“Make it your ambition to lead a quiet life…”I Thessalonians 4:7
Peace
A slender gentleman, likely in his 80’s, glanced my way and offered me his spot in the checkout line.
Ninety plus degrees outside and I notice his soft sweatshirt hoodie was all the way zipped and baggy around his crisp but loose khakis.
Hardly a wrinkle in his thin face, I noticed as he smiled sweetly and asked again if I’d like his spot in the long line at Publix on senior citizen day.
He began to talk about kindness and how we need a resurgence of it. He moved on to politicians and I did my best to lead him back to kindness, respectfully agreeing with him that misuse of money or promises of wealth made by politicians isn’t what this country needs.
I believe he said what we need and I drifted in thought because I’m not one to engage in a discussion over the next potential President.
I’m not smart that way nor interested in debate.
Lines moved and he moved forward. I left my cart and went to tell him
“We keep our light and peace so that others get a little light when they’re near us.” LT
He smiled and added, “Seeing you blessed me today.” I replied, “and you for me.”
He paused to talk to another cashier, pushed his groceries past the exit to chat and lingered. I found my car and loaded my bags and turned to head home to see him engaged in another chat with a man gathering buggies.
I hoped they weren’t annoyed, the others like me interrupted by the kindness of this gentle man who spoke softly about life.
Who brought light and peace and just a hint of politics wrapped in age and wisdom.
This morning, I’m remembering a conversation about my father, about the longing for him to have lived longer.
Somehow I know God told the man in Publix to notice me, to take a chance on a grocery store conversation.
To gift my afternoon an encounter of peace.
To send an angel dressed in baggy but crisply ironed khakis, a thin face like my daddy’s and the same hair, only gray.
“Jesus said to her, “I who speak to you am he.” John 4:26 ESV
I sketched a thin woman in a scarlet gown in the margin of John, chapter 5, page 893. I found her flipping through to reread the account of the Samaritan woman who was avoiding the crowds to draw water at the well.
She met Jesus.
Living Water
These pages don’t tell her story, only have the recorded words of Jesus talking about living water, a life without thirst, a limitless provision.
“On the last day of the feast, the great day, Jesus stood up and cried out, “If anyone thirsts, let him come to me and drink. Whoever believes in me, as the Scripture has said, ‘Out of his heart will flow rivers of living water.’” John 7:37-38 ESV
Yesterday, I had a moment that led to chills up my legs and over my entire body. I sensed the truth of my physical reaction. I paused to accept it and allowed a tiny bit of wetness on my cheeks.
My college roommate for just a year, now a successful business woman who I’ve not seen nor spoken to in over forty years, commented on a Facebook photo of my granddaughter.
The thought that came was sudden.
“She needs to know how I came to be okay.”
She needs for me to keep sharing my story.
She needs to know how I moved from hopelessness to hope.
The Woman at the Well went into the town nearby and told everybody that she’d met the man who knew everything about her, told her all he knew and gave her hope, living water.
I find myself wanting to read more of her story.
I long for the next chapters in her life to be in my Bible, her walk forward with Jesus.
I want to know if it was shaky, her faith. I long to hear from her through John, Luke or Mark, her battles, her returning to life with the reputation she’d created.
I wonder if we don’t read about the other “chapters” in her life and others’ because God feels they wouldn’t serve us well, wouldn’t offer others that same water of hope.
I wonder if others wonder such things.
When the Samaritan woman returned to her day to day, possibly less enthused about her encounter with Jesus, was she met with disbelief, with sarcasm, with scorn?
I’d like to know what all the ex-husbands and ex-lovers as well as those who thought they might get the chance to be her lover had to say.
Was it hard for her to see herself differently than what she’d come to be known for?
Was her salvation just a fluke? Did she struggle with doubt?
Maybe.
After all, she was human as were all the humans healed by Jesus.
She had emotions.
I believe she held on tightly to the simplest of words.
“I met Jesus.”
We read that she changed the lives of many Samaritans that day.
But, we don’t read how she walked into her new future day to day.
Maybe there’s just not enough space to record all the ways Jesus continued to help her, how she continued to remind herself of the day at the well, how she hurried to tell everyone.
I have hope now. I am well.
I used to believe I’d always answer the question of why I believe in Jesus by telling of all the answered prayers I have experienced.
Now, it’s in the stories of others, in my story, in the unexpected and beautiful nudges that say I matter…
the woman you became despite the little girl and young woman, growing older woman, often imperfect that you’re becoming.
The entirety of you, your story matters.
