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Tanara McCauley

~ Love Knows Color

Tanara McCauley

Tag Archives: prayer

Unseen

22 Monday Jan 2018

Posted by tanaramccauley in Faith, Relationships, and Other Topics

≈ 9 Comments

Tags

dogs, endurance, faith, grief, grieving, hiking, love, persevere, prayer, Trials

img_4761

I last climbed this mountain a couple of months ago with a friend and my dog, Charlie. Charlie landed on a jumping cactus high up the trail. A whole burr clung to his paw and I couldn’t remove it. Each time I tried I ended up with spines in my hands.

The weather was hot. Charlie was heavy (20 lbs is light until you have to hold it just so in order to keep cactus spines from latching to other parts of the body). I was so mentally, emotionally, and physically grieved over the recent loss of my brother that this seemingly inconsequential situation brought me to the end of my strength.

I couldn’t leave Charlie on that mountain, but I couldn’t carry him down either, and it would take at least an hour for anyone to reach us— at which point there was no guarantee they’d be able to remove the cactus anyway.

I didn’t want to speak. And I didn’t want to cry; I didn’t want to give room to any emotion that could run away with me. But I knew if I didn’t ask the Lord, I honestly could have lain down on that vacant mountain—just me, my dog, and my worried friend—and given up.

In a voice only loud enough for Him to hear, I paused, lifted my face to the sky, and whispered in four small words the sum of my soul and all that it carried: “Jesus, I need You.”

My friend crested the mountain. She saw three men. They had serviced the mountain tower and were packing up when she rushed to catch them. One of them was a former cowhand and had wrestled steer to the ground to remedy problems just like Charlie’s.

But while Charlie is the biggest coward to ever wear canine form, he’ll scrap for it if he thinks death is imminent. He growled and snapped and rolled out of my grip each time they came near him. I was afraid they’d give up. I was distraught over the thought.

This time I cried in my heart: “Jesus, I need You.”

The cowhand looked at me. “We’re going to take care of this for you,” he said. “I know people get attached to their dogs emotionally. Trust me, I won’t hurt him, I just need to manhandle him a little bit, and we’ll take care of this for you.”

And they did. They took spines in their own fingers, got dirt and Charlie’s unmentionables all over one of the heavy work jackets they pinned him down with. They labored over him until his paws were free of every spine.

I didn’t want to cry. I wanted to weep. But I still had a heart too fragile to let my emotions run away with me.

So I thanked them. I asked if I could repay them. Get the jacket cleaned at least.

“Absolutely not,” they said.

Charlie stood, tested his paws, then pranced about like a show pony with his head and dirty tail high. He has no shame.

We started our descent, the three men wishing us well. The wind blew on my face, cool against the sweat on my skin. I felt inside the way Charlie looked in his prance: lighthearted and with joy restored.

Grief, trial, trouble. These all have a way of making one feel forgotten. Unseen. Unimportant. And even though truth is not changed by feelings, feelings are a powerful distraction.

But on that day, during that trivial predicament of a woman on a mountain with her quirky dog—when I truly could not take another step beyond the culmination of things pressing me down— Yeshua reminded me through the presence and persistence of those men: “I see you. I love you. I am here.”

As you head into the week, whatever it is you’re facing and however much it hurts, take your feelings, your questions, your doubts, your scheming to make it all work out; surrender these to the Son who died to save you and embrace this truth:

He sees you. He loves you. He is here.

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Know Your Enemy

24 Saturday Sep 2016

Posted by tanaramccauley in Faith, Relationships, and Other Topics

≈ 6 Comments

Tags

Bible, Christian, Christianity, community, compassion, enemy, faith, forgiveness, grace, healing, hope, justice, love, mercy, power, prayer, relationships, roaring lion, unforgiveness, unity

Black-maned male African lion roaring, headshot, Africa

“Be sober, be vigilant; because your adversary the devil walks about like a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour. Resist him.” 1 Peter 5:8, 9

The enemy is very busy with today’s Christians.

Busy getting friends to turn on each other because their opposing views become offensive and that offense becomes more valuable than the love they used to have for each other.

Busy getting us to one-up each other in sarcasm and rhetoric rather than outdo each other in love, mercy, grace, and kindness.

Busy getting Christians more concerned about issues than souls, more condemning of others than forgiving, more critical of others than prayerful, more determined to make a worldly point than testify of the goodness, faithfulness, and sovereignty of the Living God.

