Good Sleep and Good God

I slept like a baby last night!  Lord, did I need that!  I only woke up once in 8.5 hours to make a trip down the hall and then I fell back to sleep with no trouble at all.  Oh my gosh, what a great night of sleep!

So I’m driving to work this morning and I have a worship CD on in the car but I’m not really singing away or anything (like I usually do) when, all of a sudden, I start thinking about God and about all the changing, revolving thoughts I have had of Him since I finished reading “The Shack.”   Suddenly, all these thoughts started falling into a logical sequence instead of being little bits of blurry atoms shooting in and our of my mind.  The more I pressed into one thought the faster the next thought came and, suddenly, I was driving down the road with a whole new outlook - like a whole new Universe had just entered the Milky Way and taken its place among the stars. 

And let me just preface all this by saying that many of you who read this blog are not going to be happy with my revelations and you are probably going to start praying for me to get “back on track” and stop all this “nonsensical talk” but I am not too sure that’s going to happen anytime soon.  See, I had me a LOOOOONG discussion with Satan yesterday because he’s been chatting it up but good in my head lately so I finally did what I did three-and-a half-years ago when I told him I was a daughter of THE KING and he could NEVER have his way with me…and today, here I am, with a bigger, brighter version of God standing before me. 

I love it when that happens!

Okay, here goes…

One of the things I loved about “The Shack” was that it was the first time in my life that I began to get a grip on what the Holy Trinity “is.”  One of the analogies in the book was that Father, Son and Holy Spirit are not in a triagular shape with God standing at the top and Jesus and HS rounding out the other two corners below Him.  It is, in fact, more like a mobile that hangs over a baby’s bed.  They are all connected by a common thread - all one unit - all on the same “plane”, all working in conjunction with each other to keep things moving fluidly ahead.  Think about that for a moment…

I know if you are like me you get this feeling some times that God is at “the top” of all this and that Jesus and the Holy Spirit are his “right hand men” but they aren’t.  They aren’t in a power relationship where one is “higher” than the other.  Instead, they are in a circular relationship with each other - one moving forward when it is most needed, the others moving forward when they are most needed, all weaving in and out and around each other and not up and down and in charge of each other.  (And when I say “each other” I really mean each part of the whole…keep that in mind as well!) 

I had a really hard time grasping that at first.  Why?  Because I’ve never BEEN in a relationship with ANYONE that wasn’t about who’s first and who’s second.  Think about it.  Even as adults, our parents are still “over” us in certain situations and we’re “over” other people (children, some friends, workers, etc.)  So how can we be in a circular relationship with Father, Son and Holy Spirit if we don’t even know what one looks like? 

I’ve spent the past two weeks trying to envision this…trying to put myself in the same relational ”sphere” as God without actually thinking of myself in the same sphere as God…just hanging out in relationship with Him while keeping that very healthy respect that remembers He is God and I, most certainly, am not.  When I see myself sliding down the hill of bad relationships I go back to the picture of that child’s mobile and I jump back on to one of the many spots that are dangling and twirling around in unison together, all while balancing each other out.

Here’s the weird part of all this… When I pray lately, I haven’t been picturing God standing OVER me but standing NEXT to me.  Talk about mind blowing!  (Again, remember that I am not putting myself at God’s level but, instead, asking God to join me at my level.)

Now, as I drove to work this morning I thought about how God is so much bigger than we could ever imagine Him to be but how, at the heart of what all that means, I believe (and always have) that God is the purest, most refined form of love.  It is from this love that God draws upon an infinite amount of mercy and grace, but which He also yields a firm hand and a tough sword.  Remember - love is not all hugs and kisses - but a mix of what is best for you at any given moment - be that sweet love or tough love.

I also think about God, as we often do, in the role of a parent.  We call Him “our father” and we choose to accept His advice, discipline and love the way we would from our earthly father.  I started to think about what my earthly father would have done had I come home one day totally strung out on drugs and stayed that way for the next two or three years.  Would my Father have had a breaking point for showing me love and mercy?  Would my father have ever gotten to the point where he would have had to cut all strings to me in order to take the chance that I would want his love more than my drugs of choice?  I believe he would have. 

