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I Didn’t Go To Church For 3 Months. This Is What I Learned.

09 Thursday Jul 2015

Posted by Remodeling House and Heart in For the Love of People, Love, Personal Growth, Uncategorized

≈ 4 Comments

Tags

church, churchianity, Faith, love, Mathew 5:44, Mathew 6, mission work, prayer, skipping church, Starbucks Stories, Sunday mornings

Its Sunday morning.  I am sitting in the place where Americans gather to laugh and love and converse about life, the place where lives are encouraged and transformed for the better, the place that has come to be one of my favorite symbols of comfort and rejuvenation.  Yes, it is a beautiful bustling day at my local Starbucks.  You walk in, you pick your version of hope in a cup, you walk out feeling a little bit wiser and just a little bit more prepared to handle the troubles of the day.  Isn’t that what Sunday mornings are for- grabbing a little hope in a cup to take with you for the rest of the week?

I didn’t go to church for nearly 3 months.  That might not be shocking to some, but for me that is a huge statement.  I have spent most of my post-college, adult life highly involved in everything church related.  However, this past winter due to some uncontrollable circumstances combined with transitional timing and life in general, church was not a place in which I could be found.  After a few weeks I became aware of my absence and I began to take note of some changes that were going on in my spiritual life.  I started questioning why, as Christians, we go to church.  I started questioning why I go to church.  What is church anyways?  I know the answers I have been given from a life time of sermons, catechism classes, and Sunday School teachings but I needed to discover the answers for myself.  So I decided to talk to God about it as I trekked through an unusual winter sans church.  These were my findings.

  1. Church can exist outside of the a building.

Now I know that wherever 2 or more are gathered in His name then Jesus is present but during my dry spell from  church I actually experienced a completely different idea of what church could be.  It was so simple and reminded of how Jesus would often meet with people throughout the bible.  It was all about the food.   Friends, family members, and people we had just met would gather around our dining room table during the winter of no church and we would commence in some pretty spectacular discussions on faith, the bible, and pretty much everything you could think of that we experience on a daily basis.  You know…. Life.

I remember one particular evening sitting at the table after a big enchilada and Spanish rice dinner with some guests and thinking to myself that the dinner conversation was one of the most spiritually stimulating discussions that I had participated in for a long time. The conversation was honest.  I wished that I could have this all the time.  Wouldn’t it be great if this was how church happened always?  But of course, that is exactly how church began.  Jesus didn’t always sit in a building and wait for people to come to him.  He went to people’s houses and shared meals with them.  Even after Jesus had left this earth, His disciples would gather together in their homes and just talk.  They would share about what Jesus had done in their lives and how they experienced Jesus in their personal lives.

2.  You can still have a fruitful growth/ healthy walk with Christ without going to the physical building of a church.

No church did not equal no relationship with God.  In fact, I was clinging to my faith even more during those quiet months.  It was uncomfortable.  It felt wrong to not be going to church as if I was going to have my Christian card revoked.  I was constantly thinking about it.  So, I was constantly praying about it and journaling and reading.  I spent a lot of time alone, with nothing more than my bible, my journal, a cup of coffee and my conversations with God through prayer.  I wish I had the time to share with you right now all of the things I discovered about Jesus,  myself, my faith, and the world around me during those months of alone time with God.  We’ll just save those stories for another time.  I had such a fear that I would withdraw from my faith if I did not go to church consistently.  It was a refreshing relief to realize that church is not at the center of my relationship with God.  Nope, GOD is actually at the center of my relationship with God.  I think in a lot of ways attending church and serving in church ministries and participating in church activities had become a point system for me.  I had always been warned about that but never thought it could happen to me.  Those months with no church were a reset button on my spiritual life.  It was a time for God to clear away some of the gunk that was crowding our relationship and get my eyes focused on what was actually more important.  Him.  Which leads me to my next observation:

3.  Without the distractions of church your eyes are opened to be able to see the world around you and the people that God loves who aren’t going to church.

What am I going to wear?  What am I going to make for the church potluck?  What is going to be my lesson for  Sunday school class?  These were just a few of the questions that would fill my brain in previous seasons of churchgoing.  Notice that God is not actually a part of any of those questions.  But I was serving.  Right?  Serving has always been one of my arguments as to the necessity of church.  We need to be serving others and church always needs volunteers.  This is true.  But you know who else needs volunteers?  THE WORLD.

