This Guy

This is my husband, Ian Bullard. We've been married for nine and a half years now, and this month is his birthday. I was thinking the other day about how much I appreciate him. But the thing about Ian is that a lot of the things I appreciate about him are under the surface. I mean, obviously he's smart and good-looking, right? He loves God and he loves his family, and is organizationally-skilled and musically talented. But I think these things are apparent. And in honor of his birthday this month, I wanted to talk about his traits that not everyone knows that make me respect him so much.

(As a side note, I know that one difficulty with blogs and social media in general is that they tend to convey only the highlights of people's lives, making them seem unrealistically ideal. My intention today is not to seem unrealistically ideal, but to celebrate the positive things about my husband that, in all honesty, I forget about or overlook or take for granted many days.)

To start with: Ian is competent. This is the main reason why I married him. Meeting guys my age, back when I was twenty-one and twenty-two, made me realize that there were many people out there who did not care about or were not able to do things well. He is a hard worker and a good worker. When he has a job to do, he does it to a high standard. It doesn't matter whether it's filling in for higher management in a high-stress meeting or washing the dishes. I think that hard work and a commitment to excellence are easy traits to overlook, because people just expect that jobs will be done right, and only notice when they aren't. If Ian is going to do something, he knows that it's worth putting in the time and effort to do it well. If he's not good at doing something, he usually has the honesty and humility to acknowledge that someone else could do it better, and he defers to their skills.

Next: Ian really cares about people. I mean he truly, deeply cares about other people and their eternal souls. He was a pastor for a long time, and I've been part of the church world long enough to know that sometimes, whether they know it or not, pastors begin to care about people only because it's their job.

Everyone thinks that I'm the caring one in the relationship, because I'm usually gentle when I speak and I don't like to offend people. Ian is more abrasive. He often says exactly what he's thinking, which isn't always flattering, and his jokes are sometimes borderline offensive. The impression we give is that I'm the nice one.

But Ian has a depth of caring that many people don't realize exists until they get to know him well. Ian is willing to expend much more of his energy into the lives of others, maintaining both close and long-distance relationships in different ways. I tend to be much more protective of my personal time and space, and I am terrible at maintaining long-distance relationships. But if someone has a need, Ian wants to fill it. If someone needs a friend, no matter how awkward or annoying they may seem to others, Ian wants to be there for them. Ian is really good at seeing those around him as important to God, and therefore they are important to him.

I remember learning in a college class that although people with disabilities are gaining increasing acceptance in society in many ways, it is still very rare for someone with a moderate to severe disability to have typically-developed friends. Ian is the first person I ever knew who was friends with people with intellectual disabilities and Down's syndrome. He never seemed to think it was weird or awkward or an obstacle, and there was never any sense of pity in the relationship. He just accepted them as another human being and wanted to hang out with them.

So, while I'm less likely to say something that offends you, Ian is a lot more likely to reach out to you and want to invest in your life, regardless of how well he knows you or how much time you've spent together in the past.

And the biggest thing: Ian has taught me a lot about God's love for me over our years together, because loving me is something that he expresses every day. He forgives quickly and never holds a grudge. He accepts my faults as well as my strengths, and even when I annoy him, I know that his love for me is unconditional, because he made a vow to God and to me nine and a half years ago, and Ian does not break his vows. I am always expecting people to give up on me once they learn about all my flaws, and Ian has come to know my flaws better than anyone else (and has to put up with them every day!), and yet he still actively loves me.

So, thank you, Ian Bullard, for being a better husband than I deserve. To be completely honest, you are not the kind of person I always grew up thinking I would marry. But it turns out that God knew better than I did what I would need in a spouse.

I love you.

Teaching and Dealing with the Divine

For me, spiritual moments often happen at the most random times and in random places. They happen more frequently when I am in the middle of praying or reading the Bible, yet they are not something I can manufacture. In my life, they often hit when something makes me think about God, bringing His involvement in the world around me to the front of my mind.

This happened once when I was giving a test.

I teach high school Spanish, and teaching is usually kind of a frenetic activity for me, in a good way. Monitoring a room of thirty hormonal kids (all frontal lobes underdeveloped), explaining concepts and distributing copies of practice activities, noting who is behind and floundering and who is ahead and bored, making transitions flow smoothly, keeping a positive attitude (or at least a positive front) when discipline needs to happen, taking note of which activities need to be adjusted or dropped for the next class, making sure everyone is communicating for the most part en español, por favor; these take up pretty much all of my mental capacity on most days, leaving little room for deep inner reflection while I am teaching. Teaching itself is the time for heightened sensory intake and snap decision-making; reflection comes afterward.

