Posted on

Saying Hello

It is always hard to say goodbye to an era, to a season you were highly invested in. There’s a loss and it deserves time, and I believe time is healing. But time itself is not enough…

How do we move on, really, in wholeness and peace and new motivation?

For me, the loss is relatively quite small. It’s the end of my homeschooling era. It’s the end of my “family years” with Selah. It’s entering mid-life, leaving behind the skin and body (and sometimes brain) of a younger me.

Others have more grievous losses, like the death of a child, a major job transition, or a health scare or long term disability.

We know in our heightened focus on mental and emotional health that we can’t shove all this down. We can’t just keep busy until we forget. We can’t self-medicate with idols like overeating and numbing out.

We have to make room for it.

Some ideas for that are to write in a lament journal, just taking time to write when the sadness or confusion hits; prayers written to God who does grieve with us. Sometimes we need to take time off to caress our senses with beauty outdoors, friendships, and things we enjoy- as opposed to bingeing Netflix and ice cream. Sometimes we need to talk with someone regularly who will ask questions to make our minds wake up and sweep out the places we don’t want to go inside, finding fears and core beliefs that drive our thoughts, then feelings, then words and actions.

Healing, letting go, and moving on is an actual journey…a process…and like any good journey or process, there is an end. We are created to be resilient and heal! Skin, neural pathways, feelings- they don’t stay the same. When damaged, they can be renewed. Our hearts, our hurts, our disappointments, our memories can also be renewed and restored through the power and healing of Jesus. He can do it anyway He chooses- in an instant, or through a long journey. But just like Joseph, we can know that the timing has purpose. It is making us, molding us, and we can willingly go with that current or never see that God is there driving a current at all.

So the key is surrender. The key is surrender to an awareness of a bigger picture, of a great big God, of others in need, and of the short time we have here to run in the path He has for us. The key is surrendering not only to God’s work in our story, but surrendering to being a part of His story.

When we left Selah at college, knowing I was entrusting her to God like never before, there was this moment in worship where the lyrics were:

“Oh Christ be magnified~on the altar of my life~oh Christ be magnified in me.”

And I realized, my life being laid down—my surrender—day by day as a parent, and in the other ways I try to trust and obey Him, is for no other reason than to be a willing part of His story.

So, now it’s time to say hello not to the next chapter in my life or my family’s life, but to the page of the seemingly unseen story my life is a part of. Do I have choices, do I have feelings? Yes and yes! But I choose to get excited about His story over mine. The memory of Lyndsay Taylor on the earth will at some point be long gone; but what Jesus did through my simple, transparent, messy life surrendered to Him will actually remain!

I’m going to close with this thought. When we pray for God’s will to be done in our lives, what is our motivation? Is it to see a life that at the end we can say we “did right”; are we praying this in hopes of it all going fairly well?

Or do we pray “Your will be done on earth as it is in Heaven” to surrender to our smallness, praying that the reality of our lives – whatever He allows – will make a clear way for others to see Him?

God ~ You areJehovah Rapha, Healer ~ You are Jehovah Jireh, Provider ~ please bring joy into our processes and pain, as we surrender them to Your purposes, for Your glory and Kingdom plans in the world!
Amen.

Posted on

A Prayer for Our Children

O Love that will not let me go,

Please grab a hold of my children-

Not so that I can sleep better at night, not so that I can maintain a godly reputation, not so that I can feel better about my parenting, but so that my children can know You, separate from me, face to face, heart to heart, in the secret place.

If they are close by me, please be working in their inner man –

If they are in the “far country”, please be working in their inner man –

If they have to face problems, persecution, and pain, brought on by their own sin or just because we live in this world, please be working in their inner man.

O Love that will not let me go,

Do not let them go.

You have done in me what no parent, no mentor, no teacher, no counselor, and no experience could ever do.

I am trusting You right now to do the same for them.

Do what I cannot do. Be where I cannot be. Even in the grief, the tragedies, the things that “shouldn’t” happen, yet do – I will choose to know that You are sovereign and against all odds, You bring healing, a wholeness that is created from You putting pieces back together again.

Help me to not be afraid of the things that shatter me.

Help me to not be afraid of the things that shatter my children.

For You do rebuild ancient ruins, You do make oaks of righteousness. You do change ashes to beauty. You do give gladness for mourning. You do take clay down to the simplest form and with Your own hands, create in Your likeness. You do.

