Joy unspeakable.

Five years ago tomorrow, I miscarried for the first time. It’s still one of the deepest pains I’ve ever known. But tonight as I was writing and praying, I decided to go back to the letter I wrote Anna the day I found out I was pregnant. And I stand amazed again: such a powerful, loving God watches over me. He’s a God who lets nothing, even the laws of nature, stop him when it comes to blessing his children.

Wednesday, 17 April 2013

Dear Baby,

I found out a few hours ago that you’re joining our family. No news ever could’ve made me more excited: you have only existed in my dreams until now. I missed you before I ever knew you, so I can’t even tell you how wildly overjoyed I am that God has blessed your dad and me with the gift of you! You are so loved and wanted there aren’t even words to express it.

The first thing you need to know in life is how wonderful your dad is. Besides Jesus, your dad is my favorite thing about being alive. He’s strong, kind, and loving; in other words, he is exactly what every man should be. And no need to worry, Baby – he’s also unbelievably good-looking, so you will be too. I love your dad most of all in the world because he loves Jesus and he loves me. Love is hard sometimes, Baby, but your dad will do whatever it takes to love you and support you. He was in my heart decades before I knew him, kind of like you.

I don’t know anything about your personality, Baby. I don’t know the choices you will make or what you will be good at or who your favorite person will be. I don’t even know yet if you’re a boy or a girl. But I know this: you are ours, and that means we will love you forever. Even more importantly, you belong to Jesus, who is the source of all power and love in the world, so you are safe forever too. In fact, I’ve already been talking to Jesus about you, and it’s sounded a bit like this: Thankyouthankyouthankyouthankyouthankyou.

With so much love,

Mama

Positive pregnancy tests.

I write my baby letters. Sometimes I speak them to her* when we’re in the car by ourselves. Sometimes I type and save them. Sometimes I pray them aloud so she can hear. There’s no telling what people will say to her when she gets here, so I want to make sure she’s got nine months of truth packed into her tiny brain. I tell her how much her dad and I love her, how wonderful her family is, how she can always trust Jesus. In fact, I never run out of things to tell her. The problem is I can’t seem to write about her. I wish I could tell you how miraculous she is and how much joy and wonder she’s brought us already. But every time I try, it comes out in a syrupy, overwrought voice that doesn’t sound much like mine.

I can tell you this. For a full decade, four medical professionals (three of whom are doctors) in two states assured me I couldn’t support a pregnancy past five weeks, and my body proved them right three times. It wouldn’t produce progesterone, and artificially spiking production didn’t work. PCOS seemed to be the culprit, but no one was certain. After several fruitless months of trying and three losses during my five-year first marriage, I didn’t have a reason to believe the doctors were wrong.

Then on March 8 of this year, I married the strongest, kindest man I’ve ever met. And almost immediately started vomiting.

We went on the honeymoon I’ve always dreamed of – mountains, cabin, fireplace, Jacuzzi, wine. And it was good. And never did “ovulation days” cross my mind because I was so obviously, certifiably, doctor-approvedly infertile. But then sneaky things started happening. A few mornings I felt so nauseated I couldn’t get my clammy self out of bed. And with a passion unrecognizable to me, I craved red meat. As in, I literally salivated over the raw hamburgers at the grocery store one day. I might have torn the package open with my fangs and feasted if the butcher hadn’t been right in front of me, asking from a healthy distance whether I needed assistance.

Then on the 17^th of April, I put on my favorite dress, kissed my husband, and headed to work. I realized I hadn’t menstruated, an odd thing since my medicine keeps me from being even an hour late. So on a whim I picked up a pregnancy test and a decaf coffee on my way. Maybe a few prayers escaped into the air as I did these things, but mostly my mind raced with menstruation math. When I arrived at my desk, I set down my bag calmly. I sauntered to the restroom. My steady hands placed the test on the sink. Less than a minute later, I peered over and saw the two pink lines that had already formed. Two. “Oh, God,” I breathed.

People have asked if we were trying to get pregnant. Of course, the answer is no; not only were we not trying, but we didn’t think we could. That doesn’t mean, however, that my baby is a “mistake.” Even though she wasn’t part of our plan, she has always been part of the Great Design God has for the planet. Our plan is short-sighted and imperfect in a thousand ways. But this baby – the one whose mother has a reproductive disorder – is the one God has chosen. He wants a person created out of our DNA, to be parented by us, to make his compassion and power visible to others. So whether the timing seems right or wrong, whether my body seems capable or incapable, whether other people agree or disagree, my man and I will love and raise our baby to bring glory to God.

I asked God one night in an overwhelmed state, “How did this happen? And why is it happening now?” I got an answer, flashing in my heart like a marquee: For my glory. So I already know how the story turns out: God’s glory will be undeniable. What a perfect reason for a baby to be born.

* I say “her” for two reasons: 1) simplicity, and 2) I believe I’m carrying a girl. The night my first pregnancy ended, which I have already written about, I knew I would one day have a baby girl and her name was supposed to be Anna because “Anna” means “grace.” I believe I am pregnant with that promise.

Stories.

Everyone knows not to pray for patience. Let me tell you what else not to pray for: a story. One icy Colorado afternoon a few Decembers ago, my former sister-in-law, who is a reading teacher, and I were talking about stories as we drove to the city. She and her husband have the most beautiful love story, and I asked her why she thought she’d been blessed with it. She shrugged and said, “I guess because I asked.” Later that night, I prayed a prayer that might have changed the course of everything, if you believe in that sort of thing. I asked God for a story. I asked him for adventure, to be involved in something bigger than I am. I asked him to show his glory through my life. I asked for indisputable miracles.