What I no longer believe is that he would have condemned me and stopped loving me because of my bad choice.

So, if God is truly the deepest, most pure form of love and being in God’s love is about living in the light of that love, how can hell be about burning in a fiery wake of eternal damnation?  It can’t be.  It just can’t be.  I can buy that it would be total darkness and total separation from the One who created me.  I can see it being an empty, void place with lonliness and despair the likes of which we’ll never be able to fathom here on earth - but a fiery damnation?  An eternal burning?  Even my earthly father in his knowledge of love and what it means to give love couldn’t do that to me, no matter what horrific and terrible thing I had done to him and my family.  People go to death row every day and their families still weep for them.  So how could God who is THE LOVE sentence His creation to a torture like that?  I don’t believe He could.

And here’s the shaky thing…

If I don’t believe that’s true, how can I believe other parts of the Bible are true?  The Bible either is, or isn’t, God’s truth.  Or is it?  Is it, maybe, man’s version of God’s truth?  Think about it…if we can’t imagine who God really is because He is so outside the scope of our lives how then can we fit Him and who He is into that book? 

How?

Is the Bible an invaluable piece of literary work that helps us to understand the life of Jesus Christ and the creation of earth?  Yes, I believe it is.  Is it 100% factual and all inclusive?  No, it cannot possibly be.  Does it help to read it so we can come to terms with our history as God’s children?  Yes, it certainly does.  Is there wisdom and truth inside that book?  Yes, there most definitely is.  Is it all God is and all God will ever be? 

no, it is not.

If we can’t fit God in our minds, in our hearts, and in our lives because He is so much more than we could ever begin to understand, how can we fit Him inside the covers of a book? 

All of this came barreling down on me this morning as I made my eight minute drive into work and, by the time I stepped out of the car, I was one step closer to living in a circular relationship with my creator because I no longer had Him compartmentalized inside an imaginary pocket between the written pages of the Bible. 

God feels “bigger” to me today than ever before.  His possibilities for my life seem more endless now.  His grace and mercy, His love and light, they all seem to have grown inside my thoughts on my drive in to work today.  I am left, once again, to think about my favorite verse in the entire book about God:

And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the saints, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge—that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.

~Ephesians 3:17-19

May it one day be so.

At Least It’s Pretty

It was 98 degrees here at 8 pm tonight.  Holy cow, that’s hot!  The whole day was made better by the discovery of a huge bed of daylilies at a nearby shopping mall.  There is a retaining wall of them that is probably 100 ft. long on two sides and the whole thing is lined with different daylilies. 

It’s hot, but at least it’s pretty.

Summer In The City

(Eat your heart out dlyn!)

Hot

I honestly think you could stick your head in a pre-heated oven and be more comfortable than you could sitting outside today. 

Seriously.  Enough already!

24

In the past 24 hours I met Chris for coffee.  She decided to stray from the usual hi-fat fare and went with Starbuck’s new Vivanno coffee drink.  It’s got chocolate, banana, whey powder & coffee and “is loaded with energy.”  Too bad it wasn’t loaded with taste.  Wow…was that ever a bland drink!  Poor thing was very disappointed and then she left the coffee shop only to come down with a killer migraine the rest of the day.  Me thinks all that healthy whey powder was to blame.  Probably hit her system and was killed instantly by all the stuff she (and I) like to eat on a daily basis! 

Today, my friend J. is coming over to see what she can learn from me and the Internet about Photoshop Elements.  I’ve got some online classes I subscribe to and I was going to watch those with her and see what I could learn in the process.  Before she gets here, though, I have to whip back over to the coffee house from yesterday morning because they had a wall of daylilies growing next to it and I want a few photos before they die out in the heat of summer.  Did I mention we’ve gone from hot to sizzling around here?  Well…we have.  UGH!  But…just like ”it’s darkest before the dawn” it’s also “hottest before autumn” so I’ll pay my dues and hush up because September will be here before I know it and so will Autumn!!!

