If it's Christmas, it's pink

 

 

My friend's mom, Ati, always liked the color pink. It was one of her favorite colors. And indeed, the very first time I met her, on a late afternoon in October of 2002, she was wearing a soft pink sweater. Now, when I look back on our relationship, the color pink is right there in my mind, an aura that is represents the love and the care and the gentleness in our friendship.

 

I've also heard that pink is a color that represents healing. Ati was always such a healing presence in everyone’s life, and such a comfort. You just felt so much better after talking with her, like everything was going to be okay. When you needed her, she was there, offering a hug and an uplifting word. Or maybe a joke that would ease the tension of the situation. Or a compassionate look, a listening ear, a gentle smile. She was the healing color of pink in everyone's life.

 

Ati's daughter did not like pink. She preferred darker colors, black and gray and navy blue. Ati knew this and so, when I came into Ati's life, I suddenly became the recipient of everything pink. I will always remember that first gift from Ati, for Christmas 2002: a white shirt with a pink flower on it. That started the trend, and from then on, at each Christmas I got pink shirts, pink pajamas, and even pink shoes as gifts. I was bombarded with pink things. However, what Ati didn’t know was that I didn’t really like the color pink either! But I couldn’t tell her that, could I? She had already been unable to shop for pink things for her daughter, and I didn't want to hurt her feelings. Her daughter always laughed every time I got a pink gift, probably out of relief that she was no longer the recipient. 

 

An interesting thing happened, though; over the years, I began to develop a taste for the color pink. It was always associated with Ati, and in this way, I became a fan. I liked wearing the pink pajamas because they made me think of her, especially since she had a matching purple pair. I liked the pink shirt. I never got into wearing the pink shoes (they didn't match anything I owned), but I couldn't bear to throw them out. They made me happy, just to look at them.

 

Another interesting thing happened over the years: Ati's daughter started to wear pink as well! Pink sweaters, pink blouses… wearing pink made her feel closer to her mom. Ati managed to convert both of us into pink people.

 

Ati was a very special person in my life. She was loving, kind, and maternal. She was so full of love and life and warm, wonderful feelings. And while she held, and will always hold, an important role in my life, she always thought about the other people I had in my life as well... relationships that needed repairing, connections that could be restored. And she always wanted to do whatever she could to help those reparations happen. Ati was always generous and warm, having such a healing effect on people. She is the color pink.

Loving intensely

Two Christmas Eves ago, I texted an overseas friend to wish her happy holidays. We had only become friends a couple of weeks before, but it was one of those friendships that starts out really strongly. I felt like I'd always known her. Actually, a couple days after I met her, I already felt like she was a part of my family.

When I texted her, I didn't expect a response. I knew she was with her family, and it was Christmas, after all. But not long after I sent my message, my phone lit up. Her reply was loving and intense, just like she is. Lots of exclamations, capital letters, and terms of endearment all packed into a little message.

People have all sorts of ways of expressing love. There is a book by Dr. Gary Chapman called The 5 Love Languages. It identifies the 5 major "languages of love" as the following:
1) quality time
2) words of affirmation
3) gifts
4) acts of service
5) physical touch

You can have one preferred way of receiving love, and one preferred way of expressing love to others. Sometimes those match up, and sometimes they don't. I know that for me, I feel loved by all 5 of the ways of expressing love, but I feel most loved by quality time and words of affirmation. I am not sure how I express love the best to others.

I get the feeling that I express love in the same manner in which I have been loved. I think about all the people who have loved me in my life: family members, friends, the pets I've had, acquaintances, friends of friends, strangers, people in other countries, people who started out disliking me and then grew to like me... I have grown and become a better person with each example, each experience of love in my life. I don't know how to explain it except to say that as I grow older and experience more love, my definition of love becomes broader and broader. And I have to thank each and every person who has ever loved me; everyone adds a new perspective of love to my consciousness.

Now, let's look at the source of this love and other examples of love in our lives: to me, that source of love is God. And because we are God's creation, we love people and are in turn loved back by people. And sometimes we love pretty intensely, and are loved back pretty intensely. Sometimes it is more relaxed, and may take a while for the full extent of the love to be shown or expressed. And each way of loving, each expression of love, is a blessing and a gift from God.

