I sit, right at this moment, in the living room of my daughter, Elizabeth. Duke is playing legos at my feet while Scarlet takes a much-needed nap. We share this moment of quiet as only two hearing impaired people can grasp. Their little apartment in the heart of L.A. is flooded with golden sunshine while storms rage back home in the Northwest. I know I'm supposed to love all this sun and warm weather, but geez-- in November? Over the weekend Phil and I were in Long Beach speaking to a group of all-in, passionate-about-Jesus parents. What an honor to get to pour into this generation of parents as they pour into their children! At one point of the conference, as I was telling a bit of my story, I just couldn't go on. They began crying right along with me as I recounted how close I came to throwing it all away in vicious anger at God. Then afterwards, women began telling me their own stories and I started crying all over again. Because God is still rescuing people, still picking broken women up out of the pits they have dug themselves into.

One young woman told me that a friend had sent her a link to my blog while she was in rebellion against God. Growing up in a pastor's home, she'd walked away from Jesus when He didn't heal her of the epileptic seizures that have created havoc for her since she was three years old. When she read about  the Beautiful No in my story, her anger turned into worship. She's been walking with Him in love ever since.  I couldn't stop hugging her! I know that on that Day we will dance together in full abandon in the presence of the One whose grace set us free.

Tonight I'll go to my other daughter's home. I'll soak her in, filling my heart full to the brim with talk about books and stories and writing and reading and all the endlessly fascinating things I love about Bekah. I'll hear about their upcoming trip to Japan and be fascinated by their life that is so different than mine. A life of creative entrepeneurism, interesting friends, and a fresh take on culture that always leaves me with things to think about that I rarely encounter in my cozy cabin in the woods.

You know that saying: My cup runneth over? Well, that's exactly how I feel. Like a way over-sized cup that is overflowing with refreshing goodness.

Let me pass on a blessing I read this morning:

The LORD bless you and keep you;

the LORD make his face shine upon you and be gracious to you;

the Lord turn his face toward you and give you peace."

Numbers 6v24-26

From an overflowing heart,

Diane

One week ago everyone went home. Camp Comer was long over, but we’d extended with visits from Elizabeth with Duke and little Scarlet, and then the unexpected delight of our other daughter, Rebekah, coming for a long weekend.

While they were here I relished the moments, ignoring e-mails and messages and responsibilities and deadlines (and cleaning!) to fully pour myself into relationships that will be mine for a lifetime.

I cuddled with Duke when too much play with too many friends and cousins left him exhausted. We lay on my cushy feather bed, his head resting on my heart, imagining castles and knights and maybe could we make a fort in the attic space above the bedroom?

I issued yes’s for all the times I’d no’d my own kids.

Yes you can help yourself to the gum in the top drawer. Yes, you can have a bit of unhealthy whipped-cream-from-the-can on your vegan hot chocolate. Yes, we’ll build forts and find nooks where imaginations can fly us to other worlds.

They’re all gone now and my little cottage in the fir woods is neat and clean once again. Handprints on the windows lingered long enough to remind me why I’m spending my summer writing words for parents— words I’d longed for when I was the mama with little ones.

And then this morning I read a passage in God’s word I’ve read a million times and somehow this time it lit up the page like the marquees in Times Square:

Here is a trustworthy saying:  Whoever aspires to be an overseer desires a noble task. Now the overseer is to be:

…above reproach

…faithful to his wife

...temperate

… self-controlled

…respectable

…hospitable

…able to teach

…not given to drunkenness

…not violent but gentle

…not quarrelsome

…not a lover of money

And even while I cringe at the realization of how I fall short, it dawns on me that this is God’s matrix for the kind of spiritual leaders He is looking for. A list of character qualities that He values.

A list for parents in the thick of raising the next generation of men and women who will shape the Church and will bring the Kingdom of God into their world.

I’m excited now and fully awake to the riches hidden in plain sight!

This is why Phil and I have changed course after years and decades of pastoring in the local church. Why we are risking security and ease and saying no to retirement and a gazillion things that take up time. Why I am packing my suitcase to trek to un-touristy places like Haiti and Uganda and Albania instead of staying ensconced in my cozy little cottage in the woods.

God has tapped us on the shoulder and beckoned us to come alongside parents who are raising the next leaders and elders and deacons and teachers and entrepreneurs and engineers. His invitation to us is to teach and encourage and train and point out the wisdom pieces in God’s Word that lay waiting to be discovered.

Treasures like Proverbs 24:3,4:

By wisdom a house is built,

And through understanding it is established;

Through knowledge its rooms are filled with rare and beautiful treasures.

There’s a metaphor to inspire parents! To build and then establish a spiritual house where rare and beautiful treasures are the norm. A calling to wisdom and understanding.

I read that list in 1Timothy knowing it was the Apostle Paul’s inspired-by-God list for choosing leaders in Timothy’s church. And at the same time I read it sensing that Paul’s list is also a parent’s list.