“Now there are also many other things that Jesus did. Were every one of them to be written, I suppose that the world itself could not contain the books that would be written.” John 21:25 ESV
There’s still plenty of time and space to share it.
Continue.
Continue and believe.
And if you’ve not yet believed or your belief is fading or shaky.
I’d love to pose a question.
How might your life be different if you decided to believe and believe in Jesus.
I brought my “grandma” mug outside. It’s quiet. The cats are being cats, deciding which one is the favorite, staking their claim, one in a chair beside me, the other at my feet.
Quiet and Hidden
I remember my mama had her coffee on the porch. Soon, I’ll hear the sliding door open. My husband will wonder where I am.
Not cushioned in my morning chair in the corner.
Now the birds are strengthening the chorus of their choir, all the chatter becoming less harmonious.
Too busy, I softened the borders and the colors on a trio of paintings last week.
Now, they are more soft-spoken, their message more a hint than a demand.
“Sea Glass” trio
Soon, I’ll not be hidden in the quiet place shielded by too tall hedges.
Last week, walking, I found a new explanation for my tendency to retreat, to isolate, to stay small and unnoticed.
Why the resistance is so strong in being seen, known, unhidden.
It’s because, I gave myself permission to accept, hiddenness is a skill set, a talent I finessed as a child.
Being hidden is a pattern I’ve perfected well.
With Joy
But, less often even if difficult.
Deeply recessed is this go to behavior, a way to protect even though protection is not necessary.
I am safe. I am loved. I am not limited any longer by the required skill of self-protection.
I am safe. Salvation is my story.
Hidden and loved.
Noticed by God as I notice His Spirit in me.
Quietly seeking him in places that are hidden in a good way, the way called peace.
“But for me it is good to be near God; I have made the Lord God my refuge, that I may tell of all your works.” Psalm 73:28 ESV
I haven’t joined other writers in a while, been hiding there as well. Today, I’m linking up with Five Minute Friday here:
I stood still to find it again and then the bird perched in boldness and just waited on the top of the tomato cage. Its belly was brilliant, glistened like silk. It seemed untouched, unmarred, original and articulately designed.
At first, I thought “a tomato already?”. A brilliant spot of red amongst the lush green growth of vine.
You are loved by God.
Two pages of my journal are covered in words in reply to the question, how does God see me?
I finished Henri Nouwen’s “The Return of the Prodigal Son”. There are multiple asterisks in the margins and many underlines.
I paused here yesterday. Read and reread about A First and Everlasting Love.
“For a very long time I considered low self-esteem to be some kind of virtue. I had been warned so often about pride and conceit that I came to consider it a good thing to deprecate myself.” Henri Nouwen
Nouwen reminds of Psalm 139, that before we opened our eyes to life, God had brilliant plans already decided in the way He made us.
Often, I think of the beauty of being wonderfully made and not so much the “fearfully” part. What does it mean to us that we are made “fearfully”.
I would say it means “well-made”, not haphazardly, not without intention and plan, well-thought, very, very distinct and worthwhile.
So, I continue to return to the truth for me and for you.
We are valuable according to God and that value doesn’t change according to the limitations I know like fear, self-destructive patterns, lack of confidence and/or lack of the notice of others.
This is the “footprint” I want to leave here when I’m gone.
Your value is not determined by what has happened to you or what you hoped would and did not.
Your value is according to God. He fearfully planned it for you to discover just how “wonderful” you are.
Your value is not determined by the plans of God that got trampled by malice, meanness or evil decisions of another.
Your value remains untainted, to be discovered with sweet and steady intention…you keep going towards it.
Continue and believe.
“I praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Wonderful are your works; my soul knows it very well.” Psalm 139:14 ESV
When my granddaughter balanced on the highest beams and danced on the lofty walls up the playground equipment, I imagined her losing her footing. I was ready to drop all my stuff and catch her. Instead, she offered joy. She shared her confidence with me.
She demonstrated faith in herself and faith in me and reminded me of God that she sees, clearly more clearly than me.
“I’m older now. I can do this.” ELB
When I read about the man who was blind I can’t help but see a boy. I don’t know why.
“As he passed by, he saw a man blind from birth. And his disciples asked him, “Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?”
Jesus answered, “It was not that this man sinned, or his parents, but that the works of God might be displayed in him.” John 9:1-3 ESV
Jesus is saying exactly what he means.
As God’s Son, the “light of the world”, it was God’s plan that this man, blind from birth would have an encounter with Jesus and be healed. That he would follow the “doctor’s orders” and go to a pool called Siloam and put muddy water on his eyes.