All love comes from above. One of my favorite verses talks about gifts: "Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and cometh down from the Father of lights" (James 1:17). Whatever good we have in our life is a reflection of the goodness of God, a gift that is given to us, His beloved children. The amount that God loves us is more than we will ever understand here on earth. Jesus loves intensely, God loves intensely, and likewise, we reflect their love when we love people, animals, and the world around us.

However, even though we are loved by God, sometimes love can seem unexpected, foreign, even undeserved. In my own life, I look back at even just the past year, and there were so many times when a friend or family member reached out to me, loved me, and I didn't know what to do or say. The amount of love that I felt was so strong, so overwhelming, but in a good way. This amount of love made me so grateful for life and everything in it. Every day was like a present that I was opening, to discover what goodness it contained.

Along these same lines, the friend I texted a couple years ago was so intensely loving from the get-go, and I didn't know how to respond at first. She began our friendship by telling me she was upset with me for not introducing myself when I first saw her. "You didn't come over. You denied me the opportunity to give you a hug." How does one respond to that? This person had so much love to give, so much affection, that she never let me forget that day when she was denied the opportunity to express some of that love. Later in our friendship, when I would get down on myself about something, she would say, "What are you talking about? You are WONDERFUL! Any other thinking is like when you thought you were going to bother me by saying hello that one time..." I definitely didn't feel that I deserved the amount of love that she was pouring out, but at the same time, it opened my eyes to another example of incredible love that was a direct reflection of God's love.

Why do we ever feel unworthy of this love, from people or from God? The Bible tells us, "See what kind of love the Father has given to us, that we should be called children of God" (1 John 3:1). We are His children, He is our Father. How could we ever doubt that He loves us, or that we are lovable? Of course, as humans we all make mistakes; we all stumble and have challenges and sometimes don't act in ways that demonstrate our highest selves. But God, as our parent, will always love us, and we, as His children, will always be lovable and worthy of that love. If we could only see ourselves as God sees us... or even, for that matter, as our dearest friends see us. We would be a lot more patient with ourselves, and definitely more loving towards ourselves.

Mindy Jostyn has a wonderful song, In His Eyes, which always helps me in seeing that I am worthy of being loved. An excerpt is below:

"In His eyes, you're a fire that never goes out
A light on the top of a hill.

Now and forever, that light never dies
You're dearly beloved in His eyes."

If we could see the way that God sees us, it would change our views of ourselves, and of those around us. We are all worthy of love, and of being recognized as precious children of God.

There is another bible passage which has brought me a lot of comfort this past year, about how God helps us because He loves us so dearly.

“He reached down from on high and took hold of me;
he drew me out of deep waters.
He rescued me from my powerful enemy,
from my foes, who were too strong for me.
They confronted me in the day of my disaster,
but the Lord was my support. 
He brought me out into a spacious place;
he rescued me because he delighted in me."
-- 2 Samuel 22:17-20

Many times this year, I focused on the last line: "He rescued me because he delighted in me." And I would remind myself that as my Heavenly Father, He loved me as one of His precious daughters. I kept thinking about all the (sometimes overwhelming) love I felt in my life from people and from my dog, and how much greater His love for me was. That is a lot of love, an incomprehensible amount of love. Intense.

I am so grateful for the gift of feeling love for God's creation, and for feeling love from God's creation. And I am so grateful for the source of all of our love, the One who loves us the most intensely of all.

Rolling down the path - some thoughts on life and death

Life and death, loss and grief, love and the eternal. In the past 2 days in light of what happened in Connecticut, and then in the past 6 weeks in light of losing a close friend of mine, I've been thinking a lot about these things. Today a thought came to me that gave me some comfort.

We often see our existence in 2 phases: the time we are alive, living on this earth; and the time when we have passed on, and our "being" is no longer occupying a tangible, breathing body. I see our existence this way; I know many people do. But I think these 2 phases differ only in their appearance or in the perspective of those who are alive on this earth. When we pass away, when our loved ones experience loss in our passing, I have heard the person who has passed on described as being "in the next room." Our souls, our actual identities as "beings," don't change; we have always been and will always be God's son or daughter and one of his divine ideas.