The enemy is very busy with today’s Christians.

Busy inciting fear, hatred, violence, injustice, retaliation, bitterness, separatism, vengeance, murder, and deception in the world, and busy getting Christians to join the ranks in picking worldly sides and buy into it from a worldly perspective, while we completely ignore his handiwork from the shadows.

He’s very busy there–in the shadows, recruiting the same souls for destruction that we should be turning to the Messiah. Recruiting us to rally for a candidate or a cause rather than look with compassion on the lost. Recruiting us to redefine “the lost” and to use our own judgment for determining who’s worthy of compassion and forgiveness. Recruiting us to look at skin or uniform color rather than the soul inside. Distracting our attention away from who and what we really wrestle against.

The enemy has convinced many of us to ignore that in our anger we should not sin, that the very sins we condemn others for we ourselves commit or have committed, that those sinning against us are in need of the same grace and repentance we have been given, that we are to love our neighbors and enemies, bless those who curse us, pray for those who persecute and spitefully use us, and not resist an evil person.

The enemy is busy getting us to live like desperate citizens of a lost world rather than confident children of the Almighty God. Children who have the wisdom that is from above, which is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, willing to yield, full of mercy, without partiality and without hypocrisy.

He’s busy getting us so angry that we become unforgiving, and in becoming unforgiving we forget how our own sins ripped through Christ’s flesh.

He is busy convincing us that God is silent. And that if God is silent we should be shouting. At the world. Not crying out to our Father. Together. United.

The enemy is very busy with today’s Christians. He is busy keeping us subjected to the influence of media and away from the instruction of God’s throne. He is busy trying to make us look and feel hostile, sarcastic, furious, forgotten, forsaken, indifferent, uncaring, hard-hearted, and hopeless. He is busy trying to make us look and act like him.

Resist him.

“For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this age, against spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places.” Ephesians 6:12

 

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Be “Hoo” You Are

24 Friday Apr 2015

Posted by tanaramccauley in Faith, Relationships, and Other Topics

≈ 4 Comments

Tags

Christ, Christianity, conformity, early bird, faith, fitting in, God, motherhood, night owl, parenting, peer pressure, prayer, relationships

night owl

~My eyes are awake through the night watches, that I may meditate on Your word~
Psalm 119:148

As a young child I came alive at night, and snoozed each morning till the last possible second.

In college I signed up for all the evening classes I could find. The professor of my one morning class once gave me a dignitary’s greeting. “Miss McCauley! How nice of you to grace us with your presence!”

I performed my way into a job with a flexible schedule, often baffling the poor security guards by strolling into an empty office around 2 a.m.

And yet, despite always knowing I thrived best under the glow of a silver moon, when I became a mother I tried squeezing my night owl thighs into early bird tights.

Those suckers refused to fit.

Still, the desire to blend in with other moms had a strong enough pull to make me keep trying. No matter that my little ones were involved in several activities, or that they could read before kindergarten. Forget them being accustomed to being on my schedule.

Others would hear how we ran our house, and show their disapproval to the tune of raised brows, clicked tongues, and the occasional snarky comment disguised as friendly teasing. I began to question my methods and doubt my adequacy as a mom.

I’d retire at a normal time, then lay there thinking about what I could be doing instead of actually doing it. I struggled to make it to 8 a.m. playdates, despite having gone to sleep just three hours prior.

And though nothing changed with my internal clock, my liveliness faded. My time with God became mechanical, reading the Word without actually absorbing any of it, praying from a confused, tired, joyless frame of mind.

What I’d had with Him before, in the watches of the night, had been rich and full. And I missed it.

I realized what I had sacrificed in order to assimilate and be acceptable on the ever-so-competitive mom scene. And the urge to conform lost its luster, because the cost was too great.

Of course I rise early every morning. Those kids have school. They need to eat. Practical stuff like that. But I no longer force myself to engage when I’d rather be calm and silent. I go to bed when I want, and take a nap if I need to.

And when the world sleeps, when my house is clean and silent, and more words to a story have been written, that’s when my eyes see Him best, when my heart hears Him clearly, when my joy is full.

Because that’s how He made me. So I’ll be “hoo” I am.

Your turn: When have you been tempted to operate contrary to how God uniquely designed you?

