Last week, while letting my dog, Lexie, out once more for the night,  I heard a bird singing loudly. It was the only sound other than the sound of the wind blowing lightly through the trees and it was disconcerting. Disconcerting not only because it was late at night, not only because it was the only bird I could hear but because it was an eerie, desperate cry of sorts. I don’t know, maybe I was just being too imaginative for my own good, but it just seemed out of place in general to hear a song bird singing in the darkness rather than the light of day. The sound and the feelings surrounding it have stuck with me in the back of my mind for the week since.

Today in my quiet time I began thinking about it again. So, like every other distracting thought that comes into my head, I jotted it down on the notebook beside me to research later. The question “why would a bird sing at night?”, was repeating in my head over and over. To me, birds are creatures of praise. That is what I think of when I hear them. They just exist and worship, that’s it. Okay, back to my thoughts… birds usually are silent at night…sleeping or whatnot. So I googled the topic and began to read these threads about it. Here are the most common streams of thought.

1. A hungry cat has recently moved into the neighborhood causing the raucous

2. There is too much light in the area

3. Too much noise during the day so they sing at night. (mating calls, communicative singing)

So, here is what I felt drop in my spirit. We as believers are quick to sing our praises during the day, when we can see the light but when the darkness comes, we are often silenced out of fear of the hungry cat (roaring lion, enemy of our souls) or we are so busy during the day that the voice of God is drowned out by the noisiness around us. I know that I tend to withdraw my praises, not intentionally, but it just seems that when life gets really hard and I feel alone, I get quiet in my worship and prayers. It just dwindles until I am left cold, empty and fearful. I want to be like that bird. I want my song to be heard by God and the enemy even in the darkest moments of my life. I want to lift my voice loudly in prayer and praise when I hear the enemy coming. Lord, give me a song in the night, a word of praise during fear. Give me ears to hear in the midst of the storms around me. Help me to stay focused on you!! You are my deliverer, my refuge and my salvation!

2 Kings 4:1-7 A certain woman of the wives of the sons of the prophets cried out to Elisha, saying, “Your servant my husband is dead, and you know that your servant feared the LORD. And the creditor is coming to take my two sons to be his slaves.” So Elisha said to her, “What shall I do for you? Tell me, what do you have in the house?” And she said, “Your maidservant has nothing in the house but a jar of oil.” Then he said, “Go, borrow vessels from everywhere, from all your neighbors—empty vessels; do not gather just a few. And when you have come in, you shall shut the door behind you and your sons; then pour it into all those vessels, and set aside the full ones.” So she went from him and shut the door behind her and her sons, who brought the vessels to her; and she poured it out. Now it came to pass, when the vessels were full, that she said to her son, “Bring me another vessel.” And he said to her, “There is not another vessel.” So the oil ceased. Then she came and told the man of God. And he said, “Go, sell the oil and pay your debt; and you and your sons live on the rest.”

How do you raise a generation who fears God and seeks holiness? How do you teach that humility precedes holiness to a people of such independence and pride? How do you seek to have broken vessels filled with the spirit of God. The task is daunting and at times seems unattainable. I know this, it cannot be done by the ideas of man. It will not happen because we have some cool new way of presenting God. It will not happen by implementing some new program. When the widow went to Elisha, she had nothing to stop the creditors from taking her sons into slavery but some olive oil. I can tell you this, if someone told me that the mortgage company was coming to take my little one, olive oil would not be a comforting thought. I would probably panic, had a prophet given me those instructions! However, as a youth worker, I see the enemy taking our kids onto slavery on a weekly basis. As ministers, parents, leaders, we having nothing in and of ourselves that could snatch them back from becoming slaves to the enemy of our souls. However, we do have the oil of the Spirit of God. I am praying and asking The holy spirit to be released in a powerful way among the teens that I work with. I am asking for deliverance from bondage, freedom from fears and a group of teens who can say that they have seen God. I am not interested in a youth group full of kids who can play church, talking the talk and faking holiness, I want to see the fire of God resonating from them as they seek His face. Messy? Yes, but nothing worth having comes easily or without cost! What about you, have you come to the place where you have exhausted your man made efforts to see change in a situation? It’s time to seek the face of God…not just his hand and what He can do for us, but His face! That is my heart right now! I pray that you too will begin to come to the end of human resources so that all you can do it seek Him.

