Saturday, August 31, 2013

Intimate moments between us..............................................

It was precious....

Gosh do I love the Father....  I get that He is the Almighty.  I do.. And in all reverence I bow before Him. But  as I bow I lift my head and catch His eye and smile the smile of a daughter... A daughter in love with the King.  Who happens to her Father......

It is amazing to me...  I think at times I am making this up ... imagination over load.. but then time after time He calls... Time after time He beckons... And I enter His presence and somewhere within the interaction, even when it is hard and painful.. somewhere.. at some point .. He so gently ushers me into His presence.. so gently ushers me into His understanding... so gently guides me to the depths.. that I end up with this smile on my face....  This feeling that so penetrates all that I am that the adjoining gleam in my eye and smile upon my lips feels like the utter most holy of moments....

I am so in desperate need of Him...  and He comes....  I reach out and before me He pulls out all the stops... pulls me into His affections and brings a reality of comfort to my soul that nothing else touches...

Tonight as I was resting He came into the room.. What does that mean?  Do I leave too many questions when I make a statement like that?  What do I mean when I write He came into the room?

I mean just that...

I can tell the difference between when Elizabeth is in the room and when Caspian is in the room... I can tell the difference when my friend is in the room versus my husband.. I can tell the difference... can't you?

So He, the Father, came into the room.. Why? Why, wouldn't He?

I am His daughter....

The days  that go by that I don't spend time with my sons and daughters leave a dull ache within the core of my being.. if I, being human, have that reality, how much more does the Father long to be with those that He loves?

So of course He comes into the room where I am.... He loves to come into the room where I am and my goodness.. oh how I welcome Him in....  When He fills out the room with His presence there is nothing better... nothing richer.. nothing firmer... when He brings His presence into time and space all feels so solidly right...  And I just soak in His affections.. In His presence.. in the reality that goes before Him and surrounds Him.. There is nothing like it...

I have been sad.

I have been really sad.

I think at times the reality of the seasons I have walked through have been suffocating and I think I wanted to enter into a place of rest in the natural, within the world.  I wanted... I needed rest...

Not as those in religious circles would possibly define it but as it truly exists... I needed the reality of security and love... I needed the reality of certainty and belonging... I needed the assurance of love...

Tonight as I rested in the arms of the Father.. as I listened to His voice.. I heard the most magnificent sounds of Heaven and the reality of His love saturated every pore of my being...  

It was the quintessential Father/daughter conversation...

When we were done talking He asked one thing of me...  "Will you share our conversation?"

I looked at Him.. paused and sat there and looked at Him again....  He didn't have to ask please.. as I recounted the hours of our conversation I knew that which He wanted me to share... and so this is what I said to our Father as He entered my room and granted me the blessing of His presence...

I'm tired Father..
I'm really tired and I'm really sad.. I need you to hear me.. I need to say that to You.. I need to know that it matters to you.. my flesh grows weary and but these moments with you.. but these times I think I would be lost...  I need you....  My eyes hurt at times from seeing.. my heart aches more times than naught from knowings.. I feel inept and broken... My own insecurities and fears plague me and this journey with you into and through all these fears is both exhilarating and exhausting... You matter more to me than my very own breath.. your requests.. your desires.. your affections... when you make them known to me.. when you draw my attentions to them and I become ever aware...  they fill me out .. they matter to me.. they course through my being and I realize that as your daughter.. as yours upon the earth.. That is my journey.. To know your desires and to walk them out as I know how to and to watch you and be led of you...  But Father... I feel the weights of the atmosphere of men and women and ache...  and exhaustion .. exhaustion is so in the environment that it is debilitating at times... But your instruction.. But your truth... but your revelation I would cower under the reality of the way the world looks through my eyes... So grateful when you give me your eyes to see through.. But that I couldn't do it.. But you holding my hand and walking before me and granting me the assurances of your love I would falter... Keep my feet from faltering, Father.. I know but You I would......

Father... I must say how grateful I am for how you bring balance... with the way you fill my heart with glee over hearing Gregory's foot steps or Elizabeth's voice, seeing Joshua's face or Caspian's smile...  I love how you counter balance the sorrow of the air with the delight that comes from knowing my Gideon and the absolute joy these children are to my being....  I have been blessed by your instruction to delight in the small things... to embrace life in the reality of love and live there...

Father... I wouldn't ask that you would have wired me differently.. but I feel so out of place...  I feel so in need of the reality of Heaven to surround me and I am so very grateful for these moments when you draw near....  For those moments when the world feels like the unseen reality and Heaven and where you dwell feels ever more real than anything solidly upon the earth...
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I spoke and then took time to just be silent.. to lean into Him.. to listen to His heart... to absorb His love...

He is in all and He is all.. He is that He is that He is....

He began to take His leave and my heart wasn't ready for the depth of presence to leave...

Remembrances of that which He spoke swirled into the air and landed with a weight... His thoughts.. His opinions .. the way He recognizes things....  A calm.. a peace... The reality of His presence..

He touched the bottom of my left foot as He left.. He touched the bottom of my left foot and held it.. and looked up at me and smiled... As He smiled He spoke the three most important words of the whole evening... "I love you."  He said... He smiled.. and I smiled back ...

Then the air in the room returned to normal and the presence that had just transformed the room abated... but what was left was a calm.. a sincerity of affection

A remembrance of intimate moments with the Father...  Joy and peace and strength....

Never does He ever leave.. Never does He ever forsake.. In our pursuit of Him we learn diligence... Besides telling me He loves me that was the last statement He spoke.. "In your pursuit of Me you learn diligence.."  Something to ponder upon... something to let ruminate within my being...

Here is the definition of Diligence...  careful and persistent work or effort.  

I will carefully and persistently with all effort pursue His heart... Join with me.....

In a veiled mean threat and an encounter with an angel... The remembrances of the past and the reality of life .. I am facing today!

I read the words. The status wasn't even a very long sentence.  But it was clear.  I paused. In those words felt like a threat.  Instead of passing wisdom along to those that would follow, it was as if it was stating in the christian (use the word loosely) way of masking what is really being said by carefully sculpted language.  Even framed as to not out and out say don't cross me but clear enough to any who would read it that the understanding was there....

Maybe if I didn't know all that I knew I could read that status up date and think nothing of it.... but sadly.. all too sadly I knew enough to at least have to rebuke the thought of, "I wonder to whom is that being said," and repent for the judgement

I don't miss that world....

I don't miss the craziness that gets into the heads of people as they feel they are climbing the social ladder of the christian ministry machine.

I don't miss the paranoia ... I don't miss the envy... I don't miss the atmosphere of jealously.. I don't miss the air of entitlement ... I don't miss it.....  Among those that are called to lead and those that partner and serve....  I don't miss the craziness of the insecure and what their insecurities cause them to do at times..

In a hunger to be loved, accepted... (should I not say revered.. is that sacrilegious.. maybe so but sadly true)... In a need to be the marque player of the hour.. the one up man ship that goes on .. that I've witnessed laid my soul bare...

