4.30.2009

What's Up

I'm just going to go ahead and bullet point this out for you, because otherwise I might start whining again:
  • I cut my hair, like way off for me. Just at my chin, but I kept the layers and bangs. I'm still getting used to it. The funniest part about this is that I am learning how to use mousse, and my natural inclination is to use way to much and, well, that's just a little gross
  • I'm reading Harry Potter for the first time, and I'm shocked how much I'm enjoying it. At this rate I'll read the 7 HP books faster than I read the 4 Twilight books.
  • I'm currently embroiled in a blood feud with a crop of dandelions in my yard. I need another hose that will reach the other side of the yard, then those bitches are mine
  • I've landscaped my front yard, with the help of some people with greener thumbs than I, and so far everything is still alive. Which is nothing short of a gardening miracle.
  • I'm obsessed with Property Virgins, obsessed.
  • I'm thinking about running. Like a race. Just thinking about it. I need to get myself in shape, at least better shape. It's disgusting. I'm hoping setting a goal like this might help me. Now there is only the pesky issue of making time to actually train...
  • Speaking of time, my schedule seems to have gotten a little out of hand lately. I seem to be booking up and just focusing on moving from task to task. I'm pretty sure this is a result of the battle of the wills I'm attempting to have with God right now. It annoys me that I haven't learned this lesson yet.
  • The battle of the wills I'm having is coming to it's breaking point soon, I can feel it. I'm pretty sure the only thing that's keeping me from giving in and submitting already is my stubborn need to keep piling on the to do's and not be obedient in my time with God. I find myself angry and wondering when the hell I'll learn already.
  • I've been sleeping with my windows open most of this week. I LOVE it, but it makes it hard to get out of bed in the morning when I'm all snuggled down under the covers.
That's it, that's about all that's going on with me. Aren't you glad I broke up the pissing and moaning posts?

4.27.2009

All I can Say

All I can say is that I'm sorry.
That I still think about it, that I still see it in my head.
If it was my choice, it would all be erased.
As if I never saw, heard, experienced these things that are scarred on the back of my lids.
But I'm hoping, praying and pleading that I will turn my eyes from these things and turn them to you.
These things that knock me down, leave me gasping for breath.
You who saved me and saves me still.
You who I am hiding from, refusing to speak or listen to.
As if there is anything that is hidden from you at all.
All I can say is that I'm sorry.
Lord I'm tired
So tired from walking
And Lord I'm so alone
And Lord the dark
Is creeping in
Creeping up
To swallow me
I think I'll stop
Rest here a while

And didn't You see me cry'n?
And didn't You hear me call Your name?
Wasn't it You I gave my heart to?
I wish You'd remember
Where you sat it down

Chorus:
And this is all that I can say right now
And this is all that I can give

Bridge:
I didn't notice You were standing here
I didn't know that
That was You holding me
I didn't notice You were cry'n too
I didn't know that
That was You washing my feet
-David Crowder

4.24.2009

Compassion Trip to India

Anne Jackson over at flowerdust.net is leaving with several other bloggers on a Compassion International trip to India, Kolkutta to be exact.
That's why this is on the top right corner of my blogity blog:

anne-hope-in-calcutta

You can follow the posts of all the bloggers that are going by clicking India, Kolkutta . Angie, Pete and Anne all write on blogs I follow and I can't wait to read about what they're seeing/doing in India. Check it out, and pray for them and the trip.

4.20.2009

The only balm

I read this on ye olde forum today and this quote in particular took my breath away.

That first service was excruciating, in that it seemed to tear all wounds
wide open, and it was profoundly comforting, in that it seemed to offer the only
possible balm.

What I've been so afraid of, what I've been hiding so desperately from God is a wound that deeply longs to be healed. It is an obsession and distraction that only serves to keep me at a distance from him. But the wound has healed a bit, improperly at best, but there has been a scabbing over, ripping open, and scabbing over process going on for years. This pursuit that God is in, to claim the very deepest and darkest region of my heart hurts. It hurts.
So I run, so I hide, so I go deaf and mute, blinding myself to the only possible balm.

