Story

I know, it's been almost a month...really...how did that happen?  I write this post, a little fevered, a lot feeling really ill and mostly dumbfounded.

In the past 24 hours I have read two books on genocide.  People who know me well, will smirk a little at this.  Yes, I submerge myself and can read books quickly when I want too...and yes, tragedy is my favorite genre, and if it is a TRUE tragedy, I eat it up.  These two genocides are 40 years apart from each other, on different continents, written by two people who are nothing alike...and yet, the similarities are frightening.  The first is the book Night by Elie Wiesel which is his first hand account of the Nazi takeover.  Being shuffled from camp to camp, in his shockingly refreshing honesty (much like Manning's) it drags you through the stench of emotion that we dare not even imagine.
The second is Left to Tell by Immaculee Ilibagiza...words cannot describe this book.  This heroic woman recounts the life she LIVED during the Rwandan holocaust...to say she is a hero of mine, is an understatement.  The cursor blinks as I think of words to type...

So in the midst of these two books about God, questions, humanity and evil...I found my worldview once again being opened.  As I sit and realise that we all have stories, issues and tragedy...I see the questions that these people asked in thier situations that I couldn't even point pictures too at times, the very same as mine as I seek God's counsel about daily situations.  Lies are lies.  The devil only has that trick...fear, doubt, irrational thinking...it's all about lies.  Whether it's a lie that a certain people group is inferior to you and God would rather them be dead or that You aren't worth loving and no one really likes you.  We all fall prey to the lies...

What is even more exceptional is that freedom in all these situations is also found in the hope of the truth.  How these two people found hope at all is a miracle, but the fact that I find hope is too.  I love finding people with scars who are not ashamed of them, realise that God thinks they're beautiful and has shown them a way to use them.  Our scars are our stories and our stories change lives.  Don't hide your scars, take the oversized sweaters off and surround yourself with people who love you scars and all, and let the world gawk and stare...then someone will be brave enough to ask a question...which in turn you have the opportunity to answer...and thus a conversation is born...

Get these books.  Left to Tell is my recommendation if you can only read one.  Find courage in their stories...and share your own.

Definitions..

**sorry for the typos...kids mean a quick type**

let me start by saying that I have set myself up...promises of new and exciting thoughts, well written statements, timely posts...well, motherhood has called and called and now I have shut the door and locked it, and am not answering the calls for a bit. (Literally and figuratively).  As well as now wondering if this writing will be worth the fanfare it has been given.
These thoughts are not new, they aren't exciting. If you've been around me this past 6 months you've probably heard them...but it something else to put it in writting.  To stake claim in them and allow the scrutiny and questions to flow.  I am there. Tired of candy coating and not stepping on toes. This is where I have landed.

Again, if you are any part of my life, you are aware of lots of changes.  Changes at Wayfarer, changes at church, changes in our personal lives (this shockingly isn't the major catalyst).  And the awkwardness of it all is that it is so intricately interwound that it gets blurry, grey, and well mis represented at times.  This is not about that persay, but about me voiceing where I stand on an issue that seems to be all a buzz and all over. Healing...(again it isn't such a different topic if you are in the daily ins and outs).

Healing is part of my spiritual DNA.  I was raised to believe in it, taught to know it and led to expect it.  I have seen all of these things come to pass too. People healed, released, filled and overflow.  I also know that it can be done apart from God, for things other than God's Glory and by manipulative people.  But as the pendulum has swung back and forth, it has landed in what I have come to accept as center, for me at least.

All of this came about as I have wrestled to answer questions of others as well as my own, on my thoughts of a movement of the Holy Spirit that is, without question, here in G'ville.  So, as I sing and pray and whisper the same words as people around me: "I believe that you're my healer...nothing is impossible for you..." I can't help but wonder if we are singing the same thing.  Bold I know, I'm willing to be alone on this...

