I love this poem because it speaks of new amidst tradition. Completely appropriate for the new year!

Ring Out, Wild Bells - Alfred Lord Tennyson

Ring out, wild bells, to the wild sky,
The flying cloud, the frosty light:
The year is dying in the night;
Ring out, wild bells, and let him die.

Ring out the old, ring in the new,
Ring, happy bells, across the snow:
The year is going, let him go;
Ring out the false, ring in the true.

Ring out the grief that saps the mind
For those that here we see no more;
Ring out the feud of rich and poor,
Ring in redress to all mankind.

Ring out a slowly dying cause,
And ancient forms of party strife;
Ring in the nobler modes of life,
With sweeter manners, purer laws.

Ring out the want, the care, the sin,
The faithless coldness of the times;
Ring out, ring out my mournful rhymes
But ring the fuller minstrel in.

Ring out false pride in place and blood,
The civic slander and the spite;
Ring in the love of truth and right,
Ring in the common love of good.

Ring out old shapes of foul disease;
Ring out the narrowing lust of gold;
Ring out the thousand wars of old,
Ring in the thousand years of peace.
​
Ring in the valiant man and free,
The larger heart, the kindlier hand;
Ring out the darkness of the land,
Ring in the Christ that is to be.
​

This is my crew. Justin, Aidan, and Jordan smiling and goofing around and smiling for the camera in Alberta, Canada. This is one of those shots that shows the best of my family, so I am really proud of it.

Boys. They are a handful. They are loud and noisy at the table. They never make their beds without being asked. They can't be bothered to pick up their socks and clothes. They cough and splutter all over everything. And just when you have had enough, they smile at you, give you a hug, and say, "I love you Mom!"

Boys. They are a handful. They can be caring towards each other. It isn't often, but it does happen.

Let's start with the youngest. Jordan. 

Jordan Andrew Sunwoo Kim. You can tell already that the kid is a ham. He loves making his eyes bulge or making silly faces for the camera. He loves his Nintendo and his little phone. He hates all vegetables and kimchi. He is unbelievably good at playing soccer. Most importantly, according to him, is the fact that he is going to be taller than his brothers! 

​Our next big boy is Aidan...

This is my child who could sit still and do puzzles or activities for close to an hour when he was a baby. That has served him well. He ranked #2 for midterm exams and #1 for final exams in his class at middle school. He loves listening to music, studying, and doing sports with his friends. He is a little more reflective than anyone else in the family. This child has plans! Sometimes I am the last one to find out about what he has planned.

And now we come to Justin. One of a kind Justin...
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Justin Peter Sunjoo Kim. Recent high school graduate who survived the Korean education system. University student who wants to be a pilot. 

Justin. This is the kid whose one requirement for his friends growing up was to play hard. He was intense in his ability to play and have fun. He still is. He has a funny sense of humor. He identifies with being a black female!

He is intelligent, but is not as able as Aidan to articulate his viewpoints. Still, a diamond in the making is happening with this kid!

So, how do you love a boy? Well. I would say very carefully with a lot of humor and a lot of fun. 

Let us count the ways:

1) When they are little, the bedtime routine of a story and a hug and a kiss good night is a great place to let them know they are loved.

2) As they get older, the hug and the kiss are still appreciated. (Apparently, it was me who loved the stories!)

3) Feed them bacon at least once every two weeks. Very, very important!

4) Feed them well. Cook their favorites along with the healthy stuff! (They will complain about the tofu, but they are going to love the chili around Christmas time!)

5) Ask them what they did at school even if they tend to grunt at you and give blank stares.

6) Tolerate the grabbing of each other’s butt cheeks and the nipples until you hear someone cry. (Then the fun is over!)

7) Give up on trying to wake them up early. Eventually they will get up. 

8) Tell your husband that you have been tolerating the look of his office for years and that you need to clean it up (yes, it bothers me that much and, yes, I consider him to be a boy!!). Remind him that this is love.

9) Tell Jesus that you love them and think of them often.

10) Tell them that picking up the laundry is a pleasure for you!!

(I would actually switch #9 and #10, but I will leave that up to you!)

How do you love the boys in your family? I would love to see your list here or in Facebook...

I recently went back to Canada to see how my family was doing. My parents split up years ago, and they sold the house that I had lived in growing up. My mother lives just outside the city of Calgary on an acreage in Bearspaw. My sister lives in the city about five minutes from my father. My mother lives in Moose Jaw, Saskatchewan.