As all the best writers have proven, if you’re going to set up a miraculous event, you need a seemingly insurmountable conflict. You need something way too big for humans to fix in order to validate a deus ex machina. Well, if you’ve read my sex blog, you know a source of deep pain in my erstwhile marriage. I’ve written about other losses and sadnesses, too; others I’ve kept private. And now I feel like I’m in that part that all the best stories have where you think, “How in the world will this turn out?” But light is pushing through the cracks, just waiting for the moment God turns it loose and crumbles the pain with a season of joy. For instance, my man’s spectacular daughter let me take care of her on Saturday while she was ill, and his son gave me a precious nickname. Light. Last week God sent me the same message from four people who don’t know each other—two of whom don’t even know me well—in a way I couldn’t question. Light. A student gave me a huge and by all accounts undeserved compliment today. Light. More light is coming. God is teaching me joy.

I’ve learned that the best thing about asking God for a story is that when he gives it to you, you never really have the luxury of heading back in your own direction. You can fling open the door and storm off in a huff, but then he chases you with this crazy, powerful love unlike anything you’ve ever dared to imagine, this grace-full love that is exactly the stuff you were hurting for…and you fall into his arms again. You can’t doubt the veracity of the miracle when you are the miracle, when your whole story is the miracle. The joy and freedom are too real.

I don’t have anything in my story, miraculous or otherwise, figured out except that there is Jesus. Because when I am weak, then I am strong. Someone has to be behind that. Someone has to be writing that, and doing a better job than I could. Someone has to be authoring these struggles, conflicts, and “imperfections” to bring a level of artistry and depth to my character that wouldn’t otherwise be there. Every time I reach a moment of pain or conflict in my story, whether I caused it or it waylaid me, I see more of him and more of me. He develops the character of Amie by adding layer after layer of healing. I wouldn’t give that back for anything.

One of my favorite quotes is something I read on a coffee mug—that I totally should have bought—in Barnes and Noble once: “Everything will be okay in the end. If it’s not okay, it’s not the end.” I find that biblical: the endgame of my brokenhearted moments will be beauty for ashes. He’s promised me, and all of us, that. And that’s all the resolution my story needs.

Ears.

I have this thing with names. I’ve written about it once already. The thought of giving a blessing or honoring someone or telling a story with your baby’s name is such a precious concept to me. Many names are on my Love-It List, but as long as I can remember, my favorite name of all has been Kate. Growing up, my most beautiful Barbie was Kate. My favorite paper doll—yes, I played with paper dolls—was Kate. Just last year, I asked on FaceBook what my pen-last-name should be if my pen-first-name was Kate. It’s the perfect name—simple, elegant, and timeless.

So when I got pregnant in July 2008, I was beside myself with excitement. I kept thinking, Kate’s here! She didn’t stay long enough for me to know by way of scientific confirmation that she was a girl, but I know anyway because moms just know. When I daydreamed about what the rest of her name could be, a Buechner quote kept resurfacing: “Grace is something you can never get but only be given. There’s no way to earn it or deserve it or bring it about any more than you can deserve the taste of raspberries…or bring about your own birth.” Having for years worn that definition of grace like a pair of contact lenses, I knew my daughter could have no other name. She was something I could never deserve, something only God could give me. My then-husband let me take the reins with naming, so I chose Anna Catherine. Anna means “grace,” and Catherine means “pure,” so my baby girl would be named “pure grace.” Which is exactly what she was. But she’d go by “Kate,” of course.

Unfortunately, Kate faded from me on Sunday, 14 September. I cried steady, silent tears, sitting with my back against the tub. I was a heartbroken mother whose daughter had been taken in the night. I hadn’t protected her, hadn’t known how. I did the only thing I could: I crawled back into bed and prayed. At first, I heard nothing, but the tender presence of the Holy Spirit comforted my heart. Then I had a powerful, inexplicable urge to look up Isaiah 49:16, a verse I did not already know. Bewildered, I opened my Bible and read: “See, I have written your name on the palms of my hands…” My name. Kate’s name. The tears came again, but this time for an entirely different reason. The verse reminded me that I am so precious to God that when he looks down at his hands—or, perhaps, Jesus’s—he sees my name. And in a small way, I had the same thing going with my Kate. The veins in my right wrist, I had noticed as a child, form an unmistakable K. After that night, it became a sweet reminder. Kate was gone, but her name was written on my palm, so to speak, and God makes all things new. God restores.

Over time, he has restored my heart. Time, I believe, numbs pain, helps a wound scar over maybe, but God actually heals. Certainly, sadness hits me unexpectedly sometimes, or with unexpected force: it was the saddest and most unfair day of my life, being at once Mother and Not-mother. But God has guided me through the process of letting my daughter stay with him, of not begrudging the laws of nature that sent her his way. For too long, I carried her as a millstone around my neck. I feared that not thinking about her might mean she never existed. As her mother, it seemed to fall on my shoulders to acknowledge her fleeting presence. But God has taken my heart from that prison of grief into a position of grace. I do think about her occasionally, but in a peaceful, heavenly way. I imagine her spinning giddily in a white cotton dress in a field of lavender, so drunk with joy she dissolves into giggles. I imagine her sitting on Jesus’s lap, enamored with him, asking him questions with the ethereal wisdom that a heaven-born child must possess. I imagine her smiling when she sees me, if you do that sort of thing in heaven.