So, those are my plans…hang with J. today and wait for autumn to come and kill out this summer heat.  Vacation days are accruing as we speak and they’ll all get spent once this heat passes and I can get back outside again.  Until then…

Counting Down

One hour left until the weekend officially begins.  Ever wonder why I continue to work here when it is not exactly the job of my dreams?  Half-days on Friday, my friends…half days on Fridays. 

At 12:30 I will be out and about, buying birdfood and running to Target for pupperoni’s and anything that will squelch the incessant itching that has developed inbetween that little crevice between which both breasts like to jiggle.  All that photographing outside has led to massive amounts of copious sweat and that, in turn, has led to a heat rash on “the girls.”  OUCH.

But, other than that, I’m very much looking forward to a nice, slow weekend.  I’ve got some work planned for the yard and some planned on the computer and plenty of naps inbetween the two.  The weather looks to be disagreeable this weekend with a chance of storms and some raging temps in the upper 90’s.  Summer…love the flowers - hate the heat!

With that I am off in twenty-five minutes.  Both bosses are out of the office today so it’s been quiet and I’ve gotten a lot of the loose ends sewn up.  I’m ready to head out into the world of freedom and see where my camera and I will end up next. 

Addie, I’m praying for your weekend to be successful!

Chris, I’ve been on this situation with your mom praying at a frantic pace.

Claire, got J.  & S. covered in prayer as well.

Lori, sell that house!  Sell that house!  C’mon God!  Sell that house!

Tina, saying a few for the new job to come your way.

Todd, you and L. are being discussed with God as we speak.

Jackie, you know you’re always in the mix, little sis.

As for the rest of you…

Thank you so much for sticking around and listening to my ramblings.  I cherish you all more than I can ever say.  You’re a blessing - every last one of you.

Let’s “Face” It

Are you on Facebook?  If you are and you haven’t received a handy dandy “be my friend” holler from me yet, email me at Heyjules.mwg@gmail.com and let’s hook up!

Beat

I am beat.  Beat, beat, beat.  Work today was the busiest day I’ve had in probably the past five years.  I am taking the camera out to the lake and I am going to sit there.  I hope I have the energy to click the shutter a few times. 

Please, Lord, may I have a free refill?

I Am…Unplugged

I woke up around 6:30 this morning.  The heat wave from last week finally broke with Saturday’s early rain so I spend the night sleeping with the windows open and the sunlight tripped my internal alarm clock.  I padded around the place for a while and then packed up the camera bag and headed out to Englewood Lake to see what was happening in the great outside. 

There were 2 or 3 people out fishing but the rest of the lake was deserted.  I had my long lens on the camera but had the macro with me - just in case.  I never did change over to the macro although I ended up shooting close-ups all morning long.  I had a run in with a couple of birds but they never got close enough for me to really get a decent photograph.  Still, it was nice to see my arch nemesis, the Great Blue Heron, and his smaller counterpart, the green heron, flying overhead.  I even ran into a hawk or two and a flock of redwing blackbirds. 

I “did church” at the lake this week.  I wanted to spend a little time with God all to myself without the band and the entire congregation along for the ride.  We walked up and down the lake together, marveling at the spiderwebs, the never-ending variety of bugs, and all the flowers weighed down with dew.  Two hours later I was back in my car, renewed and revived, a media card full of images and my mind full of thoughts. 

I thought back to the first couple of months after I became a Christian - before I was attending an organized religious setting - and how I had spent every Sunday with God walking along these same lake edges and throughout other wooded areas near my home.  I remembered feeling upset that I was going to have to start taking this whole “God thing” seriously now that the veil had been pulled back from my eyes.  I had such a bad taste in my mouth about attending church again that I could barely stomach the thought of it.  Now, here I was three years later, plagued with guilt when I didn’t make it to a weekend service.  My, how times have changed…

There were no earth shattering revelations from my time with God today.  I didn’t hear Him whisper the secret meaning of life to me or anything.  I did feel Him with me, though, and it was amazing to remember what its like to spend Sunday morning (or Saturday night as the case may be) with God “unplugged” - no band, no videos, no dramas or sermons.  It was raw and real and I enjoyed the heck out of it - so much so that I totally lost track of the time. 