I spent the first part of the trip longing to feel something homey. Since I couldn’t go back to the house where I grew up, I decided that I was looking for something similar to my grandmother’s house. My grandmother specialized in making people feel special. When I was little my grandmother made endless chicken and rise dinners along with a dozen other German-Russian treats for me and my sister. I also remember many afternoons swimming in the local swimming pool, watching Lawrence Welk on the television, reading everything, and playing the organ. Time with grandma and grandpa made me feel comfortable.

I stayed in Calgary for a little too long due to unforseen circumstances. Reverse culture shock was definitely a thing that I was feeling. I felt like the beauty I so fondly remembered was nowhere to be seen. The people had changed too. All of us were twenty five years older which was making worse in the endeavor to find something home-like.

The other part of this story is that I ended up in the hospital for a while, and I just wanted to not eat hospital food and say goodbye to the endless round of nurses and doctors. I was diagnosed with depression and an anxiety disorder. I did have a moment when the hospital was serving snap peas as a side dish with supper. I was suddenly lost in memories of picking snap peas from my grandmother’s garden many yeas ago. It was an episode in settled happiness and security which we all desire.

C.S. Lewis write in The Problem of Pain, “God withholds from us by the very nature of the world: but joy, pleasure, and merriment. He has scattered broadcast. We are never safe but we have plenty of fun, and some ecstacy. It is not hard to see why. The security we crave would teach us to rest our hearts in this world and oppose an obstacle to our return to God: a few moments of happy love, a landscape, a symphony, a merry meeting with our friends, a bathe or football match, have no such tendency. Our father refreshes us on the journey with some

Was my quest for home pointless? Was I searching for something that did not exist? While C.S. Lewis makes an excellent point about not resting our hearts in this world, I was still looking for something home-like. It provides some clues to my own happiness, which is good for my soul.

Lewis talks about a landscape as a pleasant inn. On my father’s property, I had a magnificent view of the mountains on clear days. I spent more than a few evenings looking at the sunset and enjoying the view. It was really breathe-taking. A pleasant inn for my soul.

Another clue came when I went to visit my mother. There was a beautiful park about a two minute walk from her home. There were beautiful shops full of paintings, carvings, jewelry, and clothing. The paintings were done by local artists along with the carvings (my uncle was one of the carvers). The jewelry was very Victorian. Some of the clothes were very vintage. But the best part of that trip was just spending time with my mother in her house. It felt like spending time with Grandma.

My mother is in the early stage of dementia. Despite this, she keeps in good humor about her family, her life, and her many knitting projects. It was good to be around her and her creative energy.

The elements of finding home are there. The pleasant inns included landscape, creativity, and being around caring people. It was in the landscape. I love the Rocky Mountain View and the beautiful park in Moose Jaw. It was the creativity energy. My own chosen art is this blog, and a myriad of small writing projects, but I loved the paintings, carvings, and jewelry that I saw. It was also being around beautiful, caring people. My mother really knows how to do that. I was there to take care of her, but she ended up taking care of me.
​
And maybe that was the biggest clue in finding home. Finding people who wanted to care for you in whatever limited way that they can. Home is where there is love.

Easter Week is always full of emotional highs and lows. This Easter Week has been extraordinary. Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday were bright and beautiful. Wednesday and Thursday brought rain, and it suited the week and the story of Christ. I felt a little empty on Friday, but I am looking forward to Easter Sunday. 

I thought about Jesus entering Jerusalem on Palm Sunday. I thought about the palm leaves that greeted him as he rode in on that donkey. I thought about the people chanting Hosanna. I thought about the happiness of knowing that their savior was there. The glory and beauty of all of it was very striking.

I thought about Jesus cleansing the temple on Tuesday. I can imagine the anger in seeing how people were treating the temple. A foreshadowing of what was to come. He was physically getting rid of the blasphemous barriers that human power games try to throw up between the Lord and the world that He loves. 
​

I contemplated His anointing on Wednesday. Mary’s poured-out soul matching that poured-out perfume. She was willing to give all for Christ. A moment of beauty and hope that was to be magnified on Easter Sunday. 
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Good Friday. I imagine the veil torn into two the moment that he died. I imagine the confusion in the hearts and minds of those who loved him. A barrier had been broken, a gate had been opened. Death was not something to be afraid of anymore. We are through at last. We just don’t know it yet. 
​​

Easter Sunday. The day Mary found an empty tomb. The day she mistook Him for the Gardener. A day unlike no other. A day where she tells the disciples that He is alive. 
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He has risen.

He is love.

He has loved, he loves, and he will love us like no other.

Death has killed death.
The already born can be reborn. 
Sin has been consumed by love.
Debt can be erased by grace.