I trust You.

As I watch their lives, Lord, I am really watching for You.

Do what I cannot, and keep me in this hiding place of total trust.

In Jesus’ beautiful name,

Amen

Posted on

The Roots of Control

I was going to write about something different today- I actually have a series up my sleeve- but in my Bible Study this morning, another issue sprang up that I really want to talk about from seriously personal experience.

And that topic is CONTROL.

“Controlling people” may or may not know this about themselves, but what they/we truly need is safety. They have some unresolved pain, fear, and sense of responsibility they may not know how to satisfy. They need assurance and clarity. They need encouragement and peace. They need to learn again to trust. They need to know they aren’t all alone up there keeping the world together.

We become controlling when we live out of a place of fear for too long, fear that settles in when we feel like no one is leading well and no one is meeting needs well and one day we wake up and we hate where we are. Subconsciously or right-out-loud, we say, “This is changing here and now, and I’m going to make it happen my way!” Sometimes this leads to healthy assertion, and sometimes it leads to trying to control things and people that are simply not our’s to manage. When this happens, there will almost always be anger as a result. If anger is turned outward, we know what that looks like: if anger is turned inward, it becomes depression.

Whether it is “real” fear, like major disruptions of trust and physical/emotional danger, or it is “felt” fear, like being constantly disappointed by someone’s lack of love and help, we develop defense mechanisms to protect ourselves from the memory of that pain as well as future pain.

But just like with all defense mechanisms, love can overcome the need for them! How can we best love people who constantly have to know what’s happening, seem to have to have it their way, or are never truly satisfied?

One, they need to know they aren’t alone. Understanding of how their minds work, communication of plans and ideas, and the reliability of team members can go a long way in being in a great relationship with someone who tends to be controlling. Believe it or not, “controlling people” don’t necessarily want to be in charge and they can handle being led—many are crying out to be led if they can relax and know they can trust their team to talk them through something when worries or questions come up. They might act like they want to be a Lone Ranger, but I don’t buy it. Fear is the driving factor in choosing to be an island.

The second way we can love people who struggle with this is, well, love. Not judging and being irritated by their high strung, frustrated, or critical behaviors will be hard, but we can choose to see behind those sin habits to the frantic person inside. We can help calm and soothe, we can help bring peace to those restless waves, and these behaviors might change quite quickly when those inner needs are addressed. We can also, in love, share the way their behaviors make us feel. We can encourage them with small challenges and insights. While we cannot change anyone, I’m gonna be a hippie here and say I believe in love and its power to change people!

SO. I can relate to both sides of this coin. I have controlling people in my life that I am beginning to see in a new, more compassionate, light. Also, in my fleshly, un-redeemed nature, I grew to be very controlling in my first couple years of marriage because those years felt chaotic after my structured, safe, tightly-held-together childhood and college years. It was a paradigm shift and a new type of relationship I did not have any skills to handle well. I had a strong sense of wanting to do everything in my newly adult life “right”, but felt a power struggle with my husband as his opinions of “right” didn’t always match mine. Also, I had major health problems that made me feel like I was in a power struggle with God!

My first session of counseling, to my remembrance, was with a very insightful woman when I was maybe around 35 years old. After probably starting out our session with a 20 minute personal monologue (verbal processor here!) she said, “So when did you start believing you had to be God?”

I remember feeling like the wind had been knocked out of me…and that I was talking to the right lady.

Control is ultimately fearing that we have this responsibility to do God’s job yet overwhelming pain comes when we realize we are failing. Of course we would be failing; the whole premise is wrong! God alone is God and God alone is good at being God, and we must understand the difference in our roles.

Will we let Him be Lord over every part of our lives or will we keep holding some things very, very close and out of His reach?

Will we trust Him to be Savior for our kids and loved ones, when we know there is nothing else we reasonably and prayerfully should be doing to protect and guide them?

Will we “be still and know that He is God”? (Ps. 46:10)

The possibilities of failure and pain will always be there.

But the pressure we put on ourselves to keep that failure and pain far from our personal doorstep can be relieved.

We can exhale. We can stop living from a place of fear and live from a place of love – knowing God will give us and our loved ones the perfect amount of help from on high when we need it, come what may.

