The Beautiful Game

Tonight is (my) first blueberries game of the season. I've been thinking a lot about soccer. Me and the world have, you know with that whole "World Cup" thing happening right now.  So I've been thinking on this sport that my dad put me in shortly after I could walk. Thinking of all the years I played and what they were worth.  Thinking of the season I had to pull out early and how I assumed that would have to be the end for me.  You take off 6 months and you come back out of shape, out of practice, out of confidence.  That's not the recipe for moving up in the premier world.  But somehow I came back with something else, I wasn't over-thinking it.  And due to a number of other details out of my control - what should have been my scariest, worst tryout - was my best.  I knew no one.  I hadn't been competing.  I was trying out for the same league that I'd pulled out of early last year. What were the odds? Low. I moved up.  I became a part of what would be my favorite team.

But what is the point of all those years?  What's the point that I didn't quit playing soccer in 10th grade? Well, I'm engaged to a guy I met on a co-rec soccer team.  And who knows, maybe I'd still have joined it if I quit back in 10th grade.  Then again, maybe not.  It's just delightful to me to look back and see that this thing that became a part of my life so early on - introduced me to the guy with whom I'll be spending the rest of my days.

I can't just leave it at that though - because I don't think the guy is the end goal of it all.  I don't believe who you spend your days with is more important than who you become - before them - with them - maybe even after them. This sport also crafted deep parts of who I am, taught discipline to my stubbornness and teamwork to my strength.  Taught me that sometimes it pays to sprint the field and be the only one down there by the goal.... but more often, it pays to wait for a good teammate to join you. Your glory might be less, but your score will most likely be higher.  There's nothing better than a good teammate that you don't have to see to know they're running the opposite sideline and setting up for you - nothing better than creating something beautiful with someone you trust.  That's what soccer taught me.  And perhaps it's fair to say, that's what soccer brought me.

I'm glad I didn't quit the berries that first season. That's another thing soccer taught me, part of that disciple and stubbornness. Don't quit.


I'd never have met that guy making dollar bill rings with Chris.

Happy Anniversary Mumsy & Dad!

Happy Anniversary to my mom and dad, who've taught us what it means to love one another for better or worse, through thick and thin. You've shown us a real (stubborn) love.  And, you're a whole lot of fun!

Thank you. xoxo.

Morning.  It is Christmas Eve's Eve and what a busy weekend it was.  I am and always will be a little obsessive about Christmas and traditions. Yesterday, I let myself get all overwhelmed and bent out of shape - there is still so much to do!  And then today, I read this, and I remember again what is important.  Love.  And Trust.  

Saturday, we got to be a part of extending an opportunity to our friends to love an amazing family.  We were able to extend love, with our actions, ourselves.

If you haven't yet, please consider giving to the Jorgensen's.  And whether you give cash or don't - please pray for them. As you can hear below - they are pure gold.  I have only met them once or twice on visits to Nashville, but over the past years I've heard them in dozens and dozens of stories.  "Dana's helping Jason with the roof this week." "Julie and I are heading away for a girls weekend." They have been there for my sister and brother across the states, to support and strengthen them through their hurts and trials, their house troubles, their tired days.  I want to help take care of them, because they've always taken care of the people I love and can't always reach. 

I want to help take care of them because I feel this is the heart of a Christian - to love and trust.  With your actions.  With your money.  With your time.  With your words and your prayer and your devotion.  Love one another. 

In all that is happening around - I have never been more sure that Christ is Supreme.  He is in control. All we have to do is give everything to love and trust Him. 

Noel. 
God with us. 



December 14, 2013 - Dana Jorgensen:

Hey friends. I'm not one for using Facebook to post these things but I don't have enough time in my day to respond to everyone. If you have called or left a message, thank you for your kind words. Please know that I have received your message. I will post as much as I know right now. 
A couple of weeks ago Julie found a mass under her left arm. Two weeks ago we went in for a biopsy, and this past week we found out the mass is metastatic melanoma.