These scars wouldn't be so hidden

If I could just look myself in the eye. If I stopped hiding behind this thick black thunder cloud and all of my whispy and pathetic excuses.
If if if if if if if if if if.
I could go on for hours, days. I've gone on about it for years.
Sometimes, it feels like I inflict these scars upon myself so I'll have something interesting to talk about. But I'm getting bored with the melodrama of not being able to let it go.
I had to take another way to work today, because every single avenue to work was blocked by accidents. Stupid mistakes and sometimes outright intentionally bad choices these drivers made.
I was thinking this morning about how often I've blocked myself from the work I feel so deeply called to do because of my bad choices and cowardly evasive manuevers.
I feel like I've been swimming through molasses mixed with honey and mud lately. I just can't seem to break the surface.
I know why. I know the solution. But I'm glued here, cemented in place by habits cultivated and nurtured over years of avoiding my self inflicted scars.

Tomorrow morning a friend and I are going to start holding each other accountable for getting up early and spending time alone with God. Basically a call/text to make sure the other is out of bed and on her feet. A week ago today I confessed more crazy to someone then I ever have before. These moments have been like a brief breaking of the surface, reminding me that while I feel all pissy and anti-social I need to reach out and allow others to reach in. Because without that, I'm just drowning alone.

4.19.2009

Humility in Service

I read this on a blog today. Loved it and wanted to share.

Humility in Service

Mighty God,

I humble myself for faculties misused,
opportunities neglected,
words ill-advised,
I repent of my folly and inconsiderate ways,
my broken resolutions, untrue service,
my backsliding steps,
my vain thoughts.

O bury my sins in the ocean of Jesus' blood
and let no evil result from my fretful temper,
unseemly behaviour, provoking pettiness.

If by unkindness I have wounded or hurt another,
do thou pour in the balm of heavenly consolation;
If I have turned coldly from need, misery, grief,
do not in just anger forsake me:
If I have withheld relief from penury and pain,
do not withhold thy gracious bounty from me.

If I have shunned those who have offended me,
keep open the door of thy heart to my need.

Fill me with an over-flowing ocean of compassion,
the reign of love my motive,
the law of love my rule.

O thou God of all grace, make me more thankful, more humble;
Inspire me with a deep sense of my unworthiness arising from
the depravity of my nature, my omitted duties,
my unimproved advantages, thy commands violated by me.

With all my calls to gratitude and joy may I remember
that I have reason for sorrow and humiliation;

O give me repentance unto life;

Cement my oneness with my blessed Lord,
that faith may adhere to him more immovably,
that love may entwine itself round him more tightly,
that his Spirit may pervade every fibre of my being.

Then send me out to make him known to my fellow-men.

Trying

But do not distress yourself with dark imaginings. Many fears are born of fatigue and loneliness.Beyond a wholesome discipline, be gentle with yourself.
I read this on Scott Will's blog today. I love his blog, so often what he is writing is somehow exactly what I needed at the moment.

I am not gentle with myself, and I know that at least one of you feels exactly the same way. I am increasingly less gentle with myself, and with the summary of my worth when I am tired or sick. I know these things about myself. But that doesn't matter in the middle of a torrential assault of verbal disparaging.
So I am trying, to let go of the dark imaginings. I am trying, to hold on to the imaginings of light; to the clear evidence of light.

I'm trying.
Go placidly amid the noise and the haste, and remember what peace there may be in silence.

4.15.2009

These two things

God has worked out a lot of junk from my heart. I will always be a work in progress, but there were a couple junk emergencies when I first met Jesus that just had to be urgently addressed.
But through the years, there has always been something, two things really, that I've declared as mine. "This is mine" I would say, "You can fix and refine all that other stuff, but this is mine."
These two things that are connected and buried down in the deepest and darkest corners of my heart. These two things that I have, to date, absolutely refused to surrender and lay at the feet of the cross. These two things that I hold in steel reinforced death grips and say, "Anything but this Lord, ANYTHING but this."

