Who am I too you? Who am I darling....

To....

a quiet christmas day, the importance of good coffee, biting lips and nervous smiles, fear and walls, depth and tragedy, strength and discipline, the birth of magic and it's tragic loss, button's, belly laughter, conversations, walks, music, the hope of a happy ending, the devastation of feeling deceived and the sound of your voice...warmth.

My heart is broken, did I tell you that? Not by you, but by the innumerable tragedies I have seen, felt and even sometimes experienced. I ping pong back and forth with just wanting to be in heaven, where there is no sin, or wondering if there is even a "good" God out there. I felt Him when I was with you. I have known love of all kinds, but you made Him more real to me. It's what I miss most about you. Maybe I just miss Him.

Him,
Where have you been? I miss you and need you! My heart aches for hope. My eyes long for something other than the tragedy that haunts us. The gravity of loss that we are forced to witness is an evil I cannot even acknowledge. Children.....    Where are you? Where is your perfect love? I don't know what to pray. I know in the depths of my soul that You are all that is constant and perfect but I lack faith. I don't know how to encourage others when it seems we are being defeated regularly and well. I cling to your promises that remind me again and again that we are to not be afraid. I can't imagine the vastness of what you must of bore that day on Calvary. Lord, show me in the quietness how to pray for those that have lost.
 love, me

"For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, being justified freely by His grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God set forth as a propitiation by His blood, through faith, to demonstrate His righteousness, because in His forbearance God had passed over the sins that were previously committed to demonstrate at the present time His righteousness, that He might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus." Romans 3: 23-26

I never tire of the "good news"!! I grow tired and weary and often just exhausted by life, but the hope I find in Christ never stops consuming me. I have been enjoying the lights of my christmas tree this evening thinking upon the night in the manger where it all started. What would it have been like to experience the miracle birth. I think of it medically (being a labor and delivery nurse and all) and I wonder about the experience spiritually. i would have loved to deliver baby jesus. Can you imagine? I would probably have wept over him, gushing with love, and overwhelmed with the honor of being able to do something for Him. Mary must of had such a unique relationship with our savior. I would love to have talked to her about it. I'm excited for this Christmas. I'm excited to love my patient's with the love of Christ and to serve others so that I might serve Him. I'm beyond grateful and words cannot express how much I feel the blessing of His sacrifice and the hope of His life!!! Merry Christmas everyone! I pray that we all carry His light to the world, the greatest gift we can give~

Redemption....

I love how faithful God is to answer us when we come to Him with our honesty. This last week my friend sent me the book "Redemption" by Mike Wilkerson. It has been such a blessing already. So many of the questions that I have written over the last few weeks have already been answered and I am encouraged that the Lord hears me...or at least reads my blog. heehehe.  I wanted to share a few of the gems I have uncovered already.

In reference to the Israelites in Egypt...
" When faced with the dilemma of either trusting God for their freedom or seeing relief by appeasing Pharaoh, they chose Pharoah. they hoped merely not to sink in the sight of the Egyptians, so that some of their suffering might be alleviated. Had they forgotten how this ruthless slavery had driven them to cry out for deliverance? What "normal slavery" was it that they hoped to settle back into?"

I think so often that I have turned back to my slavery (sin) because I thought it would offer some initial relief, and just like the Israelites I so quickly forget that I had cried out to the Lord in the first place. What I love so much about my Jesus is that He does no abandon us despite our disbelief.

"God answered Moses' cry by reminding the people who his is and what he had promised to do. He didn't propose a new and less painful plan or apologize for how much worse things had become. Rather, He assured them with the same words he had spoken to them at first. His message had not changed. he is faithful to His word even when his people are faithless (2Tim 2:13) he would deliver them: "I am the Lord, and I will bring you out... I will redeem you... I will take you to be my people, and I will be your God...I am the Lord" Ex 6: 2-8  Moses carried these hopeful words back to the people, but the people , because of their broken spirit and harsh slavery, would not listen to Moses. Their broken hearts resisted hope."

I feel like so many believers I know have resisted to hope because of their broken hearts, myself included. I would rather stay in the familiarity of my slavery then risk being disappointed by God. What if He doesn't deliver, what if He doesn't answer my prayers? How will I survive His silence to my cry for deliverance? OOOOh but wait there is an answer!!! I hadn't seen it this way, but of course now it makes perfect sense.

"The reasoning goes something like this: If God is trustworthy, and Jesus trusts him, then he wouldn't be hanging on the cross so shamefully; so it must be either that God is not trustworthy or that Jesus lacks faith. And those tend to be the very conclusions we draw for ourselves. We, like broken-spirited Israelites, find it nearly impossible to keep trusting God as circumstances worsen. (this does not fit my picture of redemption) We are tempted to believe that God has forsaken us and that all hope is lost. Or some naive Christian tells us that if we merely had more faith--if we just learned whatever lesson we're suppose to be learning---the pain would stop. But jesus experienced worse pain than you or I will everknow. We may fear the worst---abandonment by God---but He actually faced it. And he didn't stop believing."

Jesus prayed in the garden for the cup to pass from Him. He prayed to the Father to be delivered from the cross, but He wasn't. Why hadn't I seen the gravity of this example before? I have struggled with my prayer life for months now because I felt as though the Lord didn't hear me and He had 'abandoned' me. I had been praying so faithfully and doing all the "right things" why had God not saved my marriage or spared my broken heart. Jesus was perfect and he definitely did all the "right things" and God's will was bigger than what he had asked for. And God's will is perfect. I'm not sure what you might be facing or maybe even you feel betrayed by God but I know one thing....He is trustworthy. He didn't answer Jesus' prayer, the way Jesus had asked Him too, but in that He gave the greatest gift ever given in all of time. "We can be sure that our redemption is as certain as His resurrection." How exciting!!!! There is purpose in our torture, in our suffering, in our pain, in our time of being still. He has promised to work all things for our good to those that believe!!