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The Goodness of God

17 Saturday Jan 2015

Posted by tanaramccauley in and Other Topics, Faith, Faith, Relationships, and Other Topics, Relationships

≈ 7 Comments

Tags

arizona, basketball, Christ, Christian, faith, God is good, grief, joy, miracles, NBA All-Star, phoenix, prayer, tragedy

womanheart I would have lost heart, unless I had believed that I would see the goodness of the LORD in the land of the living. ~Psalm 27:13

It was Valentine’s Day, 2009. The NBA All-Star festivities were taking place in Phoenix, and my husband Jon and I decided it would be fun to go as a family. We excited our twins, then three-years-old, with the promise of a fun-filled evening of basketball, cheering, and endless snacking.

We figured we’d buy tickets at the arena, since All-Star events never look sold out. But this event had. And the people selling tickets on the street were selling them at face value or higher.

$300. Each.

We’ve taught our kids about God from infancy. Trust Him. He loves you. Pray about everything. Know that He hears you.

And though we model these admonitions in their presence, praying about the tickets didn’t occur to Jon or me as we talked about a plan B.

“But, Dad.” Our daughter grabbed his face between her little hands and turned it toward the entrance. “We want to go in there.”

“We don’t have tickets, baby.”

“But we didn’t ask God yet. You said we could ask God anything.”

And so ask Him we did. Not two minutes after “amen,” a young man approached. “Do you guys need a ticket? I have an extra one.”

“How much?” Jon asked.

“Here you go.” The guy handed over the ticket, shook Jon’s hand and walked away. We received the rest of the tickets within minutes, all for the same price: free.

allstar

We had a wonderful time that night, and praised God for His goodness.

But sometimes the answer to prayer is no. Like the time I lost my third child to miscarriage, or when we lost my mother-in-law to leukemia sixteen months after her diagnosis.

Even in those instances, as painful as they were, God remained faithful, loving, and good. Because His goodness isn’t contingent on how He answers prayer, or even that He answers prayer. His goodness is one of His many unending, never-changing attributes.

A “yes” to our prayers is a byproduct of that goodness. A “no,” a byproduct of His wisdom. For He knows the plans He has for us, even when we don’t.

Divine admittance to a basketball game wasn’t a monumental life event, but it was definitely an eye-opening one. It affirmed that God cares about the trivial and the major, because He cares about us.

We can trust Him, knowing that He loves us. We can pray about everything, knowing that He hears us. And we can enjoy peace that passes understanding, knowing that the God we serve is good.

Your turn: In what way(s) has God wowed you with His goodness?

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Ready…or Not: An Author’s Pre-Conference Petition (and Parody)

08 Sunday Sep 2013

Posted by tanaramccauley in Faith, Relationships, and Other Topics, Writing and Pursuing Publication

≈ 24 Comments

Tags

ACFW, agent, American Christian Fiction Writers, amwriting, author, Bible, Christ, comedy, editor appointments, elevator pitch, faith, fears, humor, introversion, introvert, onesheet, parody, personality traits, prayer, relationships, spiritual warfare, spirituality, synopsis, thorn in the flesh, weakness, worship, writer conference, writers, writing

In less than a week, I will kiss my husband and kids goodbye, board a plane, hoist my carry-on in the overhead compartment, and fly to Indianapolis for the American Christian Fiction Writers (ACFW) Conference.

I’ve worked on my proposal and one-sheets (all that’s great about your novel on one page), practiced my elevator pitch, become acquainted with other first-timers via a group thread, and have been praying for God’s will, whatever it is, to be done.

I’m ready…almost.

The idea of being among hundreds of other authors–all Christians, all with the goal of using the craft of writing to glorify the Lord and touch lives while doing it–is astounding. And I’m amped to worship with these folks.

I’m praying to walk away with a new writing buddy. Not just a “trade likes on Facebook” type of buddy (though I’ll take those too :-)), but a special sister I can connect with on that deeper level to take this journey with.

The worship and the buddy connection I’m anticipating are enough to have me so excited I burn calories just thinking about them.

But then I think about the appointments–those two fifteen minute slots I’ll have with an editor or agent (I won’t know who/which til I get there)–and I ask, “What on earth have I gotten myself into?”

