Posted in Family

Together

Posted on by Ann B. Hibbard

I recently ran across something I wrote more than a few years ago, back when we believed empty nesting was still a long way off…

A couple of weeks ago, we headed out for a much-needed and highly anticipated family getaway. We left early on a Thursday morning because our mouth-watering, start-vacation-off-right, pancake and omelet breakfast treat was an hour away in the destination city of Hot Springs. It was a delight to hear the proclamations of, “Wow, that’s just good,” and see the expressions of delight as the kids tasted phenomenal apple pancakes, delectable omelets, fresh-squeezed orange juice, local sausage, thick bacon, and delightful apple butter. Before climbing back into the car to head on to our cabin twenty miles away, we walked off our fullness by browsing the shops that were open at such an early hour, and I once again delighted in the responses of my children as we entered a cute shop with pottery and carvings and jewelry. We ended up having to drag them out, even after they’d made small purchases and thought they were done looking. They kept finding new treasures they’d missed!

And then there was the cabin on the lake. A glorious retreat into peace and quiet and fresh air and beautiful views. A treasure for each and every one of us. Some of the time, we interacted. Walking around the park. Hiking a trail. Skipping rocks at the lake. Closing out each day with s’mores or warm beverages and a game of some sort. Other times, we did our own thing. Curling up with books either in separate rooms or scattered around the cabin’s living room. Wandering around outdoors. Sitting out on the porch with a cup of something or other, watching the rain fall.

But even when we did our own thing, we were together.

And that’s what I love about our family. We love being together. Oh, we frequently go our separate ways out of necessity, but we all like coming back together. We enjoy sharing things with one another. Laughing together. Discussing with one another. Speaking in movie or book quotes and pursuing philosophic contemplations together.

Just being together. Whether we’re interacting or doing our own thing.

Life is very different now. Our oldest lives two hours away. Our middle is choosing to spend her summer break from college here at home, but it’s temporary. She and our youngest will pack up and head to college together this fall. Our time of everyday physical, geographic togetherness has come to an end.

But here’s the sweet part. All five of us still really like doing life together. Sharing in the everyday, even when we’re not under the same roof. It has had to change forms, now looking like a Discord server where we enjoy random discussions about all sorts of topics. Now looking like taking the opportunity to enjoy one another’s company in groups of two or three, only occasionally getting all five of us together. Now looking like playing online games instead of gathering around a table once a week for game night.

When I think of families I’ve known through the years, the consistent reality is that the happiest of those families are those who enjoy being together, whether they have plans or are just being. And there is a distinct common thread that runs through all of the families who enjoy one another. They are all intentional about their togetherness.

Togetherness doesn’t happen by accident. Neither does the desire to be together. Both must be intentionally chosen. Actively cultivated. Even stubbornly pursued through the times when togetherness is not the pleasure and bliss we enjoyed during that memorable cabin vacation.

Sometimes togetherness is hard. Sometimes we get on one another’s nerves or wish for someone else — anyone else — to be with. (And yes, there are many times when we need to be with other people, but that’s another topic for another day.) But the good only comes when we choose the work. The discipline. The intentional interaction.

Togetherness may not be so easily accomplished these days. But my prayer is that we will never lose the joy of our togetherness, even if it has to be enjoyed through creative means. I also pray that our children are able to take that joy into their own adult lives. That they are able to cultivate and celebrate togetherness with whatever community or family God blesses them with.

Because it’s a beautiful thing to enjoy life…together.

Posted in Thoughts from Life, Thoughts from Scripture

The Choice

Posted on by Ann B. Hibbard

When my anxious thoughts multiply within me, Your consolations delight my soul. Psalm 94:19 (NASB)

This was the first verse on my mind this morning. I felt the anxiety tighten its band around me, even though I had no idea where it was coming from or what specific thing was causing it. So, I breathed this verse and asked the Lord to whisper to me the truths of His consolations. The things I sometimes don’t automatically remember when I’m in the middle of anxiety.

When the anxiety hits, instead of the consolations I usually see the circumstances. And never the good parts, no matter how numerous they might be. I only see the negative parts of our circumstances. The struggles. The discouragements. The places where we are lacking. I know this shouldn’t be my focus, but it can be hard to redirect. To actually enumerate the consolations of our amazing, victorious, loving God.

