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Meeting God in the mundane + Finding joy and grace in the mess of motherhood, ministry, and urban missions

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May 8: Happy Mother's Day, Then & Now

May 9, 2016 Jacqui

Then...

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HELLO!

I'm Jacqui, the mom behind the camera. Wife of one + momma to five. Writer + speaker. Unqualified philosopher + theologian. Accidental mentor. Chaos manager. Lover of coffee + wine, perspective, and Jesus. Truth teller. Freedom fighter. Worth affirmer. Wanna-be author + world changer. Occasional cusser. Laundry piler. Emoji enthusiast. It's nice to meet you!

I hope you'll stay awhile and take a look at life through my lens, as I seek to find joy in the mess and walk with God through the beauty of everyday life.

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As much as I’ve grown to despise selfies (basically because I have to take approximately 23 pictures before I get one I like), I’ve also realized that I probably need to start showing up around here more often. You know, so you have a face to put with all the words and pictures of flowers and other inanimate objects. 😜 We’re probably harder on ourselves than anyone else would ever be, so my guess is, people aren’t going to care whether or not you put on makeup (this is why God invented filters), if your shirt is speckled with toddler goo (b&w covers a multitude of sins/spills), or if your smile ended up slightly crooked. They just want to see YOU and get to know YOU, the more imperfections the better. Nothing knits hearts together faster than plain old messy humanity in all its ordinary glory. Happy Friday (and last day of school!🎉📚) everyone!!!! #fridayintroductions

Some of my “shoulds” stem from way back in elementary school when I first discovered comparison and became acquainted with the feeling of not measuring up. This is partially due to my personality and the fact I have a deep-seated belief that I’m lacking something important (Enneagram 4) and also because I’ve incorporated lies into my psyche to the point I’m convinced this is who I am, or who I am not. . Consequently, it’s taken me a dreadfully long time to accept myself for who I actually am. Maybe you can relate? Maybe you find yourself desperately wishing you could be like someone else, or that your life would look a little more like hers. Or maybe you were so sure things would turn out a certain way, and they just….haven’t. . But in order to make peace with ourselves and our lives and somehow find the beauty in all of it, we need to start with the truth. The truth is the way things are, for better or worse, not how you would like them to be, or how you think they “should” be. Rachel Hollis says it like this: "It’s impossible to go somewhere new, to become something new, without first acknowledging where you are. The self-awareness that comes from truly digging into what you’ve come to believe about who you are is invaluable." . 🎉New post up on the blog: “stop ‘shoulding’ all over yourself” #linkinprofile

Lately I’ve been obsessed with light seeping through the cracks. Put up a fence, close the blinds, try as you may to block it out, but the light will always find a way back in. It simply cannot be contained.

Summer seems to squeeze the crazy out of the city like strategic pressure pushes the pus out of a pimple. It festers indoors during the winter months, undetected below the surface, but it never fails to become infected. Arguments spill out open windows and broken doors, waking the neighborhood, and evictions vomit every earthly possession onto the front lawn like garbage. But crazy never fails to leave behind a scar. The little boy whose mom was high in the middle of the night and fighting with her boyfriend, who fell asleep to the sound of screaming and sirens, if at all—that little boy still had to get up and go to school this morning. As if nothing happened. As if they wouldn’t find their clothes all over the front lawn and child services wouldn’t come knock on the door, leaving a court summons tucked behind a newly fastened deadbolt. As if life were “normal”. But that’s the saddest part of all—for some, this is normal. Today I’m tired and my heart hurts. I don’t always know how to love them well, these neighbors of mine, but for now I’m going to plop my life down right next to theirs and overstay my welcome. I need to believe that if we keep setting up camp by the margins, eventually, the lines between us will be erased.

It’s the last week of school. Anyone else feel like there’s no less than a million things to get done by Friday? 🧐 But first, Target. ♥️🎯

Because of the Lord’s great love we are not consumed, for his compassions never fail. They are new every morning; great is your faithfulness. Lamentations 3:22-23 🌿

I came across this quote (via @ben.roberts0😘) from 2015 when Pope Francis “urged Catholic bishops and priests to go out among their flocks and know the people they serve like ‘shepherds living with the smell of their sheep. God’s grace comes alive and flourishes to the extent that clergy are among their flocks giving themselves and the gospel to others. This I ask of you: you must be shepherds who smell like your sheep.’ He cautioned bishops and priests not to hide behind their ceremonial rituals and funeral-like faces, but to follow the model of Jesus as shepherd who was willing to live among his sheep and to offer his life in service for them.” What a beautiful reminder for all of us today: be a shepherd who smells like your sheep. ♥️🐑

Wednesday #werkflow. 🚶‍♀️☕️👩🏼‍💻 Watching all the school buses fly past on their way to the zoo. 🐘 #countdowntosummer

Because #itssimplytuesday and these babies won’t last forever. In fact, did you know lilacs only bloom for 1-2 weeks?! #whyGod 😩💜🌸

It’s incredibly humbling to see yourself through someone else’s eyes, especially when that person is your child. I don’t know why, but I always expect to see answers like, “she yells too much,” or “she gets angry when we spill things,” or “she’s often crabby at bedtime.” Then the gig would be up, my shortcomings forever etched into visibility with a no. 2 pencil, no doubt becoming fodder for school lounge gossip, and everyone would finally see me for what I actually am. . Instead, I find “she lives to take care of all of us,” and “she sees the best in people,” and “she touches people’s hearts,” and “she gives all she has to give.” As parents, we may have the hallmark on unconditional love, but we’d be hard-pressed to match our children’s capacity for grace and forgiveness. No matter how many times and days and years I mess up, when they finally sit down, pencil in hand, to sum up all that I am, they only see the good. In an instant, all is forgiven. In a moment, all is grace. When Jesus said the kingdom of God belongs to the little children, perhaps this is exactly what He meant.