It’s silly really, I know. Tell that to my beating heart. Tell it that those fears of showing up to my appointments and not remembering my own name (let alone the summary of my story in thirty words) is unrealistic. As is the notion that I’ll open my folder to pull out a one-sheet only to find it empty, or open my mouth and start selling my story…in Chinese.

This past week the nerves have put me in a very “productive in every area but conference preparation” sort of mode.

Instead of fixing the formatting issues on my one-sheet, I’ll look at my 3-year-old and think, “I haven’t updated her baby book in a while.” I’ve trimmed my plants, organized closets, categorized photos for goodness sake…anything to avoid thinking about that whopping thirty minutes of the conference weekend.

According to all that’s sane and scriptural, it’s ridiculous. The worst thing that can happen is I pitch my book and they’re not interested. Rejection is nothing new in the world we writers live in. So, being at peace with that potential outcome, why can’t I shake these “interview” jitters?

I don’t have a concrete answer. Some on my first-timers loop (my new peeps) have suggested spiritual warfare, which they’re experiencing in various ways. And it makes sense, since introversion walks a fine line between personality trait and personality flaw, and it’s definitely an area where I’m susceptible.

It could also be the weakness I have that Christ uses to tell me “My grace is sufficient for you, for My strength is made perfect in weakness.”

And like I told my peeps, “Though I’d love to be that person who’s so confident and carefree their only worries are what places of interest to visit during free time, I have to say that my insecurities have made me cling to God and bury my face in His robe like a child stuck to the leg of a parting parent. So I’ll take it.”

Regardless of the why, however, the what is not an option. I will, for lack of a better epithet, “get er done.” I will polish my proposal, put some more practice on these pitches, fix this annoying alignment issue on my one-sheet, and, oh yeah, pack.

And I will ask for your prayers.

Pray for me that I will finish strong in my preparations, and that I will go to this conference trusting God. Pray also that He will help me to just be myself, to be open to and serving of others, to be confident in Him and joyful. Pray that His will be done.

And pray for my family that He watches over and guards them while I am away, and that He brings me home to them safely. And if you are willing, pray the same for the hundreds of others rowing the same boat that I’m in. We all need it.

Thank you, and God bless you.

Now I’m ready.

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Chevy Man Prayer

18 Thursday Jul 2013

Posted by tanaramccauley in Faith, Relationships, and Other Topics, Short Stories, Songs, and Poetry

≈ 12 Comments

Tags

amwriting, chevy, dialysis, God, healing, health, miracles, organ transplant, poetry, praise, prayer, psalms, sickness, spirituality

toolbox

He sat alone in the cab of his Chevy
Eyes burning, heart heavy
He rubbed on the arm that had just been used
His blood recycled, his spirit abused
He looked to the sky to the One he can’t see
Do You know? Do You hear? Some mercy for me?
It’s been only weeks and I know they said years
But Lord I can’t take this…Lord I can’t take this

That night at his home he pondered the morrow
More tragic sessions, unending sorrow
He felt the guilt of not having more hope
Of thinking of self, of failing to cope
Try as he might he could not reconcile
A lifetime of pain and poor health with this trial?
Of lacking in joy for indefinite time?
Oh Lord will You take this? Lord will You take this?

That very next day Chevy man got a call
Mr. M.? We’ve got news that’ll make your mouth fall
A donor’s been found, the organ’s en route
You’ve got to come put on this hospital suit
Transplant’s in the morning, and if all goes well
You’ll have quite a story of wonder to tell
His mouth fell indeed, his heart leapt in praise
Lord my God! Lord my God! Lord my God!

Sounds a bit far-fetched right? Only it isn’t.

Mr. M. is one Mr. McCauley–my dad.

He started dialysis this April. In June he was approved for placement on the transplant list. He was told to expect 5-7 years of waiting for an organ, if one ever came at all due to his rare blood type.

After a particularly horrific dialysis session in late June, he sat in his truck with the same heaviness of heart mentioned in the poem. He looked to the sky and asked for deliverance.

The very next day he got that call. And the day after that he was the recipient of a new organ. I was able to visit for a portion of his recovery and walk with him, talk with him, watch movies, laugh over memories, and just wow over what God had done.

In the words of King David: “I have set the Lord always before me; because He is at my right hand I shall not be moved.” Psalm 16:8

I will praise Him high and low, through good and bad, health and illness, practical and miracle.

Lord my God! Lord my God! Lord my God!