I feel like I am being awakened from a society induced coma. It’s as if my eyes are being forced open to the state of the world. Global poverty, the slave industry and the AIDS/HIV epidemic are rampant. There is a group of missionary/musicians whose only reason for using their music is to make money for foreign missions…they are called Unnamed Servant. ALL of the money from their cd sales goes to missions. They and their families give their lives to foreign mission fields. I got the opportunity to meet them this month and was blown away by what I saw in them. Here are lyric from two of their songs from their latest album called Anthem.

On the other side of the ocean, people forgotten in commotion forged under blood red skies.
You’ve seen this world in pictures fly covered, starving children left to believe this is life.
The trash they live in eating the scraps their given, still not enough to survive
Disease and malnutrition false hope in the west’ religion, this is enough to make God cry.
From a distance, you can’t feel it, you can choose just to close your eyes
When you’re in it, you can taste it, you’ve got no choice but to give your life.
You’re home bound, can you imagine, sister raped, how can this happen, now there’s talk of genocide.
Society is all in a panic Mother cries from images too graphic and you thank God it’s not your life.
Go ahead change the channel watch a show where weight loss is a battle, so sad they had too many calories. Send your check to support a child, you did your part now you can smile and get back to your American dream.
Oh say can you see a world with out poverty, where the widow can eat, and the orphan can dream
Where the slave is set free, the oppressed find liberty, and avoid military and the farmer rewrites history?
From a distance you can’t feel it, you can choose just to close your eyes.
When your in to, you can taste it, you’ve got no choice but to give your life!

Your attendance twice aweek, your tithes and your offerings its vanity
Its not for me the worship you’re leading the sermons your preaching, it’s just noise to me

You can keep your cds the building your making, the money your saving in my name causes me so much shame, none of it matters, it just doesn’t matter.. People starving, dying,  and I’m the bread of life

Recognize, the face of God in slanted eyes, darker skin and foreign smiles. Recognize value of human life even when it’s not white. Recognize.

This cd is extremely controversial for most of us in the west. I have found that the young people who hear it, love it, it stirs them to a passionate desire to be the hands and feet of Christ. I have also found that a lot of the “adults” who hear it, tend to be less excited about it…saying it’s not practical..it’s too extreme…it’s too radical.

I will admit, that it was my first thought too…but my next thought was, but God, if I am wrong, please change my heart. Guess what?? My heart is breaking… I cry everytime I hear the songs…I cry when i see the hell that is reality for millions of people across our beautiful ocean! I believe that Jesus was pretty radical, extreme and impractical at times! I am beginning to see that in the American church we have made Jesus into this blonde haired, blue eyed gentle passivist who never got his hands dirty. How much further can we get from the truth??

What about you? After reading these few lyrics, what thoughts come to mind? Is it convicting?

Love has been perfected among us in this: that we may have boldness in the day of judgment; because as He is, so are we in this world.
I john 4:17

There are many times in my life that I find it hard to believe that God takes pleasure in me. He takes pleasure from those who desire Him in the depths of their heart. Those He calls His own, he delights in us. He is in love with us…. A broken and weak people. We are His betrothed. He is lovesick for us.
I was listening to a teaching this week while traveling, that made this statement:

“God is so in love with his church that if we just lean in His direction, He will run ten steps closer.”

That is a beautiful thought to me. I struggle so much with this mindset of making myself worthy of His love, that at times I forget that it is less about what I do and more about my heart. I cannot bring more value to myself than He bestowed upon me when He send His Son to die for me. That is the value of my life, the life of the Son of God. That is your value too. Why is it so difficult to believe that sometimes?

