ASK YOURSELF THIS...

I have a quick question for you today.  But first, spend a few quiet moments going back in your heart to people/things that you are completely head-over-heels in love with (past & present).

Is (was) it a romantic relationship??  Possibly you're seeing the faces of your children.  Or maybe your thoughts even include the big puppy dog eyes of a favorite pet.

Are you there??  Got all those head pictures and emotions rounded up??  Is your heart swooning??

Now ask yourself this honestly:

HOW DOES YOUR REACTION TO YOUR JESUS COMPARE??

Is your heart overflowing??  Are you giddy with excitement anticipating the next time you meet Him?? Are you glowing visibly??  Do you find yourself babbling uncontrollably about Him??

Sure, sometimes love is a decision.  A commitment.  A choice.   But if your honest answer to the above question left you feeling slightly "flatline"...  if a sense of "duty and commitment"was your dominant reaction... or if you "know about Him" more than you "know Him"... I'm here to tell you that there is SO MUCH MORE!!  It IS possible to fall head-over-heels in love with our Jesus!!    

One thing I've learned and experienced over the past couple years is that no matter if you're male or female... Jesus Christ desires a "sacred romance" with us.  He desires that we literally fall in love with Him.  He wants MORE than the dutiful feelings that come with settling for a "show up on Sunday and do good deeds" type approach to our faith.  How cool is that!!!!

If you desire to take things to a more intimate level with your Saviour... TELL HIM so!!
Ask Him to show you how.
Ask Him to show up in your day today.... and then watch for Him.
Ask Him to speak to you through Christian music... and then listen for Him.
Talk to Him intimately from your heart when you pray... and spend time in silence to hear what He's saying back.
Get to know Him better by reading books by reputable authors.
Dive into HIS book with a childlike openness.
If you don't already, try praying out loud!!
Ask His Spirit to actively move in you.
Spontaneously tell Him "I Love You!" throughout your day.  

Well now... I'm chuckling.  This post was intended to be a simple one-line question.  HA!  I guess I got carried away and started babbling again.  I can't help it though....

I'M IN LOVE!!!!  

JUNK DRAWERS

So here we are… the last week in January.   How many drawers have you cleaned??  How many closets have you reorganized??  It seems to be an instinctive need we have at the beginning of a new year to “clean house”.   Retailers are well aware of this tendency and market their organizers, plastic tubs, and books.   Endless strategies are offered in book stores, on t.v., and online.

Getting rid of junk feels good, doesn’t it.  Sometimes the messiest spots are the hardest to tackle though.  I’ve opened junk drawers like that, took one look, and simply closed them again!!  The task seemed too daunting….  maybe later.

I cleaned house last week.  Not my house in the literal sense, but instead… I cleaned “MY house”.    I asked God through an very extended, focused prayer time to expose to my mind and heart any area in my life that needed to be hauled out, gone through, evaluated, and/or eliminated.  Some of what I found in those deep, dark closets surprised me.  Like finding an old sweater from high school that you didn’t even remember you still had possession of… or discovering a grade school artifact that you had totally forgotten about.   These things were part of your life.  They represent the person you were.  They played a role in who you became. 

While high school fashion may make you laugh and grade school art may bring a smile to your face…. not everything you find in the deep dark corners of your heart will.  But opening those places and then just shutting the door to them again because the task is too daunting won’t make them go away.  They’ll still be there…. collecting even more and more dust. 

God brought things to my mind from way back when.  Silly things, I had thought… but when I hauled them all out and laid them side-by-side, I could see the pattern that God wanted to reveal to me.  Patterns, that unbenounced to me, had played an important role in who I am today. It was good at that point to literally ask God to go back into those situations with me.   It was amazing how in those “corners” where I was crying, I saw Him crying beside me.  In the “drawers” I opened where I felt ashamed or laughed at, He revealed Himself as having been there with His arms open wide saying “You are mine”.  And in those “closets” that exposed times where I felt rejected, I saw Him smiling at me, saying “Sandy... I CHOSE you”.