To say the least, we are devastated. Right now we are waiting for our first appointment at Vanderbilt which will be December 23rd. Julie will undergo many tests and surgery to remove the mass. Please pray. Pray that the cancer hasn't spread, and specifically to her organs. Now, Let me be clear.... as much as I hurt for my wife, I choose to believe this promise - Jesus loves Julie and she belongs to him. Julie was bought at a price. Regardless of the results, that does not change His love for her. God is the same as he was before the diagnosis and he will be the same when this is over. As a man who likes to fix stuff, I wish I could take this or fix it, but I can't. So as we enter into the Christmas season, Julie, Kai and I will be trusting in the one who came to earth and laid down his life for us. We believe that he is with us in the lowest places of our lives, carrying us when we struggle to take the next step.


December 18, 2013 - Julie Jorgensen:

I'm never one to post much about my life on Facebook but here's a little update: My doctor's appointment is booked for Monday, December 30 @ 8 am. I will meet with a surgical oncologist that specializes in melanoma and he will decide what tests I will need and hopefully I will get those appointments quickly and then I am assuming surgery will be scheduled following those results. I will have a much better idea of what's going to happen after that appointment. Right now a lot is unknown. Obviously the biggest unknown is whether the cancer has spread anywhere else. Please continue to pray that it hasn't and that god would heal me from this. Thank you for praying. It means so much to me that there are hundreds of people all across the world praying for my healing around the clock. So many people have said they are praying all day and god is waking people up at night to pray for me even as I sleep. I am seeing what it really means to be a part of the body of Christ because i do not feel alone in this and your prayers are not futile. It's not just hopeful thinking; there is so much power in your prayers. I am seeing god answer prayers and take care of us in the many hard details that are coming up these days. Just when I need something specific and tangible, he provides it for me that day. Over and over this is happening. And He has given me a peace that truly does pass all understanding right now. The peace I feel does not make sense and so I know it is from god alone. It is not that I am in denial of how serious this is and what the outcome could be and it's not that I haven't sobbed over my disappointment for what could be coming for us; I have. But god pulls me out of it and sets my feet on a rock in a way that I could not do for myself. I am not a strong person. I have said many times "I could never do that" when someone seems at peace in a horrific situation. But god really does give you the grace you need on the days you need it so that you can get through more than you thought you could. 
Thank you for all of your prayers and support in other ways. I am so grateful. I will post updates as I get more information in the next couple weeks. 

"...The real romantics are the boring ones — they let another heart bore a hole deep into theirs. 

Be one of the boring ones. Pray to be one who get 50 boring years of marriage – 50 years to let her heart bore a hole deep into yours. 

Let everyone do their talking about 50 shades of grey, but don’t let anyone talk you out of it: committment is pretty much black and white. Because the truth is, real love will always make you suffer. Simply commit: Who am I willing to suffer for? 

Who am I willing to take the reeking garbage out for and clean out the gross muck ponding at the bottom of the fridge? Who am I willing to listen to instead of talk at? Who am I willing to hold as they grow older and realer? Who am I willing to die a bit more for every day? Who am I willing to makeheart-boring years with? Who am I willing to let bore a hole into my heart? 

Get it: Life – and marriage proposals — isn’t not about one up-manship — it’s about one down-manship. It’s about the heart-boring years of sacrifice and going lower and serving. It’s not about how well you perform your proposal. It’s about how well you let Christ perform your life.... 

I’m praying, boys — be Men. Be one of the ‘boring” men – and let your heart be bore into. And know there are women who love that kind of man. 

The kind of man whose romance isn’t flashy – because love is gritty.The kind of man whose romance isn’t about cameras — because it’s about Christ.The kind of man whose romance doesn’t have to go viral — because it’s going eternal.No, your dad did not get down on one knee when he proposed – because the romantic men know it’s about living your whole life on your knees.

