Meditation Monday

Gearing up for an insane week - more on that later.

But this morning, I've been meditating on the words to my favorite hymn...Soak them in. These words are posted in different forms all over my home.

"Jesus, I My Cross Have Taken"

by Henry Francis Lyte, 1793-1847

1. Jesus, I my cross have taken,

All to leave and follow Thee;

Destitute, despised, forsaken,

Thou from hence my All shalt be.

Perish every fond ambition,

All I've sought or hoped or known;

Yet how rich is my condition!

God and heaven are still my own.

2. Let the world despise and leave me,

They have left my Savior, too.

Human hearts and looks deceive me;

Thou art not, like them, untrue.

And while Thou shalt smile upon me,

God of wisdom, love, and might,

Foes may hate and friends may shun me;

Show Thy face, and all is bright.

3. Go, then, earthly fame and treasure!

Come, disaster, scorn, and pain!

In Thy service, pain is pleasure;

With Thy favor, loss is gain.

I have called Thee Abba, Father!

I have stayed my heart on Thee.

Storms may howl, and clouds may gather,

All must work for good to me.

4. Man may trouble and distress me,

'Twill but drive me to Thy breast;

Life with trials hard may press me,

Heaven will bring me sweeter rest.

Oh, 'tis not in grief to harm me

While Thy love is left to me;

Oh, 'twere not in joy to charm me

Were that joy unmixed with Thee.

5. Take, my soul, thy full salvation;

Rise o'er sin and fear and care;

Joy to find in every station,

Something still to do or bear.

Think what Spirit dwells within thee,

What a Father's smile is thine,

What a Savior died to win thee;

Child of heaven, shouldst thou repine?

6. Haste, then, on from grace to glory,

Armed by faith and winged by prayer;

Heaven's eternal day's before thee,

God's own hand shall guide thee there.

Soon shall close the earthly mission,

Swift shall pass thy pilgrim days,

Hope soon change to glad fruition,

Faith to sight, and prayer to praise.

The Forgotten Initiative

I love this new ministry we have the opportunity to serve with! Today, I had the opportunity to share an article on The Forgotten Initiative's blog. Check it out, and follow their awesome movement!

More to come because we have fallen in love with these guys!

The Forgotten Initiative Blog, Forgotten Fridays

This. Broken. World.

My heart is heavy tonight. My pillow wet with tears, and so I escape to my quiet place ...

Sometimes, when I'm longing for my soul to find stillness again, I lay in our driveway and stare at the sky. My neighbors now all know I'm asking God to help me see Him with fresh eyes, and they drive on by.

Tonight, I'm grieving.

This world is shattered by sin. Nothing is left untouched, and my realm, those I love, are broken because it is our nature to trade the Truth for a lie.

And, the consequences are so. very. heavy.

We are bombarded with the message of what life "should" look like. It's a lie.

Tonight, I'm considering the friends who have run the race with me, both near and far.

We began with hopes and dreams, and what our marriages, children, and lives would look like - and it would all be for the glory of God.

But with each day I'm learning more of the way God orchestrates His glory. My vision of it is so neat and tidy. It's safe,

And His glory is not safe. He is not safe.

Many years ago, we left the front porch together. We stood in each other's weddings, celebrated the births of our children, and wept when things hurt.

But there's hard, and then there's sorrow upon sorrow. There's the griefs you can't even utter, and so you wail until there is no more sound, and then you feel the Spirit rise up in petition for you.

Have you been there?

Together, we said we would take up our crosses and follow, but we never knew it would seem the cross would crush.

"Though He slay me, yet I will hope in Him." Job 13:15

Around us are the shards, the remnants of those dreams we hoped for, and yet, among the ruins, my definition of what love is, what covenant love is, is being rebuilt.

"But, the greatest of these is Love." I Corinthians 13:13

And in the "dark night of the soul" that seems like it will never end, we grieve because these things are worth grieving.

We were made for more. 

And we look to the future with weighted, What if's?, because sorrow upon sorrow seems to have no end, and there seems to be so many more unfought battles ahead.