I said to the Lord the other day....  I'm exhausted by things I have seen.  I'm exhausted by things I have seen....  It's been a while and yet at the remembrance of them my being feels the exhaustion.. The sadness that I know these things.. that I experienced them.. that I can't be naive...  that I watched the truly ugly happen between people and as I try to step into new seasons of life the remembrances of the old are more in front of my face then they have been in a very long time....

Within this time of talking with the Lord  as I walked along the most beautiful of paths and listened to the waters rushing in the creek bed, I paused....  I looked up at the sky.. I watched the grassy lawn give way to the wind and I just sat down and cried......

I am no longer in my 20s.. ministry is no longer a hunger.. a dream.. a pursuit....

I am no longer in my 30s ministry is no longer a plan, a path, a vocation...............

I am early in my 40s ... ministry is a word.. people are the hunger... ministry is a word and the dream and pursuit, the path .. the endeavor is towards love...

What an endeavor.....

To love God...

To love His people....

Sounds so easy ...............  and then the nuances and then the actual individual not some theoretical human being but a real live flesh and bone person, with a past and a present, with a future.. with hopes and dreams and hurts.. with expectations and opinions....  

How?  How does it not get ugly? Maybe it is supposed to be ugly.. and maybe ugly is the wrong word.. messy.. MESSY.. that could be another...

Can I see beyond the flesh?  Can I see beyond the soul?  Can I look at the one that stands before me and have eyes that see them as Heaven does?  Can I then walk in that?  Can I walk forward and see as Heaven does?

Can I hold their hopes and dreams, can I see them as ones that my Father potentially has for them.. Can I look further and see not just their own hopes and dreams BUT the ONES my Father has for them.. Can I step up and step in and not think about myself and my own but to realize that the true calling of the kingdom is to serve.. to serve, to build up others, to love....

I can feel the rumbling.. the rumbling within the earth.. within the people....

While personally tired .. the exhaustion that rests in the air is the exhaustion of the people ....

There is a call to cease striving and to know that the Lord is the Lord...

There is a call for a hope to be birthed and eyes to be open to the reality of the Lord

There is a seeing of the machines of ministry and the religious decorum of the day and a rejection of it

There is a hungry for the reality of God.. Christian .. non Christian.. There is an exhaustion in the people.. tired of platitudes... tired of fear... tired of religion....  BUT HUNGRY!

On a morning that I was dreading....  on a day that marks the 17th year since my father's passing.. on a year that for whatever reason this event is impacting more then it has probably since the first day it happened...   I awoke to an angel blowing a trumpet....

It was a call.. It was a call and a demand being put upon me... Upon a day where I just wanted to crawl back under the covers and not see the light..  On a day that I have been knowing was coming and dreading it.. Heaven answered... Heaven started the day... But regardless of whether there is an angel .. regardless of whether there is a trumpet.. regardless of whether there is an experience.. THERE IS A GOD WHO LOVES YOU !!! YOU ARE LOVED!!! NOW GO LIVE!!!!!!!!

Regardless of how it is being declared it is the most solid thing being declared over you..... YOU ARE LOVED... GOD.. CREATOR OF ALL THINGS LOVES YOU!!! NOW GO LIVE!!


It was a magnificent beautiful transaction of Heaven that occurred as I woke up this morning... An angel had a trumpet and blew it (most magnificent sound) and declared.. You are human beings... you are sons and daughters of our God.. Go live... You're loved.....

I recently had this conversation with a new friend regarding one of my favorite movies, Elf.

In the beginning when "santa" is explaining to Buddy that not everyone down there believes, Buddy is incredulous.

He's grown up seeing and knowing and being with "santa."  So how can one not believe....

This morning as I even remember the declaration of the angel this morning... I am reminded that they stare at His presence... they see Him.. they come and go from Him.. they carry His messages and they do His bidding....

When the last two words, "You're loved!" Were spoken .. they were spoken with such clarity and authority .. spoken from one who knows ....  spoken from one who sees...

It filtered into the air and carried a weight and a truth and a reality to it that was magnificent...

You Are Loved...  There is no other revelation truly needed to be captured more than that one....


I'm facing a day that I was dreading.. I'm getting up and going to live this day.. and while my heart might faint under weights of remembrance it WILL SOAR under the reality of the TRUTH that I am LOVED!

NOW I GET TO GO LIVE................. AND LIVE BEING LOVED PERFECTLY AND WATCHING FEAR BE CAST AWAY!








Friday, August 30, 2013

So what are you going to write about today?

"So what are you going to write about today?"

I smiled when I read the message.

I smiled even more when I saw who it was from. Well, I smiled and then tears streamed down my face as beautiful moments of remembrance of the times we walked daily together filtered into my heart and mind.

I am more and more convinced that there is so much we all just wish we could say.  And it isn't always wisdom but FEAR that keeps us silent.


We go about our lives suffocating at worse and at best.. well, there isn't a "at best" really...  For those who have bought into the cultural trend of transparency and vulnerability and "being real," my  suggestion is  spend a day cataloging all of what you really don't say, how you actually still meter out your truest opinions and then revisit how much you truly believe in transparency and vulnerability.

AND PLEASE.. whatever you do don't be STUPID.  Don't use this blog or something like this to go off on your boss, or to tell your married co-worker about how much you love her/him.  This is NOT what I am talking about.

I'm talking about your gut.  Your gut instinct.  Your heart.  Who you would be if you dared to be the you, you were created to be....

That's what I'm saying.. this ISN'T license to be obnoxious... if anything what is obnoxious is the culturally relevant idea of transparency...  Hey, listen I bought into it... And I walked... You know what happens when you say you believe something and try to walk in it.. hopefully every place you don't believe in it starts screaming in your face.

Not embracing the word, Hypocrite.. But using the  discrepancy as a launching point,  I step and step and step closer and closer to who I would want to be...

So yeah.. this is actually who I would want to be.. Secrets, lies, cover ups.. well, they almost killed me.  So did caring about the opinion of man and the opinions of the ministry world....  Will I regret one day the ledge I choose to jump off of in this season... I  really can't imagine I would.  I am becoming.  With each step onto the battlefield where the Goliaths of my life stand, I find courage... even if I don't find courage.. I find pieces of myself that I have dropped along the way of living life and I'm picking them up.

I stare back at the army standing on the side lines.. some of which are my "brothers" telling me to go back to the field and just feed my father's sheep.  There are fields to go back to BUT not until this giant is conquered and beheaded.

We aren't even close to done yet!

I'm certainly not.

I wish I could be this woman, mom, minister that writes eloquently upon the truest realities of being a mom, woman, friend, minister of truth and care...  I wish I could be more at peace at times.. I wish there wasn't this rumbling in my gut and shout and desire to kill the giants that scream out lies and fear.

You want to talk honest...

I, the mom of 6, suck at being a mom....

