Everyday Observations

All I want for Christmas is $250,000 and 10-15 acres (with a pond if I’ve been really good).

I’m low-key like that.

It’s the stuff dreams are made of. A wooded frontage split by a dirt lane that immediately curves and leaves passersby curious about what lies beyond the bend. Grass grows between the well-worn tire tracks, and the road winds like a shy child directing a game of Follow the Leader. It opens onto an expanse of land hemmed in on every side by pines and maples and oaks and elms – sentinels keeping watch and holding hands. Their chins are high with pride; they mark the perimeter of a safe place. A place where hope lives.

In the middle there is a white, rustic farmhouse; a stone walk arcs towards the entrance, lined with dense, variegated monkey grass. There is a deep porch stretching the length of the house. Four rockers, ivy spilling liberally from hanging baskets, and two gold lanterns with dancing fire flank either side of the door. A haint blue ceiling, of course.

Inside, the vibe is comfortable and classy. Warm earth tones hug. Exposed beams anchor. The fireplace invites. The common areas are spacious, open, built for conversation. And the table. What a table! A wooden beauty that’ll seat twelve or so, with a black iron chandelier installed above. The kitchen can handle many hands with its gracious workspace, its generous storage, and its walk-in pantry. A wall of windows looks toward a pond reflecting the late afternoon sun.

It’s a home. A bona fide home. But it’s not for me.

It’s for women who were little girls without stability and security. It’s for women who endured the most vulnerable years of their lives without a protector or a champion. It’s for women who never, ever had a chance. And without a place like this, they still don’t. It’s a home for formerly incarcerated women, a safe place to write a new story.

I have the honor of leading Tenacious Grace, a nonprofit women’s ministry, and serving on the Florence County Detention Center Ministry Team. My two and a half years on the FCDC Ministry Team have made me acutely aware of the need for free, transitional housing for incarcerated women upon their release. The need for counseling and job assistance and recovery programs and life skills and spiritual support.

It is the long-term mission of Tenacious Grace to bring this type of assistance to marginalized women in the Pee Dee area. We dream about a home called Five Sparrows.

Scripture is clear that we are “ambassadors for Christ” (2 Corinthians 5:20) – His managers, His stewards, His deputies. As such, we are to reflect His character and His heart. Matthew 25 speaks pointedly to our responsibility to use what He has entrusted to us (the Parable of the Talents, Matthew 25:14-30) to take care of the poor, the oppressed, and the marginalized (the Sheep & the Goats, Matthew 25:31-40). In short, Truth compels us to use the resources God has given us to be agents of justice. To be equalizers in circumstances of disparity. In Jesus’ Name.

As a ministry, we recently met our land goal, which means we have raised enough money to buy a 10-15 acre tract of land if the right opportunity presented itself. Next, we’ll begin chipping away at the house goal. You guessed it. $250,000.

Incarcerated women are a hard sell when vying for charitable giving. Many times, people – even if they don’t blatantly say so – believe these women “have gotten what they deserve.” That sentiment incites something primal in me; however, I’ve stopped arguing against it. Perhaps, if you’re honest, that’s what you think. These women don’t deserve help.

I now suggest that as the most compelling reason for helping them. Because here’s the thing….

Not one of us was saved, rescued, delivered by Jesus because we deserved it. So, we help because we, too, have been beneficiaries of a grace we did not deserve. That’s the beautiful thing about grace; it has to be undeserved. That’s what it is by definition – unmerited favor.

So, if you’d like to make our Christmas (New Year’s, Valentine’s, St. Patrick’s Day, Easter, and Columbus Day) wishes come true, would you consider donating today?

You can always catch us at tenaciousgrace.cc/donate or you can mail a check to Tenacious Grace, PO Box 7611, Florence 29502. All donations are tax-deductible. You can learn more about our ministry at tenaciousgrace.cc or follow Tenacious Grace on Facebook and Instagram.

This Christmas, we invite you to invest in hope.

 

Two matters of business before we proceed.

One, the subject in the featured image is not our protagonist. Her hair is far too smallish and unaffected to be native to the humid southland of our tale. Unsplash has no collection of stunning photographs of girls with frizzy, misbehaving, drenched, matted hair. Photog friends, I have found a niche.

Two, many of you clicked this link because you thought, “This could be about me.” I knew I could count on the Sisterhood of Southern Over-Analyzers. Thanks for playing along.

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Once upon a time in a seasonless land with soggy air, there lived a girl who thought too much. Her mind was populated by a dense forest of trees that reached skyward and spread to the horizon from every angle. She stood at its center and tried to run in all directions at once, liquifying into thinness and leaking as tiny rivulets down the wandering paths between the pines. Only her bushy, messy bun retained its volume.

She drank too much coffee to help her overthink faster. She packed the boxcars of her time like a fiendish hoarder so her legs might outpace her concerns. And then she flapped in the wind behind her runaway train.

Because busyness was a celebrated self-medication.

Some called it hustle. Some called it magnanimous. She deemed it necessary. Because stillness gobbled her up. A good day swallowed all the margin where fear lived.

An indentured servant to “Yes.”

A hostage to the secret things buried beneath the forest floor.

Abused by doubt and uncertainty.

She plucked the silky curtain of her cheek with her teeth to divert the sensory attention her body lent the angry tigers wrestling in her belly. They bit and clawed and roared and twisted leaving her insides raw. A feverish hole where anxiety nested.

She presumed upon the future, forfeit the present, and obsessed about the past. She was beset by worry, bullied by lies, paralyzed by the opinions of others, and half-convinced she might be certifiably crazy. She was choked by guilt, hounded by shame, waterboarded by unhealed hurt, and drawn and quartered by her own unmet expectations.

And she was solitarily confined.

Regardless of how many people inhabited her existence; they knew nothing of the forest where she leaked like rivulets down the wandering paths between the pines.

So she ate chocolate.

And stayed locked away. Running and escaping without progress. She lived in exile in the circular province of her thinking.

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 I am an expatriate of the circular province of my thinking. I’ve completed a few tours of duty on that unkind land, and I’m here to share a secret.

There is passage through the pines.

It’s a scary course, and no part of you will want to cooperate. You’ll have to manhandle your very own self, which we do terribly.

But we don’t have to suffer the overwhelming oppression of our brains.

Are you ready?

Here it is.

Lean in closer.

Stand on the edge of the thicket with a brilliant torch and lead someone in. Invite someone in. Into the jungle of your mind and feelings and hurts and fears and insecurities. Not the landscaped perimeter. The wooly, overgrown center.

Because the forest isn’t a dangerous place to be; it’s just a dangerous place to be alone.

Twice I have asphyxiated on the stale air of my entombed hurt. And twice I experienced a cool, resuscitating breeze through the pines as I led someone in. My lungs struggled to accommodate this new wind, burning in a cleansing, difficult way.

But there was passage through the pines.

And it led to a spacious place whose topography was peace. Whose climate was restorative.

Invite someone in. 

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Storytelling is a harrowing journey to mending. There is a measure of instant healing that occurs when we push the hard words from our mouths; they relinquish their role as jailer. The work of healing just begins there, but in a realm where the labor takes so much time and effort, I was slack-jawed at the now liberation that follows hurt dressed in words.

During the month of March, we want to encourage you in your story set in a dense forest of trees that reach skyward and spread to the horizon from every angle. We will be sharing the voices of seven different women between the blog and the Tenacious Grace Facebook page, and you don’t want to miss a one.

These brave ladies have agreed to stand at the edge of the thicket with a brilliant torch to lead you in. To their stories. So that you might be strengthened in your own.

We’re inviting you in.

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