Because, what every counselor or teacher knows is:

… that faithfulness and self-control and gentleness instead of violence are best taught early before a child is hardened into hard-to-change ways of dealing with conflict.

… that being quarrelsome can be nipped in the bud when parents encourage humility and teach their children ways to listen and understand instead of allowing them to succeed by demanding control over their siblings.

…that being hospitable is best taught by throwing open the doors of our homes and lives to people who need the refuge we offer.

… and being not a lover of money is ingrained in a child who is taught and shown how to be grateful and generous.

And so I sit at my desk this summer, reaching for words to explain truths in the Scriptures that work in real life. Writing and rewriting and studying and pondering— asking God to make His wisdoms easier to find, to gift me— and all the parents who want to raise followers of Jesus— with a depth of understanding that will enable us to raise children who will become the next generation of leaders.

I’ll be spilling over onto the pages of this place, of course. Some things just can’t wait the months needed to create a whole book. And I’d love to hear from you— young moms, hope-to-be-someday moms, empty-nest moms and those who were raised in the ways of wisdom—

What is it you know about the spiritual training of children that you’re sensing is a rare and beautiful treasure?

What is it that you know now, that you wish you’d known then?

What are the areas you need help in this task of raising children whose hearts burn to know God? Members of the tribe who A.W.Tozer called “children of the burning hearts”?

And books! Don’t forget to send me the names of books that have fueled your quest for wisdom and understanding.  I would love to gather your questions and treasures as I write.

From my heart,

Diane

But you are

a chosen people,

a royal priesthood,

a holy nation,

God’s special possession,

That you may declare the praises of Him who called you out of darkness

into His wonderful light.

I Peter 2v9

I am just now emerging from that fog called jet lag. We arrived home from Albania in the wee hours of last Tuesday filled to the brim with thanksgiving for what God did in our midst.

Phil and I had been invited to come to Albania to teach the Intentional Parents: raising passionate Jesus followers conference to a group of leaders who would determine if our material would effectively cross the barriers of culture, making it applicable to the Church in Albania.

On the last night of the conference, one of the leaders who invited us asked people to come to the front and tell us how our teaching had impacted their lives.

We listened in awe, humbled and energized by their words. What we heard made all the work of preparation and study and speaking through translators and jet lag and fatigue… worth it.

Over and over we saw mothers and fathers who caught the vision of intentionally passing on their faith to the next generation.

Parents who now see their children as the hope for Albania- and as bearers of the Gospel to a side of the world that needs Jesus desperately.

Albania is a nominally Muslim country with open doors and friendly relations with nations that are closed to most westerners. Turkey loves Albanians, Syria welcomes them with open arms. They have the support and sympathy of nearly every Muslim country in the world— countries closed to Americans and most Europeans.

Because of that, we realized together that-

If this generation of Jesus following Albanian parents

make disciples of their own children,

they can quite possibly change our world!

Which is why I am already looking forward to going back next year. Their plan is to have us come back with a team (more about that later) and put on the Intentional Parents conference in the capital, Tirana, and then for a gathering of churches in southern in Albania.

On the long flight home, all I could think about was this idea of God giving us dreams that are too big for us.

How…

He takes our barely there dreams—

the ones we hardly dare voice out loud,

the dreams we know we don’t have what it takes to do—

and He infuses us with more than we are, and does more than we dare dream.

Why aren’t we talking about this every day of our lives?

This great thing, this magnificent work of God… in us and thru us and for us and to us.

I have absolutely loved hearing about your dreams. Not one of them has sounded outlandishly impossible to me… and yet so many of you are just like me… sort of apologetic about the dreams you harbor.

Why is that?

I think it’s because we are afraid: of failure, of mediocrity, of standing out from the crowd, of looking foolish, of our not-enoughness.

We are afraid because we think these God-inspired sparks of compelling desire are our own responsibility… and we know we are not up for the task.

Look at me: A shy introvert who quakes at the very thought of people turning to look at me. A back row kind of girl. Super serious and introverted, born without a funny bone, who rarely grasps the punch line of a joke. Who doesn’t actually like to travel. And on top of all that? Deaf.

That woman— the me that I am in real life— went to Albania, spoke in front of a room full of leaders… who laughed at my unplanned jokes… and learned from my raw stories.

If I can dream, just think what God might do with you?

From a heart still tired but immensely satisfied,

Diane

P.S. Okay, please, I am craving a few more honest, hope-filled possibilities of how you dare dream God may use you and your story. 

Your courage just  might light a fire of desire in those of us who are held back by fears.  

This morning I woke up far away from my cottage in the woods of the Pacific Northwest. Instead of the pungent smells of pine and cedar, I drink in the scent of the sea. And instead of my pot of steaming tea, I sip slowly from a foamy bowl filled with cappuccino served with a spoon. In just a few hours a group of hand-picked parents will make their way from Albania’s capital city, Tirana, to the coastal town of Durres, on the edge of the Adriatic Sea.