When I look in Scripture, I see many who were stuck in their circumstances. Abraham in the waiting. Jacob in his bondage to Laban. Joseph in slavery and prison. David in being pursued, first by Saul, then by one challenge after another. The Israelites in slavery and exile. The prophets in abuse and rejection of the people. And on and on and on.

But what I don’t see is evidence of rejection by God. They might have felt forsaken and abandoned by God, forgotten in their mire. But they weren’t. They just needed a different perspective.

This is what the psalmist recognized when penning the words of Psalm 94. Perspective was everything, and that perspective revolved around choosing to remember and receive God’s consolations. The truth about God.

That’s where I am today. The specific circumstances that weigh down on my heart and mind change through the years. But they are always there, in one form or another. They impact my heart, my mind, and even my health. They have wounded my husband and our children. We have often felt completely powerless to change them or to even protect our children.

Yet God is calling me to remember His consolations, no matter what today’s circumstances are. He’s calling me to remember who He is. His goodness. His truth. His purposes. His love. Circumstances may or may not reflect those things in the moment. But, He is above circumstances, and circumstances don’t change Truth.

The problem is not with the reality of God. The problem lies in the choice before me today. Before all of us in the throes of a struggle. Will we choose His consolations?

It’s hard work, and it’s easy to grow weary. But today I will choose His consolations.

I can’t speak for tomorrow or the next day, only for today. And today I will choose and pray that they really do delight this anxious soul.

Posted in Uncategorized

Sheep or Cats?

Posted on by Ann B. Hibbard

If you are a cat person, you know that the words “lovable” and “cat” are not automatically synonymous. While there are rare instances of lovable cats (we’ve actually experienced it!), most moments when a cat seems lovable usually come about because they want something.

Right now, our house is full of temperamental cats* (or maybe there are just two, but it feels full sometimes) who want love only on their own terms. Usually in the middle of the night when we’re trying to sleep. Or while sitting on the bed while I’m standing beside it stretching before and after exercise. Or perched up on the bathroom counter while I’m trying to wash my hands or brush my teeth. (Wet fur anyone? I think I’ll pass!)

I’ve mentioned Monty before, the one that pretty much claims Doug and me as his humans. He is especially particular about when he’ll receive affection. Recently, he was once again demanding attention at an awkward time, and it dawned on me just how much we can be like cats toward our Father.

Think about it. How often do we demand His attention when we want it? How often do we walk away in a snit when He’s seeking to show us His love through mercy, grace, guidance, and discipline?

Unlike my attitude with the cats, though, God is never inconvenienced by us. It’s never a bad time for us to come to Him and seek His presence, building a relationship with Him. But, much like cats, we often act inconvenienced by Him. When He’s teaching or correcting us, showing us His will, and inviting us to be a part of the incredible power of His kingdom, we tend to have “better” things to do.

The Bible often calls us sheep.

But I think we’re also cats. Stubborn, selfish, temperamental cats. Sheep, at least, know and respond to the voice of their shepherd, even if they do stubbornly — and rather unintelligently — wander off on their own at times.

Cats ignore their humans completely, regardless of their hearing, unless they have a desire. (When it’s food time, you better believe a cat will be attentive to your every single move. And you should fear for your life if you do not ensure that the food bowl is full, showing no hint that the bottom of the bowl even exists!)

Scripture graciously calls us sheep.

Maybe it’s time we stop behaving like cats.

*The image above is not one of our cats, but I just couldn’t resist the smug look!

Posted in Uncategorized

A Nothing Day

Posted on by Ann B. Hibbard

I have nothing today.

Words are just not flowing. Thoughts are not resonating.

Typically when that happens, I go back to stuff I’ve written in the past. I have a slew of old posts that I unpublished while cleaning up my blog, intending to review them and determine whether or not they still “work.” And I have a good number of thoughts I’ve fleshed out but never edited and published.

Usually, working with one or the other triggers my brain, and I can at least edit, if not write fresh.

But not today. Today is a nothing kind of day. In fact, it’s taken me over 30 minutes just to get this much out. I’ve been tempted several times along the way to just give up and go pull out the vacuum cleaner. (If you knew how much I dislike housework and would typically rather stare at a blank screen than clean, you’d know just how empty that means the brain is today!)

But I’m committed to reestablishing a habit of writing. And today is blog writing day. That means staring at the screen and coming up with…something. Even on a nothing day.

