What am I good at?

Heather and Natasha

My daughter Natasha was sitting in the mini van with me this past Sunday morning. We just pulled into the parking lot. I started to gather my things when I heard my 8 year old say
" Mommy?"
"Yes, Natasha" I answered without looking in her direction, making sure my Bible and sermon were where I had placed them.
"Mommy, I was just thinking about how Heather is good at so many things. She is good at singing, skiing, drawing, art and acting. What am I good at?"
Looking straight at her, my mind quickly jumped to list all the things I knew Natasha was good at. A little panic set in, I never liked these "comparing ourselves"comments especially between sisters. I was just about to answer her when all of a sudden she tilted her head to the side and made a face like a lightbulb just turned on above her head. She smiled at the thought that seemed to have just entered her mind and looking at me she said " I know what I am good at Mommy! I am good at loving God." I smiled at her and said " Yes, Natasha you are very good at loving God. You have a very tender heart."
The words hit me but the depth of what she said didn't reach me until we were half way through our Holiness Meeting. In the meeting the band played a selection and the verses of the chorus were about being accepted and how God takes us as we are.
Then Natasha's words hit me....well, more like knocked the wind out of me.
" I am good at loving God". I heard her confident voice repeat the words in my head.
I thought to myself--That wasn't even on my list.....It should be on my
list.......It really is what it all is about ...right?
We try to be good at so many things.....
a good worship service, a good sermon, a good band, good programming, good evangelism, a good reputation, a good family, a good ministry.
But all of it is just noise.....a clanging cymbal without....love.
Let's be good at loving God. I want to be good at loving God!
Let's not only add it to the list......let it be the list.

"... But, the greatest of these is Love." 1 Corinthians 13:13

Evangelism and Anya

This is Anya dedicating to God our Emma when we were in The Republic of Georgia in 2002

My friend has just been appointed to lead an evangelism committee. She reads my blog every day from the Republic of Georgia. She asked me if I could ask my blog community if there are any new ideas or suggestions for evangelism. Here is her question: "I was wondering if you could help me... could you please, post on your blog a question on how other Corps officers do evangelism at their Corps. Maybe they can write something on what has worked and what hasn't."

My friend's name is Anya and she is originally from St. Petersburg, Russia. She was our translator in our first appointment to St. Petersburg central corps. Then later, when we were transferred to the Training school for the Eastern Europe command she became the translator for the school. God during this time called her to be an officer. During her two years in training, she translated Salvation Story into Russian and fell in love with a Georgian Cadet named Dato Kotrikadze. Dato and Anya serve together in Rustavi, Georgia with their beautiful daughter Lena. Recently she sent me a letter telling about the winter in Rustavi. I am sharing this to give you an idea of how the officers in The Republic of Georgia live and a little insight into Anya's daily life.
Anya's Letter:
We are busy at the Corps, we have more people coming, and we would like to see more young people coming. Could you please pray for us, so we can have wisdom and passion to attract them to Christ. We had a 4 day winter camp,with about 30 kids coming each day.
Last week we had a little crisis here. I don't know if you watched it on the news but we had problems with the gas, coming from Russia..and we heat our flat with gas and the electricity. So, we didn't have gas for a week and then we also had problems with the electricity. It came only in the evening and for a few hours. When there was 8 degrees in our flat, Dato decided to get a stove which works on wood.I never thought that I would ever need to use it! But it was fun and it really heated our flat, especially the kitchen area where it was.
Yesterday, at last, we had the gas coming and the electricity back to normal! I think I learned to appreciate some given things :) On the top of all we had very low temperature, like 8 below in C, and snow, for a whole week! It was beautiful but I just felt for those who couldn't heat their flats.

A question of the relevance of poetry

This poem was group inspired by Allison, Seth, Stephen and myself. ( words were limited to the magnets that were available to us!)

I seem to have this ability/gift that comes and goes called poetry. I have tried to read about it. I have tried to produce it on my own and yet the only time I feel it is any good at all is when it flows from me out of some kind of inspiration. I have only started sharing some of my poetry in the last couple of years. It usually is too personal to share. I often wondered what is it good for? What is it’s purpose? Other’s have tried to answer my question to no avail and in the end I figure it is just for my personal reflection or edification.
In my study for my sermon this Sunday….which was snowed out! I came across and interesting commentary on Numbers 11:25:
“Then the LORD came down in the cloud and spoke with him, and he took of the Spirit that was on him and put the Spirit on the seventy elders. When the Spirit rested on them, they prophesied, but they did not do so again.”