I came home around 9:30 and whipped up a little late breakfast.  I’ve spent the rest of the day cleaning and blogging and doing the laundry.  I’m sitting here now with the windows still open (even though the heat is beginning to return) and I can hear a variety of bird calls mixed in with the buzz of lawn mower engines and an occasional dog barking.  I am overflowing with joy at the quiet splendor that has been this day.  I could have gone and done a million things this weekend but, instead, spent it in quiet solitude. 

Some times life is better unplugged.

Rebuilding

I am slowing rebuilding my new computer - today I uploaded some music from my long-standing CD collection including favorites from David and David, Tina Turner, Bob Seger, Van Morrison, U2, and Joni Mitchell.  I’ve still got to add the worship music and the classical stuff but, for now, there is music playing while I chomp my way through Photoshop for hours on end. 

I took a nap awhile ago and woke up thinking about my grandma’s macaroni and cheese recipe.  I know I’m going to have to make some or the craving is never going to go away and I hate to make it because it makes about 400 servings and there’s only me to eat it.  And eat it.  And eat it!  Still, it is a wicked mean mac & cheese recipe so if I do make it I promise to share it with you. 

Other than that, I’ve been thinking about life…about what it means to be a Christian…about whether I am putting too much pressure on myself in this regard or whether I am not putting ENOUGH pressure on myself.  I really wish I understood all this - whether I am supposed to fit my life around my being a Christian or whether I am supposed to fit my being a Christian around my life.  “The Shack” was no help in this regard - if anything it only messed me up worse because it got me to asking all these questions again.  I think it’s a good thing to be messed up, though…it means you’re not sitting around stewing in your own juices but actually trying to figure a few things out along the way.  Am I trying to figure too many things out?  Not enough?  Should I just sit back and wait for things to come to me or does God want me out there actively looking?  I wish I knew…

In the meantime, I go about my day, playing with the pups and thinking about what to make for dinner and trying to remember the words to the John Denver/Placido Domingo song, “Perhaps Love” that I listened to earlier in the day.  One of the verses starts…

Oh, love to some is like a cloud
To some as strong as steel
For some a way of living
For some a way to feel
And some say love is holding on
And some say letting go
And some say love is everything
And some say they don`t know

I wonder about love.  I wonder about God who IS love.  I wonder how I can know God if I am so unsure about what love is…or isn’t.  I wonder why I wonder about all this so much. 

It’s just another Saturday.  The dogs are wrestling and the chores are calling and I’m just going about my life rebuilding and reflecting as I find the time. 

And you?

When Miracles Abound

So here’s the deal…

(Oh, did I mention that you might want to go get a kleenex before you read this?  Yeah, go get one.  Or two.)

Last January, my friend, P., met me for dinner.  Someone had given her a Border’s gift card for a Christmas present and she’s not much of a book reader so she passed it on to me.  She said she thought it had $10 on it and that she hoped it would help pay for one of my many book purchases.  I threw it in my wallet and forgot about it…until about a week ago when I couldn’t find where I put my debit card and so I cleaned out my wallet and there it was - the debit card AND the gift card.  That was the weekend I was running around taking photos for the next church project I was working on and one of those places I photographed was the Border’s bookstore on Barry Road.  Two days later I went back and thought I’d go in to see if they had the Jewish Bible commentary that I had read about online because, as you know, I’ve been interested in looking into Judaism from a Christian standpoint. 

Anyway…no Jewish Bible or commentary - just a bunch of Joel Osteen books that you couldn’t PAY me to read so I started to leave and that’s when I saw it…

The Shack.  By William P. Young.

A couple of bloggers who I know and trust had recommended reading it but so had the girl I work with and her husband.  He read it first and couldn’t put it down; she read it after him and couldn’t put it down.  I looked at the book and it seemed interesting enough and it only cost $14.99.  Okay, I’ll take it.  Got up to the register and handed the clerk the book and my gift card and wouldn’t ya know it, the gift card was for $15.00.  I paid the tax and the book was mine. 

