a meditation on Church: the testimony of the Saints

I look around the building and see faces. Behind their faces are a history of lives lived and some stories I know: stories of courage, of fear, of anger, of betrayal and dark abuse that shake me. Yet I've heard their testimonies of an even deeper love and unreasonable hope.

I see sweet newborn cheeks and innocence. I see the water of baptism. And I want to weep for the pain to come as that little one grows up into a fuller understanding of being born utterly depraved into a world that is not the way it was created to be.  Oh, how we have marred Your glory with our broken bodies and diminish it further with our tepid words!  With our lives that skim the surface and strive for comfort. If we were to stop and think.  If we were to wait and listen.  What would we say?  What could we hear rising from these hearts in these pews today? The testimony of the saints.  The poignant mix of treasure and pain that fill our hearts as we walk the way of the cross.

Yet by his wounds we have been healed, and though we limp, we limp without rest along the road: responding -- blindly yearning -- to His great love.  There is a chorus of voices, thousands strong, who have walked this confusing road.  They have sung their songs of faith while tottering between hope and despair (He has promised all this will sing his glory) and with them we are drawn in.  We walk forward and measure out, pace by pace, our part in the story of His Great Redemption.

little bird turns 4

Dear Charlie,

You turned four this week.   You were old enough this year to want to count down the days until your birthday, but you still get naps and night-sleep mixed up.  Often you are ready to call it a new day at 4pm after your nap, so that made it confusing.  You kept asking when you went to sleep if it would be your birthday when you woke up, and on the day before your birthday you woke up from your nap and thought it was already your birthday.   So when it did finally get here and we went into your room early to sing Happy Birthday, you were surprised!

Wendy was almost as excited as you.   She loves singing Happy Birthday, and had a lot of practice with Mommy and Daddy’s birthdays right before yours.    I know sometimes she comes on a little too strong for you.   She comes on too strong for me, sometimes, too!   But she really does know to put all of herself into being excited for you!   This has been a big year for you, Bud!  We moved to a new house, you learned to rid a balance bike and now a real pedal bike!   You have made new friends and learned how to button your coat and put your socks and shoes on.   You can set the table and be trusted to obey instructions.   You are such an amazing help to your Mama.   And you are telling imaginative stories now that are so fun to play with!  This birthday, Dadda set up his childhood Darda set in the living room for you to find and play with first thing in the morning.    You kept saying, “Holy cow, is this weally fow me?”   (You still don’t say your ‘r's very well.  But you know you need to work on them now.  You asked me the other day if you were saying “roar” the way I say it or not.   And I figured out you were wondering about the ‘r’ sound.   I’m in no hurry for it to go, I still miss you saying “ploon” for “spoon”, but I guess you do have to grow up sometime!)You chose pancakes for breakfast, and Daddy made you a chocolate chip  Optimus Prime pancake.   Pretty neat! 

Wendy got a heart.

We spent the morning playing with Alaythia, Grace and Owen.   Everyone dressed up.  You cried and cried when you saw the Batgirl costume that Alaythia was wearing.  You wanted to wear it and when you couldn’t it made you so sad.  You wanted to have a Batman costume and an Optimus Prime costume to put “all over your body” and not just a cape.  I talked with you about it for a little bit and you told me through your sobs, “Mamma I need some comfort.”  So we sat together and held your blanket.    Then you needed a little time by yourself in your room before you were ready to come out and play with everyone.    Charlie, I love how smart you are about your emotions.   I am so proud of you for being brave enough to tell me when you need comfort and for knowing when you need a little space by yourself to process though something.   I love your willingness to say, “This is twicky for me.”  I hope you never loose the confidence to be transparent in who you are.   I also pray that God helps your Dada and I keep on having the discernment to respond to you well.  So that we keep on being a safe place for you to admit when you need help, comfort and support.   We do love you so!

After you were ready to join us again, we all went outside.   What a beautiful day God gave you!    We didn’t even need coats.   You all worked together to build a nest for a “fairy bird” in our hollow log.   You dug in the dirt, got covered in chalk, and you and Alaythia had so much fun pretending to be superheroes together!
”Want to save the world with me ‘laythia?”