The commentary is Commentary on the Torah by Richard Elliott Friedman. On page 463 I read the following: “ Numbers 11:25. “They prophesied.” What exactly do they do ? Prophecy in the Bible does not primarily involve prediction. It is not that they are going about telling the future. What is happening that makes it obvious to Moses, Joshua and apparently everyone that they are doing something that is associated with prophets? Some suggest that they are in some sort of trance, but trance behavior is not generally part of what is pictured in the fifteen books
Of the prophets in the Tanak or in the case of prophecy in the Tanak’s narrative books. What is typical of prophecy, as opposed to historical narrative, in the Bible is that prophecy is in poetry ( or combinations of poetry and prose).
Biblical prophecy has the characteristics of oral formulaic poetry. That is, the prophet composes on the spot, using lines that he or she has already composed and memorized, and mixing these “formulas” with new lines that occur to him or her spontaneously. When such poems occurred to ancient poets, the poet must have felt inspired. And people who watched and listened to them must have perceived them to be inspired as well. When a man spontaneously says
They’ll beat their swords into plowshares
And their spears into pruning hooks
A nation won’t lift a sword against a nation,
And they won’t learn war anymore.
We can easily imagine him and his audience feeling that it is God moving through him. Further evidence that they are doing something musical or poetic comes from the other most famous biblical instance of such group prophesy : King Saul joins in a group of prophets, he prophesies with them, which astounds everyone. And in that case the text notes that these prophets are accompanied by musical instruments. ( 1 Sam. 10:5)
See also the story of Aaron’s and Miriam’s challenge to Moses in the coming chapter. They have experienced prophecy, and they say, “ Has YHWH only spoken through Moses? Hasn’t he also spoken through us? God responds with a declaration about the nature of prophecy, saying that Moses’ experience is different from all others, and the important thing to note here is that the words of God are in poetry ( Num. 12:6-8). (emphasis mine)
Some think that biblical prophecy involved some sort of ecstatic state. That is possible, but it may be more inspired state, both in an Isaiah and in a case like Saul’s or the seventy elders here, in which one who does not normally speak in poetry is now moved and enabled to do so.”

I am not sure what I think of this.
I don’t think that all people who can put a rhyme together have the gift of prophecy. I know that some of my own poetry has been just reflections of what I am seeing and feeling. It’s my way of processing and I don’t think it is prophetic, at least not all the time! ;)
I do know this:
I like the idea of God speaking in poetry.
That he doesn’t find it cheesy or nauseating or useless but
even God is known to speak poetry to those that He loves.
So I walk away from this discovery with this:
Firstly, in my great romance with God, He not only promises to sing over me. (Zephaniah 3:17) but, He may occasionally speak words of poetry to my heart.
Secondly, concerning the purpose of poetry- if it’s relevant and is used by God than that’s good enough for me!

Sandown, NH

I am going to my “happy place!” Do you have one of those? You know, the place you can retreat to in your mind to escape or find rest from the cares of the day?
My “happy place” is tucked away in my mind and has been engraved on my heart since before I can even remember.
It’s an old burlap hammock that used to hang between two birch trees. When I climb into it and lay back…..with some wiggling around I always find the perfect spot. Then it seemed as if I am floating. One leg usually dangles over the side and my foot rest on a snake like tree root which conveniently forced its way through the ground in a perfect spot to push off from. Then keeping a steady, gentle rock of the hammock I am close to peace and rest.
Looking up, I see a canopy of light green leaves flutter above me with a gentle breeze. The summer light shining through them makes them look translucent. Usually in autumn, they turn yellowish or even gold like in appearance then they glitter and dance above like a flapper from the forties.
If I sit up in the hammock, the house my Granddad built is behind me, the lake is in front of me at the bottom of a small hill. Lilly pads cover the cove inlet in the summer and sunsets fall just over the horizon on the other side of the lake. The same lake, I swam across with my Grandmother, skipped rocks on with my Grandfather and ice skated on with my brothers. In the summer, the lake was the color of ice tea and in the winter it was frozen so solid that we could walk out to the middle, around a small island and even play hockey on it! Once I saw a fish in the ice. The fish was perfectly frozen, caught off guard by Jack Frost’s little trick meant it was unable to move till spring. I stood staring at it for a long time and imagined the ice thawing and the fish swimming away as the thickness around it gave way, setting it free.
My whole inner world can be seen from that hammock!
It was my Granddad’s hammock but we all fought over it in the same way we would fight over the front seat in the car or the window seat in a plane. Even the adults would fight for it! It was the perfect place.

