in the testing

The moment you're really tested - the treasured is stripped from you, your reputation is smeared, you best efforts fail in what feels like every area - the moment you're tempted to believe that God has targeted you for some sort of galactic "whooping"...remember this truth.

He could have left you alone.

what's in a name?

I hated the bus ride to and from school as a kid. And, to be honest, as a teenager! Boarding the bus, especially in the afternoon, was great reason for sweaty palms, heart-pounding panic, and nearly teeth-chattering fear. I wish I were exaggerating!

The bus was a free zone:  no teachers, no monitors...just sixty kids and a forty-five minute free-for-all of cursing, intimidating, fighting, and downright meanness. Some days you were the intimidator, other days the intimidated.

Most days, I was the intimidated. I tried to be quite and invisible until someone chose me as a target. And even then, I'd wait as long as I could until I stood up for myself. One time, a girl stood in my face yelling curse words at me for quite some time before I finally stood up and yelled back at her. She slapped me and knocked me back into my seat. I didn't get back up. But, I was kicked off the bus for three days while she went on with her tormenting discipline-free. Lesson learned? Just stay quiet.

(My parents didn't discipline me for my bus suspension, by the way. The sentiment I got from them was almost as if they put my on their shoulders and paraded me around, proud of the fact that I hadn't gotten into a hair-snatching, face-scratching, out-and-out battle with this girl. They just drove me to school for three days, without complaint.)

I always dreaded school. From kindergarten through twelfth grade. Many of my interactions there were very hard on such a sensitive kid. Consequently, I had a horrible view of myself. I believed far too much of what was said to me or about me. I soaked it in. By high school, I was despondent I'd ever be worth anything or ever be accepted. I was more than despondent, I was depressed.

I felt God didn't see me or know what I was going through. I searched Scripture and was comforted by the fact that He, too, was despised and rejected. But that still didn't make me feel loved and valued. It just let me know I was in Good company.

My junior year, when a friend traveled to England, he returned with a gift for me. It meant a lot that he thought about me in his travels. But what meant more was the lesson I learned from his gift. He gave me a tea cup. It would be about eight years before I embraced a love of hot tea, so I was a bit confused. But when I read the cup, I knew it had been carefully selected. It said, "Amanda, your name means, 'Worthy of Love', and you can say that again!"

Worthy of love. I had no idea. No clue that the name I carried - the name that had become synonymous with shame and humiliation, actually said over me each time it was spoken what God was crying out for me to hear, "I love you, I love you. I made you beautiful. I made you worthy to be admired, loved, by others. By Me." Worthy of love, with your frizzy hair, bountiful hips, lack of braces, and offbeat sense of humor. Worthy of love regardless of what small-minded folks may say. Worthy of love because He declared it over me. Even my enemies unknowingly declared that I was loved when they spoke my name. How awesome is that!?

That's how the Lord got to me. Every verse I memorized about His love set the stage. And each person who demonstrated care and love toward me watered the seed. But God used an even smaller, more common thing, to say, "Amanda, I love you. You." God starting a soul-healing work in me through a tea cup which sits in my cabinet still today. He has continued that work, and He will finish it.

And that work is part of the reason we have taken, are taking, so much time to name our son! His name will proclaim over him all the days of his life what we feel is important for him to know. It will speak of his calling, his God, his identity. So, to us, a name is not just a name, but an opportunity to speak life over our boy every time we call his name.

What shall it be!? Well, we will certainly have to decide before we take him home from the hospital! And when he decides to grace us with his presence, we will declare his wonderful, magnanimous name to the whole world! Our Fragments family included.

--------

If you don't know the meaning of your name, give Google a holler and find out! I've actually used babynames.com a lot, even pre-pregnancy to find the meaning of names. (MANY are accurate. But, for some, I had to do a little more research.)

Waves

I was prepared for waves of nausea, fatigue, and something that varied from discomfort to pain for a full 40 weeks. No doubt crescendoing at the end.

I was not at all, however, prepared for wave upon wave of emotion - crashing on one another and making it difficult to get footing between assails. High tide, low tide. Thrill. Panic.

