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#PrayforOrlando. #AltonSterling. #PhilandoCastile. #PrayersforDallas. #hashtaghashtag.

Another day, another hashtag. It seems every day we wake up the world is just a little bit heavier. Two shootings in as many days. In my own city, the murder of a convenience store clerk. This is not something we’re used to – Lincoln is generally quiet and calm. Aaron and I were talking about these events last night and then this morning we wake up to the tragedy in Dallas. The world feels loud and chaotic. Our cities are roaring with unrest, here and around the world. The very earth seems to groan with heartache. So what is our response? What do we do when we read this news again and again? How do we react as we sit in our cities far away from Orlando and Dallas and Baton Rouge, in our homes as we take care of babies, or in our jobs so far removed from the weighty task of law enforcement?

I know I’m wading into dicey waters. You might be nervous for me right now as you start to read like, “Oh no, what’s this blonde-haired, blue-eyed, white girl going to say about this very sensitive issue?” I’ll be the first to admit that I don’t know what it’s like to feel unsafe – unprotected by those who are meant to protect. I have faced very little, if any, discrimination in my lifetime. And I don’t know, obviously, what it’s like to be a police officer. My job causes me no stress. I never feel like my life is in imminent danger. I’m never protecting myself or anyone else when I go to work every day. I will not pretend to know what that is like. But, as we know, with power comes responsibility and as our police officers and those in the military and government wield that power over us, it must be done fairly and justly. These instances in Minnesota and Louisiana and across the country over the last year, what we know about them, hardly seem just and fair.

Four days ago we celebrated the independence of our country – freedom. Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. I’m proud to be an American and I’m thankful that I was born in this country. But are we all free? Does every person feel the freedom shining on their face like I spoke of on the fourth of July? Does every person feel free to live and move about, caring for their families, going to school and work with the same freedom that I do? Recent news would tell us that we don’t feel that way.

Are these occurrences in our cities new? Or are they just now being brought to light? We need to do our best to drag the darkness into the light as much as we can, so if this is constantly what our brothers and sisters are facing, I’m glad we’re finally talking about it. But after last night, as police officers were killed while protecting our right to protest, I think we would be remiss to not also recognize the thousands and thousands of times police carry out their jobs without incident. People of all races are treated with dignity and respect every single day by those meant to protect and serve. So I’m thankful for those who stand in the gap for us every day. Thankful to our police officers and every single person who has stepped up to the call to be in law enforcement. Thankful that all I need to do is dial 9-1-1 and I know someone will come. That is a grace not afforded to all people.

But it’s hard for me to sit here and feel like there’s nothing we can do – that we just have to read this news and throw up a quick post with a hashtag on it and then go about our day. Ghandi said that we must be the change we wish to see in the world, so how do we begin? What can I do today? The truth of the matter is that nothing will change until we recognize that each of these issues is an imago Dei issue. It’s a failure to realize that all people are created in the image of a very real creator God. There is no hierarchy. There is no preferential treatment. It is simply that the human race, every single person to ever have a beating heart, is the crown jewel of creation. Period. Matt Chandler explained the implications of imago Dei in this way:

“Where the imago Dei is understood, almost all that we call wicked starts to vanish. Pornography is an imago Dei issue. Prostitution is an imago Dei issue. Abortion is an imago Dei issue. Genocide is an imago Dei issue. Racism is an imago Dei issue. Discrimination is an imago Dei issue. All of the horrors of humanity can be drawn back to a failure to understand that all mankind has been created in the image of God.”

“Adam was created in God's image. He is the father of all human beings in all ethnic groups. Therefore, all of them are dignified above the animals. In absolute and unique glorious ways, humans alone have been made in the image of God. Look at me. There is no master race. There's not a smarter race, a better apt race. There's not. We are all made in the image of God. In the diversity of ethnicity, God simply shows his glory all the more beautifully. It is an absurd idea that there is a master race. It has driven almost every act of genocide in world history. It has driven almost every season in which slavery was permissible. On and on I could go. What's going on right now with the Islamic state is an imago Dei issue. What happened in Ferguson is an imago Dei issue. You'd be hard-pressed to find something deplorable that doesn't have at its root a failure to understand or apply the imago Dei.”

C.S. Lewis said, “There are no ordinary people. You have never talked to a mere mortal.” So we must begin to treat people, all people, as image bearers with eternal souls. And when you start to understand that, you start to look at people differently. 

