Sold Out

Floored. Washed over with a flood of Holy Ghost power. That's where five o'clock on a Wednesday evening finds me after stumbling upon a treasure trove of Keith Green material on YouTube.

Keith Green poked his way into my life when I was around twelve years of age. I had asked Christ into my heart at four. I remember doing it. But when I was in those tender, who-am-I years, I remember Christian music was a big deal. I am a words person. I love lyrics. Keith's songs told whole Bible stories and, while I am sure they were too long for some people, I hung on every syllable. Sitting here on my beige couch in a suburb of Nashville, Tennessee some thirty years later, I found tears gathering as I watched Keith address a huge crowd mobbed together in the 1982 California sunshine.

Though I had many years and a whole heapin' helpin' of life experiences ahead of me, Keith's take-no-prisoners, straight-ahead approach rang every bell in my spirit. I was already a radical. I was already with Keith in spirit, though I had a lot of maturing yet to do.

Over the years my radicalism softened. It melted under the heat of tough circumstances. It withered under the weight of other people's doubts. I let their unbelief crush my wide-eyed belief. I let the world, the flesh and the devil run straight off with my sold-out sincerity. With my radical love for Jesus Christ went my joy. With my joy went my strength.

Not too long ago I blogged that God had shown me that he would not be taking my temper as he does not do a-la-carte sin removal. He is after ALL of me. Today, I feel as if "Part Two" of that lesson has been driven home. When I give ALL to Him in sold-out, excited, championship game and I'm on the winning team joy, He gives me an overwhelming sense of His presence, His power, His love, and HIS P.E.A.C.E.

But For The Trees

A series of events happened this weekend to draw back a curtain in my mind. I was able to see that, in one area of my life, I was not seeing the forest for the trees. I had spent so much emotional effort wrestling with the trees, constantly trying to prune back areas that would grow back overnight, blocking my path, always coordinating efforts with other people to move dead limbs from the roadways of progress, even dressing the  trees to make them look like they either were not there or were a part of the décor of my heart and life's work. I even figuratively poured green paint on some of the deadest of the dead to set them out as living for the world to see. I am sure many people were laughing at or pitying my efforts. Still others were too busy writing their own happy endings with dead branches to notice my silly maneuvers.

I have learned a couple of things, both this weekend and in recent weeks. I identified one of the densest forests in my life. Now, with God's help, taking one day at a time, I will navigate this forest. I will emerge victorious. I feel God telling me to do what Abraham did, and call the things that are not (yet) as if they already were! No more tree dressing. I will serve the Lord with overwhelming joy and I WILL ENJOY MY LIFE while I am waiting for the fulfillment of what I feel the Lord laid on my heart that He would do.

The second thing I have learned in recent weeks as a product of various trials, is so simple it will scare you that it took me nearly five decades to learn. No matter what comes, no matter what other people do or fail to do, I CAN ENJOY MY LIFE. Hey, it's part of my birthright as a believer. I can have overwhelming peace, and I can B.A.S.K. in my Father's love, whether or not others approve of me, whether or not I have failed to the point that the consequences are daunting. He will never leave me. He will never stop loving me. HE. IS. ENOUGH. His acceptance, His affirmation, IS ENOUGH. I don't have to be miserable, I don't have to come and go emotionally based on my circumstances or whether or not someone else finds me valuable. I CAN and I WILL continually look for the good in my situation and in my life and ENJOY serving God. All while believing Him for the things He has assured me of that I do not see yet.

The photo I have attached is a line of trees here in Williamson County last evening at sunset. I love a winter sunset. The lack of glorious leaves makes for a beautiful stark contrast with the colors of impending night. You might say that what looks like a curse (loss of foliage) becomes a blessing under the shower of God's beauty at sunset. He does all things well, and He makes all things beautiful in his time, as a female singer on Matt's lullaby cassette I played for him as an infant trilled so softly as he slept in perfect innocence way back when. God has restored my innocence. His acts of redemption are COMPLETE.

Gliding

Not too long ago someone asked me if the title of my blog was a constant reminder of the hurt I suffered a couple of years ago. The answer was an unequivocal "No!". That's because the miscarriage pushed me back into the waters of writing, of expressing myself. It's almost as if all of the words that were pent up inside of me, my observations of all of life's beauty, anguish, beautiful anguish and stunning complexity, as layered and as fascinating as the One who created it all have come spilling and leaking out within this blog ever since. I am at that reflective age. What do I want to have done with my life and my talents when I am laying there, welcoming the angels who will carry me to my eternal home? I looked at jobs online today, watching a myriad of possible lives flip past my mind's window. I saw myself caring for other people's children, selling clothes, helping an elderly person with their dishes. None of that is bad. None of that is me.

