Thinking Outloud
When Silence Is Released
​
There are as many ways to be silent as there are to make sound. There is the silent night, holy night silence that speaks of peace in the world. There is the in sync silence of breathing between grateful parents as they watch their sleeping child after the fever breaks. Silence can fill a room with expectation while waiting for a doctor to emerge with test results. It can also fill a room with anxiety and fear late at night when the jangling sound of a phone interrupts peaceful sleep. That silence is almost deafening in the seconds between your hello and the response. There is the bristly quiet of people sitting perfectly still trying to contain their joy while waiting to yell SURPRISE! We do not realize it at the time but in each of these silent moments we are holding our breath trying not to interrupt the quiet prematurely until we are able to release all that we have been holding in.
​
Those same feelings of joy, peace, expectation, and anticipation happen as we grow and mature spiritually. We learn to sit in the simple silence of peace that surpasses all understanding because we understand who is in control of all things. We learn how to sit still in His presence to be at one with our Father. It is in that place we learn more about Him and who we are in Him. I am not sure if you can feel it but right now there is a feeling of expectation in the body of Christ. The sound crackles as expectation grows. You can sense that something is about to happen not only corporately but individually. It does not have a name but we know that it (whatever it is) is a good thing.
​
There are also a lot more distractions happening around us, and to us. It is an intense push often making it difficult to think beyond the situation at hand. It feels like pressure is being applied to your head and feet, pushing your dreams and visions down and your feet are being pushed up and seemingly away from your destiny. It is generally an uncomfortable feeling of being aware of more, wanting to say and do more but somehow the best articulation you have is that you feel stuck. The silence becomes bottled up inside along with the tangle of emotions of seeing your vision but not understanding how to make it happen. Distracted silence is one of the most frustrating types of silence to work through.
​
Be encouraged, please hang in there the sound of breakthrough is at hand!
​
I understand the distractions have been like the worst looped playlist ever, round and round, over and over back to start. You get one thing addressed and something else is raging in another direction. You pour your energies into solving that issue and before you can catch your breath another distraction starts to unfold. The maddening cycle continues until finally you yell stop! No more! Father! Please step in! The saying Jesus take the wheel or Jesus be a fence has crept into our language becoming almost casual in meaning and use. When you pierce the silence with your plea everything jumps to attention, the enemy of your life, whether it is an outside force or the battle within strains to listen for the call of battle. The heavens stop to identify that cry, once identified the host of heavenly warriors quickly move into position. They are ready and because you called on Jesus to be a fence and you invited your Father to take full control, the sure victory is yours as you release the sound of praise.
​
It starts off as a small polite sound but as you watch God move on your behalf your sound of praise becomes bolder and louder. Your praise goes from the expected response to the “I don’t care what it takes to break this I am going for it!” praise. The “I mean business praise” will slice the bonds of silence into shreds. Once that sound is released your circle of influence is changed. You will speak directly to the distractions with an even boldness that will command the issues to come to divine order. When the sound of silence is released your dreams and visions will become clear again. When the sound of silence is released, you will find your footing. You will walk with purpose toward the manifestation of your vision.
​
Release your sound of praise! Your breakthrough is at hand.
​
Trudy Doleman
September 24, 2018
​
​
​
​
Supper is ready!
How many of you enjoy dinner? How many enjoy supper? For those of you who just thought, there is no difference they are interchangeable words, you are right we do use those words interchangeably but in this region, particularly among the older generations the expectations are different. For many people dinner is the meal eaten in the middle of the day. Typically at noon, it was a large and hearty meal meant to re-fuel the body for a long afternoon of work on a farm, or in a mill. Supper is the last meal of the day, it is a time when the family comes together to reconnect. The pace is slower (unless it is bible study night or church meeting night) and everyone shares the day’s events or perhaps solves the issues of the world around the table. It was the one time of the day that it was expected everyone put aside their agendas to come together.
When you heard “Suppers ready, come eat! “Arguments were squashed before coming to the table, even if you were not on speaking terms you were expected to be at that family meal, minus the attitude. If your family was like mine you did not dare approach the table with dirty hands unless of course you wanted to be called out and sent back or worse sent to the kitchen sink to be supervised. The food was blessed and the meal was enjoyed. As the meal progressed everyone relaxed, letting go of the day. It was in this intimate setting that family took the time to talk to one another, perhaps it was something in the news or maybe it was about what at school. In the wake of laughter and maybe a heated debate or two while passing bowls of food that disagreement was explored from both sides and somehow by plate number two the problem had been resolved. At the very least you were back on speaking terms. Supper time affords the time and space to remember who and what is important, to strengthen bonds.
I am encouraging you to take these next few minutes to prepare to come to the table; let go of the people, places or things that have left you feeling gritty. Wash your hands from what happened on your way to this space and time. Slowdown in His presence; be willing to sit with your Father to reconnect. It is in the place of unhurried worship that you will strengthen your relationship with Him. He wants to hear from you. He wants to speak to you. The bond you develop will be stronger. In that very personal one on one time allow the love of Christ to wash over you so that as you receive the sacrament you will be able to taste and see the goodness of the Lord (Psalm 34:8). Relax in His presence to receive the full benefit of a meal prepared with mercy and grace and served in love.
Supper’s ready!
