Soap for Jesus

Believe it or not, this was actually a planned post over the last couple of days. Because I tend to preach things when I'm struggling with them; post encouragement when I'm in desperate need of it; write words that I know are true to make myself believe them, as well as you. I can't remember the original substance of this post, as hard as I'm trying to recall it and wind it in with what I'm writing now. I write a lot on Twitter; in fact, I'm more open on Twitter than on Facebook because I feel safer. My tweets get lost in millions of others, and only two specific people watch my tweets to see how I am. So I thought. I've received rebukes off people before for being too open, being too depressing. Watching my kids recently turn away from God and to despair added into the fact that I'm getting left behind by many of my friends as they enter college/leave college and-or get married was just part of the unconscious building up of "hard evidence...

It's almost funny, really. I so wanted to write this blog post yesterday, but as much as I tried, it wasn't ready to come. This wasn't the way I dreamed of writing it; slumped in a pool of despondency. But it's now I believe I'm s'posed to try and write it. It's almost funny. But I'm depressed. So it's not. So Lord, do Your best with this. Cause it's not going to be mine. And maybe that's why You wanted me to wait until now. Prayer and Bible reading are meant to be a way of life for a Christian. But they aren't an instantaneous desire, springing up and flowering as soon as you become a Christian. They're called a discipline for a good reason. It's hard to create and maintain a discipline - particularly for disorganised, spontaneous people like me. Recovering from the blow in February through to the beginning of April has taken me until now to start a degree of healing on, but God has been wonderfully sweet and close and started...

Hands cradling a tall, slim mug of hot chocolate, I leaned back in the red leathery chair and stared at the patterned white ceiling. Music from John Waller - "While I'm Waiting" played low in the background. I'm waiting, Lord. But peaceful? Oh yeah...painful. And not easy? Boy, that's an understatement. I hate my hurting heart. Still trying to figure out how pain like that can be so bad that it physically hurts. Raising my left hand, I stared, blank, at the wedding ring on the fourth finger. Using my knees to hold the mug, I twisted the ring, as usual, looking for the join, but it's never there. Why? Because it's a perfect circle. No beginning; no ending. It's endless. Love endures everything. I'm blinking back more tears as I'm writing this. Apparently it is possible to cry for two days. This is God's love for us. And this is how we should love one another. Love is patient . Love is kind. Love is not jealous . Love does...

It's painful. And it's sore. It's so sore I spend washtime dabbing water on portions of my skin because if I shower properly, I end up crying with pain. It's inherited genetically. I remember Daddy telling me his started when he was 19. It went all over his entire body - including his face. He had the wet kind - weeping, they call it - on his face. He had to go to work every day like that. And he said he felt disgusting, like a leper. Until he took aloe vera tablets, which reduced his eczema to some kind of controllable level. It started when I was a kid. Behind the backs of my knees and in the crooks of my arms. Then it faded until I only had it occasionally on the elbow of my right arm. Last year, it flared up again. REALLY bad. On my arms. Then I went to America. It was bad when I arrived. Came back a little in Oregon due to the dryness of the air. But otherwise, it was cleared. I forgot I had ever had eczema. Then I came home. And started work. ...

I can see your heart is yearning. Everything is so unclear. Is the answer ever coming After all these years? So begins one of my favourite songs by the band 33 Miles. At the beginning of this year, I asked God for three things, which I believe He promised me. Two of them, I will tell you. One was that He would change me. The second, that He would bring my family back to Him and me. Yesterday God was very near. My heart was alive and full of joy as well as pain, for I could see two of those three coming closer. Today He seems close but distant in a sense - because I'm struggling to talk to Him. I lose words so often nowadays. I can force them out, but they seem so empty. And the pain and tears are back. And the confusion and the helplessness. Then we start the struggle. My struggle to trust and love and serve Him and let go, at the same time that I'm fighting for the controls. I went flying once and gliding twice. Each and every time we have a brief, to remind us of what to do, ...

