A lot accomplished - And a lot of JOY!

Christmas angels so don't represent the Bible
description of angels...but they do fill my girly
love of frilly dolls.

I have to give a great big thanks to my husband for being more supportive than ever in helping me get the Christmas stuff pulled out and in place this year.  He has never liked the "decorating" part of Christmas, but likes for me to do it.  In other words, he likes the results, not the process. He also likes that I like it. But in the past years, I have had to do it all alone too many times, and sometimes just decided that it wasn't worth the effort.  When too weary or pressed for time, I have let it just slide in recent years.  In my childhood, it was such an integral part of our celebration to decorate.  In our family, we all loved it so much that everyone pitched in.  But Jimmy and the kids never really got into it to the point of wanting to help me decorate. In all these years since I married him, it has been a lonely process.  They all liked being a part of it at my sister's house. My children seemed to catch the "Christmas spirit" when with their cousins, but I just couldn't get them into it at home. So I often became discouraged.  It seemed like I was doing it all just for myself.  And I didn't want to do it all just for myself.

Well, this year, I have a new grandbaby, and the free time to pull out everything. I can at least decide if I want to put it up. I have enjoyed doing it so much that I have put out almost everything in the boxes, and once I get the tree lights on, (the hardest part to me,) decorating the tree will be my favorite part.  Then just a few simple things outside and I am done.
What has this to do with prayer, or my Christian walk? It has to do with the fact that just a little help goes such a long way.  Since my husband has been involved even a little bit, I have been encouraged. The smallest thing, like carrying a box or two down stairs when it is empty, and putting it in the correct pile of boxes...the fact that he cared enough to place a box in the box stack that is empty, not just anywhere, speaks volumns to his attitude.  It says he cares this year, in a way that makes me feel good about what I am doing. In reciprocation, I tried to hear his voice as well. He has complained a lot about my not having curtains over the window where we planned to put the tree. The old drapes were dingy, and dated. I had washed them, and not put them back up.  So I decided to get something up on the windows. It was a small thing, but it seemed to lead to Jimmy wanting to help me put up the tree. So we fluffed the whole tree together without one single arguement.  That my friends is a miracle for us. WE can't do anything without arguing.  But lately that has been changing. After 42 years we are somehow finding out how to work together. This will be my best Christmas present ever. I feel like it is coming from God.  To actually enjoy cleaning and decorating my house for Christmas has been like a dream that  I had given up on.  And this year, it is a dream come true.  Even if I never finish everything I wanted to do, I am blessed already to have come so far in just a few days. Years of working so hard to make this happen for other people, and doing without for myself and my family had made me dread the Christmas season.  In just a few days, that all has changed.

Well, not in just a few days, because it began some time ago when I gave into my circumstances and simply accepted them. But the last few days have "sealed the deal". One of the things that has always been a problem for me, is Jimmy's work hours. His working nights, left me without enough rest.  As long as I fought being awake at night when he came home, and refused to sleep in the day, unless I passed out asleep, I couldnt' get things done. Then it occurred to me, that if Iwas going to have to be awake in the middle of the night, then I might as well find something to do besides trying to go back to sleep. A couple of things happened. When I awakened in the morning, I felt a sense of accomplishment, knowing something on my to do list was already done.  I didn't have the  guilt complex that I normally lived with, feeling I needed to get something done that would disturb Jimmy's sleep. I had always felt helpless, that I cared so much about his getting rest, but he didn't seem to care that he disturbed my getting rest. I dragged into work, and passed out the minute I walked in the door after work. Always blaming my blackouts on my sugar levels, I never really gave enough credence to the fact that I didn't get undisturbed sleep.  So now if I get 4 hours at night and 4 hours some time in the day. I just appreciate the hours when I am awake, and try to do things when I am the most awake.  My life doesn't fit the life the outside world lives, but it fits us. And for now, I am just trying to "count it all joy." 