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Marriage Part I: The Model

11 Monday Feb 2013

Posted by tanaramccauley in Faith, Relationships, and Other Topics

≈ 8 Comments

Tags

anniversary, biblical, Christian, great-grandparents, marriage, prayer, relationships, renewed wedding vows, role model, selfless love

I was ten years old when I watched my great-grandparents renew their wedding vows on their fiftieth anniversary.

Though any other time I would’ve been itching to get out of my dress and hair bows so I could run off and play, I was mesmerized by the love that shone out of those two faces who’d seen each other every day for the last fifty years of their lives.

My memories of them together are all wonderful, but what stands out to me is how selfless they were when it came to the other person.

Great-Grandma would drop whatever she was doing and head out to the porch to greet him whenever she heard his tractor approaching.

Granddaddy came home more than once with his arms sticking out like stiff tree branches from the bee-stings he’d acquired getting the honeycomb she loved fresh from the bee farm.

She called him Daddy. He wrote her poetry. They prayed for each other.

It was a marriage that spoke of the beauty of marriage without using words. A marriage so timeless that my Great-Grandmother, who turns 95 this month, still speaks of him with a smile on her face and in her voice whenever we talk.

Though I’m hardly as selfless as I need to be to measure up to the kind of wife my Great-Grandmother was, I’m learning to get there.

Some of the lessons are hard, others rewarding. All of them precious.

What about you? Do you have any memories or models that shaped your perception and/or goals for marriage? Have they had a lasting impact on your marriage?

Click here for Marriage Part II: The Choice. Click here for Marriage Part III: The Wife’s Role.

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Deadly Intuition – Truth or Fiction Tuesday Story 4

23 Tuesday Oct 2012

Posted by tanaramccauley in Short Stories, Songs, and Poetry, Writing and Pursuing Publication

≈ 13 Comments

Tags

author, Christian fiction, deadly intuition, giveaway, gun, life or death, prayer, second chances, short story, troubled teenager, truth or fiction tuesday, vote, writer, writing, youth

It’s Truth or Fiction Tuesday! To be eligible to win the $25 Amazon gift card remember to cast your vote using the comments box. For detailed instructions click here.

The breeze blew by her with a carefree lilt in it. She tipped her face to the sky and smiled in response to the sun’s gentle warmth on her cheek. It was a welcome change to the ruthless desert heat which had lingered beyond its season.

She took the book she’d been trying to read for the past month and cracked it open. The marker had been on page seven so long it would probably leave a permanent crease–thanks to her three children who now dashed through the deserted park like a band of pirates. After another glance at them, she found her spot and tried again to conquer page eight.

She reached chapter two when a shadow interrupted her focus. Its owner was a pedaling teenager, presumably coming from school. She smiled and started to look away, but met his gaze before he moved from her line of vision.

Her internal alarm screeched like a siren.

His bike stopped behind the chunky blue dinosaur where she sat, and her body went stiff. She calculated how long it would take to gather her kids and cross to where her truck sat like an orphan on the street. If his intentions were evil, they didn’t have a chance.

“Mommy! Mommy, watch me!” Three-year-old Maya plopped down on the slide, her chubby cheeks flushed and glistening. “But don’t catch me, okay.”

“Okay, baby.” She walked over to where Maya would land in the woodchips, then braved a look at the boy. Maya could have flown at her like a superhero and she wouldn’t have noticed.

He was watching her.

She couldn’t place what she saw in his eyes–anxiety, determination maybe–but it reinforced her initial sense of foreboding, and filled her mind with terrible scenes made for movies.

Get a grip, Lorraine. She was just being paranoid. She knew from experience that her imagination was boundless when it came to her children’s safety. Surely this was one of those times.

But he didn’t look away. Lorraine forced herself to stare back and size him up. He was average height, maybe just an inch or two taller than she, with a solid, muscular build. When she was younger–nothing but lank, limbs, and attitude–his height alone would’ve convinced her she could take him. She didn’t dare make such an assumption now, especially with her whole world running about the park on three pairs of short, vulnerable legs.

She appraised his cropped blonde hair, baggy shirt, and skater shorts. He also wore an earbud in one ear, with the other dangling from the front of his shirt. Apart from the hardness of his features and his constant fidgeting, he appeared normal. And, as she continued to stare, he gave a slight smile and finally looked away.

