Soap for Jesus

Moments before running back downstairs to make tea (yes, the meal) and then go to my sister's to read the Bible together, I take time to stop and briefly write my joy. Mom and I just pulled three boxes out of the garage, as I start moving onto my books after sorting my clothes. How can I tell you of my joy at seeing my treasures? For the first time in six months, I pulled my books out and caressed each cover - hardback, softback, shiny, smooth, rough, plain, decorated, cloth, plastic, laminate... You who love books! My fellow writers and book lovers. Can you imagine what it is to have the sounds of the Tudors, the echoes of the World Wars, surround you after six months absence from almost any literature? One of the hardest things of this enforced absence has to be the zero access to my books. With delight, I open a cover and inhale the scents...musky, dusty, old, new, inky...how familiar, and how long it has been. Some of you will remember that I had two wall length sh...

Today was a nice day. I spent it trying to make a great impression on my bedroom. I partially succeeded. ;) Which is nice, because my bedroom and I don't get along very well, so learning how to deal with it and make the right kind of impression was good! Also, I learned the meaning of "when I became a man, I put away childish things." However, I photographed them before disposing of them. Here are a few. I photographed my favourite mother's ring (yes, she is my favourite mother, and it's my favourite ring of hers :P) and her engagement ring that I'm using as a purity ring for the present. I also created an American corner in my room! See if you can spot what you gave me! Papers going into frame in the near future. :) Then my sister came round and dropped off my niece while she went to fetch prescriptions from the chemist. After that, we went shopping. Mummy bought me three pairs of earrings!! They are so pre...

A conversation with a friend earlier revealed some rather home-hitting truths about the perspective of love's place in life. You know, it's funny....one can be respected and admired by many different people but without a word from the person who means the most to you, it still doesn't take the ache away. And writing that, I realise where the problem lies.... God has to mean the most to me. He has called me His beloved. His wife. His daughter. Treasured. Precious. And so, starving, hurting, I HAVE to go to the only One who can fulfill that need. God also gave us the desire to be wanted by that one special person, yes, and I know He did. But until it's His timing to be fulfilled, He wants us to turn that desire towards Him. He will fill it if we trust Him. Wrap us in His love and ease the pain. And...and He wants us to make Him the centre of our lives. Especially our love lives. Is the desire for a partner wrong, if you're not letting it consume you? I think th...

Today was a sad day and a happy day. Several goals were missed, and others were accomplished. Although very tempted to be down by the ones I missed, it's better to choose to be glad over the ones finished and not to be so blinded by the present I miss the repairable future. So! To share the happy part. :D Mom and I went to town this morning, Mom to the doctors and me to the bank...to meet up with her in an hour. However, I had a few other ideas of what I wanted to accomplish in an hour - AND I DID THEM ALL! :D :D :D Heading down Lichfield Street and across the Arboretum Island, I went to the Walsall Centre for the Deaf. When we drove past it yesterday, I noticed a sign up - BRITISH SIGN LANGUAGE COURSE, for beginners. YAY! This was one of my goals when I got back to the UK, to learn sign language! Met at the door and guided upstairs by a deaf man, he took me into a room where a rather harassed looking lady was on the telephone. Turned out she was the only one in that ...

Eleven months ago, I took my first steps outside of my house alone, as I took the dog for a walk around the streets I used to travel with my ex-best friend Gemma, on the start of what would become much-loved and much-sought prayer walks. There's something about walking, walking for a long while, that clears your mind, uplifts your spirit and gives a sense of independence. No other method of transport can do that to you (and if you think about it, walking is the only one God designed us for!). Eleven months ago, I was depressed, broken-hearted, enslaved to several addictions, heavily emotionally dependent on several people and doing anything within my power to flee from and numb myself to emotional pain, even if it meant inflicting more. Within a year, I have gone from walking those streets to taking my first taxi ride, first train rides, first bus ride and first plane flights (subsequently eleven flights!) on my own. :D Within a year, God has brought people into my life who h...

Standing at the airport in Houston...okay. Okay, maybe I wasn't standing. I was...dancing. Yep. To "Caramelltanzen" (:P), "Just Haven't Met You Yet" by Michael Buble, then to "Sing, Sing, Sing," "Our God" and "No Chains on Me" by Chris Tomlin. By the third time round of Chris Tomlin, I was very much aware of God's presence around me, to the point of looking around and wondering why no one else could sense it. I noticed a couple of people watching me after a while. I suppose a young woman in two long, loose dresses and a t-shirt with long hair and no make-up dancing publicly was a bit noticeable. :P I used to care, but I try not to any more. Have you ever noticed how restricting caring about people watching you is? You try to blend in. Or else, stand out in a way that fits the mold. Make up. Clothes that aren't too extreme. Moving in the approved way - walking, not skipping, or dancing. As I watched the people aro...

