The passionate commitment of the Lord of Heaven's armies will make this happen...

I close my eyes and He brings the words... He shows me pictures throughout the day and woos me towards understanding... and He draws me into His affections so that I can walk ... but then comes the moments where He sits and looks at me... with that look... and I know that I have reached a place that He desires me to go deeper... to not just linger where language and expression mingle and dance and create pictures but to that place of story.. where He takes my hand and looks me in the eyes and asks of me to not just share stories but to dwell there ... to linger... to go deeper...

To close my eyes and go beyond the words.. into the emotions...

I so truly love the way that 1 Peter 2:10 captures the essence of a life of a people .. the people... the people of God... the new living translation puts it forth this way.... It is the picture of my life....

"Once you had no identity as  a people, now you are God's people. Once you had not received mercy but now you have received God's mercy."

I have touched that place... touched it in ways I wish that I hadn't ever had to....  touched what it meant to not be a person...

 To lack mercy... is to be faced with cruelty... it is to live with no compassion... it is to be at the hands of indifference...meanness.. tyranny..... where those that see you do not see you as human.. but see an object... a thing...  they are careless with a most precious treasure...

Lacking mercy is not a welcomed place... lacking mercy is a void so deep and dark and horrible that it penetrates the soul leaving one so very wanting..... so very wanting... the effects of which tear at the fabric of what makes one human...

We are now a people.. not just any people but a people belonging to God... we do now have mercy... where we hadn't had such we now do....

So the voice of Father came forward as I came to this place and He spoke... " If I have granted you mercy and called you my own.. may you never call yourself anything less..." With amazing love and incredible affection did those words wash over my being...

 He is so very full of mercy and yet I have not always  imparted that same mercy to myself... exacting myself to be more and to be further along at times instead of just resting in the knowledge and care of His amazing love....

I used to sit for hours dazed ... away... lacking the will to focus into life because I couldn't .. I couldn't stand the sorrow of the moments I walked... I would embrace a place of smoky non existence and move about my days and times but not know what it meant to engage in life... beyond the language of shut down I could barely breath and hated that I didn't stop ... plagued by life but not living...  life was a punishment... a curse...

The disconnect doesn't have to be that extreme... what points of ones heart does one allow to lay dormant ... what aspects of joy does one not allow to come forward...  I know the prison of a heart so sick with lack of hope that to arrive at each moment feels like the greatest of tasks...

The gift .. the immense gift we receive in Jesus is beyond anything I know how to convey... I have written about desiring other comforts and allowing others to rule over me...  I was left wanting by the comfort and destroyed by the reign .....  not so with Christ...  His reign and rule and comfort into my life only continues to bring forth more... that is the hope

Isaiah spoke so richly of it when it was written of Him.... There will be no end to the increase of His government or of peace.. on the throne of David and over his kingdom, to establish it and uphold it with justice and righteousness from then on and forevermore... and then I love how it is written in the living translation.... The passionate commitment of the Lord of Heaven's armies will make this happen...

No greater joy.. no finer kindness... oh my I was so not a person.. I so very much lacked mercy and He heard my cry and He made me His own and He granted unto me a mercy so rich.. so full... so amazing...  a mercy that carries upon it a beauty so very real and so very strong... and He continues daily to bring it all about... He continues to increase His rule and reign in my life... He continues to bring forth peace... and it is His passion.. His passionate commitment that makes it happen .... all day.. every day.. not dependent upon me or my efforts but upon His passionate commitment to ever increase in my life I can rest....

Whether it is remembering days of old when mercy was not even a concept I would have comprehended or dared to even fathom its existence to  living moments now in life that stretch and test and refine me, I stand... knowing that having received so much from Him I have been made His... and in being His daughter it is His passionate commitment that will carry me home...

There is nothing more grand ... it brings a joy to the day that nothing can touch no matter what the world seems to say... a whisper of truth turned into a roar of courage that proclaims liberty to the captive and binds up the brokenhearted... opening up a prison to them that are bound... to this end I walk my days more and more...   it is all about  His passionate commitment to bring an increase of His ways and His peace to the earth.... to you.. to me.... For His spirit is upon us to do this... to proclaim that mercy is very much the reality and we are His people .. His sons and His daughters...

No greater joy.. no finer kindness

Sanctuary

I had a visitation.. that had brought a realization that there was a God, that it had to do with Jesus Christ, the bible, the cross and that I was going to be led somewhere that He was going to help me know more of that which had happened in my life....

I found myself having been accepted to a Christian college... (having first made the phone call that I was Jewish would I even be allowed to come... oh so much I didn't realize back then... )  Upon acceptance I had signed up for this trip into the wilderness for ten days... 

Before the trip began I would be sitting on a black top parking lot doing my first ever bible study... and then upon getting into the mountains I would sing my first worship songs to the Lord...

"Lord prepare me to be a sanctuary pure and holy, tried and true, with thanksgiving I'll be a living sanctuary for you."  Those words were so sweet... the song so radiant within my heart... I would be given my first scripture verse ever from another person... He had begun a good work and the promise was that He would complete it...  HE... He would complete it.....  that piece of wood bark with that scripture still hangs on my wall almost twenty years later...

Today as I pondered this other work I'm writing.. the word Sanctuary kept coming to mind... and it led my heart and my mind down this path of wonderment... and remembrance... 