The winter church- solitude brought with it acquaintances with non-church goers.  Real people with very little to non-existent faith in a God who can bring peace to your life.  People with real problems, addictions, and pain.  People that churches had turned away in one way or another.  People who did not feel comfortable going to church because the church goers would ask you to take off your hat or to cover up your tattoos or to pretty much change your entire self before you come to the altar.  People who Jesus said to love and to win over with said love.  I guess, you could count all those months without a steeple  as research as to why people do not go to church.  Plain and simple: the church can be a very judgmental and daunting place sometimes especially to someone who is not accustomed to the culture of church.

When I wasn’t busy with churchy activities I really began to observe how there is this group-think mentality that is plaguing our churches.  It is this nebulous bubble that, if you are not careful, you can find yourself trapped in.  I really never noticed it before and I really didn’t even know that I was a part of it, but during those 3 months I could really see it clearly because I was on the outside with the outsiders and looking in did not look so good.  This is what it looked like.  As followers of Christ, we adopt all of these other beliefs that really have nothing to do with Jesus dying on the cross for our salvation.  These beliefs might have more to do with politics or cultural preferences.  After a while, each church begins to appear homogenous  in that its congregants tend to agree on  ideas not in the bible.  The average outsider cannot tell that there is a line between biblical truths and personal preferences because everyone seems to agree on just about everything from dress code to radio stations to political party to social graces.  The outsider sees this and thinks that being a Christian means knowing better than to wear a hat in church or knowing which way to vote.  To the outsider it is overwhelming and it is clear when you don’t fit in.   We wear these beliefs as badges and present them on social media.  These “belief badges”  have nothing to do with the love of Christ but we excuse it as love or pride even though it looks and feels unwelcoming and exclusive.  We relish in the us versus them mentality and when we go to church we join the congregation in cheering each other on and shaming the behaviors of the very souls that we claim to be praying for all the while failing to see our own shortcomings and forgetting to first take all of our concerns to God through prayer.

Yeah, I’m guilty of joining in on the group-think.  The idea is that we can all band together and encourage each other’s soapboxes that distract us from the sermon on the mount which says, “but I say to you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you,”  Mathew 5:44.  We claim that we pray for our enemies and we are happy to post on our social media of choice that we are praying for our enemies.  But what about Mathew 6:1 “Beware of practicing your righteousness before men to be noticed by them; otherwise you have no reward with your Father who is in heaven.” and Mathew 6:5-6 “When you pray, you are not to be like the hypocrites; for they love to stand and pray in the synagogues and on the street corners so that they may be seen by men.  Truly I say to you, they have their reward in full.  But you, when you pray, go into your inner room, close your door and pray to your Father who is in secret, and your Father who sees what is done in secret will reward you.”

There is a real world out there that needs to know what love truly is.  In my research, the world thinks we look angry.  Maybe I now sound angry and judgmental too.  Like I said,  I am guilty of all of this as well.  I have been convicted that this cycle is not helping the world it is actually driving people further and further away from Jesus.  I’m ready to try something new.  You too?

4.  You fall in love with Jesus all over again.

Ok,  I might have gotten really passionate about that last one and I hope I didn’t lose you because this one right here is my favorite.  When I didn’t go to church for 3 months the best thing happened to me: I fell in love with Jesus all over again.  I don’t know, maybe the time away from the rows of pews was like a vacation for me and  my savior to relax and enjoy each other’s company.  Since I was often alone with nothing more than my prayers it became easier to pray throughout the day.  And while I was praying/ meditating throughout the day I began to see more and more how I need Jesus in every second of my life.  Left to my own devices, I am nothing but selfishness and mischief.  I already knew that I need Jesus every single day of my life but because I was in a state of heightened awareness my self-reflection was highlighted.  In evaluating myself all I could think was thank God I have my Jesus.  Thank God I have a savior who saves me from myself!

5.  I miss church as a community.

I’m still not exactly sure what is at the root of #5.  Maybe it’s the Catholic school girl in me that just adores systems and organization and the routine of going to church on Sundays.  Maybe it is because the new testament speaks of gathering together to pray for one another and to worship together.  Maybe it is because I really missed hearing about God from someone else’s perspective.  Whatever it is, I really missed going to church as a family.  Please understand that this list is not an encouragement to not go to church.  I did not purposely skip out on church.  I think it was a gift; a short season of my life for me to reflect on why I do what I do and a season to listen to what church needs to become for me.  It was a time of preparation.  I’m pretty sure I already knew some of this but I needed to be reminded and my thoughts refreshed.  It’s one thing to be told these things, it is another to experience it firsthand.