”Oh, I thought you’d never ask, Charlie!”Posing like Super Heroes!In the morning Grandma and Great Grandma called to sing you “Happy Birthday”  you didn’t say anything but you got a great big grin on your face when you heard them singing to you.   After lunch we opened the presents Nana and Papa sent you while they watched on Skype.   You and Daddy got a pair of remote control transformers that can do battle with each other.   It was really fun!   Then you and Wendy  took a nap, and Mama worked on your cake.   

We had been talking for a while about what kind of cake you wanted and during one conversation, you told me that you wanted an Optimus Prime cake.   When I wasn’t sure what that meant, you explained it would have the Autobot symbol and a flag of Optimus Prime on the top of the cake.   I suggested several other (simpler) options, but you cut me off and said firmly, “We should just do my ‘gestion (suggestion), Mamma.”  I clamped up my mouth at that.
…And racked my brain about how exactly one makes an Optimus Prime flag to fly over a cake.   Thankfully my friend saved the day by offering her printable fabric to me—who knew such things existed!? A little Google image search, iron-on fusing and bamboo skewer later, and voila!: an Optimus Prime Flag!  The Autobot symbol was made with milk and white chocolate.   I melted it and then piped it out on parchment paper over an Autobot symbol I printed out.   After it hardened in the fridge, I just peeled it off and put it on top of the icing.    Thankfully, you liked it when you saw it.  You even said, “This flag is just how I wanted it!”   (whew!)We spent the afternoon reading superhero books and playing with the Darda set.   After supper we invited Daniel, Grace, Owen and their parents along with Alaythia, her parents and her baby sister Cossette to our house to have cake with you.    It was just the right number of people to sing Happy Birthday to you and watch you blow out the candles.    You ate the whole Optimus Prime symbol with your portion!   Right before bed, Uncle Erik and Aunt Catherine called to sing Happy Birthday.  You got that big grin on your face again, hearing them sing.  They called to make sure you knew that they were thinking about you and that they love you.   You are so loved, Charlie! 

We went to be the usual way, with pajamas and vitamins and teeth brushing.   Wendy had her milk while we all sang songs in the dark.  You sang a made-up “God song”  for all of us.  It was about God rising from the dead, and saving all the people, there was something in there about thanking him for giving you toys for your birthday and keeping your cake safe until the next morning too.    I love your good-night “God songs”!  

Sometimes at night after you are asleep, I slip back inside the room and lie down next to you Charlie, and just hug you for a little bit.  I like to put my arm around you and pray for you and for me.  You are 4 now and 4 year-old boys are not very interested in snuggling with their Mamas.  (though this Mama still is)  No, 4 year-old boys are more interested in making “the biggest” loud, house-shaking jumps, and talking at the top of their lungs right next to your ear, and building elaborate pretend stories using block, cars, pillows and superheroes all over the floor of the kitchen.   4 year old boys are not very convenient at all.   I have to confess, Charlie that sometimes I get very frustrated at you for being loud, messy, or for being so lost in the story you are pretending that you don’t hear me ask you to put your sock and shoes on.   Usually I figure it out, catch myself and tell you I’m sorry for yelling at you.  But sometimes I don’t, and it makes me sad.  Sometimes, I need comfort just like you.  And then I lie down next to you and tell God I’m sorry for not caring for you the way He wants me to.  It helps me to put my arm around you and remember how thankful I am for you, because I am.  I love you so fiercely, my little bird!   And I am so, SO very glad God that gave you to us! 

Happy Birthday, Charlie!  Love, Mama

gifts in the midst of stress: poop on the deck

Its been a crazy month followed by an insane week of moving.  I’m loosing everything, down to one sippy cup, and my brain is not much better.  Still, I have seen the Lord at work in so many ways, encouraging me and giving me a thankful heart.  I feel like it wouldn’t be fair not to mention it.   Wendy has been a big encouragement to me.  Even though caring for her often interferes with my productivity, she makes me so excited to be alive and a mother.

Our Wendy is a pistol.  A fire cracker.  A spit fire.   I find myself marveling that someone so small can be such a determined force of will. 

Since moving into our new home, (it has a back door that goes out onto the back porch and has steps to the yard), she has been declaring “Out, Out Out!”   “GO”  and “Wok (walk)” and “Yea-ya, Yea-ya(Alaythia)!”   Then she brings me her shoes, puts them in my hands and sits down on my feet so that I will put them on her and take her outside to play with Alaythia.   When I do not comply with her wishes great screams and tantrums commence! 

