Raising the dead or raising the living?

Some words that have stirred my soul up tonight. From a guy named Peter Rollins.

The poet is one who helps us experience life as inscribed with a rich and sensuous texture. She helps us to call forth, confront and confirm our existence. Inviting us to find the courage that might enable us to say “yes” and “Amen” to life in the midst of its complexity and in spite of our anxiety.

In light of this we might begin to understand how a divine miracle is not something that simply raises the dead but one that is able to raise the living to a place where life is not experienced as death. For without the latter the former would appear to be nothing more than the work of an evil demon.

I guess that is why I was never that interested in gods who raise the dead. The real power lies in raising the living: something that is testified to in the act of love.

ignored by god – sharing from paulo coelho’s blog

Many people tell me: “I often feel that I am ignored by God.Why is it so hard to establish a dialogue with the Divine?”

On one hand we know that it is important to seek God.
On the other hand, life distances us from Him/Her – because we feel ignored by the Divine, or else because we are busy with our daily life.
This makes us feel very guilty: either we feel that we are renouncing life too much because of God, or else we feel that we are renouncing God too much because of life.
This apparent double law is a fantasy: God is in life, and life is in God.
If we manage to penetrate the sacred harmony of our daily existence, we shall always be on the right road, because our daily tasks are also our divine tasks.

When you feel this, just recite in the silence of your heart a beautiful prayer by Thomas Merton:

My Lord God, I have no idea where I am going,
I do not see the road ahead of me.
I cannot know for certain where it will end.

Nor do I really know myself,
and the fact that I think I am following your will
does not mean that I am actually doing so.

But I believe that the desire to please you does in fact please you.
And I hope I have that desire in all that I am doing.

I hope that I will never do anything apart from that desire.
And I know that if I do this you will lead me by the right road,
though I may know nothing about it.

I will not fear, for you are ever with me,
and you will never leave me to face my perils alone.

http://paulocoelhoblog.com/

a confession

Was listening to U2 earlier today.

Here’s a secret, a confession: I still haven’t found what I’m looking for either, Bono.

Does that make me an unbeliever? A tired believer? A true believer?

I hear he moves in power and I believe it in my small, finite way. I hear he is total and complete love, and I know that’s true because I’ve encountered him and his love for myself more than once. I hear that the God and his kingdom are closer than the air I breathe; that I live and move and have my being in him. I believe that and sometimes I even sense it in the way that while sitting in my cubicle I can sense that there is a whole city full of sunshine and beauty and history and people’s lives happening outside the windows and ten stories down, but I can’t be a part of all that outside world because I am tied to the job, cublicle and paycheck inside the building ten stories up. So, yeah, heaven and it’s miracles and life exist, but it’s always seemingly just out of reach and I can’t figure out how to grasp it and immerse my life in God and the kingdom of God. The other things creep in and choke out the Presence of God that I feel briefly sometimes when I stop to hang out with Him.

I don’t know what that looks like as far as the rest of my life goes, but I hope there is more than what I have found so far. Well, that’s not quite the way to put it. I know there is more. I’m not that introspective and self-centered (though I’m sure I rank up there with some of the best navel gazers out there), but I don’t know how to figure out how to possess it. My life is in Christ. By faith, I believe that. Yet, I have no clue what that truth means. Sometimes I feel that I am stuck inside a maze or a puzzle that I cannot figure out (I am terrible at puzzles and don’t enjoy them at all) and to take it even further, sometimes I feel that the puzzle is God. 

But I do love Him. That’s the truth! And I know that He loves me. I believe it and feel His love.

Still, I think I’m missing out on Him in some way.

My brain is tired now from writing and it’s time to go to bed. Goodnight.

needs & scars

I like the blog Advice for All My Children. Sometimes I get a lot out of the posts. Here are a couple I came across today. One is about need and one is about scars. Two things all of us deal with on a daily basis.

Isaiah 42:3

³ A bruised reed he will not break,
   and a smoldering wick he will not snuff out.

the wild goose and the wind

Below is an excerpt from Paul Leader’s post that you can read here.

“It is believed that the Celtic Christians preferred to refer to the Holy Spirit using the metaphor ‘The Wild Goose.’ For them the Holy Spirit was not a quiet, demure bird but a loud and uncontrollable one, which always seems to arrive unexpectedly and does not submit to human authority. Someone once called it the untamable wildness of hope. The word goose comes from the European word ghans, which is said to refer to the sound of honking that the geese make. The word wild is also of European origin, ghwelt, which means untamed or natural. The goose then is a bird of hidden treasure- of spirit in unseen motion, like water flowing underground, until it bursts forth in a spring. Wild is not a word of chaos but one of following it’s own will, making it’s own meaning, sailing on it’s own winds. The wind blows wherever it pleases. You hear its sound, but you cannot tell where it comes from or where it is going. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit. It is time for the Wild Goose Chase. We can feel as if we are going around in circles going nowhere, but really we are circling around the elusive and mysterious. Being caught up in the uncatchable, untamable One. This in turn makes us uncatchable and untamable. Join the flight of the wild goose.” (italics are mine)

I love this!!

The other day my two year old son Elijah and I were outside in the afternoon. There was a pleasant breeze blowing. He felt the breeze ruffling his hair and froze with an astounded smile on his face. “Look!” he told me and pointed to his hair. Then he realized that the leaves in the tree were moving to. He was fascinated by it. I told him it was the wind and how the Spirit of God is like the wind. I like telling him about Jesus, I pray it sinks into his little spirit. 