But there was one time last year when I was giving a test. My thirty-two students were sitting concentrated, for once disconnected from their phones and from each other (at least externally), blissfully silent, staring down at the assessment I'd given them to do. They were focused; I was gazing around the room from my desk to see if they were all settled or if anyone had any questions, making sure no one was looking at his neighbor's test or at his palm or a phone or a suspect water bottle.

As I looked around the room at a group of diverse kids, different nationalities and races and personalities and backgrounds and strengths and weaknesses, all in one room, a thought hit me: "All of these kids are made in the image of God."

Really seeing people as image-bearers of the divine changes how you think about them.

It's not that I thought they looked like God. From what I understand, the Bible describes God in human physical characteristics so that we can understand Him better, not because He actually has hands and arms and feet (except Jesus does. But that's not the main point now). I understand the image of God to be more about characteristics of God that humans, but not animals, share.

Like God, I was thinking, these kids can set a higher goal; they can do things that don't make sense immediately for a benefit in the long run. They can use language, not just for factual communication but for so much more. They can analyze and understand their own emotions. They possess the ability to reason themselves out of their instincts, the ability to plan for forty years down the road. They can question their realities. They are deeply relational and desire community. They solve problems and are creative, making solutions and stories out of nothing more than the thoughts in their minds. They have souls, I thought. These kids, each one with a pencil in hand, staring down at the paper on his or her desk, are eternal.

What's more, I kept thinking, as goosebumps were rising all over my skin, is all these kids are individually precious to Him. He loves them; He knows their every thought and how many hairs are on their heads. He keeps track of all their lives, knows their comings and goings, and created them, carefully, for a purpose. Every single one of these thirty-two kids that I teach every week, only really getting to know a handful... He knows them and understands them and loves them.

It's hard to describe how something is felt as holy. I was thinking about God and His involvement in my students' lives, and a deep sense of peace, felt like a fog, enveloped me. It suddenly felt like God was in the room with me, communicating to me His love for all the kids.

When you love and are in awe of God, and you remember how much He loves the people around you, it makes you value them, because He values them. It made me want to be a better teacher for my students; I wanted to make Spanish the most challenging and fun class they'd ever had. It made me determined to keep calm even on rough days and, even in the midst of bad behavior and disciplinary moments, treat each child with kindness, dignity, and respect.

In a respite from the normal chaos and orchestration and rapid-fire decision-making that is teaching, I became fully aware of the great privilege and responsibility I enjoy every day when I deal with so many of His image-bearers. It was a gift.

Little Victories: #2

Victory #2: “Let no sin have dominion over me.”

We moved a little over a year ago. Ian was working sixty hours every week, and I was teaching a couple classes at the community college, and our girls were one and three years old. I thought the girls would have trouble transitioning to a different bedroom and household, yet for the most part they did fairly well.

I did not.

Ian was working so many hours that it was a struggle to get things unpacked and put away. He would help when he could, but I was home most of the time, managing the day-to-day stuff and caring for the kids and making decisions about where things should go. By nature, I am not a decisive person. It’s not that I can’t think of possibilities; it’s that I can think of several, all the time, for every decision, and I want to make the best one. Perfectionism is good for activities like editing. It is not good for household organization (at least when you’re not good at it).

So I made tons of decisions, in addition to all the little decisions made by me as a parent every day. The boxes and clutter in the apartment were driving me crazy. I was having a hard time, and was already frustrated by Ian working so many hours every day. And then… Alexandra got an attitude.

I’d heard it’s common for three-year-olds to test their parents; I was being consistently tested every day. She didn’t want to listen and obey; she didn’t want to be kind to her sister; she liked talking back to me and mocking me; she liked making huge messes and not helping to clean them up; she wouldn’t eat her food, which wouldn’t have been a big deal except that when she didn’t eat, she got even more grouchy and naughty afterwards. 

Also, looking back at my journals, I think that I was slightly depressed at the time and just didn’t realize it.

The combination of everything made me feel frazzled and harried all the time, and I started to lose my temper a lot. I would snap and yell at her, and though, by God’s grace, I’ve said very few things to my children that I regret, my tone and expression and my whole body, quivering with frustration, were terrible displays of how to handle anger.

It’s not that, in many cases, I didn’t have a right to be displeased with Alexandra’s attitude and behavior. She was genuinely being naughty. However, my response to it was completely inappropriate. I was out of control, angry every day, and throwing grown-up fits in front of my kids. Worse, I didn’t know how to stop. It’s true, I was feeling sorry for myself. But putting a halt to the pity party is easier when you have some time to regroup, to be away, to think and pray, and there was no time for that. I was too tired at night and I couldn’t get up early enough in the morning (my kids get up REALLY early). I would pray in the mornings that I would be patient that day, but somehow in the anger and frantic frustration of the moment, I would lose my temper again.