I have come to realize that as I do believe and know and expect healing, the definition may be different.  See for some, I believe healing is defined as deliverance.  God ridding our lives, cities and circumstances of anything other that what He.  Yet, I have come to find that the character of God (through Jesus) is one that doesn't promise that, in fact at times promises the opposite.  I believe that healing is defined as deliverance and/or redemption.  We don't know why deliverance may or may not come to us...but redemption is ALWAYS promised.  If we pray "healing" over people and only use language that elludes too deliverance, what are people to do if the deliverance never comes.  Where do they land?  What is their faith in? 

On that subject, I am currently digging into Faith and Healing...Jesus says by your Faith you have been healed ( and other times, the person had nothing to do with it.  He just wanted to prove something (see Him healing on the Sabbath)).  But faith in what?  Faith that He could heal them, or Faith that He was the Son of God?  Really digging into that one.

So again, I know this isn't crazy or out there or awe inspiring, but I felt as though I needed to say it...more so type it.  I stand on the side of Healing...but my definition is much broader than you may think.

Proud Mama...

Yesterday we decided to include the whole family.  We decided to take a step of faith and let the older boys accompany us to Ash Wednesday service and see how they would recieve it.  We also decided to invite them to fast from something for Lent.  Of course the initial responses were quite, well...amusing.
Logan-"Meat, no, any food but vegetables...yeah and only water to drink"
Eli-"Broccoli...and save all my vegetables for 5 days and give it to people who don't have any"
Brennan-"School..."
Millie-"Where's my Paci?"

So, as good discerning parents we told them to pray about it during service and listen to what the Lord was telling them to give up.  Remember it's 40 days, and it's a sacrifice.

So after they did a great job during service, and complained a little about how strong the wine was and compared ashes on their foreheads, we told them to let us know when we tucked them into bed what they heard the Lord ask them to give up.

Logan...Sweets.  After David explained that's all candy and Ice Cream, he teared up a little and said okay, he'd do his best.

Brennan...DS. He told us that he knew it would be hard, but he'd try.

Eli...still Broccoli (he doesn't eat Broccoli by the way, so as I told Rhodes, you can only give up something you'd been doing prior) We'll search that a little more today.

I am so proud. David said as we went to bed last night "we've done a good job with them".  I'm not saying this to brag, but every now and then in the midst of the chaos and feeling failures and that our kids are going to end up in Juvey, God gives us moments of the big picture.  Moments their hearts shine through and their character shows.  As parents we need that, we need to give our kids more opportunites to show that.

Isaiah 58:1-12 was one of the readings last night and the crux of Father Rob's message.  It was wonderful and freeing and enlightening.  Read it, if you are celebrating Lent or fasting at any point, it's so good.

We are also following Mars Hill's Lenten calendar as a family, and it is so good too.  The theme of it is Fasting-from and Living-to...the two are meant to go together...so good.

So as a proud mother and gracious child, I encourage you today, to live well. 
Peace be with you.

Heartbeat...

Pulse...rhythm...movement...

Ups and downs...unsure...never knowing the "for sure"

All of these words, are, in some way, encompassing our lives right now.  It's exhausting, it's faith building, it's stressful and it's life.

Literally, life. David came home yesterday and said that it was an "up and down day".  I said "Good, that means there was movement".  When the movement stops...you flatline...no life.

Sometimes we wish we could live on the mountain tops, sometimes, we feel that we can show our gifts best in the valleys, but without both, we're stagnent. 

Movement...hearbeat...life.

Dig in!