And tonight, when it was time for a little earth-born girl to fall asleep, she wriggled onto the couch next to me and settled into my arms. She looked into my eyes with a beautiful face lit by a grin and laced her fingers with mine. She and I do not share DNA. I do not have memories of her in the womb. She does not belong to me in the way she belongs to her mother. But she loves me, and I love her, and we both love her father more than we could tell you. She and her brother have become a part of my heart, and as I look forward to many years with the man I love, I feel doubly blessed to be their friend as well. I never knew life could be this good, this full. But when God restores life and fulfills promises, he doesn’t do a halfhearted job of it. Speaking of promises, those letters the veins in my wrists so clearly form happen to be their initials—hers and her brother’s. As someone who does not believe in coincidence, only divine winks, you can imagine how this hits me. Especially since her name is “pure grace,” too. And she goes by Kate.

If you ever wondered whether God hears you cry out, whether he knows who you are…he does.

Adultery and Murder.

Certain words in the Christian “language” have always bothered me because I felt I should use them, but had no concrete idea of what they meant. “Redemption” is an example. My mind had always roughly equated it with “salvation,” and I didn’t understand the need for both a Savior and a Redeemer. A few weeks ago I started digging around in Scripture to see what else besides salvation might be under the jurisdiction of a “redeemer.”

As it turns out, there once lived a handsome, heroic king who was everybody’s favorite. He was a warrior, a poet, and a musician—a Renaissance man to be sure. Having been anointed by God at a young age and close to God all his life, he was richly blessed with peerless military prowess, a number of gorgeous wives, endless cash flow, and the unshakeable protection of God. One day, after receiving news of another blowout victory, he sauntered up on the roof and looked with pride over his kingdom. Out of the corner of his eye, he noticed a woman more beautiful than his imagination could have produced. He turned to gaze on her more directly as she rinsed her hair. The water caught the sunlight, illumining her perfect figure with an amber glow. His body ached with desire, and, afraid to move, he whispered to his servant, “Who is this woman?” The latter followed the path of his vision and responded, “Oh, that’s Bathsheba, Uriah’s wife.” The name sounded magnificent as David turned it over on his tongue. Bathsheba. He knew it was fate and sent the servant to bring her to him.

It was every man’s dream followed by every man’s nightmare. The two spent a passionate evening together before David said, “You better get home.” Bathsheba regretfully acquiesced, and the two parted with wistful half-smiles and several lingering good-bye kisses. She was the subject of many a daydream of David’s, and he thought often and fondly of his one-time lover. But eight weeks or so later, his fleeting thoughts of the bathing beauty were halted: David was delivered an unsigned message that simply read, “I’m pregnant.” His heart thudded against his ribcage and he lie back on the bed, trying to figure out the best way to deal with his unwelcome surprise. Finally, he called for his servant and ordered, “Get Uriah out here.”

Uriah was a really good man, serious about both work and ethics. To begin their conversation, David praised this quality and then constructed the pretense of asking for battle news. Uriah gave him a quick rundown and David said, “You’ve obviously had a difficult stint out there; why don’t you go home to your wife and relax.” They shook hands and in no time, Uriah was on his way. But he didn’t go home. He slept outside the city walls with the guards since he knew his fellow soldiers were doing the same. David saw him the next morning and asked suspiciously, “I told you to go home. Why didn’t you?” Uriah explained his commitment to his men, and while David appreciated the sentiment, it was imperative that Uriah sleep with his wife as soon as possible. This went on for a few nights until David realized there was just no convincing Uriah to go home and enjoy his wife’s delightfully perfumed embrace. So he switched to Plan B and wrote a letter to the commander. He ordered the commander to put Uriah on the frontlines where he would most certainly be killed, forever ignorant of the news of the king’s bastard child.

The commander did not make a habit of questioning the king, so Uriah was predictably killed in battle. The commander sent word back to David that the enemy had surged in forcefully, and Uriah was among those who died. Bathsheba appropriately went into mourning, but as soon as her time was served, David sent for her and married her (II Samuel 11).

In the space of one story, David broke half the Commandments: he coveted, committed adultery, lied, murdered, and stole, all because one afternoon he noticed a beautiful woman. But instead of ousting David and cutting his psalms out of the Bible, God used the once-sinful union of David and Bathsheba to bring Solomon into the world, a man whose renowned wisdom in Proverbs and Ecclesiastes still astounds. Furthermore, God used David and Bathsheba and “the child of their child of their child a thousand years thence,”* to bring about the birth of his own Son. So the lineage of Jesus—of Jesus—includes a gigantic, five-Commandment-breaking sin, a skeleton in the closet if there ever was one. But God’s love covered the whole thing and restored it to perfection, just like Romans 8:28 promises (“God causes everything to work together for the good of those who love God and are called according to his purpose for them,” NLT.). To me, redemption is something like that.

*part of a quote from Frederick Buechner’s Beyond Words

Hospitality.

