Faith That Matters In This American Life

Touch the Light

I was driving around Gloucester late last fall on a stormy day and spied this lone tree in a field. I actually stopped in the middle of a busy road and gazed for a few moments. Eventually I parked my car and walked around in a smattering of raindrops before finding the right angle for a photo.

There's just something that draws my eye to this old, gnarled and scarred tree set against the storm clouds and rising above the line of distant woods behind it. It's a lone sentinel in a field, surrounded by farm ground that's planted every spring and harvested in late summer. I'm not sure why it was left standing because it seems that everything else in what was once thick woods was chopped down and cleared away long ago to make way for ground to till and grow crops.

If you spend enough time in ministry you can relate to this tree. If you spend enough time in a relentless pursuit of God perhaps you can relate to this tree. Sometimes it feels as if you stand unprotected and vulnerable. Sometimes you take some blows. You can be buffeted by storms. You can feel alone.

All those things are what drew me to this tree. After all these years in that field and through all the changing seasons and the relentless onslaught of storms, the tree has endured. The tree is still standing. Sure it's beat up and gnarled and when you get up close you can see it's rotting in patches. But I like how, as I gazed at it from the base of a low knoll, the tree rises out of darkness and above the line of trees behind it, seeming to touch the light in the parting dark clouds.

It reminds me of our hope in Jesus. There's things that go on in within this Christian life, in faith, in ministry, that are trying and difficult. There's discouragement and at times despair. I'm reminded it always occurs when my eyes are focused on circumstances. I'm reminded to fix my eyes on Jesus. My hope and faith is in Him. And I'm reminded that in Him I'm never alone.

Life Is A Bowl Of Soup. With Sausage.

Getting prepped for soupalicious.

It's hard to explain my love affair with soup. I just really like making soup. Perhaps it's the very nature of a good soup; taking disparate ingredients and blending them together into something beautifully tasty. Which sounds sort of like our family. We have some legit kooks (a butternut squash or wild rice), some very sensible and level-headed family members (that would be corn), some who would be described as "normal" (a good chicken broth) and then there's one who's fairly whacked (that would be me, the onion).

A key ingredient for some of my favorite soups is sausage. A good smoked sausage, like your kielbasa, is an absolute delight in a soup. Why am I drawn to sausage? Maybe it's because I can relate. Making sausage isn't real pretty, I understand. Family life isn't real pretty sometimes either. But you throw sausage in the fire -- or at least a frying pan -- and oh, what a delight. Life for a big family can feel like sausage making and then you get thrown into the fire. The end result through all that trauma and fire is quite delectable. If you're eating sausage that is. For a family, at least our family, if you can survive all that squeezing and grinding and refining fire, then it's a beautiful picture of how all these different parts can work together and come out good. Or something like that.

The real back story to this blog post is I'm trying to wax poetic about making soup so I can post a blog post. (Did I just use the word "post" three times in a sentence? I need an editor.) So I'm going all symbolic with soup and sausage and family life ... let me know if it isn't working. Before you make any more fun of me, I'll just quit and offer up the recipe for Emeril Lagasse's smoked sausage, butternut squash and wild rice soup. It appears that Mr. Lagasse is pretty handy in a kitchen. (Editor's note: Matthew! Saying Emeril Lagasse is "pretty handy" in a kitchen is like saying Monet was "pretty handy" with a paintbrush. Author's reply: Oh. Well, then I'll say that Mr. Lagasse can cook good.) 

Here's the recipe, courtesy of the Food Network. Enjoy: Le soup extraordinaire

Succeeding In One Thing That Really Matters

Succeeding in something that matters. A Thanksgiving Sabo family soccer match.

I was walking down the hall tonight to say bedtime prayers and saw my 10-year-old son reading his Bible. No one had asked him to, it's simply a legacy handed down from his older siblings that was started by Brenton when he was a lad. Every night, without fail, I can see Abram, now 15, reading his Bible. It's always one of the highlights of my entire day. The thought struck me that my kids are doing something that matters. Francis Chan has a fairly famous quote that sums up my thoughts this evening: "Our greatest fear should not be of failure but of succeeding at things in life that don't really matter." 

