“They continued on and talked,”
~ 2 Kings 2: 11a

Wresting the thread and needle of mantle-making from God can produce unintended results. Sometimes the thread and needle of mantle-making don’t even need to be wrestled away from God. Sometimes believers don’t even realize He will help us make the mantles we are designed to wear.

There were many mantles in my grandmother’s soul-closet. She had a Mantle of Hospitality, a Mantle of the Spirit of Celebration, a Mantle of Needle & Thread, a mantle of Etiquette for All Occasions, a Bridge/Card Game Mantle, and, of course, the mantle of Strength for Courage.

Sometimes our God-Designed interests help form these mantles. Sometimes our circumstances force the making of these mantles, like a daffodil or hyacinth bulb can be forced to bloom early.

I learned about Strength for Courage growing up in my grandmother’s house, so, yes, my circumstances allowed me to grow up as an apprentice to a Strength for Courage mentor. Before I go there, let’s look at why Mary Edna, my grandmother, needed a mantle of Strength for Courage.

Mary Edna wasn’t a Granny, Grandma, or Nanny. She was Grandmother – and I don’t  err in saying she was a matriarchal figure in our family.

The Oxford English Dictionary defines matriarchal as the, “form of social organization in which the mother or oldest female is the head of the family, and descent and relationship are reckoned through the female line; government or rule by a woman or women.”

My definition? A woman who holds her family together through sheer will and determination, not through prayer, not through faith, not through hope that God works for the good of those who love Him. A matriarch leads through works, not through faith – and that is a hard place to be. Maybe that is what makes a Matriarch – someone who sets the rules and ensures those in her sphere lives by them.

For my grandmother, the position wasn’t about the power a matriarch wields. It was about shepherding to a secure future of those with whom she had been entrusted. She didn’t want to leave that to chance. Possibly her circumstances created in her a more heavy-handed reign on her family.

Mary Edna, daughter of Mary Eva (Mayme) and Claude (Claude who had played football for the University of Kentucky in 1896-1897, but dropped out of medical school because he fainted at the sight of blood) was born in 1906. Claude and Mayme became farmers, raising milk cows, crops, one daughter and three sons. When the school was too far away, he built a one-room school on the edge of his farm for the children of families who lived nearby. The school teacher lived with them during the school year.

Mary Edna, who went to town to live with her grandmother for a year so she could make her First Communion.

Mary Edna, who moved to a nook in the front hall when her grandmother, Susie Belle, came to live with them.

Mary Edna who loved racing her horse Lou to the trains in Normandy, Kentucky.

Mary Edna who eschewed farm living for city life, sewing stylish clothes and styling her hair in a bob with finger waves.

Mary Edna who married my grandfather and moved to the city before The Great Depression came and the world fell apart. The roaring twenties crashed within two years of marrying, one year before her first daughter was born. Though my grandmother married for love, some would say she didn’t marry well by financial standards.  She married into the security of a faithful man, a loving man, a man who knew how to laugh, to turn a cloudy moment into a burst of sunshine, but who was the vine to the fencepost of herself.

Mary Edna’s whose first daughter was born in her parent’s farm house. All of her children were born at home – and the same attending physician made mistakes on three of five birth-certificates.

Mary Edna, whose husband, My grandfather, working for a munitions factory a few counties away, quit his job when his first daughter was born. He wanted to be with his family. I imagine that stressed my grandmother out – maybe even her parents, too. But he got another job – he always did. He had trouble keeping them, but never had trouble finding a new one.

Mary Edna who was a rebel when it suited her. Her two oldest daughters tell of how when they all lived with their daddy’s mom, sat as lookouts at the upstairs window watching for their grandmother to return so they could alert their mom, my grandmother, who was roller-skating in the hallway with one of her friends.

Mary Edna the rebel was not the grandmother I knew.

Not the Mary Edna who ran a tight ship.

Not Mary Edna who wouldn’t let me wear blue jeans to the mall until I was a sophomore in high school.

Not the Mary Edna who gave me her copy of Amy Vanderbilt’s book of etiquette when I married my husband.

Not the Mary Edna who told me my husband would leave me if I didn’t cook breakfast for him every morning – the irony of that being she never cook breakfast for her husband. He left the house at 3:30 a.m. every morning for work and breakfasted at White Castle. He’d never leave her – he adored her. She was the fence post to his vine. She was the enforcer, the discipliniarian, the one who held the family together through the depression, World War II.

Mary Edna, who, in the quiet of the 50s, she worked at the dry cleaning outpost she and my grandfather owned, just four houses down from their home. He oldest daughter graduated from high school in 1946. Her youngest graduated from high school in 1959.

Ironically, it was Mary Eva and Claude’s farm life that sustained Mary Eva’s family during The Depression and The War. The farm she’d left provided the milk, the vegetables, the baby chicks that birthed hope and filled stomachs. It was the farmer’s labor that paid Catholic School tuition.

In the rebellious 60s, my parents divorced, and my mom, brother, and I came “home.” I was five years old. My grandfather then worked for The Louisville Courier Journal delivering newspaper stacks all across Louisville for the paperboys to pick up. He kept that job until he died when I was 12.

Mary Edna began raising children when cultural expectations conformed to established rules of behavioral expectations, when salary didn’t define your poverty, when men and women’s roles were segregated and women’s choices limited.