So it was paranoia.

Then why couldn’t she shake the dark feeling that defied the beauty of the day? It kept her from rounding up her children, for fear that something terrible would happen if they were huddled together with their backs to him in retreat.

It also kept her thinking of ways to fight and stay alive long enough to save them. She didn’t think like that. Why was she thinking like that? Why could he possibly want to hurt them? They didn’t know each other. In her many trips to this same park over the years, she’d never even seen him.

She couldn’t figure him out, or the ominous vibe that tickled her senses. As she puzzled over it, he mounted his bike, rode to the other side of the playground, got off, and began to pace. He pulled out his MP3 player for a brief look, then shoved it back in his pocket, all the while stealing unsettling glances at her. He repeated this ritual, including the bike trek, several times.

The pacing reminded Lorraine of an agitated tiger, tense and ready to pounce on the first thing within its reach. Coldness spread over her as intuition told her she had made the connection.

She and her little family were within his reach.

She began to pray wordlessly, ignoring the complaints of her older daughter Ria that Nate was throwing woodchips in her hair. Desperate for God to intervene, Lorraine threw up every solution she could think of, including striking the boy dead on the spot if needed–anything to keep him from hurting her babies.

She scanned his oversized clothes again, looking for the bulge of a weapon. She had to get close enough so that she could at least fight him for it. That was their only chance, if God let him live.

All of a sudden he stopped and faced her. Lorraine opened her mouth to scream for help. What came out was a controlled, “Hello.”

He blinked and pulled his brows together, confusion replacing the rigid set of his face.

“Hello,” Lorraine said again with a weak smile.

“Hi,” he said.

“Are you waiting for someone?”

He paused as if he had to think about it, then shook his head. “No.”

“Just get out of school?”

“Kinda.”

“Oh yeah? What grade are you in?”

“I’m a junior.” He walked with an unsure step and stopped close enough to touch her. Lorraine struggled to appear relaxed. “I would be a senior but I got held back,” he said.

“That’s terrible.” What a dumb thing to say. “The last years of high school are rough, though. You can’t give up. What’s your name?”

“Miguel. Or Mike. Either one.”

Lorraine searched his face again. “Miguel? You don’t look Hispanic.”

“I’m not. I’m adopted. My real mom left me when I was one. My dad left when I was four. I was adopted by a Mexican family, so I named myself Miguel. But you can call me Mike.”

“I’m sorry to hear that, Mike–about your first parents I mean. Are you and your adopted family new to the area?”

“No, just me.” His attention was momentarily arrested by a yellow-winged butterfly. “I got in trouble a few years ago, so I’ve been in foster homes ever since. I’ve been in this new one about a week.”

She chose to forego the obvious question and asked, “How do you like it so far?”

He searched her with plain brown eyes that seemed expert at reading people. “It’s okay, I guess. I don’t like the school. They’re real strict, with metal detectors everywhere. The family seems alright, though. I miss my other family, but I’m not allowed back there.”

Once he got going he didn’t stop. He proceeded to tell her about his brother going to the army, and how he wanted to follow in his footsteps, or maybe become a Marine. Though Lorraine picked up on the awkward slant to his social skills, she couldn’t help being touched by the soft earnest in his voice and how his hostile exterior seemed to drip away as he unloaded his burdens.

He wasn’t a dangerous teen after all, just a troubled one.

“Do you like music?” he asked without prelude.

“Sure.”

When he rattled off a list of artist names she’d never heard before, he frowned and asked, “Well what do you listen to?”

She laughed. “Christian music mostly. Anything else you probably wouldn’t know. I’m about twice your age, Mike.”

He looked skeptical for a moment then shrugged. “Well, you might like this then.” His thumb whipped around the dial on his MP3 and he offered her the earbud resting on his chest.

Lorraine suppressed her inner germophobe and took it. He needed love, not her ridiculous hang-ups. The song, Stand By Me, was in English but infused with a Latin sound. Lorraine smiled and sang a few lines before handing it back to him.

The sprinklers came on and drew the kids like magnets. Lorraine and Mike talked more, mostly about his dreams and how with hard work he could achieve them, and she relaxed as he soaked up her attention like a happy sponge. He was handsome when he smiled.

A truck drove by, and Mike sagged when he saw it. “That’s my foster dad,” he said. “Guess I better go.”