In the midst of it it was as if I was hearing Jesus singing the song to Father... that He was and is the sanctuary.. pure and holy... tried and true... with thanksgiving (for us.. .for those He loves) He promised forever to be a living sanctuary for Father and for us....

It was a beautiful and precious moment....

Then He brought me back to the day when a good friend sat across the room from me and spoke those words... "you will know where to go".... I will know where to go? In those moments I didn't comprehend what it was that he was saying... but within the next few days of personal ministry I would learn that where it was that he was showing me where to go was the connection to Father... to Father's heart... to a sanctuary that knows no bounds.. knows no limits....

It is in that place that I dwell... it is that place that I search for daily... it is that place that I wait for in moments of earth bound trial or tribulation... that safe place... that shadow.. that refuge.. that sanctuary...

To look up sanctuary.. you find words like "safety," "haven," "refuge," "holy"

I think what it truly means to me to have a sanctuary in Him... to have a safe place... to have a place and a refuge that I can abide in....  that no matter what happens or is happening in the world or my life or my family I can dwell in the shadow of the Most High God... that despite that which the world would bring into my path He has overcome it all and in so doing provided me the most perfect shelter from the storm... so that I too can rest .. He brings peace to my soul and restores me....

A sanctuary.. a fortress.... 

He draws me to trust in the unseen realm more fully than anything I could touch with my finger tips... and within those places I receive a grace that is stronger than anything I have ever stood on before...

Those words, " you will know where to go." Six little words were to change my life....  and link me to a place that would forever alter my heart...  

"For you have made the Lord, my refuge... Even the Most High your dwelling place." Psalm 91:7

That truth surrounds me as a song and blankets me with its strength....  I am never outside of His reach ... While tempest and toil  might surround me it doesn't get to overpower me... I am never outside of the palm of His hand... and when I can lay a hold and dwell in that place then it is always so very well with my soul....

We have the dog whisperer.. and this whisperer and that whisperer... But He and He alone whispers the strongest of comfort into my soul and when all that would desire to possess my emotions or will tries its hardest He always stands firm and perfectly strong.. bidding me to come into the arena of His sanctuary and dwell at His table forever more....

2 Corinthians 4:7-12

Amplified Bible (AMP)

However, we possess this precious treasure [the divine Light of the Gospel] in [frail, human] vessels of earth, that the grandeur and exceeding greatness of the power may be shown to be from God and not from ourselves.
We are hedged in (pressed) on every side [troubled and oppressed in every way], but not cramped or crushed; we suffer embarrassments and are perplexed and unable to find a way out, but not driven to despair;
We are pursued (persecuted and hard driven), but not deserted [to stand alone]; we are struck down to the ground, but never struck out and destroyed;
Always carrying about in the body the liability and exposure to the same putting to death that the Lord Jesus suffered, so that the [resurrection] life of Jesus also may be shown forth by and in our bodies.
For we who live are constantly [experiencing] being handed over to death for Jesus' sake, that the [resurrection] life of Jesus also may be evidenced through our flesh which is liable to death.
Thus death is actively at work in us, but [it is in order thatour] life [may be actively at work] in you.

The Kindnesses of the Wilderness... Lessons learned Part 1: It would have been legitimacy in what I could do but an illegitimate child I would have been

The picture of skeletons was what I woke up to this morning... one had duck tape over it's eyes... one had duck tape over it's mouth.... and one had duck tape binding it's hands... then there was a fourth skeleton... that skeleton had a golden rope wrapped around it's neck... and the Lord spoke and said that could have been you...... (that could have been me)

I knew what He was saying.... and the journey of the last years and especially the journey of this last season was brought into a depth within me that fell into my core..... these times are forming and fashioning me and in this time I walk more ever so close...... my eyes have seen and my heart has been made full and bound to His side is where I desire to tread.....

I've been carried around His neck whence my legs could not bare the wait to be walked upon and in that place my eyes were opened to a reality of being carried by Him that only continues to permeate into the fabric of my being.....

The skeletons... the skeletons... these not dry bones... these are those that for many a reason are blinded and muted and bound.... the golden necklace is worldly prizes... but in this case when Father spoke to me it was not worldly prizes .. although the prizes had worldly touches upon them... it was ministry.. ministry being looked at as a prize.. something to be grasped... something to attain to..... something to be possessed....

Without the kindnesses of the wildernesses I have walked through a while back I would be but that person.... identity in ministry.. in works.... legitimacy in what I could do but an illegitimate child... performance would have been my prison.... insecurity my shackles.....

Instead in this season I have walked within the reality of a prayer.... Father... other gods have ruled over me and I have wanted a king … other comforts I have sought … forgive me King of Kings and God over all creation... forgive me oh holiest of Comforters..... The One who is far more able to grant comfort....

In this place my being is saturated with peace... Because no longer am I limited to my capacity... no longer am I limited to that which I personally comprehend.... In abiding.. all is mine.... in abiding and dwelling not ownership not possession but by being dwelling ... by abiding.. I liken it to the dance... He in me and I in Him... 

It truly has been the most excellent kindnesses of God within the wilderness and while grateful to emerge... I have emerged leaning... leaning all the more... lessons of the wildernesses embraced....  upon Him and through His grace ever leaning....  I could go on and on.... weakness becoming strength because it is His... lack becoming full because of Him....  ignorance or lack of knowledge becoming wisdom because He possesses all....  and gives ever ever so freely.....