I got the weirdest feeling that THIS was the book I was supposed to read all along and couldn’t shake the feeling.  I came home and started to read it but wanted to read it intentionally and not just run through it 100 miles-per-hour like I do with most books.  I decided to read one chapter a night and really pay attention to what I was reading.  I got about three chapters in and things started to rock and roll and I set the book down because I knew that by the end of the chapter I was going to need to keep reading straight through  -  I could feel that electricity you feel when you know a book is about to rock your world - and I didn’t have time to stay up all night and read it.  I set it off to the side and went back to doing photography for the next couple of days. 

Now all this was happening right about the time I decided I needed a blogging break.  It was also about the time I said my feet were dirty from three years of walking with Jesus and I needed to get them clean again.  It was also the week before my long four-day weekend off from work.  Thursday I vegged.  Friday I spent at Powell Gardens.  Saturday I worked on the new photos - right up until the hard drive crashed.  Saturday night I was too distraught to go to church.  Sunday I woke up and rolled over and there was the book on my night stand.  No computer…bad television…okay - time to read. 

I finished the book around 1 p.m. and couldn’t stop crying.  And laughing.  And crying.  And laughing.  Every thought I’ve ever had about God seemed to be totally compounded by that book - my whole concept of religion and God and Jesus and what He wants from me and who He is - everything was up in the air.  The thoughts just kept tumbling over and over in my mind.  I was so distraught about possibly losing all my photos from the last six months and now I couldn’t even think about them because, in the scheme of things, they didn’t matter a whittle.  (What’s a whittle?  Hmm, I have no idea…)

There are at least 14 places that I turned a page corner over because I have to go back and read it again - because what got written on those pages blew my mind so wide open that I couldn’t even comprehend it the first time through.  Oh, the message is simple enough - that’s the problem.  It’s so unbelievably simple that you can’t believe it could be that simple!  Yet, it is also so complex that you can’t stop thinking about it all.  In other words…

BEST.  BOOK.  EVER.

EVER.

And here’s the thing…

(Get those kleenex ready.)

By the time I was done reading it I realized that maybe my computer crashed for a reason.  Maybe He knew I wouldn’t stop and read that book unless it did.  Or maybe He knew that my life was getting a little too centered on things other than Him and maybe it was time to remind me who is all important in my life. 

Even better than that was the fact that my feet have been thoroughly washed off because of that book.  Oh, I still have a ton of things to think about and wrestle with - but my feet are as clean as the day my mama bore me.  I cannot tell you what this book did for me other than to say it was just what I needed just when I needed it. 

(Isn’t that just like Him???)

So after I finished the book I came in to work to check up on email and one of the engineers I work with was here reviewing some plans.  He asked what brought me in to work on a Sunday and I told him my hard drive bit the dust and then proceeded to tell him about all the other financial difficulties I’ve had lately and do you know what he did? 

He offered me his son’s Gateway computer with the 19″ LCD monitor and the whole shebang.  Seems the kid has a new laptop for college and doesn’t want to use the desktop any more so it is sitting at home in his closet.  He offered it to me for FREE. 

And then I pulled up my email and there was one from Pastorman (who was a computer geek in his former life.)  I had emailed him from work last night telling him of the latest crisis and asking for prayer because it felt like the world was crashing in on me and he emailed me back and said, “Don’t touch that hard drive.  I probably have a program that can retrieve your data…just hang on.”

(Got those kleenex out yet?)

So, here it is the end of a long four-day weekend.  God has made His presence known to me in so many different ways this weekend that I can’t even begin to count them all.  I am sitting here looking at the cover of the book “The Shack” and smiling because even in my deepest pain last night (Chris can attest to that) I did the right thing and gave it all to God - and 24 hours later, He has it all under control. 

If I get those photos back - great.  If not, I’m going to look at it as a lesson and be okay with it.  The best photos are online and I can retrieve them (even if they aren’t the original files at least they’re there.)  If not - I am looking at it as a fresh start - that those were my “get ready” photos and now its time to reallys start building a portfolio that will take me on the next leg of this journey.  Either way I’ll be okay.  I really will. 

I was driving over here tonight and had my CD of worship music on and the song that flipped on first was “Testify To Love.”  I sang that darn song like I’ve never sung before.  Oh yeah, baby.  I’ll testify to love.  Just hand me a computer to write it down on…

Amen.