Lord, help me to always believe.....

It is written of Joseph in the dungeon that "the iron entered into his soul".

"My soul, if thou wouldst be enlarged into human sympathy, thou must be narrowed into limits of human suffering. Thou canst not lift the iron load of thy brother if the iron load hath not entered into thee. It is thy limit that is thine enlargement."  -George Matheson

I got an alert on my phone today that my voicemail box was full so I started weeding through the month old messages and I came across a message from my dad. I can't even type the word without a lump forming in my throat. Sometimes i feel like I just have pretended that he's dead, because it's easier. I forget how much his absence affects me until I'm reminded that he is somewhere out there in the world not calling me, not talking to me. Shit....I can't even write about him now without wanting to fall into a heap of tears, which I'm sure the kind folks of starbucks would not appreciate on this beautiful Saturday afternoon. I don't think it would be as difficult of a reality to swallow if he hadn't been such an awesome dad when I was a child. Something broke him...life broke him. I get it now, as an adult. The human heart can only stand under so much. It's easier to just check out, shut off and become the rock and island that feels no pain. (Simon and Garfunkel knew what they were singing about). i don't even blame him anymore......my dad. I just miss the memories we didn't create and the conversations I wish I could have with him now. I wish I could ask him about my broken heart. I wish he would know what to say to reassure me about my relationship with Jesus.
I never thought that I would come out of the darkness that I felt after my divorce. i wondered often if laughter would ever enter my bones again. It did. Slowly the pain wasn't all consuming and waking up each day didn't feel so awful. In December I met someone that I thought was "the one". Silly me! I prayed constantly that the Lord would protect my heart and keep me safe from any more hurt. i lamented before Him and told Him to just show me in some way if I should back off, or move on. I even felt like I could surrender him if it meant avoiding more pain and heartbreak. When one prays for these kind of things it is assumed that whatever you hear is absolutely jaded by your desires so of course you cannot trust your own thoughts or voice in the matter. I left the fleece up to God. I told Him that He would have to make it obvious that I should let my heart feel what I so badly wanted to anyway. After a night on my bedroom floor, tears in the carpet, begging the Lord to show me what to do I went to see a friend the next day that I knew I was going to talk to about it so I prayed He would use her to speak to me. Before I had even mentioned him, or my eternal struggle she says to me, "I had a dream about you last night, and I feel like the Lord wants me to tell you." WOW, I thought, God heard me! The dream was exactly what I wanted to hear. I was given permission to feel about him freely. Two weeks later he broke up with me and told me that I was "just not the one." Silly silly me! The part that I can't recover from is the "dream" that I felt was out of God's desire to have relationship with me and make His presence known. My one true comfort in life has been my prayer time with my Lord. I have prayer journals from the last two decades of my life; page upon page of my heart poured out before my savior, my beloved. I even thought He would talk back to me sometimes. Our 'time' kept me going in times I thought I wasn't going to be able to. Where does one go from here? Did I make our entire relationship up? Does God even talk to us? Is He the creator and I am the clay and I am only here to be used for His purposes? If so, then i have reconciled within myself that is still more mercy then I deserve. I guess I just always thought He wanted more between us. i don't know how to pray anymore. It's been so long since we have talked. I feel like I have put God in the same place of my heart I put my dad. It isn't anyone's fault, it just is what it is.
I feel like all this conflict within my heart and head has reached a fork in the road.  I met a man a few weeks ago. He is kind at his core and so good to me. He says the things that every girl only dreams about hearing. I feel like if I could reenter into my body and stop watching, analyzing from above I could possibly find a happiness I have never known inside of a relationship. Instead I am stuck, stuck in the in between. If I'm in place where I can't even trust God, how could I ever trust a man.
I had a dream a few nights ago, a nightmare really. I was in a village in Africa and there was a women being raped in front of me by some rebels holding guns. I couldn't do anything about it, I just was forced to watch her innocence and faith disappear in her eyes and she silently took their abuse. I woke up disturbed, but let it go. Last night I had another dream. i dreamt that there was a man who was working in an orphanage and he was discontent with where his life had brought him. I was telling him that it was just the season he was in to prepare him for the life that he had been called too. He needed the "iron" to enter him. I woke up in that moment and the first thought i had was the woman in the village and the baby she would carry, and I wanted to help her. in my half awake state i thought about delivering her baby and helping her love the child that was conceived in the moment she lost all hope. I thought about the iron within me, and the love I would so easily feel for her. I feel like the man in the orphanage. Why am I here, battling my desire for my own piece of the happiness pie, if I'm suppose to have a place somewhere else? Is God just going to break my heart again? He's entitled, but my hope feels deferred and my heart a little sick. I can only muster up one prayer....that I will Love and worship Him all the days of my life.