I do.... oh friends.. really I do.. I, in no way shape or form, am the quintessential mom.  I've gotten ok with that over the years but  times when I hear about "great ideas" from pinterest I honestly want to throw up.. when I see pictures on instagram about the really cool things friends/relatives are doing with their kids I think of how great that would be... But most of those things are above my pay grade....

I think the only thing that saves my back side with my kids is that I do so love them.. and I communicate with them concerning my affections and endearments all the time.  I will not be the mom that my kids will say every this or that we did thus and so...  We have very few of those... But my kids know that I champion their lives.. my kids know that they are under girded in life, my kids know that they can risk and fail because of the love that exists in this house for them.. and that.. that my friends, that is worth all the" glue this and put that there," projects in the world.

Did I bunny trail?

NO....

You see that's the heart beat of the Father...

It isn't what things look like, or what you can even do... it isn't that you can perform an image that you think everyone wants to see...  It's that you love.. that you love and be loved... That you walk your life... That you live your life.. your truest life... Don't contort yourself to some image you think everyone wants you to bare... There is an image you are called to bare.. HIS...

This wasn't what I was going to write about today.. that post is actually taking me a moment to wrap my head around.. but I thought the comment so fun that I began to write this first.. I think more than anything I was procrastinating...   So what am I going to write next?

The rantings of a Charismatic coming of age......  All I can say is pray... lol... I sooooooooooooooo need help

Thursday, August 29, 2013

The public rebuke wasn't hard.. not really... it was that we were right in the end and yet the causalities had already been had...

Really a part of me wants to tell you not to read this.. sincerely...  part of me thinks this is just one of those things that I should write and put away and not publish and just leave it as one of those things that you write to get something off your chest but leave it alone and leave it private...

Except I'm not sure I am going to do that.. I'm not sure I am going to leave this alone.. I'm not going to leave this private...

You know why.. there is this weird wrong supposition out there that the man and the gifts of God are the same thing.. and they aren't.... there are the gifts of God upon the life of a man and a woman and then there IS the man or the woman....

I just recently told someone... that what they had just said to me wasn't helpful.. that it wasn't helpful because we weren't what they thought we were.... we are and will always just be people.. people trying to find our way.. people just living life.. people who hurt, who struggle.. who are walking life like any other person...

A person in ministry isn't exempt from life.. or the trials and tribulations... a person in prophetic type ministry DOES NOT live 24/7 in dreams and trances and caught up into the 3rd heaven... If I am bursting your bubble.. shame on you for having that bubble... PEOPLE ARE PEOPLE regardless of occupation, title or anointing that flows upon their lives... People are people

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Tonight I am reminded of the ugly side of things...  The image side of things... the sick side of things.. the lonely side of things....performance and image and stupidity...... tonight I am reminded of the reality of the religious ministry world and its games and I'm tired.  Remembrances such as these steal my heart and exhaust my soul....

I pulled off the side of the road.

I needed to catch my breath.

Tears were streaming down my face.

Frustration was filling my soul.

And then the pictures of the past.. the picture of the day when at a conference after an incredible session I walked down a hallway towards the speakers lounge only to  see the speaker/leader standing leaning against the wall (where he thought no one was seeing him) and I watched as his forehead touched the wall and he leaned into it and hit it with both fists and started to cry.

I was young in ministry.  The one, so much my elder, knew I didn't have it in me to understand.  I didn't.  Ministry was still so fresh. So exhilarating, the reality and understanding were far from me.. I was still able to be naive.

I get that stance now.

I understand what he spoke to me in those moments... "I'm alone in a crowd of 1000, I'm alone."  I didn't get it back then.  He knew that I didn't get it...  I know now he just wanted someone to get it..... I wish I had back then.. I truly wish I had...

I wish I had known to sit with him... to sit with him and just let him be a man... not a ministry... not one who flowed in the anointing but just a man who needed a friend... who needed to feel normal..Who needed to not feel so alone in a crowd of 1000...

More recently... I sat next to a man... such similar moments but now over two decades in ministry have filled out my life... I knew I was to speak to him...  that he was cared for in the place I was sitting in not because he was who he was but because he just was.... He wouldn't let himself fully get that...

He had been name dropping left and right .. (one of my foremost pet peeves.. the attempted legitimization of a ministry and a life based on who you know and who is in your rolodex I'm just not up for ministry games any more.. not that I ever was but probably the least so now than ever.) He had preached and ministered and yet privately acted with entitlement and impatience...

Reminded of how my one friend's most fervent heart longing is to have the speakers and ministers be who they  reflect themselves to be publicly, privately as well.. oh that pretense and performance would be called up for what it is....

Then I was reminded of this other time.. this time that all should have been amazing.. except it wasn't... and then it really wasn't ... and a beautiful young couple became corpses on the battlefield of ministry....

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Everything should have been amazing...

The conference was going better than anyone could have ever dreamed.. or did even think it would....

But on the floor in the executive hospitality suite there was a couple being interviewed for a position and the outer hospitality suite was a buzz with the news.  Except something in my gut said it was wrong.  My gut wasn't the only one that was feeling that either....  The air was suffocating and my heart felt sad.

But there was a public  rebuke about a week or so later concerning the supposed wrong discernment and I remember those that had felt what we had felt the week before repented for having been wrong.

Except we weren't wrong.. at least knowing what ended up happening to that precious couple on the mine fields of ministry, I can't believe that we were wrong or that it was the heart of the Lord for that couple to end up divorced...

But we see it all the time................. sadly, the ugly side of ministry...  both upon those that serve and those that lead...  The weights.. the pressure.. the isolation.. the loneliness.. the interior battle that no one really cares to see or know about as long as the person/leader performs that which is expected of him/her and you/the people get what you wanted from them... the great teaching.. the amazing prayer.. the awesome time of worship.. etc etc etc...

Behind all of that... behind the teacher, worship leader, anointed man or woman of the hour stands a man or woman... stands one just trying to live their life and walk it out with the Lord....

Oh God for the sake of all things beautiful that we would truly learn to love one another and walk along side one another and see each other with the eyes of the Lord and understand that the reality of being human is the reality of being human.. from the prince to the pauper... the reality of being human is the reality of being human....



Wednesday, August 28, 2013

He walked out of Chick Fil A and as he turned around and smiled I was forever changed......

Each day this honesty thing gets harder and harder... I've been avoiding this one all afternoon and into the evening.  But again.. the, "that," of our God wins out and here I am.  Eyes closed.  Fingers upon the keyboard of my computer. Listening to  my fingers hit the keys.  Pausing and stopping and starting and pausing again.  I know where it is He wants me to go... I know where it is He wants me to walk.  I know which battlefield we are upon.

I see the giant roaring out to the armies of the living God.

I see the armies standing their ground cowering before this unholy giant.

I see a king who won't lead his people.  I see a people who won't step up and step in and step out.

I see a boy upon a field with a stone.

And the Lord sees me and says which one are you?

Which one are you?

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So my sweet sweet sweet... Did I say the word my?  Did I say the word sweet?