In church on Sunday, another Matt explained something about the human experience that I had never heard before and I can’t stop thinking about it. I think it fits here as we recognize that each person was created in the image of God.

"There's this ancient Jewish teaching about the name Yahweh. This is the personal name of God, and it's the name that God gives to Moses when Moses has the courage to ask God what is his name and He says, “My name is Yahweh.”  And the name Yahweh actually is what is called the tetragrammaton. It is actually four consonants, there's no vowels. We just put some vowels in it because it's easier for us to say. But it's actually YHWH, and Jewish scholars have noted that those four consonants also represent breathing sounds in the Hebrew alphabet.  Y is the  sound "YOD", H is the sound "HAY", W is the sound "WAD" and H is the sound "HAY" again. If you think about it from the breathing perspective, it sounds like this: YOD HAY WAD HAY, which has caused Jewish scholars to debate and to ask, “Is the name of God the very sound of our breathing?” And if so, does that mean that every person who has ever lived, who has ever drawn a breath, has spoken the name of God whether they knew it or not?... how beautiful is this, how generous is our God that He would give us a name that we can't help but utter every moment that we're alive. Every person, everywhere, awake or asleep with the name of God on our lips as we're breathing."

Yahweh. On the lips of every person, every day. Do you see people that way? Are you treating the people you encounter like beings with eternal souls that breathe the name of God with every exhale? This extends to your neighbors, your literal neighbors in the houses next to you. This extends to the people in your community, in your city. It extends to the people around the country and around the world. To the people you don't understand and to the people who irritate you the most. To the ones who are hard to love and the ones who you find great joy in pouring out your love upon. 

The first step toward peace and reconciliation is going to be recognizing the image bearers around you who are breathing the name of God just the same as you draw breath. It starts with you loving the people around you – reaching out to those in your sphere of influence, inviting them into community. It starts with you teaching your children to treat others with dignity and respect. It starts with you having a conversation, listening before speaking, and being willing to learn, being vulnerable enough to recognize where you may be wrong and offering apology. This goes for all people everywhere, humanity in all its diversity.

I started this blog last December with a post on fear and the call on our lives to not be afraid. I think it’s a timely reminder now. Maybe just for myself, as I went to bed last night feeling the weight of tragedy, but maybe for you, too. And in the face of horrifying circumstances today - circumstances we can't understand - maybe we can all just find a way to be kind. Find a way to love and serve. It's a tangible way to do something about the hatred and sadness and hurt. Even if you step up to serve just one single person today, wave that kindness in the face of tragedy because it’s only love and light that will drive out darkness. And with every breath you draw in, remember that each person is the same, breathing the name of the One who created us as equals. 

Calling all dads.

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When my older sister started kindergarten, my dad decided he should go to college. He had been working as a carpenter since graduating high school, but knew he needed something more. He was 28 years old with three (soon to be four) tiny kids and a wife and bills to pay.  So, he packed his backpack with his books and got on his bike and peddled down to the University for his very first college classes. He sat there with a bunch of 18 year old freshmen, most of whom lived in the dorms or a fraternity and had no cares in the world about feeding babies or loving a wife or being a provider for anyone but themselves. My dad was a full time student and then after class he came home to drop off his books, grab his red lunchbox packed with leftovers, and head to his full time job making circuit breakers on an assembly line. Second shift at a factory owned the rest of his day. Sometimes we went to see him on his lunch break, and by that I mean my mom loaded us up in the station wagon, four kids under six all in our footie pajamas, and my dad came out to the car for 30 minutes - long enough for him to say hi and remind us that he loved us. When he got off work at midnight, he would come home and fall into bed, long after we were all asleep, and then get up the next day and do it all over again.

 

My childhood was not extravagant, but I don’t remember ever feeling like I was going without. We always had shoes on our feet and our teeth brushed and ponytails pulled back so tight it made our eyes squinty (per our request, I’m told). Those were lean years – my parents will tell you that now. But they would also tell you that this is nothing remarkable. It was hard. They were tired. But they knew it was the only way. "We did what we had to do," they would say. My dad knew that sacrifice was the only way to make life better for his own children.

This story about my dad is the story of a lot of dads. Not in the same way, of course, because each has their own road, but the underlying theme is that every single day dads are giving of themselves in order to provide for their families. Men everywhere are making sacrifices and doing hard and holy things for the sake of their little tribe at home. More than anything else, they keep showing up. And showing up is hard. Showing up is selfless and sometimes thankless and usually unnoticed until you stop doing it. Dads around the world are the silent, steady, guiding light that sometimes go unseen, or instead, are only called out for the things they don’t do instead of the things they do.