There are Fridays. And the quiet romantics who will take out the garbage without fanfare. There will be the unimaginative calendar by the fridge, with all it’s scribbled squares of two lives being made one. The toilet seat will be left predictably up. The sink will be resigned to its load of last night’s dishes. 

And there is now and the beautiful boring, the way two lives touch and go deeper into time with each other. 

The clock ticking passionately into decades."

[From A Holy Experience - as kindly shared by Linda - a woman who has always championed real romance to a once hopeless romantic. Thank you Linda - for telling me about love.]

Marriage isn't for you.  [ <- click="" it.="" p="">

A great article my Beau just forwarded. 

Okay, I stole this sort of - I listened in to one of my favorite women wishing one of my other favorite women a happy anniversary.  And I took each word to heart:  

True love isn’t found.It’s carved.Carved out of sacrifice. Carved out of covenant. Carved out of two dying to the loneliness of self to be made into one.You and I, we could let our feet find each other’s under the cotton sheets and we could carve into forever together.
Before there is no more me here and no more you here —we could let the rest be carved away until there only the glory of a wrinkled love left.

From here.   

 

Saturday, I watched a wife say goodbye to her husband.  I watched a marriage end, if death can end such a union.  They'd met in their late teens and been married for over 40 years.

Sunday, I went to a wedding.

My sister warned me it could be hard - not that I needed a warning.  She and I had both hoped our godfather would be the one to marry us to our future spouses.  My dad had suggested it recently too.  And John and I had just talked about it not even a week before hearing that Uncle Bob was in the ICU.  I certainly spent a portion of that wedding wondering who else would mean enough to me to fill that spot.  I don't think there is anyone else.  I'm not sure what we'll do should that opportunity arise.

But I spent even more of my time at the wedding thinking what a wonderful, and terrifying thing marriage is.  We know the danger of young love.  The whole lead up to marriage is risk and vulnerability - it's scary and hard and at any moment it could be the end of what you've been building.  But then comes marriage - security, promises, togetherness.  And before that, engagement, the assurance of hope - - - 'til death do us part.

That part comes too.  And we never know when.  Therefore, I guess love is really always dangerous.  You'll hurt one another, you'll misunderstand one another, you'll fail one another, or feel like you're failing one another (maybe an even worse fate), and eventually one day you'll leave, or they'll leave. Though you'd stay with them forever.  We cannot promise forever.  But we can choose love until our last day. And everything along the way is leading up to that - it's trying to teach us how to do it - how to choose vulnerability, how to risk, how to give though one day we might not be able to get back.

And I assume when that one day comes, we discover that it was all just teaching us something even bigger - preparing us to be able to give something more, be more vulnerable... for some grand reason we might think we understand now, but don't.

For me, I don't understand it.  I don't get what happens next, when a woman says goodbye to her love of 40 years - to the man she's given her life to. I don't get what happens next.  But I get that love's a danger. And I get that it's better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all. And I believe it's proportionally true in the days you have together.  So Sunday I watched them give their vows and make their promises, and I pictured her saying goodbye to him 60 years later.  And it was wonderful and terrifying. Because though she's guaranteed to lose, she's choosing to love.

Should I get to choose - it will be with all this in mind.  Some people love to flip to the last page of a book before starting the story.  I've never been one.  It's so much harder to walk through a tale once you've seen a heartbreak on the last pages.

Just read, "I Didn't Love My Wife When We Got Married." It has me thinking. 

We Are But Little Children Weak

We are but little children weak,
Nor born in any high estate;
What can we do for Jesus’ sake,
Who is so high and good and great?

We know the holy innocents
Laid down for Him their infant life,
And martyrs brave and patient saints
Have stood for Him in fire and strife.

We wear the cross they wore of old
Our lips have learned like vows to make;
We need not die; we cannot fight;
What may we do for Jesus’ sake?

