meandering musings or random ruminations

I realize how much I love words. They are the things that formulate thoughts and ideas. I love learning new ones. Not so I can show off (although some may beg to differ) but to express more clearly what I want to say...I love aliteration because it's fun and it challenges my brain to come up with logical streams of thought or titles to poems or essays with words that have the same vowel or consonant sounds. I love poetry because it causes me to dig deeper into the meaning the poet endeavours to convey. My daughter says I'm a geek...that's fine with me if being a geek is reading the dictionary or getting lost in my Synonym Finder. Words. They can build up or tear down. They can bring life or death to the listener. They can encourage or exhort. A careless one can destroy a friendship. A soft one can turn away wrath. They can inspire and envision people to pursue purpose. Words can stop us in our tracks and cause us to turn the other way; take another route. Jesus said He is the Word made flesh. The creative Word of God. That part of the Godhead that spoke the world into existence. He calls us to be living words in this world. To be His word or message now to the world. I want to become excellent in the use of words. I think that's a noble pursuit. Especially if it reveals the way of salvation or takes someone into a deeper experience with the Lord. I want to articulate supernaturally, to speak things into being that are not. I want to be a true wordsmith, crafting life and hope and healing and salvation...you get the picture. Enough said.

Romantic Notions?

(Way too philisophical today)

If I could live in another era.....(I probably would have been burned at the stake. However...)

When the world still held mystery

When anything was possible

When the uncovering, unveiling of all HIS creativity was still fresh, still vibrant...

Now marred by time and 'knowledge'

Now shrouded in the darkness of 'enlightenment'

Now all colour washed out by 'science'

Anaemic, drained of the rich life blood of the supernatural, the divine

Eyes blinded by 'proof' and 'reality'

Seeing is believing

"What is seen is temporary, what is unseen is eternal."

Cynical, skeptical modern minds.

"Will I find faith on the earth?"

We're too civilized, too sure of space and time and matter

Boiled down to animal instincts and animal reasoning

Nothing more than mere chance and amoeba and molecules

"Faith is the substance of things hoped for and the evidence of things unseen."

We live and then we die and then nothingness

"Where, O, Death is your victory, Where, O, Death is your sting?"

But hark. What light through yonder window breaks?

Could it be spiritual hunger, is it eyes of faith that once again see the unseen realm in HIS creation?

Marvelling at all His hand has made?

Awakening to the invisible through the haze of the visible?

"I set eternity in their hearts."

A Renaissance of Revelation, a True 'Enlightenment'

Filtered through a new lens: Postmodern

"I will pour out my Spirit on all flesh."

Messy, chaotic revival of superstition

Ah, but with it a revival of faith for the supernatural

"Let the tares grow up with the wheat."

PRESS

longing
For something deeper than where I am.

grasping
for something real, more real than my present reality
something of substance beyond the surface and the shallows

feeling
I am out on the peripheral looking in, unable to enter.

deep calls to deep

struggling
to overcome my flesh, my pride, my humanity

searching
for experiential truth, revelation, past “the earthly stuff and nonsense”

striving
for the profundity of simplicity: emotionally, physically, financially, spiritually

straining
toward the mark, toward the goal set before me

resting
in the completeness, the fullness of the sacred redemption

reaching
for the prize, for the high calling, for the transformed mind

tortured
by my own inadequacies, my own inability to take hold of what I have been taken hold of for

frustrated
by my unwillingness to receive the gift, to take it at face value and run

waiting
and yet, trusting, confident of the outcome.
the finished work, to perfect what originated in HIM

even so, LORD, COME…..

Knit together in love.... SO THAT....

I don't normally take requests, but since it was from one of my favourite people...
A couple of Tuesday nights ago I spoke at home group about being knit together in love (of course I brought my knitting as a visual aid, can't help it, I'm an ESL instructor, I was taught to use 'realia' in the classroom (that's a fancy TESL word for real stuff))...here goes (although I've never been a verbatim person, so lots will be missing and the wording will be different. See if you can fill in the blanks).

How would you like to be "Abounding in wealth, have the blessings of assured convictions and understanding, being progressively more intimately acquainted with and know more definitely, accurately and thoroughly the mystery of God, who is Christ Jesus"? I believe I found a key that I knew sort of but not to the depth that the Lord has shown me recently. Before I'm finished you will all want to join the Lord's knitting class...after all he was the original knitter. The scripture I just quoted is from Colossians 2:2 (Amplified Version). It is a plea from Paul to be knit together in love SO THAT (two very important words in this passage) we might know Christ in the way mentioned above. About 10 years ago the Lord told me he wanted to knit the body of Christ together so that we might become a net that catches men. He wanted to tie up the 'loose' ends, pick up the slipped stitches as it were and weave them into a colourless seamless net. Let me say off the top there are no misfits in Christ. In fact we are the misfits that fit together, "woven into a tapestry of love" (The Message, Col. 2:2). In Christ there are no distinctions. The Message says....”Words like Jew and non-jew, religious and irreligious, insider and outsider, uncivilized and uncouth, slave and free mean nothing. From now on everyone is defined by Christ, everyone is included in Christ". Perhaps today we could say that words like rich or poor, Goth or punk, jock or skater, prep or geek, young or old, black or white, (you fill in the blanks) don't exist. It is unity expressing itself in diversity, faith expressing it self in love. The very fact that we are all so different and yet can truly love one another is amazing and reveals Christ in the world. And yet the very thing that can bring glory to Jesus is exactly where the enemy likes to stir up trouble, that is continually having us pointing out our differences. Yet I can counter that in Christ, though we all are unique, in the end we all dress the same, we all fit in because we are clothed in Christ Jesus, clothed in the "white linen of the saints". All this is so that we might know Christ more intimately and reveal Him to the world. We've been talking a lot about loving one another, community and fellowship. My previous blog (in case you haven't read it) mentions what characterizes a healthy family and LOVE is the number one ingredient. This love is not limited to so-called insiders but makes room for others. A healthy family never stays stagnate, but always allows room for growth. In fact, if there is no growth, or offspring, it is a sign of ill health. So loving one another, being knit together will have two outcomes. First and foremost it will draw us into a deeper experiential knowledge of Jesus Christ and the second is like it. It will open the door to drawing more people into the net of love the Lord wants us woven together into.

Skyy and me...official computer geeks

Thank You Skyy! I finally have links on my blog. So sorry it's been awhile since I blogged but...life tends to get in my way. Skyy helped me with this and in the process taught me and herself how to put links on a template that had no links. YOU ROCK, SKYY (aka starr)

Ingredients for a healthy family....

AHHH!!!! I have to start a new blog space because I can't get into my old one.....so here goes.
Last night at homegroup we came up with some key ingredients for a healthy 'family'...church family that is. Actually I started out asking what everyone thought would be the ingredients for a healthy natural family, knowing it would fit the criteria for a body of believers. This is what we came up with...
love, acceptance, provision, patience, comradrie, protection,
godly, good examples, friendly, encouragement, fun, correction, laughter, values, co-operation, leadership, communication, unity, understanding, respect, involvement, selflessness,
trust, exhortation, devotion/loyalty, discipline/training, sacrificial
Not an exhaustive list but sure a good start. Of course the ingredient amounts will vary but should all be present in healthy doses, don't you think?!