Maybe that’s as much a part of the process as actually writing. Maybe “nothing” is as important as “something.” Maybe the nothing days force me to take time to exercise the muscles that need to be stretched in order to produce something days.

Or maybe it’s about learning to rest more effectively. It’s tempting to blank out on nothing days, but I don’t think that helps. I think it hurts. So, perhaps from a writing perspective, resting is more about just rambling through a blank screen than about taking a break from writing.

I don’t know. I don’t really have an answer. I’m not sure I even have a good question. After all, it’s a nothing day.

So, here’s my nothingness. Rambling so that I don’t just blank out. Posting so that I reinforce the habit I’m working to rebuild. Putting forth words that really don’t have any significance on their own.

All in hopes that next time I’ll have something.

Posted in Thoughts from Others

Before the Experience

Posted on by Ann B. Hibbard

There is a wise bit of advice often given to writers: write what you know. Obviously, knowledge of a topic can come either from experience or research, and there is a very solid place for research. (My amazing hubby’s research for his dissertation, for instance, is giving him a great deal of understanding!). But when it comes to writing about walking through life, it has often seemed to me that research without experience can lead to a sense of untested idealism. Advice is tied up in a neat package, but it leaves readers in the trenches feeling like failures because their experience doesn’t fit into the neat package that a writer presents.

I’m a practical person, so I tend to get frustrated by those who write out of a sense of idealism. This is why I have long felt that I need to have experience before I write. I need to be able to say, “I’ve been there!” Experience shines a light into corners that research never reaches, granting a sense of companionship and camaraderie between the writer and the reader. Because of this conviction, I’ve put certain topics on the shelf, convinced that I really don’t have a solid leg to stand on when it comes to writing on those topics, no matter how passionate I was about them and how much I’d studied them.

Then along came the story of an author I follow, and suddenly my conviction waffled.
Don’t get me wrong — I still don’t like untried idealism. But…well, let me tell you about Shelly Miller, and you’ll understand what I mean.

I first “met” Shelly Miller through her book Rhythms of Rest: Finding the Spirit of Sabbath in a Busy World. I’d been studying Sabbath as my family attempted to begin incorporating it into the fabric of our weekly lives, and Rhythms of Rest provided another source of insight. I found Shelly to be real and accessible, her insights presented from the perspective of one who had pushed through the complications of observing Sabbath in a culture that, well, didn’t. And, to top it all off, she knew what it meant to figure out Sabbath from within the world of ministry. All in all, Rhythms of Rest was obviously a book that stemmed from experience. I could trust Shelly to tell me like it was, not spout of some idealistic nonsense that a homeschooling pastor’s wife like me could never implement.

In late 2019, I started noticing references to a new book by Shelly Miller, one that would come out in 2020. It was entitled Searching for Certainty: Finding God in the Disruptions of Life. I immediately put it on my wish list. I knew the Millers had experienced their ups and downs, their times of struggle and uncertainty. I knew, once again, that I could trust her.

That was proven a few months later when Shelly was diagnosed with a rare and aggressive form of cancer. Suddenly, the book she’d already written — the one that was just waiting to process through the steps necessary to get it to publication — was coming back to strengthen her. She found herself revisiting all that she had explored, studied, and researched to compile this book, almost afraid that it wouldn’t hold up to a real disruption. But it did. All that she’d studied was now proving true in her life, and she was drawing real comfort from the truths she’d written about.

Don’t get me wrong…she’d known before what it meant to find God in disruptions and uncertainties. But she was now experiencing a disruption greater than any she’d experienced before. And the truths were still holding up. God had prepared her. She thought she was sharing with her readers. Instead, she was storing up truths for what she and her family were about to face.

How powerful that the last book she’d ever get to write would also hold the very truths that she’d have to lean on to get her through her final months on earth.

So the question comes to me: Do I trust my God to be big enough to teach me truths before the experience, truths that will hold firm during the experience?

You see, there is research and study and experience. Then there is God. There’s a God who can teach us what we need before we need it. There’s a God who can build in us and prepare us and strengthen us. There’s training and growth that comes from experience, and then there’s training and growth that comes simply because we’re daily immersing ourselves in the Word, allowing ourselves to be taught by the Spirit, and dwelling in the presence of a holy, omniscient God who loves us and desires to equip us in every way.

That’s the God I want to serve.

The God who can teach me through it all.