I think God helps lead us out of sin in different ways in different situations. Usually, when I think of conquering a specific sin, I think of prayer and self-control, of trying harder to be aware of what I’m doing. But this time, what God gave me was a verse.

I was reading in the Psalms one day and praying through my anger issues, and a particular verse stood out to me:

“Keep steady my steps according to your promise,

And let no iniquity get dominion over me.” —Psalm 119:133 (ESV)

Sometimes you are reading the Bible, and you really experience it as God’s living Word. That verse cut through all the circumstances and issues surrounding my anger and make me realize that although my sin had many effects, the deepest problem was that there was a particular sin, an emotion deep within, that was dominating me. I was unable to control my anger.

Anger in itself is not a sin, depending on why we are angry and how we handle it. In my case, the reason and the handling of it were sinful.

And here is where the gift of God lay, in that situation: God used His Word to help me defeat my sin. The verse that jumped out and cut right to my heart stuck in my mind for the next several days: “…let no iniquity get dominion over me.” More than just not wanting to yell at my kids in anger, I didn’t want any emotion to control my behavior. That verse got to the root of my issue and voiced a simple prayer. And I didn’t have to pray with more words or different words, and I didn’t have to exert superhuman levels of self-control. Those were not the solutions to my sin this time. Rather, throughout the day, every day, whether I was angry or not, that one verse echoed through my thoughts: “… let no iniquity get dominion over me.” It was a very spiritual experience, like His Word was communing with His Spirit inside me and they were working together to manage my actions. I honestly had to exert very little conscious self-control; it was like repeating the verse over and over renewed my mind and transformed my outward behavior, like it says in Romans. For that reason, referring to this as a "victory" seems inaccurate, unless I am referring to God's victory working in me.

I wish I would remember to do this more often, when I am facing challenges. While it’s good to pray and exert personal effort, to bring my struggles to God, it’s probably better to listen to what God has already told me in the Bible. If my actions come from my thoughts and my thoughts are dominated by my spiritual life, then letting God’s Word shape my spiritual life is probably the most important step of all to conquer sin.

And it’s not like I’ve lived a sin-free life ever since, or haven’t lost my temper here or there. But God helped me defeat that particular pattern of sinfulness that was taking over that season of my life, and, thank God, while I struggle with other things, that one hasn’t come around to dominate me since. 

Little Victories: #1

Victory #1: Figuring out who I am and what I’m meant to do. At least for one semester.

I went back to work full-time (okay, I worked part-time as a high school Spanish teacher, part-time as a college Spanish teacher, and went back to school as a full-time graduate student). My daughters were cared for by a combination of family and paid babysitters. It was tough. I had to be more disciplined with my time and perseverant than ever before, staying up late to do homework or finish grading even when I was tired; making the time at home with my husband and kids count even when I wanted to zone out and disengage. 

But I loved it. I love teaching Spanish; I love high school kids; I loved the mental challenge of taking classes and found the subject matter very interesting, even though, if I am honest, I did not find all the assignments to be meaningful or practical. 

Enjoying fulfilling days meant coming home happy. Having relatively little time with my daughters made me enjoy (almost) every minute of the time I did have with them. Truly being too busy to clean made me stop feeling guilty about how little I do it. If I am completely honest, I have always felt somewhat like a failure when it comes to household management. I did not finish my days exhausted and defeated, which is how I consistently felt when I was staying at home full time. (I want to write more about this later, because parenting is a challenge that seems infinitely deep and complex to me.)

But the biggest point I want to make now is that I quit comparing myself to other women. I absolutely believe that comparison is the thief of joy, as the quote goes; yet somehow its practical application has eluded me most of my life. After all, Scripture gives general principles about how we should live, but what do the specific details of living a life that honors Christ look like? Looking to others for ideas and inspiration seems like a natural place to start, but I could never keep myself from completely believing that just because someone else was doing something didn’t mean I should at least attempt to do it, or something similar.

That was the true blessing of this time: circumstances, prayer, and counsel had revealed a very specific path for me, different goals from any other woman I knew; a unique set of challenges for my life for the time being. 

I quit bemoaning the fact that I was not living up to their levels of cleanliness, organization, craftiness, success, homeschooling, child stimulation, wifely excellence, fashion or style, intelligence, drive, discipline skills, or creativity. Those were no longer my goals. For the first time in my life, I felt absolutely certain that I was living out who God made me to be—not what I thought other people would want me to be, or the idealized versions of Christian or secular womanhood. My life didn’t seem comparable to anyone’s, exactly, and that prevented me from comparing myself to others. 

But I knew I was doing what God wanted me to do, and I was working at it the best I could. It was so freeing.