Sometimes I wonder if there is a point in which you just can't go "there" again. You can want to, even try to will it, but it's just unavailable. I always knew that if I got married it would be forever and now I think I knew myself better than I even realized. I know now, more than ever, that I gave everything I had; "had" being the opportune word.  I don't have the room for error and failure that comes with a healthy sense of self and is needed to be in a relationship. It's strange because this lack of tolerance exist in no other area of my life. I have resilience and fight left in me to struggle, but with matters of my heart  I am completely worthless. My heart shuts down like a reflex and I have no control over it. I'm not necessarily sure when my brain created this survival technique but how does one overcome a reflex? i can here the naysayers, shaking their heads in disapprovement and to them i would have nothing to say. How can you explain to someone else the very pain you avoid at all cost. It reminds me of  the movie cast away. How can Tom Hanks rejoin a life when no one can possibly fathom what he has overcome and how it has forever changed him? He is stuck in between the two worlds, and neither can really be home. C.S. lewis described it in , "A grief observed" as a thin film between himself and everyone else. I can talk to you about the shit that i have endured but how can any of us possibly begin to understand how another's heart has weathered the storm. I wonder what Jesus thinks of it all? Is this how he can tolerate our wickedness, our adultery and  pride. Is he able to see through the bullshit of our weakness and join us in the abyss of our fear, or does He expect in our faith to overcome? I lean towards Him having the expectation of faith. 

I find it a little telling that I am anticipating some sort of disaster or heartbreak. My life right now feels peaceful. Which makes me nervous. I have become so accustom to the battlefield that I feel out of place   when I'm not 'surviving'. I feel like I am just waiting for my car to break down or some ailment to strike me.  Jeremiah 29:11 just seemed to manifest differently in my life. I felt that the 'fire' i endured would be my blessing and this side of heaven I wouldn't really get to understand it. The part that is hardest for me to wrap my mind around is that I haven't been praying lately, or reading my Bible. Is this just the enemy keeping me luke warm? My friend the other day said to me, "Christians don't think it's from God unless they are totally suffering or don't want to it." I laughed cause it is so true in my own world. I miss my time in the word and journaling to the Lord, but I still haven't been able to define what "relationship" means between Jesus and I. What does He want out of it? Otherwise aren't we then only pursuing in vain. Pray for me to have understanding, because I miss Him.

I will become what I desire....

"I have been worrying that we all live our lives in the confines of fear."

What if my father had told me as a young girl that I was beautiful? Who would I be if my mother held me without fear or restraint? Who would she be if her mom had touched her face gently and told her she could be anything? These pathways that have carved their ways into our brains and stubbornly they refuse to relent of fear. I listen to this song and I want to dance wildly around the room and fight for the freedom from the thoughts that press down and keep small. I want to desire MORE! I want more than the daily grind, my insecurities, the finite of my faith and the obsession with fading beauty. Apathy has become America's coping mechanism to avoid all things scary and worthy! The little girl I once was use to be so on fire for life and what it might unfold into. I was broken, like most of us. My parents became human and disappointed me like inevitably they would.  I realized that nothing in and of this world would be "enough", which was a reality I was never going to be prepared for. The rubber met the road and my hope in Jesus had to be the "all" i was needing. 

I have been worrying that I am living in the confines of fear.

I'm afraid of failure, I'm afraid of loneliness, I'm afraid of vulnerability and I'm afraid of my desires. 

I'm terrified of not breaking out of my fear and being who I was created to be apart from the sin of man and my own weakness. This may not necessarily look extreme on the outside, but within I want the storm to leave nothing untouched. I pray that it manifests into my world and others notice a change. 

I have felt so loved by the Lord lately. I know that feelings are not necessarily indicators of truth and as with any relationship there are highs and lows, but I am basking in this season of warmth.  Many of my friends and family are struggling through some pretty dark times and I am just so grateful that I can be available to them and not stuck within my own sorrow. One of my favorite quotes sings, "I know that I am filled to be emptied again, the seed I received I will sow", and I feel as though the Lord is giving me a season of peace to sow His love and light into others. What a blessing. There has been a long winter in my life and I feel the ice beginning to thaw. I love my new job, I have found peace in my singleness, and I'm excited for what the future holds.
I'm currently walking through a separation between one of my friends and her husband and it has been a not so subtle reminder of my own dissolution of marriage. The grace of God is the gift of time that allows for those wounds to heal and fade, but lately the memory has felt more than close. I remember laying on my bed soaked in sweat and tears, surrounded by my closest friends and Melly wrapped herself around my fetal positioned body whispering over and over in my ear....this will not be your story. I didn't believe her at the time, because the pain was so palpable, but she was right. God is faithful to redeem and restore and even bless. I am so thankful to Jesus and those that loved me in His name, for baring the burden with me; during a time that felts so hopeless. I want to give this same gift back to as many as I can. So, how can I pray for you? What can I believe for you when you can't believe? What truth about yourself have you forgotten that you need someone to call you daily and remind you of? It would be my honor to love as I have been loved. After all we are the body of Christ and when one member of the body is weak is it not the job of the rest of the body to pick up the load until full healing is reached. If you are one of those who is in a season of summer then I implore you to be available, be sacrificial and in humility love as you have been loved. I'm adding to my prayer from my last post....I not only pray that I will love the Lord with all of my heart and all of my life, but that I will also love others in His name. How funny that 31 years of life and it took me that long to start understanding the greatest commandment. Every day I am in awe of the simplicity and equally the complexity of my God......oh how I love Him!

He loves you.....

"When He heard therefore that he was sick, He abode two days still in the same place where He was." (John 11:6)

In the forefront of this marvelous chapter stands the affirmation, "Jesus loved Martha, and her sister, and Lazurus," as if to teach us that at the very heart and foundation of all God's dealings with us, however dark and mysterious they may be, we must dare to believe in and assert the infinite, unmerited, and unchanging love of God. Love permits pain. The sisters never doubted that He would speed at all hazards and stay their brother from death, but, "When he had heard therefore that he was sick, he abode two days still in the same place where he was."