These are leaders— in business, in government, in NGO’s, in churches. They are followers of Jesus in a country that is nominally Muslim and predominately atheistic.

And they have kids. Children they love who are being raised in a culture that goes against everything they believe.

Sound familiar?

In just a few hours Phil and I will tell our story. How we met and married with high hopes. And how, when pregnant with our first child, we realized we had no idea how to raise children who want Jesus. And how that scared us.

And I’ll look into the eyes of the mothers and I’ll see that same fear. We’ll know each other in that long look. The camaraderie that comes from a shared passion.

Every parent there wants what we wanted: children who grow into people who are passionate, all-in, wise, fruitful, faithful followers of Jesus.

We will spend hours talking and listening and teaching and delving into the Scriptures and praying and sharing stories and laughing at the ridiculousness of our dreams for our children.

And God will be here, bending down to listen.

I will tell these parents, so like us when we were young, about how we prayed, over and over again, for wisdom. How we held hands and cried out to the Father for what He promised in James 1v5:

If any of you lacks wisdom,

 let him ask of God, who gives to all generously and without reproach,

and it will be given to him. 

And then we’ll share with them the treasures He gave with so much generosity that we’re overwhelmed and overflowing. I’ll watch in wonder as they scramble to write it down, filling the notebooks with letters I cannot read.

And I’ll tell them that He’ll do the same for them, here, on the other side of the world. With Macedonia’s snow capped mountains off in the distance and Greece right behind us, Phil and I will pour ourselves into a new generation of parents in the hope that they will pour into a new generation of Albanians who will, in turn, raise up a new generation of leaders who will bring Jesus to a country that desperately needs Him.

Will you pray for these people? These parents? This generation?

And will you pray for me? For us?

I have relished praying for those of you who dare to dream with God. Keep telling me those stories and I will keep hoping with you and praying for you.

From my heart far from home,

Diane

Dear Girls, Years and decades and eras ago when Phil and I were dating I was convinced he would be a terrific dad.

After all, I reasoned, he loved to play with kids. Wrestling and teasing and throwing his nephews in the air, Phil seemed, in my vast experience, to have all the makings of a wonderful father.

And even though my criteria were laughably shallow, I was right. Phil has been a terrific dad to our four children.

Just a couple of days ago he got a text from Matt, asking for help and guidance about ministry he was being called to do. What to say, how to study, the best way to approach the opportunity.

I watched as Phil once again took an opportunity to disciple his son.

To raise up the next generation to teach and think and lead. 

And I watched as my son listened and learned and prepared to take the baton from his father and run his own leg of the race.

I watch as my oldest son, John Mark, leads his own sons and daughter. How he, who is so different in so many ways from his dad, is at the same time, so like his father.

I watch John Mark encourage and discipline and disciple his children— and then how he throws them in the air for a raucous wrestling match. Just like his dad.

And girls, I want the same for each of you. Because if you marry a man who understands his essential role of imitating the Father as a father, you and your children and your children’s children will be blessed beyond belief.

Trust me, I know. I live the results everyday.

That is why I want to invite you to attend a seminar Phil and I are teaching on November 8^th and 9th. It’s called Intentional: Raising Passionate Jesus Followers.

This seminar is a culmination of a dream that started while Phil was in seminary and our first born was just a few months old. Over 3 decades ago! We knew we didn’t know what we were doing and so we began an intensive study. Gathering wisdom, delving into the Scriptures, asking questions, questioning the answers.

Now we have gathered what we learned and crammed it into six teaching sessions. We’ll tell our stories, explain the Biblical basis of the why’s and how’s, tell you what we did right and a whole lot of things we wish we’d done differently.

And here’s the real reason to come girls: When I saw, just a few days ago, Phil bent over his big, worn Bible pointing out to my son the truths that applied to his questions, I fell in love with the man all over again.

A great big swelling of I can’t believe I get to be married to this man kind of response.

And I want that for you.

Every one of you. Because in ways I do not fully understand, a woman’s feelings of love are all wrapped up in respect. I feel love for Phil because I honestly, really do respect the man. A lot.

Yes, he’s a good man. And yes, he’s good to me. But the real reason I respect him is because of the way he leads his family on a firm Biblical basis to follow Jesus with wisdom and passion.

If you’re married, bring your man. Please. This is not a seminar simply for mothers. It is a chance for men to see what spiritual leadership looks like and sounds like and is in everyday life.

If you’re not married, bring yourself. This is a chance for you to get a whiff of what you really want. For you to see what spiritual leaderships looks like and sounds like and is in every day life.

And it’s a lot more than wrestling with the kids…

From my heart,

Diane

PS: sign up by going to the website www.intentionalparents.org. And let me know if you’re coming!