“Okay,” Lorraine was sad to have him leave so soon. She almost forgot she’d been praying for his destruction earlier. The memory made her feel silly.

“See you around,” he said. He hesitated, then dropped his heavy arms over her shoulders in a loose hug, and touched her cheek with the quick kiss young boys give their mothers. It broke her heart.

“Be good, Mike,” she said. “Work hard.”

“I will.” He jogged to his bike and tripped just as he reached it.

He recovered quickly, pulling the bike up with him as he stood. He adjusted his shirt, which had lifted during the fall, and Lorraine caught sight of a gun lodged in his waistband.

Her mouth dropped open. Mike, however, didn’t notice. He flashed her one last smile–radiant and beautiful–threw his leg over the seat, and pedaled off in the direction he’d come from.

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Only You

20 Saturday Oct 2012

Posted by tanaramccauley in Short Stories, Songs, and Poetry

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

author, cares, Christian music, fears, hearts desires, Jesus, prayer, sacrifice, secret place, seek first the kingdom of God, songs, songwriting, wait on the Lord, writer

This is actually a song but I don’t have any music to it yet so I’ll just post the words for now.

Only You

There are many things that I want
So many people I care about
So many ways life can hurt me
Lord, You know, You know

So many things I still seek
So much I feel I can’t do without
So many fears that won’t leave me
Lord, You know

But when I get alone
The world outside, Your Word in my face
I feel You enter in
Such a secret, sacred place
All lies become undone
My cares come tumbling down
I find out once again
Lord all I need is You
You, You, You
Lord just give me You
You, You, You
This world can break my heart
The sky can have my dreams
Lord just give me You

~

It’s a weary heart left to wait
And a troubled soul who feels all alone
This simple frame bruises swiftly
Oh Lord, You know

But when I search for You
The world outside, Your Word in my face
I feel You enter in
Oh how precious is this place
You hear my hearts desires
The burdens tumble down
I’m strong again to wait
For I’ve been promised You
You, You, You
Lord just give me You
You, You, You
This world can break my heart
The sky can have my dreams
My hopes can drift away
Like petals in the breeze
If I lose all that I have
Or long for what can’t be…
Lord, let it be
As long as I have You
You, You
Lord just give me You
You, You, You

Only You

© 2012 Tanara McCauley
Matthew 6:33 But seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added to you.

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From My Heart to God’s Ear…In a Letter

11 Tuesday Sep 2012

Posted by tanaramccauley in Faith, Relationships, and Other Topics

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author, blessings, bond, child sponsorship, compassion, faith, Father, God, heart, Jesus, letter, poor, poverty, praise, prayer, relationship, rich, writer, writing

Heavenly Father,

I want to praise You and give You thanks for who You are and all that You do.

As I think about child sponsorship and what it has become for me, I really want to just thank You for using such a ministry to bless my family when we thought it would be us being used to bless others. I know through Your Word that You have a heart for the poor and that You have made them rich in faith. That You would use me and take my intention to help with their physical needs, then turn it into love and feelings I never thought I could feel for someone I’ve never seen, I’m amazed.

I’m blessed by every letter, truly Father. Knowing that these precious children pray for us, it humbles me and makes me want to cry sometimes. To have one mother write to tell me she’d make sure her son wouldn’t waste the opportunity sponsorship has given him, You know what that did to me.

Parent to parent I know her heart, and it touched mine. I want to be able to do more, and I pray if it’s Your will, You’ll enable us to. Let it be lavish, LORD! And thank you again for the many letters we get. Please keep them coming. And help me to write each child regularly also. Speak to my heart specific things to pray for them. May they know You, love You, and grow strong in You as they mature. And Father, if You are willing, I pray that we get to meet them all one day. I would love so dearly to hold them close.

For the children who have yet to be sponsored, especially those who have waited for months, move someone’s heart to sponsor a child today. Even if it’s just one, Lord. You pick the person, and match them with the child You’ve intended, and let Your blessing fall down on that relationship and flow through it.

Your ways are perfect, even when we don’t understand them. And I praise You for pairing the poor in flesh but rich in faith, to the poor in faith but rich in flesh, and then revealing Yourself through these bonds You’ve built. You are wonderful and worthy of praise. And I ask, in the name of Jesus, that You would match a child with their sponsor today. I love You, and I thank You for it.

In Jesus’ name…Amen.

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