Yesterday, after cleaning our old apartment all day, we walked in through the back yard, but dragged Wendy straight inside, much to her dismay.  I jumped in the shower with her to rinse off the cleaning solutions and dust before dinner and then wrapped her in her towel and sent her through the bathroom door to find Dada, who I had just spoken to about something else.  When I got dressed and met Jonathan coming up from the basement, I asked him where Wendy was, but he hadn’t seen her.  We had a short  moment of panic and then found her with her thunder-thighs and glory rolls all naked to the neighborhood, happily eating rocks out of a planter on the back porch.  (It turns out she doesn’t need my help to go “OUT” anymore.)  She looked up at us and grinned, then turned to look out over the yard, showing us her back side, and threw up her arms to roar triumphantly at the sky.  

As I grabbed her hand to lead her inside, I noticed she had left a pile of droppings on the deck and a puddle on the door jam.  All I could think about was how much I liked her—even more because she had just pooped on the floor and cared not one bit about it!  Thinking of her yelling out her victory kept me smiling all day.  So splendidly alive, this girl of ours!

A Lenten Meditation

Spring came so early this year and after such a mild winter that I almost feel cheated out of the longing that makes Spring glorious.  Still, as Lent is passing and nearing its end, the Lord is guiding me in a different sort of longing.  I’ve been seeing with new eyes the way my sin affects Charlie.  And even if I could love him perfectly, I cannot protect him from the world, or his own broken heart.  He is marred.  I am marred.  And in my sin, I mar him, as much as I hate it.   So, I’ve been mourning the fall.  No, I’ve been raging against the fall and longing for heaven, with a new intensity.  As I meditate on Easter and God’s promise to make a new heaven and earth, I’m amazed at what He has promised.  He promises to redeem it all.  Somehow, he will weave the stories of broken, vile and rancid sin into songs that glorify and praise his name.  I don’t know how he can do it.  The intricacies of working this out in the lives of those I know, let alone the billions of souls on the earth staggers my comprehension. 

But Christ’s work on the cross is restoration:  restoring us who are broken and wounded and unable to fix ourselves, restoring this world to be again a place that reflects it’s Creator’s beauty perfectly.  So as I grieve in this new way, I’m also praising God with new awe at his glorious promise to wipe away all tears and redeem it all. 

A Child’s Heart

The spring leaves are so delicate
A new lace, green, fragile and frail
Spread over the black branches of winter
Precarious

In time they will harden and grow opaque
They roughen, coarsen and obscure the sky

Time does not mend this.

Oh, Broken world! Where growth and scars go hand in hand.
Seasons cycle, spring returns, but innocence is not reclaimed.

Oh Son, rise again! Warm the earth, our hearts.
Make all new!   Bring a Spring that is untarnished!

the story of Charlie’s Bedtime Song

Way back when, when I was just out of college, so young and so broke, God lent me to the Hartman family.  I learned I adore young children by nanny-ing their three littles (6mo, 3 and 4yrs old) To be thrust from single girlhood into the duties (part time though they were) of a mother/caretaker of three was quite the learning curve.  And I am so blest by those lessons to this day!  From their parents I learned how to stop to talk, to listen to children and to explain.  From their boys I learned to treasure the seeds of fierce manhood that exist in little boys’ hearts (and a lot of baseball statistics!).  And from that Ella-girl I learned that you could physically fall in love with a baby and end up pushing your own heart around in a stroller.  And so I did what young broke lovers do.  I wrote her a song.  It was a melody made up of nonsensical syllables and I hummed it when I put her to sleep or when she needed comfort.  She called it the ‘Zaza Song’.

When her family moved away and I got married,  a little piece of living heart string between her and I broke.  And we were both sad. Then I put words to her song and sang it as a prayer for her.  Here and there, I sang it over other special children (Cole, that’s you!), falling asleep in my arms.

And now I have Charlie, my own boy, my own flesh, and Wendy, my own heart.              

Though I can’t remember to take my grocery list with me when I go shopping or even what day of the week it is sometimes, this melody stays.   It comes floating back through my mind like a ‘go-to’ salve, with new appropriate words when my children are hurt or sick or scared of the dark. 

