Month: November 2008

Oh Woe is me

DeanaLeave a comment

The poem I posted the other day references the Father of Lies – Satan. I found it in an old prayer journal of mine. The same one that listed the seven woes warned about in Matthew. In learning about the dirty cup, and letting go of my rubbery mentality, God took me through the book of Matthew – I wrote down everything I learned, and pondered them in my heart for once, instead of just my brain.

Every time the water in my cup would go down, satan would speak an offering of some sort or other to pacify my heart. Junk Food – no more no less. I was so busy learning and teaching, I’d forgotten how to ponder, and digest. My cup was so full of misadventures and the fear of being found out (fog) there was no room for grace.

The only solution really, was to allow the cup to break. Then and only then could God get my attention long enough – to do something with it.

Over the next few weeks, I’m going to be blogging about the different things God showed me, not about leaders or rulers, but about myself. Someone else might read those verses and receive and entirely different message from God – and that’s okay.

Under no circumstances do I ever presume to say “This is an oracle of the Lord.” All I know is this is what I learned, and how I am trying to apply it to my life today.

My Cup Ranneth Over

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I remember being a little girl in the playground. The normal taunts would be passed around, and sure enough someone (usually me) would shout back, “Yeah, well I’m rubber and you’re glue. What you say bounces of me and sticks to you.”

Brilliant rebuttal. Unless you are sitting in church, instead of a play ground. And you are now in your 30’s instead of ten.

I thought I had a word for somebody once, but I was wrong. It turns out I can be one of those people sitting in the pews, listening to the sermon, taking notes and thinking to myself, “Wow I really wish so and so was here to hear that! That really applies to them.” Funny how those sermons always seem to apply to someone else, but never me.

I was working at an office at the time and received a phone call after a staff meeting. Someone had left their coffee cup warmer on and could I please go turn it off. Feeling rather bothered by what I viewed as a silly request, I turned off his cup warmer and left his office, leaving behind a full cup of coffee. I knew if I left it there over the weekend the coffee would get all moldy, and frankly I didn’t care. This would be the day that God chose to speak to my heart. “Empty and wash the cup Deana.”

I was really not in a generous and giving mood that day, nor was I in the mood to do such a humble act of kindness for somebody. But I listened to the voice. Once I emptied the cup, I noticed that while the outside was pretty clean, the inside was stained black with coffee stains. Matthew 23:25 came to mind – “Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You clean the outside of the cup and dish, but inside they are full of greed and self-indulgence. Blind Pharisee! First clean the inside of the cup and dish, and then the outside also will be clean. “

Okay, well it didn’t exactly come to me like that, it was more of a “isn’t there a verse somewhere in the Bible about dirty cups? I think it’s Matthew.” and I had to go look it up.

This would be when brilliant, rubber hearted, me, thought I had a word for someone else. I mean, it was much too harsh to apply to me, right? Thankfully, I left that word unspoken. I cleaned the cup and put it back in it’s place.

I later shared my experience with one of my girlfriends. Joy has a gift for telling the truth. She also has the spiritual gift of prophesy and I was excited that God had actually given me a word and I wanted to know what to do with it. She listened to me and asked me what I thought God was trying to teach me with that. I went into my “them” rant and she very gently stated that when God uses an object lesson in her life, the message is usually about her and I might want to view it from that perspective. Truth telling friends can really rain on a parade, you know what I mean?

My life was, at that particular season, about to fall apart, but I didn’t know that yet. At that time, I was cloud nine head over heals in love with God, believing the Gospel for everyone around me, and hoping to keep the hidden things hidden. My hidden things were ugly. My hidden things had deep stains on my spirit. My hidden things kept me a prisoner to the fear of being found out.

The reality of those hidden things spoke to me more frequently than God and told me I could “go this far, but no farther, remember what you are.” Listening to the enemy is never a good thing, but I was so accustomed to his voice, I didn’t realize who was speaking. Listening to the enemy, I polished my outer cup while filling the inside with everything I could to hide the stains.

Hungry for a fresh word from God, I would sit and study, teach and learn and wonder why he seemed so silent. He had words for everyone else it seemed, but not me. That didn’t stop me from singing, or from taking everything I could from the bible and memorizing it to hold onto. My brain was filling up to over flowing, but my heart was breaking. I would go and sing, and literally shake when in the presence of Christians I feared.

Failing to fully grasp that simple message that God so loved the world (insert ME) he sent his only begotten son, brought on one of the worst seasons of idolatry, heartbreak, and brokenness I have ever experienced. My own cup, was running over and time was running out. Hidden things get moldy when ignored. If God couldn’t find a way to connect my heart and my head soon, my cup was going to break. And break it, he did.

To be continued.

Pollyanna this Ain’t Folks

DeanaLeave a comment

This blog will seem random – and I guess it is.. It’s not my typical happiness blog – but part of a bigger personal psalms piece. It makes sense to me and is actually part of a bigger story to be explained later.

There are seasons, that are rough to bear. Storms that keep us soaking wet and unable to stand. Realities that lay thick in fog. Days where the devil seems to win, and God seems distant. Hold strong, and wait for the rider to appear.