This man, a beggar before this day, all on his own with no hope for better and no hope on the part of his parents.
He was healed and everybody thought it was impossible. So they refuted, doubted, questioned the simplicity of it.
And he told all the protesters of his sudden sight recovery that he didn’t fully understand either. He just knew he could see them.
In the margin of my Bible I have written,
Can it really be true? I am healed?
The next chapter over, John details the story of the death of Lazarus and of the way Jesus tarried in attending to his friend.
When Mary and Martha, who were friends of Jesus, worshippers of him, came to tell him about their brother, he didn’t immediately go to see about him…he waited two days.
What was he thinking? Isn’t Lazarus dead? What is the reason you’re not hurrying to heal this man, your friend…don’t you love this whole family, Jesus?
Valid questions.
Jesus told the disciples essentially, I know what I’m doing…you will see.
“Then Jesus told them plainly, “Lazarus has died, and for your sake I am glad that I was not there, so that you may believe. But let us go to him.” John 11:14-15 ESV
When Jesus saw for himself, he wept.
“Jesus wept.” John 11:35 ESV
As the Son of God, he was broken over the death and yet, He knew God’s intention. This death and resurrection will be recorded. It will make a difference in the lives of others.
It will help others make sense of their own unattended to and lingering sickness of heart, mind and body.
When Jesus says “this illness (trauma, circumstance, abuse, neglect, poverty, anxiety, fear, addiction or unmet longing) will not lead to death, he’s not saying it won’t be difficult, He is saying, if you will allow me to enlighten you, to heal you.
You will be light for others.”
And that is the why, the worth, the reason for suffering.
So that we grow into who God knows we are, that we are resurrected from the lives of before.
That we live like a rescued adult, cushioned by grace.
No longer like that child with hurts, questions and or mistakes.
Joyously.
The intention of Jesus for you.
“These things I have spoken to you, that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be full.” John 15:11 ESV
Keep going, higher than ever and with joy and hope.
Continue and believe. You are fully known and loved, have been all along.
A conversation about fear led to a thought. The thought led to paintings, vivid and strong in color. Some softer and cheerful and others heavy with darkness and harder emotion.
“The world is so scary…it makes lots of noises.”
Anxiety, uncertainty, anger and sadness are beginning to be noticed not as secretly kept struggles, instead as realities to consider more closely with kind and committed responses.
I’m hoping to traditionally publish this book for children to remind them that the earth and heavens were made by God just as they were and this truth can be an anchor in their storms that they are never alone.
“Yours is the day, yours also the night; you have established the heavenly lights and the sun.” Psalm 74:16 ESV
Countless times I’ve known “goodness by surprise”, things continued and finished and left alone to develop or fizzle actually come back around to close the circle in response to that sort of open-ended question.
…let us run with patience the race set before us. Hebrews 12:1 KJV
in green pastures
I lifted the kitchen window. I’m home alone and it’s a Sunday morning rainy song.
Which do you think matters more
Skill or endurance?
Pursuit or acceptance?
I’m not a runner but I’ve heard pacing yourself is important.
Last night I dreamt I was running. It was a dream layered with threats and pursuit and one that ended with comfort.
Deeply personal and I guess likely will never be fully understood.
I opened my devotional to read an unknown author’s letter of encouragement to Christians during trials…words about endurance and about the things of life that entangle us and impede our ability to run the course set for us with peace and ease.
So many times, scripture seems nonsensical.
How is it humanly possible to run with patience?
I mean, isn’t the point of running to get there more quickly with faster dropping feet on the ground or pavement, of pushing past everyone else?
Or maybe the reason we run with patience is because there are no competitors in our race of life marked by our faith. It’s just us on our own pre-decided by our Maker trail.
The spirit of God invisible to others, but within and beside us.
A solitary race, an especially intense one not because of its importance, rather because of the very tender and personal reward.
Peace, often by surprise.
Peace that sometimes awes.
Run with patience the path that has been set for youalone.
Now, here’s the story of this I know.
Grandma, your angels…
This painting came to life after being layered and pondered many times. I’d been asked to “live paint” as an accompaniment to my artist story for a women’s event.
I was wise enough to choose the better, to not talk and paint at the same time. I’d tried that before and I decided to learn from what was not me nor easy.
So, this large piece traveled as a backdrop to my story of what had been not so easy lessons in my artist as business endeavors.