While on the one hand, I need to be willing to admit when what I’ve said, taught, or written has been rife with idealism (because, trust me, I’ve been guilty of that!). But, sometimes I need to go ahead and say it, then prove that God is who He says He is when the time comes for the lessons to be tested.

Posted in Thoughts from Life

My View

Posted on by Ann B. Hibbard

I can see irises through my office window.

When we moved here, I transplanted just over a dozen of my iris bulbs. At our previous home, they were planted in a nice little circle around a large oak in the front yard. The new home also had a spot in the front yard where flowers could easily be planted around a tree, and that tree happened to be right outside the office window. Perfect location!

The catch was that the bulbs didn’t bloom. I didn’t really expect blooms the first year after we moved, one full year after transplanting, although I knew it was possible. But I did kind of expect them the second year. So, I was disappointed when there were no blooms at all. The third year, when I began seeing irises elsewhere around the community, I went out to check my own. Just leaves. Not even a sign of stalks growing.

Less than two weeks later, I suddenly had buds on three of plants! Then buds showed up on two more plants! Although it was still fewer than half of the transplanted bulbs, those five began to produce abundantly, providing wave after wave of beauty.

And the best part was that I could see them from my window. Every time I got up from my desk or passed through the room, the irises were there to make me smile.

It sounds perfect, doesn’t it? A beautiful view from my window! But what if I told you it was incomplete?

You see, only four of the five sets of blooms can be seen from my window. The fifth one is behind the tree.

But there’s more. My fledgling hydrangea bush is off to one side of the porch, out of sight from the window. It is just starting to produce color, pink this year instead of the blue it boasted when we bought it last year. I have to make sure to step outside if I want to enjoy the new growth. My Norfolk pine, the one bought years ago as a small living Christmas tree for our bedroom, comes inside during the cold winter months. During that season, I can easily see it on its high perch, safe and sound from cat attacks. But as soon as the overnight temperatures rise enough each spring, I move the large pot to a spot right beside the front door where it will be able to enjoy the humid warmth and get the right amount of sunlight. It sits just out of sight between the office window and the front door, along with the potted blueberry and elderberry bushes lined up on either side of it.

I’m honestly horrible at growing things, and more plants die at my hand than survive. But these are growing, and it’s delightful to see them. But in order to do so, I have to actually step outside. I can’t enjoy their beauty through the window like I can most of the irises.

Oh, and have I mentioned the peach trees? This is their first year to be mature enough to produce, and they are covered in maturing peaches. Not only can I not see them from the window, there is also no way to smell them from inside. The peach smell has been glorious from the moment those beautiful buds first began to swell and produce fruit! I just have to step outside the door to see and smell and enjoy.

Life is beautiful in the same way, isn’t it? God gives us so much to see from right where we are. It’s glorious and it’s nourishing. But do we catch the fact that it’s also incomplete?

God has given us the incredibly nourishment of our immediate families, our work and social spaces, and our church home. There is so much to see and smell and taste and touch in those spaces. It can be so very nourishing and powerful.

But as beautiful as life is in the immediate spaces God has created for us, if we don’t look further, we’ll miss the fuller and more powerful beauty. If we don’t step out of our comfortable spaces into the wider world, we’ll lack an understanding of how God creates beauty in the most unexpected ways. We’ll miss the smells and sights and visions of His expansive kingdom. We’ll miss the understanding that there is beauty beyond our wildest imaginations, beauty that will be fully revealed when we cross the boundary between temporary and eternal.

My view from my office window is precious and nourishing. But stepping into my yard gives me much more. Will we step out and see the greater Kingdom beauty that exists all around us?

Posted in Thoughts from Life

Not Today, Please

Posted on by Ann B. Hibbard

Lately, I’ve been processing through some things I wrote years ago but never published. At the time, I was putting pressure on myself to organize my blog just so, taking time to design and maintain themes. And a lot of what I was writing either didn’t fit into the themes or took too much effort to design just right. So, it just got stored, waiting for…someday.

But there’s also another category of writing from those years. Thoughts that came from a place of deep struggle. Pain. Darkness, even. I don’t specifically remember writing the words, but I do remember never intending to publish any of that content. It felt too raw. I needed to process my feelings, but I did not believe I was free to show that side of myself to other people.

I know, and have always known, that we encourage others by sharing it all. Not just the good or nourishing. Not just the wrapped-up-in-a-pretty-package lessons after they have been learned. But the struggle, too. The hurt. The ugly. But it takes a lot to actually be the one to encourage that way. Not just the freedom of courage, but freedom in many other areas as well.