The Kindnesses of the Wildernesses.. Lessons learned Part 2: It would have been legitimacy in what I could do but an illegitimate child I would have been

I think of Moses' invitation to all... inclusive.... to the nation … come into the deep darknesses of God with me.. and they bid him go... out of fear they bid him go and come back to tell them.... as all powerful and somewhat terrifying as the deep darknesses of my Father are I desire to linger there... in His presence... in His midst.... To be known as His... to be identified as one whose God is with her.... His presence.. His display.. His character... His passions.. His desires... Him... He... possessed.... solely by His desires... His presence...

Again the congregation wanted a king.... their King had set the stars in their place and yet flesh cried out even if it meant slavery.... even if it meant servitude instead of sonship... they wanted to be told what to do.. they wanted to be like the other nations... Instead of THE NATION.... the nation whose “god” is the Lord of lords.... and King of Kings.....

Other nations saw it... saw it as they crossed the Jordan.. saw it as the walls of Jericho fell down... saw it as He went out before them... other nations saw it .. saw them... saw their God... the other nations knew and were terrified and yet those called to be His.. those that were His desired to be like the other nations..... intermingling with their cultures.. their comforts... while all the while.. having .. belonging.. being called to the One who formed all the nations and to whom all nations and tongues will bow....

I have been that person... I have been there....

And the years that all that was being peeled off were not pleasant.. they were painful.. they were full of sadness... they were lonely..... who I am kidding... there are still the days full of pain and sadness but time has taught me that they pass and that the comforts I might desire to reach out to upon the earth are all but too temporary.

So now in that place now I know beyond where I have ever known before where to go.. what to attach to.. and are there still the times my soul desires to attach to other things.. of course.. but now I know the riches of binding myself to the Most High... above all else... above all and anything I could or would ever do.... above anyone I could or would ever meet or spend time with.. above anything .. above anywhere.... He is creating within an understanding of the wealth of being a daughter.... and in this birthing of understanding I am watching as I perish no longer... for lack of understanding I perished.. but as understanding has come so has the Tree of Life and He has been firmly rooted and planted inside my inner most being......

So I praise Him for I am wonderfully and fearfully made.. and my soul knows it well..... and my soul knows it well...

His goodness .. His lovingkindness.. His shadow... His affections... His.. His … His... they follow me... they encamp about me... they shelter me.... not works... not things... not people.... Him... The Lord Most High.... ... who being God did not see equality with God as something to be grasped but laid down His life to serve.... He has shown me such a better way..... and this is the way …. I will walk in it.....

Permission

He reduced me to tears... He brought me to my knees and clinging to Him I just wept....  Holding onto the cloth of His garments in my hands ... leaning my whole weight into Him and just collapsing myself against Him....

His goodness .. His kindness had overwhelmed me.... and I was undone ..

So often aware of propriety and the correct way to behave... so so very often having felt the consequences of  something not going perfectly... so desperately performing life and expectations and failing miserably on the insides.. and at times the outsides too...

In these moments with Him I knew.. I knew the safety .. the affection.. the absolute unconditional love that He grants... and the strength of that love that filtered and flowed into my being...

In those moments He granted permission that I had never given to myself... He looked me in the eyes and with so much of that which He is He looked at me and seeing me He spoke for me to walk... and in those few but very powerful words permission was granted into my heart to be the me He created for me to be... Not a me that performed or a me that felt expectation but me.... not to apologize for me (as I so often felt that I needed to do ... apologize that I lived.. that I breathed..that I took up time...  that I whatever you will fill in the blank) but no longer feeling like a mistake that took up air the reality of being His co-heir and our Father's daughter saturated my soul... and soaked me... and filled me.. and I could feel the change it was bringing to bare.....

He does.. He changes us and changes us and changes us.. all by His perfecting love that looks at fear and casts it off far far away...

Again the acknowledgement that I am His and live in a land of grace and mercy flowed over me like living waters and I was washed in His tremendous flow of love.....

Father has bestowed such great love....

He appeared in the doorway and drew my eyes up to Himself.... stretching out His hand He beckoned me to release myself to Him....  We smiled... and in those moments I kept my eyes glued to Him ... to His strength.. to His hand...

It had been a while since we walked together and then we were there... and the moment I knew I was no longer seeing Him here but we were walking there I closed my eyes and took so many very deep breaths...

He motioned for me to sit down and like two old very dear friends we sat upon a blanket and just chatted... just chatted about everything....  listening to Him talk about the birds of the air and flowers of the field... listening to Him talk about everything and nothing... listening to His laughter... listening to Him.... just listening to Him... I love how well He knows us... I have a dear friend who when I get on the phone with her I usually ask her just to talk....  because I love hearing about her day.. and her life.. but beyond that I love the sound of her voice... it makes me happy... the sound of her voice makes me happy... and hearing about her life and what is happening while I get to hear her voice makes me all the happier... 

And as I sat there on the blanket I realized that was what He was doing... He was talking.. He was talking and telling me all these wonderful things because He knew that I just wanted to hear Him talk....  and while I could tell there would be things He would want me to hear... I knew those would be later... for now... now it was just about showing His joy and His delight in us.... and Him knowing me so well to know that simply by talking He was filling my heart with joy and peace and delight...

Oh I listened.... I listened and listened and listened... I could have sat there forever just listening and the thought that one day I will only served to increase the joy.... 