Lately it has become Charlie’s only request at bedtime:  “Mama, pwee sing da song you maked up for me.”  The love and prayers I’ve had for all the children I’ve cared for over the years have filtered and distilled into this: 

Charlie’s Bedtime Song

And have no fear, my little bird.
The Lord holds you in his hand.
He’ll keep you safe while it is dark,
and wake you to see the light.

For God loves you and God loves me.
I know that this is true.
He gave us Jesus Christ his son,
To make us his children too.

He helps us when we do not obey,
to confess, repent and change.
He'll never stop, he loves you so,
and Mama and Dada too.

So go to sleep, and while you sleep,
you worship him with your dreams.
And sing your song, when you wake up,
of all that He’s done for you. 

And though I sing it to him every night and he calls it his by right, I still remember a girl with dark curls who began it all. I sing with a thankful heart for the gift of love she and her family so freely shared. So rich we all are in the Father’s care!

From Mama, from KK, with love.

owning the cattle on a thousand hills….

I drove home from teaching piano lessons last Monday night with  a couple hundred dollars worth of frozen grass-fed beef in my trunk.  It took the form of about 20 lbs of ground hamburger, several different roast cuts and four sirloin steaks.  All in all it was about three grocery bags full and was a completely unexpected gift from the mother of my piano students. 

We’ve not really been eating much meat.  Lately I’ve been exploring what beans and tofu can do for our shrinking grocery budget.  Not to get all dismal and all, but Jonathan and I feel the weight of our needs pushing up against our limited resources on a regular basis.   I’m starting to see that money has been much more in my little heart than a economic currency.

So, when push comes to shove,  and I find myself wandering down the grocery isle, asking ridiculous questions like, what is more important to buy this week? Baby wipes or laundry detergent?  I feel a different pushing and shoving.  So much in me hangs on my money.  You either have  MONEY or you don’t.   With money, you are either SAFE or you are not; you are either IN CONTROL or not.  Yes, the lack of money is interfering with things I have up until now thought to be my rights--my safety(new tires), my comfort (heat/air conditioning), my relaxation(eating out, movies), my rest(babysitters), my health (physical therapy).  But even more telling, the lack of  these things in my life is also interfering with my ability to give, to be kind and patient, and to love.  And that my friends, is convicting!

I’m pretty sure there is not a place in the Bible where God says, “Love your neighbor as yourself when you feel safe, comfortable, well-rested and relaxed.  Otherwise, you just go ahead and feel free to cuss him out for the annoying inconvenience that he is, honey.”

I guess my point is this:  We are limited. Finite.  And God made us this way.  He knows.  He created us with an end to our strength, our patience, our optimism, our hope.  He created us to need him—to find our hope in his infinite strength, patience, and love.  He is asking us to trust his care for us.  Yet, he also commands us to trust and obey regardless of our circumstances.   But I am much more inclined to trust and obey my bank account—meaning I feel much safer and much more generous with my time and patience when my bank account high than when it is low. 

I think I have a case of misplaced trust. 

Although I’ve known this, I’ve not known this like I know it now.  And most days, I still don’t know it as I should.  But somehow not having enough, has forced me to to notice and admit--in a way I have never before--that I am not enough.

And then, just as my finite-ness begins to occlude my hope and my faith and my love, God (in his infinite kindness) fills my trunk with frozen meat.  And I start to remember (like my own little chapter 11 of Hebrews)—

Just as we wonder how we will seat two small children at our table for meals with only one highchair/booster, I see a beautiful wooden highchair out by the dumpster in the alley.  It barely fits in my trunk, but looks beautiful in our dining room.

Just as we are about to burnout, we are flown to Florida for a two-week vacation in the middle of January.

Just as we notice we can’t afford tuition this term, a friend e-mails us out of the blue and asks to help move us along in our seminary career.

And just as we have resigned ourselves to never eating a good steak again, God sends me home with a trunkful of grass-fed, organic beef. 

For every beast of the forest is mine, the cattle on a thousand hills. I know all the birds of the hills, and all that moves in the field is mine. If I were hungry, I would not tell you, for the world and its fullness are mine.

Psalm 50:10-12

Kind’a makes you want to giggle, doesn’t it?   That freezer full of meat is such a silly, bloody love note, isn’t it?

confessions of a J during finals week….