We have all heard the verse that says ‘perfect Love cast out all fear’ which by the way is the directly following the one at the top of this page, but to understand the depth of that statement, I think that verse 17 is important. Love has been perfected among us….because as HE is, so are WE IN THIS WORLD. This is not talking about our character being perfect, but our position to God through Christ. It is saying that in the eyes of God, the judge of the world, we are in the same position as Jesus. Do you grasp that?? I mean it is blowing my mind the more I chew on this. I have talked to many believers over the years who live in fear of God’s judgment, disapproval and punishment so much that they are paralyzed. When you cannot see the truth of this verse, and the work that God already did to bring us into relationship with Him, you live in fear and bondage. God is so much in love with us, a broken, needy people, that He did the work to make it possible to be with Him. He already accomplished it. There is nothing left for us to do, but lean into Him.

Have you ever seen a movie or television show, an individual who cannot swim, thrown into a pool or river that they think is deep water? They struggle, panic, flail about only to realize that they are in only a few feet of water? All they had to do was stand up? Sometimes I feel like as Christians we do the same thing. We get into this life called Christianity all bound with fears of failing and judgment and instead of standing up in the position that Christ has given us, we flail around, striving and working to earn that position. We do not have to cower in shame nor do we have to grovel for mercy, He has already given the greatest gift of mercy available! We can stop striving and trying to keep our head above water so to speak, we are not going to drown. We cannot be ripped from the hand of the God who holds us. Our beautiful, all powerful, sovereign and lovesick bride groom sees us with eyes burning with the flame of love. Stand up and take your position in Him. Accept that there is no fear in Love. We have to believe that the debt has been paid IN FULL. We own nothing and are free to reciprocate the love He has given us. Hallelujah!!

Intercession is different than prayer.  When I pray, a lot of times, it is things that I think about, worry about, care about and just talking to Jesus.  For me, intercession takes place when Jesus communicates His heart for a  situation and causes me to identify with Him. Intercession is praying the heart of God,  it is praying in agreement with Him. I am an intercessor. That is something that God has called me to be. However there are times when the nature, problems, sins and losses of those I am called to intercede on behalf of can cause me to be discouraged. As a result of this, I have two choices, I can hide deeper in Jesus, or I can put on blinders and  hide away from it.  When I find myself depending on my own nature and strength to “pray” I quickly burnout!!  When I get so involved in people’s pain that I lose sight of God’s heart for that situation, I will burnout too.

See, it’s like wearing glasses. I was laying on my bed this afternoon, praying and I took off my glasses because my eyes just got tired of focusing on things. Sounds silly, I know, but I just wanted to gaze at the blur of my ceiling instead of the patterns formed by the double knock down ceiling. I was sort of thinking all this while praying and I felt God stop me. He helped me to see that there are times that I get tired of  focusing my spiritual eyes on the effects of this fallen world so I take off my “spiritual glasses” in order to get a break. I stop seeking the heart of the father, because the closer I am to His heart, the more I will begin to feel my heart breaking with His. So if I back away, I don’t have to “see it”. I can rest.  I become near sighted again.

There is an effect on my own life as well when I am pulling away from Jesus, I can become self centered, impatient, sullen, and withdrawn in my disillusionment. Sounds a lot like II Peter 1:5-10 to me. It says:

“5For this very reason, make every effort to add to your faith goodness; and to goodness, knowledge; 6and to knowledge, self-control; and to self-control, perseverance; and to perseverance, godliness; 7and to godliness, brotherly kindness; and to brotherly kindness, love. 8For if you possess these qualities in increasing measure, they will keep you from being ineffective and unproductive in your knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. 9But if anyone does not have them, he is nearsighted and blind, and has forgotten that he has been cleansed from his past sins.
10Therefore, my brothers, be all the more eager to make your calling and election sure. For if you do these things, you will never fall…”

How do you come to possess these things? By being intimate with Christ. It is a fact that those we are in closest relationship with, we begin to imitate…it’s just human nature. This applies to our relationship with Jesus too.
II Corinthians 3:17-18 says: “17 Now the Lord is the Spirit; and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty. 18 But we all, with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as by the Spirit of the Lord.”