The perfect moments passed by and then I laid down on the blanket and kept listening to Him talk away... I just wanted Him to talk and talk and talk and never stop.....  I must have fallen asleep for I woke to the most beautiful of fragrances...  and He was still there...  There was so much rejuvenation in the air... and it was so easy to focus on Him and be with Him....  The cares of the world had faded so quickly in this place ... and without words I knew what He had wooed me to understand.... 

There was not one iota of chastisement... just the most beautiful of all knowing looks...  as if He was reading scripture to me and speaking His knowledge of how I am made.. and that I am but dust.. more grace... more kindness.. so much more kindness that I didn't know what to do...

Then as if that wasn't enough... we were no longer in the meadows but we were in the most magnificent of places... and it drew me in... He had brought me to Father and even stepping into that place... one footstep into that place and something .. something I can not describe soared into my being from the bottom of my foot upwards.... 

Liquid love saturated the air and I stood there... not getting wet as with a shower but being penetrated by His affections.. I just stood there... I stood there and allowed the washing of His ways and His words to flow over me and through me and into me and surround me and strengthen and uplift me... 

His strength knows no limits and in those places with Him there is no doubt about that... ah.. I understood even more.. my eyes were being opened as were Elisha's servant... to the reality of the unseen.... to the reality of that which I am...

I am His daughter.... and while I live upon the earth.. it doesn't get to declare it's hold on me.. I had desperately entered His chambers... I had desperate need of Him and in turning to Him He dealt bountifully with me....  I can lay down now and be at peace.. because in His presence is fullness of joy and His strength overshadows me... 

He drew me beyond myself tonight into His sweetest of embraces and restored my soul... oh how I had such desperate need of such sweetness...  and in my need I was not left wanting... but was filled beyond what I could have even hoped or asked for.... 

because when anything can happen something usually would and it wouldn't be good

I listened to her....  she came to a place in what she was sharing that I was struck by the words she was speaking...  a dear friend of mine has told me that in prayer ministry sessions there are times when you are sitting with someone that the things you hear end up causing you to realize that later on in the day or when the chance comes you too will have things to pray through....

This was one of those times.... something she had shared sparked understanding in my heart to somethings I had not considered before.. her understanding of events was birthing something inside me...


I have permission to share that which I am about to and I will place my own experiences in where I believe is beneficial...  because I think there is something so powerful to opening up these emotions and experiences to those of you that are struggling to even allow thoughts or remembrances of specific moments or events to even run through your mind.... 


I remember the very first time I wrote down just one sentence of what had occurred in my life... I looked at it... took a black sharpie and scratched those words off of visibility forever....  No one to talk to ... not even able to face words written down ...

As I listened I wanted to say its ok... to say that where one might find themselves today won't be where they will find themselves tomorrow....  I listened and watched as grace and mercy kissed and truth was expressed and a light entered her eyes and filled her countenance

So back to listening to this beautiful daughter of God......

Personally I have always wondered why days that were just the kind of day that most people desire cause me to be unsettled... those days that have no specific agenda... those days when most things are done (or enough done that they don't crowd or place a demand on the schedule) and so the day can just be a day... nothing planned ... nothing demanded.... just a chill out kind of day..... I don't really like those days they leave me with this pit in my stomach the "anything can happen" and instead of that being a good thing it is a place of anxiety...

Rather I don't mind the days that have a specific schedule ... even the grueling long conference days of meetings and ministry and and and are preferred... I know what to expect and there isn't a vague notion of what the day will entail... I know exactly what it will be and what will be expected of me and for the most part know how to operate within those days.... Days where kids schedules or other schedules rule my days those are good as well...  but those days when anything can happen or just the chill kind of days (yes even with a family of 6 kids we have those... sometimes) those days end up being a bit more taxing upon me and I have never had clarity...

Well not until I sat with her and listened to her and watched her and then I knew... I knew why those lazy care free days where anything can happen were not pleasant for me and I thought... hhhmmmm this will be one of those times where later in the day I take a long walk and process life with the Lord... pushing back those thoughts for now and looking at this most beautiful of women sitting in front of me.. I turned my attentions to her and to her story....

Days that you knew were going to be full of craziness... where either a parent was very drunk or angry....  or cult members were preparing ritual type moments.... or and the list could go on and on... those days... as horrible as those days were... there was a sense of at least one knew what to expect.....or if she couldn't know what to expect she knew it was going to be bad.. there was no illusion of a carefree day ahead...

Once she began talking about things like that I knew where she was going and this is that...

It was the days that started off nicely... it was the days where things seemingly were going well... it was the nights that you could lay your head down on your own  pillow and think everything was going to be ok....  It was those times... those times where you actually allowed your body to relax and your mind to be at ease... those times where you actually had a genuine bit of laughter emerge from your being ... those times where the day seemed good... 

She shared how she thought that in her experience those days were as much a set up as the bad ones....  that she was brought to a place where her heart wasn't on guard so much... where she had allowed herself to relax... 

She remembers a day lounging on a towel outside feeling the warm beautiful rays of sun upon her face... when a shadow fell upon her and with it a chill rushed down her spine... she thought if she kept her eyes closed long enough the cloud would pass away and the sun would come back out all the while knowing sadly it wasn't a cloud.....

She came to dread the so called good days... because when anything can happen something usually would and it wouldn't be good....  she remembered sleeping under her bed because then she couldn't be so easily grabbed in the middle of the night....  she remembered hiding out in the loneliest of places and trying to not breath so loud so that she wouldn't be discovered... closets... basements...  attics... woods ... they would be where she would stay a good portion of her days... always listening.. for the footsteps... the voices... living always unsettled...  