When people find out I’m a French teacher, most of them respond one of three ways: 1) “I could never teach high school,” 2) “Bonjour!…That’s about all I remember,” or 3) “Why did you choose French?” In general, I’m sure people mean the third question benignly, but since humanities programs are slashed from universities like crazy of late, what I hear is, “Why in heaven’s name did you choose that?” In my French courses, in both college and grad school, the fact of being in a discipline that requires a constant fight for relevance was a frequent topic of discussion. It’s an increasingly prevalent opinion that students’ time would be better spent on science or math. So I do a preemptive strike on the first day of French I. I tell my students that the only reason our planet is of any consequence at all is that there are people on it. And the only way these people can get anything done is to communicate with each other. The more people we can communicate with, the more efficiently and effectively we can get all our things done. And since the brightest people in the world are not concentrated in one country, they speak different languages. Ergo, we learn languages. That is the pragmatic argument anyway.

But that wasn’t compelling enough to 17-year-old Amie to make her choose French. I usually tell people that French chose me, in fact. My French textbook called out to me: “You love to travel? Countries on five continents claim me as their national language. You love to read? Study me, and you can read millions more books. You love words? I’ll give you a whole new set of words to play with.” Clearly, 17-year-old Amie was persuaded to study French by selfish reasons. But as I got further in, I discovered that learning another language isn’t about speaking so much as listening. Conversing with someone, when you think about it, is pretty darn magical. Language, mere sounds your mouth makes or lines and dots scratched from the tip of your pencil, translates your feelings and thoughts into something others can understand. So the act of learning another’s language communicates, “Understanding you is important to me.”

If that hadn’t already hit home for me, it certainly did while I was in the hospital last week. One of my technicians was named Jacotte, a kind, lovely Haitian woman. On the second afternoon that she came in to check my vitals, she said, “You speak French.” Surprised, I said, “I do. How did you know?” She smiled. “The way you say my name. I said to myself, ‘Jacotte, that girl called me by my name. She speaks my language.’” From that point on, barely two words of English were exchanged between us. At one point Jacotte told me, “It feels so good to speak my language. I don’t get to do that much.” So Jacotte and I had a constant exchange of hospitality: she took attentive care of me physically, and I let her relax into her linguistic comfort zone for a few minutes each day. Following my surgery, Jacotte was the one who took me walking to keep my muscles in motion. She introduced me to everyone, saying, “This is my friend. This is mon amie.” And when my mom went to the desk to ask for Jacotte’s help, she said, “Yes, yes. Anything for mon amie.” I didn’t say anything special to this woman. I didn’t do anything extraordinary for her. But because she was able to communicate in her natural way, because I was willing to be at a linguistic disadvantage, Jacotte showed me every kindness she could.

I believe in studying math and science. I believe in studying organic chemistry and calculus and medicine and physics. But if we let go of language study—as many universities are now wont to do—vital lines of communication will be broken. International trust will be harder to win. Cultures will have trouble understanding one another. Why not study math and science alongside the way to communicate them? This way, we will continue to discover our friends, our amis.

Glossolalia.

Here is my deepest embarrassment as a girl raised Pentecostal: I have never spoken in tongues. It’s not for a lack of trying. I have listened to infinite how-to sermons on the topic, and at the end of each, I have traipsed down to the altar and done exactly as I was told, which varied wildly from preacher to preacher. One instructed us to interminably repeat one word – he suggested “hallelujah” – so that when the foreign words came, God wouldn’t have to surmount whatever complicated prayer we were praying. Another admonished us to stand with hands raised; God must see us praising – in exactly this manner, apparently – in order to be convinced of our desire. Another gave a three-step formula that even God can’t resist:  1) Confess your sins, 2) Surrender to God’s will, and 3) Ask sincerely for his Spirit to fill you. One of the aforementioned preachers vowed he would not leave the building until all seekers had spoken in tongues, but he lost interest with me after what felt like hours of coaching. He asked me if my heart was right, if I had any lingering sin. When I realized I was confessing sins I hadn’t even committed, I assured the man I’d done everything on my end that I could. He left that night with at least one devotee who hadn’t spoken in tongues.

God never did bless me with the gift, even though I wholeheartedly cast every preacher-advised spell on him I could. The unwillingness of my tongue to break free caused me stress and frustration for nine infuriating years. Six years ago, when I graduated with a B.A. in French and English, it intensified. I had never longed for the gift more: I’d spent the last few years of my life studying language, and I desperately yearned for the ability to use God’s own words to praise him. I had learned how to speak another people's language; why could I not do this with my Lord? How many times did I pray, “God, please let me speak in tongues”? Each time it didn’t happen, I was crestfallen anew.

If you don’t understand why this is a cause for embarrassment (rather than mere disappointment), let me explain. In many Pentecostal churches, such as the one I attended for eight of those nine years of frustration, my lack of speaking in tongues meant that I had not been filled with the Spirit. Therefore, I was not a full-fledged Christian because I didn’t have the power boost that his Spirit gives you. Essentially, the “other half” of my salvation was hanging in the balance. Speaking in tongues was not a choice. And I craved it besides.

I learned in a college class for my minor that this Pentecostal doctrinal stipulation on salvation comes from the Acts account of the Day of Pentecost (2:1-13, NLT): On the day of Pentecost all the believers were meeting in one place. Suddenly, there was a sound from heaven like the roaring of a mighty windstorm…Then, what looked like flames appeared and settled on each of them. And everyone present was filled with the Holy Spirit and began speaking in other languages*, as the Holy Spirit gave them this ability…When [others] heard the loud noise, [they] came running, and they were bewildered…“How can this be? These people are all from Galilee, and yet we hear them speaking in our own native languages…about the wonderful things God has done!” So the thought line is this: when the Holy Spirit fills followers of Jesus, speaking other languages ensues. Note that the church has relaxed the prerequisites of the “mighty windstorm” and the “flames,” but the speaking of other languages is still a requirement.