What a startling "therefore"! He abstained from going, not because He did not love them, but because He did love them. his love alone kept Him back from hasting at once to the dear and stricken home. Anything less than infinite love must have rushed instantly to the relief of those loved and troubled hearts, to stay their grief and to have the luxury of wiping and stanching their tears and causing sorrow and sighing to flee away. Devine love could alone hold back the impetuosity of the Savior's tender heartedness until the angel of pain had done her work. 

"Who can estimate how much we owe to suffering and pain? But for them we should have little scope for many of the chief virtues of the Christian life. Where was faith, without trial to test it; or patience, without nothing to bear; or experience without tribulation to develop it? -streams in the desert

As I grow older and further away from the magic of innocence and naivety my heart longs to reconcile God' love to the incredible amount of sorrow I see each day. I struggle with finding the purpose of my prayers when they seem to go unheard and unanswered. My small brain and little faith cannot grasp God's plan or His love in it. I hadn't thought of the discipline it must take to "abode longer". We being evil give good gifts to our children so how much more the heavenly father gives good gifts. I know as a friend I want to rescue, save, heal and spare and I just can't imagine the restraint our Father must have to hold back and allow the pain to do it's work. I once heard a pastor say that the thing he was thankful for that thanksgiving was a strong heart. Tears just flooded my eyes because I knew how much he had endured and suffered and so the richness of his gratitude was priceless. I'm thankful for the strong heart that the Lord has given me, and the vastness of His love. I pray to the Lord that whatever His will be that He would grant me the mercy to love Him all the days of my life, with all of my heart. I pray this for you too friends who are struggling to understand why He 'therefore'  abodes. He loves you.

Night Shift provides a lot of time alone with your thoughts. While the rest of the world sleeps you find yourself awake and searching for something, anything to fill the loneliness or the boredom. I have not been adjusting well, which has probably been obvious. I don't know if it's the feeling of laziness or the lack of productivity or just being female but I had a bit of meltdown tonight with my best friend. As usual I more than likely over exaggerated, in my head, the gravity of what I was feeling, but nonetheless I felt overcome. It wasn't really anything specific but more general in nature. I have started to date again and I feel it is opening up things in my heart that I thought I had dealt with or closed, but those sneaky little wounds seem to reopen without much warning. Let me just start off by saying, I am horrible at dating. I don't do well with knowing the appropriate boundaries in newly developing relationship, because my entire personality is about all or nothing. I don't downshift very well or even shift at all. Even after years of counseling I find myself struggling with wether or not I even feel it's necessary to be different then who I am by default. It feels more like a game, and I am no good at that game. I want what's easy, and if it is easy I want it all the time. I'm simple in that regard. I can almost hear my friends chuckling to themselves as they read this, knowing exactly what I mean. So, how is dating going? It's depressing. I'm not really sure what "chemistry" is based upon but I know immediately if I feel it and if I don't I can't ever create it. I know there a lot of girls in my boots. We don't want to be alone, we want a family, but we also can't settle. I left a date the other night and I just began to sob in my car. All at once it hit me that this might just not happen for me again. I had a husband. I experienced the love that takes work and the reality of how difficult "unconditional" really is. That might have been my go around and the Lord quite possibly may have a completely different season in store. I think I have been trying to create it on my own because I thought I had it and it was amazing, and then it wasn't. I wanted that back. I wanted him back, and he wanted someone else. These wounds run deep. Probably all the way back to the garden. I'm not enough, I fail, I disappoint and I fall short regularly. What we are all searching for is for someone to say, even still, you are worth it and I will love you. I have that in the Lord. I want it in a man, I wanted it in this particular man, but that's not my story. I have different story. My tantrum tonight was about wanting a piece of the "joy" pie, and feeling shafted by God. I then started thinking about all my friends and their situations and I started feeling like all christians were getting shafted. I meditated on all those suffering with chronic illness, poverty, tragedy and relational devastation and my heart began to ache.  Oh satan, so sly in his dealings with us. I called my friend and I asked her to pray for me and I am just so thankful to have friends like her. She reminded me of this life being but a vapor, and to stay heavenly minded, she also talked about the grace and the mercy God has allotted us to endure. It's amazing how the truth does set you free. You can be drowning in your woes and then your heart gains perspective, you gain Christ and you are renewed. I don't know how those without Him as their hope survive. As we continued talking we started imagining a different story a bigger story. Maybe I will be in a orphanage and I can love without reserve without hesitation. All rules of engagement are cast away and I can give and that in of itself with give back. I got excited. I forgot about him not choosing me, and realized I am chosen and I can show others they are too. Thank you Lord for the fellowship of the body and friends that protect us from ourselves.

Survival creates within us an ability to endure far past what we thought ourselves capable. It blinds our minds and emotions so that one foot can be placed in front of the other  so insanity doesn't ensue. It's after the dust settles and during a time of peace that the beasts that have been so quiet within, awaken.

Complete Candor.....what am I wanting to risk, and why? Potentially I want wholeness and for my heart's thoughts and words to maybe....just maybe.... reach someone else. So here it is...

