Joshua's Farewell Tour

This past week was Joshua’s last week in P-Town before heading off to college. Pretty much anything Joshua wanted, Joshua got. Eric started calling it Joshua’s Farewell Tour. First, we made a special trip to the running store in Cape Girardeau. Then, I took him to get a haircut. 

Then we went to get a few pair of shorts he has been needing. Since his love language is home cooked food, I cooked his favorites each day for breakfast and dinner. One evening two of his closest friends came over for grilled steak. And when he wasn’t around, I feverishly worked on a scrapbook for him of his high school years. 

I had really wanted to give him a scrapbook in May when he graduated, but I never could get it together. I tried so hard to be super mom this week and make this scrapbook spanning four years in a matter of three days, but it just didn’t happen. So I had to give it to him as a ‘work in progress/to be continued’.  While I was busy being super mom to my oldest, I'm pretty sure the rest of my kids got neglected. Especially my two youngest (oh, you never ate lunch? Here, have some saltines.  No you can't have those four waffles.  I'm saving them for Joshua.) 

Everything this week has been prefaced with, ‘this is the last time for….’ Even the argument Joshua and Soph had regarding who got to drive what vehicle was began with, ‘this is the last time we will ever fight over this.’ Last night we had our Last Supper. I’m surprised I didn’t wash Joshua’s feet :) . Had I thought of it then, I probably would have. We were going to go up to the pool and eat dinner with Joshua, Sophie and Wes in the lifeguard office because they were supposed to work until 8:30, but someone pooped in the pool and they had to close early. I think it was a God thing, because they got to come home and we got to have our last supper around the dinner table. I am so thankful it worked out this way because it is the thing that Joshua said he is going to miss the most—our family dinners. 

After dinner, we had one last big white van ride to get ice cream. 

Then we came home and spent a few minutes taking turns praying for him as he begins his college life.

'The Hay is in the Barn'
This is what our children's first ever XC coach used to always say at the end of the season right before the state meet.  It was supposed to remind them that they’d already done all the work.  They were trained up and ready.  Now it was time to reap the benefits.  

I was reminded of this saying yesterday as we were driving to drop Joshua off at Morehead. The hay is in the barn.  We have spent nineteen years pouring our wisdom and knowledge into him, teaching him to the best of our ability.  The foundation has been laid.  He is trained up.  Now, it's time for him to go it alone .

Younger mamas, hear me when I say this.  We have missed things.  We have left gaps.  We have failed to do this parenting thing well on many occasions.  However, don't miss this: it really wasn't about our ability to begin with.  It was about taking our feeble attempts before God and asking Him to work through them and despite them.  The best thing we can do as a parent is to ask God to be our strength in our weakness and fill in the gaps where we mess up.  The best way we can parent our children is by staying so connected to God ourselves, that our 'fill up' overflows into their lives through our prayerful intercession for them and through His presence within us.  

  

Upon leaving our boy at Morehead, I am sensing that a change has taken place in our parenting role of our 19 year old.  He is no longer under our watchful eye to give him 'in the moment' advice or to coach him through situations that arise.  Maybe we will still advise on occasion, but for the most part, he's on his own.  It's time for him to mess up.  It's time for him to fail.  But what better way to learn then from his mistakes?

While our advising and teaching may no longer be as needed, there is one thing I believe God is telling us loud and clear: our main parenting job for our college student is to be on our knees in prayer.  We may no longer be able to intervene physically, but we certainly can spiritually.  

Young mamas, this is the most important weapon we have against all that will come against our child(ren) in the years to come.  We must stay on our knees for our people.  While it would be wonderful if our children leave our home with great teaching, words of wisdom and advice that we have given to them along the way, if I had to choose, my desire above all else would be that they left home with correct posture.  A posture that turns to the Lord in prayer above all else, before all else. A posture that knows that the way up is down.

Prayer--it is not a work, it is the work.

