Peace in the Midst of the Storm

 Please enjoy the reflections of Stephen Parsons as he visits the Island of Crete. (The post in its entirety struck me as so lovely and deep using a powerful analogy that I have not even noted here, it is well worth the visit to Surviving Church to read it.):

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When our Spirits Learn to Skip: Spiritual Lessons Learned through Downs Syndrome

Source on Imger

I love children and adults with Downs Syndrome.  They are pure, honest, and I think that I might actually envy their capacity for sheer joy.  I even wondered as I entered the third decade of my life if God was preparing me to birth a baby with Downs Syndrome because of my love for people who struggle with it.

The other day, a dear friend who was blessed with a lovely daughter with this genetic disorder in combination with some other health issues announced that her daughter had learned to skip.  I bubbled over with joy as I read how this wonderful little girl just started skipping everywhere all the time, mastering a skill that most everyone else takes for granted.  It set my mind racing about many different things.  I wish that I could be there to witness the extra joy of watching her experience the self satisfaction along with her zeal for life and love.  My heart just soared.

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See “Salvation Road” (a stage play in NYC and Louisville) and “Paradise Recovered” (a motion picture), Both About High Demand Fundamentalism

  You're Invited!

To a Play...

SALVATION ROAD, a new play by D.W. Gregory about the cult experience, will be produced at the New York University Steinhardt School of Educational Theatre Oct. 26 to Nov. 4. Tickets are $15 and can be obtained online HERE. BroadwayWorld.com's info page states that the play is appropriate for middle school aged children on up.

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Risks

To laugh is to risk appearing the fool.

To weep is to risk appearing sentimental.

To reach out for another is to risk involvement.

To expose feelings is to risk exposing your true self.

To place your ideas, your dreams,

before a crowd is to risk their loss.

To love is to risk not being loved in return.

To live is to risk dying.

To hope is to risk despair.

To try is to risk failure.

But risks must be taken because

the greatest hazard in life is to risk nothing.

The person who risks nothing,

has nothing and is nothing.

They may avoid suffering and sorrow,

but they cannot learn, feel, change, grow, love, live.

Only a person who risks is free.

Author unknown.

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Housekeeping and Some Irish Poetry

I had one of those days today...  It wasn't that nothing went right so much as it that it didn't go as expected.  That had blessings and what seem like pains.

Like trying to figure out how to make these new blog template features work.  I thought I'd spend an hour or two as a diversion, taking a break from some other duties.  It would be fun...  ??? What, am I nutz?

I think this blog template works fairly well.  I have not yet figured out how to direct the blog buttons on the first bar at the top of the page to the particular web pages for "Contacts" and "About..."  But I have bigger fires to put out -- like figuring out that I can move gadgets around on Explorer but not on Firefox...  I'm fairly happy with it and I think it's now in working order.  But now I'm in a very weird altered state of consciousness and can't see straight after looking at this crazy box all day.  I'll probably dream about fonts or something.  Rich from over at By His Grace, For His Glory was going to help me try to re-work this old blogger template, but I found this one that seems to be doing just fine.  (I might have to get him to help me figure out this navigation bar at the top, however!)  Thank you, Richard for all of your help.  Now for time to write more posts!

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Nunc lento sonitu dicunt, Morieris.

Perchance he for whom this bell tolls may be so ill as that he knows not it tolls for him; and perchance I may think myself so much better than I am, as that they who are about me and see my state, may have caused it to toll for me, and I know not that. The church is catholic, universal, so are all her actions; all that she does belongs to all. When she baptizes a child, that action concerns me, for that child is thereby connected to that head which is my head too, and ingrafted into that body whereof I am a member. And when she buries a man, that action concerns me.

All mankind is of one author and is one volume; when one man dies, one chapter is not torn out of the book, but translated into a better language, and every chapter must be so translated. God employs several translators; some pieces are translated by age, some by sickness, some by war, some by justice; but God's hand is in every translation, and his hand shall bind up all our scattered leaves again for that library where every book shall lie open to one another. As therefore the bell that rings to a sermon calls not upon the preacher only, but upon the congregation to come, so this bell calls us all; but how much more me, who am brought so near the door by this sickness.