I felt hatred today. Stone cold hatred. This is super unusual for me because I have like a fifteen second rebound rate. My childhood developed within me an ability to believe and hope against all circumstance and trauma for the "just around the corner" break I knew had to come. If I didn't believe then I would have crumbled under the sorrow.  So I endure. I endure because I have taught myself too hope even in the hopeless. I built an entire identity on this and became the friend, the girlfriend, the wife that hoped against all logic for the good of man to prevail. It even felt super Christian like and gave me a sense of uniqueness I so desperately craved. It wasn't until my failed marriage that I realized that it was just a fancy way of being a codependent and I really had no idea how to love someone rightly. Unfortunately, this realization came after my heart had suffered an incredible amount of disappointment and loss. The anger and the hatred isn't about my past it's about my future, I feel robbed of the ability to trust. I want to blame someone, or something. I want someone to value what I suffered, but I feel that it might have been for no one's benefit. Not even my own. It's just the combination of a bunch of fucked up people doing what they have learned and been taught to do to survive. I want to hate my dad for not fighting harder for me as his daughter, but instead I think about what he must feel and the hurt he has had to swallow. I want to hate the man that swore to love me for forever but instead shattered my heart with his fist and his pride, but instead I ache for his own lack of example and the loneliness he has known since childhood. Who assumes responsibility for all of this? Is it God? Is He to blame? Is it Satan, the evilness of man? Is it just the wages of sin? Maybe a combination, I'm not sure, but the dust has settled and I feel the raging within. Who will fight my heart? Who will fight for me?

Giving thanks always for all things unto God. Ephesians 5: 20

I'm not really sure what "relationship" with God really means. Does He talk with us outside of the Bible? I don't know. How do we have a relationship with someone we only have one way conversations with? I don't doubt the existence of God and Christ, or even His sacrifice for me, but I struggle with believing in the intimacy between us. Obedience is commanded and rightly so; after all, He is God the creator and I am the created. I just cannot get my mind around what He wants with me relationally. I'm a firm believer that pain and suffering are gifts that He gives to build our character and our perseverance but what does He mean when He says "plans to prosper you, and not harm you, to give you a future and a hope"? I find my hopes often dashed and and my prosperity minimal. I know that most of this is based upon perspective. Of course I am blessed and I have a lot to be thankful for in comparison to so many. I try to hold on to this and really maintain a sense of contentment but my humanity often wins out and I feel sad for wanting more. I feel disappointed that my "christian" marriage fell apart and that I couldn't make it work, I feel sad that I am alone and without children and I'm frustrated that I haven't used my singleness as an opportunity to live whole heartedly for God. I some how feel entitled to His voice if He isn't going to give me the desires of my heart. I feel He owes me a "relationship". My brain can conclude that this is craziness, but my heart is relentless. How can He be 'All that I need' if what I need is a best friend, a lover and a dad? I opened up my devotional book yesterday and I was thinking about all of this and the Lord's 'answer' to me....Ephesians 5:20.

"Giving Thanks ALWAYS for all things unto GOd."

Regardless if I understand it or even believe whole heartedly, all things are Father filtered, and I have to trust in His kindness and love despite my feelings and my longings. This is the call of faith. It's often a battle within me, but I have learned that there is nothing else on earth worth holding on to or fighting for more.

Bittersweet

Sundays are bittersweet. Worshiping the Lord is one of the most incredible things we get to experience here on earth. My whole body is consumed by His love and for a brief time I forget about myself, and all the things that fade, and I'm in the presence of Glory. It truly is magical. The muddy waters my mind normally travels through become clear and I see how it suppose to be. My body responds almost without thought and all of me feels propelled to a place of complete surrender. I realize then how much I miss Him and want to be with Him and how no other place even compares. I wish each week that church wouldn't end and I could just be frozen there in His presence, but week after week the message comes and the service ends and I'm forced back into this world.  I come home to my empty house and I am just sad. I'm lonely for home. I'm weary of struggle, evil and the distance that my humanity creates. In my last entry I talked about how I once thought God wasn't enough, but the truth is that nothing else is enough and I can't have Him the way I want Him. I want Him the way He created me to want Him...always and without ceasing. Sometimes I am convinced my greatest wish is to be able to let  all that is... me....go. In the christian "ease" it's called dying to self. It so hard to die to yourself. I just want to be killed. As ridiculous as it sounds, i laugh through my tears because I realize how crazy it is to say. I just have this ache, and the only way I can describe it is a broken heart. I want heaven. I see now how Mary broke the bottle of perfume over Jesus' feet and wiped it with her hair. She looked as silly as I feel I'm sure, but girls in love act silly and say strange things. I pray that I would resist the urge to find solice in compromise and perserverance to hold on to what for sure will be.

  

My mind has been saturated with this message today. I can't stop thinking about the reality of it's truth in my own life. Yesterday I had some friends call me out about a sin pattern in my life and I wanted so desperately to argue my character and reputation but I didnt have a leg to stand on. They love me and weren't being hard on me they were just being honest. It stung! I want to feel "good enough" and I turn to anything other than Jesus to find it. Each time I experience regret and shame and yet I fall again and again. I remember calling a friend once, while I was married, and she asked me if Jesus was enough for me and I answered no. I could not imagine, at the time, Him providing me strength to endure, worth, value and peace admist my circumstances. I still struggle trusting in His goodness and love for me.  I have a hard time trusting anyone to love me. It's easy to love others. There are always people in need and looking for someone to care. It is much more difficult to trust someone to love you. Once you allow them a place.... what then? What happens if you grow to rely on them or you get comfortable and then it is taken away? I find myself even holding back with my creator. I don't want to need Him so much because it feels so vulnerable and terrifying.....my heart and my are reeling.