He loves us. Come and believe.

Dust you are and to dust you will return. 

Did you hear this on Wednesday? 

Are you aware that you are dust? Skin, bones, flesh began and will return to dust. 

Dust is holy. Life is holy. 

I thought about healing on Wednesday. I thought about all the medical staff who have endured with this pandemic. I have thought about the doctors and nurses who have saved others. 

I am watching a drama about a healer. ,She is a quick and precise with what she does.  She ignores her wounds and moves on to the next thing that needs to be done. (Doing it, of course, with great ease and skill.)

She never feels self-pity or questions the Almighty. She accepts all things with effortless grace. Her faith never wavers.

She represents all who do this kind of healing work.

She keeps coming back when I am alone. She sweeps into my thoughts. She keeps edging her way back into my imagination...my aspirations.

She has been pushed towards death door. She has lost loved ones, has seen rape and torture, and yet she works. Her edges are fraying. And maybe, just maybe, something truer and more lasting is struggling to emerge.

Healing--any healing--is slow work. 

Most healing is done in the dark. 

Hardly anyone else sees, so the applause is minimal. 

But it's the work of the One who has also felt ache and loss, wounding and rejection. 

He knows. And because He knows, He is not afraid to enter my undoing and reweave me, thread by thread.

Ash Wednesday has passed. This was a day to embrace my own finite-ness and receive his infinite fellowship in every shadow. Know that you are his.

 "Lenten light is the light that gets through                                                     what is torn, fractured, frayed, worn. 
 It brings its own kind of joy,                                                                       a stubborn gladness that comes from having learned--
 and learning still--what the Holy One can do with dust."
-Jan Richardson

 He heals the brokenhearted
 and binds up their wounds.
 He determines the number of the stars;
 he gives to all of them their names.
 Great is our Lord, and abundant in power;
 his understanding is beyond measure.
 The Lord lifts up the humble;
 He casts the wicked to the ground.
 Psalm 147: 3-6 ESV
​

Usually at the beginning of the year, one thinks about resolutions for the New Year. This is not a bad thing, but it is not what I want to do with this post. I want to reflect back on the past year and think about all the people that have loved me or have loved my family. This kind of reflection is helpful in giving me a sound mind as I enter a new year, and it will give me good reason to celebrate love in this COVID world. 

The first person I would like to share about is the teacher/mother that lives down the road from me. We swam together quite a bit last fall. I did not have class on Monday unitl 12:00, so I decided to join her when she was talking about swimming pools this past summer. She took me a pool up in the hills that I remember going to years ago. We swam, and I fell in love with being in the pool. I love the water on my face, the not-so-strong smell of the chlorine, the other swimmers, and I love being around my friend. A number of laps of breast stroke puts me in a great mood. Love swims, so to speak.

I love that fact that she has a child that she mothers in a way I can relate to. In fact, we have gone on many outings with her child and my boys. Swimming, the zoo, movies in her home, chit-chats over coffee. I can relate to her in so many different ways. 

It may be the fact that she personifies Canadian Prairie hospitality, but really it is just her and her way. She is kind, loyal, and overly generous.

Another friend who has expressed love beyond measure is the person I make cookies with every winter close to Christmas. It is our annual tradition. It started years ago when we were in a Bible study together. Near the end of the study, she shared about an orphanage that she was volunteering at. She wanted to bake cookies for 40 orphans, and she thought she could do that in a little toaster oven! I was reflecting on my rather large kitchen in that moment and wanted to share it with people who would appreciate it. I offered to host a cookie baking party, she accepted, and the whole Bible study came over to my place to bake cookies that year. That was about 15 years ago. 

We still make cookies once a year, but the conditions are a little different. We are the only two of the original group who are left. Everyone else has moved out of the country for different reasons. We now bake for the Christmas pleasure of it. I love the smell of cinnamon and apples, banana bread, and cranberry and white chocolate chip cookies. Another important aspect of this is the chili I make for lunch. I have a special spice blend that goes into the chili that my friend appreciates, and she has tried to duplicate it. We eat the chili with my boys googling over warm buns and butter, and then we bake.
We have done other things in other seasons. One autumn day, I took the boys to Kongju (this means princess in Korean but it is the name of a town) and she showed us an art gallery in the woods. The boys had a great time visiting all different kinds of tree houses in this natural setting. We have also had meals in Kongju, visited parks, and have gone for walks. It’s a quiet place and very natural in its beauty. When I think of Kongju, I think of Lisa and her smile that brightens up a room.