Oh to meet Gregory is to meet purity of sweetness.  To meet our almost 7 year old son is to meet delicate wonderment.  He is so enthralling to me.  I could watch his expressions and his kindness and listen to him talk forever.  Oh how I love this child.



Today we were at Chick Fil A and he exited in front of me.  As I walked out something about him caught my eye, I turned and I looked at him and I saw the presence of the Lord all over him.  Then the Father began to speak and it was all I could do to stand.  "I love you like that."  He said.

You see in the moment that I had beheld Gregory it was liquid love.  I saw into my son.  I saw his life.  I saw him and I fell in love, in deep deep love.  Oh, I fell in love when we heard his heart beat for the first time or when we saw the sonogram picture.. but this afternoon.. it was all consuming... LOVE!

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I got pregnant with Gregory after we had our first miscarriage and lost our daughter.  

Then towards the end of our pregnancy with him I would feel the spirit of death coming against my womb.  I remember the day I pleaded with God.  "Please, not again.. not him.. not now.. I couldn't handle death again."  

I would go into labor only a couple days after that prayer.  The umbilical cord had been knotted twice and he was tiny.  BUT he was alive.

Each of our children are magnificent in my eyes.  Each of our children and their birth stories are so very unique to each.  With Gregory, he was the one I felt Heaven roaring over.  The presence of Heaven upon him for the first 72 hours of his life was amazing...  As the hours rolled away and the days passed I felt that presence ebb away but I have never forgotten it.  And actually instead of ebbing away I actually thing it soaked right in... 

To be around Gregory when he is truly being Gregory is to interact with lovingkindness in a way that is deep and real and profound.  He says things that are too sweet and too kind and too beyond an almost 7 year old.  He is so intuitive and so brilliant and so kind.  Did I say this kid is kind?



Today.. today at Chick Fil A....  as Greg held open the door and I peered into his deep, beautiful eyes.. I saw love... I heard God say, "I love you like that." And I heard the Lord's heart beat.  And He continued to speak...  He continued to tell me that I have tasted and seen of His love.  He continued to speak of the reality of His love, His passion, His desire... I could see Jesus standing over Jerusalem.  I could see the Father enraptured by His creation.  I could see His love.  I could feel its reality.  I could feel His desire for the people....

Jesus DID NOT come into the world to CONDEMN the world... He didn't... He isn't standing condemning you... His passion and His kindness is holding open a door for you... and He is calling you to look into Him and see His affections for you and to realize the great love that the Creator of all things has for you....

YOU!!!

Oh the thoughts I have towards Gregory....  oh the thoughts.... I am reminded of Psalm 139.. For God knows the thoughts He has towards us and they are amazing and wonderful and full and could not ever really be counted.. they are liken unto the particles of sand at the shore... Those are the thoughts God has towards us...
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One thing I wonder if you are wondering at this point is what about this blog post is hard to write... well, you haven't gotten to it yet... It didn't take anything to write about how much I love my son...  It will take everything to finish this piece up and close it out the way that I know the Lord wants me to....

As I wrote the words that I prayed in regards to the last day I was pregnant with Gregory I know that is what today and the encounter at Chick Fil A was all about...

 "Please, not again.. not him.. not now.. I couldn't handle death again."  

That is life right now.... 

That is life right now.....................................................

 I have walked and blogged and processed a season that has known no end.  And these last days... well, these last days have packed their punches....  A reality is that this journey into honesty has been public with you, private between God and myself and intimate with a few friends... I don't ever think I have ever had more earnest and unguarded conversations as I have in these days...  

It is as if this season has become an  all out assault on fear  and the Lord is transacting all things into my life as to have me look at as many, "thats," as only He can.....  

I have been more honest with the Lord, with myself and with people in the last few days, couple of weeks than I think I have been in a life time... And while at this moment I feel exhausted and at this moment there are places in my heart that could not fathom another loss, another transition, another massive life change...  while at this moment the cry of my heart when I felt death encircling was a plea saying NOT AGAIN... I can't handle anymore loss...  at this moment all that that means for me in regards to relationship and ministry and life is encapsulated by the remembrance of a boy, as he held open the door at Chick Fil A, today and as the love of God shown forth, and as the word of the Lord's heart rang true.... "I love you like that.."

Oh Death where is your victory .. oh grave where is thy sting....  death to vision.. death in relationships.. death of ministries and dreams and potential all give way under the amazing resurrection of Christ...  "I love you like that.. " He says... "I love you like that.." As He points to my son and to His Son... the only words to cling to are... "I love you like that..." When fear wants to roar in like the waves of the ocean and scream there will only be more loss, there will only be more failure, there will only be more broken vision and sorrow...  when the world wants to rise up and show how very true it is that tribulations and trials are its nature... That which is higher and fuller and truer stands firm... "I love you like that..."  "I love you..."  

Perfect love is casting out fear and giants are being slain........................................



Your mouth might be saying, "don't tell me what to do," but your heart is screaming.. "TELL ME WHAT TO DO!"

I'm beginning to catch glimpses that if I can just survive this journey, I will actually be the person I always would dare to believe I was but that fear kept at bay.  The moments are brutal at times.  It is as if every self protective guard over my heart, every intelligent thought that says, "that would not be good to share," has been removed and it is now feeling like a game of truth AND dare with the Lord.

I have to admit something though.  As I begin to realize what it is that I would really say, think, believe even do...  I enter into this reality of life and living.  Not to be personally grandiose or equate my experience with David's,  but if I picture David walking, as a boy, onto a field, being stared at by all those who have been trained to be in the army.. those who know what to do, those who KNOW it is ridiculous to be doing what David is doing; as I picture them and think about what it is I want to do or want to say I realize that it probably IS ridiculous.  There is indeed a huge giant upon that field. And them, with all their training and all their armor, and all their everything aren't venturing onto that field.. what makes me think I should?  

Well....  Not the fields of my father but in the life I have lived throughout these seasons something has transpired in my heart...  In the wilderness.. in the place of no props.. in the place of leaning and in the place of being spoken tenderly to .. I have gotten to know my God.

From that place and that place alone I venture onto the field.. not because I am capable of anything BUT because He is... Not because He is even specifically saying to go slay that giant... but  the fact is I know that that giant needs to be slain.  First and foremost... most importantly in my OWN life....  The giants of fear and lies and doubt... But SECONDLY... I have seen these things cripple the sons and daughters of God and who is that giant.. who are those giants to get to be allowed to do that....

So first and foremost I venture there for me... Secondly I have seen too many taken out by fear, doubt and lies and that giant most definitely needs to be slain...

So two things:

First, as I wrote recently there was this place where someone was receiving a prophetic word and as the word was being spoken... It opened up other doors through which to see into... One of which was this guy was waiting for permission.  He had all these things upon his heart to do but wasn't risking because he was waiting for permission.. I could see as fear had stolen from him steps and confidence and I wanted so much for this dear friend.... 

No one was going to give David permission to go out onto the battlefield..Not really. Can you imagine the tone in which Saul said, "And may the Lord be with you."