One May afternoon a few years ago, I was reading the Bible and happened upon 1 Corinthians 12, part of which declares: All of you together are Christ’s body, and each of you is a part of it…First there are apostles, second are prophets, third are teachers, then those who do miracles, those who have the gift of healing, those who can help others, those who have the gift of leadership, those who speak in unknown languages. Are we all apostles? Are we all prophets? Are we all teachers? Do we all have the power to do miracles? Do we all have the gift of healing? Do we all have the ability to speak in unknown languages? Do we all have the ability to interpret unknown languages? Of course not! (vv. 27-30, NLT). My head reeled, and I read it several times more: “Do we all have the ability to speak in unknown languages?…Of course not!” Oh, wow, I thought. I put the Bible down and lie on my back, staring at the ceiling. Wow, my brain kept saying. I can’t explain the overwhelming grace I felt. And you are a teacher, my Lord whispered to my heart. And I am so pleased. It was too much for words, something inexplicable and glorious and freeing and joyous.

Later, when my heart realigned with my brain, I did some thinking. No doubt, God did a beautiful thing on the Day of Pentecost; what modern-day church wouldn’t want it? People verbally exploded in praise, such that sticking to their own languages couldn’t describe the bubbling of the Holy Spirit inside them. That’s holy and God-given and divinely lovely. However, to require a reenactment of such from every believer – and from the God they serve – is constricting and unholy. God will not be forced into doctrine because it so pleases the church overseer. God works as God desires because only he has complete wisdom. Furthermore, as God is anything but one-dimensional – look at the rainbow of his actions and words and emotions throughout the Bible – so should our reflection of him be. In the church he raises up apostles, prophets, healers, teachers, etc., and each of these roles reveals a little more about the God we serve. If we were all unknown-language-speakers, where would our interpreters and leaders and miracle-workers be? The wisdom of God is manifold and diversified by definition.

I have been filled with the Spirit for years. I never dared believe it until I read the 1 Corinthians passage because my experience did not include the linguistic manifestation; nonetheless, I know it’s true because I do things that reach people. And the reason for that is the Holy Spirit’s stirring in me. My victories with students, for example, come from the pouring out of the Holy Spirit’s wisdom in me. Pieces I have written that have blessed someone are from the Holy Spirit’s words in me. He uses me, and I am filled.

In my experience, conservative Pentecostals do not agree. A well-read Pentecostal layman a few years my senior is insistent that I am missing a “higher power” in my walk with the Lord because I don’t speak in tongues. He explained to me a few years ago that two things have held me back; namely, that I didn’t want it enough, and after so many missed opportunities, I have now closed my heart to the possibility. My response is two scriptures: 1 Corinthians 14:33, God is not a God of disorder but of peace, and 1 Corinthians 12:11, It is the one and only Spirit who distributes all of these gifts. He alone decides which gift each person should have. The first verse speaks to my years of disorder, confusion, and anger over not speaking in tongues, contrasted with my now perfect peace over not having that particular gift (at least, not now), but being blessed with others instead. The second verse dovetails with this, explaining that the Spirit gives the gifts as he deems necessary. He’s the only one doling them out, and he has not seen reason as of yet to allow me to speak in tongues. In the same way that he doesn’t give everyone the gift of healing (nor does the church doctrine require everyone to have it…), he’s not giving everyone the gift of unknown languages. Should he see fit one day for me to speak in tongues for a moment or for the rest of my life, I will be open and willing. In the meantime, I will simply learn to trust his judgment.

*Although this is somewhat of a side point, I think it’s important to note that the languages spoken on the Day of Pentecost were earthly languages. The gift of these languages brought others to the scene where God’s power could be displayed.

Doughnuts.

Don Miller tells a beautiful story in his work Through Painted Deserts about God’s provision. He’d climbed down the Grand Canyon with a friend--a feat of which the mental, physical, and emotional toll was nearly unbearable. After a particularly grueling day, his friend asked him, “If you could have access to anything right now, what would it be?” Miller replied, “Tortillas and scrambled eggs.” An odd answer perhaps, given his more immediate needs, but he went on to explain how strongly the meal reminded him of home and family. When the pair emerged from the Canyon, they resumed their trip but didn’t get far: their jalopy broke down. They walked to a nearby diner to eat, and guess what was remarkably available for breakfast? Yep, tortillas and scrambled eggs. And guess what was wrong with their truck? Nothing; it started up the moment they were ready to leave. Miller says it brought tears to his eyes, realizing how personal our God is. Even something as simple as breakfast food becomes important to God when it’s important to us. Knowing how much pleasure tortillas and scrambled eggs would bring Miller, our Daddy-God orchestrated a plan for him to have them.

I have never climbed the Grand Canyon and completely lack the desire to try. I do, however, understand the concept of an experience that reduces you to a helpless mass of flesh dependant on a great big God. The last two years have brought enormous challenges in every area of my life: academic, relational, physical, personal, spiritual. One such challenge was my master’s examinations, which I successfully completed last Friday. Spaced over a two-week period, there were four parts, two written and two oral, based on a list of more than 200 works in French. The most terrifying component of the exam came last: the orals. The panel could ask me literally anything from any work on the list, starting with the Revolution. To say this is “terrifying” is an understatement of gargantuan proportions. Not only are you worried you don’t know enough about the individual works, but you’re also wondering whether you know enough historical context, whether you can remember what you’ve read, whether your nerves will hinder your mental capabilities during the exam, and so on. In a word, it’s nerve-wracking.

