’m left wrestling with an angel who dares me to let go, but I won’t because the morning has not yet broken, and I have not yet been blessed. These angels are not fluffy bundles of feathers and painted smiles. They can put the fear in you and your bones right out of joint. I am tired of this fight, this lengthening night, but I am locked in embrace till I see your face. The light will dawn and you will say my name, and then I will know my contender. Then my limp will be my trophy.

~lg 

Free (lyrics)

Long my spirit lay with no hope in the darkness
Couldn't see my way through the shadows of night
Then the Saviour came, stepped right into my sorrow
Lifted up my head, filled this dungeon with light

My chains fell off
My heart was free
And I heard the voice of the Risen One call out to me. . .

Rise up, rise up and follow Him
Cast off the heavy weight of sin
And be free
Free indeed
Rise up, rise up and follow Him
Run to the prize that won't grow dim
You are free
Free indeed

Bound and broken one - He is hope in the darkness
Weak and weary one - He's your song in the night
Lost and lonely one - you have not been forgotten
Oh lift up your head, He comes flaming with light

'Tis mercy all
Immense and free
The amazing love of the Risen One calls out to me. . .

Rise up, rise up and follow Him
Cast off the heavy weight of sin
And be free
Free indeed
Rise up, rise up and follow Him
Run to the prize that won't grow dim
You are free
Free indeed

Let every chain be broken
Let every heart be free
The curse of sin and death and hell is crushed beneath His feet


(with inspiration from Charles Wesley's hymn, And Can It Be)
* Acts 12:1-10, Hebrews 12:1-2, Philippians 3:12-14

~lg

Memory of a river

The Slave River, Fort Smith, Northwest Territories

And even in the dead of northwest winter, with a silver hush over all the world, the rapids murmur. There are waters that run so fast they never freeze, never succumb to winter’s sleep. In the silent nights, their voice is heard, the hopeful lullaby of December. Summer’s roar is a powerful whisper still, a testament to the faithfulness of living water. Perhaps it is their music which calls down the northern lights to dance wild rose above the white river. Perhaps it is their music which echoes in the ache of a distant island. Perhaps even these eastern waves and breakers can hear it, a dozen parallels away, singing over Canadian shield to this sandstone, you are not forgotten.

~lg 

New Article: At the Heart of Christmas

Click on over here to read my latest article in Testimony Magazine.

"The mystery of the Incarnation hovers over Christmas, whispering through the twinkling lights and beckoning in the silent nights. That “God of God, Light of Light, very God of very God; begotten, not made”  should come down from heaven and put on our tattered flesh—here is awe and wonder! Here is joy to the world and all the true magic of Christmas. Immanuel has come: “The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory …” (John 1:14).

But what a home we gave Him then. “No room at the inn,” the story goes. Bethlehem hospitality fell short that night in what could only be described as an epic fail. Now, eager to make amends, we sing, O come to my heart, Lord Jesus, There is room in my heart for Thee. We want to clear a space, sweep away the dung and stale hay, and prepare a proper bed for baby Jesus. If God is choosing to make His home in us, then we feel we need to have things just right on Christmas Day.

Yet, almost inevitably, the turkey burns or the cat throws up under the tree. Tensions surface between family members or we are stuffing our mess into a hall closet two minutes before company is due to arrive. It’s so hard to get it just right, so hard to make space in our cluttered souls. How many times do we lie awake the night before Christmas whispering, “I’m not ready”?

  

But what if Christmas is not so much about making room in our hearts for God as it is God making room in His heart for us?"

Read more here...


~lg

Run for Covenant

What I want to say is this: In the face of the bewildering nature of human interaction, there is nothing better than to throw oneself headlong into those relationships defined by covenant. When you want to run for cover, run for covenant. When restlessness calls like the mythical merfolk out beyond the sandbars, don’t waste your time splashing in the tidepools straining to hear more. Turn and run for the hills, to the Mount Zion of your relational landscape. Run to the shelter of timber and hearth before the storm surges up and sweeps you out to sea. Run to the fortress of covenant.

The only true freedom to be had is that of obedience, and the sacred bonds of spoken vows will only chafe unless you are close enough to run together. It is not restriction – it is the place of revelation. It is not limitation – it is the face of love, whose lines can only be traced, caressed, transfigured in the constant whispering of the covenant oath.

Here is grace.

Here is truth, when the tempter’s lies buffet.

Here is trust, when trials should come.

Our original response to original sin is a patchwork cover threaded with shame. And there are days when the old bruised heel still aches along the stony way of life. But even though the path back may be laced with thorns, the healing balm is held by the hands of covenant.

It is the covering for shame.

It is the context for sanctification.

It is the geography whose contours lead to the horizon of hope and whose ridges all rise in ascent to the holy city.

What I want to say is this: Run for the covenant. For Christ Himself will always be found in the relationships He institutes. He is present in the sacramental mystery as King of the mountain. He is its heart. So run for covenant. Run for love. Run for your lives. Run to Christ.

~lg

Terror, Love, and Living Free

And with all this "terror" round about us, what is the antidote to fear? Oddly enough, not courage, not even faith, but love. When the shots ring out and the doors lock down, we do not hold on to bravery, but to love.

"Perfect love casts out fear." (1 John 4:8)

Bravery alone steels itself for the onslaught to come. Love puts on the armour of God and sets out to do good. To be sure, this making vulnerable takes courage, but bravery must be put in service of this end if it hopes to be a virtue.

To put our hearts in lockdown - this is the true tyranny of terror. To hide our faces from the other, to stockpile hate, to execute hope - this is the victory of darkness. But hearts in love are free from fear, for love's end is always, eternally life. Hearts in love are free to give unconditionally and serve sacrificially, because they are secured in a reality stronger than death.

Love is the only thing which will loosen fear's grip. If we are afraid, the first thing we must do is find some way to love - love concretely, love generously, love in new and strange and difficult ways - because it's the only way we will ever face the last thing when it comes.

Love your child, love your neighbour, love your enemy's child. Make a cake, make a peace offering, make a friend. Say a prayer, send a letter, start a movement. Give your stuff, give up your seat, give your life. Where fear blows a hole, step in. What we need most now are love's boots on the ground.


~lg