All across the country churches are changing, adapting to the next generation.  I have been to churches  held inside of coffee shops.  I have been to coffee shops housed inside of churches.  Sometimes I wish that church could be as simple as the experience of going to the coffee shop.  You walk in at your own pace wearing whatever you just so happen to be wearing because you are going to a place where you know you will feel comfortable.  Someone pours something wonderful into your cup or places something delicious on your plate.  You sit down with a small group of people and listen and speak and pray and savor.  Perhaps you take a moment to enjoy the music that plays in the background.  You pour out your heart as Jesus is poured into you.  Pass the sugar and cream please- I could get used to that!

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Living in The Fog

01 Wednesday Apr 2015

Posted by Remodeling House and Heart in A Leap of Faith, Blogging 101, Faith, Living Unbound, Personal Growth, Quirky Stories

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

Being Brave, Blogging 101, Faith, Feeling Alone, Feeling Vulnerable, Fog, Ice, Inspiration, Melancholy, On the Journey, Pacific Coast, Road Trip Insights

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Blue skies, soft breezes, mild temperatures, not a cloud in the sky for miles ahead of us- this is how we began our journey.   Kids in the back, sister as co-pilot, armed with the best playlists and snacks- we were ready to cross the great state of Texas.  We got this.  Classic road trip.

Then, there it was.  A wall of clouds stretching from north to south as far as the eye could see.  The wall cloud was so tall that my sister actually thought it was a mountain range.  The ominous wall seemed to be rolling towards us.  It was something out of an apocalyptic movie.  I had never seen anything like it and I have seen my fair share of snowy days after living in Minnesota for four years. It was enormous.  It was dark gray. And we were heading straight for it with my two babies sound asleep in the back.  From the outside there was no way of telling what the driving conditions would be like from within the strange cloud wall.  But if we wanted to get home we were going to have to go through it.  There was just no getting around it.  I mean, we were literally in the middle of the desert.  Nowhere to go but through.

As soon as we entered the cloud wall it was as if someone had waved a magic wand and had frozen everything in sight.  It would appear that queen Elsa had just passed through.  Just seconds before we were looking at sunshiny skies over dusty cacti and suddenly everything was frozen solid.  There was no snow or rain.  It was as if the air was too frigid to mess with moisture and instead everything was thick with white ice.  The scene reminded me of what my freezer looks like if you leave the freezer door open all night- everything coated with a thick layer of white ice.  It was beautiful.  It was quiet.  It was frightening.

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image

Maybe it was the vulnerable position we were in, two women with small children idling through a sinister mist, but I quickly realized that I felt very alone. It was the kind of alone in which you have this desire to go back home but you are not exactly sure what you mean by “home.” I thought about my beautiful house and my loving family and it was immediately apparent to me that I was being ridiculous. How could I feel alone when in reality I am surrounded by loved ones and I have a beautiful home?

Except that it wasn’t ridiculous.  For the past couple of years my little family has been on a challenging journey of sorts.  We have experienced all manner of frustration and doubt as we continue to pray and have faith that this “thing,” this goal will somehow come to fruition.  We don’t know how this dream will be realized or how long it will take or if we will even live to see it.  Let’s just say that we kind of feel like Noah at times.  Here we are building our ark even though we don’t exactly know why because we have never seen rain.

That is the journey that we had been on when I was fortunate enough to experience the crazy winter weather in the middle of the desert.  My soul was aching with melancholy doubt; I was just trying to hold onto the dream when I first got glimpse of the ice cloud wall.  When I began to feel alone I took a hold of those feelings and harnessed them to make sense of this journey that really feels like a ship lost in the fog.

What I came up with is that on this journey you never really know what is going on in your life.  You really have no control and that fog of not knowing what lies ahead is scary and seems dangerous.  It makes you just want to get back to a place of comfort and security.  And so you try to find that security.  You look for that warm fuzzy blanket or your favorite lovie- something, anything to cling to.  But sometimes there is no way to attain comfort and security in this world.

Sometimes you have nothing to turn to and nowhere to go but through.

