Beauty in Forgiveness

Why to titles come? To define a pause, a thought, a moment in time when everything else seems to have the ability to be summed up in a single phrase. My thoughts and pauses are dramatic, reflecting the sermon I just heard from a man who has pointed me to Christ in radical ways. Thank you Jesus for this man. Thank you for your work in his life to prove to a people in desperate need of a cure that the only remedy is You. The only solution to an idol-wired heart is the grace and mercy, love and care of Jesus. Faith in you is hard, Jesus. Trusting in your perfect timing feels okay now, because I am also riding on the assurance of my peers. Trusting in myself and my ability to perform for these people cannot hold the weight of a tomorrow. No, it does not give the sustained hope that I need to breathe, but instead comes up short. every time. There is no doubt in my mind that idols continue to be formed within my heart but the ones

I am addressing PHil Eubank in this. I feel his tone, his emphasis drive this typing and it makes me nervous. is that okay with you, Father? Jesus, are these thoughts that are so clearly marked by Phil's words acceptable as my own, given to you? I cannot fathom the depths of your living sacrifice and I was not sacrificial today. I FEEL sinless but I am not. I FEEL like I was good enough to sit in bed tonight, after having REMEMBERED to pray on my knees and thank you for nothing deep or important, but simply that today was wonderful. Today was a day filled with relationships that are familiar and affirming, I witnessed you before me in Accounting when I felt alone and was immediately surrounded in that moment with peace. Is that okay? because I FEEL that it should be harder than that, and it probably will, but what is next? was today enough surrendering that I will continue to experience freedom, or will it bring another soul-flattening reminder that this is NOT all that there is. that there is not simply gifts on earth to give me happiness, but instead are meant to point to an all-magnificent God from whom ALL blessings flow. I just don't know, Father in Heaven. and yet here I am giving You titles that aren't congruous with my heart, but yes absolutely my heart recognizes YOU, CREATOR and RESTORER of all things, are the source of these gifts, but the poetic elegance I lack, I cannot recreate these songs which filled the hearts and minds of scholars, servants, kings, and businessmen thousands of years ago. 

Running Beyond

With each step I hear Truth, with each breath I exhale today and breath in the words I pray will tattoo themselves upon my heart, not blind, but OPEN my eyes to the need around me, to change my view to Christ alone and allow the outpouring of the Holy Spirit's obedience to infiltrate this false hope in my worth, my deeds, my identity. With each step I am reminded that insufficiency is beautiful and weakness is used.

Count your Blessings

Thank you Jesus for unhealthy breakfast, unhealthy lunch, car accidents, and pain,

uncertain circumstances that change the frame

of my heart, my perspective and view

of how deep and great mercy is from You

Tension: Let it BE

What has happened to us? How come the normalcy of this day is sitting in reality that I can control? How can I exist in this world, being awakened to life by Father Above All and still question whether I am breathing?

This tension, God Above All, even now grazes my heart, helpless against this false identity of not being single. IT IS FALSE. It cannot sustain nor provide for the hurt and anxiety, change and uncertainty, so why does it seem to easy to lean on? God have mercy upon me that I could see your unchanging ways amid all the exciting pace of life.

When the storms of life they come
and the road ahead gets steep
I cannot imagine lifting my hands in disbelief because I am nor worthy nor entitled to find such grace awaiting me there. This is hard!! I find this part of the week so difficult because I am disillusioned by grandeur of a false god and indifferent to the wonderous, amazing, incredible grandeur of my Father Above ALL:
"HE IS THE IMAGE OF THE INVISIBLE GOD, THE FIRSTBORN OF ALL CREATION. Whether thrones or DOMINIONS or rulers or authorities, all things were created THROUGH him and for Him." COLOSSIANS 1:15-16

BOLDED the oops that I have forgotten, but still it goes on. my hopes in pouring out this pain that instantaneous peace would result but God is good and His love endures forever. Not simply when He chooses to reveal himself, to remind my soul of How big He is ABOVE ALL THINGS. "Whether thrones or dominions or RULERS or authorities, all things were created through Him and for Him." Colossians 1:16

Life at the foot of the Cross

There were bushes underneath the cross at church yesterday :)

The ashes remain. There is no need for God to remove them for in their molecular structure is the ability to produce life from what was: the history of failure and struggle, the past beyond our grasp. The plants are green, the are small, but numerous as life springs forth, growing slowly but extending it's roots deeply into the soil, our souls remember the past but are slowly beginning to forgot. The blessing is in the ashes just as much as the life coming from it. Things must be burned for the soul to be fertile ground for life, mountains must be moved, weeds taken away, rocks thrown aside, thorns cut back, for a clearing to appear to allow life to begin again, harmful things aside that only Jesus Christ remains.