Horse in the House

April 4, 2025

Reclaim Your Living Room

Dear Nieces & Nephews,

We were part of the Willerup Methodist Church in my early childhood. Just across Water Street from our home in Cambridge, it was a big part of our lives. Your grandparents (and great grandparents) had gotten married there.

Here's a shot of the guests at their wedding:

This angle shows our house across the street:

Your uncles mowed the cemetery and rang the steeple bell. When a kitten was heard crying in the foundation, it was Uncle Dave who climbed down and rescued her. (Waddly Wump birthed many litters of kittens for our family to enjoy over the next decade.)

I remember running over to a midweek service in bare feet more than once, only to be sent home for my shoes. I didn’t understand why, because church was home.

But then disagreement hit the fan, we left, and home became church.

For about a decade, a revolving group of Christians met in our living room where Grandpa Clark taught and led worship from his guitar while Grandma Nancy played piano, and we kids tried our hand at a variety of instruments. The ragtag group that attended, in retrospect, reminds me of David’s Mighty Men. Remarkable, displaced and disgruntled with traditional church, they were drawn to your grandparents’ dad-and-mom hearts (and maybe the kittens). We lived a lot of life together, and it’s the quirky memories that stick in my mind the most:

Helping a family clean their house and watching their joy when the long-lost piano was found.

Taking in a family’s pig when neighbors complained to the police it was living in their basement. (We had moved out to our farm on Highway 73 by then.)

And then there was the family with the sick horse. They brought it into their living room to nurse. The horse died there, and the family moved out. That’s all I remember. No details, which is bothering me these days because I really want the full story. Especially how long they moved out for.

The reason this memory has come front and center this week is that I let a horse die in my living room too.

Figuratively speaking.

And then another.

And another.

Repeatedly, these words have rung through my heart: “Do NOT move out just because a horse died in there.” Here are some specifics:

Do not move out of that identity just because a lie moved in.
Do not move out of that dream just because selfish ambition moved in.
Do not move out of that hope because of failure.
Do not move out of that pursuit because of weariness.
Do not give up on that person because of what they just did.
Do not give up on that plan because the finances ran out for it.

The picture has given me fresh resolve to reclaim my living room and hold my ground.

Are there any dead horses in yours? I hope you will ask the Holy Spirit and take time to listen. If He brings one to mind, refuse fear and shame. You’re in good company here. Ask Him the best way to drag it out. He will be happy to help you.

I wouldn’t wait too long. Dead things get stinkier by the minute, and clean-up becomes much harder.

The world needs you to share your living room. So do I! I’d love an invitation.

All My Love,

Aunt Michelle

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I Don't Get To Do What I Want ...

By Michelle Hauge • November 17, 2025

Dear Nieces & Nephews, Did you know that rules stimulate the desire to break them? It says so right in Romans 7:5. “For when we were controlled by the sinful nature, the sinful passions aroused by the law were at work in our bodies, so that we bore fruit for death.” Bingo. The source of all my parenting woes! The law. Rules. What’s a parent to do? Get rid of rules? “By no means!” to use Paul’s phrase. Jesus didn’t come to get rid of the law, but to fulfill it. So if I’m to follow His parenting example, I don’t get RID of our rules, I fulfill them. What?! What in Heaven does THAT mean in the heat of battle? I wish I could give a clear, concise answer, but all I have is hints that I’m collecting in a bucket. Do you care to join me? If not, skip the next twelve paragraphs and jump back in where I tell you Lexie’s inspiring story. This is what I've got in the bucket so far: Rules, like “The Law” of the Old Testament, reveal the existence of naughtiness. Without them, we wouldn’t even know what's naughty. We need them. The problem is, they also stimulate a desire to break them. Which leads to pain. (Keep reading Romans 7-8. It paints quite a picture.) If God provided a way out of this pain with sacrifice born out of deep love (dying on the cross), maybe we can do the same for our kids so they can experience it first in the natural realm. “This is going to hurt me more than it hurts you,” with natural consequences we neither rescue them from, nor remove ourselves from. We’re still there, with them as they suffer. Yes, we suffer too. Ugh! But with the kind of suffering that brings joy. Maybe God-inspired deep-love-sacrifice releases our kids from the tyranny of forbidden-fruit-infatuation and sets them free to live in a new way, deeply rooted in connection instead of rules. Because our connection to them pulls them into our connection with Christ , facilitating their connection to Christ , which sets them free from sin and changes their whole mindset. Eventually. In a slow progression of their minds learning to choose Spirit ways over sinful nature ways. One small painful step at a time. While we parents have absolutely no control over which way they choose. One of my dear ones stashed every forbidden candy box and wrapper ever collected in their dresser during my ongoing war against sugar in our home.

A Birthday Note

By Michelle Hauge • November 16, 2025

Dear Nephew, What do you want for your birthday? Like really, really want , so deep down you’re afraid even to say it? I feel like God’s waiting for you to say it. He knows what you want, He just wants to make sure you know what you want. So say it. Then hold onto it with all that tenacity you’re famous for, until you see Him bring it about. He put your deep desires in you for a reason. It’s been a painful process of sorting it out from the surface wants that are so fleeting and even damaging. When I used to take you all shopping and you got to choose something you wanted, the other kids would quickly grab something off the shelf. But for you, it would become such a process. You were so worried you were going to choose the wrong thing and be disappointed. These past few years, you have had many disappointments. From rejections of your love, to devastating breakdowns, to friendships not working out, and then all these health problems. Disappointment times infinity. I believe it’s been a process of sifting in your heart that has been so painful you don’t know what to do with it. I hate to watch it. I hate to see your pain. I think breakthrough is right ahead of you. It’s probably not going to look like you expect it to, but I think it will look many times better. Above all you could ask, think or imagine. Because God’s goodness is infinite. Where it looks like He has forsaken you and let you down, He’s just not coming through in the small things because He needs you to let them go so you can grab hold of the big things He’s offering you. There is so much champion in you. So much skill. Such refreshing wit. Such a winning smile. Such a blend of tenacity and tenderness. I can’t tell you how proud I am of you. How relieved that we are still close. I want to team with you for whatever is ahead. I love you from the bottom of my heart, Aunt Michelle

What Do You WANT?

By Aunt Michelle • November 4, 2025

Dear Nieces & Nephews, You’re always on my mind. I’m hoping that with the approaching holidays and Camp Fire gatherings (more on this later), I will see you in person soon. In the meantime, here’s to writing again! I was part of a mom-care panel a couple weeks ago, sharing with homeschool moms some of my triumphs and failures in caring for myself while caring for children. The next day, while that was still on my mind, Aunt Marian called to offer me a week’s stay in a cottage at Christmas Mountain in The Dells because of a last-minute cancellation. I accepted, and God took such good care of me there! I decided what mom-care ultimately means is letting Him care for me, and cooperating as He directs me to assist. We moms would call that “obedience.” A good friend told me recently, “Michelle, if I was God, I’d give you an A+ for effort and a D- for results. But that’s not how God grades us. He grades us on our obedience. Some plant, some water, but it’s God who provides the increase. Just keep doing what He tells you to do.” OK. I can do that. I’m actually really good at obeying. I mean, I can put my nose to the grindstone, grit my teeth and plow as only a mule can. I’d make a really good mule. I’m not so sure mules are happy though. Our Midnight is, but … well … she’s never worked a day in her life and knows nothing about obedience.