Word

You search in so many places for the real me because you cannot bear the silence of waiting. It is the sort of silence one dreads. The silence in which you can hear yourself. But it is in the silence of waiting that I am found. In the truth about yourself, I come. Where I have always been, but you have chosen not to see. Vulnerability is the cost you must count.

Altars on the journey

Recently I have had what we shall call 'misty moments' rather more often. I suppose in seeking God, brokenness must come. It hurts. I've heard people say love hurts - that's probably why we don't spend enough time on our relationships. Well, I don't. I tend to think the more I love someone, the more secure that relationship is aaaand (here's the real cringer) therefore the less work and time it needs... And Jesus warned about losing the ardour of my first love. It brought a song out of me, once. In the words of Cliff Richard (lol, okay, okay I know, don't hit me ;O) - He knows me better than I know myself, eh? Because, you see, I have this idea that I've got it all together... and when the going's good, I somehow get it into my thick skull that I've got less cleaning up than some... Ooooh boy, I know I'm wrong when I think about it. But complacency happens - far too often.

By the way, on a lighter note, maybe I'm just wired that way!! My mum would probably agree - I leave a couple of clothes on the bed telling myself it's only a couple. I will use it soon enough. Makes sense, doesn't it? Why shove it into my already ready-to-deliver-at-a-nudge wardrobe? Well, there's a couple more tomorrow because something happens and I can't wear just what I thought I'd wear... so the clothes wait, until I need to sleep on the floor and not just out of choice! Sigh! Sometimes I'm so all-girl-stereotype, I could laugh. I mean why can't I wear what I thought I decided to wear? Beats me.

Anyway, that's about what happens to my life often. Thankfully because I am being taught to listen - I am able to see the clutter more clearly. Not because I'm particularly perceptive (sob!) but because... well, what Cliff Richard said. Lol, Jesus knows me best. And I'll admit, I panic sooner and much more when I hear the distance than when I see a messy bed... The trouble is learning to listen takes a lifetime. But God is good and He speaks.

In seeking and listening, as I said, a lot comes out in the raw... And I am so grateful for it. It shakes me out of inertia. And when I feel as if I am reaching out for God, and I know He is holding me so close and holding out to me what He wants for me just before my eyes... and yet, I grope because I am crying... Well, those times it pays to remember the altars on the journey. That's what this blog is about - to say how thankful I am for the times God has led me to write. Because when I want to speak, but can only sob (in a quite-unromantic-big-snivelly way!) or when I want to pray and words will not suffice - and I am waiting on the tongues - when I am overwhelmed - then God, like today, shows me the altars we have built along the way. To comfort and rest and refresh and maybe even give me a cuddle :O!! God holds you when you're breaking, you know... So nothing falls away. So He takes me along and says Okay, it's time to remember. Not relive, not glory in the past, nor bark at a memory just remember what happened that made me write that something, or made me feel that way or what I had heard or seen or learned or received. Yes, I am glad for the altars. Because they trace out a cross.

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Be very careful, then, how you live--not as unwise but as wise, making the most of every opportunity, because the days are evil. Therefore do not be foolish, but understand what the Lord's will is.

What, then, do I do? As I seek the answer, I am learning and unlearning. But I need an answer! But as I seek answers, I come out with peace - no answers yet, but Jesus. Strange working indeed.

My favourite story as a child - it still is one of my favourites and means so much

That day when evening came, he said to his disciples, "Let us go over to the other side." Leaving the crowd behind, they took him along, just as he was, in the boat. There were also other boats with him. A furious squall came up, and the waves broke over the boat, so that it was nearly swamped. Jesus was in the stern, sleeping on a cushion. The disciples woke him and said to him, "Teacher, don't you care if we drown?"
He got up, rebuked the wind and said to the waves, "Quiet! Be still!" Then the wind died down and it was completely calm.

He said to his disciples, "Why are you so afraid? Do you still have no faith?"

They were terrified and asked each other, "Who is this? Even the wind and the waves obey him!"

My world this week ;)

At this point in time, I am really finding waiting on your will hard for me. It's as if you don't hear, and yet when you speak I know you have. And you do speak. Even now.

I'd love my blogging friends who share the faith to pray for me :)

I have had a fantastic week. There has been so much fun and being together with friends and family. And yet both my mum and I feel that just the one thing has gone quite wrong, which is bad because satan's trying to take away the best.

I have this habit of saying to myself and others - life has a way of working itself out. As if life were a self-willed knot, that tied and untied itself. It would take years and years of wearing away and aging for the threads to loosen themselves. Life needs God to work it out.

The three or four full days also mean that I haven't had much time to myself. By the time I get to bed, I am so washed out, I can only pray and read a bit and go to sleep. But I've so wanted to talk to God for a long time and cry. I don't know, LOL, maybe this is just a girl thing. But I am not UNhappy. I have been sad at moments, and I do want to cry but still it's not as if someone's taken my sunshine away!!

Thank you, Lord, that I can blog because this feels so much better again. Lol, yeah, the blog wasn't working for a couple of days either! But even a blog, impersonal and open as it is, is not sufficient. I need God, more of Him I mean. It's funny - beyond a point, impersonal just doesn't cut it for me. God does.

And it would be good to hug my mum again.

It has not all been fun, it has been hard work. And I found out that I was working with two homosexuals. I cannot get over how wrong it is. I pray they would know Jesus. But even a few years ago, you would be laughed at for accepting homosexuality. Now you are laughed at if you don't. As people, I would give the same care to them as to any other person. They are precious to God and he would save us all. But it is sin in the eyes of God. There are several arguments against it. But I am not going into them. Someone who was a friend once said - it's making a mountain out of a molehill. The Bible says it is sin. Then it is sin. And if that makes me a 'bigot', so be it - I agree.

On a different note, I graduate in less than a week. I am rather excited! God has been good - well, what else would he be anyway eh? Lol. It is also perfectly fantastic to be back here and meet everyone and be back in the church here. It's a heart-tripping-quiet-smiling feeling. Well, sometimes it's more like a grin.

Maybe God's plans for me are entirely entirely different to what I think. Nothing he has promised will go unfulfilled. But I have a lot of questions, and no answers, only Jesus. And you know what? That makes me blessed. :D