I spoke of how God was teaching me that my value was not acclaim, gallery shows, representation or sold out collections.
Rather, my value is my story of continuing.
Fast forward, I get all excited and choose this piece for a prestigious exhibit and am thrilled and a little too obviously excited when a couple decided it should be in their home…and then reconsidered.
Then, I submit “Of Lasting Value” as a part of my portfolio for an Emerging Artist Show.
Again, giddiness over the possibility of acceptance and “fame” convinced me I’d be “in”.
Not selected though and I’d actually decided not to enter this piece in a local show. I was so confident, I’d decided…well, I can’t enter it if it’s committed someplace else.
A simple decision, an afterthought led to entering it in the local show because of the tenderness of its story and it came full circle, a tearful surprise.
Of Lasting Value, detail
My husband and I entered the gallery for the opening reception and I scanned the room to find my paintings.
“There’s a ribbon on one of mine.” I said quietly, almost a whisper.
Then discovered and later heard the juror’s reason why
My painting had been selected, “Best in Show”.
Congratulatory chats continued and I told a friend, “There’s such a bigger significance to this for me.”
Later, I made a promise to myself, or I guess I should say a request of God.
Don’t let this fade, the blessing of this honor, the many layers to the story of me written by You
This affirmation clearly that I am your beloved, that I am loved by you, God.
I don’t know where the story of this painting will go from here, whether I’ll stop by the gallery to see a red dot saying she’ll be gracing someone’s home or whether she’ll be coming back to me.
I don’t know yet. I’ll be patient. I’ll keep walking with a stillness I can’t create or maintain on my own. I’ll be shepherded on this path I am on.
“He makes me lie down in green pastures. He leads me beside still waters.” Psalm 23:2 ESV
We stopped by the gallery, my granddaughter and I. We love to decide on a “favorite”.
We had the whole space to ourselves and after she’d pointed out “my angels”, said “Hurry, hurry, look” and turned the corner to gaze long at a brilliant painting of the ocean.
A textured piece with vividly and perfectly rendered sea grass with a background of water and sunset.
And this one, she told me was her favorite because it was “shiny”.
And I told her, my little artist and watcher of all things, just how spectacular I found it to be too.
“Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a huge crowd of witnesses to the life of faith, let us strip off every weight that slows us down, especially the sin that so easily trips us up.
And let us run with endurance the race God has set before us.” Hebrews 12:1 NLT
Run with patience the path made for you.
Others are watching, not following, not chasing you.
“Whether you turn to the right or to the left, your ears will hear a voice behind you, saying, “This is the way; walk in it.” Isaiah 30:21 NIV
My friend, Susan gets me, the way I share a story that goes down every path possible and then I circle back around to the point of my sharing.
God has placed wisdom in the form of listeners and those who notice me and mostly unbeknownst to them lead to clarity.
Many years ago on a Thursday morning, a question lingered, had been lingering long. I asked God what to do and added that I knew me and I’d be confused and conflicted forever if He didn’t show me in a big and clear way.
And He did and the course of my life changed.
I accepted that I would be a single mother.
I may never have a prayer answered so promptly and sure again. Or I may.
Wednesday morning, the country road was quiet, the half moon moved with me and fields on either side, sprinkled with cows and crops were striated by thinly layered fog.
Like a canvas changed by an artist who intentionally used light spectacularly well.
I’d been thinking of that same sort of application in new paintings.
seeing goodness
I thought of my words in a journal, the research into what the phrase “honing my craft” truly means.
I was happy. I love words and I love when they are like little secret gifts.
A term I used as a nonprofit professional came to mind, “mission creep”. New to the leadership field, I inherited a mess of misuse of many things. Funding was failing, the agency facing catastrophic losses and necessary changes.
I had no skillset for this position other than compassion for others and a commitment to that call.
There were talks of “adding programs” for which grant funding was freely distributed. If we did more, there might be more money.
But, we had two employees and no capacity to carry out additional programs. I said no and I had a board who trusted me.
I offered, “No, let’s figure out what we are known for, what matters and what we do well and let’s get better at that.”
That naive assertion on my part redirected the course of the agency I oversaw for ten years and I suppose as I write this, it’s the actual first time I have given myself credit for that courageous “no” to chasing after new at the expense of forgoing good.
Abstraction
Choosing better over bigger.
Lord, I see you refining my jagged edges.
A prayer I offered on Wednesday morning, the fog striated in the sky, layered like paint in varying thickness on the canvas of an abstract painting. The sky wrote a beautiful note to my soul that morning,
told me to slow down, settle into what you love about writing and painting and do what is you, not anyone else.
