Dear Mom

You reek of death.
Even your mere sight brings a stench of pain...it seeps into my hair and reminds me of your sorrow.
My throat collapses; even your shadows suffocate.
My heart pounds to breathe and my lungs loose rhythm.

What is this you have done to yourself?
What is this you have drowned in?

Even your house swims.

Come.
Let me anoint you with a fragrance that is sweet.
Come.
Let me braid your locks and adorn your crown with flowers.
Come.
Let me show you hope which won't sink.

So this was Death.

The approaching night took its time as it left the sky awkwardly diffusing remnants of the sun. In the middle of a San Diego December around 4 pm, this was what I would have expected. It couldn’t have been the weather that made coming through the gate and walking amidst dying weeds on a cemented path to my front door any different than the countless late-afternoons before.

As I approached my front door and fumbled for my green, plastic-covered-key, I ignored a small can of cherry-red finishing stain (topped of course, with a ruined paint brush.) This was my dad’s accomplice in an unprofessional attempt to revamp the tone of the door’s original wood; it had been sitting there for half of a year.

With an unlocking “click,” the slightest push of my front door seemed to open a floodgate of volume. Before my first foot had fully entered the familiarity of the foyer, I identified the song that was blaring; it was “Layla” by Derek and the Dominos. I had walked in on the solo-not the guitar solo, but the piano solo: the longest, most beautiful, four minutes of British rock.
The stench of cigarettes and aroma of wine intermixed with the smell that only a full day’s worth of laundry could produce. Something was wrong. My parents’ favorite song or not, it shouldn’t have been playing so loudly and my stepmom never smoked inside.

Forgetting to let go of my backpack, I jolted for the staircase.

I was running but my eyes noticed each stair and on each stair, each stain; the hideous pink carpet was original from the 80s. As if forgetting the queue of the frog-shaped coffee stain, my brain finally registered “I have reached the top.”

At this point I started crying; perhaps it was because I thought I knew what I would see just around the door of my parents’ bedroom, or perhaps it was because I had no idea.

There he was.

My vision completely blurred as I managed to ask my stepmom, “How long?”
Putting away laundry and crying herself, she responded, “He fell into coma right after you left for school.”

Again, I asked-or tried to ask, “How long, until...”

Thankfully she interrupted, “It could be a few minutes or it could be a few weeks. Some doctors believe they can hear us. Honey, you should talk to him.” She went downstairs. I didn’t realize the blaring music had stopped until I heard the beginnings of a song. “Layla.” She was playing it again, but this time so soft that I could barely hear it.

I made my way towards the left side of the bed and grabbed his hand. I didn’t want to grab it. I knew it wouldn’t grab mine back.

I mumbled what had typically been the instigator of our great conversations, “Hi, Dad.” But at that moment, I realized we had already had our last. Talking to him was uncomfortable and awkward with him like this; I preferred listening to him: his great ideas, his vast epiphanies, his lessons.

After my babbling about my grades and all the make-up tests I earned A’s on, a thickening silence built a pressure to keep forming these pointless sentences (as if the more I talked, the less I would anticipate a response.) Quietly, as if knocking, the piano solo from “Layla” exposed itself from downstairs.

Suddenly, I simultaneously watched my Dad’s eyes open and heard his lungs grasp for air. Rising and leaning over so he could see me, I looked at him intently, as if speaking into his fading eyes. Overwhelmed by the rattling noise of his breadth, I blurted out, “Dad, I love you. Thank you. Thank you for everything you have taught me and everything you have done. I couldn’t have asked for a better father; thank you. Thank you. Thank you.” My voice trailed into weeps, there was nothing else I could say.

Franticly, my stepmom came running in and grabbed our hands. She placed one over my dad’s and one in mine and cried out, “Oh Honey, we know. We know. We know you want to say you love us, but we know. And we love you too. And we know you’ll love us for all eternity.”

For all eternity. These words struck me.

Dislodging her hand from mine, she closed his eyes.

So, this was death.

The Ants Go Marching One by One, Hoorah! Hoorah!

They attacked my drity dishes. I wiped away their trail, but they came back.
When enough was enough, I washed the dishes. Finally, gone.

The next morning...

They attacked my trash. So I took out the trash. But over the course of the day, new trash filled the new bag. They came back.

So today...I'm forced to take out the trash the momment I accumilate it. Can't keep it too long in my house, they'll find it and tell all their buddies. It will become something they all feed off of.


Hmmmm. Yes, Father... I see.

The Imitation of Christ

It is better to avoid sin than to fear death.

-Thomas a Kempis

"I hate you, pen."

Context: Last night, about 12:30 AM, sitting atop my loft bed, writing to God.

Wedged in between delicate prayers, with clash-like interruptions, my written thoughts violently yet truthfully reveal the current condition of my heart...

My journal entry for April 27th is something similar to as follows:

(Prayers...blah..blah...prayers..) "This pen sucks." (Prayers..blah..blah blah...) "I want to throw it off my bed." (prayers...blah..blah..blah... delicate prayers...) "But if I throw it down, I won't be able to write anymore." (prayers...blah..blah..blah...delicate prayers...) Amen.

I couldn't go to bed-No, not after such blunt and shamefully unembarrassed interruptions in my conversation with The King. I took the time to write it down; why couldn't I be distracted and just think it? In this entry I left behind clear evidence which proves me guilty of having a divided attention; and indeed-today, as I reflect, I confess...es la verdad: my attention is hardly undivided, nor is it directed towards The King.

I find it interesting, and perhaps if it weren't my journal entry, even amusing that the immediate thought process was "...if I throw it down, I won't be able to write anymore." At the time, I had an unreasonable amount of anger towards the pen for running out of ink. Yet all the while accrediting it with being valuable: I thought of this pen as my only means of writing.