It is finals week and though he has been in the house most of the day, I have seen Jonathan for a total of maybe 20 minutes if you exaggerate it.  The day after he takes his last evening exam, we are leaving early in the morning on a 12+ hour road trip with two small, ACTIVE, children.  Christmas is upon us and there are MANY things to be made.  I don’t really know why (except that by the grace of God, the Holy Spirit must be prompting me) I’ve been dealing with this finals week differently.

Normally a week with this much activity, responsibility, uncertainty and potential for disaster would have me making plans upon contingency plans and lists of my lists in an effort to stave off any negative impact on my family.   Though this approach may sometimes result in being prepared for everything, it always guarantees one very stressed out and grumpy Mama.  I’ve been noticing, in the little bit of growing up I’ve done these past few months, that Mama’s mood quickly becomes everyone's mood.  So, in an effort to love my children and husband better, I have let the house go.   I am moving through each task in front of me without stressing about the cloud of other urgent, pestering tasks remaining undone.  I have no set of lists except the overall objectives of:

• getting Charlie outside for HARD playing once a day,
• making sure I have timely snacks and meals to provide my offspring (and to hand through the door to my muttering husband, hunched over yet another outline of notes he is studying)
• being aware of and then using any moment my hands are free to work on the projects I’m making for Christmas. 
• getting us all packed and travel-food supplied for our trip while the children are awake (as long as I can make it fun)  so that I can work on Christmas-ing while they are asleep.

The super bonus is that I’ve found I haven’t been inadvertently showing Charlie he doesn’t matter and is an inconvenience to me like I usually end up doing in high-stress  times.   We’ve actually had fun together instead of resenting the fact that we can’t have Dad!  This was our chaotic but delightful scene while we made pizza for dinner last night:

Many, many thanks to Gail, our Sunday school teacher, for teaching us this joyful song!

Charlie’s Prayer

At dinner tonight:

“Der God, tank you for nana and Papa and Uncle Jon and Nana and Papa and Nana and Papa and and and … and…”

[mom prompt: “and Grandma?”]

“and Grandma and Grandpa who sings ‘no body but you’ and my food and meat balls and pagetti and my plate and my knife and my pasta and my cheese and my napkin and Mama plate and Mama food and Mama ploon and baby sistuh and (glancing around now) and ow table and my chair and baby sistuh bouncy seat and bumbo and the fan and table and my chair and mama chair and and … and…

[mom prompt: “in Jesus name…”]

“in Jess name, Amen, you got ta say Amen, Mama."

reflux revisited--sanctification in progress?

Every once in a while I see myself grow up.  It doesn’t happen often, but when it does it is so very encouraging. 

So Wendy has reflux just like Charlie did.  And her case is worse than Charlie’s.  For her this means endless grunting and writhing at night, combined with regurgitation that sometimes comes out her nose, a constant whistling wheeze when sleeping and episodes of apnea. She is uncomfortable, doesn’t like nursing and fusses (there is a reason reflux is often confused with colic) during the day.

Enter the things that effect our life:  less sleep and a grumpy baby.  Jonathan and I spend at least a portion of every night ‘sleeping’ in our rocking chair holding her upright against our chests, listening to her breath wheeze, laboring in and out, then stop altogether and after a long hanging moment (where I have to remind myself  not to hold my breath too) start up again with a long nerve-wracking squeak.  With Charlie the diagnosis just gave me a word to define my misery to other people. I hated the intrusion on my sleep, and I resented him for being inconsolable.  With Wendy, I have been surprised to feel my self swamped with compassion for her discomfort.

As she has writhed and grunted her way through her heartburn at night, I’ve seen that she is trying SO hard to stay asleep. It is what she really wants, but just can’t achieve. That understanding has made it easier to sit up, holding her on my chest for the long hours of the night, rocking and patting when something from the last feeding comes up her throat. As the night glides by, it shocks me that I don’t resent her intrusion on my sleep. Don’t get me wrong, I do fantasize about lying down with a baby born with a coordinated gastrointestinal tract and dozing off while she sleep/nurses—my tired, tired body aches for it. But if Wendy is sleepy, vertical is the place where she is the most comfortable and this time around, I just want to be there for her.

Delightfully, as this very difficult newborn phase has turned our lives upside down, I have found myself being thankful for the whole meals I get to eat with my family or for having my hands free for 10 minutes to blow bubbles with Charlie.  Thankful rather than resentful.  Surrendered even?   And that, my dear friends, is pretty much a miracle given the reality of our lives and my inability to stay emotionally stable without at least six hours of sleep at night!