Knowing Who He is gives us the sense of safety we need to bear with one another and dissipate our personal hold on all the things we carry.

“When anxiety was great within me, your consolation brought me joy.” Ps. 94:19

Posted on

What the Spirit Desires: A Cure for Worry?

All semester I have longed to truly trust God and see the effect of that trust in my feelings. I wanted His peace that everything was going to be okay, but constantly the concerns of my life were on my mind like if I forgot them, He would, too.

Then several weeks ago, this happened. I had no intention of blogging about this, but I kept feeling like I should share. In a nutshell, the Lord said to me:

“Lyndsay, thank you for going to the nations, learning languages, loving and serving your family, and being so concerned about obeying Me with your life. But dear one, I have this one thing against you and you desperately need to hear it. You do not trust Me. You don’t relax under my care and power as a child of Mine would. While you’re physically obeying, you’re worrying. You’re wondering if what “you’re” doing will be enough and if you yourself will be enough for all the problems surrounding you. It’s a shame. I have peace and life for you if you’ll just allow Me to accomplish in your life all I said I would in My way and in My time. You do not need to be or do anything except trust and abide in Me.”

I had to just think on that for awhile and then repent, all the while knowing I could not fix myself. That’s the awesome thing about repentance. It’s not saying, “I agree with You, Lord, I am wrong, and I will do better.” Nope. It’s “I agree with You, Lord, I am wrong, and I am completely bankrupt in every. single. area. of. my. being.” And HE promises to take that heart and make it clean; He also promises to bring solutions by the power of His Spirit once we realize our inability to live His way.

He wants me to live at peace and enjoy life as I follow Him. But how, if this (sadly) doesn’t come as easily as it should?

 

Romans 8:5-17 has our answer. Reading the whole text would be great, but the gist is that our minds can either be controlled by the Spirit or by our natural, sinful nature. 

The things I usually am all in a tizzy about, needing desperately for them to work out soon, are not bad things. They are actually all things that I believe by His Word to be His will. So that led me to skim over this part of Romans 8, because I never realized that my sinful nature can take over even in the midst of daily obedience and doing things HE has led me to do.

My mind constantly on these things working out in my way and my time, adding a smidge of “I better get this right or it’ll all fall apart” made my so-called obedience a big fat adventure in missing the point. Repentance truly was the step to take, not a self help book on worry, and the next step after that was to let God show me how to have a mind ordered by His Spirit.

We can choose at any time to set our minds on what the Spirit desires instead. Let’s get specific if we’re going to do it, right? What does the Spirit desire? Here’s just a short list…

*That we would know the character qualities of God and trust His heart

*That we would know the Word of God as a comfort and a sword

*That we would know and claim personally the specific promises of God for each individual trial we face

*Full surrender in prayer, acknowledging we don’t even know what to ask, and rely on His intercession (Rom. 8:27)

*That we would know how to praise and worship God, being lifted above this realm for healing, relief, and transformation

 

And lastly, back to Romans 8, the Holy Spirit who is such a good friend and wants so much for us in the Lord, He longs for us to know that we did not receive a spirit that makes us a slave again to fear, but we received a spirit of sonship. “And by Him, we cry ‘Abba Father’. The Spirit testifies with our spirit that we are God’s children. Now if we are children, then we are heirs–heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ, if indeed we share in His sufferings in order that we also may share in His glory.” (verses 15-17)

What are we supposed to set our minds on? What the Spirit desires.

What does the Spirit desire? That we would receive our spirit of sonship!

 

Three out of four of my children were once orphans.

That’s not an easy title to break free from, even after the adoption papers are signed. I can love them, show them my intentions, and care for their needs all day long, and they blossom, and I begin to think Ah, they are beginning to see themselves as daughters! But the moment I say “no”, or even “not now”, I see it in their eyes. They’re orphans again. The trust isn’t there yet. It’s all sight; no faith. It’s every man for himself; this supposed caretaker, this supposed parent, is not what I hoped for because they will not bow down to me and bend at my command!

When we are disappointed with God’s decisions in our lives or when we don’t see His power working quickly enough, we can easily take on a spirit of an orphan–bitter, untrusting, fearful, self-protective, focused on losses, controlling, angry!

No matter what I do for my girls, I cannot make them receive their new status as daughter…but it is still their’s, like a gift all wrapped up, waiting to be opened and enjoyed.