O day by day each Christian child
Has much to do, without, within;
A death to die for Jesus’ sake,
A weary war to wage with sin.

When deep within our swelling hearts
The thoughts of pride and anger rise,
When bitter words are on our tongues,
And tears of passion in our eyes;

Then we may stay the angry blow,
Then we may check the hasty word,
Give gentle answers back again,
And fight a battle for our Lord.

With smiles of peace and looks of love,
Light in our dwellings we may make,
Bid kind good humor brighten there,
And still do all for Jesus’ sake.

There’s not a child so weak and small
But has his little cross to take,
His little work of love and praise,
That he may do for Jesus’ sake.

Music: Al­stone, Christ­o­pher E. Will­ing, in the Ap­pen­dix to Hymns An­cient and Mo­dern, 1868 (MI­DI, score).

Love & Photography

One of the greatest articles I've read on love, written by one of the greatest young women I've known. 

Go read, and relish in the beautiful insight and photography.

We're busy. Dear God we are busy!

And I can't help but think, this is the time for us.

This is the time for us to volunteer.  To throw off excuses. To be wildly passionate about something.  To follow through.  To do what we say.  To say what we feel.  To feel something for someone else.  For a stranger.

I'm going to.

Because I can't help but think this is the time.

Don't waste your life.  Don't waste your youth.

Nothing good comes without a fight.
And without a fight, good might just walk away.  For good.

Fight like hell.

I'm praying for some fight today for each of the people I love.  For strength for those who've been fighting, and who are just dead tired.  And for fight in me - that I'd never be willing to let go of something worthy.  Not for myself - and not for others. 

And, I call her friend. : )  This is a comment to one of my posts last week.  It was far too compelling not to share with you all here.  Good thoughts on how to invest, how to love, how to be a friend at an age when so many people seem to be coming and going from our lives, yet our hearts are desiring to build real relationships.  (Also, EB gets another shout out.  No lie,  he is an amazing friend - that guys spent most of his Saturday helping me move into my new place!)

Well...I've only had one real relationship that's been 20 yrs long...thanks to Erik Byland. My bro. But I would like to respond to your musings because I feel like I have learned a lot about this subject,and unfortunately, in a lot of cases, a lot to late.

I haven't been the best of friend to people, yourself included and I'll be the first to admit I've shut people off where I've should have let them in. And now I've realized in order to have a friend that could last no matter what happens- whether proximity of space or the proximity of heart- you have to be that kind of friend.

So should we always love people until it hurts and invest in people until we have nothing left to lose? My answer is yes. Because that's what I would want done to me. And that's what Jesus did. He knew Judas would betray him and Peter would deny him, but he was still there for them. And I have to believe that until the day they died, they never once were unaffected by being with him.

So I think your question of how to invest in a way that lasts is right on. Because life takes us many directions and we meet so many different faces along the way, but if we only touch those who will never hurt us...then we can never fully love. Because perfect love casts out all fear. So maybe love is perfected in spite of our fear. That in what we may fear most- losing someone who means so much to us- we truly find a love that surpasses that.
anyways, that's my humble opinion, from someone whose half the friend they wish they've been but promises to be the friend I wish I've had.   [MEC]

Before I tell you this question, I'm going to tell you something even more important.

I'm not sure there's really an answer.

That said, I've been thinking a lot about investing.  How to invest in a way that lasts.  I won't be all coy about it, I'll just come out and say it:  We never know which relationships in our lives will last forever, and which will end tomorrow.  What seems most important today, may end up not tomorrow.  And what seems less important may in fact become a sort of lifeline to us one day. 

We can weigh the past.  We can consider who has stood beside us in previous trials, who has held our hand when we cried.  Who has woken us with coffee and who has fallen asleep to our most honest mumblings.  But ultimately, that is no promise.  And that's not even considering wrongs - just truths.  That some times we are called to be close, and sometimes we are not.  Some friendships are for seasons, and while our heart may ache for them one day we might be called different ways.  That's not to say our hearts won't stay close maybe, or that we wont look forward to a renewed friendship in a different season.  Or maybe we wont. Who knows.

