winter

Seeking Hope After Christmas

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Because I love Christmas, it is always a bittersweet challenge to pack up everything, tape the boxes closed and carry Christmas to the basement.mantel after Xmas

I simply cannot endure the thought of an entire year before I pull out the twinkle lights, caress my angel collection and replay memories associated with the ornaments.

This Christmas was especially difficult as my son had to work through the holidays. I missed being with him as I remembered Christmases past and the excitement of a little boy discovering his first drum set, a giant box of Legos and a package of plastic army men.

This Christmas also brought more confusion for my mother. Her Alzheimer’s side effects seem to peak during the holidays, when I long for her to remember the daughter she sewed for, the special box of books she placed under the tree with my name on the tag, my excitement when I opened that box and knew I would soon be transported into the mysterious world of Nancy Drew.

This year, Mom didn’t even remember that Dad now lives in heaven. Our quality time was nonexistent, and when I drove her back to assisted living – she argued about living there. She couldn’t even remember why someone had given her presents.

So to preserve some joy of the season, I rearranged my pearl lights on the mantel and merged winter accessories with pine cone candles. Just a touch of Christmas to lessen the loss.

But I needed more. I have learned the best way to preserve the joy of Christmas is to proactively use my Christmas cards. I keep them in a pile beside my Bible, then each morning throughout January and February, I choose one card and pray for that person or the family that sent the card.

I remember special friends and family members, clients and colleagues by reminding God of their importance in my life, lifting up their needs to the only one who can fulfill them.

It helps me tolerate the cold fingers of winter as I focus on the warm love of the God who transcends every season and time.

So as we move into 2016, let’s all try to find more tangible ways to seek hope.

Then next year during Christmas, we can celebrate with extra joy.

©2016 RJ Thesman – Author of the Reverend G books http://amzn.to/1rXlCyh

 

Hanging On To Hope

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As the Kansas winter blustered through my yard, I noticed a unique snapshot of the season.leaf - hanging on

Although all the other leaves had already let loose and dropped to the ground, one leaf still hung on.

In spite of the wind, the calendar day and its length of life – a lone leaf clung tightly to the branch that had given it life.

It didn’t take long to wrap my heart around the analogy and honor thousands of saints who continue to cling tightly to their true source of life.

They persevere in spite of the calendar days that scream, “You should have given up already.”

They hang on in spite of the circumstances of life or the opinions of others or even of well-meaning friends who speak cruelty.

These are people who inspire me to persevere as well:

  • The single mom who drives her children to church even though she has been shunned because she’s divorced
  • The writer who revises the same manuscript seven times until every word is as good as it can possibly be – then ignores another rejection to revise it again
  • The cancer patient who refuses to be a victim but spends her time during brutal radiation treatments, praying through her list of friends and family
  • The nonprofit organizations who operate on a financial shoestring and trust God to provide resources each and every day
  • The missionaries who continue to serve even when their prayers don’t merge with the answers they long to see

Persevering folks who keep hanging on to hope even when everything in life attacks them.

Brave and vulnerable caregivers who keep serving even when the days are 36 hours long.

Mothers who keep praying for their prodigals. Fathers who work jobs they hate so their children won’t go hungry. Christians who refuse to deny Christ even though faced with the wrath of a radical Muslim sect.

The power of those who persevere is modeled at the end of Hebrews 11 – saints who refused to be released from torturous prisons, faced rejection and persecution, were destitute and mistreated. They did not receive what they were promised but they hung on anyway. They persevered and “the world was not worthy of them.”

What is required to continue in hope when everyone else has let loose and fallen around us?

Courage and the grace to keep hanging on to the One who empowers us with resurrection life.

©2015 RJ Thesman – Author of the Reverend G books http://amzn.to/1rXlCyh

 

Living Out Hope

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Hope in winter pictureBecause the tagline for my blog is “Finding hope when life unravels,” lately I’ve pondered a bit about how to find hope.

Perhaps it is a response to the death of Robin Williams and how fragile life can be. Why couldn’t Robin find hope? How do any of us define and pursue hope?

Besides writing and coaching, I also work at a nonprofit for women, GateWay of Hope, where we help to transform the lives of hurting women. We counsel them and provide support groups. We coach them forward in life and pray with them. In the process, they find hope.

It has been said that we cannot live without hope. I have seen hopelessness in the eyes of Alzheimer’s patients as they stare forward into some invisible memory, lost within the befuddled plaque of their diseased state. They are still breathing, but they are not alive.

None of us wants to get to that point and none of us wants our ending legacy to be a dangling rope, alone, in a closet.

So how do we stay in hope? How do we find hope when it hides behind the darkness? Is there a formula for finding hope?

Because I struggle with SAD (Seasonal Affective Disorder), the winter months are difficult for me. I’m okay during November and December because I’m looking forward to the holidays, family time and lots of chocolate.

But January and February wear me out. The temperature is cold and the sky is ugly gray. I’m tired of shoveling snow and dodging ice and wish I could be one of those snow birds that rides out the winter in Arizona.

It is vital then, to find my hope, so every year I focus on three activities:

Exercise. I absolutely must find a way to walk during the winter months. Whether it’s inside a mall or a trip to Wal-Mart where I walk the perimeter of the store and tell myself over and over, “You cannot buy anything to try to make yourself feel better. Keep walking.” Exercise releases the endorphins and helps me rediscover hope

Read. Finding hope, for me, means escaping into other worlds through the pages of books. I keep a stack of books in my bedroom, another one in my office and a stack on my desk at work. I am constantly reading two or three books each week – nonfiction, self-help, fiction, memoir, the Psalms – anything to keep the cells of my brain alive and thinking about something other than the gray sky outside.