But dads, man. Their hands are dirty in the mess of parenting and loving and living with passion. Dads wake kids up in the morning and feed them breakfast and send them off to school. Dads change diapers and wake up in the middle of the night to grab the bottle or pat that baby’s bottom until she falls back asleep so mama can get an extra hour. Dads go to work and make hard decisions and feel the weight of being a provider, and while less common today than ever, sometimes the sole provider of the family. Dads aren’t idiot "babysitters" who mismatch the kids’ outfits and come within inches of lighting themselves and the house on fire while mom is gone. Dads build forts and put on superhero costumes and have fake sword fights. Dads play Barbies and dress up. Dads feel the gravity of knowing those little eyes are looking up to them every single day. Dads are the sanity and saving grace for mama – her safe place to land and the arms to fall back on. Dads aren’t Homer Simpson or Phil Dunphy or whatever other moron way they are portrayed in media. Dads are compassion and strength. They teach us honesty and integrity and respect. The maker of mac and cheese and the reader of bedtime stories. The rescuer of the pacifier from behind the couch. The helper of homework at the kitchen table. The giver of advice and listener to teenage (and grown up) drama. The one who takes off the training wheels and, in what seems like moments later, is teaching you to drive a car. Dads are equal parts nurturer and protector. They are partner and lover to one and friend to many. 

I was listening to the radio and they were talking about this study of millennial dads and they found that 9 out of 10 dads say they feel like they have to be perfect. In a society that's constantly changing its mind about what it means to be a man, they start feeling like they have to be equal parts William Wallace and Tim Gunn and Chip Gaines and Danny Tanner. We see a lot of articles about moms (or maybe I do because I’m friends with a lot of them) and they talk about how moms are done feeling like they have to be perfect, how they are going to be "real" and "authentic" about what motherhood is really like, about how messy their house is and how their kid had a screaming fit in Target. Moms are allowed to be messy, but dads? Do we give them the same courtesy? Dads put a lot of pressure on themselves and I wonder if we recognize that as much as we should. Hey, dads, this is your permission slip to stop feeling like you have to be all the things all the time. Aren't we all just a crazy wild mess trying to raise more little humans to not be a crazy wild mess? 

Maybe you hate everything I’ve said so far because you don’t even know your dad or you feel like he doesn't know you. Either daddy walked away or just never really showed up in the first place. Maybe you fall asleep at night wondering why you weren’t worth it for him to stay. Maybe he made an idiot decision that cost him everything. Maybe he really IS a moron who can’t be helped – I don’t know. I’m not saying he didn’t make bad decisions or leave a lot of casualties in the wake of his own selfishness. I have yet to meet a perfect dad, my dad and grandpas included. And hear me say this, if your dad is/was unsafe or unkind or uncaring in any way, I’m so sorry for that and I will always advocate for healthy boundaries with people - family or otherwise. Daddy wounds can cut deep and I don’t make light of that today.

But, if it’s possible, what if we start looking at our dads as simply people who did and are doing the best they can? What if you looked at your dad in the most generous light possible and for whatever he did or didn’t do for you, what if you let him off the hook? What if finally forgiving him is the best thing you can do today? What if it’s for your own sake and not for his at all? But what if you both benefit from that and it’s a chance to start fresh? 

So, to the men who are biological fathers and adoptive fathers and father figures, we celebrate you today. If your dad is amazing - everything I have described and more - celebrate him today. For the man that he is and the man that he is still becoming. If you don’t have your real daddy but you’ve got a man in your life who kept showing up for you – a teacher or a mentor or a stepdad – celebrate him today. If your dad has gone on to Heaven, celebrate him today. For the man in your life who has been your father in one way or another, send him a text or write him a card or call him this afternoon. Thank him. Encourage him. Pray for him. Love him extra hard today and try to let that spill over into the other days too. Dads work hard and play hard and love hard and for all the things we hear about dads who don't show up, I just think we need to keep encouraging and celebrating the dads who do. The ones who are examples to others. The ones who love their families so well. I know so many men who faithfully serve their families and they deserve our gratitude.

To my dad, thank you, today and always. For your sacrifices of time, energy, effort, love. And to dads everywhere, do not grow weary. This is our plea. We see you. We need you. We celebrate you and ask you to please keep showing up. The world is desperately hungry for more dads who keep showing up. 