Today, when thinking about the recent losses in our nation and in my own experience, I pictured a ball rolling down a path. The ball represented our entire existence, both on this earth and then afterwards for eternity. Let's picture that the path is lined by trees, and that the ball is rolling through the darkness of the shade. Then suddenly, the line of trees ends, and the ball continues rolling under the sunshine. The path is lit up brightly, and the ball continues on its journey, rolling down the path.

At no point did the ball ever stop rolling; it didn't even slow down. I see this as our identity: even when we pass on, our identity and our being doesn't ever stop or slow down. We are just moving along down the path. Likewise, there is not a second when we are out of God's love or out of His care. Just as the ball didn't stop when it got to the end of the shade, and start again once it entered the sunlight, God didn't stop being right with us. He is right there for our entire journey.

It comforted me somewhat to think about this path that we take, especially when thinking about the children in Connecticut. Their existence as beautiful, wonderful, precious children of God never stopped, and was never interrupted. On earth, their loved ones and the survivors may see an interruption and a stopping point: I definitely did when I learned that my friend had passed away. But this idea today gave me a bit of hope, and made me feel so close with God. He is right there, right next to us, walking down the path with us whether we are in the shade or in the sunlight.

Thank God I Missed My Flight

Two years ago today, a couple friends and I were packing up and getting ready to fly back home from the UK. We'd just explored Spain, Andorra, and finished off the trip with a few days in Britain. I checked with my friends, and they informed me that our flight wasn't until 4pm. Good, I thought. I have time to go to church beforehand.

I stumbled out of bed Sunday morning and was alarmed to realize it was already 10:15. Church started at 11am, and I had no idea where it was. The UK-dwelling friend we were staying with came upstairs and said, "You ready to go?" I was so grateful she was going to walk me there, even though it was apparent she had just gotten up as well. I quickly changed into a hooded sweatshirt and wrinkled pants, and we headed out the door.

Once there, I was surprised by how warm and friendly people were, even with my obvious disheveled look. I hope they didn't think that all Americans look like that, just me. :) But I was welcomed with smiles and kind words upon walking through the door, and I felt immediately at home. Since then, this church has become my UK church... I've attended their services 2 other times, and I always feel so incredibly welcome. After chatting with some people there, I found a seat and waited for the service to begin.

At the time, I was struggling with something... it was an internal struggle, something that was happening on an emotional level. It had come up a few times during the trip, and I had been praying and thinking about a solution. But what was interesting was that as soon as I walked through the doors of the church, I felt immediately at peace. I felt so much love in that church. And once the readings from the bible lesson started, I was amazed at how applicable they were to the issue I was having. It was like each scripture and verse was written just for me, to specifically address my personal concerns. It was profound.

In that moment, I closed my eyes and felt God's presence more than I'd ever felt it in my entire life. I felt like I was being wrapped up in a hug. It was amazing. And I felt some healing happening with the struggle that I had been feeling only moments before. And then the thought came, "This is how I want to feel, and this is where I want to be."

Also, I connected with someone there who would later become a dear friend. Just being in their church seemed to bring us together, and a wonderful friendship blossomed from that starting point. So all in all, it was a great morning.

After church, I got my friends and we headed to the airport. And immediately found out that our flight had left a couple hours before; what my friends had seen where it said, "16:00" was actually the departure time of our connecting flight, a brief layover in another country. After waiting in line for a few hours, it seemed our only option was to take the same flight the next day. We would be charged for the difference in airfare (about $600 each, about a third of what I had spent on the entire trip), and would have to find a hotel room that night. We sent some frantic emails to our workplaces as obviously we would not be coming in to work the next morning, and then dejectedly left the airport. I hardly slept that night, fearing that we would sleep in and miss the flight again and have to pay even more money.

Later, probably weeks later, I became so grateful for what happened. I realized that I wouldn't have changed what had happened for anything in the world, as the experience I had in that church was one of those truly great experiences of my life. It was so life-changing for me, in ways that I cannot even begin to explain here. And despite the annoyance or inconvenience of missing our flight, that was probably one of the greatest mistakes I've ever made in my life. And even more recently, the past month or so, I have been even more grateful that this happened. What a gift that morning church service was, in so many ways.

We never know what will happen in our lives. We don't know the good that can come from something that seems like a negative event. But God knows; He knows what's happening, and what we may need or want in our lives even before we do. And I am so grateful that He knows and provides these wonderful moments in my life.