....

Monday night, as Webb and I left work, we planned to run some errands. We were headed about twenty minutes away, to Wal Mart, when I asked, "Babe...do you think we could eat at Longhorn? It just sounds really, really good to me."

"I don't mind, but that's an hour away. You are realizing that means our entire night will be out and about, right?"

"I do. I know. It just sounds really, really good right now. And not many things do."

He sighed a bit, but smiled, "Sure. Longhorn it is."

My husband. Such a gracious husband to moody, unsatisfiable, pregnant woman.

As we neared the next town though, I threw out another request, "But babe, we have an hour drive and it's going to be an hour and a half before we eat. And I'm hungry now...really hungry..."

"Ok?"

"Can we just drive through McDonald's here on the way?" I suggested it like this is something normal people do - pre-dinner dinner.

"Let me make sure I'm right," he clarified. "You want to drive through for a cheeseburger, and then you want to eat a steak?"

"I know! But I'm just so hungry! I haven't eaten since 8:00 this morning!"

"Amanda. That's a little bit crazy. It won't take long to get there, I promise."

And the quick-approaching McDonald's was on our left, and then it was in the rearview mirror.

He drove by it. And I, instead of contenting my heart with the steak I would eat in just a bit, BURST into tears. Not teared up, or was just disappointed. No. BROKE into SOBBING.

"Oh my gosh!!" the shocked man in the seat beside me slammed on brakes, swerved into the turn lane, and made a beeline for McDonald's.

"I didn't realize it was this serious! You just want a cheeseburger, right?" he asked with slight panic in his voice.

"Yes..." I uttered between sobs.

..."And a small fry."...

At that, laughter broke the tension of the moment just a bit. I heard how ridiculous I sounded and started cracking up. And he laughed, knowing I was completely out of control and I knew it.

"Can I get a mighty kids meal, with a Diet Coke, please?" he requested.

I sat beside him crying, apologizing and thanking, "I'm sorry! But thank you. I'm sorry!"

When I offered him some fries or a bite of burger, he shook his head like, "Take food from a lion? What kind of idiot does that?"

And we laughed. And an hour later I ate four ounces of steak and a baked potato. Could have eaten more.

I wasn't at all prepared for these waves. Tears at the slightest thing. And I certainly thought if I had navigated the first trimester without any of this, it surely wasn't coming for me. I would make it through pregnancy unscathed! False.

But I am so thankful for such a wonderful husband. I tell him every single day, "You are the most amazing husband any pregnant woman could have. You know that, right?" To which he often replies, "I do know that," with a smirk on his face.

But why all the waves? Why the crashing down of thrill, panic, sadness, excitement, worry, anticipation...one right after the other?

Now more than ever I need the peace only He gives. His joy - a calm delight. And yet every offer He extends, I refuse. If I am to receive peace, I must forego my striving. I must settle my agenda. I, with no exceptions, must surrender - exchanging myself and my plans for true, lasting peace.

This is the peace I've prayed over our son. The reason his nursery is decorated in neutral, calm colors. The reason I often pat my belly and speak softly and reassuringly to him. The very peace that I want him to have more than almost anything else.

And yet, I expect myself to pass on something I am refusing for myself. My son will not simply, "Do as I say." I know this. He will take his cues from who I am. He will walk the way I walk. I cannot pass on what I do not hold.

"The Lord will fight for you. You need only to hold your peace."

Picture it - He hands us peace and says, "Hold this. I'll be right back." And that is our only job. To hold it, ponder it, let it feel at home in our hands.

Today, that is your only job. Forget all the rest of it. He only looked at you and said, "Hold this. I'll do the rest." You must, if you don't do anything else, clutch it. Don't let your hands be so full of all else that you have to let go of the one thing that will help you endure all that otherness.

That's what I'm speaking to myself today. "No matter the wave, wrap yourself around the peace. Though you tumble through the water, unable to distinguish up from down, cling to the peace. For this is only a wave. It has an end. And what you hold does not. It is inexhaustible."

"He will fight for you. You need only to hold your peace."

      (Photo credit:  Ann Voskamp)