I love the imagery of beholding as in a mirror, the glory of the Lord.  That just sounds so intimate to me. To have an unveiled face, to be laid bare before Him,  and to reflect back the image of Christ! That is so beautiful to me. I don’t want to be nearsighted when I gaze upon Him. I want to see clearly who He is, so that I can reflect accurately His heart for His people. I want to be laid bare before the lover of my soul!

So often I put myself in bondage to performance again, when I lose sight of the relationship and try to do the job myself. My prayers become fleshly…based on my own thoughts, feelings and beliefs… which are so discouraging!  Intercession works only when it is born of a right relationship with Christ…it cannot be duplicated!

How about you, do you find your self trying to do your “calling” out of your own strength? Does it lead you to burn out?

Since, It’s been about a year since I began blogging and I have a lot more readers now… (though not many commenters..hint hint ) I thought I would post my life story in cliff note version. So you can know a little about me!

I was born in 1978 to my parents, the first-born child of two. My brother was born 2 ½ years later. My parents were both Christians and were involved in church. My father worked shift work at a mill about 45 minutes away.  My mom worked too, but only when we were asleep or at school. She was around a lot. She was sort of the June Cleaver type, cooking, cleaning and generally involved in our lives.
Most of the memories of my family are of being super involved in church. Our lives were always wrapped around it. They are mostly good memories now.   At one time most of them brought the sting of rejection.  I never felt that I could measure up to what I was supposed to be. Some unattainable and lofty Godliness that I now know is impossible to achieve.  I knew what a mature Christian looked like and I could talk the talk really well. I thought I was one.  I was running frantically trying to look like I had it figured out. At school, I performed too. I was a good student and  a cheerleader.  I made sure everyone knew I was a Christian. I was so judgmental and  hypocritical. Don’t get me wrong, I loved Jesus to the best of my ability (or so I thought)  and I did genuinely want others to know Him.  I just did it out of fear and  did not know what it was like to have  love relationship with the One who created me.  I now know that I did not have the steps in the middle filled in.  What do I mean? Well I did not have a relationship with Christ. I just had empty rituals and jargon. I had the appearance of Godliness but not the power of God. I had a distant, performance-based relationship with Him. I felt that He was constantly disappointed in me. I could never do enough to make Him proud of me…. It took some time to realize this was not the first time I had felt like this.  I had felt like this all my life growing up. I never felt that I could please my parents. I felt that nothing was ever good enough. I had to be the best at everything I did or I was a failure.  I put up a good facade of being a happy, well-adjusted, Christian girl but on the inside, I was miserable. I hated my life and wished I were dead.
I was 11 the first time I thought about suicide.  The thought came to my mind dozens of times a day. Every time I felt angry, hurt or like a failure, I would think about ending my life. I was too afraid of actually killing my self so I began to cut.  I would run razors over my skin until I felt some sort of relief from the emotional pain. Anything to relieve the pressure in my life. I wrote out so many suicide notes that I lost count.  I never told anyone this until later on in life. It was my secret shame, one more area I could not live up to the standard. Who was I to feel this way? I had a good family, I was not the neglected child of divorced parents!!  How could I help others if I could not help myself? I had nothing to give. I was empty and broken.  I tried to bring worth to myself by  performing and looking like I had it all together,  all in the hope that my pain would be healed.  I began thinking that if I got married.  I thought that a husband who loved me unconditionally would heal my pain. I began dating Jon in 1995, The summer before Senior year.  We dated exclusively until we got married in 1998. Within six months of marriage, I began to have suicidal ideas again. I was devastated. I really thought that marriage was going to bring me relief. I came to realize that there was no human who could fill the emptiness in my soul. I had to face the fact that it was not my circumstances that were causing my so much pain. The pain was in me. The problem was me. I joined a seekers group through Living Well Ministries in September 1998.  That small group of women  helped lead me out of the darkness I was living in. I know that God ordained this step in my life and  I am so grateful to my Father in Heaven that He spared my life. Not only did He spare it, He has redeemed it and brought meaning and joy into it. He sent me on a journey to discover why I felt the way I did and taught me how to Love myself and others from the abundance of my heart instead of the emptiness. I now know that Love is a choice. I don’t have to look for love to fill my brokenness, I now love because I know what love is…it has a name and that name is Jesus Christ!
I love my life now. I am even at peace with my past. I am very glad that I lived through the pain I did  because through it I saw the kind of God I serve. Suicide is no longer a thought for me. I am happily married and I love who God created me to be. He has transformed me. I now gladly serve Him because He brought me out of darkness into the light of His love.  I love Him more than anything in this world! I now see a constant thread throughout my life that was Him. He wove together the ugly, dark of my past with the light and beauty of  His love and made a beautiful tapestry!

