a place for your soul to breathe
May your weekend be filled with surprises. When you laugh, may snorts soon follow. When you smile, may your teeth be clear of broccoli. And when you cry, may you not apologize or try to hide it. Let your tears remind you of your humanity, your compassion, and your deep capacity to feel. Slow down so that you may fully consider your joys, your sorrows, and the beauty of ordinary days. Enjoy your weekend, friends.
May your soul be open to the way God moves and may you have the courage to move with him. Don’t despise the ordinary, for it is in those small places where the Divine makes his home. Let the simple graces of your everyday moments escort you further into the mystery of God. Remember the words of Jean-Pierre de Caussade: ”The soul, light as a feather, fluid as water, innocent as a child, responds to every movement of grace like a floating balloon.”
Enjoy your weekend, friends.
I only have one link to share this week. Kids in Paraguay Make Music From Trash: They call their orchestra Landfill Harmonic. They’ve been featured on nearly every major news outlet over the past six months or so, but somehow I missed their story until this week. As you watch this 3 minute video below, let their music be a kind reminder of how God moves beautifully in unexpected places.
May your weekend be filled with small, sacred moments of awareness. May you set aside your hurry, your pulling, your wishing for different. May you linger over meals and take walks with slow steps.
May you hold books with pages, mugs with steam, and hands who know your secrets. Set down comparison, regret, revenge, and all of your defensive explanations. Settle in, right where you are, refusing to wish for something different.
Enjoy your weekend, friends.
When you walk into rooms this weekend, may you truly see people rather than wonder what people see in you.
May you love them the way you long for love, listen the way you want to be listened to, and celebrate the moments you have rather than long for the ones you don’t. Breathe in the gift of this day. And if this day is rotten? Hold on to hope for tomorrow.
Enjoy your weekend, friends. Here are some good reads to curl up with (with which to curl up? That sounds so pretentious):
May the with-ness of Jesus be your comforting reality. May you have hope, even in the midst of the dark now, that this story will not end with the lights going out but with the blazing glory of Light rising up. May this hope take your breath away.
He doesn’t fix like a technician but moves like a Lover, soothes like a Father, creates like an Artist, listens like a Friend.
Even as the pain of rejection, loss, loneliness, and fear burrow deep into your soul, may you know the companionship of Jesus goes deeper still.
Enjoy your weekend, friends.
A recent conversations with my son:
“Mommy, are there more race cars or people in the world?”
“People.”
(big sigh of relief) “Good.”
***
May your weekend be filled with people – the kind you love and the kind who love you. May you be brave in conversation, humble as you listen, lighthearted as you refuse to take yourself too seriously.
And if you spend a little time with someone who is hurting, may you be willing to offer your company without saying any words at all. And may you remember that really, everyone is hurting. Be slow to take offense.
Enjoy your weekend, friends.
May your weekend be a sacred pause for your soul. In your boredoms and your emergencies, your resting and your work, your ability and your inability, may you remember your anchor is not wisdom, answers, or an organized agenda.
Your anchor is Christ – with you and within you. Even as you predict a gloomy future, remember he has already been before you and he would not have you go where he is not.
Enjoy your weekend, friends.
Recommended reads:
May your weekend be filled with less before and more after-ish.
And may you visit my post at (in)courage to read a more complete weekend blessing.
Enjoy your weekend, friends.
May your weekend be filled with knowing that your life in Christ is as true at your kitchen table as it is on the dusty streets of Trinidad. May you remember his sacrifice is relevant for the teacher, the waiter, the lawyer, the infant, the President, the postman, the paper boy and the prisoner.
May you not attempt to separate your spiritual life from your real life because in him you live, move, and have your being. It all counts. Enjoy your weekend, friends.
Recommended for your weekend:
If you are a campaigners leader with Young Life (I know that narrows it down to about six of you) enter to win a copy of my book, Graceful, for every girl in your campaigners group at The Young Life Leader blog!
Enjoy your weekend, friends.
There isn’t one great thing you were made to do. There's one great God you were made to glorify. When you embrace the unique shape of your soul and live as the person you most fully are, art comes out. (Coming Nov. 2013)
My first book encourages tired women to let go of the try-hard life. Instead of trying to grab on to grace, what would it mean to let grace grab on to you?
Written especially for teen girls encouraging them to give up on perfect and instead trust the One who is.