When it comes to my writing, I only want to do a couple of things. First up, glorify God. He is amazing all of the time. He is loving in so many layers of so many colors my mind cannot possibly take it all in. Secondly, I want to affirm other people. That pretty much just leaves my blog, feature writing for a Christian or feel-good publication or some sort of Christian fiction. Yep, there's no big money in my personal future. And that feels good. Really, really good.

Beth Moore (who has not endorsed this blog, or this housewife) says in her recent lecture series on the book of Deuteronomy (and I am strictly paraphrasing here) that when we let God bring us out of our personal Egypts, or places of bondage, we should let Him take us in to our own personal promised land (place of incredible spiritual fruitfulness). If we don't we will find ourselves some place we "don't even recognize." I'm so there!!! Okay. God is bringing me out of anxiety and depression. I can't stop there! I must let Him bring me in. Thanks, Beth. You don't know me but you touched my life this week!

If it seems that this post is rambling around the county that's because this post is rambling around the county. I hope you enjoy being you today and every day. Don't let anyone else define you. If someone else looks at what you are doing and finds it to be not quite enough, just laugh to yourself. You are not put on this earth to look good to them. Your life is your gift from God and your gift back to Him. Listen to Him! He is speaking to you TODAY. A few days ago I was down at our itty bitty neighborhood ponds, trying hard to forget that there was a roaring parkway filled with cars at my back. I was grabbing some peace in an activity-charged suburb. I watched some Canadian geese line up to slide into the water for a swim. I had my camera trained on them as they eased, one by one, into the water. They look awkward on the ground, but once the waddling stopped at water's edge, the gliding began. That's what it looks like when you are in God's plan for your life.

 

Seize the Day...and Its Blessings

Nine years and some change ago, it happened that I celebrated the tenth anniversary of my marriage. My husband told me to sit in what was in that house (we live elsewhere now) what I affectionately called the "ditchen"... a kitchen with tiny, den-like sitting area attached, and to close my eyes. He placed a warm, wiggly puppy on my lap. I was truly surprised.

I held the little dachshund for two hours without letting go. Nearly ten years later, I am still in love with him. Little Charlie is still a staple of our household, close to its heartbeat. He makes it a warm place to come home to. He is a tie back to the time when my teenaged boys spent time with me, and enjoyed some of the same things I do. He is a loving, loyal, consistent presence at the center of my world.

Throughout the week that he spent in and out of the vet clinic, at times seeming to hate the very life that still clung to him, at others seeming to hold onto it by the merest thread, I had a tender experience. I have heard people say that when they believe death is imminent, their entire life flashes before their eyes. This past week, Charlie's played out before mine, in images that were poignant, leaving sore spots on my soul. I remember me, Matt, aged seven and Jon, aged three, out on a pond on a paddleboat. Charlie, frantic not to be left behind, jumped into the pond and began churning his little legs toward us in the water. "Move to him fast," Gary was yelling from the shore. He was afraid the little dachshund legs would fail Charlie and we would lose him. I remember another cabin experience. Charlie jumped from a fourteen- foot embankment when he saw us loading into the car, rather than taking the three minute walk back the way he had come, again afraid he would be left behind. Sometimes love is irrational, we have learned. I remembered photos of him at the end of a dock while everyone fished. I thought of how he ran from us after we had moved into this house eight years ago. "He is acting like he doesn't love us," Matt said, disappointed. Not so. He just needed about twenty minutes of running around time. Every time he ever made a jail break, and that was often in his early years, he would run for approximately twenty minutes, then head on home. That seemed to be his aerobics timeframe. Just a few minutes ago I remembered how I made a ten hour drive by myself to visit my grandmother when she was sick and seemed close to death. She lived for another year or so, but she was bedridden at this time. I had Charlie with me for company. He was a comfort to me in a truly dark time.

In the emotional and often scheduled chaos of life, I have taken Charlie for granted. I will NEVER do that again. I almost lost him this past week. The grief that I wore like a bulky bathrobe for several days was suffocating. The pain was almost physical. My husband, not an emotional person by any stretch of the imagination, was hurting too. This was something new for me to witness. I learned a valuable life lesson, one I hope will not fade. We simply cannot take for granted the beautiful gifts God has given us, as most will slip through our fingers at some point in time. We have to celebrate them while they are here.