Springs of Life (a Reading List)

 Our oldest and youngest, reading their new books.

Happy New Year to all my friends. 2013 was a good year for our family. We didn't have the health struggles that robbed us of joy in previous years. We had regular employment (for Nate) and busy, productive days. Some days were difficult, but they were of an ordinary difficulty. They didn't feel impossible. Even the loss of Nate's dad was a reminder of the Lord's faithfulness. We wish we had more good years with him, but we are thankful for the time we were given.

But I know that gratitude for the last year is not true for everyone. I know that some people struggled mightily, with illness and sadness and loneliness and loss. We have been there (and knowing the nature of life, we'll cycle through some valleys again). I've been thinking about the sorrow of this time of year. About darkness. About what helped me most when the future seemed bleak and scary. 

What worked for me won't work for everyone. But for what it's worth, here's what I did (or on some days, vaguely attempted to do. You who are in it, understand):

Start the day with a song

For me this means singing out loud, usually an old praise song. Some of my favorites are "Praise the Savior," which no one seems to know anymore, and "You Can Have This Whole World, Give Me Jesus." I often sing hymns. Find what works for you, what you love to sing, and start to sing the minute your feet hit the floor. Praise banishes darkness.  

Find friends who know how to listen

Or, find a good counselor who is paid to listen.

Exercise
When my mind swirled with confusion, and it didn't feel like God was answering any of our prayers, I kept going to the gym at the beginning of the day (about four days a week). God made our bodies to move. You can't buy endorphins, you have to earn them. And they're worth every bit of pain and any inconvenience. Now I don't go to the gym, because I'm home with two kids. I try to do bit of the Tracy Anderson workout and some Pilates. But they aren't the same. What works best is a good old-fashioned work-out.  

Guard your heart.

Proverbs 4:23 (ESV) says, "Keep your heart with all vigilance, for from it flow the springs of life."

And yet we do so little to guard our heart, to keep it with all vigilance. We feast on bread that does not satisfy, and we wonder why we are left hungry and desperate. These last nineteen month with a nursing baby, I've spent countless hours in front of the television. It's a waste of time. But some stations are more of a waste than others. I keep that remote handy, I try to practice vigilance, and if I can't find anything worth watching, I turn off the tv and lean my head back and rest. And pray.

So on the topic of guarding your heart, I'm including our family's current reading list. It's so cold this week. Yesterday never even reached zero degrees. But with the fireplace burning, and the cream puffs baking golden in the oven, and the baby running around, and all of my big kids burrowing into their books, it felt warm. It felt nurturing and peaceful. I only wish I could join them. My reading is done in fits and starts, usually very late at night and in the wee hours of the morning. 

Malachi is reading Barnyard Dance, Jorge el Curioso, Mr. Brown Can Moo!, and Brown Bear, Brown Bear. He especially loves the Brown Bear book because each corner "swipes" to reveal the next animal.

Anna Kate just read Katherine Patterson's Jacob Have I Loved. Next up: either a Narnia book, or a Betsy-Tacy. I will choose, and she probably won't be happy about it. 

Julia just finished How Green Was My Valley by Richard Llewellyn. I think it's one of my top five faves, but my sister, an English teacher, doesn't love it as much as I do.

Caleb does not have time to read. However, the books he got for Christmas include Manalive, Heretics, and Orthodoxy by Chesterton, The Checklist Manifesto by Gawande, and The Beloved Works of C.S. Lewis.

Isaac just finished Phantases by George MacDonald, a book he's read twice before and enjoys so much that we gave it as a gift this year. Now he's reading Pensees by Blaise Pascal, which Caleb gave him. 

I am reading The Wind in the Willows for the first time. It was a gift from Isaac. I like it very much, and it's high time we owned it.

Nate is reading a book from Isaac called Beyond Band of Brothers. I think he's liking it.

What are you reading this year? I'd love to know.

(lyrics to Praise the Savior)

Praise the Savior, ye who know him,
Who can tell how much we owe him?
Gladly let us render to him
All we are and have.

Jesus is the Name that charms us
He for conflict fits and arms us
Nothing moves and nothing harms us
While we trust in him.

Trust in him ye saints forever
He is faithful, changing never
Neither force nor guile can sever
Those he loves from him.

Keep us Lord, oh keep us cleaving
To thyself and still believing
Till the hour of our receiving
Our eternal home.

Then we shall be what we would be
Then we shall be what we should be
Things that are not now but could be
Soon shall be our own.

(hope that's right - it's from a faulty memory)

And here's a promise for 2014: Neither force nor guile can sever those he loves from him.