A friend later surprised me with what she’d been seeing in me.
“With your painting -it is beautifully abstract-it does not have to be “perfect”. I sense you feel that your writing has to be “perfect” whatever that is for writing which trips you up. I see Holy Spirit lovingly pouring what looks like liquid gold over and into your mind. I feel that as you continue to explore God’s unconditional love for you. His words are going to flow out of you.” K.
My friend’s response to the question that wears me out (and probably others).
Should I just paint and not write?
If you’re still reading, you may be tired of this old weary question.
Me too. ME TOO!
I stopped by the gallery of a friend. If you’re anywhere near Augusta, Georgia, you must stop in to CANDL on Broad Street. The photographer and curator, Drake White is someone I described as just “happening upon me and my art”. I am honored to have been photographed by him.
I committed to seeing the current exhibit of the acclaimed artist, Ed Rice on the final night of the show and so I drove over yesterday evening, scurrying into the gallery without an umbrella in the sprinkling rain.
I was greeted by two gentleman, one an artist and the other Mr. White. Fascinated by the works, I commented on the emotion of the subjects, not people, rather 18th century dolls.
Still, I decided one was demure and another had been “harmed”.
I was introduced to the other artist with words about three things…
my faith
my writing
my art
faith
I stood quietly and accepted the kind commentary of me.
The me I’d been losing, sort of like a “mission creep” in creative endeavors seeking to be known.
“This is what the Sovereign Lord, the Holy One of Israel, says: “Only in returning to me and resting in me will you be saved. In quietness and confidence is your strength. But you would have none of it.” Isaiah 30:15 NLT
I hadn’t lost my faith; but, maybe I was losing “faith in me” as in the Holy Spirit answering in the most unexpected ways and quietly, a ripple of wisdom that barely changes the stream.
Involving others as teachers, as witnesses of you.
For the sake of you.
For goodness sake and to contribute to the question…with the surest and sweetest answer.
Faith, writing and art, Lisa Anne…for the goodness of others, share my goodness in you.
Is there a place you’ve ventured away from what is for you?
Are you missing the goodness because of grabbing for grander?
Pay attention to what others notice in you and be reminded by a certain little phrase my granddaughter is quite proud of saying…
Walking, exhausted and walking, I thought about a storm I must’ve missed.
Fragments on the pavement, objects fallen and scattered.
I’d been away for three days.
Fern fronds, one facing upward the other folded, wilted. Similar, of the same family
Yet, different.
I’d just gotten home from two days with family, the aunt like my mama, cousins, siblings, nephews, nieces.
Grandchildren.
Shown off on social media, the celebration.
It happened again.
Someone said “she’s your mini me”, referring to my granddaughter, Elizabeth.
And it prompted me to think again
About resemblance.
I have two children, a daughter and a son.
One is fair, blonde hair, blue eyes and porcelain complexion prone to freckles.
The other, dark almost coal hair, brown eyes and a more easily bronzed complexion.
Still, I’ve heard through the years.
Oh, he/she looks so much like you!
Of course, I love the assessment.
Last week, I smiled as I saw the light in the eyes of an adopted child on her birthday.
This child, brown in complexion, parented by blondes I was fortunate to meet and be a part of their story.
I saw her mama’s smile. I recognized her father’s confidence in her shoulders.
Not genetic, not inherited.
I see my granddaughter and I see the glimmer of her grandmother, “Gamma” in her eyes. I see her daddy’s expression in her confident answers. I see her cousins’ smile in hers.
I see her mama in the freckles sprinkled across her nose and in her stubborn tenacity.
I see my heart when I see hers and I also see the heart of others.
And that’s what I’ve decided about resemblance…
It’s the heart that shows and the heart that knows.
One child can be seen as the echo of so many all at the same time.
Cousins, aunts, uncles, brothers, caregivers and protectors.
All of us, imparting resemblance.
It’s not the curve of the cheek, the tip of the nose, the color of the eyes or the way the lips turn above the chin.
Instead, it’s the imprint of love.
Less severe the likeness, more sweetness and nuance.
Love is the reason for the resemblance.
And resemblance is the evidence of that love.
Wildflowers, oak leaves and children.
The remnants of rhododendron.
All the same and on their own on display.
When others say my granddaughter is so much like me in her sweet little face
I know the resemblance is so far from physical and every bit
Spiritual.
The heart of me in her alongside the heart of others who love her.