Through the journey.

Through the unknown.

That beast of not knowing must be faced and conquered and tamed. And yes, you should feel a little scared and vulnerable.  The vulnerability heightens your senses; it pumps you up with the adrenaline you need to be brave.

You just have to have faith that God will bring you through this journey.

Not long after the drive through the freak polar vortex of Texas, my husband and I took a drive down the Pacific Coast from Seattle to San Francisco.  It has always been on my bucket list to experience the majesty of the great giant Sequoia Redwood trees.  While driving through the redwood forest I felt claustrophobic and insignificant.  I was sick to my stomach from the winding roads and change in air pressure.  At times the forest was so dense that the trees completely blocked out the sun.  It could be a sunshiny day but you would never know that in the redwoods because the trees had conquered the sky.

I had a hard time taking a good picture of the Redwoods because they are just too tall to fit into frame.

I had a hard time taking a good picture of the Redwoods because they are just too tall to fit into frame.  “The redwoods, once seen, leave a mark or create a vision that stays with you always. No one has ever successfully painted or photographed a redwood tree. The feeling they produce is not transferable. From them comes silence and awe. It’s not only their unbelievable stature, nor the color which seems to shift and vary under your eyes, no, they are not like any trees we know, they are ambassadors from another time.” John Steinbeck

Naturally we drove past huge cliffs and bluffs that dropped into the icy Pacific ocean.  The cliffs were breathtaking and catastrophic looking- an insurance company’s nightmare.  Each wave that crashed upon the black rocks was a warning to stay away.  So of course this meant that we just had to climb down the rocky cliffs despite a rain storm and warning signs that we were entering tsunami hazard zones.  But who could resist getting a closer look at the ocean filled with all manner of mystique?

Here's hoping the tide doesn't come in!

Here’s hoping the tide doesn’t come in!

In places like that, places in which nature demands your attention and announces its strength by simply being there, I am reminded once again that I really have no control of my life.  I could run my day on schedules and events and budgets but an gigantic wall of ice could just go ahead and sweep through my life and commandeer my plans for the day. Or, a tsunami could just come on through and knock all of my kingdom down just as it would knock out all of those stately redwoods. Just like that.  And of course I know this already but I am hard headed and sometimes I have to be reminded.

Those of us who have chosen to be on this journey.  Those of us who have our heads in the clouds. The dreamers.  The crazies.  Those of us who keep the faith and muddle through the unknown focused on a mission.  We have to know that we are not alone.   It’s going to be murky and it’s going to be a windy road and a little scary at times- you might get nauseated- but we can’t be afraid to take that first step into the cloud wall.  We can’t be afraid of climbing into the tsunami hazard zone.  We must trudge on through. Something you have never seen before can be a little scary like the height of the redwood forest or the fluorescent looking moss on the trees in Oregon or like an enormous cloud of ice in the middle of a Texas desert.  We just have to go through it and maybe allow ourselves to get swept up in the mysterious beauty of the unfamiliar .  Perhaps if we take the time to admire the beauty of the unknown we will begin to feel more like we are home.  Maybe we can learn to live within the fog.

I have never seen fluorescent looking moss on trees before.  I don't know what kind of trees these are but they were everywhere in Oregon.

I have never seen fluorescent looking moss on trees before. I don’t know what kind of trees these are but they were everywhere in Oregon.

Yours on the journey,

Elizabeth

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Who Am I and Why Am I Here?

03 Tuesday Mar 2015

Posted by Remodeling House and Heart in A Leap of Faith, Blogging 101

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

Blogging 101, Faith, home improvement, Hope, renovating an old home

Avila Art Photography

Photography By Tony Avila

“Who I AM and Why I AM Here” is a writing topic that I have been assigned from the blogging world but lately I am constantly asking myself, “Who AM I and Why AM I Here?”  The first is a statement.  The second is a question.  Right now, I prefer the question.

So, who am I?

I have always been drawn to the idea of taking a leap of faith.  Even the statement, “taking a leap of faith” appeals to who I am at the very core of me.  A dancer since preschool, leaping through the air is a great passion of mine and faith… well… faith is my language.  I am the most content when I am alone in prayer with Jesus.  Not trying to be a weirdo; I just have to be honest.