As I watched her continue story after story I thought these stories need to be told... I thought for each story I was hearing and/or could tell... for each story that others hear ... they must be told.....  while painful... courage is granted and  to have then someone come alongside and show compassion and speak truth ... to have the stories out of one's being is empowering as hard as those first steps might be ... to open up heart and mouth and share allows the process of healing to come forth...

I thought of how when a very dear friend of mine has talked to  me through  things I am thinking about we get to this place and the thing I keep telling her is so beautiful for me when she speaks is when she communicates comfort... when she shares about how what I am speaking of isn't crazy or so far out of the ballpark... when my friend speaks and she relays her understanding of the character and nature of God... His grace and His mercy and she presents it in such a way that is so easily grabbed a hold of she ends up being a springboard of hope.....

Hope and understanding are powerful tools....  lack of each causes one to perish but with each element comes strength and peace and life....  and that is truly beautiful to behold.. the redemptive work of our Lord is forever awesome...

So here we go... liars and manipulators and those that love them or live with them.. here is a story for you..... Part 1

This season has been truly interesting.... a season that has held within its days moments where I have shared portions of my life that either no one before had ever heard or only a small handful.... a season that within its moments held for us after seventeen years of parenting a new and frightening road.... a season that married the two and in only ways that our Lord can do and  has brought me forward and  changed and strengthened me  even though feeling so very tired and weak I am amazed...

There have been so many obstacles … so many deep breaths... so many not so deep breaths and then realizing that I must remind myself to breathe … But amidst all that has gone on I have at times through presenting emotions remembered other times....

He spoke so softly and gently but clearly... “it is time ..” and I knew what it was that He was saying...

I realize that there are portions of my story that help others... help those struggling and help those that love them... and there are places while I am willing to go anywhere that I am not as excited to travel... but I have seen recently how all those places are just mines waiting for the person that needs those nuggets and I am willing for the Lord to extract....

Recently in Massachusetts I shared some stories that only my husband and a few close friends were aware of ….. I write these things realizing that there are those of you who will not understand how I could ever have done such things... I can appreciate that and I am grateful that your mind and life can not understand.... I am not being sarcastic... not one bit... I am grateful... but then these stories are not for you.... for those of you that have touched desperate places... mental illness.... depression.. abuse... or walked alongside those that have these next stories are for you...... and my prayer is that you would find comfort... we are called to comfort those with the comfort we ourselves have received and I am seeing that emerge all the more in this season...

So a bit of a back story for those of you that are new to this blog … there are some initial posts that spend more time on this portion of my life.... but suffice it to say there was abuse... one result was that I grew up a very talented liar.. manipulator... lacking a conscience... not feeling remorse... how I lived was in survival mode... day by day .. sometimes minute by minute.. sometimes barely …

Having grown up and gotten saved I walked with the Lord and yet coping mechanisms and ways of living during stress were undeveloped... grateful to know God I leaned on working for Him and being busy as a new escape... getting importance and self worth through all that I could do... not really focusing on how much practical life skills still just didn't exist....

So here we go... liars and manipulators and those that love them or live with them.. here is a story for you..... and have hope this once was really me... and the truth that has come forth truly has set me free.... the details here are for you....

So here we go... liars and manipulators and those that love them or live with them.. here is a story for you..... Part 2

I was 26 years old... have been married for a few years and had one son.... it was August 1996... and a phone call was about to change my life forever....

We had spent the day in Brooklyn, NY at a friend's little boy's birthday party.... the day had been really weird and Jim and I along with our young son were all feeling very off.... on our way home to NJ we had picked up a good friend of ours.... We arrived home.. and I put our son to bed and my husband and our friend went downstairs....

The phone rang... I thought it was another friend calling back as we had gotten cut off.... but it was my mother... Her first words were, “Is Jim home?” I can't recall whether it was something in her tone or something just caught me as weird but my response was, “Why? Mom did nana (my mom's mom who had lived with me since I was 2) die?” I don't remember much after that except she said, “No. It wasn't nana. It is your dad.”

What I have been told of the moments that followed was that Jim and our friend came running up stairs thinking that an intruder had broken into the house and I was being stabbed.... I don't remember dropping the phone.. I do somewhat remember being in the living room but I don't remember much about that evening.....

We had never been close.... everything was left unresolved....

What I do remember in the days and weeks that followed was the pain.... the bewilderment... the fear... and looking back I was desperate to move away from it … desperate to get over it.... desperate... Period... just desperate....

I honestly can't remember how I used to think back then … and I didn't journal well enough back then that I can go and look back.... what I have is what I know happened and what I felt..... I didn't have the capacity to sincerely ask for help... I didn't own the capacity within me to communicate what was truly going on inside.... I wanted someone to understand where it was that I felt I was but couldn't communicate it and the need inside to have some release was just overwhelming....

As I write this next part.. I pause... right now I pause... putting my hands to my mouth I think out loud … am I really going to do this.... am I really going to write this next part... I have already shared it publicly but this feels different to me...

But here we go.... I am one for jumping off ledges these days and so here I go..

There wasn't anything really going on.... Jim and a friend had gone out to rent a movie.... and I had put our son to bed... I laid there.... to say that I had the capacity to think rationally back then I think would be a stretch... but there is so much I don't remember.... I don't say I don't remember to remove ownership of my actions... I say that I don't remember because back then I wasn't even a shadow of who the person God would heal me and bring me into being... but I did do these things I am about to share.... I remember doing them.. I just don't remember all the thoughts around them....