Pain at the physical, mental and emotional stages are almost at the highest point that I'm aware of on their gauges. Spiritual level has closed down so much I'm aware of nothing but unvoiced, mere thoughts of prayers and now and then, the presence of God here. It's not lack of sleep and this isn't a stage of exhaustion. Apparently I look half dead - laboured movement, laboured talking, etc. I forced myself to sing at the second song this morning at church; never had to force myself to sing but once before in my life. Singing is my love. The entirety of everything that's bringing this down forced me to one point this morning. I opened my eyes and saw neither one of the addictions I normally run to, but the cross of Christ. At the foot of that cross I am clinging and aware that God's Hands are beneath and upholding me to take the weight. My body is collapsing and my mind is blanking down but if one were to draw a picture of what life currently looks at, there woul...

This is a big topic of small importance... I attended the OYAN Summer Workshop 2011 last year (well, obviously last year). And loved it and everything to pieces. (I think you were still intact when I got home though... *glances at her trident*) I spent two months in the States. 2 weeks in Kansas, 2 weeks in Oklahoma, 1 week in Oregon, 1 week in Texas and 2 more weeks in Kansas. June 15 - August 16. I am not a millionaire and family circumstances were such last year that it is a total miracle that I even got there, much less to travel that extensively. My families took care of me and loved me and God bless them very, very much. Thank you. I fell in love with America while I was there. I'm a passionate British patriot, but I feel two totally different ways about both countries. America and Britain are not perfect - but America is a new land. A beautiful land. A new life. A fresh start. And chock full of my friends and people I love. Long and short of this being, due to my family'...

It's 10:54 am. Probably be later by the time I finish writing this. Thirty (yes, thirty - I was counting) thirty Peppa Pig episodes later, I carry my finally sleeping (yes, I know, Mr. S, OYANers. Adverbs.) Okay, I'll stop interrupting myself cause it's getting annoying. Thirty Peppa Pig episodes later, I finally carry my sleeping nephew upstairs to his bed and tuck him in, praying desperately under my breath that he will not waken. Today's not been a good day from start to finish...woke up late, accomplished little and what I did accomplish wasn't what I'd particularly aimed to do. People I wanted or hoped to talk to, things either went wrong in the conversation or else, as with tonight because of babysitting, I didn't get online until a few moments before my friend went offline - so we were able to exchange goodbyes. It's also one of those terrible days when I lose words. When I can't really pry deeply into someone's heart or attempt to reach o...

They sold them every year. People in green and brown clothes and people in blue, smiling, with a box around their necks or in their arms, full of small red paper flowers. Other people came up and put some money in the buckets they had on their arms, and walked away with a little red flower that they'd put on. 'Course, not everyone did it. My family was something Daddy called "pacifist", and he hated the people in green and blue. Every time he saw one of them, he'd call us together and herd us past them as fast as he could. Still, that didn't stop my sister and I looking. In the end, Marissa stopped looking. She said that Daddy was right, and it didn't really matter. After all, it was just a paper flower that people wore a few days and then forgot about. It didn't seem to matter that much to them, so why would it to us? I didn't care about what everybody else did. It was the people in green and blue that I watched. And they were there, year after ye...

One of my most favourite books of all time has to be Elisabeth Elliot's Passion and Purity. Elisabeth Howard Elliot Leitch Gren has to be one of the most inspirational and amazing women out - especially in the guidance area of relationships. The story of her husband, Jim Elliot, is legendary. However, less well known is the love story of Jim and Elisabeth. Embodied in the book Passion and Purity, it contains pain, hope, peace, struggles, tears, timeless God-given love and prayer. It talks about the concepts of releasing back to God, waiting on God, emotional battleground - in fact, pretty much every area that one could struggle with in relationships. This blog post is for Calleigh, Kiehl, Carissa, Rebekah, Anjelica, Kay and Holly, and Miguel, Nick, Matt, Jay and Miles from Passion and Purity. I’m including some of you not because you necessarily have relationship problems, but because you may find some of it a blessing in your own personal lives right now. Chapter 12: Holding Patte...

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...