Christmas tidings of "Joy to the World" are my theme this year. I want to be joyful. I believe it is where the Lord calls me to be. In a state of Joy. God smiles when we have joy. When we chose to celebrate in Joy. Rejoicing is the spirit God choses for us. Why not live in it?  Today I am praying for this kind of Joy for everyone I know.  A peaceful acceptance of our circumstances, that allows us to think about them differently than we might have or have in the past.  A renewal of our minds that leads to a newness in everyday life that exemplifies the Joy that God has planned to give us. 
Thank you, Lord for JOY today.  I love Christmas and all that it means because you were born into this world. When your mother saw your baby face, she could not have imagined your horrible yet magnificient sacrifice.  Her feelings were feelings of JOY. Perhaps coupled with so many other emotions, but everything about Christmas, including the singing of Angels lets me know that you want us to have Joy when I celebrate your birth.  Please Lord, spread that joy around the globe this year. Not because of gifts, and decorations, but because of You. Then let us  give good gifts, and celebrate in the best way we are able. Always with Joy!

I am also doing something else this year. I am forgiving myself for all the times I failed my family and couldn't make their Christmas as wonderful as I wanted it to be. But also I am forgiving my self for little things. Like the fact that these pictures are dark. It is considered poor form to put poor pictures on your blog. However, it has been raining for several days, and these were the best picures I could get without more light.  I cannot make the lovely warm glow of the lights to be as comforting here as they actually are. But I forgive myself for falling short of perfection. I am counting it all joy. Everything. I am accepting my circumstances, and allowing something short of perfection! That is definitely a part of finding Joy.

Thanksgiving, my favorite time of year...

I don't exactly know why Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday, but it is. I love the smell of the foods cooking, and I actually love cooking it, but I love it traditionally the way my MOM cooked it.  I don't like changing it up much.  Some of my favorite foods, are now some of the foods that I can't or shouldn't eat.  The health thing gets in the way the older you get.  Shouldn't have the fruit salad I love more than any food in world, the dressing and gravy that we make with so much sage it's green in color.  The pumpkin pie, pecan pie  or sweet potatoes with nuts and marshmellows... But I do love the turkey...I so look forward to at least eating some turkey.  But now they want to fry it, marinate it, or stuff it with unfamiliar flavors and unless I cook one just for me... no warm turkey smelling up my kitchen fresh from the oven.  So, the one thing left is to be with family..and I am going to focus on being thankful for that.  It wouldn't matter, I am just plain thankful for so much. One or two years ago, there was so much I was fearful that we would have lost by now.  Now we are on the other side of the losses and I have lived through the fears as we lost loved ones and friends, and God allowed that a number of other things were not lost, and I just feel content. I am thankful to be content.  I am blessed to be content.  I have a new grandson, who amazes me everyday, and that alone is BIG in the things to be thankful for.  I just want to have some fun this thanksgiving.  To enjoy the day.  I want to celebrate the fact that each day I wake and there are still things that I want to do.  Just knowing I don't have to do them, I just can if I want to is something I am thankful for.  No demands, or quandries about how do I juggle it all.  Just get up and plan my day. Pray, or write or do art a little and accomplish something I was looking forward to doing and hadn't gotten around to.  I have begun to dream a little again. Something I had put on hold I guess.  That's a marvelous freedom.  I am thankful for the God who walks with me every minute, a savoir, a friend, a companion, a provider.  And once again I am reminded that I am content. 
I wish a few things had gone differently in the last year or two.  But I give that to Jesus.  There is a quietness that overcomes me when I am in this special place of being content. People often think I am mad who are around me, because I am ususally quiet.  But that's just it. My soul is quiet. No noise in my head or anxiousness in my heart. Just quiet. My favorite place to be.  A stillness in my emotions. And for that I am thankful.
I have a lot of needs, but tomorrow I refuse to think about all I need, but rather to celebrate the things God has not taken away.  And that's a lot. 

Lord, I wasn't sure what you intended to do in my life a short while back.  I still don't see the plan in some areas.  But where I am, is just fine as long as you are here to give me this marvelous contentment. Thank you, AMEN

Galations 3 and 4 Exposition on Law vs. Faith

See the note below on how this picture applies to this blog.