“Don’t worry about this Philistine,” David told Saul. “I’ll go fight him!”
“Don’t be ridiculous!” Saul replied. “There’s no way you can fight this Philistine and possibly win! You’re only a boy, and he’s been a man of war since his youth.”
But David persisted. “I have been taking care of my father’s sheep and goats,” he said. “When a lion or a bear comes to steal a lamb from the flock, I go after it with a club and rescue the lamb from its mouth. If the animal turns on me, I catch it by the jaw and club it to death. I have done this to both lions and bears, and I’ll do it to this pagan Philistine, too, for he has defied the armies of the living God! The Lord who rescued me from the claws of the lion and the bear will rescue me from this Philistine!”
Saul finally consented. “All right, go ahead,” he said. “And may the Lord be with you!” 1 Samuel 17 (NLT)


But David said this... 

David replied to the Philistine, “You come to me with sword, spear, and javelin, but I come to you in the name of the Lord of Heaven’s Armies—the God of the armies of Israel, whom you have defied. Today the Lord will conquer you, and I will kill you and cut off your head. And then I will give the dead bodies of your men to the birds and wild animals, and the whole world will know that there is a God in Israel! And everyone assembled here will know that the Lord rescues his people, but not with sword and spear. This is the Lord’s battle, and he will give you to us!”


Nobody could have given David that courage nor that permission.. that permission and that courage.. the capacity to walk onto the field WASN'T ever going to be because a man gave it to David.  Permission to do so...( Just remember the army, they had all that and even with the promise of reward none of them could muster the faith to step out onto the field) that permission. ... that courage.. that tenacity.. That was birthed only between God and David.  

But today I watch as so many want that level of permission to be granted to them from a man.. But that authority no matter what man, can NEVER be granted from a man...  Because BUT God those victories DON'T come.... 

I'm NOT instigated rebellion against authority here... I AM instigating rebellion against the idea.. the notion that you need permission to live your life with God.. there is an unholy thing concerning compliance and people are allowing the culture of Christian expectations or religious notions to keep them from stepping out.  People are crippled by fear.. I am and have been crippled by fear..." Oh I can't say that.". "Oh I can't do that..". "Oh what will people think... "

That kind of thinking would NEVER have allowed David to step onto that field and CONQUER those giants....

SECONDLY, remember way baack up in this blog post that won't end when I said, first?  Well, Secondly... the other day someone who I regard in high esteem said a similar statement regarding people just wanting to be told what to do...  As the words came out of his mouth all that was circulating within my heart continued to take form...

IF SOMEONE TELLS YOU TO DO SOMETHING.... WHOSE IN CHARGE? AND  IF IT GOES WRONG.. BUT YOU WERE TOLD TO DO IT.. GUESS WHAT?!?!?!  It isn't your fault because you were just doing what you were told.... The RISK isn't completely on you.... YOU ARE PLAYING IT SAFE.....

So in the middle of this one conversation regarding this journey of honesty that I am taking ..the comment back to me was interesting. Yes, friends, people do say these things... more think them .. GUESS WHAT?  The honest ones say them.... While it takes me back.. I'd rather have the honest ones who are at least willing to tell you that which they are thinking directly.

Mims what do you really have to lose?  Stir The Water is small. Your blog is small .. just do whatever you want... This is the time to Risk. It behooves you to risk...  Stir the Water is small and we have gone through so much change that even I think it is a miracle that we are still going.  Believe me there have been days.. nights.. weeks where everything and anything was put upon an altar and given back to God and if truth be really told there were places within me that would have been alright if He would just keep it all... Oh But God... .  

BUT... In other times and other days there were risks .. well, they didn't seem like risks at the time... it just to us was the right thing to do... To do anything less would not have been in line with who we are... and so we risked and we entered into a different journey and while some would have called that foolish.. I have seen Jesus over those decisions time and time again...  In the words of Jim Elliot, “He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain that which he cannot lose.”  

And in other words of Jim Elliot, “Wherever you are, be all there! Live to the hilt every situation you believe to be the will of God.” 

So whether small or large.. whether those around you perceive you have nothing to lose or that you have too much to lose.. RISK anyway... CEASE waiting for someone to tell you what to do.. and LIVE.... Go  FORWARD and love those around you, jump into life and DO what's on your heart.. STEP onto that battlefield.. BE a David NOT a member of the army standing on the sidelines of faith...




Tuesday, August 27, 2013

He doesn't entertain... He enthralls

So until about a week ago I would have said I was pretty self disclosing. I would have said I live a transparent life. I would have said I was vulnerable. I would have been wrong.  To retell part of the story, there are moments all the Lord will say to me right now is, "that."  It's like a pointing of fingers.  It is like a, "you know what I mean are you going to do it? Say it? But acknowledge that this is "that" and it is what I want."

Until those moments started happening I would have said I was all those things as I described.  Now, well.. folks.. now I would say, I self - protect with the best of them!  I only really tell you what I want to tell you.  With those things I am vulnerable and transparent. Some would say I am more than most.  I would say that they were wrong.  Well, maybe more than most... But not transparent.  A fraud, more like it... a fraud because I say I am vulnerable and transparent but have kept an arms length distance between you and me... between the Lord and my heart... between places that I would rather Him just leave alone...

I have gotten to the place I can answer any question about my past, about the abuse, about the mental illness, about being healed.... there really isn't anything I couldn't tell you and there really hasn't been many topics that have been off limits...

But your responses to these last few blogs have had me realizing a whole lot....  My response to writing these last few blog posts, stepping into honesty, as had me cringing and waiting and dreading coming to the laptop and keyboard that I so very much love.....

Except I can feel it... I can the surge in the things that you say... in the ways your willing to communicate and share....
I am thinking of  John the Baptist alot these days..... people came out because they were tired of the same old thing.... and here was this crazy guy preaching in the wilderness... He didn't go to them... he didn't have an amazing website... he didn't know how to market.. there wasn't twitter or email or Facebook....  He was preaching in the wilderness and the people came....

There is exhaustion in the spirit... There is weariness... there is exhaustion....  Even where the" seeker sensitive" .. "promise the best side of the gospel"... "win it all.". "you're winning it" type churches are growing.. are the people?  Are the people?  When they are behind closed doors and sitting on their beds.. what are their hearts saying?  What are their minds saying?  Have the current religious order of the day put such millstones around the necks of the people that they are suffocating?

Listen I'm not preaching there isn't a hell, and I'm not saying there isn't sin.. there is a hell, there is sin, there is a right and there is a wrong and there aren't all equal paths or good works....  And I'm not preaching that if you turn to Christ all is going to go amazing with you and you are going to have all the answers and you are going to be the best you that you could ever be...

NO!!! NOT AT ALL...

I'm preaching that you are going to die...

You are going to be crucified with Christ...

I am preaching that you are going to be standing in a garden saying, "not my will but yours be done." And you are going to be praying alone.  The agony of which is going to rivet your entire being and it will be more than you think you could ever endure...

I am saying there is a cross for you to pick up and carry...