The screen door was blown in the wind... and it shut against the frame …. friends have said that maybe it sparked a flashback... or maybe this or maybe that... but I take full ownership of the choice that I made in those moments.... in that moment fear that someone was going to break into the house gripped me.... fear that hurt or pain was going to ensue.... but no one was there I went out of my son's bedroom and no one was there... I stood in the room and the idea that if someone had been there... if someone had been breaking in the house and was to rape me the pain in the natural would match what I was experiencing inside... I had sadly known that experience and it felt like it matched....

I am having the hardest of time writing this part and it isn't because I have a problem telling you that what happened next was that I lied.... I created a lie that I had been raped and lived it out for a couple of weeks.... The hard thing about writing this is just that I lack the memories of all the thoughts that were in my head... I remember being in a car with a friend trying to convince him that it had happened... everyone knew I was lying.. I was just desperately trying to cling to it as reality.... I remember standing in the doorway of our bathroom as Jim gave our son a bath asking him if he believed me.. I remember sitting in a cafe with a girl friend and I remember whispering into the ear of another woman the lie of the story ….. I guess I thought if this happened then maybe it is ok to feel so badly.... looking for any sort of legitimacy for the pain that I was in... Not giving myself permission to say losing my father was traumatic enough … not being able to say in a healthy way.. “hey, I'm really hurting and I really need help...” Not being able to say, “ I am in need..” I need attention...” “I can't breath” “ I can't feel this way any longer.”  

So here we go... liars and manipulators and those that love them or live with them.. here is a story for you..... part 3

I know that some of those emotions are the reasons people cut themselves... and step into cutting... hurting so badly on the inside they try to replicate the pain on the outside.... I remember as a child scratching myself so badly until my arms or hands or legs would bleed.... looking for attention.. needing attention... so many bad things happening but not knowing how to communicate them... not knowing how to ask for help... lying about everything.... not knowing how to live one single moment of life.... living in a vapor... feeling invisible.... but feeling so much pain.... wishing I could die or disappear... not thinking I mattered to another living soul....

So alone... so much despair... so much isolation... so humiliated.. a panicked wounded crazed animal is how I would describe myself more than even human...

yup... that was me... lying to friends... family... manipulating.... trying to control the uncontrollable emotions.... trying to contain everything that was leaking out all to quickly …. trying and failing miserably and hurting a lot of people in my wake.....

So fast forward to a season where the Lord has encouraged me to open up my life for the strengthening and comfort of others.... fast forward to a season where a son has been so sick and in so much pain for almost a month... you better believe buttons being pushed and past things remembered....

Being in the ER one morning and telling the doctors there that he is an A/B student and that he was happy and well adjusted... and he had friends and he loved sports and that he wouldn't make this up... but wondering what they were thinking.... to calling my pediatrician and for him to speak that he knew us... that he knew my son and he knew he wasn't a complainer... He called the ER back and told them he didn't think it was psychosomatic.. and that would they please run the tests again...

Every time I had to call the doctors... to ask for help.. (BUT I WAS ASKING) I swallowed hard... I could feel the nerves in my stomach lurch... and then when the moment came where I had to assert myself as a mom to the professionals and ask for something to happen “today” not in a couple days or in two weeks... I lowered my head and closed my eyes and as I choked out the words I said them... I asked for the help that I needed … and I realized later as I thought back over the last three weeks... that these three weeks were probably changing my life and who I was more than I could even think...

I stood in that moment and thought of all the times I lived through where I wasn't known and there was no one to speak up for me and where there were lies and falsehood... I thought of having to lie for almost two decades to protect a family that hadn't protected me.... I thought of living for decades that if I spoke the truth I would ruin a family that hadn't stood by and made sure that I wouldn't be ruined... I thought how amazing in one generation how the Lord could so heal a family line... and how in one generation a child's experience could be so different... I thought of what it meant to be known and supported... I thought about my son and how he has had family, friends, community, doctors all standing alongside him trying to help him and that he was able to communicate and express that he was in pain and not shrink back from communicating it but be heard.....

In one generation..... but also in my life... my child's life and my life being so different than anything anyone would have even ever believed to be possible.....

So here we go... liars and manipulators and those that love them or live with them.. here is a story for you.. Part 4

This is our God....

I was mentally ill.. I was truly broken.. I was a pile of dry bones... I was a liar... I was a manipulator... I was slave to need and desperation.... I hurt people and didn't care.... or if I cared I didn't care enough to not act out.... I was lost... I was in need... But Christ..... He saw the dry bones and while there were those that would have said “NO! These dry bones can not live again...” He knows better.......

An exceedingly vast army...... that is the end of that story of dried bones..... that is the end of your story... for He who begins good works completes them... and He who plans you future for the good and not for harm is strong and all sufficient.....

To Him who sits on the throne and to the Lamb.. to Him who overcame so that I could overcome... blessings and glory and honor... To a husband who could hold onto a vision of who I was in our Lord as His daughter... To friends who walked alongside on different parts of the journey.... to those that walk alongside me now and push me forward … I am forever … Forever grateful...

I was very lost but I was always a daughter of a King who runs to His own and makes the way home.... “For I know the plans I have for you declares the Lord... plans to prosper you and not to harm you... plans to give you hope and a future...” Jeremiah...