  I am not sure why I never really considered the truths of Galatians 3 and 4 and prized them as much as I have recently. It is a valuable tool in understanding that we should not place our souls into the mish-mash of trying to determine our eternity based on how well we keep the commandments. Where did the Christian community go so wrong in sprinkling in a few commandments here and a few there to make faith more complete? WHY is faith not enough. Is it bland like an unsalted bean, so we feel we need to spice it up? Or are we just not sure that faith is just that simple? Can we not accept the gift of God? Do we reject that a loving Lord would just provide us everything we need to have a fulfilled spiritual life?

Is it too easy?  It was very hard for him.  It took Him several hundred years to set up so we had volumes of documents and lifetimes to show us we couldn't achieve a spiritual peace on our own, or that we would ultimately fail under the law. It took him sending his beloved Son to die on a cross to make it possible, indelible. He went to great lengths. To make sure that it was all written down. 

Galatians says in no uncertain terms that God clearly dealt with His Old Testament believers without the law for 430 years before he gave them the Law.  Why did He give the Law anyway? and set up a whole priesthood to help the people keep the commandments?  Well, there seem to be two basic reasons. One is to make it clear that we are incapable of keeping them. To help us see that the standards of God are pretty high. WE need God to help us live to any level of the the standard. But the second one is that some of those things in the law are all about preserving us. God's form of Eco preservation. If He hadn't helped to preserve the nation of Israel, Jesus would have not been a Jew. LOL It was about showing us that there are certain things in life that if not taken seriously, will lead us to extinction. How we eat, if we rest, how we treat one another, if we kill one another irresponsibly, how much we respect the possesions of others as belonging to them.  Ecologists act as though these concepts are something new they thought up. The reason being, we have lost our way. Do the laws of God have relativity in the modern world. More so than ever, because we humans are on a collision course with our undiscipled lifestyles.  Are we more unlawful in God's eyes than any of our predecessors? NO We totally are no different than any before us. There are just so many  more of us that the consequences are catching up with us. Will we ever be able to turn it around. No. It's fruitless...to beleive that Utopia will come to earth. But not fruitless, to try to live healthier, treat others well as much as we are able, and not make what we do be detrimental to others, and our environment, or to that of future inhabitants of this creation. But ultimately, it is like any other thing in the universe. Someday, in someway, God must intervene. There must be renewal or a remake. So the Lord gave us some direction. Do we therefore get busy keeping the law with more determination?  AHHH the delimna.  Back again to working harder at keeping the law.  Jesus summed it up. He said the law was all rolled up in Loving God more than anything, and loving others in the same manner we love ourselves.  The implication being that we should also find a place to love ourselves. Scripture also gives direction to chose life....so oddly, we start with asking ourselves do we, or can we, at least try to love ourselves, enough to desire a realtionship with our creator, and then give that same opportunity to all others?  Taking care of the earth, ourselves and other people becomes a matter of respecting what belongs to God. Some will make that their life's journey, Some will stop there, thinking that if they just do their part on this earth that God will be pleased enough somehow to take them into his eternal blessing. Some will work harder and harder to make a difference, and proudly so, but fall short.