Truth.

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I have been caught in the comparison game lately. You know the one. You start to look at what she has and what he’s doing and start to take up your brain space with questions like, “Well how can they afford that?” “Why do they get to do that?” “How did he end up with her?” “Why do they have ____ and I’m over here with _____?” You start to wonder why this other person is more deserving than you – why they get to have the new thing and you’re stuck with some older thing or no things at all. I find myself tangled in it the most when I see engagement pictures, wedding pictures, new house pictures from people younger than me. Gosh, aren’t they still 12? Do they let 12 year olds purchase whole houses these days? And, more importantly, don’t they have to do their time here in this waiting room? Don’t they need to cry a few tears first as they listen to someone else’s name called ahead of theirs? Or sit long enough to feel the backs of their legs start to stick to the chair? 

I was listening to a sermon from Judah Smith not long ago and he posed this question: "Do you ever read the Bible to help yourself feel better?" You hold your Bible up and stick your finger randomly somewhere in the middle and open it up. Give me something, God! I need a fresh word here if I’m going to make it! I know you say you’re listening and you say you’re here, so just give me a sign. Speak to me!  I was at Bible study with my sweet group of women and one of them said the exact same thing – they don’t know where to start when it comes to reading the Bible so they just throw a finger in the middle and open it up. Whatever you have for me, God!

I did that one time. Learned my lesson real quick.

Last year, one of my best friends got engaged. I knew it was going to happen – this was not my first rodeo as co-conspirator on a proposal. Her boyfriend told me when and where and how this would all go down as he asked her to be his forever, so my heart knew it was coming that day. I waited for the picture to show up on my phone – the one where they’re hugging each other and she’s showing off her ring. I knew it would be perfect, just as she deserved. When it finally came later that evening, I’M ENGAGED!, it was everything I knew it would be: smiling faces, celebration, surprise, peace. There is a sense of peace that must come with engagement, when it’s the right person. Just this sense that the search and the waiting is over. No more games or guessing or set-ups. What a sweet deal that must be.

I stared at the photo on my phone and texted back something like, “YAY!” with probably 48 emojis following it: flame, kissy lips, heart-eyed smiley face, wedding ring, bride. I watched as other elated responses came in on the group message.

And then I burst into tears.

I laid on the couch and covered my face with a blanket, silently letting the tears fall while staring at that photo. It wasn’t the photo making me sad. I was thrilled for my friend. Over the moon. I was so happy that it was her turn. But it just made me wonder, once again, when it was my turn. It's easy to leap to that question when someone else gets a thing you've always wanted - a baby, a dog, a scholarship, a car, a trip, whatever the case may be.  And in those moments, the waiting room felt suddenly suffocating. The smell of the disinfected floors was stinging my nose and my ears were tired of perking up only to hear 'Lindsey' or 'Lisa' or 'Linda' called instead. 

As I studied the photo, this feeling kind of settled into my bones. It was a deep-seated, heart-wrenching, sort of soul-twisting, sinking feeling (doesn’t it sound great?) where I just thought, “You will never have this. You will never feel this way.” Those are the words that honestly came to my heart in those moments, staring bliss in the face. “You will never feel this way – this intense love and belonging and sense of being chosen. You will never be enough for someone to stay.” Being single and casually dating in our current culture is mentally chaotic and I had never known any remote sense of calm in a relationship before. I never felt completely at ease – never knew his true intentions or thoughts or feelings. Oh, I heard what he said, but I never listened to his actions and they will always tell you who they are even if they aren’t saying it out loud. 

Anyway, for a few years I had been asking (in the begging, pleading, crying, wiping the snot from my face kind of way) “God, what do you have for me?” I wrote one time about how I was always waiting for my Joseph-gets-out-of-jail moment. If you’re not familiar, there’s a story in the Bible about Joseph. Maybe your only reference is the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat – it’s that guy. He was sold into slavery by his own brothers, thrown in jail for YEARS, then one day he got out and became second in command IN THE WORLD. Talk about redemption. So I always felt like surely God had a version of that coming for me – surely I suffered enough, waited enough, prayed enough, served enough. Surely he saw me down here slugging it out at a job I didn’t love (what about my passions, God?), going on blind dates that never turned into second dates, hitting up my ten year high school reunion where the only card I had to play was “Secretary in a basement in the same place I went to college, which is in the same town I went to high school. No, I don’t have a spouse or a kids, you know what, I’ve done nothing since high school, okay byeeeee.” But, what do you know, that’s the only card I had and while I loved my high school reunion (for real, so fun!) I left feeling defeated. I needed an attitude adjustment. With everyone seemingly moving forward without me, I was pretty convinced the dealer had this one rigged and I desperately wanted a new hand.