And then we remember,

The One who is the Truth. The One who is the Life. The One who holds the victory.

Yes, the battles are many, but the war is secure.

So, grieve, my children....grieve, my friends, but grieve with hope,

Because Hope does not disappoint us - Romans 5:5.

To My Son

Dear Caleb,

Today, you are nine. Early this morning, I crept into your room and quietly watched your chest rise and fall and silently wept in humility that God has graced me with you as my son.

Every day I fail you, and your tender heart is so fragile with want to please. Sometimes I succeed in using my catastrophes to walk you to the one who will never fail you, to your perfect parent. Sometimes, you must walk me there.

You are your earthly father. Your looks and humor, your build and talents - it duplicates all he is, and he is my hero. You battle to show vulnerability as he does, and you refuse to admit you are wrong.

Your heart belongs to Christ alone, and we strive to come alongside of you as you grow in this realization. Yet, so often, you set your offering to Him as a grasp for perfection, as we all do. Baby, it's in your sorrow, your poorness of heart that He whispers to you. Cling to that.

You will never be perfect, and there is no perfect plan, because He will change it. But, as I've looked deeply into your eyes so many times and told you, you can go and be anything He has called and created you to be, to whomever and wherever He calls you to be His hands and His feet.

Few people have the opportunity to discover this truth in their own home, yet you have taken it in stride. 

You have wailed with grief when they leave. You have written notes, they will never see. You have been the first to hold them, even before their own parents at times. You have forgiven, when it seems impossible to forgive. You have cheered, when it seems ridiculous to cheer.

You have been real. I want that more than anything in a son, and you have been that for me. You have screamed when you have wanted all this to go away, and you have knelt beside me at my bed to give it back to God once again. You have prayed for mothers and fathers whose sins are so grave, I can't explain them to you, and you have trusted us as we have trusted our - your - Savior.

You have drawn maps to help me figure out how to fit more beds, and you have denied your own material desires to give to those who enter our home with nothing.

Daddy has said often that this isn't our calling, but our family's. You have embraced it alongside of us, even when it has broken our souls. He knit us together as unit before the foundation of time, for His kingdom to be grown through us, in a way that only we can be a part of.

I am so honored to be your mother, your teacher, your sister in our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.

Happy birthday, Son. You make me long to drink more deeply of Jesus, and there is no higher gift you could give me.

I love you to the moon,

Mommy

A Bad Rap

I think the Evil Stepmothers get a bad rap. You know, Cinderella's and Snow White's? I know there are times when they are slightly murderous, vindictive, and lock-my-stepdaughter away for lifeish, but really...

Ever since I was little, I've meditated on this in my own demented way. I've felt sorry for these women who married into lavish lifestyles with new stepdaughters who could grab any young prince's eye, sing like a nightingale, and cook, clean and care for seven messy men. All the while, they are to fall madly in love with these new daughters and make sure their homes are run smoothly by the cleaning maids, which as we all know typically ends up being those stepdaughters with whom they were to have fallen madly in love.

I know the following is a hard subject to approach, but I fight to be as real as can be in this venue...

I have friends who have fallen affectionately in love with their adoptive children from the moment they saw them.

I have friends who have told me that love sometimes looks like daily showing up for that child they have sought after, prayed for, and longed for more than life itself.

There have been seasons with my own boys that love has been a fight for joy, and there have been seasons where the delight has overflowed.

Perhaps these sound like statements of horror, but I'm not Jesus, though I'm being transformed into His image with ever-increasing glory. Right now, I'm a redeemed sinner, who by nature still strives to seek my own comfort, more than less.

Confession #2: There are a lot of moments I feel like my friend the Evil Stepmother. No, my children in no way embody the blissful beauty of our favorite Disney princesses. But you see, all these gals had another thing in common. Their circumstances made them long for what life once was, and for the hope of what it could return to being.

My presence is a daily reminder that life is and never will be what two of my children once knew. The traditions will never be the same, the hugs never the same, the feel, the smell, the smile, the kiss - all a reminder that I'm the interim mommy.

