February | 2016 | ☕ Espressos of Faith ☕

Is That God Waking Me Up?

#Psalm139_23 #SearchMeOGod, and know my heart! Try me and know my thoughts!

— Bonnie Lyn Smith (@BonnieLynSmith) February 11, 2016

I woke up in the middle of the night. An old wound reopened. My mind was rushing, and I could not for the life of me understand why certain memories were flooding back upon popping one eye open.

Didn’t I take care of that business, Lord? Why am I awakened by this?

Truth be told, I was having a hard time sorting out whether I was being tormented (which isn’t God) about something in the past just to derail me and disrupt my peace, or if God had woken me up to sort through something.

I was aware of the small trigger that had set off the memories, but I felt I had dipped them in His amazing peace, prayed them down, and stepped off the memory platform.

Apparently not so.

Ever have something come back and revisit, and you’re not sure what to do with it?

Yeah, me too.

Whenever this happens and old tapes play in my head, I have two choices (because ignoring them doesn’t work): Read the rest of this entry »

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Posted by Bonnie Lyn Smith on February 12, 2016 in Ministry Moments, Relationship with God, Renewing Our Minds

Tags: break free, coming back to God, confession, discernment, faithfulness of God, forgiven, galatians 6:1, God wakes us up, God's rebuke, know my heart, luke 8:24, memories, peace, perfect peace, prayer, psalm 139:23-24, relationship with God, repentance, search me o God, search my heart, shame, sin, spiritual discipline, torment, trigger, unfinished business

Take It to the Healer

10 Feb

Take It to the Healer We drove to the Deep South for post-Christmas fun with my husband’s sisters, their families, and his Dad. As I looked out over the Alabama fields, I told God:

“My heart hurts. What healing do You have for me here?”

I believe He always wants to heal our wounds. It’s part of what He went to the cross for.

You know what? I found His hugs, warmth, and love in watching young cousins have light-saber battles and in playing rowdy games of “Nuts” with my nephew and nieces. I watched each God-given personality interact and shine. I saw their faces as once-babies now in mostly/almost adult form.

And I thought of this verse:

Psalm 27:13, KJV, King David speaking

I had fainted, unless I had believed to see the goodness of the LORD in the land of the living.

We must see God’s goodness in everything He gives us because death, disease, addictions, injuries, and sin are thieves we can become embittered hating if we don’t focus on the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living. At times, it’s a minute-by-minute choice, or else we’d lose our minds and hearts to deep grief, shame, or disillusionment.

Sometimes, seeing His goodness is so hard for us because of our incredible pain. He knows this, so we can ask Him to help us. We absolutely should.

John 15:7, ESV, Jesus speaking

If you abide in me, and my words abide in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you.

Our family of five, along with two rather compliant Shih Tzus, began our road trip back from Alabama and traveled as far as Knoxville, Tennessee, when the text came in that my 26 year old cousin Read the rest of this entry »

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Posted by Bonnie Lyn Smith on February 10, 2016 in Grief and Loss, Relationship with God, The Healing Cloak of Jesus

Tags: abide in me, addiction, Alabama, comfort, compartmentalized, disillusionment, faith walk, God's purposes, goodness of the Lord, grief, heal our wounds, healer, hope, I had fainted, Isaiah 53:5, John 15:7, loss, mourning, pierced for our transgressions, psalm 27:13, shame, with his wounds we are healed

Redefining Unconditional: How Our Son Completely Changed Our Lives

06 Feb

I was so honored to have the opportunity to write a very personal piece at Rosevine Cottage Girls a few weeks ago. Cheyenne asked me to join their series on the “unconditional love of a special needs parent.” Oh, yes, please! You see, I believe this article is for any parent. Our children transform us and chip away at selfishness and pride, if we’re willing to let our parenting experiences shape us into better people. Parenting of any kind is saying “yes” to the changes that happen within us when we welcome the possibility of unconditional love into our lives.

——————

For two years, I would sit at his basketball games and silently sob.

Not because Little Man (our youngest son) wasn’t as good as the other kids were. (He wasn’t at the time.)

Not because I was embarrassed to be the only parent with a kid on that team not keeping up.

Redefining Unconditional_ How Our Son Completely Changed Our Lives I would weep because he was cognitively stuck. Like a computer sluggishly trying to process a hard drive full of information, he would stare. The game went on around him, and he lagged 30 seconds behind. He would run down the court just as the team was turning around to head the other way down the court. Then he would remember, briefly, to “guard his man” before getting lost in the loudness of the gymnasium, the overstimulation of the ball bouncing around him, the fast pace of the kids racing past, and the pure anxiety of being in slow-motion when everyone around you is on pace. He would peel his hangnails and wear a perpetually worried look on his face.