Her last child, my mother was born the January before the United States entered WWII. World War II blew open the doors of job opportunities for women, and her youngest daughters had opportunities beyond those available in my grandmother’s youth. The world changed a lot during her parenting years. A woman’s influence and affluence shifted away from a providing husband to women entering the workforce. College? A career besides or with marriage? If her girls had the Strength for Courage, the opportunity was there.

With all the cultural upheaval, I often envision a mother hen trying to gather all five of her chicks under her wings and it feeling more like herding cats.

She believed in God, but wasn’t taught that He was a loving, protective father who had a place of shade and safety beneath his wing. She knew He might have the crows bring food for Elijah – and fresh water, too, but I don’t think she knew He would have done that for her, too.

I don’t think she knew that “those who hope in the Lord will renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint” (Isaiah 40:31).

I don’t think she knew to ““Fear not, stand firm, and see the salvation of the Lord, which he will work for you today. For the Egyptians whom you see today, you shall never see again. The Lord will fight for you, and you have only to be silent” (Exodus 14: 13, 14).

I don’t think she knew that if she lifted her eyes to the mountains that her the Maker of heaven and earth would come help her (Psalms 121: 1-2).

I don’t think she knew that God could be her hiding place, protecting her from trouble and surround her with songs of deliverance . . . that he counseled with a loving eye (Psalm 32: 7-8).

I think she thought that kind of love from God to His children was for the Mother Teresa’s and Peter, Paul, and John – not for regular, everyday ordinary believers.

I don’t think she realized that God’s hand could help write her children’s stories better than she could, so she took the needle and thread of her own sheer will and determination and created a Mary-Edna-Made Mantle of Strength for Courage.

How many other believers of her generation believed in God, followed God, but didn’t realize how He wanted to help them, to carry them, to let Him be their strength? That He loved each of them as much as Peter, James, John and Mother Teresa? How many resorted to their own inadequate Strength for Courage and felt soul-worn from the work of it?

We are not designed to carry self-made mantles. It is hard for joy, hope, peace to line a man-made mantle. . . . because man’s dreams are just shadows to God’s plans. Call it a knock-off of the original – they might look the same but the quality is never the same as the original. Man-made mantles can be unbending, unforgiving, easily torn, easily worn through, constantly needing mending. Man-made mantles risk a heart’s softness being worn away through the hardness of doing it all in one’s own strength.

Sometimes, though, you have to start out with man-made Strength for Courage. . . and that’s what Mary Edna did. Through effort and determination, she designed her own mantle of Strength for Courage. . . and I benefited from that mantle. It provided security, boundaries, refuge, home, belonging. . . . I also learned that if you dared to walk close enough to the bearer of a Man-Made Mantle of Strength for Courage while holding on to God, there are blessings to be vintaged, softness to be found, Strength for Courage for God-Designed dreams – because God can redeem a man-made mantle.

Come back next week for the next part of the story where I became the apprentice to her mentor for Strength for Courage.

Remember Me Monday: #116 Link-up

“I’ll make a list of God’s gracious dealings,
    all the things God has done that need praising,
All the generous bounties of God,
    his great goodness to the family of Israel—
Compassion lavished,
.    love extravagant.”
~ Isaiah 63:7, The Message

In the Old Testament, God repeatedly, quietly and loudly, tells his children, “You have forgotten me!”  (Jeremiah 3:32, Ezekiel 22:12, to name a few). It’s a heart cry from a father to a child who has forgotten all the love, all the saving, helping, little and big blessings – and it leaves me stunned when I realize our Father, the creator of the universe, who knows things I cannot begin to fathom, who authors storylines that leave me amazed, delights in all of us so much, He cries out, “Remember Me.”

While every day is a Remember God Day, I am inviting you to join me on Monday mornings to come by and remember what God has done for you, for your family. Maybe God sent a cardinal darting out in front of you, as if to tell you, “I’m here,” or broke a child’s fever after you laid it all down at His feet in a 2 a.m. bedside vigil. Maybe He stood with you in the wait of a prayer sent out, or brought someone you loved to Christ. Maybe He healed your broken heart, gave your courage, or you gave Him your dreams as a love offering only to have Him give them back in an unimaginable way. Maybe God helped you survive to bedtime after a crazy Monday, or forgive yourself for missing it with your kiddos –– Whatever it is, let’s Remember Him. . . in a “Remember Me Monday” love letter.

“My mouth will tell of your righteousness,
Of your salvation all the day long,
Though I know not its measure.
I will come and proclaim your mighty acts, O Sovereign Lord”
~ Psalm 71:15-16.

Let us delight in Him by telling the  stories of what He’s done!  If you wrote a blog post remembering what He’s done for you, join the linky. If you didn’t but still want to praise Him for what He’s done – write it in the comment section. Then visit a comment before or after yours! One of the beautiful things about the blogging community is the relationships it builds!

Rules?  Write long or short, a list or a story, include photos or not. Just Remember Him and what He has done, and let the gratitude of your heart guide you. Let’s make Monday so Rejoice, that the goodness of God spills into the rest of the week! (Link opens Mondays at 6 a.m.)

Places I’m Linking at This Week:
  Instaencouragements, Legacy Link-Up, 
Recharge Wednesday, Scripture & a Snapshot
 Grace&Truth, Sweet Tea & Friends
Let’s Have Coffee Wednesday