The same is true for us.

It’ll take time for my daughters to trust me enough to relax and go with the flow. It may take years, but I know the first step would be for them to really know me and their dad, and what we’re all about, to be immersed in our heart for them.

For us as believers to truly be just that–believers–we are going to have to know God, get past the little verses taken out of context and truly eat His Word, and get in step with the beat of His heart. We’re going to have to immerse ourselves in His heart for us, which is revealed through His Word, prayer, worship, and community. There’s a “new normal” the Spirit longs for us to embrace!

Right now for me, to abide means (a) to live in a place of knowing my bankruptcy, my inability to be who God is calling me to be and (b) to constantly be filling my eyes, ears, mind, and heart with what the Spirit desires.

I’m the type that needs to know what my job is.

This—abiding—this is my job. And the more I do it, the easier it is to see how very, very well He is doing His.

 

Posted on

Adoption Update!

Hello friends! It has been awhile since I updated our website/blog about the adoption and I wanted to take a moment tonight to share what’s been going on. As many of you who get our newsletter know, we went to Haiti in December to visit our two lovely Haitian daughters. We got our referral on May 29, 2015 after waiting (officially with dossier entered to IBESR) for 15 months. We took our socialization trip the last two weeks of June. We exited IBESR and received our Authorizations of Adoption at the end of October; we were so overjoyed! Then we entered Parquet Court on November  24th, and got our Adoption Decrees on December 22nd, 2015; actually we were in the airport on the way home when we got the email!

IMG_8566

I made 4 of these matching t-shirts right before our trip, they say: I love my sisters!

I have enjoyed working through the Beginner Haitian Creole book by Gloria Guignard Board. She is a blessing!! I studied August to December, and still need to study a LOT more, but on our trip in December I was able to communicate pretty decently! Grace, grace, God’s grace! Selah, our 10 year old, picked up a little, too, and began formed her own sentences as the trip went on. One of the best moments of the trip was when Yemi, our 7 year old, broke the ice in those first minutes of communication by shouting with a huge smile on her face: “Bonjou, tout moun!” (Hello, everybody!) No one expected her to know any Creole, and it was just perfect!

We were SO blessed to bring suitcases full of goodie bags, quite a few Razor scooters, tiny little teddy bears for all the little kids, and tons of games and toys for all the rooms to share. People gave and gave for this to happen. Here are some pics!

IMG_8713

 

IMG_8872

 

IMG_9045

Another Mama Blan (that what our kids call us) and I will be going to Haiti in about a month to visit, and we are praying to get our kids sometime this Spring or Summer. There are still several steps to go!

Currently, our dossiers are in Legalization after Parquet, then they will go to Ministry of Interior, then Passports, then USCIS, then the last serious step: Visa & Medical appointment with the Dept of State, ending with an exit letter a week or less later. Each step has a “predicted” time frame, but really everyone has had different experiences. We are truly in the Lord’s hands and thankful for His timing and sovereignty!

Here is a picture of our four daughters, finally all together for the first time:

IMG_8874

I’m just so excited, and trying to stay calm as I ride this long wave all the way home. God promised from Day One: My Presence will go with you and I will give you rest. And He has done that. It has been long, but it has not been anxious. And for one good reason only–the gift– the free, sweet, kind, loving gift–of communication with my Father in Heaven! When I lay all this at His feet (and often I know He’s like “You really don’t have to say those details again, sweetie, I’ve got this!”) every day, He displaces my worry and fear with peace and joy. He’s a good Father!

That’s one of the most wonderful things He has taught me this year…the peace enveloped in the privilege of being His daughter.

If I had to say what I long for the very most as a mother it would be that my daughters would have victory over any barriers that would keep them from reveling in the love and protection their family and their Heavenly Father provides them. I know that was a mouthful of a sentence there, but the reality is that adopted children often have a very hard time truly relaxing in the simple gift of love. Their hard past makes it a little (or even a lot) complicated to enjoy all that they now have.

And doesn’t that sound a little like me and you, too?

This summer the Lord allowed me to swallow a seed and it’s been growing…the seed of confidence that what He says about my being related to Him really is true! Let me share an excerpt from my journal…I’ve been waiting for just the right time.