There was a contention as far as a suit (in which piety and dignity, religion and estimation, were mingled) which of the religious orders should ring to prayers first in the morning; and it was determined that they should ring first that rose earliest. If we understand aright the dignity of this bell that tolls for our evening prayer, we would be glad to make it ours by rising early, in that application, that it might be ours as well as his whose indeed it is. The bell doth toll for him that thinks it doth; and though it intermit again, yet from that minute that that occasion wrought upon him, he is united to God. Who casts not up his eye to the sun when it rises? But who takes off his eye from a comet when that breaks out? Who bends not his ear to any bell which upon any occasion rings? But who can remove it from that bell which is passing a piece of himself out of this world?

No man is an island, entire of itself; every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main. If a clod be washed away by the sea, Europe is the less, as well as if a promontory were, as well as if a manor of thy friend's or of thine own were. Any man's death diminishes me because I am involved in mankind; and therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee.

from Meditation 17
"Devotions Upon Emergent Occasions"
by John Donne

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Where the Chisel Meets the Stone

Please say a prayer for some new friends of mine today, for abundant wisdom for them so that God's words would be found in their mouths. Currently, they are walking out of a patriarchal spiritual abuse situation, making the hard decisions about what to do and how to do it. I'm so grateful that there are so many resources now for this couple who are new to the whole idea of spiritual abuse, resources that I wish I had as my husband and I made decisions about how to exit our own group years ago.
Their situation reminded me of my favorite 4Him song, which along with nearly everything else, can be found in some manner or form on YouTube. When I first heard this song, I was commuting from Norman to work in OKC in the early '90s, and I would play this song over and over and weep. My sinful nature and my self want to have their way, but I have relinquished my heart to the Lord and want my wheels to turn for Him, not for me.

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Thoughts for the Day

Quotes from Around the Web This Week

1. Confronting Deception

"Truth is an absolute defense against charges of libel and slander."

(Hicks)

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A Prayer for 2009

By God's grace and work in our lives, may we all aspire to and realize every aspect of this verse this year and live it more fully than we every have before in our Christian walk. May this be true for the whole Body of Christ.

Amen, amen, and amen.

2 Timothy 1:7

For God has not given us a spirit of fear,
but of power and of love and of a sound mind.

(NKJV)

For God did not give us a spirit of timidity,
but a spirit of power, of love and of self-discipline.

(NIV)

For God has not given us a spirit of timidity,
but of power and love and discipline.

(NASB)

For God did not give us a spirit of timidity
(of cowardice, of craven and cringing and fawning fear),
but [He has given us a spirit]
of power and of love and
of calm and well-balanced mind
and discipline and self-control.

(Amp)

God doesn't want us to be shy with his gifts,
but bold and loving and sensible.

(Message)

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Fooling Ourselves

Only a Rumor

*As it appears in
"Watch For the Light"

Søren Kierkegaard

(from "Meditations from Kierkegaard,"
© James Nisbet and Co, Ltd., 1955)

Now when Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judaea in the days of Herod the king, behold, there came wise men from the east to Jerusalem, Saying, Where is he that is born King of the Jews? for we have seen his star in the east, and are come to worship him.

When Herod the king had heard these things, he was troubled, and all Jerusalem with him. And when he had gathered all the chief priests and scribes of the people together, he demanded of them where Christ should be born.

Matthew 2:1-4

Although the scribes could explain where the Messiah should be born, they remained quite unperturbed in Jerusalem. They did not accompany the Wise Men to seek him. Similarly we may know the whole of Christianity, yet make no movement. The power that moved heaven and earth leaves us completely unmoved.

What a difference! The three king had only a rumor to go by. But it moved them to make that long journey. The scribes were much better informed, much better served. They sat and studied the Scriptures like so many dons, but it did not make them move. Who had the more truth? The three kings who followed a rumor, or the scribes who remained sitting with all their knowledge?

What a vexation it must have been for the kings, that the scribes who gave them the news they wanted remained quiet in Jerusalem! We are being mocked, the kings might have thought. For indeed what an atrocious self-contradiction that the scribes should have the knowledge and yet remain still. This is as bad as if a person knows all about Christ and his teachings, and his own life expresses the opposite.