It’s no wonder, then, that I woke up Friday morning with a stomachache and tears in my eyes. And a huge craving for doughnuts. Huge. You’d think I was pregnant. My brain and heart were so worn out from the stress of the previous two years—and, of course, the task in front of me—that all my nervous energy zeroed in on one desire: a doughnut. Irrationally, I thought, “The only thing in the world that could calm me down right now is a doughnut.” When Jeff asked what I wanted for breakfast, I said, “A doughnut. I want a doughnut.” I didn't get one. It was almost more than my distressed self could take. “No doughnut?” it asked me quietly. “But that’s all I want.” I tried to calm my inner self, saying, “Some way or another, I will get you a doughnut. But you have to shut up now with this nonsense so I can practice my presentation.”

As we were heading out the door, Jeff realized he had to make an emergency run to work to drop something off for his boss. When we got there, he promised to return quickly so as not to make me late for my appointment. I was surprised, however, when he returned in less than five minutes, knocking on my window. I rolled it down and was handed…a still-warm glazed doughnut. “I don’t know where these came from, but they were sitting out on the desk,” he said with a shrug. Tears sprang to my eyes for what must have been the eighty-eighth time that morning. I gratefully ate my doughnut and was reminded of Don Miller’s tortillas and eggs. God was providing for me, something so silly and so irrelevant, but something that showed me how personal he can be. Right then I knew that if my desire for a ridiculous little doughnut was important to God, then my need for success on the exams was that much more so. I knew that, as Isaiah promises, he’d be with me and would help me and hold me up in his victorious right hand (41:10). My human weakness doesn’t matter in the face of such an almighty God.

One July night in 2009, a week before I moved, I was telling God how nervous I was about what lay before me. He showed me the first chapter of Joshua, and I knew in my spirit the words were for me too. Wherever you set foot, you will be on land that I have given you…I will be with you. I will not fail you or abandon you. Be strong and courageous…Do not be afraid or discouraged. For the Lord your God is with you wherever you go (1:3, 5, 9). God had already prepared the way for me to succeed. Nothing about my program or my professors or my exams shocked him. He never had to reconfigure his plan for me because something didn’t happen the way he expected. In fact, he was and is so much bigger than a French degree. And if he was on my side—which the whole Bible promises—then what is there to fear? So I went in the exam room being strong and courageous, knowing that God had already given me the “land.” And a doughnut.

Magic.

Oz. Narnia. Wonderland. Never-Never Land. Consider our myths and fairytales, and you’ll see immediately that we humans crave magic. A deep, long-lost part of us must believe in it: decade after decade we teach these stories to our children. At a young age, we learn that if you shove aside the coats in your armoire, you will walk straight into a snowy kingdom where all your courage will be needed to fight the White Queen. Or that if a tornado strikes your house, you will land on a yellow brick road that takes you to the Wizard. Or that if you fall through a hole after being hurried there by a rabbit, you will find yourself in the midst of an epic battle between kindness and jealousy. Courage and magic intertwine at the core of our favorite childhood stories. My own favorite story, Charlotte’s Web, relies on the reader’s willing suspension of disbelief in farm animals’ ability to converse.

How does it happen that gradually such belief fades? Last month my three-year-old niece told me about a pink-and-blue tent she received for her birthday. When I asked her favorite thing about it, she replied, “Probably the lift-up door because I can lift it up and see what’s going on in there so I know if I want to play in it or go somewhere else with Mommy.” While I’m sure my niece knows that whatever might be “going on in there” is strictly her imagination, I’m betting she’d be an easy sell on all things magical. After all, to the young brain, both Santa Claus and rainbows are magical. How did exactly the toys you wanted appear under the tree sometime during the night on Christmas Eve? Somehow Santa must’ve done it. How does light shooting through suspended water droplets cause a bursting forth of colors in the same order every single time? Somehow God must’ve done it.

When it comes to faith, instead of harboring a childlike willingness to believe in magic, we enter into these ridiculous adult arguments about old earth versus new earth, or literal versus figurative. Those conversations might be enjoyable or even faith-building to some, but when they split friendships and churches—as they often do—something is wrong. Consider the words of Jesus in the Book of Mark: Let the children come to me. Don’t stop them! For the Kingdom of God belongs to those who are like these children. I tell you the truth, anyone who doesn’t receive the Kingdom of God like a child will never enter it (Mark 10:14b-15, NLT). Can you imagine children arguing whether Jesus turned water into wine or grape juice? Whether the Flood actually killed everything except that which was literally on the ark? Kids eat up Bible stories: they’re pure magic. You hear a lot more cries of “Cool!” than snorts of “This is obviously not meant to be taken literally” when you teach children’s Sunday school. And clearly, this is what Jesus is after—unbridled enthusiasm and belief in all things magically God. Luckily for most of us, Jesus doesn’t say, “Anyone who doesn’t receive the Kingdom of God like a theologian will never enter it.”