Use the gage.
If we use all the oil deposits, will all our environmental efforts bring it back. NO
If we change the chemical makeup of our air, can we change it back to oxygen? NO
If we cut so many trees...replant enough trees...etc., etc....
So if it is so impossible, why are we so responsible?  WE are not. God made us stewards of HIS work. But His Creation is HIS Creation. The point being, that at some point we must incorporate the God of Creation back into the resolution. So it is with our salvation. Why not sooner than later?  So then the question is do we couple the law with our salvation?  Only to the extent that by knowing it, we can try to work with respect to God's laws. God set up plans for renewal, replenishment, return. Almost anything in His creation works on a cycle.  It is beyond our ablility to see how the whole of our universe recycles itself. But on smaller scales, we see that other things in our universe circle around until the time they have extinguished their purpose, and they disentegrate.
It isn't news to God that things expire. The life death cycle of humans demonstrates that things should be expected to expire. The renewal is in the fact that we reproduce. The laws of God, and not just those written on behavoir in Old Testament Scripture, are about how this will continue when our earth expires from the universe.
People talk about the end of the world, thinking that it will be over when something catastrophic comes. But the other more wonderful element of God's law of "re" is that He made a way that supernaturally, we are renewed to a place in a realm we cannot fathom. The world in which God resides. We think of it as being out there somewhere. A heaven beyond the horizons of our solar system?  I don't think so. I believe that it is a realm into which only our souls may go because it is of something totally beyond our understanding.  I don't believe in re-incarnation, because I beleive in the principle of expiration and recreation as much as I believe in the law of renewal. There will be a time of extinction for this physical world. What if that dreaded catastrophe comes while people still inhabit the earth? Did God just forget that? No He made way that we could be a part of His spiritual realm.  Who knows.  Maybe there will be yet another realm beyond Heaven. But I know that it will be as impossible for me to get there on my own as Heaven is a place to which I have absolutely no power to transport myself there.  At some point, the God of the Universe must intervene. I am in the end, totally at His mercy. No amount of anything I can do to work within His laws endows me with power to do the Godly, impossible tasks of keeping things going. Yet I am not only a part of the laws of God, and ruled by the laws of God, I am in existance due to the laws of God.
Simply, the laws of God are not something I do or keep, but are something that exists to keep me. So what do I do with the laws of God. I live within them to the best of my ablility to make those choices, simply because God gave me the right to make choices. Why did He do that? So I would need to get to know more about Him. Giving me the choice to live outside of His laws, can in fact help me understand that it doesn't work, and may give me a reason to seek the companionship of God to know how I might have life and that more abundantly. Everything God did in creating man, as about allowing us to make a choice to be His friend, to get to know Him, fall in love with Him, to desire His presense, and involvement in my life. 
A keyboard is useless if you don't type. Electric lines are powerless without a source of energy. Life doesn't go on without water. Tools are of no value without a purpose and a person or machine to use them for that purpose. These are all kind of "laws".  Mathmatics is a set of laws. Because they are laws, there is an element of dependability about them. The items are useful because the laws reguarding their use are dependable. I can say certain things are true, and can build upon that truth.  That is the requard God would have us give to His laws.  Use them as tools to build upon. But don't count on them to give eternal life. They can describe the paths to eternal life. I can build hope upon them. I can have understanding about Justification, value, and Redemption which are all legal terms. But they are the description of how it works, not the essence of how it works.  Grace by faith is HOW it works.  It is when God intervenes to bring life to the law.
Precious Lord, how do I praise you enough for the laws of life and eternity. How do I place you in the box in my mind that tries to understand the magnificance of a God who is that big? Thank you that all you really want is me, a loving relationship with me.  That a place a value on that leaves me humble     and desirous to be ever aware of your indwelling companionship.  YOU came into me... and you wanted to be there enough to go beyond your own laws to make it happen.  Much Love Jesus. And praise! Thank you. AMEN

The picture at the top of the blog is of a fractal. Fractals are the visible result of placing points on a grid of numeric values derived from a type of function or mathmatical equation.  The resulting answer to this kind of equation is dimensional because there are an infinite number of answers to the problem. The resulting image is both infinite and repetitious. It is also artistic and generally intricately beautiful. A flat image can not present the full depth of these graphics. A 3 dimensional rendition is however impossible because the image is infinite.  Therefore we must use our imagination and possibly a little virtual zoom to see the repeated pattern being reworked an infinite number of times.  I love these images because to me, they are as close as I can come to getting a visual of the law of God of renewal.  I also love that it takes a mental exercise to imagine the concept of this pattern being set and going on for ever into infinity directionally, and expansionallly, for ever near,forever far, forever large, forever small, and larger than is possible to construct even virtually.  They are an artistic picture of the laws of God in practice. The law is in place. The math has been revealed to us. The tools have been made to make the picture visible. It is up to man to plug in the numbers to the formula.  Since that is also beyond our ability to do without the help of the computer, we don't even have to plug in the numbers. but rather slide a button along a line and determine the place in the numerical values of the color spectrum and hit enter. Et Viola ~ That's how it is with God's law and how we are to live within its perameters. Just plug in the numbers, so to speak.  Use God's laws to make our lives beautiful. Recognize their capacity, enormity, boundaries, and see them as reasonable patterns for a good life that God intended to go on and on. But when we break the pattern, life does not go on and on. There fore God must intervene to renew the pattern.  I love the deep things of God. and I love fractals for being a visual on the laws of God.  As a child I saw this in the simple exercise of setting a mirror to reflect something in another mirror. You've done it. the reflection goes on and on... Same principle but more linear than the fractal. Jesus said he was the light of the world. Light is intricate in concept.  The thing Jesus was telling us was that the act of salvation is just that intricate. The laws of God are just that magnanamous and beautiful. In order to bring out that beauty, we need only plug in the numbers. Use the laws to bring infinite beauty into our lives.   