My heart would ache and shatter not because he was different but because it was an indication that once again, he was suspended in that time and place called dysregulation, for whatever the reason, and we would need months to partly climb back out again.

Parenting is saying “yes” to the changes that happen within us when we welcome the possibility of #UnconditionalLove into our lives.

— Bonnie Lyn Smith (@BonnieLynSmith) February 2, 2016

Join me over at Rosevine Cottage Girls to read how Little Man changed our lives for the better.

——————

Read the rest of this entry »

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Posted by Bonnie Lyn Smith on February 6, 2016 in ADHD, Anxiety/OCD/Depression, Dance/Karate/Robotics/Band/Basketball/XC Mom, Other Places Where I Blog, Sensory Integration, Tweens/Children

Tags: ADHD, anxiety, depression, dysregulated, dysregulation, John 15, mental health, OCD, sensory, sensory integration, sensory overload, special education, special mind, special needs, special needs child, special needs parenting, unconditional love

Love Knocked: It’s Time to Answer

04 Feb

I opened the door to find her standing there in thepouring-down rain, hand outstretched toward me with a Peppermint Mocha and Salted Caramel Square just waiting to delight me inside a paper bag. I greeted her with bedhead, three-days-worn pajamas, and a defeated face. Not sure when I had last showered. She doesn’t even drink coffee from my café of choice, but she had the barista handcraft a beverage just for me. She didn’t come in. She took her soaked self back to the van, having delivered friendship in a cup. And it was the real deal in every way: Love Knocked

friendship

and

good coffee.

Before that knock came, I got an email:

“You home right now?”

Me: “Yes, upstairs resting.”

Nothing mattered to me right then. I had tried to drag myself out all day to get a coffee just to be somewhere and exist outside my own grief, but I couldn’t. I listlessly made three breakfasts, packed three lunches, sent three kids out the door to three different buses, and went back to bed. All I knew was that Dad was dying several states away, and that phone call was coming in any minute. I was in some kind of nightmarish limbo—stuck and free-falling.

Then, that knock!

I wanted to but could not in any way will myself to answer it. I simply couldn’t leave my bed. I didn’t know it was raining. I wasn’t even sure who it was. But the knuckles rapped a bit stronger and then my phone burped. Read the rest of this entry »

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Posted by Bonnie Lyn Smith on February 4, 2016 in Grief and Loss, Lotsa Latte, Ministry Moments, Relationship with God

Tags: Christmas, coffee, eternity, friendship, God's gift, God's plans, God's presence, grief, Holy Spirit, hope of Christ, Jesus knocks, John 14:6, love knocked, manger, mourning, no man comes to the Father, peppermint mocha, relationship with God, rescue, resurrection and the life, Revelation 3:20, stand at the door and knock, Starbucks

When You’re Stuck, Like Me

02 Feb

When You're Stuck, Like Me This article was first published at Your Tewksbury Today, where I wrote in real time as I processed the loss of my father during Advent 2015. While this was two months ago, to the day, I feel it is important to revisit it; it is part of an ongoing series I am writing on grief. Sometimes it is a stuck place, and we need a little help to get unstuck, but it’s not just grief that leaves us feeling this way. We can land with legs up in the air, unable to find our ground during any kind of loss: relationship disappointment, abandonment, betrayal, a crushed dream, etc.

I hope you find something in it to bring you or someone you know peace and comfort as you/he/she experience/s the inevitable: mourning what was and adjusting to the new normal.

—————–

I was stuck—a stuck mouse to a glue trap in my grief. Arms and legs flailing in perpetual motion but no ability to move forward. My sweet father lingered in a place where peace was promised ahead, but he had to cross the precipice by himself, and there was nothing I could do about it. The push-pull of those last days brought such conflicting feelings that penetrated my very marrow. Waking or sleeping, all I could do was picture the glory ahead and a sweet man with fingers gently reaching up to wait for the hand of Christ.

When I look at my youngest son’s limbs, hands, and feet, freckled and long, I see my father. The auburn wisps around his face? Another genetic transfer. For years, when we lived in the Marshall Islands, we would send his hair clippings to Dad to show him that beautiful autumn fire that successfully lived on in the gene pool.

Last week I found myself holding my breath just looking at my son. I was grateful my father was so evident in his appearance. I walked around half-completing tasks, afraid to be in public when the phone would ring, immobilized in my favorite IKEA chair with both dogs on my lap, and unable to fully clear a table, finish a load of laundry, or make a meal. Time. Stood. Still. I was waiting for the crossover with a grief that engulfed me for what would be—a fearful anticipation of life without Dad. I could not move on.

What about you? Have you found yourself stuck in grief, fear, disappointment, shame, or disillusionment? Read the rest of this entry »