We are tempted to suppose that such a person wishes to fool us, unless we admit that he is only fooling himself.

from "Watch for the Light:
Readings for Advent and Christmas"
The Plough Publishing House
of the Bruderhof Foundation, Inc.
Farmington, PA

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Thanksgiving Blessing from Doug and Wendy Duncan

I'd like to add my voice to this Thanksgiving Day message from Doug and Wendy Duncan who have both been a wonderful encouragement to me.

I think that anyone interested in the gender debate within the Southern Baptist Convention should read her powerful testimony of her journey through the SBC and into the cultic Christian televangelist watchdog group, The Trinity Foundation.

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A Serious Post Anticipating Christmas

Some of my favorite singers singing one of my most favorite songs.

I feel like all these people are my family, and I long for the day that I can sing this song with all of them. I cant wait to harmonize with Vestal Goodman, Michael English and Larnell Harris, John Starnes all the Cathedrals, the Porter Family, the Spears and all the rest on streets of gold.

Merry Christmas!

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I'll See Your Quote and Raise You One

A friend of mine sent me this good quote from Chesterton this weekend:

"The wisest thing in the world is to cry out before you are hurt. It is no good to cry out after you are hurt; especially after you are mortally hurt. People talk about the impatience of the populace; but sound historians know that most tyrannies have been possible because men moved too late. It is often essential to resist a tyranny before it exists. It is no answer to say, with a distant optimism, that the scheme is only in the air. A blow from a hatchet can only be parried while it is in the air." 

~G.K. Chesterton~

I forwarded the email off to my husband who sent me this email in response:

Good Quote – Thank You Now here is a good one from Harry Blamires: "If Christians cannot communicate as thinking beings, they are reduced to encountering one another only at the shallow level of gossip and small talk. Hence the perhaps peculiarly modern problem – the loneliness of the thinking Christian."

These quotes serve as good descriptors of my thoughts and concerns over the past few days, and they are both too good to go unnoticed. I offer them here as encouragement for those others who resist tyranny before it exists -- all those lonely, thinking Christians out there who dare to dig below the shallow levels of our peculiarly modern problems.

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Christ Crucified and Risen from the Dead!

Everywhere I've turned recently, I've heard people talking about how many churches no longer preach Christ crucified, and the do not teach about the Blood of Jesus. I heard a pastor recently who urged other pastors and music ministers to choose more songs about the Cross and the Blood of the Lamb, because so many churches have ventured away from the most powerful message that Christians bear: the message of Christ crucified.

Tomorrow, many of us will celebrate the Resurrection of Jesus from the dead. Jesus now holds the keys to death, hell and the grave! Glory to the Lamb who was slain and has redeemed us unto God by His Blood, out of every kindred and tongue and people and nation. Worthy is the Lamb!

May we ever sing, sing, sing of Christ crucified and risen, and of the Blood of the Lamb!

Hallelujah! He is risen!

I chose a photo of a Cross that is very close to my heart and my heart for missions.

Pictured here is the Cross of the Scriptures at Clonmacnoise in Ireland. I was taught (rightly or wrongly) that the Celts worshiped the sun, so the missionaries who brought them the Gospel helped them understand and remember that God was not in the sun, but that the Cross which stood before it. Like Paul had said of the "unknown god" to the people on Mars Hill, so these missionaries used the symbol of the Celtic Cross to teach the Gospel message. On this Cross that I was actually blessed to see myself in Ireland, there is an additional witnessing tool. The scenes carved into the rock depict the story of Christ's crucifixion. (The Roman soldiers are depicted with pointed helmets, reminiscent of the Vikings who raided the area many, many times by sailing down the River Shannon from the ocean.)

I also learned that monks named "Mullen" (my maiden name, meaning "tonsured") who lived near Clonmacnoise were scribes that penned the "Book of Mulling," small books that contained the four Gospels that were used for missionary work all over Ireland.

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Selective Love

copied from

TODAY’S
JOURNAL
Brief, Biblical Essays for Thinking People

Richard D. Sandlin

Selective Love
“Ye yourselves are taught of God to love one another. And indeed ye do it toward all the brethren...” I read recently of a preacher friend, now ninety, holding a conference in an elaborate hotel in Orlando , Florida . At his own expense, he invited various leaders of different Baptist groups to this meeting. The purpose? To teach them to love each other as well as all “good Baptists.”