What a cool way for God to explain Himself. What a pleasant and wild feeling it is to be touched by a Presence totally outside of ourselves. Like Eli, it makes me realize that I am being touched and that things around me are indeed moving in a wild way that I cannot predict. I love that about God! The wild goose is such a cool symbol of the Holy Spirit.

awake, my soul!

Psalm 57: 7-8

⁷ My heart, O God, is steadfast,
my heart is steadfast;
I will sing and make music.
⁸ Awake, my soul!
Awake, harp and lyre!
I will awaken the dawn.

“My heart is steadfast. My heart is steadfast.” Saying it stirs my spirit up. It churns up my insides to come alive and BE unshakably determined. I will wake up the day with my heart set on Him, looking at His face, recalling and recognizing His love for me and for all those around me. I will be a part of the beginning of the day where it all starts over again and grace seems brand new because my soul is waking up!!

This is in me today. Listened to Mumford & Sons last night and, along with the Psalms, I sense the Holy Spirit encouraging me to set my heart on Him.

How fickle my heart and how woozy my eyes
I struggle to find any truth in your lies
And now my heart stumbles on things I don’t know
My weakness I feel I must finally show

Lend me your hand and we’ll conquer them all
But lend me your heart and I’ll just let you fall
Lend me your eyes I can change what you see
But your soul you must keep, totally free
Har har, har har
har har, har har

awake my soul…
awake my soul…

How fickle my heart and how woozy my eyes
I struggle to find any truth in your lies
And now my heart stumbles on things I don’t know
My weakness I feel I must finally show
Har har, har har
har har, har har

In these bodies we will live,
in these bodies we will die
Where you invest your love,
you invest your life

In these bodies we will live,
in these bodies we will die
Where you invest your love,
you invest your life

awake my soul…
awake my soul…
awake my soul…
For you were made to meet your maker

awake my soul…
awake my soul…
awake my soul…
For you were made to meet your maker
You were made to meet your maker

christ’s love for us

This postcard annonymously sent to postsecret.com reminded me of the way God loves us.

1 John 3 says:

¹ See what great love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And that is what we are! The reason the world does not know us is that it did not know him. ² Dear friends, now we are children of God, and what we will be has not yet been made known. But we know that when Christ appears,^[a] we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is. ³ All who have this hope in him purify themselves, just as he is pure.

I felt so ugly inside yesterday after I was angry and hateful at work. I was so down on myself. Jesus caught my attention in the midst of that and I realized His love for me in the moment. Such forgiveness!!! His love is lavished upon us. When we are at what we think is our ugliest, He is lavishing love Himself upon us in powerful tenderness.

Thank God!!!

Hear Him say to you right now: “When you told me your deepest, darkest secret, a secret that made you think you’re a bad person, that’s when you look the most beautiful. Know this: I really do love you.”

He really does. I hope His love fills you with peace today.

thankfulness

Thankfulness.

I’ve been pondering a lot these days and thankfulness is one thing that keeps coming to mind.

I’m talking about the thanks that genuinely comes up from your heart and spills over when you open up. That is what has been happening to me.  Up until now the scriptures instructing us to be thankful were very task oriented to me. It was something I tried hard to do, usually immediately after complaining about my job or something I am supposed to be thankful for. Now, sometimes it’s beginning to happen naturally. I believe it is a choice, but I am also experiencing that it is about what is being cultivated in my heart too.

While living in in the UK I was always living on next to nothing.  One day, when some money came in my housemate and I went to the store.  I grabbed some badly needed shampoo from the shelf and said, “Thank you God for this shampoo!” I hadn’t really thought before I said it, and I meant it with all my heart. Going without shampoo had not been fun!  My housemate just stopped and was uncharacteristically quiet.  He then told me that not once in his life had he ever even had the thought to thank God for something like shampoo. I told him neither had I until I had gone without it!

These days my life is a lot different, yet we’re still watching every penny and never really have a lot left over when all the bills are paid.  In the midst of this, often stressful, lifestyle I find myself lately being a lot more aware of what I am thankful for. Obviously, my husband, my son and my family, but also the food in our refrigerator, the meat in our freezer, the heat, the lights, the gas in our tanks, the laughter in our home.  It’s amazing. It’s like there is a heightened sense of what we have and of Who has provided it for us.

Jesus is drawing me towards him. To be honest, it’s a bit closer than I am comfortable going. Yet I completely ache to be his close friend. It’s great. I am becoming more aware of what He asks for and also of what He gives. More aware of those in need. I think I need? Huh! I have A LOT. It is a great love we are called to be a part of. My soul is not satisfied without Him… so I hope I do not waste this time.

O God, when I have food,
help me to remember the hungry;
When I have work,
help me to remember the jobless;
When I have a home,
help me to remember those who have no home at all;
When I am without pain,
help me to remember those who suffer,
And remembering,
help me to destroy my complacency;
bestir my compassion,
and be concerned enough to help;
By word and deed,
those who cry out for what we take for granted.
Amen.

-Samuel F. Pugh

 

what is spiritual

the world’s secret

I saw this on www.postsecret.com this morning and loved it.

The unconcious comparing of myself to others who “have it all figured out” or “have it together” is lethal. I hope that I can let God take that from me and give me peace and confidence in return. If we all just realized that we don’t know much, our journey might get a whole lot less complicated!