These two things that bring me such sorrow and mourning, these two things that have cut me to the core. These two things that I carry on my shoulders and shove down my throat with food I am not hungry for.
I've been trying to spend some quality time with Jesus. Consistent, quality, intentional time talking and listening, praising and worshiping him on my own. Alone at my dining room table.
While I knew that when you spend time alone, asking for God to search you and heal you, forgive you, of anything you're holding back, that he will. I was not even a little prepared for the consequences.
I was not prepared how ripped open and raw I would feel. I was not prepared for the beeline God would make for this last vestige of my former life. The life I was supposed to lay down at the foot of the cross and not pick up again. He spoke to me, he came into my dreams, he floats up to me in songs and conversations, he just won't let it go. Much as I am still refusing to let go of my grip on these two things that will only bring me death.
I was not prepared for the fear that would immediately grip me and how panicked I would get to control something, anything, for even a moment to dull the razor sharp edges loosening my grip on these two things would bring.
I was not prepared for the repulsion that would rise like bile in my throat at the thought of the alarm going off at 5am for prayer and worship with God. I was not prepared for the pissy attitude that descended like a cloak to block out the sun.

These two things...I'm going to have to let them go. I know, I know that only good things, only pure and righteous things can come from letting God take these two things I was never meant to carry. Now, I just have to loosen my grip, and let them go.

4.09.2009

You

In between the breaths I don't take
In the words I don't speak
Covered by the tears I don't cry and in the midst of the arms that are empty
I find you
I find you whole and complete, shiny and made new

Carried on the wind I can't see and in the clouds I can't touch
On the tip of my tongue and the curl of my lips
Written on a blank page with the pen I don't hold
Is your name
Your name that I speak without ever making a sound

Drowning in the bottom of alcohol I don't drink
Burning at the end of a cigarette I don't smoke
Riding on the back of the one I do not kiss
Is your memory
Your memory that comes in waves like my grief

By not speaking I try to make it not so. By not breathing I try to ease past the times that I think of you most. By not crying I hold together the shattered edges. By not writing I am holding back the avalance that carries your smell, your laughter, you

4.02.2009

You got me begging you for mercy

Mercy: compassionate or kindly forbearance shown toward an offender, an enemy, or other person in one's power; compassion, pity, or benevolence

Last night at bible study we talked about mercy. There was a question that Beth Moore posed in the homework about mercy and trust. She asked about a time that we had a hard time trusting someone and if/how we showed them mercy in that situation.
I may have gone on a tangent. Maybe.
I talked about how I get into conversations with people a lot about mercy. I wonder how much mercy is enough mercy. Is there such a thing? At what point do we cut people off, tell them "Sorry, you have used up your allotted amount of mercy good day. I said good day!"

I seem to fight myself about mercy. My natural inclination is to cross my arms and stomp my feet. Because I have some wounds and they're all so serious and terrible, poor me wounds. But they often push me to not pursue relationships, and to certainly anticipate the dramatic demise of any relationship at any given time.
However, there is this other part of me. The part that has healed. The part that hears the call for mercy so clearly. I know that mercy, that relationships and forgiveness healed some of my wounds faster than anything else. So I can't possibly think to withhold it from other people. I also think about how God forgives and the abundant amount of grace and mercy that he bestows on us. I wonder, who exactly do I think I am to refuse something that God himself does not refuse?

I know there are places that say people can harden their hearts to God, and his mercy. But when does that happen? What's the magic number of stubborn stamps of the foot that cause God to say, "Ok...moving on. Good Day!" Because I don't know, do you? Don't you think that means we should err on the side of extending more grace, more mercy?
God is the ultimate judge on all these things. If we give mercy to someone that doesn't deserve it, God will take care of that (read them). If we refuse mercy to someone that deserved it, God will take care of that (read us).
I don't really know all the answers to this. I know that sometimes, showing mercy to someone can seem weak. But I'm really not interested in appearing strong. I'm interested in allowing God to work through me, extending mercy where there may be none. Because I know that it saves lives. I know that it draws people closer to a God that saves.
Matthew 5:7 Blessed are the merciful, for they shall receive mercy

1 Timothy 1:16 But I received mercy for this reason, that in me,
as the foremost, Jesus Christ might display his perfect patience as an
example to those who were to believe in him for eternal

James 2:13 13 For judgment is without mercy to one who has shown no mercy.
Mercy triumphs over judgment.