Therefore, confess your sins to one another and pray for one another, that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous person has great power as it is working.  James 5:16

"Prayer is as natural an expression of faith as breathing is to life." ~Jonathon Edwards

“We think of prayer as a preparation for work, or a calm after having done work, whereas prayer is the essential work.” Oswald Chambers

TEENAGE IDENTITY THEFT

No one told me that living with teenagers would be like someone taking my purse and dumping it upside down nearly every day.  At best I am scattered.  I am unproductive.  And I am frazzled.

Before the teenage tornado swept into my home, I considered myself a semi-organized person.  I mean, in my own topsy-turvy way that only makes sense to me, I had a system going on.   At the end of the day, I could put my hand on most things.  Now my husband might beg to differ, but he also happens to be one of those super anal organized people who can always locate every single pair of socks he owns and whose shirts are folded in his drawers all particular.

Lately, though, my organization is slacking.  Take my van, for example.  Currently, my van has 'most favored car status' in our home.  Which means sometimes trying to find where my keys were laid down last becomes a game of 'Who's on first? And what's on second?'  {Okay.  I'll admit that before teenagers, I had a slight problem with losing my keys.  But now I wear a lanyard and it has solved most of my problems.}  Getting back to my story, though.  My teenagers borrow my keys ALL OF THE TIME.  Not long ago they were missing for several days.  I was so sad without my lanyard around my neck.  I felt naked.  Then one day my daughter's friend showed up at the front door with my keys.  They'd been in her bedroom she said.

Since my van has most favored status and since teenagers never know their 'exact' plans until literally five minutes beforehand, they often 'forget' to get my personal stuff out of the van before they drive off.  A few nights ago, my purse traveled along with eight teenagers to a soccer game in Graves County.  My sons 'forgot' they needed money to get in the game and buy dinner.  But it was their lucky day because their mom's purse just happened to be right there.  So they made the executive decision to borrow my cash.  Of course they forgot to tell me this.  I discovered it the next day when I reached in my purse to pay for something.  Awesome. 

And then there's my clothing.  It's not unusual to walk into a ball game and see my favorite sweater on someone in the student section.  Or for my Nike shorts to suddenly disappear.  Gone forever.  While my Husband can put his hand on every single piece of clothing he owns, my clothing gets eaten at a catastrophic rate by my daughter's bedroom.   And if it doesn't get eaten by her room, then it somehow gets mixed in with one of the other four children's laundry.  Or maybe a teenage friend's laundry.  Or sometimes I come home from a XC meet and I can't wait to put on my comfy slides but they are on one of my teenager's smelly feet on the opposite side of town.  Of course, I find this out after I spend the latter amount of twenty minutes looking for them.

Or what about the bathroom?  Every time I need my bathroom, it's occupied with someone 'borrowing' our shower.

My mascara.  My mascara and makeup disappears on a recurring basis.

And I believe I've invested a small fortune in buying myself a new phone charger a long with 274 hours of searching for my missing phone charger.

Ear buds?  Don't even get me started.  I'd almost completely given up on owning a pair.  It's just not worth the amount of time I spend searching for the stolen things.  However, my husband did recently get a new I-phone and, feeling sorry for his wife, gave me his old buds.  I was completely enjoying the luxury of listening to music while running until I left them sitting out on my desk one day.  

GONE.  

I questioned them all.  Not me they all said.  I stared at them all wild-eyed in my blue robe with my hair in disarray and stormed all over the house looking for them.  I finally found a pair out in their car.  I snagged them.  I'm pretty sure they were too scared to cross me about it.  

That husband mentioned up there tells me it's my fault.  Don't let them borrow these things he says.  Don't allow this he says.  Hide your stuff he says.  But he doesn't understand.  I'm pretty sure it's part of the unwritten mom code that everything you own also belongs to all of your offspring.  And they know all my hiding spots.  Besides, if I hide things in new places I will just forget where I hid them.


Not only has my stuff been strung all over the West KY area, let's talk about time.  Like when my freshmen told me the night before Homecoming that maybe he really did need some new dress pants and a bow tie.  Oh and probably some dress shoes too.  Or the text from my other son letting me know the day before that he kind of forgot about buying a corsage for his date.  Or someone coming in my room right before I'm getting ready to crawl into bed asking if I can help with ten geometry problems.  Oh and proofread a paper, if you don't mind. 