Lately hope has  become my new obsession.  Maybe it is because we live in a world that seems to be inundated with the doom of impending apocalyptic scenarios that I have become infatuated with the idea of hope.  Or maybe it’s because I am living way out of my comfort zone in a small country town just clinging onto a thread of hope that I will witness a miracle coming to fruition.  Or maybe it’s because I am a work from home mom just trying to survive through the daily grind while simultaneously attempting to renovate a 118 year old Victorian era house and supporting my husband in the start of his law practice.  Breathe.  Sigh.  Hope.

So, why am I here?

I wake up every day wondering how I got here.  How did I end up in a small town living in a 118 year old house with flower speckled wallpaper?  This is so not me.  I am not that kind of girl who likes renovating houses and country living.  No.  I am a city girl.  I thrive on the energy of traffic and diversity and progressive thinking and anonymity and amenities galore.  Don’t get me wrong, small town living definitely has its charm and there are plenty of wonderful people around these parts.  Nonetheless, it has been quite the adjustment for me.

Again, why am I here?

Faith.

Hope.

I am here because I feel in my bones that me and my family belong in this house.  Even if the only reason why we moved to this town and into this house is so that I could have plenty of stories to write about, that is fine with me because I just know that I belong here.   I am in the right place.  Why is this the right place?  I don’t know but I am willing to get to the bottom of the great mystery that is God’s sense of humor to move our little family to a small town (something we swore that we would never do).

In the almost 2 years that we have lived in this house, I have discovered that there is an amazing beauty that is lurking around the mundane and trivial pursuits of life.  In a way, this house has revived me.  While I feel like we are constantly renovating the house, I think it’s actually the house that is piecing me back together through the labor of love. I guess that’s  why I decided to start a blog about the quirky stories behind renovating and living in this old house.  It was something that I felt just needed to be done.

I don’t know where this is going but I couldn’t keep running from the fiery urge to share some of the beauty that surrounds this house even though the house sometimes feels like it is falling apart.  But that’s exactly it: WE are beautiful even when we feel we are falling apart. This little project is my great leap of faith into the vast unknown that is the internet. I hope that you will visit and dance with me a little.

For more of the story check out my first post “The Renovation of My Heart”

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Help Part III: The Heart of the Matter

04 Wednesday Feb 2015

Posted by Remodeling House and Heart in Faith, For the Love of People, Living Unbound, Love

≈ 3 Comments

Tags

Amazing Grace, Ex-Convict, Faith, Les Miserables, love, prayer, prison, Redemption, Texas

 

This is not my image.  But it was so beautiful and I love Les Mis quotes- I just had to share

This is not my image. But it was so beautiful and I love Les Mis quotes- I just had to share

A loaded gun sits on the table.  The argument escalates.  A second later, a man is dead.  And it was all over a waterbed frame and $96.

On April 29, 20 year old Richard was sentenced to life in prison for the murder of his friend, Mark*.   Mark worked with Richard out on the oil rigs of Texas.  In the months that preceded  the murder, Mark had stolen money from Richard, had assaulted Richard’s girlfriend, and had written some hot checks.  Tension was building by the time April 15, 1984 came around when Richard was to buy a waterbed frame from Mark.  Mark took the money but did not provide the bed frame.  For the hot-tempered Richard who described himself as a hooligan at that time, it was the last straw.  Mark came over to Richard’s house that night to discuss the situation.  Unfortunately, Richard’s hot temper boiled over and exploded into an untimely death for Mark.

Richard knew he was playing with fire that night.  He had purposely left a loaded gun on the kitchen table as a warning to Mark that he was ” about to get tail- kicked” in Richard’s words.  When I asked Richard if the shot was an accident he was clear to mention that he grew up in the Ozark mountains of Arkansas shooting squirrel straight in the eye. Richard was a good shot, he knew what he was aiming at.

Richard spent his first 8 years or so in and out of solitary confinement due to his rebellious spirit.  He went 6 years without seeing the natural sunlight of day.  Other inmates steered clear of Richard; his hot-tempered nature branded him with a reputation of a man that was not to be reckoned with.  When he was not in solitary confinement Richard was the go to man for your every need.  Weed, cigarettes, money, you name it  Richard could find a way to get it to you.  If he was a hard man before the murder then prison had only made him worse.