Today I am in a very different place with a new set of struggles but also a new fount of freedom. And today I found one of those posts that I never meant to publish. I have no idea what was happening at the time, but I know it’s not the only time I felt this way. Nor is is the most recent time I’ve felt that way. So, today, I’m going to do what I never intended to do. I’m going to take advantage of where I am right now and share it. And if you have ever felt this way, or even feel this way more often than not, I hope that today you can know you are not alone.

I’m just not feeling it today.

It’s one of those days when actually getting out of bed was a hard-won victory. One that took every ounce of the will power I had to accomplish anything. Real work, real productivity, real living all take too much effort. It would be so much easier to curl up with a book or lose myself in the mindlessness of social media. To just play. Goof off. Push it all aside. Or better yet, just hide completely. Be invisible.

To push aside the hurt of feeling unwanted – rejected, even – in the very thing that I thought was actually going well.
To walk away from the overwhelming feeling of being behind in everything.
To stop trying to succeed when at every turn I feel like I’m failing.

It would be so much easier.

And yet, I can’t. So, I wish I could write a poem like my precious daughter does. To get it all out in bare honesty. But that’s not part of who I am. I have to find my own way. Figure out my own release. Work this out in the way God created me to do so.

So, here I am. Tapping it out. Vaguely, yet openly. Not naming the hurt, yet seeing it in every word. Not exploring the sense of failure, but trying to recognize the truth behind the feeling. Not listing all that leaves me feeling overwhelmed, yet acknowledging the tension in my neck. My shoulders. My back. My head. And seeking that planner so I can create tangible to-dos to help focus my energy and relieve the pressure.

I’m not feeling it. But I’m going to do it. I’m going to dive into the work day. I’m going to accomplish tangible tasks. I’m going to choose progress, even when I’d rather curl up and hide.

And with that decision alone, I feel better.

Maybe I can do today after all.

Posted in Work & Life

The Ideal Solution?

Posted on by Ann B. Hibbard

Our cat is a bit of a jerk.

I’ve mentioned this cat before. His name is Monty, short for Monterrey Jack, and he’s orange and white and should be very lovable. We expected him to be. (Someday I’ll tell you about his predecessor, the very lovable Colby Jack, and you’ll understand why we expected it.) But, he’s not. Instead, he’s a jerk.

(For the record, yes, both cats were given cheesy names. Yes, we love cheese. And we’re cheesy. And we have a weakness for orange cats. But I digress.)

Monty has so much personality, and we really do love that cat. But he’s a mess. And his love is on his own terms.

So, back to him being a jerk.

When our oldest daughter graduated from college and moved back home for a time, she brought with her a large black cat named Anubis. Newcomer Nubs (can you tell we like nicknames around here?) got along fine with our other daughter’s cat, a tabby named Rose (who never gets called Rose but instead is referred to by her litany of nicknames, especially Flüffy), but he and Monty did not get along at all. The feud was so great (mostly Nubs terrorizing Monty) that we ended up putting a baby gate up in our bedroom doorway that Monty could go under, but that, at least for a time, blocked Nubs. Our room was Monty’s safe space. We moved his food in there, and he only needed to go out to use the litter box, which was in the laundry room very near our bedroom.

After about 10 months, our daughter and Nubs moved out. And Monty quickly rediscovered the rest of the house. Delighted, we moved his food bowl back to its original location in the bathroom connected to the laundry room — separate from the litter box area, but in the area we had designated the “cat zone” when we first moved in.

But there was a problem. He wouldn’t eat from it. Not unless he was desperate. He would only eat from Flüffy’s bowl. At the other end of the house.

That was kind of funny in and of itself because we’d originally moved both bowls back into that bathroom, since it’s where they were before Anubis moved in. While Flüffy’s bowl was in there, Monty wouldn’t touch it and would only eat out of his own bowl. Flüffy, however, who is a rather anxious cat, wouldn’t go in there to eat at all. So we decided to move her bowl back into our daughter’s room, at which point Monty decided her bowl was the only one he would eat out of. (Remember my reference to him being a jerk? Yeah. And yes, there is a point to all of this, so bear with me.)