I remember daydreaming, reading, drawing and floating in that burlap sack between two birches as early as I can remember and well into my teens.
Later, when I was in college and returned to Christ, rededicated my life to Him…..I spent the first two weeks of my NEW life, every morning in that hammock. My time with God, my devotional life started there. I would get comfortable and with my Bible and a cup of coffee, I gently rocked. I gently started each day with God under a canopy of lime green leaves and pillars of white birches.
Both my grandparents are with the Lord now. The house is sold and someone else gets to stand amongst the birches of Sandown and look at the sunsets and lily pads.
But I can’t say I miss it…..because like I said……It is engraved on my heart and I go there often. I figure, if I can still see it when I close my eyes…still feel the burlap under me and hear the water lapping the shore of the cove…..then I haven’t lost it but have taken it with me.
Do you have a “happy place”?

Going Deeper

My weakness overwhelms me at times….the fear of not living up to expectations…. Not being good enough….Jesus reminds us that only God is good. We will always stumble, we will always fail….we are always sinners who fall short of the glory of God…
George MacDonald says in his book of unspoken sermons “ Many, alas! Have looked upon his face, yet never seen him, and have turned back; some have kept company with him for years, and denied him; but their weakness is not the measure of the patience or the resources of God.” pg. 182 ( The Way)

With scuba diving you have to practice "failing" in the water before they would let you go deeper. You have to allow water to get into your mask, you have to learn to loose your air piece. Then learn how to clear your mask and retrieve your air piece. They made us practice in the shallow water so that we still had our feet on the ground. I wanted to scuba dive so badly but I didn’t do so well at the “how to recover from possible problems” lesson. Finally after several tries I looked at the instructor and said “ I really want to do this!” He agreed to let me go deeper but I would have to hold his hand. I took his hand and we went deeper and deeper into the water. There was a whole world down there with bright colored coral, eels and painted fish. Before I knew it I was swimming and breathing on my own. I felt like I was flying and I never would have seen any of it if the instructor hadn’t taken my hand and led me deeper.
My fear of failure almost kept me from experiencing a whole other world….what keeps us from Going deeper with God…
“Our weaknesses are not the measure of the patience or the resources of God.”.

Deeper Lyrics and Words by Delirious

I want to go deeper

But I don’t know how to swim

I want to be meeker

But have you seen this old earth?

I want to fly higher

But these arms won’t take me there

I want to be, I want to be

Maybe I could run

Maybe I could fly, to you

Do you feel the same

When all you see is Blame in me?

And the wonder of it all is that I’m living just to fall

More in love with you [x2]

I want to go deeper

But is it just a stupid whim?

I want to be weaker

Be a help to the strong

I want to run faster

But this old leg won’t carry me

I want to be, I want to be

Maybe I could run

Maybe I could fly, to you

Do you feel the same

When all you see is Blame in me?

And the wonder of it all is that I’m living just to fall

More in love with you [x2]

Maybe I could run

Maybe I could follow

It’s time to walk the path

Where many seem to fall

Hold me in your arms

Just like any father would

How long do we have to wait?

How long, we’re going all the way

And the wonder of it all is that I’m living just to fall

More in love with you

Asbury Revival

Revival at Asbury College!

Habakkuk 3:2 “Lord, I have heard of your fame; I stand in awe of your deeds, O Lord. Renew them in our day, in our time make them known;
in wrath remember mercy.




http://www.asbury.edu/press/chapelcontinues06


Savior, Savior, Hear my humble cry;
While on others Thou art calling,
Do not pass me by.

God's word to women

I would like to share a site that I have found recently. It is about God's Word to Women.
I found the word study, scripture for women and articles very insightful. These are not young feminist who have set out to dominate the men. Take a look at who the women are behind this web site!

Who We Are . . . and Are Not!

