Hebrews 10:35-36

Love the phrase “fearless confidence”

photo courtesy of 500px.com

On a flight to Texas last month, I sat between two older people who were very still and quiet as the stewardess prepared everyone for takeoff. An older lady on my right, and an older man on my left, both appeared to be in their late seventies or eighties, with their silvery gray hair and deeply creased faces.

The older lady on my right asked sweetly, “Can you please help me buckle my seatbelt? I can’t figure this thing out.” As I helped her with the seatbelt, the older man on my left fumbled his cup of coffee, spilling the remains on the floor. I smiled as the stewardess passed him some napkins, and wondered if they were scared. Had they ever flown before? Did they have family? Why were they alone?

The plane took off and we all settled in for the hour and twenty minute ride. As I mindlessly flipped through the SkyMall magazine, I thought about how much life the two of them had seen. Their aged hands, with sunspots and wrinkles, had experienced far more than me, in my suddenly young-feeling 23 years. I wanted to know their story, but wasn’t sure how to ask, so I shyly tried to make conversation with one, and then the other.

 The sweet old man in jeans and a denim shirt traveled Europe during WWII, seeing “just about everything.” When he got back from the war, he purchased a homestead in Montana where he and his brother grew beets, alfalfa sprouts, soybeans and other things. He met the love of his life, married her after two months, and they had 5 kids who are all grown and living around the U.S. Six years ago, he lost his sweet wife to cancer, after being diagnosed only 2 months earlier. It was a shock, but he smiled and seemed relieved to know she isn’t sick and in pain anymore. His eyes spoke so kindly of her as he shared about his life.

Katherine, on the other hand, was from Arkansas. She was a teacher all of her life until her husband died several years ago. At that point, her sons bought a house for her right next door to them, and now take care of her, while still letting her be independent. There was something about her that made me want to laugh… she seemed kind of sneaky, like there was some kind of secret she wasn’t telling me. Like, maybe she was actually Bill Clinton’s mom or someone famous. Who knows.

As the plane landed, I suddenly realized that I had not asked either of them for their name. I would remember this plane ride for the rest of my life, but would never really know who I had spent time talking to. Then we shook hands. Paul, 89, from Montana. Katherine, 84, from Little Rock.

Anne Roiphe: My Late Husband’s Words

It was mid-December of 2005. I don’t know why he said it. I don’t know if a shadow had fallen across him, something appalling he saw out of the corner of his eye. I don’t know if it was just coincidence or intuition that prompted him, but about a week before my seemingly healthy 82-year-old husband suddenly died, he emerged from the kitchen ready to go to his office, his face clean-shaven, his eyes shining, smiling shyly, holding the copy of the Anthony Trollope book he was rereading, and said to me, “You have made me very happy. You know that you have made me a happy man.” There I stood in my work outfit, blue jeans and a T-shirt. There I stood with my white hair and my wrinkles and the face I was born with, although now much creased by time, and I felt beautiful.

“What?” I said. I wanted him to repeat the words. “You heard me,” he said and put on his coat and drew his earmuffs out of his pocket. “Say it again,” I said. He said it again. “You’ve made me happy.” We had been married 39 years. We had held hands waiting in hospital corridors while a desperately ill child struggled to breathe and thankfully recovered. We had made financial mistakes together. We had spent hours out in fishing boats. We had raised the children and then second-guessed our choices. We had stood shoulder to shoulder at graduations and weddings and we were well-worn, but still I had made him happy, and I was proud and flushed with the warmth of his words.

I know I looked beautiful that morning. Perhaps not to the young man holding his toddler in his arms who rode the elevator with me; perhaps not to the friend I met for lunch, a true believer in Botox; perhaps not to passersby on the street; but I knew it for a certainty. I was beautiful.

I don’t believe that inner beauty is sufficient in this cruel world. That’s the pap one tells a child. I don’t believe that positive thinking improves your skin tone or that loving or being loved changes the shape of your nose or restores the thickness and color of hair, but I do know that there is a way of being beautiful, even as age takes its toll, that has something to do with the spirit filling with joy, something to do with the union with another human being, with the sense of having done well at something enormously important, like making happy a man who has made you happy often enough.

Ten days after that morning conversation, my husband and I returned from a concert and dinner with friends and walked down our windy block toward our apartment house when suddenly he stumbled and fell and died within minutes. As I waited for the ambulance, I remembered his words, a beauty potion I would take with me into the rest of my life.

My mom is so wise. It such a wonderful thing to have someone I can tell anything to, who will pray for me, and who loves me so well. While talking on the phone this morning, she taught me something ..

You may have heard the saying that “Anything you truly want must be worth fighting for.” I think this is so true. We all want to be compassionate. giving. full of good virtue. free from fear. confident. prosperous. creative. The list of what we want to be could go on and on and fill pages for days. But these good things rarely come naturally, and without opposition, just because we have a wishful thought. Good things are fought for, sought after, with a bold heart that says “this enemy,” whatever that may be, “will not get me down. It will not stop me.”

There’s an interesting verse in Joshua 11 that tells how God caused enemies to come against His people  so that he might destroy the enemy. We all face opposition of some kind in our life. We all have enemies, whether physical or spiritual.  And a lot of times, our circumstances get worse before they get better. But could it be that God causes the enemy to fight against us so that we will fight back and defeat it? If the things that keep us from moving forward only slightly hold us back, we will never really notice. But when the opposition comes in full force, God often causes that to happen so that we will fight back with that boldness that says “this will not stop me.” Because His desire is for us to have FREEDOM from the things that hold us back.

Joshua 11:20   For it was the LORD who hardened their [enemies'] hearts, to come against Israel in battle, that He might utterly destroy [the enemies], that they might have no favour, but that he might destroy them, as the LORD commanded Moses.

“Love is friendship caught on fire; it is quiet, mutual confidence, sharing and forgiving. It is loyalty through good and bad times. It settles for less than perfection, and makes allowances for human weaknesses. Love is content with the present, hopes for the future, and does not brood over the past. It is the day-in and day-out chronicles of irritations, problems, compromises, small disappointments, big victories, and working toward common goals. If you have love in your life, it can make up for a great many things you lack. If you do not have it, no matter what else there is, it is not enough.” — Laura Hendricks

P.S. I don’t actually think this is cool. I have a decent level of self-awareness.

Months ago I posted a recipe for a green smoothie. Yep… green. It was so good and healthy! Well guess what… I’ve cranked it up a bit with Kale, coconut oil, and flax seed! The kale may take some getting used to, but it’s worth it because one cup of Kale contains over 100% of your daily Vitamin C, Vitamin A and Vitamin K! AND coconut oil is a really healthy oil that is overall good for you (immunity, digestion, metabolism). So here is the recipe. I hope you enjoy:)

(add to blender in this order)

1 Banana

1 cup of spinach

2 leaves of Kale

4 frozen strawberries

1/4 cup frozen blueberries

1 Tbsp ground flax seed

1 Tbsp Extra-virgin coconut oil

2 ice cubes

1/4 cup of water