Other gods.. kings... and comforts..

In my  tradition of honesty... of vulnerability... of transparency... I come to writing tonight....  

In the bathtub tonight as I sat there knees to chest... head resting on knees...  facing the wall.. fingers tracing the water....  I prayed a prayer I have prayed lots these days.... not many coherent prayers coming forth from my lips or my heart in these moments... but days ago I hit upon a prayer that has carried me through many a moment.. 

I can't remember what it was that caused me to first pray those words... Maybe I was realizing that I was going to a diet coke for comfort... or I was watching a tv show to entertain myself away from the reality of what the day had been....

But as the words came out the first time it hit me that this.. this could be a big part of this journey or this season....  I prayed "Lord.. other gods have ruled over me... " and as I prayed those words I also thought how I wanted a king... a proverbial king... someone to tell me what to do.. someone tangible to tell me what to do... I wanted comfort... comfort that my flesh and soul could feel.. could attach to.... 

I thought of my diet coke, I thought of the feeling in my body of being in control when I didn't eat.... I thought of many things.... my "gods," my "kings," my "comforts."  

I have heard a friend teach about needs and when the props of life are removed what does one fall back on.... I have watched my soul attach its okedness to a situation or scenario... if this is happening then I am ok.. if this isn't happening than I am not..... I am ok... if....  instead of it is well with my soul  ... PERIOD....

My emotions are still on edge... and my soul is still trying to  find that settled place... I acknowledge that peace that passes all understanding is mine always and yet landing there isn't the easiest task.... and that the wellness of my soul should not be able to be dictated to by whatever might emerge within the day....

In the warmest of warm water tonight again I prayed.. .Lord other gods have ruled over me and I have desired a king....  I have allowed other things to bring comfort to my soul and allowed the temporary aspect of them to trump waiting upon You and Your permanent all knowing kindnesses.....

Not much changed....  but I spoke the words again and again.... " other gods have ruled over me and I have desired a king... I have allowed other things to bring comfort to my soul" ... but this time... this time as the words continued to flow so did a confession....  and repentance....  and acknowledgement... that only Him...  that only in Him would I find the truest of comfort.... He is the comforter.... and that while there are so many proverbial  "gods" and "kings" out there He is God and He is King... and I spoke of how being His with or without understanding was truly all that I wanted....

Still tired... still ragged..... but turning in the right direction.... commanding my soul to quiet down... and turning to my God.. my King.. my Comfort.....    "In Your presence is fullness of joy..." Psalm 16:11...  His presence isn't dictated to by life's circumstances or situations.. His presence is that it is that it is.... and within His presence is fullness of joy... not temporary... but forever lasting.. and His joy is my strength....

"In repentance and rest you will be saved.. in quietness and trust is your strength..." It says of the Israelites that they were not willing... yet I truly desire salvation and strength... and so I turn to rest and repentance... I turn to quietness and trust.....  and I declare to my soul... as in psalm 116... "return to your rest, oh my soul, for the Lord has dealt bountifully with you..."

No other god.. no other king.. no other comfort... can match that which He is and does... I let go of what I can only temporarily hold to grasp that which forever holds me.....

When I am fading... when I am not going to last... A Hollywood script gets it right....

The picture flashed before my mind and I had to go look up the script to see what it said exactly....  There is much I appreciate from the Lord of The Rings movies but this part is actually one of my favorites.. although I had never thought of it from the perspective that was currently hitting my heart.... I love the scene at the river where the water forms into horses... but today I kept thinking about how I thought that  in the script  Erowyn speaks of getting Frodo to her father....

So today I actually looked it up... and this is the line, "He's fading.. he's not going to last. We must get him to my father."

I thought of stories I have heard about revivalists ... having not even arrived into the town they were headed to people were being saved....  I thought of Peter's mother in law being healed... I thought of the lame walking and those that were lepers being cleansed and healed .....

"He's fading... he's not going to last. We must get him to my father..."

It is recorded in the gospel of John... "Do not let your heart be troubled, nor let it be fearful. You heard that I said to you, ‘I go away, and I will come to you.’ If you loved Me, you would have rejoiced because I go to the Father, for the Father is greater than I." John 14:28....


Or the prayer Jesus spoke as He taught us to pray...
Our Father who is in heaven,
Hallowed be Your name.
 ‘Your kingdom come.
Your will be done,
On earth as it is in heaven. 


Those words... "our Father..." 


They fill my heart with such delight... His will.. His ways... upon the earth as they are in Heaven... 


I stand in the gap between the already and the not yet... learning the lessons of  endurance and how it strengthens but truly hungering for His ways to be upon my life and my days all the more....


We must get him to my father.....


Those words....  how can I best help those in need? How can I best walk my days no matter what they entail? How can I face all that is to be faced? How do we walk upon the earth?


We must get to the Father.....  His ways greater... perfect... amazing...  where He dwells there is no need... where He is present there is no lack... no hunger... no tears.. no sickness....


We must get to the Father....  when I am fading... when I feel as though I can not last but another moment... I must get to the Father... His strength.. His glory.. His beauty... His tenderness... His compassion.. His power... His might.... when I can't .. He can..


My Father who resides in the Heavens.. Your name is amazing...  may Your ways manifest upon the earth without interruption ... may the earth know Your ways as Heaven beholds them..... 


Psalm 16 puts it this way...
You will make known to me the path of life;
In Your presence is fullness of joy;
In Your right hand there are pleasures forever.