So, I’m calling it evidence of “God-here-with-us”—his gentle gift of encouragement—a blessing over Wendy’s addition to our family—grace.  And I am so thankful !

Out of the mouths of babes….

I’ve been thinking a lot about labor as our little girl’s arrival into the world gets near.  It was a very overwhelming experience with Charlie.  And while there were many lovely things I remember about it, the intensity of the experience took me so very much by surprise, that I didn’t do a lot of choosing what I thought about.  At one low point, I was even imagining that my contractions were ocean swells, going over my head and that my nose was only high enough to stick out to breathe in the troughs between them.  Not good.  It is scary facing it again. 

It is also exciting facing it again.  I learned a lot about what I need in labor, especially the importance of having positive, true words being spoken to me.  I’d like my attitude to be different this time.  Most importantly I would like to try to pray my way through this labor in an intentional way.  Instead of getting lost in the downward spiral of focusing on the pain of my contractions, I’d like to choose to worship with my husband and rely on the Lord.  I’ve been asking the Lord to prepare my heart.  To give me verses from Scripture and mind pictures that I can cling to when our time comes. 

So imagine my surprise (and gratitude—the Lord really does speak through little children!)  when I wandered past Charlie drawing at his easel this morning.   I stood silently behind him while he drew a big circle and then a tiny circle inside of it.  He told me “wittle tiny circle, wittle tiny baby sistuh.” Then he drew another circle next to these and announced, “Jesus.”  Then he moved his crayon over and said “storm” while he violently scribbled and made roaring sound effects. 

I know he was thinking of the story of Jesus in the boat and storm with the disciples, because we have talked about it a lot after reading it in his picture Bible.  But baby sister inside of another bigger circle, right next to Jesus?  That was all him!   I assumed I was the bigger circle around baby sister until I asked him to explain his drawing for the camera and got an even better answer!

So in short, little baby sister is inside of God.  And Jesus, who calmed the wild storm by merely saying “Be still,” is between her and me and the storm of labor.  Doesn’t that sound just  like the lesson this Mama was asking God for?  And it even comes with an illustration!  I think I might just be clinging to this drawing all through “wittle sistuh’s” labor!

“Just like Dada”

This morning it was the red hooded sweater and the book…At dinner it looks like this:

Last Sunday it was the shirt with buttons and a belt…

…and of course Dada can’t go anywhere near the tools without handing Charlie a wrench or screw driver of his own to use too!

….The apple just does not fall far from the tree…

Give the father (or grandfather for that matter) a vacuum and Do NOT expect to see them for the next three hours-- DO expect they will eliminate dust and dirt from places you didn’t even know to look for it!Give the son a vacuum for the first time. Show him how it sucks up pine needles. Watch the intense fervor spread across his face as he is busy for the next hour--even meticulously noticing and picking out red pieces of lint from the needles before vacuuming them because Mama had said (when he went after the leaves on the fichus and the soot in the fireplace) to only vacuum up the needles!I find I heartily agree with the Psalmist:

Behold, children are a heritage from the Lord,
the fruit of the womb a reward.
Like arrows in the hand of a warrior
are the children of one's youth.
Blessed is the man
who fills his quiver with them!

Psalm 127:3-5

helping

Jonathan and I are realizing that being helpful is very important to Charlie’s mental health. He fusses and frets when we are trying to get a job done, but as soon as he has a related task to do all is again right in the world.  Sometimes letting Charlie help is a joy.   Sometimes it means means letting go of efficiency, which can be hard on the die-hard optimizers that we are. 

Laundry is a prime example….I took a picture story the other day.  Try not to count, as I was at the time, all the extra effort and minutes that it took for Charlie to ‘help’ me!   Because once we were done, his little chest puffed up and there was an important swagger in his walk all the way back up those stairs! 

I’m realizing that the struggle between my own convenience and loving someone else is actually a life lesson I need to learn.  This is good, this is God disciplining me, and I am learning.  It makes me truly be in awe that the Lord lets us, no, wants us to help him in bringing the kingdom of God.  Wouldn’t it be so much easier—so much more convenient-- for him to just do it for us?  Yet wouldn’t we miss out on SO much learning about who He is?! How he loves us!  Thank goodness it is much better than I love Charlie, I’m thinking!