"For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God." 1 corinthians 1:18

"For you see your calling, brethren that not many wise according to the flesh not many mighty, not many noble, are called. But God has chosen the foolish things of the world to put to shame the wise, and God has chosen the the weak things of the world to put to shame the things that are mighty; and the base things of the world and the things which are despised God has chosen, and the things which are not, to bring to nothing the things that are, that no flesh should glory in His presence. But of Him you are in Christ Jesus, who became for us wisdom from God-and righteousness and sanctification and redemption-that, as it is written, He who glories, let him glory in the Lord." 1 cor. 1: 26-31

I love these verses because they give me reassurance that God did not make a mistake in choosing me, the greatest of sinners, as one of His own. He is only following through with what He said he would do...choose the weak, broken, and unworthy. I was reading Jude today and realized that I am no different then the men and women he is addressing. I have rejected authority, served myself, grumbled, flattered people to gain advantage and walked according to my own lusts. I find myself reading through the word a little intimidated by my massive failure to live rightly and overcome the enemy each day. I even hear my thoughts say, "Lord, how can I escape hell, when I am such as these?" As usual I read on and find the answer, "But you, BELOVED, building yourselves up on your most holy faith, praying in the Holy Spirit, KEEP yourselves in the LOVE of GOD, looking for the MERCY of our Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal life." Jude 1:20-21  It again comes back to faith. Faith that He is who He says He is and I am saved only because of what He has done. This is the GOOD NEWS. There is for sure a hell and I deserve it no doubt because I am wretched and a hypocrite if I claim anything other than the mercy of Christ. I am so thankful for my savior. I am so thankful that He is my hope, all glory and honor  to Him!

"Now to Him who is able to keep

 you from stumbling,

 And to present you faultless 

Before the presence of His glory with

 exceeding joy,  

To our God and Savior,

 Who alone is wise,

Be glory and majesty,

Dominion and power,

Both now and forever.

Amen"   

Jude 1:24-25

Trials=God's blessings!

Is it raining, little flower? 

Be Glad of rain; 

too much sun would wither one; 

It will shine again. 

The clouds are very dark, it's true; 

But just behind them shines the blue.

Are you weary, tender heart? 

Be glad of pain:

In sorrow, sweetest virtues grow,

As flowers in rain. 

God watches, and you will have sun,

When clouds their perfect work have done.

-Lucy Larcom

What if the parable of five talents was a metaphor for pain and struggle? If we are dealing with a heavenly currency what would God use to make us more like Him and prepare our hearts for a world without sin? 

When I spend time with the Lord we hike and listen to Ben Howard. We don't have to chat much because He has created all things to mimic His character and I grow to know Him more deeply by just opening my eyes to what is around me. The struggle I go through to get to the top of that mountain get's easier the more I discipline myself to do it, and the more I do it the better I feel. Despite it's obvious benefits I struggle to commit and be consistent. It is the same with spending time in the word, and washing my mind of all the lies of this world and filling it with truth. I feel better after and I feel empowered to battle on and seek righteousness. You would think that this would keep me starving for more, and eager each day to dive into this weapon that the Lord has given me, but quite the contrary actually. I have many seasons in which I completely avoid. The faithfulness of God is the pain and the fire in which He bestows upon me to keep me close and hungry. In nature to much sun shine will wither the flower, and to much rain will wash it away, but the perfect combination of both produces fields of wildflowers and are we not more valuable to the Lord than the flower? He is the great "I am" and all things are Father filtered and in this we must trust. He knows exactly how much "talents" we need to prepare us for eternity. This world is but a breath and a vapor. I implore you today to find rest in His word from what you are battling and waring against. He will meet you with His peace and mercy. Do not be discouraged by the trials you face because He says...."For those whom the Lord loves He Disciplines, and scourges every son He receives." Hebrews 12:6 He is trusting you with the five talents. He is teaching you how to store up blessings where they matter. 

"My grace IS sufficient for you." 2 corinthians 12:9

"Never change God's facts in to hopes and prayers but simply accept them as realities, and you will find them to be powerful as you believe them." H.W. Webb Peploe

His grace IS sufficient. He doesn't promise it will be, it just IS. Wow, what a reality to swallow. In our brokenness, loneliness, hard marriages, difficult jobs, financial struggles, health problems and loss of loved ones His grace IS enough. What does that mean? What does enough look like? Job struggled, he complained, and he felt hopeless but yet He was without sin. So how does "sufficient grace" manifest in our lives? What are we called to believe in, or for, and how do we walk that out so that He and others know we believe what He says? I looked up the word "grace" and one of the definitions said, "A state of being protected or sanctified by the favor of God." I found it fitting. In our complaining, in our lacking and our sin we are protected by His limitless favor, being sanctified by His grace through our struggles. What an incredible protection He offers His children and if we accept we feel secure and hopeful despite ourselves and our circumstances. One of my favorite musicians, Jason Gray, talks all about this in his song "Remind Me Who I am". Is it not true that when we forget who we are in God's grace that we find ourselves in the greatest pits of despair?  I know it has rang true in my life and it is only He who can give hope and freedom and outside of that protection it feels like hell (or what I imagine it to be).
I often pray that God would stamp eternity on my eyes and that my focus would be on forever with Him and less on this world. Are we not just blades of grass, here today and gone tomorrow? Why then do I spend so much time and energy on that which is temporary? I want freedom, and I'm sure that it exist somewhere inside of faith. It is in that faith that we believe what God says and simply accept it regardless of how far fetched and unattainable it feels and seems. I want to believe that I am beautiful, valuable, lovable, worthy and righteous because He says so not because I am skinny, I work hard, I'm accomplished, I behave or because others say so. I want the faith of a mustard seed, that believes that He loves me. If I could just trust in that, knowing His character, then I would already have more than enough. When my brain is tempted to go to 'the grass is greener place'  I will focus on all that is noble, pure, right and holy (Philippians 4:8) and remind myself that it is the discipline of faith that brings me to a place of contentment and sufficiency. What a loving and gracious God.