...As if I couldn't get off my bed and get another pen. As if I don't have a surplus of blue papermate medium ball-point pens sitting untouched in the right hand drawer of my desk.

Immediately I thought, "ughh...this devo time with God blows... and its the pen's fault." "If it weren't for this pen..." "I hate this pen." This pen, this pen, this pen...

I blamed the pen rather than my laziness. It is so easy for me to be mad at circumstances. So easy. ...And likewise it is so gratifying to be unaware that the solution is-being prevented by-me.

I really did blame a mediocre night of prayer on that pen.


In reflecting, I wonder on what else I'm blaming my boring walk:

"well, I can't be radical-I'm in a contract with Charley where I have to stay
in school & pursue a degree, I'm forced to be here until I graduate in Spring 2011;"

"I do have money, I'm not dead broke, I'm not a missionary serving in India;"

"These are my circumstances. Therefore I'm off the hook, I mean, its harder being radical in southern California;"

"God put me here knowing it would be like this...God's standard of my living must be different than his standard for your living/for Miles McPherson's/for Francis Chan's/for my friends'...;"

"If God really wants me to be a more radical follower and have a more radical life, then he will relocate me. Yah, that sounds good."

How ridiculous, to blame my lazy, divided, complacent heart on the blessings God gave me. This isn't even an issue of a having a boring, unweighted, insignificant life (which I understand some people indeed posess, as a direct consequence of not obeying God) but the issue here is that my heart fails to respond to God's glory. Being a steward of his money and a steward of an education...these are things The King wove into my life; my eyes rather than my understanding, testify how from the beginning he has been faithful; from the beginning he has set me up; before I knew to love Him, He was already loving me....

Me:the precedent of a failed marriage. No, me: the precedent of a failed attempt to marry. Somewhere, someone-maybe even many people-prayed that God would use the consequence of two peoples' sin for His Glory. And like a "knight in shinning armor" coming to the rescue on a Pegasus...God-The-Rescuer answered that prayer with "Gladly."
"I will gladly take this baby girl, and she will be my daughter...and she will be apart of something great!"

My heart fails to respond to God's glory...
I am already apart of something great, and this whole time I've been apart of something great.

Conclusion: its not the pens fault.

I could go without....

complaining.
doubt.
everyone else?
my pride.
no....wanting everyone else.
a worry, I could go without a worry.


I could go without.

It started with a bluejay and ended with a handshake

After weeks of desolate brokenness... and sneaking in and out of spiritual rehab a few times, God sent me a blue-jay (the most intracet phone call ever) and He called me out.


He called me out... on my heart and my prayers-how hardened I've been, "I'm not so sure how bad I want you" was the secret mentality that plagued communication with Him. Ouch.

He called me out... of jail: bondage. This time around in the jail of my flesh, it wasn't my one phone call to God, rather, it was Him calling me. Ring, Ring, Ring-his very own spirit in me dialing the numbers for help, waiting, and answering: "Oh Jen, I'm glad you picked up... Can you get me out of here-this place is awful, I want to go home."


He called me out... of rehab-the "fixing" of my spirit. Enough is Enough-stop dwelling and stop believing restoration with God is a process...as one wise woman pointed out-"it's done." He has already forgiven me! "Jen, let's not waste time being akward or too careful-I know you, we're okay again. I have things I want you to do, can you let it go?"
Only days later, the same reminder would come from a different mentor-like-figure in my life, his encouragement being "once you've gotton here (to the point of realizing you want to turn back) you've already gotton to where you need to be-you're there."

[How can I be sure He wants to bless me? Yes I know he loves me, I know he wants me...but how can I be sure he wants me to be happy? These were my selfish doubts that sat in my mind for the last month. Isn't happiness only through God, dare I say...limiting? What about boys? What about clubs? What about fun? His way might not be any fun...

As these ideas sat, and stirred, and invaded my will to obey...I dilly-dallied off the road that so many before me have worked hard to pave straight so that I, and people like me, would know that truely this is the road to be taken, this is the road worthwhile. I ignored the gold asphalt and decided I would look for some dirt, "just in case its better."]



Tuesday, about 4pm

Upon arriving at The Rock to put in some volunteer time and seeing if the Facilities team needs an extra set of hands, I was given a ticket to see Chris Tomlin. I wasn't even aware he was in town, none-the-less playing at The Rock that night...what a pleasent suprise.

It was fantastic. Liberating. God picked me up from jail and drove me home. Ironic how the songs I caught (juggling working the merch table and enjoying the show) came from his album "Arriving."

Down at the front someone kept saying, Galations 5:1! Galations 5:1! Some how I knew it was for me... this morning I looked it up:

"For freedom Christ has set us free. Stand firm, therefore, and do not submit again to a yoke of slavery."

Yes, I am free! Thats me! Like Matthew 5:45 "..and God sends down the rain on the righteous and the unrighteous.." The unrighteous, thats me! The rain is for me too, His GRACE is for me too!


The show, liberating.
Breaking down, cleaning up & talking with a new-found beloved "older brother:" healing.
I thought it ended there, but God planned otherwise. Not desiring, not guessing, not expecting...some how the 4 of us left got to meet Chris Tomlin and Israel!

That hand shake wasn't excitting because it was Chris Tomlin, it was excitting because God showed me "Look, I can plan the last 8 hours of your life better than your imagination...won't you trust me with the youthgroup? The coffee shop? Your husband? Your life..."

My handshake was with God: Yes, God. I trust you & I'm back, let's shake on it."