SWELL.

Hey can you iron this shirt right now before I leave for school in five minutes?  And make my lunch while you're at it.  Can you wash my uniform before my meet that is in two hours?

Teenagers will also migrate to the room that you haven't bothered cleaning for a while and it will become their hangout.  Take Homecoming recently when all twelve people met at our house and somehow ended up in mine and Eric's bedroom.  The room that was completely ransacked from head to toe.  One by one they just kept coming in...until all twelve were hanging out in there amidst the unmade bed and dirty clothes all over the floor.  Because that's what everyone does before Homecoming, right?  Hang out in the parent's bedroom.  I finally joked that they could take their pics in our room if they liked.  They just stared at me because teenagers never get mom jokes EVER. 

Not only has my stuff and my time been stolen, let's talk about my sleep, or the lack thereof.  No one ever told me that I would be more sleep deprived with teenagers than I ever was with toddlers.  You can put toddlers to bed and know they are safe and secure.  You can go to bed at peace.  Not so with teenagers.  When my bedtime hits, they are often still out and about, driving or being driven.  Unsafe and unsecure.  And Mama bears just can't go to sleep until all the cubs are home.  And when the teenage cubs ARE home, mama bears still can't sleep.  Because teenagers are nocturnal and like to slam bathroom doors and kitchen cabinets at all hours of the night.  And they and their friends will do outrageous things like hang out on your roof at 2 in the morning.  Meanwhile my dear husband is snoring away.  He tells me it's my fault that I can't sleep.  Just go to sleep he says. 

Couple the teenage tornado with the fact that my younger two children still do things like leave their slick winter coat on the steps so their mama can accidentally slip on it and fall down the hard wooden steps on her back.

Yep. 

My black and blue, unorganized, sleep-deprived life is not my own.  I've been bought at a price. 

And so, I rest my case.  My state of mind has been taken over by teenagers and tumultuously deranged.  So if you see me at Wal-mart shuffling my feet, make-up-less and with unkept hair, wondering aloud why I walked in there in the first place, have pity on me.   If we have a conversation and I can't find the words I need or mutter unintelligibly, bless my heart.

Teenage identity theft has swept through our home.    

The Power of the Group

Two years ago I started running with a group of women here in Paducah and it has changed my life.  You see, left to myself, I am not the most disciplined person to get myself out the door to exercise.  I need accountability.  And a little pushing.


My group enables me to get my behiney out of bed and meet them for our 5 AM runs.  Believe me, I wouldn't be getting up that early for me, myself and I.  But knowing that people are waiting on me makes me do it.

My running group distracts me, in a good way.  Running produces a lot of randoms pains here and there, from a side stitch to a muscle or foot ache.  When I run by myself, it's hard to not fixate my mind on those pains and make them bigger and worse than they really are.  Not so with my running group.  My mind is able to focus on our conversations, which keeps the pain in check and out of the fore front of my mind.

My running group makes me a better runner. They push me in ways I would never push myself. They spur me on when I don't feel like it. I kind of don't have a choice--if I stop then I will have to run by myself. And most of the time I'm really not sure of the route or where we are exactly (since it's dark), so I'd probably get lost or end up running in circles.  Besides that, I'm a big scaredy cat in the dark.  Thinking that you can't stop on a run is good for the mind, because it's always looking for any excuse to give up. If the mind is tricked into believing there's no way out of running, it will stop trying to nag you into quitting.

My running group is eager to conquer an array of problems. Anything from parenting concerns to work issues, we got you. We're not even afraid to broach the political hot topics of the day. It's kind of like stepping into Lucy's Psychiatric Booth as we counsel one another through the ups and downs of life. It's much cheaper than therapy; the only downside is sometimes the one venting tends to run faster than normal. Of course, all of us Garmin wearing fools are more than happy to announce that we have ventured off pace!

