Sunshine and pass the soda crackers.

Sometimes I wonder if I make an error in telling mainly the best parts of my life on the internet. Will people think, ever, that it's easy for me to lead a Christian life because I have such an easy time at it? Will people become discouraged if their marriages, children, home, jobs aren't perfect when mine appear to be somewhat flawless online?

Yet, when I attempt to talk about times when we fail, when my kids mess up, when my husband is irritating me, when things get tough at work - I get stalled out all the time. It's one thing to air my own dirty laundry (which I do try to do on this blog- you know I am messy and anxious and lazy and worse) and it's an entirely separate thing to air the shame of the people I love.

And though you might be interested, and maybe even encouraged, to know (for example) the story of who in my family BROKE MY HEART this weekend- it's not only my story to tell. I want desperately to share with you how we lived through a fairly major-ish problem- how God triumphed, and how we're better off for it. But telling it out of turn could bring unnecessary embarrassment and could cause one of my people to stumble... so, away it goes into the archives of my heart, filed under 'blogs I can write when my children are grown.'

Still, though I'm not a 'sweep it under the rug' kinda girl in real life, picking things to blog about here is kinda like doing just that. I have to wade through my thoughts delicately- considering the effect my words could have on my family, my church, my friends. Because of that, to the reader, it may seem like my life is all sunshine and pass the soda crackers- even when it isn't.

This may not speak to many of you, but in case you've thought 'of course she loves God... she has the perfect life'- I want to clear some things up:

• my life is not perfect, but I can navigate the imperfections because I have a God who is.
• my kids are flawed, but I can love them through their mistakes because I am loved by a God who loves me through mine.
• my marriage has highs and lows, but I can endure the rough spots because I trust my God to repair them.
• my job isn't always easy, but I find joy there because God goes with me every day.

And yes, I am blessed. My kids are healthy, smart, and fairly well behaved... I have a noble, strong, able husband... I have amazing friends... I get to do what I love for a living. But none of this is guaranteed.  If I base my happiness on if all the ducks are in a row, I will be miserable whenever they aren't. My joy can't be based on the unstable perfection of my world, it has to be rooted in the constant perfection of my loving God.

I hope that even among my tales of vacations and home improvements and toothaches you are able to see that there is 'real life' there in between the lines- and that the same God who teaches me in the garden and in the dentist chair and on Whidbey Island is the same God who will teach me in the valleys of disappointment, fear, and betrayal. Because He loves me.

And He loves you, too.

I don’t mean to say that I have already achieved these things or that I have already reached perfection. But I press on to possess that perfection for which Christ Jesus first possessed me. No, dear brothers and sisters, I have not achieved it, but I focus on this one thing: Forgetting the past and looking forward to what lies ahead, I press on to reach the end of the race and receive the heavenly prize for which God, through Christ Jesus, is calling us.

Philippians 3:12-14