A high compliment, I was once given and until now have kept secret,
“Your Bible could be in a museum one day.” D.W.
I paused in awe of his assertion, this skilled photographer who discovered me through the sketches I share from the margins of my Bible was quite convinced of this possibility.
I can only hope that if my Bible is found by someone when I’m long gone, that the gift of it finds them in the same lasting way.
That their response to God’s word catches them by surprise, that their reaction is a quiet and lasting one, a reaction that resembles mine.
On page 576 of my Crossway Journaling Bible they will find a sketch of a figure facing forward, she’s not small and her shoulders are bent in either thought or simply aged posture. Her hands are cupped in front of her and cascading behind her is a flow like a river that curves and grows larger.
She is pouring out all that’s within her, joy.
“With joy you will draw water from the wells of salvation.” Isaiah 12:3 ESV
She is giving to others what she has gone searching for, drawn up from deep wells.
I pray I resemble her.
That I focus less on the outer aging, conflicted and overly burdened by activity me and that I consider the gifting inside me, not my gifts, talents, words or physical abilities.
Instead, I hope my life is a resemblance of joy.
Babies are born and bystanders ooh and ah as they decide who the nose, the eyes, the hands are from like a fun little challenging trivia game.
What matters less is who they resemble and more the ones God puts around them to contribute to the best of our ability what joys and gifts and graces deep within us that we embody and get to give them.
When someone says “ELB” looks like me, I smile because I know in that moment caught in a photo it’s not at all that we resemble.
Rather, it’s that the person who caught the moment on film also captured my joy and it was joy, not looks that were mirrored in a toddlers face.
Who resembles you?
Who do you resemble?
Years from now, a grandchild may flip through the thin pages of my Bible and I hope they find a drawing in the margin and say sort of quietly to themselves.
That’s me. That looks like me in that same story.
And rest in their hearts in this,
“Surely God is my salvation; I will trust and not be afraid. The Lord, the Lord himself, is my strength and my defense; he has become my salvation.” Isaiah 12:2 NIV
“Delight yourself in the Lord, and he will give you the desires of your heart.” Psalm 37:4 ESV
What are the desires of your heart? Or as Jesus asked,
“And stopping, Jesus called them and said, “What do you want me to do for you?” Matthew 20:32 ESV
I keep a very old dictionary next to my morning spot. Its pages are thin from age and dark like dried clay.
I researched “delight” this morning, it’s a word that is defined as “to gratify or please greatly”, “high satisfaction”.
So, the psalmist tells us we will have whatever our hearts desire when we delight ourselves in God.
How do we delight in God? I think we set our hearts on pleasing Him and we couple it with joy that expresses to Him and others…”I’m satisfied with God.”
Then over time, our desires might surprise us or they may continue to be deeply important and personal, may seem like an impossible hope.
I get that.
I have a couple of those. But, my heart is at peace knowing, God knows and He has heard my prayers.
God knows the desires of my heart and He desires that I delight in Him…not just what I want. Maybe in a little while, what we desire most will be God and maybe that’s the discovery God knows we need and He’s so sweetly patient as we discover this ourselves.
He’s gentle and loving that way, isn’t He?
We can hope,have hope.
Not long ago, someone devastated by an injury and a woeful prognosis for her son had a tone of hopelessness in her voice.
And God brought a verse to mind.
I can tell you, this astounds me. Much of the Bible is still a mystery to me and I can’t recite the books in order or articulate truth accurately with confidence.
Still, there are things that pop up and I share them, the promises of God.
I told this mom that she could not stop hoping, that she couldn’t postpone, pack away or defer her hope.
That if she did, she would only be more heartbroken, heartsick and well, hopeless.
“Hope deferred makes the heart sick, but a dream fulfilled is a tree of life.” Proverbs 13:12 NLT
And as with every word I speak or write, every canvas I create, I’m telling myself the story first, the story of hoping.
The truth of a God who loves us, the embrace of a greater understanding of His faithfulness to love, protect and guide.
Desire and hope, such precious and fragile,
Secrets, mostly.
Don’t let go. Keep hope, wear it like a necklace. (I think that’s a verse). Treasure the knowing that your desires are fully known by the Maker who knew them way before you could.
we run away from our discomfort... but it doesn't leave us. to heal we need to turn around and face it, experience it and once we truly do we are out of it. We heal and we grow.
2 Timothy 1:7-8 For the Spirit God gave us does not make us timid, but gives us power, love and self-discipline. This blog is about my Christian walk. Join me for the adventure.
Lisa Anne Tindal 