I would also like to honor my Korean office mate, Chung Eun. She was hired about 10 years ago. I had a running joke at the time that her desk was cursed. There had been a number of English professors who had just not lasted, working from 4 months to a whole year. Chung Eun has an easy smile and a great disposition. She also loves to talk. We became friendly immediately. 

Right before COVID started, she congratulated me on the book that I had written, The Giver. She said that she thought it was impressive that I had written a book while working on a Masters in Education. I just smiled when she said that because I had not quite connected the dots the way she had. I knew I was extremely tired.

About two years later, right before Christmas, I was able to give her a copy of the book I wrote. She again said that it was impressive that I had written a book that was useful for Sunday School teachers, not about teaching English. Of course, for me, it all runs or comes together after a while.  

She gave me a lovely 3D Christmas card. The card sits at my desk. Santa Claus is sitting in his sleigh and the reindeer pop out. It is absolutely gorgeous!

When I took Justin, my oldest son, to university the other day, she was very kind. She bought him some coffee and a muffin. She said that he looked cool, and that he would be popular with the girls in university. I kind of laughed when she said that. 

Of course, I need to end this by talking about my family. The boys are great. They help me carry in groceries, give me hugs to keep me going, and say ‘I love you’ when I am exhausted. I love to see their smiles. 

My husband deserves an honorable mention as well. We went to Outback Steakhouse on Wednesday in honor of Aidan’s graduation from elementary school. With the COVID restrictions, social gatherings have been reduced to families of four, and you have to prove that you all live at the same address. My husband spent about 30 minutes arguing with the manager in Korean, and then with City Hall, attempting to get them to realize that this policy is unkind to foreigners and to large families. Justin spent a bit of time explaining President Moon JaeIn’s policies to me. I was just about to give up on the whole thing when we were called back into the restaurant. We had a good meal that day. Hansung celebrated by taking himself to the hospital in Daejeon to find the results from a blood test he had taken a few weeks before. I would have just slept when I came home, but I am not him.
​
Love is very diverse when you think about. It brings clarity and comfort. It can feel like a warm blanket covering you up in winter. Love can be full of activity, or it can be a moment when you realize that someone has gone out of their way to protect you. The bottom line is that love makes sacrifices for your benefit. 

It is the beginning of Advent.
Advent is Latin.
It means coming.
Who is coming? 

Jesus is coming.
A baby born to save the world. A baby who is God.
He shows up in a fetal ball.
He who carved out the universe curved Himself into a fetal ball in the dark. He tethered himself into the uterine wall of a virgin, and let His cells collide, light splitting all white.
He gave up the heavens that were not big enough to contain him and let Himself be held in a a hand.
Thi is a mystery.
He became a baby so small, and an infinite God became infant.

The Giver becomes the Gift.

He has a a heart beating in the chest cavity of a held child.
His hearts beats hope, change, love - the whole planet has been spinning round waiting for Him.

Advent. 
Jesus is coming. 
When you open the Bible and read of his coming,
you first read of His genealogy. 
The gift starts to upwrap itself.
You know the stories of Christ’ family tree.
You need His geneaology.
The branches of His family, the love story of His heart
that has been coming for you since the beginning.

And you think about your own family.
Family matters.
Family gives you context and origin gives you understanding.
The family tree of Christ gives you hope.

There are women in His family tree.
Four broken women who felt like they were outsiders.
Women who were tired of being taken advantage of.
Who wants to go unnoticed, uncherished, and unappreciated?
Women who thought about giving up. 
Christ claims that those who are wondering
and wandering and wounded are His. 
Christ grabs you into His family tree, His line, His story, His heart,
and he gives you His Name, His lineage, his righteousness.
Christ gives you grace.
Is there a greater gift?

This is a love story unlike any other.
It’s a love story that has been coming for you since the beginning of time. 
You can miss it.
You can brush past this gift.
You can rush through it.
You can not see how it comes for you over the edges of everything.
Every page in Scripture has been waiting, reaching, coming for you.
You could wake up on Christmas
and only see
that you did not take the whole of the Gift.
Christ gives you grace.

Advent. 
Jesus is coming. 
Christ gives you grace.

Waiting for the coming of the Lord in the manger
who made himself bread for us who are starved.
Watiing for the Savior in swaddling clothes who later wears clothes of Righteousness for those who are worn out.
Christ brings in Christmas.
Without rushing, without pushing.
He is here.
Mark this waiting.
Mark this art in your life.
Mark Advent with a counting.
It’s a way of staying awake and not missing anything. 