I'm faithful.  I love long, deep, true friendships.  I have many that I've had all my life.  And they've looked different in different seasons.  This isn't out of hurt, distrust, or disappointment that I say it.  It's just the truth that we don't know what tomorrow will look like, or who will be standing beside us.  And therefore, how do we know how to invest?  Who becomes the priorities in our life?

As I said, I don't think there's an answer.  Except that, to some degree, it's not about worrying if they will be there forever.  It's about investing today because you know God placed them in your today.  And that frees you both up to not put weird expectations on one another or act out of fear of losing each other.  Our investments reap broader than in that one direct line held on one side by you and the other by a friend.  We reap in our hearts so much more - so many lessons, so much change.  We learn to love and to forgive. We learn how to be a friend.  We learn how to listen and how to share.  What is our business and what is not.  What is our fight, and what is not.  And our friends learn the same.  We become blessings in each other's lives each day - and if we are lucky, we get that for the rest of our lives with them. 

But we don't know.  So from time to time I think we have to ask, how do I invest in a way that lasts?  And I think we do that by loving them in a way that will leave an investment in their life and in our own, even if we find ourselves in two very different places a year down the road.  Maybe I'm wrong, but I think healthy relationships grow when we focus on the other person and serving them, not so much on the relationship itself.  Because that relationship will change. Guarantee it.  But if your focus is on the other person, loving them, that relationship will almost always remain - and with the freedom to grow and change through the seasons as it must.  It will become a blessing to you both, rather than a rope that strangles you. ;)

I could be wrong - and some of you have relationships that have lasted 20 years longer than any of mine - so I'm more than eager to hear.  How do you invest in a way that lasts, especially through a time as turbulent as the twenties?

When Love Fails

Why do we think love ends?  Is it just me?  I've been thinking about this a good deal lately, and I think it's more than just me that struggles with an underlying expectation that at some end, love ends.  It fails.  I might be so bold as to count it something our generation in general carries.  I don't know if it's because we've seen our friend's parents go from in-love to suddenly in separate homes, or maybe our own parents.  Or maybe it's a dozen other reasons.  But something happened that made us terrified of making a commitment, and finding that love fails.  And we know that we can't control it or prevent it for certain.  We can't determine what someone else will choose in 20 years.  And what if they choose to walk away.  What if they don't even want to, but love just fails. 

I don't really have an answer.  I know I won't let go of love.  But I also know I'll never be able to choose for someone else - and that's for best.  Love requires choice.  It's at the core of why Father created us with a choice- we can choose him.  Or we can choose to walk away. That's what makes love matter I think.  It's what makes trust matter too.  And I suppose, it's beautiful. That day after day, we get to choose.  And we get to be chosen. We get to trust, love, give, receive, and forgive.

But beyond that, I know as a fact that love doesn't fail.  I'm sitting here at work, and suddenly Drew Halcomb's Love Will Bring You Home came on and made me recognize the very fact that I have been assuming love can fail.  How can I?  We can fail at love, but love cannot fail. And it cannot end. 

If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. If I give away all I have, and if I deliver up my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing.

Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.
Love never ends. As for prophecies, they will pass away; as for tongues, they will cease; as for knowledge, it will pass away. For we know in part and we prophesy in part, but when the perfect comes, the partial will pass away. When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I gave up childish ways. For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I have been fully known.
So now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love.

(1 Corinthians 13 ESV)

I love the power of scripture to just sweep away the chaff, clear away lies and confusion and remind us of what is always true.  I want to always believe in love.  And believe that love is for always.  In the depths of my mind, heart, spirit and soul.  I did once, and I will again, for always.  I refuse to believe the mess around me more than the Spirit within me.

[Go ahead and say it, I know, "hopeless romantic," but you have to admit - that is really good.]