Am I taking issue with the discipline of theology? Certainly not. Am I suggesting that all sophisticated and/or inquiry-driven considerations of God should be quashed? Not at all. But I do wonder why we can’t go back to our child selves and be willing to accept a little more magic at face value. A fourteen-year-old Middle Eastern girl who’d never had sex in gave birth to God’s child? Let’s just go with it. As we’ve learned from the oft-quoted passage, Faith is the confidence that what we hope for will actually happen; it gives us assurance about things we cannot see (Hebrews 11:1, NLT). What is that if not a definition of believing in magic? So what if we can’t see God? Let’s just believe he’s there. We’ve never seen the wind or Neptune either, and we believe they’re out there. Maybe it’s time to peek back in that armoire with the children and see what they teach us about God.

Rainbows.

So when…I'm all by myself / And I can't hear You answer my cries for help / I'll remember the suffering Your love put You through / And I will go through the valley if You want me to.

— “If You Want Me To” by Ginny Owens

I didn’t grow up in a Christian denomination that spoke much about grace. Instead, sermons of sin, God’s displeasure, and the weakness of humans abounded. Once, a pastor informed my youth group that there was a specific formula one must follow when praying: God wouldn't listen otherwise. An evangelist who came to my church when I was barely a teenager suggested that those who weren’t filled with the Spirit might not be saved, and the only way to be sure you’d been filled with the Spirit was whether you’d spoken in tongues. For this reason and others, I grew up doubting the grace of God as frequently as I went to bed at night—and if I were being honest with myself, I’d have to say that I still sometimes have relapses. Every night for years and years, I prayed the sinner’s prayer just in case Jesus came back in the night. I wanted to cover my bases in case the last 24,591 sinner’s prayers didn’t take.

It’s no great surprise, then, that when I was eighteen years old, I was sure that God had revoked my salvation privileges forever. Looking back over my life, there were lots of things I regretted thinking or doing—from saying disrespectful things to my parents to making fun of people at school. Drugs, alcohol, and sex—the trinity of Big Sins—might never have tempted me, but there was still an undeniable sinfulness at my core. I kept praying words like, “I know You’re probably not listening anymore, but even if I can’t be saved, I’ll still try to live like I am. I still believe in You, and I’ll try to send others Your way. I’m just sorry I’ve screwed up so often, and this relationship didn’t work out any better.”

I remember praying exactly that way as my family drove to my aunt’s house one Friday afternoon. I was feeling especially bold that day, and asked God if he wouldn’t mind sending me a sign if in fact I hadn’t quite used up my grace allotment yet. “I know I’m probably overstepping the bounds here a little,” I whispered tentatively, “but if there’s still a little grace with my name on it, would you let me know?” I fell asleep, praying that prayer over and over. When I woke up from my nap, I swear the first thing I saw was a rainbow. Now, a rainbow might not mean much to you, but here’s what it says about them in Genesis: Then God said, “I am giving you a sign of my covenant with you and with all living creatures, for all generations to come. I have placed my rainbow in the clouds…When I send clouds over the earth, the rainbow will appear in the clouds, and…when I see [it], I will remember the eternal covenant between God and every living creature on earth” (Genesis 9:12-14, 16, NLT). So every time God sees a rainbow, he remembers his covenant with us: he has guaranteed us love, grace, and protection from the perils of life on earth. It only seems fitting that if that’s what’s on God’s mind when he sees a rainbow, the same can be true of me. I spent the next several moments in the car contemplating the mercy of God…until I began talking myself out of the message. “Mercy for others, but no longer for me,” I reminded myself, frustrated that I’d been swept away by the magic of nature. “God is merciful to those who have more self-control than I have and can keep themselves from sinning.”

A few months later, it was January of 2003, and I was in a church service with my then-boyfriend. I don’t remember what the minister preached about that morning, but I do remember the overpowering urge to ask for prayer. I was still struggling (privately) with the feeling of being outside the bounds of salvation, but that rainbow had sent a tiny ray of light into my being, causing me to question if all really was lost. Almost immediately after I walked up to the altar, a woman joined me and began praying for me, praying all the things I wanted to say but didn’t feel that I could. Without ever asking why I was at the altar, she told me that God found me beautiful, treasured, and even holy. She told me that God did not take kindly to his children being terrorized by Satan’s lies. She told me that God roars like a lion against anyone who bullies, mistreats, or harms one of his own. She told me that I was precious and forgiven…and I believed her. I finally believed that I was still accepted and that God was welcoming me to his side. My body crumbled to the floor, and for a long time I sat in the presence of the Lord, letting grace and peace flood me. I belong to Jesus, I belong to Jesus, I belong to Jesus…

That night I ate dinner at my boyfriend’s house, and then we all took our regular spots in the sunroom. His mom sat on a wicker chair in the corner, and he and I settled onto a glider. In moments, the sun was setting in the most unbelievable way: the sunset was quite literally a gigantic rainbow that spanned the entire sky. Red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, violet…they were all there in order as the sun slipped below the horizon. We marveled; none of us had seen a sunset like that ever before. (And while I can’t speak for them, I can say that I haven’t seen anything remotely like it since.) Remember? I heard the word echoing somewhere within me. Remember? God reminded me that we had a covenant, he and I. He’d painted both rainbows—skywriting, really—to remind me of the immense love he harbors for me. If I hadn’t already believed that God had power even over the colors of the sunset, I certainly did then.

Ever since, I have sought rainbows. Although, I usually don’t even have to: if I am going through a trying time, if something is weighing heavily on my mind, a rainbow will inevitably appear. God always reminds me of his ultimate control over the situation and of my privileged place in his family. Just yesterday I tearfully returned to my apartment in Virginia after spending a fabulous week of respite at home. I begged the Lord to tell me why I’m having to go through this—being away from home, family, and friends—in order to get a degree I’ve fallen out of love with. He didn’t answer, but did send a rainbow to meet me along the interstate. I love you more than words can express, remember?