On occasion one of us runners will injure ourselves. Left on our own, we are likely to talk ourselves into running on our injury. 'It's really not that bad,' we justify. This is when the group has to speak truth into the injured one's life. We remind her that she needs to stop running or she will have an even bigger problem to contend with. There have also been moments when we have to yell out 'Stop!' to one of our fellow runners when she attempts to cross an intersection and doesn't see an oncoming car.  It's times like these when the group steps in and serves as a warning bell.
Lately, we have been increasing our miles as we are training for a half marathon this spring. I have been amazed that I have been able to do this. I suffered from plantar fasciitis for so long that I really thought my long distance running days were over. Every time I express my astonishment that I am able to finish one of our long runs, Terri (a fellow groupie) replies, 'It's the power of the group!'

The power of the group.

I've been thinking about this phrase a lot lately. There IS power in a group and it doesn't just apply to running. It applies to many different aspects of life, especially spiritually.

Proverbs 27:17 reminds us that 'As iron sharpens iron, so one person sharpens another.'  When iron blades are rubbed together, each becomes sharper and more effective. Just as the people in my running group challenge me to become a more effective runner, I need people in my life to challenge me to be a more effective Christian. I need someone to remind me of God's attributes and His promises when I'm having a difficult day. I need someone to give me God's perspective from His Word when I am tempted to get caught up in the world's perspective.

In the same way that my running group distracts me from the pain and negative thoughts in my head, I need people in my life who believe in me and will encouragingly cheer and spur me on when I'm tempted to be down and out.

Just as my running group serves as a warning bell when faced with injuries or dangerous situations, I sometimes need the people around me to step in and caution me in regards to life's trajectories. I need to be told to stop and consider a decision or choice I am about to make. I need someone to ask me hard questions, reminding me to slow down and critically think through a dilemma.

We only have to look as far as Ecclesiastes 4:9-12 to understand why there is such power in a group:

'Two are better than one, because they have a good return for their labor: If either of them falls down, one can help the other up. But pity anyone who falls and has no one to help them up. Also, if two lie down together, they will keep warm. But how can one keep warm alone? Though one may be overpowered, two can defend themselves. A cord of three strands is not quickly broken.'

A group can pick us up or take over the load when we don't have the strength to do so ourselves.  A group is stronger and more powerful operating together than when we try to operate individually. Groups have one another backs and can recognize danger that we ourselves might miss.  Two or more brains processing a problem is far better than one on its own.

Throughout the years, I have been involved in many 'power groups'.  They have come in the face of running partners/groups, Bible studies, church small groups, prayer groups, neighborhood friends, a marriage/parenting mentorship and a homeschooling coop.  Some groups have been as small as myself and one other person; others have been quite large. Some groups began specifically to meet the need of spiritual growth, others (like my current running group) started out meeting a physical need but has morphed into something more.

There is a quote I often share with my teenage children and my FCA huddles: 'You become like the five people you spend the most time with, so choose carefully.' Today I challenge you to consider with whom you are surrounding yourself. Are they making you bitter or better? Are they spurring you on to do great things for God or are they hindering your progress? Are they encouraging or discouraging? Do your times together include honest, transparent conversation or do these friendships stay at surface level?

Perhaps you are in a lonely season of life right now and you don't have such a group--maybe you've moved, changed jobs or such. My husband and I were in such a season after moving four years ago.  Even now, we still sometimes struggle to find our spot or sense of belonging.  I do believe with all of my heart that God wants to answer our prayers when we ask him to bring more fellowship into our lives; sometimes, though, he puts us through a waiting period of quiet isolation in order to fill that void with Himself and Him alone.  If we are willing to see this solitary season as a gift and a blessing, I believe it can be some of the most treasured time with our Father that we will ever experience on this side of heaven.  Such seasons, however, should not be the extended norm; we were created to be in relationship with both Him AND other believers, it's not an either/or.  Also, we need to realize that we have responsibility in the process of cultivating relationships; we can't expect to just sit back and wait for friendships to happen.  Relationships are a two way street and we have to be willing to do our part to pursue them.

How about you?  Do you have a 'power group'?  If not, I encourage you to commit to pursuing and praying for one in 2017.