In 1992, a prison ministry began 4 day bible retreats for inmates.  Richard participated in these bible studies as a way to break up the norm; it was a way to have a little more freedom.  I imagine Richard sitting in a circle with other hardened inmates, perhaps feeling vulnerable.  He was a man that never turned his back to anyone but in those bible studies he was asked to share the most intimate of ideas- faith.  It must have been difficult for him to break down some of those walls but Richard was tired of his “hard living.”  He was ready for a new start.

When Richard and I sat down together recently to discuss this time in his life, he continuously referred to an illustration in which you feel like you are at a hole at the bottom of a ladder that you just can’t quite reach.  You want to get out but you just can’t get to that ladder.  Richard felt like he was beneath that hole and really needed someone to reach down and pull him up.

During this prison ministry Richard experienced well versed Christians teaching these classes but, in his opinion, it seemed like they were totally missing the point.  It was clear that they knew the bible backwards and forwards but they still came off a bit stand offish and it was hard for some men to relate to the lofty concepts that were being presented.  While these Christians were well meaning, it was the Christians in the group who, in Richard’s words, “fell down a lot” that he could really identify with.  It was the people who were honest and admitted that they were not perfect- these were the people that caught Richard’s attention.  It didn’t matter if they were well versed in theology.  These Christians, you know, “kept it real”.  They made a relationship with Jesus Christ seem attainable even for someone like Richard.

According to Richard, Jesus got a hold of his life and hit him like a bolt of lightning. Inmates would comment that nothing made Richard mad anymore.  Try as they might, other inmates could not ruffle Richard’s feathers.  Richard’s hot- tempered nature had melted into a patient peace, a noticeable difference from his tumultuous prison beginnings.

It was this peace that finally allowed Richard to forgive himself for his crime.  Part of Richard’s sentencing stated that Richard was not to make any contact with the victim’s family.  By the time Richard had repented of his crime, Mark’s family members were all deceased.  Through prayer, Richard apologized to Mark and his family anyways and asked for their forgiveness.  At this point Richard decided to dedicate his life to Mark and his family.

From that moment forward Richard sought an education for himself, learned several trades, and set his mind towards being a light in a dark place- dedicating every action to the life that Mark never got to live.  The way Richard saw it was that both he and Mark were on a path of destruction and now that Richard had changed the course of his own life, he owed it to Mark to live in such a way that it would honor Mark’s life as well.  Richard felt like it was his duty to give Mark a second chance at life in this way.  It would be his life-long burden and pleasure to live a good life for Mark.

That might seem like an undeserved privilege- to live a good life after you have taken someone’s life but it is indeed a cross to be carried.  If it were me, I could see myself crippled with guilt at the thought that I had taken someone’s life.  The guilt would probably weigh me down to the point of no relief.  Burying yourself with guilt is the easy way to deal with a situation like this.  It is much more difficult to receive the free and easy grace of God and forgive yourself.  Richard says, “You have to forgive yourself or you can never deal with the consequences.”  That made a lot of sense to me.  If you don’t forgive yourself then every time you face a consequence for your crime, such as not having a place to sleep at night once you are out of prison,  that debilitating guilt would creep back in and drag you back into darkness.  Then all the work that God had done in your life would be in vain and that little light would be snuffed out completely.  Perhaps the guilt would be so heavy that it would lead you back to another tragedy, another death.  I’ll take forgiveness over darkness any day.

After 29 years and 6 months in prison, Richard was released on parole probably in large part due to health issues.  Richard’s heart was beginning to fail him and it was costing the state too much money to keep him in prison.

Richard thought that he might die in prison because of his heart condition, but his heart condition ended up being his ticket out.  I find that as a kind of poetic justice; Richard’s heart could no longer be confined to a prison cell.  It is especially satisfying to see him on the outside, healthy, receiving proper medication, and always wearing bright colors.  Richard loves to wear shockingly bright colors of the highlighter palette.  Yes, Richard is a neon sign shining through the darkness flashing “mercy,” “grace,” “forgiveness.

“Do I deserve freedom?  NO!”  was Richard’s response to my husband’s questioning about how he felt now that he was out.    “All I can do is live right and follow the letter of the law and be thankful.”  With every blessing, with every lovely thing in life Richard thinks of Mark and strives towards goodness all the while flashing the neon light of his story.

*Denotes that name has been changed.

Again, not my image but Les Mis quotes just go so perfectly with Richard's story.

Again, not my image but Les Mis quotes just go so perfectly with Richard’s story.

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