It’s a good feeling to have a clean house, isn’t it.  But, I wish there was a way to keep those freshly cleaned LITERAL drawers and reorganized LITERAL closets clean.  To the best of my knowledge, there isn’t any full proof product or strategy on the market as of yet.  Eventually, they will become disorganized and messy once again.   

   

The GOOD NEWS is there IS a way to protect our spiritual and personal house.   And it’s part of the cleaning process that I had missed before.  After hauling things out, sorting through them, dumping the crap, and at times handing over treasures… I asked the Holy Spirit to literally move into those places inside me that were now left exposed.  I asked Him to FILL THEM so those spaces were now occupied, and that particular junk could never return to them.  Of course they’re always be new junk to contend with, but those old spots are now FILLED… and sealed off forever… with the Holy Spirit.   I’ve never in my life felt cleaner... and can honestly say I've never felt closer to God.

 

I have to admit that it makes me grin how all this happened in January… the month notorious for cleaning house.  Ha!!!  Our God is SO awesome, isn’t He. 

Thank you, God… I love you too.   

PASSION

NO... I haven't disappeared.  Just going through a bit of a block and also had been at an amazing conference on the power of the Holy Spirit!!!  Can't wait to share ways God is working. 

In the meantime, I encourage you to check out this amazing you tube video clip from the book "Crazy Love".  Francis Chan REALLY expresses the passion for Christ that I wish for all of you... and for myself. 

Here's the link:  http://www.crazylovebook.com/videos.html  From there, click on "more videos" at the bottom and then on "Just Stop and Think". 

WHO said Christianity needs to be boring!!  Let's fall CRAZY IN LOVE... with the lover of our soul!!

FROZEN PEAS

Yesterday was a day filled with the blessing of friends.  I spent a few hours in the booth of a quaint coffee shop tucked in the village of Saugatuck with a beautiful friend who is literally glowing with love and excitement over what God is doing in her life.  I spent time on the phone with another dear friend discussing various issues we’re both concerned about.  Later in the day, I spent an hour sitting on a couch with a friend who’s going through some tough “life stuff”.  I’m not the world’s most social person really, but I DO cherish my friends and consider them… a blessing. 

  

I realize it’s a crazy time of year to talk about growing peas, but they are "snow peas" after all, so bear with me!!  I put this thought into words last spring after a night in my garden before Beauty In Brown Eggs.  It came to mind after reflecting on my day yesterday and I’d like to brush the snow off it, thaw it out, and share with you some thoughts… on peas.   

I was working in my garden the other night and was getting just a tad bit frustrated at the way snow peas are.  Seriously, have you ever grown them??  What appears to be the main, thick part of the stem is SO insanely fragile… you hardly have to touch it and SNAP… it breaks in half.  Personally, I thought those plants would be much better off climbing a different part of the trellis I had so diligently built… but every time I tried to move them, the buggers cracked in half.   HOWEVER… they have these hair-fine tentacles that reach up and out… grabbing on to whatever sturdy support they have near them… and upward-ho-they-go!!  The entire plant is supported by these little hair like fibers… allowing it to continue its climb upward.  Try to move THOSE and I swear they cling for dear life!! 

Isn’t it the same with us as people??  Our outward appearance can look so strong… a complex fig leaf of sorts.  But the slightest upset… or change in direction… can leave us broken and misguided.  We also NEED something to cling to… to hang onto for strength… to guide us on our path.  And this, my friends, is an intimate walk with Jesus Christ, prayer, the Word of God… and Christian friends.   

Hang on FOR dear life WITH them.  

Hang on for dear life TO them. 

For TRUE life.

The only LIFE.

Look around you… there are lessons to be learned everywhere.  Even in a simple garden.

 

I love you too, God.

p.s... stay tuned for some pictures of my unique garden in case you need a winter project.  

WONDER While I WANDER - Part III

Do you think it's on purpose???

Was He intentional??

OR is it purely coincidental that SO many things in nature reflect our walk with God??

Possibly it's just the way my quirky brain works,  I don't know.

But it makes me WONDER... once again.

It was the cactus this time.  While wandering through the deserts of Arizona, looking at what I call the "people cactus" dotting the dry, arid and brown landscape, I couldn't help but think of the Israelites... and our own personal deserts.