Sharing Blessings and Sorrows

Today, my neighbor's grandchild died.  I am so sorry for this family who has prayed and loved the little one to the age of 7 months.  But since the Lord decided to take her home, I can so relate.  When God chose to take my little grand-daughter, it took me forever to see her in Heaven.  I knew in my heart she was there, but I just couldn't get past the grave. I pray for this family, and the upcoming months of emotional stuff they will have to endure.  But I thank God for their testimony to us all while they waited on the Lord.

I went back and forth this week on whether to put my long blog onto Christy's page - Wings, or here on the Garden.  So I am linking to "My Wings Are Made of Faith" so that it can be read from both blogs.   I have several things I gleaned from researching the battle between living under the law, and living by faith.  It is unclear to many Christians what God expects of us.  I am so glad for Galations 3 & 4 which makes it very clear.

Once we realize that God is the one who brings victory to our battles over sin, and satan, we can find release from sin, and from the power of Satan. We can choose to send Satan Packin'. In today's blog on Wings, Lori discusses freedom from fear, tomorrow I show how Paul taught the Galations freedom from serving the Law.  In both cases, we look to the cross and make decisions to act on our faith. 

I thank God for the ability to claim the power that comes with the cross and a knowlege of a risen savoir, that allows us to paint the blood on the doorposts of our future, to enter boldly the paths God asks us to trod, and expect victory over Satan and Sin...and put fear in it's place.

I praise you dear Lord. AMEN

Thankful for the Leaves in Fall

This morning the leaves from the trees are falling like flakes of snow, softly making shadows through every window in the house. Since I was a child, one of the things that made me feel God was present most was the constantcy of the seasons.  When the leaves fell, and the cold came I wondered why God made winter. I was much older of course when I understood the parallels between the season of rest, and how God allows the plants to die back to their roots or bare branches, so that in the spring there may be renewal and fresh growth. Just as Jesus died and was buried, and resurrected so that the church might have life and flourish, each Fall the seasons begin the cycle over again.  Many people think of Spring as the "beginning" of the seasons, but I think of fall. It is the time to me when things begin the process of starting all over, with a fresh start.  I like to think of prayer in the fall, as a time when I can make a concerted effort to allow the things that have withered in my life to fall away. To seek a clean slate, allow the cold crisp winds of the spirit of God to kill back the failing efforts of my busy-ness and prepare me, give me rest, and allow me to get back to the sustenance of the roots of my Christianity.  It is this natural cylce of things that allows me to have peace with God.  There are so many ways that God tells us it's OK to let go of the things that were once the very essence of what we depended on for daily life - jobs, relationships, material things, health, all are not permanent.  They are a part of life, and add to the fullness of life, but they are disposable.  Yes even relationships can be allowed to drop away. I can't even count the times I have listened to a friend or family member who was torn apart by whether it was OK with God to walk away from a relationship that was not working. Relationships that cause pain, and are basically dying, need to be dropped like a leaf. I am not advocating leaving marriages casually, but when they don't work, and the time comes that there is no life in them, or one of the partners is not commited, God understands the need for a fresh starts.  He allows us to wipe the slate clean, cast off sin, or hinderances on our lives like the trees dropping leaves. There comes a time when it is the season to drop everything that has run its course, or is withering with age, or simply needing to go. 
The concept is visible in several of Jesus parables or picture stories...like the question that he asked about putting new wine in old wineskins. (Matthew 9, Mark 2, and Luke 5.) Or patching worn fabric with new cloth. He says that it is an absolute waste to spend the time, use the resources, or hold out hope for success in the effort.  He says to allow God to supply new jugs, new clothes, new beginnings.  The number 8 is about new beginnings. The eighth month of the year is August. Immediately following are the Cleansing months. Fall and Winter reflect the times in our lives that we slowly recognize that is time to let things go, and one by one we can let things fall away. Then there is a time of adjustment, that parallels with winter, while we rest and regroup.  It takes time after life's hard spots to let go, and then it takes time to process what has happened, before we are ready for the warm winds of Spring. 
The seasons of life are often seen as birth, youth, adult productivity, and old age. I like to see the seasons in smaller units.  I like having a few more points in time where it's OK to start with a new clean future. Fortunately, God allows that it can be everyday, if we need.  But the great joy is that God allows, encourages, plans for and expects us to have seasons in our lives.  He understands that sometimes on a regular basis, the old "stuff" just needs to go.

