As I reluctantly reached for the pooper scooper, and gingerly moved toward the dark mounds littering the grass of a yard that was not mine. I fought back the imagery that was so clearly before my eyes, the idea of what I was about to do, needed to do, and was doing, all for the sake of money. That green stuff we have all come to know and love, the “secure option”, the paper we exchange for goods and services.
As I neared the first mound that badly needed scooping, with breath appropriately held, and mind focused on the deserted island that I was yet to experience in this lifetime. I desperately tried to scoop the poop as quickly and artfully as I could, all the while working the blatant and relentless littered imagery before my eyes off of my pristine white beach with aqua water caressing her shores. Of course, all this without exhaling or fainting with my face in the middle of a mud pie. It was at this point I noticed the brown mound form a life of it’s own. Yup, it moved…. “Huh?” “What the….?” “Dammit!” I mumbled, as I lost my record for breath holding, my beautiful beach faded into the distance while the mound beneath my eyes seemed to grow in proportion.
Like something from an old sci-fi horror movie, not only did this mound grow, the movement within it increased as my stomach caught my throat. They were maggots, bugs even, and worms crawling within this mound of Dog dung……..”ooooohhhhh delightful!” Yup the mound was alive with crawling creatures who’s sole purpose was to find a nice warm, moist home to breed, eat and live. As the nausea and dizzy head brought me back to reality, I quickly and desperately took in a breath and stopped immediately as the strong odor found it’s way through my nostrils, highlighting every sensory action in my body………. “OH MY GOSH!” I gagged, and ran for the safety of the court yard, puffing and panting, and trying to force any vision I could over what I had just witnessed. Breathing deeply and talking the nausea out of my throat.
I burst into tears and my spirit shouted out of my mouth for freedom. Freedom from a cage I had clearly placed myself in.
So how did I find myself shoveling other peoples Dog doo for a living. I didn’t, somewhere I chose this. I chose to walk down a path that led me to this place over the Festive Season while others donned their new polka dot bikini’s, slathered their bodies with fresh tropical coconut scented suntan lotion and headed off to those island holidays with palm trees swaying in the cool ocean breeze, while those clear sparkling waves refreshed not only their bodies but revived their work weary souls. I chose to use what I thought a good opportunity to make the money we so desperately needed at this time to pay our bills, and offered my services to feed, water and care for these same peoples’ pets.
Oh when I designed my pretty little pamphlet with pastel colors and cute cartoon characters, it seemed so arty at the time. When I envisioned the feeding of these pets, it seemed so quick, the cash seemed so easy and the focus of the money pouring in kept my momentum and belief of what I believed to be a “God idea” going strong. I was a woman on a mission. I finally had a plan to bring in some cash, there was a need out there and I was going to meet it. We had reached a desperate place in our finances, where beggars could clearly not be choosers. I couldn’t say I was too good for this, I needed to do what I needed to do to keep the roof over our heads. I believed that God saw this as a worthy cause and perhaps would even congratulate me for being so industrious. A “Well done Kid!” “God helps those who help themselves, and you have now earned my favour” blah blah blah!
Anyway, back to my spirit shouting out of my mouth at the sight of low, low, lower than I realized I could go. Something broke inside of me as I shouted out to God. I shouted, but not in an angry or arrogant, demanding way, not even from the place of the bitter victim I had so clearly been representing for so long, and not even from the desperate pleading place to an unfair God that refused to change my circumstances, but rather from a REAL place. A place of truth within me that I had abandoned so long ago. A truth that I know was written on my heart at the beginning of creation, popped out of nowhere, yet out of somewhere and shouted loud enough for the freedom and victory it knew it needed to claim.
So did God miraculously intervene and beam me from the doggie doo strewn yard to my Seychelles beach? Nope. Yet something DID change inside me that day, a hope rose in my heart for the person I am to be, the person I’ve crushed and whipped into submission for all the “bad” choices. This person was allowed to stick their heads out of the black prison for a brief moment of sunshine, and hope rose again.
“I am allowed to feel free, I am allowed to want this freedom, and all because the sentence I am trying to serve has already been served.” Those words resonated through me and my beaten, broken and imprisoned heart began to loosely and weakly grasp at the concept of someone higher having already paid this price for this bad decision. Visions of the cross flooded my mind, but my religious brain told me that Jesus didn’t waste His precious blood on my bad decisions. That His cross experience actually had limitations, and that my stupid choices couldn’t possibly be included in something as holy and sacred as Jesus dying that vicious death on that awful cross. That his dying was only for serious sins that really needed it. That my silly antics in this world, my Kamikaze maneuvers through life are wasteful of His precious sacrifice…..