"I implore you to not give in to despair. It is dangerous temptation, because our Adversary has refined it to the point that it is quite subtle. Hopelessness constricts and withers the heart, rendering it unable to sense God's blessing and grace. It also causes you to exaggerate the adversities of life and makes your burdens seem too heavy to bare. Yet God's plans for, and His ways of bringing about His plans, are infinitely wise." -Madame Guyon

I know in my head that I am not the only one struggling and battling against hopelessness, but how isolated I feel by it. Faith and Wisdom are the friends I wish I hung out with more, but I tend to allow my insecurities to keep me from calling them. They seem so out of my league and to busy to deal with my weakness and hesitation. Now Jesus, He seems to be a little easier on my conscience, but I fight to believe that because otherwise I got nothing. What will He say about my anger and frustration? How can the potter ask the pot to be anything other than the pot He created it to be? Especially, after the pots been used, and cracked, and weathered by the many washings. I cannot reconcile in my mind the expectations that loom over me. I'm not offended that I have to be obedient, I'm frustrated that He won't cure me of my lust, selfishness, insecurities, and pride.  The God of the universe who created it in less than a week seems, in my tiny brain, to be a spectator to my sin. The natural progression, of course, is to assume one self a failure and therefore unlovable. The Adversary triumphs because I'm caught in a stalemate. Inevitably, He will rescue me for the billionth time from my weak mind and consume my heart. I'm waiting with the lump in my throat and the shame on my shoulders. My hopelessness takes seed, in this cycle, that I long to overcome and only have the memory to fuel my 'victorious living'. Oh Father, why do you tarry? What is Your brilliant mind trying to work in to my heart? Why am I so deaf and stubborn?

There is this one thing that has become 'the thing' that taints all other things. This thing, is the most effective of weapons against my heart in the enemy's hands. In the hands of my savior it's the thing that keeps me so closely dependent upon His grace and His mercy. This thing is the vain of my existence, the thing that paralyzes me to hope against the odds and to venture out in bravery. This thing, I hate, is the thing that I never asked for but am reminded of by one right after the other. Repetition is is the most successful of ideologies because it resembles a hammer that never tires until it's job is complete. It's the one thing that I cannot seem to shake or overcome. Lord, cure me, take me home, take away this one thing...take away my humanity. Take away my struggle against my flesh!

"My God will meet all your needs according to His riches in Christ Jesus." Philippians 4:19

PERSPECTIVE.........

Daily I read the devotional "Streams in The Desert" and I am often amazed at how it can reach in to me every single time as though the Lord had written my life's struggle for each daily encouragement. If I were to speak freely and honestly it's difficult for me to hold on to the truth in Philippians 4:19. I find myself ravenous for MORE; more love, more excitement, more purpose and even more of Him. I feel like He is too far away and He has left me behind only with love letters to remind me of who He is, but they are a poor substitution for the real longing I have to be home with Him. My mind repeats mantra's of His promises in hopes that I will gain perspective and return to the faith that I know is really my only hope. I know better. I know truth and I know Him and yet my heart longs desperately and deeply for more. I want Him to rescue me, again. Emanuel, be with me, be closer than near. I know that it's in the midst of struggle and suffering that we are able to fully appreciate the tenderness and love that Christ alone gives. Today is one of those days.....I'm clinging with fingertips to what I know to be truer than my feelings, His word.
"Therefore humble yourself under the mighty hand of God that He may exalt you in due time, casting all your care upon Him, for He cares for you. Be sober, be vigilant, because your adversary the devil walks about like a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour. Resist him, STEADFAST in the faith, knowing that the same sufferings are experienced by your brotherhood in the world. But may the God of all grace, who called us to His eternal glory by Christ Jesus, after you have suffered a while, perfect, established, strengthen, and settle you. To Him be the glory and the dominion forever and ever. Amen." 1 Peter 5:6-11.
The lord is establishing and strengthening me. I hope to feel more settled in my mind and heart with the renewed knowledge that He CARES for me. I wish that I could believe once and for all, but instead it's a battle. There is so much to fight against and to remember. Ironically the battle looks much more like a surrender than a war. In my need, in my want I have to reach out and lay it down. I close my eyes to the circumstances that are before me and instead I remember who He is and who He says I am and if I am willing He will provide me with the faith I need for today.

"What a source---"God"! What a supply----"his glorious riches"! What a channel---"Christ Jesus"! It is your heavenly priviledge to trust "all your needs" to "his glorious riches," and to forget "your needs" in the presence of " his....riches." In His great love, He has thrown open to you His exhaustive treasury. Go in and draw upon HIm in simple childlike faith, and you will never again have the need to rely on anything else. C. H. M. -streams in the desert.

Romans 8:26 'We do not know what we ought to pray for.