His presence changes all things... and all things are changed by His presence.....

May it come all the more.....

Because you are so other

Laying there I silently spoke of my need for Him... my desire to commune with Him... My need for His presence.. my heart hunger for Him to come and strengthen me...

Laying a hold of the promises that I will never be left nor forsaken... that I will always be loved more than I could ever fathom... laying a hold of the promises that before I call He answers.. and while I yet speak He hears..

Raising my heart up to Him.. my heart that needs His love and His affections so very much... laying there on the sofa.. curled beneath a blanket.. heart and hope looking to Heaven I release myself to Him... pulling away from fear  and embracing hope I turn to the One whose character and nature I am learning to trust all the more...

I am His... His daughter... but in the natural away from that relationship daughter has never been a term used for joy....  a placement of horror...  a relationship so warped...  fear fed intentionally....  It took me over 15 years to be able to embrace this aspect of our God... but He waited... He waited and He wooed me and His patience and His kindness and His generosity played a part so large in my life becoming that which it is becoming....

I was asked a question today about my relationship with Him and I smiled.. I smiled to myself as I answered... I wrote of how He is my safest place... even as I write that I feel my eyes brighten and my heart breath in hope as it exhales a sigh....  I wrote today of how my communication with Him has become one of no holding back... of taking walks and exposing to Him my heart ... the things He already knows .. but I am opening up my mouth and my heart and laying it all bare to Him...

Places where I see sin... lack.... fear... within me... things that I would not so readily  share... now sitting at His feet ... by His throne ... asking my Father to console me... asking my Father to heal me... asking my Father to empower me towards things so different than what my flesh.. history.. soul... have known...

So tonight... in a weak and weepy place I looked to Heaven...  I laid upon my sofa in my living room curled under a blanket... such an earthly place and I looked towards Heaven ... for that is where my strength comes from... 

A place so other... a place so full...  asking that as it is there so would it be here....  that the fullness of who I most truly am would find its expression within me now... that as I am already seated in the most beautiful of Heavenly places that that reality would manifest upon my body while walking upon the earth...

I can barely type this part.. head bowed.. fingers reaching for keys... I tremble... shaken inside by the immense level of compassion that manifests within Him and flows forth from Him... He knows how we are made.... He remembers that we are but dust....  His tenderness is beyond me.. I am undone... hungering for an age and time where nothing separates.. but yearning to walk this space and place out well... I am His daughter.. I bare forth His image.. it is nothing I do it is just what it is .. His image upon me.. His breathe breathed into me... He in me the truest hope of glory.. His thoughts and opinions ruling within me forming me over and over into more of Him....

I laid there on my sofa tonight needing a Father... something I never knew tangibly on this earth ... something that never brought one iota of comfort and brought great harm... I laid there on my sofa tonight a daughter.. needing her Father... and before I called He answered and while I yet spoke He heard... and I saw Him emerge as One so other than anything that could ever be expressed...

Those moments I will carry into eternity with me.. These moments I walk daily with and hold them dear and precious to my heart... I am His... My worth to Him far out numbers the capacity of measurement....  And His care and concern for me leaves me open ... changes me beyond my understanding... 

so that I 'll know....

I can believe many things.... I can believe a chair is going to hold me up until I sit on it and find that one of the legs isn't working probably.. then what I believe hasn't mattered... because now I  know that said chair can not do the thing I had expected it to.....


 I woke up early this morning...  and I sat in the quiet hours of dawn on my sofa... thinking through yesterday.. thinking through today..... I can believe in God's goodness and His nature and character all day long... and then a need arises and what I truly believe is exposed.... what I know to be true is tested....

I awoke afraid.. thinking of a sick child... thinking of events and circumstances that surround me... and I felt that lack... My heart felt faint...  and while I knew where to turn I wondered about His answer... I wondered how would He meet me here .. now... and there were places in my heart that wondered if He would.... or would this be a moment where trust would just have to be found and mustered ...

My heart lacking courage ....  I sat in the dark and just pulled myself into the corner of the sofa and allowed my body to just sink into the cushions... Just sitting there... just waiting.. not with any grand anticipation... not with any huge amount of faith...

 In James chapter one we read... "Consider it all joy, my brethren, when you encounter various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces endurance. And let endurance have its perfect result, so that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing." Who considers some of the things we encounter upon this earth.. "all joy"...  days of trials where fear and lack would want to scream in and tear at your soul....  But who also wants to lack in nothing..... as I read that verse this morning he turned my heart back to joy....

 As I sat on my sofa and laid out all the areas where I was being confronted with the places where what I know to be true was being tested...  I heard it ... in the depths of me..

 I knew.... And I heard the words..

 "so that you'll know...."

 There are places in my heart that believe in the goodness of God and thoroughly delight in it and then there are places in my heart that doubt... that have divided judgments....  But this morning .. this morning I got to see how faith does indeed produce endurance... and if I'll let endurance have its perfect result  I truly may be perfect and complete

 .. not lacking anything...

 My material status or the status of health of a child didn't change in those moments but I did....

 I did..

 and in those cool quiet early morning  moments I realized that I knew far more then I thought I did....

  I realized I don't just believe this ... I really know it... and in that moment all lack disappeared from my heart....  in that moment the fear in my heart of what if God .. fill in the blank.. was answered... Strength poured in from on high and a heart that had barely believed in some places truly knew the goodness of God and was lacking in nothing....