The night my girl got engaged I threw a spectacular pity party for myself. I was stomping around in a puddle of sadness while also frantically looking for a way out. So when I threw my sorry self in bed that night, I opened the Bible to try and make myself feel better. Say something, God. I’m losing it down here. Hit me with sweet comfort like, “He’s near to the brokenhearted,” “For I know the plans I have for you,” “Strength for today and bright hope for tomorrow." Okay, I don’t even think that last one is a verse, but I fully expected something comforting and cuddly - something you see cut out in script-font vinyl and stuck to the family room wall. I wanted a “Top ten verses when you’re feeling sad” list when I opened my Bible that night. So I stuck my thumb in a random spot and I opened those thin pages, landing on John 21, and above verse 18 the heading reads, “Our Times Are in His Hand” and my head was like, Yeah, they are, God. Preach, man. You’ve got my times so just tell me the times are going to get better!

Well, let me tell you what. God spoke that night. He just didn’t tell me exactly what I wanted to hear.

John 18: 21-22:  So Peter seeing him [John] said to Jesus, “Lord, and what about this man?” Jesus said to him, “If I want him to remain until I come, what is that to you? You follow Me!” 

The exchange that happened there was Peter comparing his fate to that of John and Jesus basically said, “What’s it to you, man?” And as I sat there reading that night, and because I think God sometimes speaks to me in my love language of sarcasm, I heard the words as, “Hey Lyndi, if I want literally every single person you know on this whole green earth to get engaged and married before you, have kids before you, build three houses and own a yacht, and then live a life of unending joy and ease, what is that to you? You follow Me.” 

Ouch.

I don’t know about you but when my siblings and I were younger and we wanted to do something or go somewhere with friends but my parents said no, my mom’s answer to our protest was always, “I don’t care what they’re doing. They’re not my kid.” This is the kind of moment I imagine God was having with me. He had pulled me aside and said, “It doesn’t matter what she got, what I give him, what I do over here. This is what I’m doing with you. You know what I asked. Follow me.” 

One thing we know for sure is that God always promises to tell us the truth – about himself, about who we are, about our lives here. Instead of comfort, he gave me truth and I finally had the answer to my unending question, “God, what do you have for me?” In the weeks that followed he was steady to repeat, “This! This is what I have for you. Be here now. Follow me in this.” Stop waiting and wishing and daydreaming your way out of wherever you are. Stop comparing. Stop competing. Stop thinking there’s something else, something better. Look around the waiting room. There are other people here. Meet them. Talk to them. Bond over the crossword puzzle in the back of the waiting room magazines. Share the snacks in your purse. Love them well. “I’m giving you chances every single day to just be here. Can you do that?”

Sure, I can do that.

When I'm caught up in comparing, it's hard to see where God is leading me because I'm too busy trying to see if I can follow someone else. Assess your own life right now. Do you have everything you need to follow God today? If the answer isn't yes, I love you, but you're wrong. I was listening to Bob Goff speak recently and he was saying that sometimes we need to break it down and just see if we can follow God for the next 30 seconds. And if you get through that 30 seconds, add another 30 seconds to it. And another. Following God isn’t so much more than one foot in front of the other, ever forward toward him. Eugene Peterson calls it “a long obedience in the same direction.” 

Lately I've had to go back to that lesson I learned last year. I've had to check my heart a lot recently and, if I'm honest, I’ll probably need the reminder about seventeen times a day until I return to dust. We have to remember it doesn’t matter what other people are getting or doing or having. You can celebrate with them, but their road is not yours. The people and things in your life are specifically fashioned for you. We might never know why someone gets one thing and we get another and maybe it’s not fair - in fact, most times it probably won't be fair. But be careful when you read the Bible simply to help yourself feel better about it. He won’t always tell you what you want to hear, but he does promise to tell the truth, and that's what you really need anyway.

The waiting room has been a lot less stuffy lately. I got my nose out of my phone and met a few of my neighbors. I asked to change the radio station and started humming along. And I don't know if you read my last post or not, but I think I (finally!) heard my name called.