(I wrote the following on June 26, 2015, in Haiti, after listening to Melissa’s Story, a podcast from Jonathan and Melissa Helser)

“This is the day God delivered me from a spirit of fear and made me to really understand what was standing in the way of my joy and peace. I was living from an orphan’s heart, a heart full of disappointments and fear of more, a heart of distrust. I was a daughter of the King I just wasn’t letting my heart feel and my mind think from that status. I thought and felt and acted like an orphan just not quite believing God was good. It’s the great lie whispered in every tragedy: God is not good.
When a child doesn’t trust their parent, all kinds of mental and emotional problems happen, and when that parent is actually wonderful, what a sad story that the child would miss out on enjoying that stability they could have had.
I decided I would not waste another minute of my life consciously doubting whether or not God was good.
If He loved me, and adopted me, it was time to let that carry its full weight and set me free. No more saying I believe it but it having no real effect on my feelings of dread.
This is the happiness of the believer–to let go of how your life has to be and ENJOY being His beloved, highly favored, cherished child, whatever He decides that should look like!
I’m ALL IN. I’m tired of being a worry wart. I’m tired of wondering if He’s good or if He makes mistakes. I need my Abba and I’m choosing to trust Him and know I’m not forgotten…know He is coming back for me, know He never stops thinking about me, know He weeps when I weep and rejoices when I rejoice, know He can see and orchestrate things in the future that I can’t comprehend, know He really is good and He really does love me, know I can be little me because He is Who He Is. If I know all of that, and I can honestly say that I do, then regardless of what He allows me to face, I really do not have anything to fear because He is the One Thing I must not–but could never–lose.
And every single sentence I just said about ME choosing to dwell with God AS A DAUGHTER NOT AN ORPHAN is happening before my very eyes in the seen realm…what will it take for these little girls to know they are no longer orphans? That there’s a room prepared for them like they’ve never imagined? That everyday half a dozen grandparents are whispering their names to the God they entrust their beloveds to? That their place at the table sits open and ready and no one else can fill it but them? That I dream of snuggling under covers and eating ice cream and helping them find their callings and really knowing them like only family does?
They don’t know these things…yet. It’s just words to them right now. And it really will take faith for them to believe it. And it really will take faith for me to believe He is speaking these same beautiful thoughts over me. I’m no longer an orphan; I’m in. Not even as a slave or a worker bee, but a precious child. There’s a room prepared, and a life to live until then carefully planned as well. In Heaven, the cloud of witnesses spur me on, the Holy Spirit intercedes with groans words cannot express on my behalf, and Jesus Himself, my dearest brother, goes to the Father for me and pray God’s will over my life. He says my name to the Father daily! I’ve a place at that table and His banner over me is love. He loves the story of my life, and revels in knowing me, behind the eyes.
My ability to speak it and write it is sadly inadequate, but just like with me and my Abba, my girls can either trust us and have a happy childhood…or not. They’re not gonna get everything they want or always be happy with us, but they can trust us and have a happy childhood…or not. There will be a huge transition of going from a disappointed, distrusting orphan to a content, relaxed DAUGHTER, but this is my prayer for us both. Healing matters, but you know what it really requires is faith. I’m choosing to accept that seed of daughtership, that seed of confidence to believe He is good, perfect in all of His ways, and worthy of my trust.
I pray that I will never be the same and that I will enjoy and relax and sink deeply into being my Daddy’s girl, and let Him fight my battles, write my story, and meet my needs. I pray I can LIVE that trust, seeing the fruits of joy, peace, security in who I am, and be that example by God’s grace to these girls, until they relax in our arms without a care in the world as all children should.”
I can honestly say in the months since I have truly been changed. Active petition and thanksgiving, with true surrender and excitement about what my Abba will do in His great love for me and others I am praying for, is the scene of my prayer life now. Worry is displaced by the choice to trust Him, and He makes me carefree when I come to Him and am renewed by His Word and truth. Trust has led to surrender, which has led to peace, which has led to joy, which has led to thanksgiving, which has led to having light even on the dark nights. And when I get lost again, it’s trust that I have to go back to. It’s square one.
That seed is the beginning and as Matthew 13 describes, the smallest of seeds can become strong arms, a plentiful home for the birds of the air to find refuge. May it be so in our lives, because the world is full of sparrows, looking to know their worth.