Here It Is!

I'm so excited to show you the cover for my book, Essay of the Weak. 

Simple, evocative and beautiful! 

Essay of the Weak is now available for pre-order now on Amazon. 

Follow this link: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B08YFH1VV4

Although the paperback version isn't ready for pre-order yet, I can give you a sneak peek at the back copy. I will post updates about the paperback as soon as I'm able. I'm still planning for its release on March 18th.

Book News!

 What have I been up to? I'm glad you asked! Besides child care, home keeping, locking down and working, I have finally finished my fourth novel. I know!!! It's been a long time coming, but I'm so happy to announce that on March 18th, 

Essay of the Weak 

will be released on Amazon.

BUT...before that, I will be revealing my cover for Essay of the Weak, designed by my creative and talented sister, Sandy Flewelling of TrueBlue Design. Watch for it on March 11th...

I will also post information about preordering.

Rosary

 Although I'm not Catholic, I purchased prayer beads a while ago. I find them helpful for structuring my prayer life, but don't use them every day. 

Recently, in working on a poem I had started many years ago, I found a connection between the rosary and footprints in the snow on the lake. Here's what I came up with...

ROSARY

 I still can see his

footprints in the white expanse of snow

that lies between the shore and the island.

 For a bird riding

the north wind,

this trail must resemble the

beads on a string,

a rosary; 

even,

measured,

a circle around the tiny ledges

and back to land.

 

 How could one know if

each step was weighted

with cares

that pressed him against the ice,

or threatened to stop him in his tracks.

 

 Perhaps,

as a rosary,

each one was a prayer

lifted and held up,

every move a cry for grace,

a march in the twilight of the world,

to find where the light is best.

 

 What I see is a steadfast path

that led away,

and then,

returned

to home again.

Letting Go and Leaning In

THEY There is no limp when they walk,     no cast or brace to shore up         their wounded souls. No scar, no mark to trace     the change, the primal shift         when you were torn away. But there is this -     fault lines have settled in,         where cares before unknown             trace patterns of sorrow. Fragile shells now easily broken.

And this - hands open, still releasing,     hearts swelled,         still longing for hope to be enough.

WE We have let go. You asked us, each one, to loosen our grip, to love enough to release a soul to you. We have let go.

But see, our open hands, ready for what You promised. See, our upturned faces.

Merry Christmas!

Through December 27, pick up a free copy of my ebook: https://www.amazon.com/Some-Smaller-Grace-Noelle-Carle-ebook/dp/B004V5I4MG













And free thru midnight, December 25th: https://www.amazon.com/Light-Over-Water-Noelle-Carle-ebook/dp/B009NJ7692

System Restore

Restore Point

1 Samuel 12:20  “You have done all this evil; yet do not turn away from the Lord, but serve the Lord with all your heart.

 Computers have a handy dandy function called System Restore.  Its purpose is to “undo harmful changes to your system and to restore its performance and settings.”  This set up provides an easy fix when you’ve upset the mysterious critical balance inside a computer.  It takes you back to a restore point, a time previous to the change.  In effect, it’s as if that change had never happened.  Somehow the slate, or hard drive, is wiped clean of the mistake.

I wish we had a restore point.  I wish somehow we could go back to just before we said that mean thing, or did that spiteful, selfish or reckless deed, and restore our performance and settings.  I’m not talking about time travel, because that’s much too complicated and the time/space continuum is too easily disrupted.  (I know that from watching Star Trek.) When you perform a system restore, you don’t lose your recent work.  Somehow the computer figures out the critical error and only makes an adjustment in that area.  I’d like to reset my spirit without losing all my experiences and work, to the time just before I’d sinned.  I’d like to be clean, innocent, unburdened, and unashamed.

Our instinct is to turn away from God when we know we’ve sinned.  Adam and Eve tried to hide because of their guilt. Several years ago, during a visit with our eldest son and his family, my youngest granddaughter, not yet three, came to me crying.  She lisped, “Sorry,” as she looked everywhere but at me.  I took her little shoulders, turned her to me and asked her why she was saying sorry.  She cried out, “Broke...lamp!”

We all know how she felt.  When we’ve deliberately played with temptation and been carried away, out of control, the last thing we want to do is talk to God about it.  It’s easy to put off or forget time with the Lord, when we know that confession must come first.  We find excuses for not praying, or we let our work consume us.  Our performance and settings do not function properly.  In other words, we turn away.

In chapter twelve of 1 Samuel, the old prophet is giving his farewell speech.  He leans quite heavily on the Israelites and speaks convincingly of the enormity of their sin in requesting a king.  He reiterates how faithful God has been from the time he brought them out of Egypt, through the conquest of the Promised Land until now.  They have taken their eyes off God, and think a king will save them.  Samuel has them persuaded of their sin, and evidently their shame is evident - for he tells them, yes, you’ve done all these evil things...but don’t turn away from God.  Rather, jump in wholeheartedly and serve him again.  Even with a king, even with the evidence of their sin in front of their eyes, he asked them to try again.

How can we do this?  Only because of mercy, and by grace.  Forgiveness is akin to a system restore.  Here is the promise: If we confess , he is faithful and just to forgive our sins and to cleanse us from all the wrongs.  In other words, He takes the critical error off our hard drive and wipes it clean.  And it isn’t even kept in his memory so he can bring it up later and remind us.  I think God knows that between us and Satan there is enough memory to go around.  My husband says it well - Guilt is the gift that keeps on giving. But truly, our sin is remembered no more by the only one who has the right to forgive it.  With confession, System Restore becomes a reality and we emerge clean, innocent, unburdened and unashamed.

Hope Persists

We had a family birthday party a while ago, celebrating three birthdays that all occur within three weeks or so. We met at Neal and Tracy's house: all my siblings, my parents and some of the grand kids. Picture taking started, and it wasn't long before someone said, let's get all the siblings. They counted off six, and said, you're all here. And in my mind I thought, no, we are seven.

I talked with Russell about it later, telling him I didn't want a picture without Neal. There were only two brothers there, not three, and even though I've navigated some of this journey through grief, I still have a tenuous sense of reality sometimes - how is it possible that Neal is not here?

I'm old to be starting Grief 101. Many have been acquainted with it far longer and at an earlier age. I'm learning, taking baby steps, just like my four year old grandson, whose counting and alphabet are perfect one day, then all over the spectrum the next. I'll think I've turned a corner, and then I'm crying every day again. I hear a song and feel like I've been punched in the chest. I read a book and dissolve into a tangle of questions. I speak boldly about trusting God and his goodness at the same time that I'm wrestling with  niggling doubts.

I think grief may always be there, like a bad sunburn, just below the surface of each day. At birthdays, reunions, anniversaries it will flare up and hurt again, for a while.

My big-hearted husband held me, and cried with me, then gently said, this is your family now. This is the new normal. And I know he's right. The picture has changed, and it will change some more, probably many times. But hope persists, and we will be seven again someday.