There is a death to be had...

There is a laying down of all rights...

There are no promises of prosperity...

I preach a gospel where the world goes topsy turvy and the first shall be last and the poor shall be rich and the weak are the strong and the meek inherit the earth.. I preach a gospel that says that you are loved beyond your wildest fascinations... beyond your wildest imaginations...  I preach a gospel that says you were thought about and loved and adored before the foundations of the earth were laid... I preach a gospel that doesn't condemn you but that died for.. I preach a gospel that reverberates with a peace so large and so firm that nothing can shake it and that nothing can defy it and that it passes all understanding... I preach a gospel that says you are passionately and unequivocally loved by the very one who created all things...

I preach gospel that tells you what you really, in the depths of you need to hear... I preach a gospel that says no matter what happens it is well with your soul.... I preach a gospel that doesn't satisfy like a smoke show, media enriched presentation.. but I preach a gospel of the Nazarene, who was born in a manger, sought after to be killed, lived as a man..  died as  God and rose again and lives forever more having ascended back into Heaven....

He intercedes for us.. He stands with us... He is passionate for us....

Whenever you think you have realized how good and amazing the Lord is... all I can say is just wait.. He will continue to blow your mind...

His goodness is better than anything this world has to offer... I serve a God who does say, "no."  Who does bring discipline.. who in His kindness calls people to repentance but not a religious version of kindness... not platitudes... But a kindness that is thorough, and beautiful and strong.. A kindness you can rest in and upon and get set back up upon your feet... Mercy and justice kiss and grace and righteous swirl and our God... the one true God is amazing...

He is hope to the hopeless
He is strength to the stranger
He is Father.. redeemer, friend......

Yes ... just when you think you have a picture of how utterly crazy incredible He is.. He paints a brand new picture and smiles and pours out His affections.....

He doesn't entertain He entralls


I would be the one that didn't fit.....when honesty meets the road and we begin to really walk this thing out.....

August is messing with me more than it has in years....

The closer it gets to the ending of this month the more moments throughout the day and into the night fill my mind and heart with the complicated realities I lived being the daughter of my father.... He will have passed away 17 years ago as of August 31st.

From dreams with him in them to moments with the Lord pointing out the places where my own judgement of him and unforgiveness has poisoned my own soul.

This morning, this morning ... well, I hope this morning is the pinnacle of all these experiences because at this moment if there is more ... well, let me put it this way.. at this moment if there is more it would seem like it would be more than what I (in this moment) believe that I would want to handle... if anything these years have taught me, it is I can handle far more in grace and the passion of the Lord then I would have ever thought...  That's His majesty.. that's His nature.. that's Him beginning and bringing to completion.. Because I know myself and in knowing this about myself I know that without Him I would most thoroughly be toast.

But this morning as I was processing all that was happening within my heart, the presence of God was full within the room.  Again the "that," was what He was pointing at... it was all He would say....

In only saying one word He is pointing out to me that I know....I know what it is He wants...

Ever know deep in your heart something like that?  Ever know that you know but you'll be darned if you'll tell anyone....  Ever escape into self protective modes, whether with shopping, entertainment, food etc .... to deny the things if you would just turn around and face them there would be life and not death and dullness... Oh no I am sure in this I stand alone... (Insert smiley face)

So His, "That," is Him pointing out to me that I know in these places what it is He desires... and I can choose to face the most real issues or I can push them away out of fear and indulge myself and my flesh....  I can choose to live.. or I can choose to die... Either way there is a choice...


Ever realize that the issue will keep being in your face until the core.. the root of it is dealt with....

Well... a bunch of those type things are hitting and I would love to escape to a tropical island.. but instead I AM turning around....


The lies....  the things that have been allowed to be ingrained into the fears of my heart due to programming of the heart from life, abuse, ministry...  etc....

I once had this dream.. I will share the whole thing in a blog post soon.....  but in the dream a leader I once served under spoke to me and at the end of  the dream said, "Mims, you are not an inconvience."  That dream was over 11 years ago and I remember it as if it was yesterday....  I will write more about that dream soon.

Second.. I was the one that didn't fit....  didn't really fit at the Christian college I went to because having been saved by a visitation I knew nothing about "Christian culture," (I will write more about that as well..)  but from not realizing that there were people who didn't believe Jesus still spoke and acted and moved upon the world today to not understanding that "praying" (I thought I didn't know how to) was actually what I was doing with the Lord as He and I took daily walks together...

There is a whole list of places I could write about not "fitting," but this morning the Lord was pointing at the reality of my heart, the reality of His heart and where it was He wanted me to walk...

Pointing to His own heart, He spoke more then the word, "that," ......  pointing to His own heart... He said, "You fit."  "You fit here, you always have.. you always will.. you fit."  In those moments more was happening within me than I know how to put into words...

There are many things in this, "season of honesty," that I know the Lord is arising upon....  I know that He wants me to forgive my father on levels I have never touched.. I know that He wants me to repent for the judgments I have against the man, I know that He wants to heal my heart in relationship to the reality that I felt like I never fit in.. not in my family and not in the communities of faith that I walked within, I know that He wants me to know that I am not an inconvenience and to stop shrinking back...

So I'm eating less peanut M&Ms and I'm watching less Netflix...... and I am sitting with Him in these moments and weeping....

His love is truly magnificent... His ways truly more full of life... His heart beat so thoroughly for His sons and daughters... He is better than anyone of us could ever imagine or conjure up.... He is that He is that He is and He is love... A love so full and so fierce and so vibrant and so clean and so pure and so beautiful... He is ....

In the early days of being in New Hampshire with Streams and the people there.. what would become the Fire Side Chats were just staff meetings.... In one of those meetings in the garage office at John Paul's house, JP turned to Jim and started to speak to him about how was Jim feeling about all that the Lord was activating in Jim's life.  The prophetic had been turned up to a whole new level and the details and accuracy Jim was walking in was astounding.  So Jim spoke for a bit and then I was asked how I felt about it all?

My answer was this...

I have felt like an ugly duckling all my life... I could look around and see all the places I didn't fit.  I expressed that in finding that place I had realized that I wasn't an ugly duckling but just another type of bird all together..  and that I wasn't meant to fit with the ducks...

The truth is I don't fit because at one point and time I was part of a prophetic community that was wired more like the way I was wired... and the reality is I don't fit nor would ever fit because I could be the perfect daughter, the perfect wife, the perfect mom, the perfect friend, the perfect co-worker, the perfect church attender.. etc etc... the truth is I don't fit.... we don't fit in this world....  the truth is I perfectly fit in my Father's heart... that the puzzle piece that is my life fits perfectly within the all encompassing reality of God.

In Him there is life.. not in a ministry, not in a community, not in a job, not in a family, not in a role or task or function.... In Him.....

I don't walk there fully and my heart aches still from the bumps of the past and the present and I am sure it will be bumped again, such is the nature of things....

But in the quiet of the moment.. in the solidness of the times spent.. in the reality of the One whom I worship.. in Him I fit and He makes crooked paths straight...