In due time

There are seasons where it seems like the devil is winning
But they are only seasons
Not life times.

Things you should be able to trust become untrustworthy
they trick you into thinking they need you
or that you need them.
They tell you lies
About how special you are
How important you are
How they need you
Because you aren’t like “them”

Only “them” doesn’t seem to bad,

The longer you listen to the lies
“them” no longer seems to like you.

He’s good at that

The liar
And the thief

He needs you
To hide behind
Because he can’t face himself.

He’s told you the truth
You are special
You are needed
but not like this.

He twists it
Much like an unwanted vine twists over a fence
It’s the wrong vine
He’s grafting you to.
Don’t take hold.

He knows your weaknesses
He knows your fears
He knows your needs

He zones in on them
And Exploits them

Rather than listen the spirit
Who warns of an enemy near.
You feel fear
lack of faith
Or think yourself the enemy.

You feel betrayed but don’t why
And think maybe it’s just you.

You want to tell
But no one hears you
Or wants to listen

He’s built a wall of lies between you and them
Trying to keep you for himself
Trying to stay unexposed.

You believe the wall but
It’s just apparition
A figment of his imagination
Created for you.
and you believe it as if it were real.

It’s fog
If you reached your hand out
It would go right through
But you don’t.

You’ve stopped trusting, even yourself.

So you sit
And you wait
For the author of truth
To bring darkness to light

Time passes
Too slowly it seems
And soon
When things are almost forgotten

The rider appears
faithful and true

He is trustworthy
He is your redeemer

A sword in his mouth
Cutting the darkness
Showing the truth

No longer will you be called forsaken
Arise and shine
Daughter of Zion
For your time has come.

Standing
With no one to blackmail
Or blame
Or darken the sun.

Clothe yourself instead
with
Humility
Forgiveness
And grace.

Knowing your God has heard you.

————————–

We serve to an audience of one. But it’s easy to forget that. At times our witness appears to deny Christ, and we are denied in return. Been there, done that. I found an old prayer journal the other day. It was written during one of the worst fire storms of my life. A season where everyone it seemed had turned against me, and the enemy lay in wait – a season where the wrong choices felt right. A time where I almost threw it all away, I prayed.

One of my prayers was simple really – “Dear Lord, when the world has turned against me, teach me now how to seek out only you. Let your approval be all I need.”

I learned how to play to an audiance of one.

I’m Proud of my Country

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My son Dillon attended a country school years ago that had animals of all sorts. One day while they were doing a pretend “archeological dig” where the students were to uncover class made artifacts, he and another student got into a mud fight. Half way through this fight they discovered the mud they were slinging had been enriched with Llama poo. Both mothers were called to please bring a change of clothing. After watching the debates, reading the stories, and listening to commentators, I feel as if our nation needs new clothes too. Or at least clean ones.

History was made on November 4, 2008. The United States of America voted in Barack Obama as our 44th president. I’m torn only in that, he isn’t the man a lot of us wanted. But according to the numbers 51% of America did. Truth be told though – the republican party failed America in a lot of ways over the past four years and America fought back. Our nation fought back by ousting some really good republican senators, who lost their posts not because of personal failure, but because of their ties to our current president, whose ratings are now below 25% approval. That is the lowest approval rating in my lifetime anyway for an exiting president.

I like W. I don’t agree with everything he does, but I still like him. I do not think it fair that he is judged on the fall out fiscal policies that were set in place during the Clinton administration. This recession was a long time coming. Jeff and I felt the first wave during the Clinton administration when we lost our life savings in the MCI stock scandal. We needed reform before Bush ever stepped into office.

Interesting to me, in this land of Free Speech, is how dirty this election got. The far right called Obama everything from a Marxist to a terrorist, from a Muslim to the anti-christ. I suddenly felt as if our nation had somehow been transported to the McCarthy era, where everyone who didn’t fit the norm was called a communist. Reputations and lives were destroyed in that modern day witch hunt. The far left, were no different. They called McCain out as a “certifiably tooney loons of a man” and ripped Sarah to shreds over not only her Christian beliefs, but her (true) lack of ethics.

If McCain had won – our nation would have prayed hard that he live the full four years. I for one have more faith in Biden‘s abilities to run our nation, than I do Sarah. Choosing her to woo the Hillary supporters backfired. According to CBS news last night, 80% of the women in the exit polls voted for Obama.

Barack, while not my choice for president, is a very well educated, intelligent man with strong ideals. He, like all of his predecessors, has hopes, dreams, and ambitions for this great nation of ours. I find him to be naive and wonder what the realities of being in the position of one of the strongest world leaders will do to him. Even so, our nation has chosen to rest its hope on him. His downfall to me is his stand on life. His voting record shows he supports abortions, and I do not. I rest my hope in God, who still sets kings. He has a greater purpose than my small vision.

Our decision has been made. We live in a land of democracy. Obama won not only the popular vote, but the electoral college as well.

As Tom Browkaw said last night, “When this election is over , we as a nation stop being Democrats and Republicans, we become Americans United and we stand behind our President.”

It’s time both sides hit the showers, put on clean clothes and get on with the business of running our great nation.