Now, having Monty’s bowl in the laundry room was ideal for us. It kept the bowl from being under our feet (its location in our bedroom was rather awkward), and it was in a convenient location for him. But he just wouldn’t eat out of it. Meanwhile, poor Flüffy was starving to death because chunky Monty was eating all her food!

In an effort to solve the problem, we moved Monty’s food bowl back to our bedroom. But even that didn’t work because at this point it was really more about reasserting his alpha status than anything else. So, we finally put both bowls together in our daughter’s bedroom so that both cats could eat.

Not necessarily ideal, at least from our perspective, but it worked. Of course, that brings us to an important realization (Yes, I’m finally getting to the point!): an ideal solution is only ideal if it actually works. In this case, what we thought was ideal actually held no practical benefit whatsoever because it simply didn’t work.

We get caught in that trap a lot, don’t we? We read books, listen to podcasts, or attend conferences about success and make decisions based on what the experts say about ideal solutions, whether regarding our personal lives or professional success. There is often great information there, and it’s frequently solid enough to indicate that it can help meet the need. So, we work to shape our practical to fit the ideal solution. But that’s backwards. The true solution is to refine and shape the ideal until it fits with our practical reality.

Solutions only work when we take the ideal ideas and process them until they become practical ideas. In our case, the ideal was to get Monty’s food (and Flüffy’s as well), into the cat area in the laundry room. The practical need was to provide nourishment for our cats. The ideal had to be reworked and shaped until it met the practical.

Is there something in life you are trying to shape to fit the ideal? Maybe it’s time to turn it around. Perhaps the better solution is to reshape the ideal to fit your life. Only then will the ideal solution truly become the practical solution.

Posted in Thoughts from Life, Thoughts from Prayer

Never to Return

Posted on by Ann B. Hibbard

I occasionally jot down writing ideas, or post starters, to come back to later. Sometimes I come back to them and have no clue what my notes mean, so they end up being ignored or discarded. Other times, the memory of what I was thinking comes flooding back with even greater clarity than when I first had the thoughts. The writing flows in a way it never would have had I written about it back then.

Still other times, though, the post starters feel almost prophetic. It’s in those times that I truly see how the Holy Spirit works in our hearts and minds to not only grow us but to prepare us for challenges that lie ahead.

I recently revisited one such post starter for about the third time. It’s over seven years old, but the implications are profoundly appropriate for right now. Here’s part of what I wrote:

Sometimes, normal will never return. It’s a new normal.

Restoration never involves going back. It involves going forward and realizing that the only constant is Christ Himself. Not normalcy.

I’d jotted down these thoughts as we watched two different dear friends process through losing their spouses. The circumstances and ages of the friends were very different, but the reality was the same: their lives could never go back to what they had previously considered to be normal. It wasn’t possible.

The realization led me to recognize my own struggle with some changes our family had made a couple of years before. We’d made such changes many times before, but this particular time, it was harder to figure out how to make the adjustment. There were just too many differences. We had tried for so long to settle back into normalcy. But, it always failed. Only when we realized that we needed to start from scratch were we able to make some sense of the changes. And in the experience of processing through all of this, we learned what it meant to be able to rediscover routine and normalcy again, even when everything had changed.

Who knew that a global pandemic would require us to fall back on that skill again years later? That was actually the second time I revisited this thought and fleshed it out a bit more. But I still wasn’t ready to put it out there. Everything felt very raw, and I struggled with how I was processing any of it.

And now, as I revisit this thought yet again, my family is in another stage of transition. Long, drawn-out transition that prevents settling into a “new normal.” (I grew to greatly dislike that phrase during Covid, and it’s not much happier now.) Through it all, I’m realizing that we haven’t really hit a “normal” for our family in a long, long time. That forces me back to the last part of my original thought, the one about our only constant being Christ Himself, not normalcy.

That’s hitting me hard.

What if I were to redirect my thoughts and focus on something other than normalcy? What if I were to focus instead on restoration? On truly letting Christ be my constant instead of always seeking after normal?

We often think of restoration as returning something to its former glory, but that’s never the case. We can’t accomplish that because there will always be a newness. Even if the restored treasure looks the same, the materials are always new. They are always bound to the time in which they were restored, no matter what style they may represent. It’s never a return. It’s always a newness.