Pray. When I wake up in the morning, as I drive to work, in between appointments at work, before meals, at night, for extended periods on the Sabbath – prayer is my connection to the Author of Hope, the only answer I have to the desperate plea of my soul for Light and Love.

During the darker days of despair, the enemy of our souls comes, splattering his drivel that neither God nor anyone else cares.

I believe this must be the final cry of those who end their own lives. They believe no one cares.

It is the exercise and discipline of fervent prayer that keeps me centered on the truth so that I can scream back, “OH. YES. GOD. DOES. CARE.”

Although this tiny formula, Exercise + Reading + Prayer = Hope provides the morsel I need – ultimately, hope is one of those nebulous qualities that ends up as a gracious gift from the Giver.

For those who live in the deep hell of depression, for those who struggle with SAD and for those who just feel desperate at the end of a long day – we can only cry out and ask God to gift us with a nugget of hope.

Then sometimes, we just need to find another human being and ask for a hug. “Please remind me that I matter. Please touch me and help me feel alive.”

©2014 RJ Thesman – “Intermission for Reverend G” – http://amzn.to/1l4oGoo

 

Finding Hope in the Grey

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What is it about February? The shortest month seems to stretch into a cavernous calendar of grey days.winter scene

Grey isn’t my color. I don’t live well in February.

Occasional spits of snowy ice combine with frigid temperatures. We huddle tighter inside our coats, wishing for a warm blast from the Gulf rather than the icy breath of another polar vortex.

Winter is my least favorite season and it seems that February stretches my barely active tolerance for winter to the limits. Every year, I struggle through it, trying to find joy and praise even while I flex my cold fingers and fight depressing thoughts.

Seasonal Affective Disorder distracts me, especially during February, and I find myself sad emotionally as well as physically. Add to that a family history of several funerals during February that left emotional scars within my memory bank. I can still hear the scraping of frozen earth as cemetery maintenance tried to dig a hole for my great uncle’s casket.

So what do I do to somehow find hope during February?

I count off the weeks, reminding myself that somehow in March, even if we have a late snow storm – somehow the abundant life will return and the sun will shine. Grey skies will morph into blue once again.

I sit in my rocker and watch the sun set, reminding myself that it’s only three more weeks, then two, then one, then a few days until the dreaded month is over once again.

Every year I ask God to somehow provide me with enough money so that I can be one of those snow bird people and escape to Arizona to stay with my cousin during February. He and his wife would put me up in their spare bedroom. I know they would. If only I could get there.

What helps me the most is reciting Psalm 43:5 over and over. “Hope in God, for I shall yet praise Him.”

The “yet” will come with the next turn of the calendar. February will become March. Seed catalogs will arrive and gardening supplies will replace mittens and coats. The promise of spring will once more erupt with purple crocuses and yellow daffodils. Birds will sing and I will journal in the sunshine on my deck.

In the “yet.”

It is also in the “yet” that we wait for that eternal hope, when we leave the grey of this sinful earth and live in the warmth of God’s love for eternity. Surely there is no snow or ice in heaven – at least not in my corner of heaven.

For me, heaven will be completely devoid of death and cold, of grey blank skies that promise only icy storms. It will be a place of eternal spring, of joy and hope, of warmth and love, of life that continues forever and ever.

And I will never be cold again.

©2013 RJ Thesman – “The Unraveling of Reverend G” – http://amzn.to/11QATC1

Mom’s Unchanging Smile

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One of her long-time friends visited Mom in the assisted living facility. This was a friend who attended church with us and served with Mom on several committees.

When her friend entered the room, Mom looked up and smiled – as if she remembered the years of service together, the sharing of Mennonite foods and the fellowship in a crowded sanctuary.

The smile remained fixed even as Mom’s eyes registered surprise.old woman

The three of us chatted about the weather. Mom repeated the same phrase several times, “So cold now. The ice…that’s what you have to be careful of.”

The friend and I reminisced about another friend who had recently graduated to heaven. We talked about family and generations of connections, the folks who traveled a distance for the funeral, the nice service, the beautiful music.

Mom’s smile remained in the same upturned pose. She seemed a world away.

The friend asked about Mom’s activities. “Do you like the food here?”

“Oh, yes. Wonderful food. I think I’m getting fat.”

We all laughed. My slender mother has never struggled with her weight. Her only weight gains over the years were the pregnancies of her three children and even then, she gained a mere eight pounds.

Mom’s smile widened. She seemed to enjoy the echoes of our laughter even though she may not have comprehended the humor. It’s odd how a smile conveys a compliant spirit even as memory hides behind walls of dementia-covered plaque.

Then a break in the conversation – one of those lulls where no one knows what to say because every appropriate subject has been covered.

Mom filled in the gaps with the same statement as before. “The ice…you have to be careful of ice.”

The friend reached for her coat and found her gloves tucked into her pockets. She hugged Mom good-bye, then hugged me. Her whisper touched my cheek with the slight smell of peppermint gum. “I’ll pray for your mother, for all of you. Alzheimer’s is a such a terrible disease.”

“Thank you. We appreciate that.”

As she left, Mom’s smile began to fade as her eyes widened. “Who was that?” she asked.

“Your friend from church. You used to be in the same Sunday School class. You met every week and served in the women’s ministry. She was a good friend.”

“I see,” said Mom, but her eyes registered no remembrance.

Then she turned toward the winter-frosted window and smiled.

©2013 RJ Thesman – “The Unraveling of Reverend G” – http://amzn.to/11QATC1