Yet, my heart was flooded with the hope and the gentle touch I had just received from the very person that hung on that cross. The hope was too strong, the experience too rich, and no amount of self doubt and persecution could drown that out this time. My Jesus had just stepped down and reminded me once again that when He saved me, He saved me from EVERYTHING I will ever need saving from. That included my stupid financial mistakes that led me down the path of self destruction to finally finding myself intimately acquainted with a dog’s toilet.
I left this house with a spring in my step I had not experienced in years, there was a weightlessness about my walk from there on out. No, my circumstances didn’t change immediately, as a matter of fact I still had to go back to my overcrowded house full of visiting family over the Christmas season, I had to continue to interact with their hopeless views on life, and I had to continue the next day to do the pet run morning and night which entailed more fly and worm infested dog poop. Yet the hope was there. The creator of the universe had spoken to little ‘ol dog poop scooping me, and now all that was needed was for me to nurture my encounter and meditate on it in the midst of all that was shouting against it this time. To allow it to surface, and dare I say survive this time.
Tuesday, March 3, 2009
Wednesday, January 7, 2009
THE REAL REASON FOR NOT SHARING
The real reason I don’t share.
I go through intense issues in life, and immediately after figuring it all out, and seeing the reason behind it all, instead of expressing it like I know I need to, even if only to myself. I run from the exposed truth. I run from me. I have every excuse in the book. Why bother? Who cares really? The world doesn’t need another expressed opinion. My Gosh! Do we reeeealy need another blog expressing yet another bunch of poetic emotional blah? What difference does it make? You’re just trying to make sense out of, or bring significance to your pain, like who hasn’t done that before….puleeez…. get original already!...ummm. that cynical nature raising it’s ugly head again.
The underlying thing I have come to realize from all of the above cop outs would be FEAR. Fear masked under many guises, but the bottom line, the truth on the matter is I don’t write because of fear. Actually I don’t do a lot of things I should because of fear. Fear seems to be what has gripped and completely paralyzed me my whole life, and although initially it cunningly disguised itself, instead of digging deeper under the obvious and shallow surface to find the truth, I’ve just accepted each façade as the truth. The sad situation is that even as the surface veneer cracked and chipped over the years, exposing the blatant truth staring me in the face, I would continue to choose to ignore, and rather believe the peeling surface paint that so clearly resembled nothing of reality or substance. Rather the devil you have come to know than the supposed one you don’t. I don’t know the truth or what do with it, so instead, I continue to ignore it, problem being I have reached the end of the painted surface. There is no more veneer, it has all but peeled away, and I am facing nothing more than the blatant truth. I think over the years I have come to not only love the pretty peeling surface, but trust it wholeheartedly. So much so that I have invested all my time, energy and resources trying to restore it. Now that it has finally been removed I have NO CLUE what to do with the revealed truth.
I seek God on it and He tells me that the truth will set me free, but freedom is the last thing I have experienced thus far. Rather it has been a battle of wills from the beginning. God peeling away while I frantically restore. Today I am naked. Somehow God won, and I am left with my shameful and very naked truth. The truth I see:
I am NO BODY and I am NO ONE.
Well, that would be MY version of this truth, but thankfully the story doesn’t end there. For God completes the sentence. He brings the completion to us if we will allow Him to and say’s:
“Correction Kid. You are NO ONE without Me.”
He doesn’t leave me shameful, I have to believe that in spite of the naked and terribly shameful place I find myself in, I AM NOT left here, but rather my loving heavenly Father cares enough to cloth me in his righteousness for His name sake. In other words, this ain’t just about me, but it’s about His name too, so the longer I stand naked, ashamed and afraid, the longer His name sake suffers. Problem is I am still fighting Him. Pathetic, I know. But like a wounded animal, that has been beaten one too many times, I continue to fight for my right to hold my own head up high in all my naked glory…..ugh!! Instead of embracing….okay, let me drop the poetic here. Instead of grabbing with both hands, arms and legs his righteous clothing for me naked little ass, I choose to stand in my prideful, yet very pathetic place and deny my nakedness….. This might be the very definition of the word ridiculous. Like the story of the Emperor’s clothes, I too have been deceived. The difference between the Emperor and myself is that I don’t believe I am clothed in invisible clothing but rather that I am doing some good by suffering my nakedness, by possibly paying for my own sins. You got yourself into this, now you will suffer the consequences. Take responsibility for yourself already! God extends His shielding robe of righteousness, but I refuse it, I reject it even, in some stupid “holy” attempt to save my own butt from a shame so deep and so awful that not even every human on the planet put together could overcome. A shame so huge and insurmountable that it could only take God’s perfection to blot out. Yet, I figure that little ol me in all my nakedness can take care of.