Tdoleman April 2016
Dad Deserves a Day Too
Father’s Day is coming soon and many will celebrate dads, pop-pops, and mentors with ties, lots of wonderful barbeque and we cannot forget the #1 Dad mug, hat, or t-shirt. Yet Father’s Day is not as celebrated as Mother’s Day. As I sat in a recent meeting the subject of Father’s Day was on our agenda, during the update on how the planning was going to honor the men in our church, the question was thrown out “why isn’t Father’s day celebrated the way we do Mother’s Day?” two of us could share the origins of Mother’s Day from memory but no one could say exactly how Father’s Day was birthed. When you think about the question you have to admit it is a fair question, Dad is kind of big deal in family life. Wait! Before you begin a letter to the editor campaign let me assure you I am not discounting all the single moms, military moms or any moms who do double duty as mother and father. I understand that Mom is a phenomenal super human (being a mother myself LOL) I truly do know what it takes for you to do what you do. I want to take a look at the other half of the story. I hope you will keep reading.
To satisfy the question I did some research online to discover that Father’s Day was birthed in Fairmont, West Virginia. Inspired by the efforts of the founders of Mother’s Day in Grafton, WV Grace Clayton a local Fairmont woman wanted to honor the 362 fathers, sons, husbands, and caregivers who died in a coal mine explosion at the Fairmont Coal Company mines in Monongah. Clayton was moved by impact of tremendous loss the widows and orphans were experiencing. The very person they would turn to for comfort was gone. After sharing her heart with Reverend Robert Thomas Webb (her pastor) the first Father’s Day celebration was a sermon dedicated to these men on July 5, 1908. If location is vital to the success of a business, timing is vital to the successful launch of any event. The celebration did not take off in Fairmont as Grace Clayton hoped due to a large July 4th celebration and the death of a young girl in the Fairmont community. The seed was planted but it did not take root as an annual or widely celebrated holiday until Sonora Smart Dodd of Spokane, Washington began to nurture the idea of Father’s Day as a way to celebrate her own father who was a widower with six children. Using the example of Ann Jarvis, Dodd was very successful in her efforts to gather the support of churches, business, and the YMCA to celebrate fathers in the same manner as mothers. Washington State took the slowly growing idea to the next level by officially recognizing Father’s day as a state holiday in 1910. Don’t fire up the grill just yet, there is more nurturing to do before we get to the Federal Holiday.
​
Slowly the idea of celebrating Father’s Day made its way to President Wilson’s desk, who in 1916 celebrated the day by using new technology for that time. He remotely unfurled a flag in Spokane, Washington by using telegraph signals from Washington D.C. I am not sure how that celebrated Father’s Day but it may help us understand why there was such an underwhelming response to the holiday. President Wilson’s encouragements to Congress to recognize Father’s Day as a holiday was not adopted. If the combination of a presidential request and technological flag flying was not enough to move Congress what would? We can understand why it was not catching on like Mother’s Day, fear. Fear that it would be over commercialized. The media mocked the idea; few took the idea of thanking Dad seriously.
​
In 1924 President Calvin Coolidge encouraged state governments to observe Father’s Day. If you are wondering why not make it a Federal Holiday, you are not alone, with the backing of two presidents the lukewarm feelings persisted. The push to grow Father’s day continued in spite of the attempts of pro parents groups efforts to get rid of Mother’s Day and squash Father’s day in favor of a parent’s day to celebrate parents together. This thought would pop up throughout the 1920’s and 1930’s. The activist efforts to merge the two holidays and to take the emphasis off of the retail aspect suffered at the hands of The Depression. The Depression had the opposite effect on merchants who increased their efforts to pump up sales in their sagging economy. Suggesting clothing items like ties (so that is where the default gift of tie came from?), socks or hats even suggesting larger ticket items like sports equipment and cards with the marketing strategy to give Dad a “second Christmas”. The retail industry found a way to put a patriotic spin on Father’s Day by suggesting Father’s Day was a good time to support the war efforts of World War II by honoring our American soldiers. When World War II ended it was still not a federal holiday but it was recognized as a national institution.
​
There is not much information as to what happened to the campaign to make Father’s Day a holiday. We know that it made it Congress where it appears to have stalled for more than 40 years. We know the holiday did not fade away nor was it blended together with Mother’s Day to become Parent’s Day. Father’s Day quietly survived. The subject resurfaced in Congress in 1957 when Senator Smith, Senator Margaret Smith, basically called her Congressional colleagues out for not taking action. She challenged congress to take action in one of two ways, either pass the bill to make Father’s Day a holiday equal to Mother’s Day or abolish Mother’s Day and in effect send the message we will not celebrate either parent. The thought that both mothers and fathers should be honored in some way travelled from 1908 to 1957 as a common thread throughout history. It was not until 1966 that President Lyndon Johnson declared with the first presidential declaration the third Sunday of June was a day set aside to honor fathers. So close, but not quite a holiday.
​
Perhaps he was tired of seeing unfinished business on the Congressional to-do list. Maybe he remembered the stern words of Senator Smith admonishing Congress to answer a forty year old question. Maybe he was thinking of his own father, research does not conclusively give this writer a specific reason but it seems reasonable to suggest that President Nixon understood the heart of the holiday as he made Father’s a holiday in 1972 with these words that the third Sunday in was "an occasion for renewal of the love and gratitude we bear to our fathers." (Find Me a Gift, "The History of Father’s Day")
Works Cited
History, Art & Archives, U.S. House of Representatives, “SMITH, Margaret Chase,” http://history.house.gov/People/Detail/21866 (May 30, 2016)
"The History of Fathers Day." Find Me A Gift. Web. 16 May 2016. <http://www.findmeagift.co.uk/fathers-day-gifts/history.html>.
Staff, History.com. "Father’s Day." History.com. A&E Networks, 2009. Web.