Oh God help our eyes to be upon you and help our hearts to be fully fitted into you

I would be the one the didn't fit... I would be the one who ached to belong... I would be the one that will more fully continually discover how much my hunger to belong and to fit is overwhelmed by the reality of His capacity to draw me in and up.....  Be drawn up and in today...





Monday, August 26, 2013

Day #3... Some things just get plain interesting.... It's all worth fighting for... What it looks like doesn't matter so much as much as what it actually is.... a fight.. a stance.. freedom

It is interesting to consider that which words can do...

It is interesting to consider that which silence does...

It is interesting...

Whether words or silence is involved there is communication.

When Jesus stood silent before His accusers there was more being said in His silence than any word could have ever spoken.  When Jesus rebuked the Pharisees and took up the cause of His Father's people, the spirit world shuddered as did the religious...

There are so very many thoughts upon my heart and mind as this project of 100 days of honesty keeps floating around and around within my being...  Honest with who?  Becomes the question.... Communication with who becomes another? Where is wisdom? What is the role of wisdom? What is the role of common sense? Where does  one pursue communication and where does one contemplate? What am I willing to say? What seems beyond the scope of permissible?

I was raised within the exhausting, debilitating, confines of social propriety... and in religious circles I have seen social and religious propriety to the nth degree.....  Honesty was at times more viewed as cruelty.  Self preservation essential to survival.

I touched openly upon fear and the rebukes I received were interesting.....Let's chat I say!  Let's really talk... Not in some hyper superficial way and not with religious tones and condescension...Not with polite overtones....  But let's talk.. why does talking intimidate some?  What conversations are so hard to be had?

I look more and more to Jesus... the way He interacted with the religious.. the way He went to the heart of the matter, the way He spoke to the women, the children, the fisherman, the tax collectors.. the people!  The way He walked and talked with the Father, the way He wept, the way He spoke.. what He said.. what He did... How heaven touched earth in the presence of this man, our Lord... How He walked... How He spoke... How He conquered.. How He loved... How He served.. How He ruled....

I honestly think people are exhausted by religion and religious pretense... so I admitted to watching this tv show, Ally McBeal, and it offended some... But it is interesting...  In watching this show and thinking upon how the writers wrote this character and then some of the dialogue that goes with her, I have been brought to a place of honesty.

I allowed myself to realize how exhausted I was by trying to be something... by trying to get through a long and difficult season in an appropriate manner... how horrified I was when I leaked emotion or felt weak and confused.. But who doesn't feel weak and confused at times and as much as the rebukes were interesting what brought me to my knees... what propelled me to surrender myself even further to this process WAS YOU!!!  It was you... It was your relief.. It was your joy... It was you... It was in opening up and being honest and forthright some of your exhaustion rolled away... You saw you aren't alone.. You saw that you have faith even if you are more like Gideon hiding .. You ... Condemnation got washed away even a little bit and something awoke within you ... with the understanding that you aren't ALONE...

Hey.. Truly..  this journey isn't easy.. the places where I cringe and ask the Lord, really?!?! Those places only multiply... but  more and more  the 100 pictures that swirl around my head aren't like the uga chucka baby.. gotta watch the show to understand... they are poignant not psychotic...  I don't make light of where I come from but I remember where the Lord delivered me out of and I remember the way I felt versus the way I feel.....  

Am I afraid? Absolutely... I am afraid.. Is perfect love going to have the last say? ABSOLUTELY!!!  He began a good work.. He is going to finish it.. Is there a fight.. ABSOLUTELY... BUT IT IS HIS... I'm just willing to say... I am afraid...

Look at most angelic encounters.. What words did they begin with?  Don't be afraid... We expend more energy trying to not be afraid then being afraid and allowing the perfect love of the Lord to come wash it away.. I have walked in pretense instead of authenticity and gotten false security out of image and appearance then in the affections of the Father that loved me more than I could ever comprehend.. enough to send His son to die for me.. Do you think He is going to condemn you or chastise you for being afraid?


 I find the more interesting thing that is circulating within the depths of my heart that the more I touch, see, hear, look at .. sense.. etc etc the reality of fear and what it has accomplished in my life .. what it has stolen... what my silence cost... what my speaking has cost at times....  When I touch upon this journey that I felt the Lord asked me to embark upon I am finding in some places more life and more courage than I ever thought imaginable...

Nothing happens in a vacuum .. not in real life, and of course I should have foreseen that if there was going to be a journey into honesty, there was going to be plenty of opportunity to be forced to honestly look at myself, the world in which I walk, have walked and am going to be walking within.....  How in the matter of days, in the matter of moments can so many opportunities swirl... maybe I have ceased to consider the whys and now am just considering each moment ...  Within each moment lies the opportunity for who I am to step forward, shrink back, observe, engage fully or partially....

The real question before me regardless of whether I speak or am silent .. regardless of action or inaction.. is do I self protect or do I gaze upon the Father and seek that which is He doing?

He is arising... He is washing over His people.. He is on the move....  His love is arising with a fervor and a passion and a fight.....  He is perfectly stepping onto the scene and saying let me wash away your fear.. your self protection.. your performance.. your light shows.. your hype.... Let me over turn the tables within the temple again and show you what real religion is.... People don't need a show.. they never have and they never will.. what will satisfy them for a moment won't bring real life into their gut....

I could go on and on.. But Isaiah 58 says it ever so much better....

“Shout it aloud, do not hold back.
    Raise your voice like a trumpet.
Declare to my people their rebellion
    and to the descendants of Jacob their sins.
For day after day they seek me out;
    they seem eager to know my ways,
as if they were a nation that does what is right
    and has not forsaken the commands of its God.
They ask me for just decisions
    and seem eager for God to come near them.
‘Why have we fasted,’ they say,
    ‘and you have not seen it?
Why have we humbled ourselves,
    and you have not noticed?’
“Yet on the day of your fasting, you do as you please
    and exploit all your workers.
Your fasting ends in quarreling and strife,
    and in striking each other with wicked fists.
You cannot fast as you do today
    and expect your voice to be heard on high.
Is this the kind of fast I have chosen,
    only a day for people to humble themselves?
Is it only for bowing one’s head like a reed
    and for lying in sackcloth and ashes?
Is that what you call a fast,
    a day acceptable to the Lord?
“Is not this the kind of fasting I have chosen:
to loose the chains of injustice
    and untie the cords of the yoke,
to set the oppressed free
    and break every yoke?
Is it not to share your food with the hungry
    and to provide the poor wanderer with shelter
when you see the naked, to clothe them,
    and not to turn away from your own flesh and blood?
Then your light will break forth like the dawn,
    and your healing will quickly appear;
then your righteousness will go before you,
    and the glory of the Lord will be your rear guard.
Then you will call, and the Lord will answer;
    you will cry for help, and he will say: Here am I.
“If you do away with the yoke of oppression,
    with the pointing finger and malicious talk,
and if you spend yourselves in behalf of the hungry
    and satisfy the needs of the oppressed,
then your light will rise in the darkness,
    and your night will become like the noonday.
The Lord will guide you always;
    he will satisfy your needs in a sun-scorched land
    and will strengthen your frame.
You will be like a well-watered garden,
    like a spring whose waters never fail.
Your people will rebuild the ancient ruins
    and will raise up the age-old foundations;
you will be called Repairer of Broken Walls,
    Restorer of Streets with Dwellings.
“If you keep your feet from breaking the Sabbath
    and from doing as you please on my holy day,
if you call the Sabbath a delight
    and the Lord’s holy day honorable,
and if you honor it by not going your own way
    and not doing as you please or speaking idle words,
then you will find your joy in the Lord,
    and I will cause you to ride in triumph on the heights of the land
    and to feast on the inheritance of your father Jacob.”
For the mouth of the Lord has spoken.