I've thought about this quote a lot recently as I survey the landscape of American Christianity through the lens of parents. And I'm pretty darn sure we're succeeding at things that don't really matter. So many people I've known over the last several years who had been churchgoers are partaking of the youth sports elixir. They spend their Sunday mornings at the soccer, baseball, field hockey, or any number of other athletic fields, watching their kids play. And the message they are sounding loud and clear to a generation of youth is that sports is more important than church. And we wonder why Millenials and others are walking away from the church? I  would suggest one factor is that it's not important to parents.

Look, being at church for the sake of being at church -- treating it like a club -- is a whole separate subject. In our family, going to church isn't optional and subject to whichever kid's travel sports team -- or any other event for that matter -- has a game or match that morning (Disclaimer: None of our kids are on travel sports teams). But neither is it this legalistic rite we do every Sunday. Going to church on Sundays is our time to corporately and individually worship the Lord, as well as pray, study and learn Scripture and fellowship with brothers and sisters in Christ. It is vital. We look forward to it. We desire it. We are strengthened and encouraged by it. We are equipped by and through our worship, prayers and Bible studying on Sundays to navigate the travails of the week. We are also able to encourage our church family on Sundays.

At our church, Calvary Chapel Gloucester, even our young kids are studying through the Bible at their level. In the church, we study through the Bible verse by verse, chapter by chapter, book by book. Last week we studied Acts 4:1-12. Next Sunday we'll pick it up in Acts 4 verse 13. We have seen a tremendous amount of fruit in our lives and in the lives of our children in the systematic study of Scripture and prioritizing what we do on Sundays as a family. When our older kids leave the house, they choose to find a church in which to worship. It's vital to them and I thank the Lord for that. They have a personal relationship with Jesus Christ. They are firm in their faith. 

I truly believe that we are succeeding in something that matters.

Things Kids Say, And Sing, Are Simply The Best

Judah deep in thought on where to find faith.

To me, age 3 is right about the golden age of childhood. At least from a parent's perspective. The child's vocabulary is expanding by leaps and bounds, they've cleared the diapers stage, there's an uninhibited glee they often express over the seemingly littlest things and their personality blossoms. Judah is our resident 3-year-old and he has a way of putting things that is just so, well, Judah.

For example, one evening a while back he came to me with a very serious question. "Dad," he said, "can you keep an eye on me?"

After suppressing a laugh, because he was quite earnest, I told him I sure could. Then I asked why he wanted me to keep an eye on him.

"I might be up to something," he said.

I told him I appreciated the heads up and then went and kept an eye on him.

The other morning after getting up and playing for a while he came to me while I was in the kitchen. He had some news he wanted to share with me.

"My tummy tells me I'm hungry," he said.

I told him it's good to listen to our tummies when they tell us they are hungry.*

Another thing about Judah is that he loves music. He loves to sing and is always busting out in song. His current favorite is King and Country's "Fix My Eyes." Part of the chorus goes, "Fight for the weak ones, speak out for freedom, find faith in the battle, stand tall but above it all..."

The other night Judah was singing at the top of his lungs his own version of "Fix My Eyes." The chorus went like this: "Fight for the freak ones, find faith in the bathtub."

I love it. I actually like his version better than the original.


*Unless you're like me and have listened to your tummy tell you it's hungry way too much. There are times you shouldn't listen to your tummy when it tells you that it's hungry.

In A Big Family, Communication Is Very Important

Letting people know they are too close to the edge would be a good form of communication.

In a large family, having open lines of communication are very important. For example, say you were on a road trip across the country and made a quick pit stop off of I-80 in Nebraska. It would be very important to have open lines of communication between the passengers and the driver when one of the passengers noticed a brother or sister running out of the restroom and sprinting to catch up as the van headed back out to the endless cornfields freeway. In this case, it would be very important to say something. You know, like let the driver know there's a child left behind. Or maybe something like this: "DAD! STOP THE VAN! WE FORGOT _________ (enter the name of any of 10 children you might have accidentally left behind)!