The first Sunday of Advent I read of covenant keeping, promise-keeping God. 
“Out of the stump of David’s family will grow a shoot -
yes, a new Branch bearing fruit from the old root…
Is that the day the heir to David’s throne will
become a banner of salvation to the world.
The nations will rally to him,
and the hand where he lives
will be a glorious place” (Isaiah 11:1, 10).

It changes us.
It changes our hearts. 
Out of the stump of hearts…
Miracles will grow within, open slowly, bear fruit. 
Our hearts will make time and space for Him
to come to a beautiful, glorious place.
A place of sheer, readiant defiance
in the face of the world careening mad and stressed.

Advent. 
Jesus is coming. 
Christ gives you grace.

We will listen to Old Testament stories.
We will imagine the branches of the family tree of Christ
all the way back from Adam.
Each story points to Christ, the relief, the incarnation of God.

Advent. 
Jesus is coming. 
Christ gives you grace.

He is the exquisite gift cut and given for us.
Broken.
He is the Gift who hung on a tree for us.
The Gift who was pierced for you,
wounded and willing. 
He unfolds himself on the tree
​of your endless, greatest Gift.
​

It’s a weekday afternoon. Jordan is curled up in the crook of my arm. I am sitting here quietly and listening. Jordan suddenly says, “This is peace, isn’t it?” I agree that is. “I love this moment, Mom!”
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I have thee lively boys, and I am continuously seeking a balance in our family between activity and stillness, sound and silence, society and solitude. For the moment, I still have measure of control over the tenor of my children’s days, as the actual amount of time we spend together inevitably shrink, maintaining this balance becomes more important and more challenging. 

Certainly there can be a very wide gap between my vision of harmonious family and the day-to-day reality. Many days we simply through a handful of balls up in the air and start juggling: work, school, paino lessons, volunteer work, playdates for the social, social obligations, school meetings, homework. The list goes.

Most of the Moms I know are performing some variation on this theme. That we are all efficiency experts almost goes without saying. How else could we meet our deadlines, care for our children, make time for our partners, and put dinner on the table every night?

Yet most of us also yearn for a quality in our lives that has nothing to do with accomplishments. It might be the desire for grace or spaciousness, for a sense of deeper connection with the universe, or simply, as Jordan said, for peace. It is a quality we know to be essential to our children’s lives - and yet is all to often missing from our own.
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We do live on the run so much of the time. We are in too great a hurry to shape and enjoy the kind of meaningful interactions that define a family’s life and nurture each of its own members. Only by slowing down do we make time for one another. Only by stopping long enough to observe our surroundings can we bring form and meaning to our lives and make the small adjustments needed to stay on course. 

Our children need this pause. Regular rest for the spirit is as necessary for their healthy growth as sleep, fresh air, and good food. Our children depend on us for three meals a day, they also need us to prepare peacefl spaces for them in the midst of this busy world.

When we create a haven of serenity - be it in a quiet room, by means of a simple ritual, or even in the space of a fleeting moment - we make room for spirit. I do not want my children to experience their lives as a dash from one thing to the next. I do want them to be bombarded with noise, information, media messages, etc. I do not want them to be pulled along on a current of activity and stimulation. They need time to stop and exhale, time to feel centered, safe, and whole. 

In a society that endorses activity, I think we would all do well to put trust in stillness. No matter how busy we are, we can find meaning and renewal in moments that are available to us. We can come together in an intimate way, even at the end of a long, draining day, if we are willing to be fully present with our children - to take the time to hear their confidences and to respond from the heart. We can teach them the value of a deep breath, of a spiritual pause, or rest, if we take the time to learn it ourselves.

When I come to a stop myself, when I draw a circle of stillness around me, my children are drawn into that peaceful plae. They visibly relax, as if my very calmness nourishes them. The impact of just a few minutes of quiet attention can be profound, changing the mood of an entire day, restoring equilibrium to a distressed child, and to frazzled a mother!

We might sit side by side and draw, or gather up a stack of favorite picture books and read them, make strange creatures out of clay, or just cuddle on the couch and listen to music as the darkness falls. These are the moments when my children reveals themselves to me, when conversation spirals up and out, from here and now in the real of spirit and imagination. There, in that place Tennyson called the “quiet limit of the world,” we connect with one another at a very deep soul level. My children know then that they have my full attention and, even more important, that there’s no place I would rather be at that moment.
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Jordan and I look out the window. We can see people shivering outside, and suddenly I see a snowflake. Jordan suddenly says, “They need scarves so they won’t be cold.” 

In stillness, we find our peace. Knowing peace at home, we bring peace to the world. 

(This piece was adapted from the book entitled Mitten String for God.)