i have been thinking about what it takes for us to know God. I grew up in a Christian home and my family was very involved in the church we attended. My dad was one of those few dads who spent a lot of time, teaching us about the word of God. He would read bible stories to us and ask us tons of questions meant to help us to understand the word. I was raised to live certain biblical principles such as tithing and guarding my heart at a very early age. Later as a teenager, I was extremely involved in my youth group, ministry teams, and worship team. Where I learned about the responsibilities of being in a leadership position. I knew a lot about maintaining a life that was above reproach, I could pray a “powerful” sounding prayer, I could preach a sermon, I could give my testimony in front of a crowd in churches or in a town square of a third world country. I had cast out demons in His name. (does this remind anyone of the verse that says “lord Lord, I cast out demons in your name!??) I knew a lot about God. I did not know God though. I mean I thought I did… I had prayed the sinners prayer. I do know that I was a Christian, but I knew nothing of the joy of a relationship with this Saviour I lived for. It was not until later in my life, when I grew tired of the performing that I had grown accustomed to, that I hit bottom and realized that while I knew much about God, and his word, i did not have a heart to heart relationship with Jesus. I focused more on looking the part, preaching about Him and making sure that my life was an example of what it looks like to be a follower of Christ than actually loving Him and allowing Him to love on me. Knowing about someone is very different than knowing them. I can read and study all about Denzel Washington, but if I don’t have a real relationship with him it would be stupid to call my self his best friend.

The bottom that I hit was on many levels, but the level that most changed my perspective on God’s personal love was when I had grown so tired and disillusioned with my faith that I no longer had it in me to perform. Like so many before me, I in mock defiance quit all of my strivings. I stopped all ministry, I stopped doing my ritualistic quiet times, I stopped going to church and stopped listening to any Christian music. All of these things had become like superstitions to me, like somehow by doing all these things, God owed it to me to bless me. It was never about relationship. I never did those things out of love but out of desperate fear of what God would think of me if I did not do them.

I never stopped praying. Although, they were not prayers for anyone but me. Selfish? Maybe, but I had come to realize that if God did not break through my preconceived ideas of Him, I did not want to live. I was tired of feeling like God was perpetually angry, disappointed and sick of me and my screw ups. I knew that none of these things were scriptural, but my feelings were very powerful force in my life at the time. If we are honest, a lot of us live our lives with our feelings in the driver’s seat instead of the truth! My prayers were constantly begging God to change me. Change my heart, my feelings, my beliefs, my fears, my weaknesses, but most of all, my view of Him.
I am grateful to Jesus, that He has answered my prayers and continues to clarify my thoughts of Him. I can honestly say that God has redeemed my life, my fears and my misconceptions of Him.

I pray that you, whoever you are, whatever your struggles, would begin to ask God to remove the things that distort your view of God. For me, it was a lot of things, but one of those things was my own “information” about Him. I knew too much about Him without a relationship with Him which prevented me from see Him clearly. All of the things I knew about Him allowed me to keep Him in a box that I could control. I no longer serve a God that I have all figured out! Praise God.