Lord, I am so glad that the falling leaves don't fall until they have turned those gorgeous colors.  As they drop like snow this morning, the trees are looking so barren, but the ground is just beautiful!  Your message to my heart seems to be that although some things in my life seem too beautiful to be ready to be separated from...precious friends and family who are dying or have died...but they are passing into a beautiful beginning too. And there are other things too that I have some difficulties parting with, so I am trying to see the beauty in letting them go. I am trying to look into the future with hope for the spring that I can be assured will come, because you are in control.  You want us to have joy even in the seasons of letting go. To have assurance that there is beauty in everything, including loss.  Help me and those who may need this truth today to count it all joy.  Even as the falling leaves bring me joy, make me smile and think of you, help me to see the falling away of the fading leaves of my life as beautiful, and may they always make me think of you as a loving God who allows the load we carry just drop away.  Love you - Father, Son and Spirit- all, AMEN

IT KEEPS ME GOING

AAAAAHHHHHH!!!!!

WHAT A BLESSING

Even in Pain We Learn

Today on My Wings Are Made of Faith, I wrote a blog about Unconditional Love. When I sat down to post it, on Thursday, I had a migraine that had almost grown to full force. I don't know about other people's strong headaches, but I know that mine sort of grow to an intensity that I can no longer stand, and then when I have finally taken enough meds to knock it out, I crash and sleep for hours.  But while it is intense, I can't see clearly and my body hurts all down my spine and out into the extremities. When it goes away, it goes away slowly too.  Even after my head stops hurting, my spine continues to hurt for several hours.  Well, I was in the I can't see stage when I was trying to put up my post.

I normally certainly wouldn't find it necessary to tell my readers this, but today I want to show God's grace.  I had also made a nice peice of art to go with the blog. But it wouldn't load from my laptop.  I decided to email it to my PC in order to post it. But my head hurt so badly, I couldn't find where I saved it. I finally decided, I would just post it somewhere today.  In addition, I couldn't see to do the edits on my post.  A couple of edits I thought I had made were not corrected when I read it this morning, so somehow I managed not to save them.  So am I kicking myself this morning. Normally, my perfectionistic self would be hating that I let it go up that way.  But this morning, I have decided to take my own advise and love myself unconditionally.  Flaws and all.  I would like to go back in and correct the errors. And I often will on this blog. But I decided not to today, just so I can make this point.  Sometimes we must accept our circumstances, pain, and flaws and continue to love ourselves.

My favorite saying I have heard lately is the one that is on the Facebook page, Breath Of Fresh Air, which says "I may not be perfect but Jesus thinks I'm to die for."  This morning on Joyce Myers' TV program, she was talking about unconditional love taking some time and effort.  Sometimes years of hanging in there trying to learn to communicate. It is things like this that help me know I am on the right track when listening to God's still small voice. Because the Holy Spirit is sharing God's message with lot's of people.  He wants us to hear him giving us the message that He feels is necessary for the day.  So even in my pain, I learned from the message God gave me to post, and although I am not happy about the headache, or the fact that there are errors in grammar in my post, I can be more than happy that Jesus who loved me, wants me to love myself, 'cause He thought I was lovable enough to die for. 

Lord Jesus, thank you for giving me peace about not being perfect this morning, that I can go on with my day knowing that you will work your love, and grace whether I am perfect or not.  Counting on it. Cause your word will not return void. Love you, Jesus. AMEN