That has so many meanings for me right now!! 
1.) It means that I am eating some pretty "salted" words that I claimed a little less than a year ago.
2.) It means that I need to stop complaining and just do it
3.) It literally means "dig my heels in"

Sigh...so a few weeks ago, the night of the Earthquake, Kim's birthday and an emotional bonding moment...I agreed to run, with my friends.  The 4 of us (Reichley and Rhodes clan) promised to run the...gulp...wait for it...Spinx Marathon this fall.  That's right 26.2.  Not only am I running 13.1 AGAIN, i'm doing it AGAIN AND AGAIN! 
So, my friends took advantage of me in a vulnerable moment and we made a promise to do something that I really don't want to do, nor do I think it is at all possible!  So next week starts my Hal Higgy (thanks Anth) 30 WEEK training program.  No, don't worry, I won't peak out too early, it starts at  1.5 miles.  So, I think I'm safe.
Yes, I'm about to throw up just typing about it.
Digging in...

Moving

I've been accused before, of needing to live in chaos.  Of moving from tragedy to tragedy, my own or someone elses.  These were right accusations.  I have learned how to function best in the midst of calamity. I know the God of that, my strengths shine brightest in that, I am COMFORTABLE in that.  It gives me a sense of meaning, of achievement, of fulfilling my passions and well, keeps my mind working.

Now, this isn't all bad, if I may expound on the positive points for a few, it's a bit theraputic. There is something ingrained in us Taggarts to get something done.  When someone has a need, we do what we can. And if there is something we can do, we do it...and then some.  We were raised well, and this something that I proudly share with my brother, sister and parents. Because I know God inthis "season" I trust God in this season.  This is the foundation for it all. 

But, because of the positives, and they are good, I have a tendancy to jump from trial to trial. To try and "live" in the midst of them.  I have never been one to run from conflict, but I have realised that I do often run TO it.  This isn't healthy, for anyone.

The past 9 months, our family has gone from storm to storm to storm, etc.  It's been tough, it's been character building, trust instilling, life changing stuff.  But it's been left wide open...all the storms eventually became a tsunami (that's what happens when you cannot or refuse to find closure in something).

But (yes there is a but) as I lay in bed Saturday night, with my exhausted husband in our bed, and little Franklin 5 miles down the road in his bed (or at least on the floor of his room) I had this overwhelming emotion.  I couldn't describe it.  I tried to my exhausted husband...I just kept saying, that it felt like he had been gone for weeks instead of 15 hours....then it hit me.  It was closure.  Something I hadn't felt in a long time. It made me realise what it feels like to (as Kim quoted) not just turn a page, but start a new chapter. It was freeing, refreshing and joy inspiring. In a way, Frankie put a seal on the volume of our lives.

I know that closure needs to come for so many other things, but for now, I find rest in the refreshing redemption I have found in this story, being exactly that a story that's moving.  Not necessarily moving on, but it's moving. And movement like a BIG morning stretch or a wonderful Yoga class (not that P90X stuff) makes one feel SO good.

All this to say, I'm moving...away from the calamity, and into a season of wholeness.  I feel it in my bones, I sense a stirring in my spirit that for the first time in a long time says "rest".  Will conflict come...absolutely. Will I search it out, I hope not.  But I'm moving..

They found a way.

It's early, no one is awake in our house.  It's dark, it's quiet...it is well. The cursor keeps blinking at me, asking for another word, but none come. Indescribable.

The emotional state, that I'm in cannot be summed up in a word, a look, a feeling.  It's a tempest.  Raging as conflicting thoughts and emotions swirl. 

Frankie's home...still laying in his new bed  or maybe, even better, between two people,he calls Mama and Daddy.

Their story, will unfold in the next few days, via news casts, blogs, spoken word.  But the impact, on me, is just beginning.

Frankie's home.  But all of them aren't.

David and the Rhodeses told me about a family that was at the airport in Florida to pick up one of their daughters, a baby girl named Amelia.  But their other daughter, the older Naomi...she didn't make it through.
Jason, her father, is trying to get over to Haiti to find a way to bring her home too.My heart is crying out for them...and so many others. It's hard, the overwhelming joy of a homecoming, and the heartbreak that your daughter is still over there.  We'll find a way.

But Dave and Kim...they found a way. Frankie's Home.