Have you read it? I read it this past week and it totally rocked me. I have been rethinking some of my beliefs about the relational aspect of God. I can’t explain it, but I cried all the way through the book, not because it was scary or sad, although to some it will be, but because I was seeing the heart of God in a totally different light. I saw Jesus in a new light too.

Now, I will admit, there is a part that I will not ruin if you have not read it, but I almost put the book away when I got to it. I actually did put the book down and asked my husband if he was crazy for recommending the book to me!  After some persuasion, I picked it back up and now understand the authors intent!

So, if you have read it, what did you think? If you have not read it, go read it!!

lately I have had several folks say things to me like, “if you see me doing anything Codependent, tell me so I can stop” or ” just tell me what verses to memorize to make me better” or “what’s the quick answer to this problem?” We are so quick to look for the easy remedy to a deep problem. We are more concerned with all of the outward appearance of the deep rooted dysfunction then  we are of the real heart issue. We want to make sure we don’t appear controlling instead of dealing with the fact that we are afraid that if we don’t control other people or circumstances, then our own junk will spin out of control. We are afraid of the pain that we will inevitably feel if we really allow the Holy Spirit to expose our soul wounds. To top all of it off, we are impatient and terrified that if we don’t fix it quickly, we will appear unspiritual, crazy or unstable, so we look for a quick fix.
This reminds me of the following verse:

Matthew 23:26-27 “Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You clean the outside of the cup and dish, but inside they are full of greed and self-indulgence. 26Blind Pharisee! First clean the inside of the cup and dish, and then the outside also will be clean.

“Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You are like whitewashed tombs, which look beautiful on the outside but on the inside are full of dead men’s bones and everything unclean.

The Pharisees were all about the outward appearance but full of all kinds of soulish junk. By soulish, I am referring to the mind, will and emotions. Jesus called them blind, hypocrites, and compared them to stone tombs which housed decaying corpses.

I don’t want to be like the pharisees! The church is full of them. What will it take for us to get real about our own junk? What will it take for use to get honest about our own humanity? Just because we are Christians, does not mean that we are instantly made into a perfect resemblance of Christ! The world surely can (and does) look at the church and see that we have problems, pain and woundedness, why can’t we admit it?

I am sure I sound like I am ranting, and maybe I am a bit, but i get really irritated when I see the fruit of the lie that says “as a Christian, we can’t make human mistakes.” It’s just not true. I am not talking about a life of willful disobedience, i am merely talking about the sinful behaviors that are natural byproducts of a wounded soul. We will only be as spiritually healthy as we are emotionally healthy. We will see everything in life including God and ourself through the lens of our pain, until we deal with it! Don’t be afraid to do what you have to do to get healing in your emotions!

ok, I am done! Comments?

Yes, I have a cool child. She has no idea that she is so cool either. Today on the way to school, she and her dad talked about standing up for what you believe in regardless of other’s response to you. She asks tons of questions all the time about God, Jesus and faith among others. Its cool to watch her as she wraps her brain around the ins and outs of Christianity. She is only eight but she is very smart. Anyway, when she got off the bus this afternoon, she was so excited to tell about what God had done for her that morning. Here is the story.

In her creative writing class, they were given a “free write” day. That means she can write an essay about whatever she chooses. My daughter says she had no ideas about what to write, so she prayed and asked God what He wanted her to write about. She says that immediately she knew that He wanted her to write about the work He did on the cross. In her words, “I told Jesus that I was really scared to write about that because the class may laugh at me, but I knew that Jesus would be with me.” So, she wrote all about Jesus’ love for the world and that he died for us even in our sin…THEN she had to read her essay to the class. She was amazed that noone laughed at her. More importantly, she says that she knows that God was with her and she got to know him little bit more.

So, I just wanted to brag on my baby!