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A Christmas Kiss from Heaven

I received an odd Christmas blessing this morning. I drifted off to sleep with the prayer that God would bind me to Him and help me correctly discern everything that it is He would have me do. I prayed that I would not be like the Church at Ephesus of whom He Who was alive, dead and alive forevermore said had lost their First Love.

I spent the wee hours of the night posting what I had copied of the all the critical Amazon online reviews of the Passionate Housewives book onto my other website, after receiving many emails about their disappearance.  All this on the eve of the celebration and remembrance of our Savior’s Birth. It certainly was not what I picked as an ideal Christmas Eve activity.

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My Favorite Advent Meditation

Sixteen years ago, just a few weeks before my second Christmas as my husband's wife, I listened to TL Osborn on a Christian talk-show. He's a Pentecostal who looks both adorable and sinister all at the same time -- a fiery preacher of short stature with red hair, moustache and beard. He reminds me of the type of preaching I remember from my youth -- the type of preaching that is not so frequently heard anymore. I always found him to be adorable and felt a deep sense of love for him -- watching him on the little box in my living room.

.

That afternoon, he gave a short and simple message, explaining how the Annunciation can apply to every believer -- perhaps the most profound Christmas message that I have yet to hear. He explained, ever so simply, that like the Holy Spirit overshadowed Mary, the Holy Spirit comes upon us, the Power of the Highest overshadows us and puts the Word of the Lord into our hearts. Through the Holy Seed of the Word of God that He grafts into our hearts, that which is born of our intimacy with Him brings forth Christ in our lives. All we need to say is "Be it unto me according to Your Word, Oh Lord." I knelt down on the living room floor and wept.

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Painfully Apart from the Beaten Track

Charles Spurgeon said:

At any rate, cost what it may, to separate ourselves from those who separate themselves from the truth of God is not alone our liberty, but our duty.

I have raised my protest in the only complete way by coming forth, and I shall be content to abide alone until the day when the Lord shall judge the secrets of all hearts;

but it will not seem to me a strange thing if others are found faithful, and if others judge that for them also there is no path but that which is painfully apart from the beaten track.

“Attempts at the Impossible”

Sword and Trowel

December 1988

Reproduced at www.spurgeon.org/s_and_t/dg12.htm

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Thanks to Paul Elliot for drawing my attention to this quote by citing it in "Christianity and Neo-Liberalism: The Spiritual Crisis in the Orthodox Presbyterian Church and Beyond" published by the Trinity Foundation.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

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My Eyes So Full of Light

Until I get something more substantial to put here, I decided to post this poem that I wrote in November 2006. I was still suffering from a sluggish thyroid and had just experienced some new healing of some very old wounds.

A musician friend of mine charged me to write a song around my new epiphany, as I kept repeating that my eyes were so full of light that I could barely see. Within a few days, I awakened in the wee hours of the morning, scribbling the words down on cardboard (the first thing that I could grab to write on). I still hear no music dancing behind or above these words, but they're not going anywhere.

My Eyes So Full of Light

As I wrestle with this old, familiar problem
From this place I always flee but never leave
Overwhelmed and strangled by the growing chaos
Where I know futility
And I feel strength leaving me
Come now, Lord, and be glorified in me

Outside of You, my heart is cold and stony
Per the prophet, it is wicked desperately
It is if my heart of hope is dead already
Yet it somehow feels this pain
And knows that all is not in vain
So, COME NOW, LORD, and be glorified in me

If your strength is truly perfect through our weakness
And your power glorified through human need
As your eyes look to and fro, gaze now and see me
I groan with the very earth
For You to show YOUR MIGHTY WORTH
Oh, COME NOW, LORD, and be glorified in me

My heart knows well that death's my only answer
But as your power overshadows me
My death to selfish gain is what You called for
Never to cover up in shame
Hiding the glory of your Name
Oh, Transform me and be glorified in me

This heart, once dark, now beams with understanding
My eyes so full of light I barely see
The path before me, and where all my steps You've ordered
As your whisper says "This way"
As your right hand holds my sway
I rejoice as you are glorified in me

So ALL glory be unto my Heavenly Father, my Creator, Savior, Lover of my Soul,
Be ever by me with your Spirit Breath within me
As Your Spirit sanctifies and makes me whole
As I ever dwell within this love renewal
And within Your very hands I dance and sing
May my life be nothing but a place of worship
Unto honor and all glory to my King

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