Sunday, August 25, 2013

Not having the luxury......

I awoke feeling like I had spent the night situated under the shadow of the Lord.  I awoke and the words that flowed immediately out of my heart were those of thanksgiving.  His presence had deeply rocked me as I slept and I awoke with the reality of what His tenderness and lovingkindness do for the soul.

I stretched... Pulled the covers back around me and laid my head back onto the pillow only to realize it wasn't going to happen...  There was something upon His heart for the early morning hours and so laying there I began to listen.

A song filled the atmosphere.  It definitely filled my heart and I watched as my Lord triumphed once again ... taking immense care of my heart, the, "that" spoken of in another blog post struck the moment again and I knew what it was this hour was going to contain.

.........................................................................................................

By the time I was willing to share about my journey with mental illness it was in the past.  By the time I was willing to talk about what it felt like to have my mind and heart bogged down with weights and confusion and sorrow and the torment of mental anguish,  there had been quiet and healing.  Immense healing had arrived and been lived in... I had felt what it felt like to have a conscience, I had learned what it was like to feel remorse... a fractured heart had had parts and pieces called back together and I was standing in places that not many thought I ever would.

It took years to begin to talk about my life as it was when I was mentally ill.  It took years to be able to effortlessly speak about when my mind had been broken and my life and heart as well.  I had been saved for a long time... but it was encountering the Father as a safe place and under the safe network of some very dear friends that I would begin to share my story.

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Today....  resting in the shelter of the Most High, I awoke to the reality that I wasn't being given the luxury of that time to wait.  It was no longer the past and something He had done that He wanted me to write about... It was now something He WAS doing.. Something He was CURRENTLY doing and His affection was birthing courage.

I had come home the other day and the emotion of the times was weighty upon my heart.  I had just had a magnificent conversation with a dear old friend whose wisdom and life I have, through out the years treasured.  I had allowed a release of emotion that had needed to be released within our conversation. It had been  her kind and understanding words that had permeated my soul.  Her kindness had released within me a sense of being known.  In her understanding as a mom, a friend, a woman who has been in ministry for a very long time I found life.

I have known this family since our oldest was 18 months and her knowledge of me and my heart and my life and my history blended together and so as she spoke and as her words cascaded across my soul they brought the balm so desperately needed.

...............................................................................................................

The last couple of days have been an interesting blending of emotions, experiences and history.  Yesterday I took time in the afternoon and laid my heart before the Lord.  He kept pointing to this one conversation that I spoke of in yesterday's blog post.

It was a calling to remembrance of walking without fear.  It was a call to remember and taste truth, trust, authenticity......  There had been life for me in those moments and life soared in again....

By the time I spoke about being healed of mental illness and the journey of learning to live beyond the days that were plagued with that journey,  the courage needed wasn't a huge amount.  I felt surrounded by support and it felt right.  It isn't that this, season of sharing, doesn't feel right but I don't feel as ready....  Except this morning the Lord, who I adore and cherish and love as Father, asked me to consider what does it look like to not give yourself the luxury of silence...  I love Him... He has loved me well.  That was all He needed to say..............

So here goes............................

In this season..................................................

I come home and turn on Ally McBeal on Netflix because I want to tune out.  Because instead of stepping into intercession and allowing the weights that are upon my heart to be processed with the Lord I would rather go to entertainment and a dulling numbness.  WHY?

FEAR.....

Yes, this is 100 days of honesty... and 100 days of looking at the giant of fear upon the field that is defying the army of the Living God and saying, "NO MORE!"

I am afraid that it won't matter if my heart cares about something.

I am afraid that nothing will change.

I am afraid that I can believe in the Kingdom of God and my Father and still not truly see its affects upon the earth.

I am afraid that nothing done really matters and that it is only a dream that God actually intervenes on a larger scale and changes things and makes things right...

I am afraid that my faith won't cut it...

I am afraid that I will only continue to see ugliness in ministry and what is the point...

I am afraid that the passion and zeal and desire that I feel for the Kingdom, and my God and His people will get washed away again in pain and regret.... I am afraid of restepping onto a battle field where I have watched so many perish, burn up, dry up and die....

I am afraid of the realities of the world and the condition of the Body and Bride of Christ...

I am afraid that it costs too much care.....  That is the nuts and bolts of it really... I am afraid that it costs too much to care

.....................................................................

That is what it comes down to.. really, I am afraid that it costs to much to care..... that caring will kill me and the temptation to shut down or live partially aware or to just drown out the fact that I do care with peanut M&Ms and Netflix will consume me....

I am afraid that by caring about God and what is upon His heart I will only meet death time and time again.. I will only meet disappointment time and time again.... I will only meet frustration...

I am afraid....

SO WHAT HAPPENS NEXT......

Part of it I don't know the answer... Remember what I said... this isn't yet a testimony .. it is a step... BUT

this I do know:

This I recall to my mind,
Therefore I have hope.
The Lord’s lovingkindnesses indeed never cease,
For His compassions never fail.
They are new every morning;
Great is Your faithfulness.

Lamentations 3:21

I awoke this morning basking in the lovingkindness of the Lord and what was called to mind was that His perfect love casts out fear.  

Yesterday as I drove home from my time with the Lord I thought of David ... a boy.. a field... a giant... an army... a king.....  I thought of David and how he stepped onto a field and with His affections towards God, David flung a stone and won a victory....

So what happens next...

Another step...

Another prayer....

Another conversation...

Another fight....

Perfect love is resounding in the atmosphere... It is penetrating the hardest of places ... this isn't about my life per se... It is what He is doing... He perfectly loves... He sees a world blanketed in fear and uncertainity and what does He do.. HE LOVES... What have I done?  Come home and watched Ally McBeal... Sometimes, YES.  

BUT THIS I HAVE CALLED TO MIND AND THEREFORE I HAVE HOPE!!!!!

His lovingkindnesses wash fear away..... and His mercies endure and endure....  

He triumphs... He begins good works to bring them to completion...

Engaging in the battle is truly the only way I really know how to live... so onto the battlefield I walk again...  facing that giant of old, that beast known as fear...  because fear can not defy the armies of the living God...  and I am being perfectly loved......