That’s where we are right now. We’ll never return to “normal.” But, we can move into beautiful restoration. We can move into a newness of life. Of course, that’s only possible when we embrace the Author of life Himself. After all, He is the only constant. The only thing that ever remains the same, no matter the changes. The only One who can never be restored because He can never be damaged. Never changed. Never warped. He is. Continuously and always. He restores us, constantly remaking us into the image He intended from the very beginning. Were we to cling to our sense of normal, we would miss the restoration. We would never succeed in becoming what we were intended to be because our normal is warped. Incomplete. Corrupted. He is bringing us into the incorruptible, but that means that we must go through the refining.

Thinking of this, I realize I don’t want my old normal back. I don’t want to settle for a new normal, either. Instead, I want restoration. It’s a process that will continue until I see my God and Savior face to face, and that’s okay. That means that this “new normal” is temporary as the restoration continues.

May I walk faithfully through it, trusting His work all the way and never hungering to return.

Because what lies ahead is so much better.

Posted in Thoughts from Life

The Goodness of Messy

Posted on by Ann B. Hibbard

If you’ve processed through any advice from time management gurus, you’ve probably heard about things like routines, rhythms, and habit stacking.

For the record, I love all of those. Good routines and rhythms, built around a reliable structure, breathe life into my ability to process each day. Without those, I feel more than a little lost. In times of life when I lack that solid structure and the ability to build my rhythms, it takes a lot of effort to avoid wasting my day. And usually I spend so much energy trying to figure out how to handle each day that I don’t have a whole lot of energy left for actually doing the things I determine need to be done.

So, yes, I’m a huge support of structure, habits, rhythms, and routines. But I also recognize how easily they can backfire!

Easter Sunday was the picture of backfiring habit-stacking and rhythms.

Frequently on Easter Sunday we have a sunrise service, which means that our rhythm is completely off anyway. This year, for a variety of reasons, we didn’t have that service. So, we had our normal rhythm with one exception: our traditional enjoyment of caramel pecan sticky buns on Easter morning.

The sticky buns are super easy to make in advance, which makes them easy to add into Easter morning prep. And I thought this year would be even easier without having to figure out timing around the sunrise service.

And I was right on one count. Getting the sticky buns ready was still easy. All I had to do was pull the prepared buns out of the fridge when I first got up and was prepping coffee and Choffy. My hubby turned on the oven as he headed to the treadmill, then I popped them into the oven when it was my turn to head to the treadmill. When I was done, I rotated them so they’d cook evenly, then he got them out of the oven while I was in the shower.

Easy, right?

Yes…but also no. Because suddenly all of my rhythms and habit stacking were off.

Had I been alert and awake, it wouldn’t have been a problem. But I was sleepy. Tired. And not feeling my best because of allergies. So, the brain just wasn’t firing quite right. And when that happens, I fall heavily back on that habit-stacking approach to the morning. I do this, then this, then that, almost mechanically.

But this particular morning, I added in some things. It was all fine until I went to rotate the sticky buns and had to do some quick problem-solving because the caramel was overflowing the pans. After that, I was thrown off. I got to my bedroom and forgot my post-treadmill stretches. Then I missed another step. And another. All because my habit-stacking was thrown off and my brain just wasn’t keeping up.

So, what’s my point here? To give up on the time management guru advice? No, not really. I still love having structure and habits. I still believe in rhythms and routines.

But, Easter Sunday was a reminder that I’m not a machine. Instead, I’m a living, breathing, flexible human being who was designed to respond and feel. Because of that, sometimes the best keep-me-on-track tricks fail. They are mechanics. I am alive.

Being alive makes life messy. It means that even when there seems to be a solution that perfectly fits our personalities, even that solution doesn’t always work. Sometimes things go wonky just because life is an experience.

And guess what? That is good! The mess is good. The wonkiness is good. The things that go a little haywire are good. They might not feel good in the moment, but they serve as a reminder of goodness. A reminder that we are not machines but are living, breathing human beings. That we are unique.

As a perfectionist, that can be hard for me to remember in the moment. Oddly enough, though, that was the biggest blessing on Easter Sunday. I recognized this reality right in the middle of everything going wonky. It made me feel alive, even in the moment. (Kind of appropriate for Easter, huh?)

Is life messy for you right now? Either in small moments or just in an all around immersion in mess? I know you need to get out of the mess. To deal with it. To get your structure back and recapture the benefits of the practices those time management gurus teach us.

In the meantime, though, remember that there is goodness in this mess. That you can be encouraged by it. That it serves to remind you that you are alive!