On any given day in the Sabo house, there might be three dentist appointments, two separate soccer practices, picking someone up from school and dropping that someone off at work, then later picking that person up from work, a shopping trip in order to feed a small army our family, a night Bible study and an emergency late-night run to the store for ice cream. To achieve maximum efficiency in the Sabo house on days like this it requires the ultimate in communication. Husbands, read closely here because what I'm about to say may revolutionize your marriage: The key to communicating with my wife is that I need to "talk" to her. Yes, actual conversation that goes beyond grunts and "yes" or "no" or other primitive forms of male communication. I have discovered that it's often good to "talk" to my wife in the morning to achieve the previously mentioned maximum efficiency. Alas, sometimes I fall short. I still believe Julie has the ability to read my mind and it's not uncommon to get a phone call from her asking what I'm doing. That's usually a good sign that I should be doing something else, which typically involves a matter of importance in the Sabo household. And apparently I believe Julie is not the only person who should be able to read my mind.

On Sunday afternoon I left for Charlotte, N.C., to spend a week long retreat with my co-workers in the Transformational Education Network. I was dropping off Ethan in Richmond on the way so he could pick up his car and head back to Hampden-Sydney College in Farmville, Va. Monday morning got off to a great start with my colleagues until I got a text from one of my kids. Here is the text I got from my 17-year-old daughter Evie: "So mom just told me you went to North Carolina for a week ... I just thought you had decided to stay a night at Farmville when you dropped off Ethan. I asked mom when you'd be back today and she said, 'Oh...about a week.' "

Although I love to communicate with my children by texting, sometimes even when they are in the next room, that was not a text I enjoyed receiving. In fact, I was horrified. I should have my `Dad' card pulled. How did one of my kids not know I was going to be gone for a whole week? I extended my profuse apologies to Evie and am still kicking myself. When I get home I'm going to ground myself. After I make it up to her somehow. Like sharing my calendar with her on Google+ maybe? Would that qualify as good communication?

A Gloucester Game-Changer: `Pocahontas Lived Here'

Gloucester: The view ain't so bad. Neither is the history.

When I tell most people I am from the lovely, photographically enchanting enclave of Gloucester, Va., they give me a blank look that says, "Where's that?" Or a blank look that says, "I thought Gloucester was in Massachusetts." Often I've aided the geographically-challenged by saying the Virginia strain of Gloucester is across the river from Yorktown and Williamsburg, or an hour east of Richmond on Chesapeake Bay, or 2 1/2 hours south of Washington D.C. and a light bulb goes off above their head. But I've been scrapping all that lately and just saying, "Pocahontas lived here." Eyes light up at the mention of Pocahontas.

Just this morning it happened. I am in Charlotte, N.C., for the week for a retreat/conference with my co-workers in TEN3, Transformational Education Network (www.ten3.org). We are here at the headquarters of Serving In Mission (most notably in the public eye recently because two of SIM's doctors contracted Ebola recently while serving in West Africa) from literally around the world. From California to Zambia, 10 of us TEN3 missionaries are here  from around the globe to talk strategy, plan, pray, encourage and exhort each other on our mission to provide transformational Christian education materials and technology skills to disciple and equip young people in Africa and the Caribbean.

This morning I met another missionary who is here for a separate conference. This missionary serves in Ethiopia but is from Australia. When she asked where I was from I told her Gloucester, Va., and explained roughly where it was. Then I mentioned it's where Pocahontas lived. That was the game changer. She had seen the movie. You know, the Disney animated film "Pocahontas." Even though the scenery in the Disney flick is utterly and completely lacking anything remotely close to what you'd find in Gloucester -- for example, the next waterfall someone stumbles upon in Gloucester will be the first -- and I have yet to meet a animals or trees that can talk, it's one of those things that's made Pocahontas famous.

