Leaning Heavily

Honestly, I have no idea what the new year holds. I will say, I'm quite ready to be done with this year.  It has been hard for me to even come here with all that's going on.

But today I'm here.  Today is all I can focus on.  I have to leave in God's hands the rest.  The future. Or I'll go crazy.  Really.

What I can do is focus-today- on what God is teaching me. Lately, He has been speaking to me on rising above the circumstances, on matching my intentions with my actions. I am not great at this.  My intentions are seemingly established and then I fail to rise above and my actions display something entirely different than I intended.

I heard recently that it is wise to know our intentions first.  Perhaps this seems simple, but it spoke to me. If I examine my motives, analyze what I intend, then maybe these intentions will be easier to keep.  They will be more ingrained within.

Thou, therefore, my child, be strong in the grace that (is) in Christ Jesus...-2 Timothy 2:1YLT


It is His grace that enables me.  So, I lean heavily these days.

Always found

After Christmas confession:

This has been the worst Christmas for me ever.  It's now over so I hope it's safe to say that.  My favorite part of the season was the  Shabba-Chanukah party we attended Friday night.  Does that tell you anything?

Christmas Eve day, I tried desperately to keep it together while taking care of my last minute wrapping and keeping the kids entertained but clean and ready for service.  I was painting a smile on my face but when I realized that six gifts had gone missing(?) I lost it. Not in front of the kids, but alone, the tears came.

And I started thinking.  Maybe, there were tears that Mary cried on the day before Jesus was born.  Or in the months leading up to.  She would have been hormonal, right?  And stressed even.  She was pregnant with God's son. Not Joseph's.  They were journeying far.  And they arrive at their destination only to find 'No room at the inns.'  Maybe she broke down a little.  So, perhaps, waiting for Jesus, it's okay to cry under the pressure, wanting so badly the relief of his arrival.

And then I thought some more.  I remembered the song 'The Little Drummer Boy'.  And I prayed that me letting the kids make gingerbread cookies and ornaments would be enough for Jesus. He knew my heart wasn't in it this year.  But I did what I could.  I gave what very little I possessed.

And then I found the presents.  And we made it to church.  And that was beautiful.  We ate Chinese food and read a Christmas story before bed and all in all it turned out okay.

Christmas morning, I tried to keep things jolly as well.  We opened presents, and messed the house royally with polly pocket shoes, puzzle pieces, and play-do and at noon when the kids left, I again let the tears come.

But it's okay.  Jesus is here.

We never did find the thumbnail Jesus from our nativity.  And the last few weeks, every store I've been in I've looked for a replacement nativity....with no luck.   I found one finally, on Saturday.  So I bought it.  It's still in its packaging to save it from the three year old's violent hands but I may just open it and take out baby Jesus.... to hold Him, to remind me that He can always be found.


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Dwell in the source

December has felt a little mooney, a bit blah.

In fact, I can't quite believe we're this close to Christmas.

Circumstances in my life have shifted considerably and I'm already feeling the 'after Christmas blues'.  Maybe, because November, in many ways was very special. In other ways it was very rough, but within that difficulty I could really hear God. And I'm not hearing Him as well this month.

Last night, a friend and I were talking and she said that she prays and she does her readings but one thing she just can't get is the meditation part.  Meaning, her mind continues to wander whenever she attempts. I almost had to laugh, because she said it as though, she were one of the only ones with this problem.  I told her that I was fairly certain most people had this problem. I'm reading Letters of the Scattered Brotherhood right now and it's a treasure of a book. It speaks quite a bit on going into the silence, hushing the outer man.  If the Desert Fathers recognized the difficulty in meditating, certainly, we in our busy lives will find it near impossible.  But I think that the more we practice, the more we discipline ourselves, we will find that God is waiting to meet with us in the silence.

This section really spoke to me.  This is something I am certainly in need of practicing:

"May I say here that the mind cannot remember easily when it is full of criticism; you cannot afford to take umbrage, to have prejudices, nor hold to yourself these violent human emotions which flare up in human contacts.  Let them go and dwell in the source of all love, infinite love"

The only way I have managed at all during this time is to pray for those I resent.  To try to stay above the human drama and enter instead into the drama of Christ's love for me.  The drama of His birth, His death, and  enter, too, into my own dying to self for Him.

".....Prepare yourselves to be sons of God, rise to your full height and live most of your life in spirit while in the material world....The discipline of the body and the spirit is an exercise as old as time.  The conflict of body and spirit, joy and sorrow, has been an accompanying mystery;"


I am practicing this picture of my inner man rising above. Staying above with the peace that surpasses all understanding.  I heard a suggestion recently to breathe in with the thought, 'I am' and out with the thought, 'Peace'.

"I will give you a talisman to use in times of pressure, of drabness, of temptation.  Say, 'There is no measured time at this place, no future, neither is there a past.  I am in the eternal moment, the limitless, infinite, now.'"


Furthermore, I am in today.  Today only.  Only God know what tomorrow holds, so here and now, I am able to trust.



submitting at Playdates with God

Steps

Saturday steps

Sure looks fun

Our first winter in Iowa.  The boy's first 'taste' of snow.  It sure looks fun.  But I know enough now to say that  looks can be deceiving.  It's all fun and games till someone has to shovel the driveway.  Glad to be back in sunny Arizona complaining about the chill of sixty degree weather.

Now and Within

"Each one of us makes his own choice; it is either the way of negation, a materialistic philosophy, or the way of the creative spirit, the Way of Life.  'But one thing is needful,' he said, and 'now is the appointed time.' One has said that 'two of the greatest words in our language are now and within.'"- Letters of the Scattered Brotherhood

wordless wednesday

This Christmas

I'm not especially looking forward to Christmas this year.  In fact, the past few holiday seasons have lacked their usual sparkle.

It's the commercialism, the greed, the way that as an adult I'm forced to see how retailers have hijacked that which ought to be reverent, special and holy.

But climbing atop a soap box doesn't help.  All I can manage to do in any given day in any given situation is look inward.  Where do I fall on the spectrum of greed and buying into commercialism.  I'm sorry to say, I have a long way to go.  And maybe what I hate is what's inside of me.

I do know that over the years, I have been given a holy ache.  I have understood a little the word compassion.  I have felt urged to sacrifice because I have so much. And I feel it's not enough.  But I know God takes my little.  He sees it.

Last year, my husband and I bought chickens through the Compassion program rather than exchange gifts.  It was not much.  But it was a place to start.

This year, we chose to sponsor a child through Compassion.

And still....

Still, I find myself this month, shopping madly to fill all my American aches.  I fill not my Godly ache.  I justify my shopping sprees by telling myself that I so often go without. How is this true?  All my needs are met.  All.  And there are so many who lack basic necessities.

An Africa Drought Survival Kit costs $13.  Same price as a video game on sale.

Food Baskets for Survival are $40. Twenty dollars more will buy a holiday food basket from Amazon complete with Camembert cheese, crackers, sweet butter and cookies, decorated with poinsettias.

$100 through Compassion buys a cow to give milk and food,  things I take for granted, things which too often go to waste. This is half of what a leather jacket would cost.

I write these comparisons down to convict myself.  To remind myself of the luxury I live in, which I'm blessed to be able to afford.

But as God has blessed me, might I now bless others.