Something I learned this past year while attending a series by Ray VanderLaan (www.followtherabbi.com) was that God left his people wander in the desert for 40 years for a reason.  The reason wasn't so much to get them out of Egypt (because there certainly were shorter routes), but to get Egypt... out of them.  That was powerful to me.  What HAD been just another Old Testament story, really came alive.  The reality that God still does that today with His people.  With us.  When we need it, He brings us out into our own deserts... to draw us closer to Him.   And I knew He was doing it... with ME.

Nothing much grows in a desert, does it.  From what I remember of biology class, the only way a cactus survives is by storing up water in it's core.  As I rode by all those "people cactus", I wondered if it wasn't the same for us.  When God brings us out into the desert of our own lives, the ONLY way we will survive is by soaking Him up.... the Living Water.  And He loves us enough to keep us there until we do.

So what do you think??

Do you think it's on purpose??

Was He intentional??

Hhhmmm.... I WONDER.

Thanks for wandering with me a bit.




 

 

WONDER While I WANDER - Part II

WONDER some more with me.   But first, please come with me on some of my WANDERING this past week by way of this short slide show:

I came across the following quote the day before I left on my week of wandering.  It came to mind often.

"People travel to wonder at the height of the mountains...

At the huge waves of the seas...

At the long course of the rivers....

At the vast compass of the ocean....

At the circular motion of the stars...

And yet

THEY PASS BY THEMSELVES WITHOUT WONDERING."

(St. Augustine)

Take time to wonder at this:

The creator of the mountains... is the SAME GOD that created you and me.

The artist behind the sunsets...  is the SAME GOD that created you and me.  

The author of the seasons... is the SAME GOD that created you and me.  

Take time to wonder at this:

The SAME GOD that created you as the crown of His creation not only designed you... He wants an INTIMATE relationship WITH you.  

How can it be??

With ME??

Sometimes I don't think I truly "get that".

Do you??

WONDER While I WANDER - Part I

I've been wandering the Southwest corner of our nation this week by Harley.  Traveling by motorcycle is a very sensory based experience.  Not only do you see the world without a roof over your head or a car frame around you, but you can literally smell a change of landscape that will make you look around for cedars... or feel a sudden change in temperature that is completely unexplainable.  I love the rare opportunity to pull in the clutch to silence our loud mufflers and quietly drift down a winding mountain road while listening to beautiful praise music.  How can you not lift your hands to that!!

Another beautiful thing about wandering is it gives you a chance to WONDER.  A few things came to mind while wondering and wandering that I'd like to share.  These won't be sequential like "Pink Doors" was, but just a bit of wondering... while I wandered.  

So let's get going.

My favorite roads to travel on by motorcycle are those that just keep going... and going... and going.   No exits to worry about, no heavy traffic to maneuver, nothing to do but sit back and enjoy the scenery.  There is no question where you're going... you just follow the road laid out before you.  We took several roads like that this trip, where the route was very clear.

Inevitably, by choice or happenstance, you will encounter a big city.  On this particular trip, we spontaneously decided to find our way through downtown San Diego and onto Coronado Island.  Cars were weaving in and out of 5 lanes... multiple signs flashing overhead making you question your route... exit options every quarter mile... sensory overload of the unnerving kind.

I would've had no idea where to go if it hadn't been for the use of a GPS.  It told me what road I was on, how far I needed to go before the next turn, and what direction that turn would be.  It told me what lane was best and safest for me to stay in at the moment and alerted me to what the current speed limit was.  Having this in my hand, I was able to navigate and give direction.  It was a life saver.

Life can be like this, can't it.   Sometimes the road seems easy and clearly laid out before us.  But inevitably, we WILL encounter high traffic areas now and then.  Unfamiliar territory.  Options for exits we aren't sure are ours to take.   Confusing signs that make us question our direction.  Awareness that a wrong turn could result in us being... LOST.

What I "WONDERED while I WANDERED" successfully through SanDiego was this:

Is God my "GPS"?? 

Do I let Him navigate my life??  

How often do I just try to find my own way??

To me, these questions are worth wondering about.  Preferably... while I wander.