         I prayed for strength, and then I lost awhile all sense of nearness, human and divine; The love I leaned on failed and pierced my heart, the hands I clung to loosed themselves from mine; but while I swayed weak, trembling, and alone, the everlasting arms upheld my own.
         I prayed for light; the sun went down in clouds, the moon was darkened by a misty doubt, the stars of heaven were dimmed by earthly fears, and all my little candle flames burned out; but while I sat in shadow; wrapped in night, the face of Christ made all the darkness bright.
         I prayed for peace, and dreamed of restful ease, a slumber free from pain, a hushed repose; above my head the skies were black with storm, and fiercer grew the onslaught of my foes; but while the battle raged, and wild winds blew, I heard His voice and perfect peace I knew.
         I thank you, Lord, You were too wise to heed my feeble prayers,and answer as I sought, since these rich gifts Your bounty has bestowed have brought me more than all I asked or thought; giver of good, so answer each request with Your own giving, better than my best.          -Annie Johnson Flint

I am convinced that I will never understand, this side of heaven, how we ought to pray or the importance of it to our faith. The "lord's Prayer" hardly seems like an adequate model for us to live by when we are to pray without ceasing and our prayers are the very incense before God's throne. Do not misunderstand, I love prayer. I love that we get to talk with The Great I am, the King of Kings without fear or reservation. I love that we can offer prayer to others as hope, during hopelessness, and that it really carries its weight. I love that prayer has many dimensions and can change our hearts as we are lamenting for someone else's. I just want to know more about it, and have a greater understanding of what the Lord intended in its design.   It seems that often, if not always, prayer is the predecessor to all the miracles done by the disciples in the new testament. Oh what I would give to converse with just one of them, preferably Peter, because there are so many other things I would like to ask him. I want to get what he finally understood, that changed him from being denying Peter to Peter who hung upside down on the cross. Also, I relate to Peter. I seem to be an instrument of satan more often than I would like to admit. I fall short and I'm quick to speak, slow to listen and impulsive in my behavior. People, might have said the same things of us. I love the Lord so much and yet I often make Him look the fool for choosing me. It breaks my heart. Prayer is such a relief, a gift for me, because God understands my weakness and my heart. I feel like I can get on my knees before Him and love someone rightly, wholly, when I have failed to love them again and again in real life to my everlasting shame. I want more of this and less of selfish, weak, inconsistent Theresa. I want to grow in my prayer life and be more effective in my love for others. This is my prayer.

A day of yes, confession and great laughter!

If you tell me Christian commitment is a kind of thing that has happened to you once and for all like some kind of spiritual plastic surgery, I say go to, go to, you're either pulling the wool over your own eyes or trying to pull it over mine. Every morning you should wake up in your bed and ask yourself: "Can I believe it all again today?" No, better still, don't ask it till after you've read The New York Times, till after you've studied that daily record of the world's brokenness and corruption, which should always stand side by side with your Bible. Then ask yourself if you can believe in the Gospel of Jesus Christ again for that particular day. If your answer's always Yes, then you probably don't know what believing means. At least five times out of ten the answer should be No because the No is as important as the Yes, maybe more so. The No is what proves you're human in case you should ever doubt it. And then if some morning the answer happens to be really Yes, it should be a Yes that's choked with confession and tears and. . . great laughter.” 

― Frederick Buechner

I met with an old friend today and amidst our conversation I was flooded with the reality of God's unconditional mercy and grace towards His creation. The journey of sanctification never ceases to remind me of how much has been sacrificed for the church as a whole and me as an individual. There are so many different things upon this earth that far exceed my understanding and even my imagination that I struggle deep within on God's purpose in it all; psychosis specifically and tragedy and sickness more broadly. I approach it with Him as a child would their father and questions flow between us. Mine are more of the "why" and "how" genre and His are more of the "who" nature. I refer to God's conversation with Job in Job 9:14-15, "How then can I answer Him, and choose my words to reason with Him? For though I were righteous, I could not answer Him; I would beg mercy of my Judge." Then in Job 38 when God responds to Job, "Where were you when I laid the foundations of the earth? Tell me, if you have understanding. Who determined its measurements? Surely you know!" I love God's sense of humor in this verse because He is light heartedly making Job aware of the magnitude of difference between their positions and yet answering in love nonetheless. I realize the better question to ask is what is my role in all of this suffering  and how can I serve and love most effectively according to His purpose and will.  

How then Lord can I help my friend struggling with the things of the mind.. sanity, reality verses delusions, chaos and confusion? Most of theses things are far above my created nature to understand or even process and yet I know that you are the one who puts wisdom in the mind and gives understanding to the heart (job 38:36-37) I listened to my friend recount her story and I was reminded of C.S. Lewis' book "The Boy and His Horse." Toward the end of the story Aslan is talking with the boy and He says that he only discusses  each person's journey (sanctification) with them and that we must ask the other if we want to know about their personal experience of the situation.  I loved this idea because it just supports our need for one another as a body and that each of us gain a different understanding of God's character and holiness through our own personal experience. I am often guilty of putting God in a small box that I think I can explain and control, but today I realized He is far beyond what I could dream. He is the only one who has an understanding of reality and it is only through the blood of Christ that I am privy to that reality and spared from insanity. I have had many mentally ill patient's as a nurse and being of sane mind is something to truly value and be thankful for. So, although I have no greater understanding of the why's and how's I am a little closer to the who. "fear of the Lord is the beginning of all wisdom". There is nothing more terrifying than the realization of how holy He is and how unworthy we are, and nothing more relieving of those fears then the understanding of who He is and what He has sacrificed.