Adieu.

French, like English, offers its speakers a number of ways to say goodbye, most of them dependent on when you expect to see each other again. A tout à l’heure has one of the smallest lapses of time between departure and reunion: it translates loosely to “within the hour,” although in conversational French it’s just used for “see you very soon.” There is the weekday staple a demain!, which means “until tomorrow.” From there, you have your generic goodbyes of indeterminate length but with certain reunions, expressions like salut for your friends and au revoir for your superiors. Then, there’s the scary one. It connotes a forever goodbye, quite literally translating “to God,” as in “I commit you to God.” This is a very certain goodbye, not one that had ever been said to me, not even mistakenly from a student, until today.

E and I were at the market for the last time this morning, picking up our final selections of bread, cheese, fruits, and vegetables. On our way out, I stopped at the Bread Man’s stand because I just couldn’t pass up being his customer one last time. Besides, he had my favorite bread, pépites au chocolat, which he hasn’t had since that first week. It was a sign.

When we approached his display, he said, “Ah! You were in Avignon, no?” Surprised at his remarkable memory—he must see a few hundred people pass by every Sunday—we replied that indeed we were. “You went to see the plays of the festival. I remember. I went there myself once, spent an enjoyable weekend there. This is a good tradition of France.” We agreed that we too had had a great time in southern France but that we were glad to be back in Lyon. I ordered my pépites au chocolat loaf and then informed him that it was our last market visit before returning to the States. “I had to come back once more for your bread!” I said with a smile.

He raised his eyebrows. “Your last market?” He shook his head. “When do you return? You are American, no? Going back to America?” We told him he was right and that our planes for America would leave on Saturday. “What city will you go back to?” For simplicity’s sake, E and I just gave him our home states. “Well, I must take my breads to America then! You have nothing like this in America. All factory breads!” We all chuckled as he handed me my box. “Well, I guess this is adieu then,” he said with a regretful expression. “Yes, adieu.” I nodded, almost tearing up, and echoed his goodbye.

It’s amazing that someone I spoke to for only a few minutes each week could cause such emotion in me. But this, this is why I chose language for my career. You learn a language so that you can hear other people speak: their stories, their joy, their pain, their fragility. You learn a language so that you can appreciate the Godlikeness of other people. You learn a language so that you can laugh with them, understand them, be welcomed by them and welcome them in return. That’s why it’s so close to God’s heart. He said at the dawn of mankind that it’s not good for us to be alone.

The Bread Man and I never spoke more than ten minutes at the time. We don’t even know each other’s names. But for four weekends, we looked forward to seeing each other and exchanging a few words of conversation in his native language. He clearly enjoyed regaling E and I with brief stories of traveling to Avignon and America and with proud claims of the superiority of his bread to anything else at the market or across the ocean. I enjoyed hearing it. That, if you ask me, is a little bit of God showing up in everyday life.

Kaleidoscopes.

There’s something deliciously confessional about a blog, isn’t there? Things I would never actually say, for fear that it’s just too corny or insignificant, I feel free enough to present to the entire cyberspace world to peruse at its whim, should it so desire. Case in point: the reasoning behind naming this blog “The Kaleidoscope.”

It’s a great word.

Well, that, and the word kaleidoscope comes from two Greek roots: kalos, meaning “beautiful,” and eidos, meaning “form.” Don’t ooh and ahh just yet; the word gets better. The suffix –scope means “instrument for viewing, observing, or examining.” Therefore, a kalos-eidos-scope is an apparatus specifically designed to show the viewer everything beautiful in a particular design or shape. A kaleidoscope’s raison d’être is to suffuse beauty into someone’s immediate vision. Which is kind of our mission as responsible humans, right? Isn’t the Golden Rule all about upping the world beauty quotient a little?

So this blog is The Kaleidoscope because being a kaleidoscope is my goal. (I know that sounds cheesy, but hey, I’m in confessional mode here.) My life ought to consist of a shifting and colorful design of love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. I ought to be living beautifully.

I must admit, though, living beautifully has proven enormously challenging up here in Virginia. My days are filled with nothing but reading and writing in my second language, which is shaky even on my best days. I work my derrière off and make decent, but not great, grades. Those factors (and others of which I will spare you) add up to major discouragement a lot of the time, and to make it worse, I’m not sure why I’m doing it all. My life’s dream is not moving to a Francophone country or being a scholar of French literature.

But here’s what I do know about language: it’s a kaleidoscope. Language is an instrument that lets you see the beautiful forms of life around the world. You don’t learn a language so you can speak it; you learn a language so you can hear it, so you can appreciate the beauty that is other cultures, other colors, other designs of life. And here’s what I know about God: he’s the power behind the kaleidoscope. He shifts people and their talents around to create intricate and lovely designs that saturate the world in beauty. His grace allows us to see the magnificence of the world; indeed, his grace is the magnificence of the world. The changing colors of leaves and flowers, the prisms tucked away in dewdrops, the rainbows spread from east to west: it’s all kalos eidos, beautiful forms.

It may be years before I know why God opened the door for me to study French at the University of Virginia; by all accounts, I don’t belong here. But until I get my next set of marching orders, I’m just going to try to live like a kaleidoscope.