Sometimes, the Evil Stepmom rears her head. If I've taken enough punches (which doesn't take too many), my nature dreams of carnal solutions. Every now and then, if I'm really daring, I'll share struggles with my friends, who are faithful to fight and pray with me. But you know what the most common comment is: Catie, I don't know how you do it. You have every right to feel that way.

- I Corinthians 13: 4-8: "Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never ends."

In those moments where I claim my rights and believe they owe me credit, am I really bearing all things, enduring all things, hoping all things?

Or, am I clinging to comfort?

Big Sis R's greatest dream at this point is to go to college. She wants to be a teacher. If God fulfills this dream in her life, she will be the first person ever in her family to go to college. She will be the first to earn a degree-seeking career. That's what fills her thoughts, conversations, and imagination.

And me? I become irritated stand-in mom at another load of laundry, another hungry tummy, another time I'm told I'm not real mom.

His dreams are so much bigger for me, for her.

So I look into their eyes and say that I will bear all discomforts, believe all things for them, hope in a redeeming future, and always show up for one more day.

And for one more day, a little more of Evil Stepmother dies, and her Savior breaks through.

Help Wanted!

Two awesome ways YOU can help by holding up our arms in caring for the fatherless:

1. This Saturday, June 9th, we are moving our clothes closet for foster children to Lifeline's NEW domestic services building at 9 a.m. We will only be moving, not setting up. The more helping hands we have, the more quickly it will go. Please message me at cafranktie@aol.com if you are willing to help! (AND, you get to spend our 11th anniversary with us, so FREE breakfast! :)

2. Bessemer Department of Human Resources is in DEEP need of larger size diapers and pull ups. Our ROCK STAR church is doing a diaper drive for Bessemer, but please feel FREE to jump in and love on these people who serve endlessly, and to provide for these children! Again, message me at cafranktie@aol.com. I am more than willing to pick them up from you!

It would be an honor to have you serve alongside of us.

Because of God's GREAT faithfulness ~

Catie

One Year.

It's the birthday of their arrival, and the anniversary of a journey for me.

One year ago today the girls moved in. One year ago, we were entrusted with two souls to be the incarnation of Christ to.

It was five minutes before the first lie was told. Ten minutes before the first tantrum thrown, but I made it a full hour before the first doubt of, What have we done? crept into my limited mind.

Little has changed on the girls' surface. The lies abound more than the truths, and I'm told I'm hated because I'm not mother.

But dig a little deeper with me, She's searching. She's beginning to wonder if she really was made for more. She's testing the waters of the One who will always prove faithful.

She's never known that before.

When we arrive at court in July, some monumental things will happen. One being, it will be the longest either child has lived in one consistent place. Ever.

Dig again with me, but this time, in my own soul.

They have seen my worst. I always thought Benj was the one who had, but I underestimated myself. I have slammed, screamed, and manipulated, mostly God, but my family, the girls I was entrusted with, have had a very substantial share.

I begged prayer for my way to be made known to God, what I knew I could handle.

Then some moment along the way, He reminded me of Who this journey is for. Not for me, not for them, but for HIM alone.

Our future, their future, is so uncertain. But the deepest well of peace abides within me. The lies haven't stopped, the tantrums are still at full force, and Satan's whisper are ever so loud.

But the difference...

I know the purpose of my life.

I would have said that before, and honestly meant it.

But now I know...

My life is a slave to the one who owns me, the lover of my soul.

Each morning is a new chance to die, to taste His suffering, to drink of the greater joy, to know a little more of this mystery of the Hope of Glory I am discovering.

Each day is a new chance for them to see my wretched, mucky, self-absorbed sin, so that I may take them to my Amazing Savior, the One who pursues them.

Each night is one more chance to fall on my knees, crying out my need for Jesus as I lament my failures and rejoice in His redemptive victories.

I don't know what our future holds, their future holds, but I know that each moment is purposed by the Author, Perfecter, and Finisher of my faith...

The one to whom I am a slave, the lover of my soul.