From Left to right: Pat Joyce, Gay Anderson and Barbara Collins

God says that He will "...use those things that are weak to confound the wise."
I Cor. 1:26.
Who we are... We're three women from Texas--Barbara Collins, Gay Anderson and Pat Joyce. Barbara and Gay came to the Lord in the 60's and Pat in the 70's. Although we are all ordained ministers, we have found our identity in Him; and He's been our life since we first met. On this basis, we would like to share some of the truths we have discovered.

God is presently calling women to the full redemption for which they were created and which He purchased for them on Calvary. He wants woman to walk in the fullness of the original, pre-Fall relationship that He had with her as well as Adam. The three of us are only a tiny part of this great move of God but we pray that we will be faithful to the call He has given.
What we are...and are not. We do not identify ourselves as feminists. Placing the word Biblical before feminist, or saying Christian feminist does not solve the problem. The word feminist has come to be identified with a radical posture that maintains that women have few differences from men, or denies the need for men, or at best presents men as lesser beings like some of the TV sitcoms. We believe man and woman offer a completion and strength to each other. Woman was created as a help (counterpart, partner) to man--not inferior in any way.
We do adhere to the belief that women and men are, and have been, treated differently by our society, and that women have frequently and systematically been unable to participate fully in all social arenas and institutions including marriage. We carry a sincere desire to change that situation, especially as that participation relates to ministry within the church, the home and the Body of Christ-at-large.
We believe that much of the present-day attitude in the church toward women comes identified with tradition and human precepts rather than Bible truth. When the church is cleansed of denominationalism; human tradition; prejudice that includes race, gender status or class; bondage to culture; and customs, then the church will be ready to demonstrate the unity and the oneness for which our Lord prayed in John 17.
In the Magna Charta of Women published in 1919, Jessie Penn-Lewis quotes Dr. Katharine Bushnell who said, "The church which silences women will be found to silence the Holy Ghost," and "a sect or sex, or race which attempts a monopoly of the Spirit's voice and power, will find that the Holy Spirit will flee far from it." (p. 102) Jessie Penn-Lewis continues: "God's time has come for the emancipation of women, but it will be woe to the world and terrible loss to the Church if they are not won for Christ and for His service. For it is certain that if Christ does not get hold of the women of today, the devil will." She concluded by saying that "it will be woe to the serpent and to his kingdom if those whom he has so oppressed and persecuted lay hold of the fact of his utter defeat at Calvary and in the power of their triumphant Head turn upon their foe in assurance of victory." (p. 103) Let it come, Lord!
Although the three of us are only a small part of this great move of God, we are committed to being faithful to the call He has given us.
We are honored to have been mentioned in Vinson Synan's new book The Century of the Holy Spirit in the section on Spirit-filled Women written by Dr. Susan Hyatt.

Here is the link:

http://godswordtowomen.org/main.htm

Married Women's ghetto RANT

Married Women's ghetto RANT,
is an article by Captain Danielle Strickland. You can read it at J.A.C. on line :

http://www.armybarmy.com/article1a.html

I highly recommend it. It is passionate and raises some good questions. I appreciate her honesty and her willingness to lay it all out there.
Is she right? Has she gone too far? Is she exaggerating??
Hmmmm…….

Random words of love

My littlest one, Emma is three and a half. She has just started randomly telling me that she loves me. It usually isn't related to anything. We can be doing nothing and she looks up at me, grins and says “Mommy, I love you!". Her eyes are so full of love and she always looks as if she just HAD to tell me. There is nothing like the pure, innocent love of a three year old. Every time she says it, all on her own, my heart melts, I feel great and really..... kind of "gushy"!
Today, I got a free coffee at Starbucks. I think they feel bad for me with my addiction and all. They just gave me a tall skim latte and wouldn't take my money. I left laughing at the fact that I am in there so much, they are now giving it to me free and then I thought.......you know, God loves me! God bought me a coffee today. It seemed as if He walked out of the Starbucks with me to my car as we laughed together at that thought ..........and then it happened!
I randomly said it......" I love you God!"
All of a sudden, I thought of Emma saying those words to me and I wondered.......does God feel the same way that I feel when Emma says those words to me? Does His heart melt when I randomly express my love for Him, even over a seemingly small incident?
I like the idea, that God's heart might melt or that He likes hearing me say...."I love you!"
Maybe, God even gets a little "gushy" when His children randomly tell Him that they love Him.

Quote for the artist

"Where the Spirit

does not work with the hand

there is no art"

Leonardo Da Vinci