Beyond the Disney flick, I asked the missionary what she knew about Pocahontas. She was an Indian princess, she said. That appears to be part of the fascination with Pocahontas; other fascinating things include that she was an Indian princess, saved John Smith's life, conversed with animals and traveled to England, among other things. In May, when I was still working as a reporter for the Daily Press, I attended an event in Gloucester in which the Virginia governor, Terry McAuliffe, paid a visit to the historic site of Pocahontas' village, called Werowocomoco, on the banks of the York River. He hopes the site will become a national park, something that would truly put Gloucester on the map. Historians and government officials say that around the world, Pocahontas is more well-known than George Washington and other iconic American figures. They say that if Werowocomoco received a designation as a national park, visitors from around the world fascinated by the story of Pocahontas would pay a visit.  I bet I won't be explaining so much where to find Gloucester if that's the case.

Here's a link to the story I wrote for the Daily Press about Pocahontas' old stomping grounds becoming a national park: Werowocomoco story

Oh, and one other thing. We look forward to you paying a visit to see us in historic Gloucester.

Birthdays, Birthdays...So Many Kids, So Many Birthdays

Unlike most people, my first thought when I wake up isn't, "Coffee! I need coffee!" As a father of 14 children my first thought each morning is, "Is it one of my kids' birthdays today?" Now I usually can't make that determination until after I've had my morning cup o' joe, but quite often the answer is, "Yes." Today is one of those days. Our son Abram turns 15 today. So join me in wishing him a happy birthday.

Birthdays in the Sabo house are pretty cool. For one thing, we don't have to throw a big party because, well, it already is a big party. He already has 13 of his closest friends, in this case brothers and sisters, at his party. Our birthday tradition runs like this: We let the birthday kid pick out where he or she would like to eat dinner or lunch and the treat's on us. We have a cake, typically a fairly big cake, open some presents, -- our parental expenditure budget on birthdays is around $20; if those in the Sabo house who have a regular income choose to get a present for the birthday kid, then that's their prerogative and often times they do -- sing the birthday song and generally enjoy the festivities.

I distinctly remember Abram's birth. Now that I think about it, I distinctly remember the births of all the kids. I remember Eli was born at night when I was trying to watch the women's gymnastics competition during the Olympics in 2004. The U.S. women were going for the gold when Julie got serious about. I politely asked her if she could hold on just a little longer because the U.S. women were going for the gold ... just kidding! I said no such thing. May not have even thought it ...

In September 1999, I was commuting from Prineville, Ore., to Corvallis, Ore., after taking a job over in the Willamette Valley as a correspondent for The Oregonian. It was a three-hour drive and I would leave Prineville on Monday morning for the lovely cruise over the Cascade Mountains and come back Friday evening. Julie was due right around Labor Day, Sept. 6, and on that particular day I remember giving her something of an "ultimatum." I explained to her that if she didn't have the baby soon, I would be leaving for Corvallis first thing in the morning. So, you know, things needed to get going.

So Julie took matters into her own hands. Or womb. I remember going for a brisk walk around the block with her when she started going into serious labor. It was late in the afternoon and our midwives -- Abram was among the stretch of Sabo wee ones born at home -- we're having trouble making it to Prineville on time. So I started boiling water, cutting sheets and doing things doctors do. Just kidding! I believe I prayed fervently that the highway traffic would part like the Red Sea for our midwives.

They made it on time and Abram was born late in the afternoon, a whopping 8 lbs., 13 oz. and the chunkiest Sabo on record. It was a difficult birth and Julie hemorrhaged and I remember feeling helpless. The midwives were able to slow the bleeding with doses of Pitocin before we had to rush her to the hospital, which was literally a block away. I thank the Lord that Abram and Julie were fine.

Fifteen years later Abram is a wonderful son. He is kind, gentle, helpful, responsible an amazingly skilled Legos contractor, a faithful servant at church and very good with our little ones. One thing in particular I love about him is that every night I can find him in a quiet spot reading his Bible. At 15 he is one of the wisest people I know.