Linked to me earlier today by my big brother Jay Lauser . “Who am I?” By Dietrich Bonhoeffer (March 4, 1945) Who am I? They often tell me I would step from my cell’s confinement calmly, cheerfully, firmly, like a squire from his country-house. Who am I? They often tell me I would talk to my warders freely and friendly and clearly, as though it were mine to command. Who am I? They also tell me I would bear the days of misfortune equably, smilingly, proudly, like one accustomed to win. Am I then really all that which other men tell of? Or am I only what I know of myself? restless and longing and sick, like a bird in a cage, struggling for breath, as though hands were compressing my throat, yearning for colours, for flowers, for the voices of birds, thirsting for words of kindness, for neighborliness, trembling in expectation of great events, powerlessly trembling for friends at an infinite distance, weary and empty at praying, at thinking, at making, fa...

My latest playlist is called Happy Ones. My consistent happy playlist at the minute is formed up of: With You - Mark Willard Ever, Ever After - Carrie Underwood Haven't Met You Yet - Michael Buble Sing, Sing, Sing! - Chris Tomlin Our God - Chris Tomlin No Chains on Me - Chris Tomlin While I'm Waiting - John Waller Joyful, Joyful - GoFish God Has a Plan - Bethany Joy Galeotti One Life to Love - 33 Miles Caramelltanzen Don't Give Up/You Are Loved - Josh Groban. Isn't that awesome! :D

As everyone knew, the anticipation of arrival at home was worse than the actual reliving. :P Here, I'm back home with the people I am deeply and intricately connected to with ties deeper than normal love, and God has enabled me to keep my eyes on one thing at a time. However, I wasn't expecting the fear to start again...or the Rebelution to cure it. My brother, Joseph (more commonly Jose) asked me to do a hundred and one things for him...as usual. Most I passed off as impractical. Which is, thankfully, true. Then he asked me to help him build five model battleships which he'd been saving until I came home, and he wants them built by the weekend. You've seen the models, right? Those plastic, fiddly, bitty thingies with glue and paint and stuff galore? I could probably cope with the glue and the paint. But not the tiny fiddly bits you breathe on, and they fly away. Especially with Jose. Besides, this would interfere with my nice little laid out schedule. ...

This blog post has been coming for four weeks. During the "message" yesterday, it exploded. Why do we need CCM in the church? It's cause it's the only time that people feel ALIVE! To get some kind of psyche to get feeling towards God, we have to use music to feel alive. Why? The CCM is rarely based on God. It's all based on us and on our feelings towards God. "How lovely is the Lord" is probably the most you get in the first line - then "how my heart longs for and EVEN faints for You." "I love You endlessly." (Like we do...?) How WE feel towards God. Why is there nothing like the wonder of the hymns of 'Love Divine', 'Amazing Grace'? No soul repentence, little adoration of God. It's all spiritual sensuality - because worshipping by feeling is the only way people feel alive. The reason people sleep around so much before marriage? Because in their boring lives, it makes them feel ALIVE. The music does the same ...

Well, I was going to do one blog post. :P Then I decided to do the excited squeaky one first and the more serious thoughtful one (as such as my flimsy butterfly brain does in thoughtful areas) in a second post. :D Here are some of my tweets from Twitter. Strange how I can't spend a week outside the ER. >.> Gashed my foot open on a metal door and fainted today. #coolstuff Yep, I appear to LOVE the Emergency Room! I was in there last Sunday in Texas, and back there today! During the lunch break, I went to go back inside the building, opened the door - onto my toe. I was instantly aware of the pain, but toughed it out as usual. I thought it was a graze as I walked across the lobby, then the blood started to well, and it was dark red - and kept coming. I stopped and called for Carolyn and Grace. Another woman, Jennifer, stepped forward and asked if I needed help. I said, yes please, and they looked at my foot and sent to fetch the nurse who was there - Becky. Next ...

Climbing up onto the rough log fence, I stretched my arms out for balance and looked down at my feet. The surface was slippery. Two logs, roughly fitted together with a nail through the ends, formed the basic, repetitive structure all around the edge of the playground. I like adventure, to some degree. Daring feats like climbing wobbly tree logs and walking on them, or dancing around a shop aisle laughing at people's expressions. Yep, I love being nineteen and having the freedom to do that. I also like the internal lessons God teaches through it. Like today. I soon realised that by walking carefully, watching every next step I was going to take, would lead to overcarefulness and I would fall. By walking confidently with arms outstretched for balance, and consciously quelling the fear of "I'M GOING TO FALL!" inside, I was LESS likely to fall than if I gave every conscious moment over to the fear that I was very likely to fall. By taking my eyes off the log and keeping ...

Yesterday I left Houston, Texas, on what would be the final lap of my journey through the United States. I flew from Houstin to Austin, from Austin to Dallas, and finally, from Dallas to Kansas City International. Here I spend two more weeks, until starting my flight back to the United Kingdom on August 15th. I arrive home on August 16th. As the family I stayed with passed out of my vision and I began my long walk to my gate, I cried. Trying to accept that all of it was over and that I was probably never going to see these people again was very hard. I don't think it's any good trying to write it like a story, because who wants to hear of ragged sobbing that would ease off and then come back? :P Needless to say, I was feeling very alone, very young and very afraid. Then this dear lady walked by me, stopped and said, "Do you need some tissue, sweetie? I know how you feel, I was crying my eyes out a few hours ago." The kindness of it touched me and I started to cry agai...