I know this comes from not knowing my God like I used to, not knowing Him on the intimate level I used to walk with Him on. Before I allowed myself to be corrupted by the religious blah not only in the church but even the world. My Godie and I were connected, I was not part of any church at the time and I was hearing from Him in very real terms. Don’t get me wrong, it is not that attending a decent church is not a good idea, but I truly feel we have churchified God. We have even done this to ourselves. There is this little box we call church, we define it, label it, and try to keep it under this control. God is stifled, we are stifled, but we continue with what doesn’t work and wonder why we have lost all intimacy with the Master, and disconnected our hearts from all that matters. When I first began to find God, completely by accident, and funny enough during a very exposing and vulnerable time in my life, it was a fresh walk with just He and I. I wasn’t allowing man’s opinions of Him to flood my spirit, but rather I was connecting with the one and true living God, and He would direct my paths, He would tell me what preaching to listen to, what preaching I was not yet ready to digest, what opinions to stay away from, which people to connect with etc. We had real conversations, and connected. When did I trade all of that for the latest Christian cliché? Yuck!
Today I realize that I’m alone, I am completely alone and there is no one to turn to with the advice I need. No this is not a self pity moment, but rather a very real acknowledgement of the fact of the matter. Oh trust me there are plenty people I could call for the pet answers and platitudes if I really wanted them, or thought it might help. There is an abundance of people I could even invite to a self pity party and solicit some sympathy from, but I know that won’t help. Actually any of these ideas make me nauseas just typing, let alone acting on.
NO! That is not the answer. None of that is an answer. My life has reached a far too real, far too serious place. My wounds are too deep to fit a band aid over. Hell! I wonder if a surgeon could rescue this mess. The wounds are gaping, raw and bleeding. The depths of these wounds a band aid would only further infect rather than assist. How did I get to this place? When did I get here? Why did I even allow this place? In answer to all of the above…… I have NO idea. The point right now is how to deal with what is.
So what is?
Well, like I mentioned earlier…. I’m butt naked. Vulnerability doesn’t even describe the complete exposed and open place I find myself in. God I could blame for this, but no, it is my heart’s desire to actually be naked enough to not only need clothing, but also humble enough to receive it. Truth be told, I think I allowed this nakedness to happen. Secretly I knew the truth, detested the peeling veneer and have probably been peeling along with God just as the other part of me was furiously restoring the exposing of myself….
I am so desperately trying to drop the poetic wadda wadda here and just call things as they are. So forgive the innuendos and colourful description of some very real and raw wounds I would rather not expose right now. Yup, still clinging to my scraps of surface paint. Bottom line, I am exposed, and suppose just trying to get used to the nakedness, seek the righteous garments God is probably dangling right before my eyes, and then cloth me naked butt before I catch a worse cold….
Maybe tomorrow I can share a little more on the reality of what is in my life, but for now don’t stare at me naked butt.
I go through intense issues in life, and immediately after figuring it all out, and seeing the reason behind it all, instead of expressing it like I know I need to, even if only to myself. I run from the exposed truth. I run from me. I have every excuse in the book. Why bother? Who cares really? The world doesn’t need another expressed opinion. My Gosh! Do we reeeealy need another blog expressing yet another bunch of poetic emotional blah? What difference does it make? You’re just trying to make sense out of, or bring significance to your pain, like who hasn’t done that before….puleeez…. get original already!...ummm. that cynical nature raising it’s ugly head again.
The underlying thing I have come to realize from all of the above cop outs would be FEAR. Fear masked under many guises, but the bottom line, the truth on the matter is I don’t write because of fear. Actually I don’t do a lot of things I should because of fear. Fear seems to be what has gripped and completely paralyzed me my whole life, and although initially it cunningly disguised itself, instead of digging deeper under the obvious and shallow surface to find the truth, I’ve just accepted each façade as the truth. The sad situation is that even as the surface veneer cracked and chipped over the years, exposing the blatant truth staring me in the face, I would continue to choose to ignore, and rather believe the peeling surface paint that so clearly resembled nothing of reality or substance. Rather the devil you have come to know than the supposed one you don’t. I don’t know the truth or what do with it, so instead, I continue to ignore it, problem being I have reached the end of the painted surface. There is no more veneer, it has all but peeled away, and I am facing nothing more than the blatant truth. I think over the years I have come to not only love the pretty peeling surface, but trust it wholeheartedly. So much so that I have invested all my time, energy and resources trying to restore it. Now that it has finally been removed I have NO CLUE what to do with the revealed truth.
I seek God on it and He tells me that the truth will set me free, but freedom is the last thing I have experienced thus far. Rather it has been a battle of wills from the beginning. God peeling away while I frantically restore. Today I am naked. Somehow God won, and I am left with my shameful and very naked truth. The truth I see:
I am NO BODY and I am NO ONE.
Well, that would be MY version of this truth, but thankfully the story doesn’t end there. For God completes the sentence. He brings the completion to us if we will allow Him to and say’s:
“Correction Kid. You are NO ONE without Me.”
He doesn’t leave me shameful, I have to believe that in spite of the naked and terribly shameful place I find myself in, I AM NOT left here, but rather my loving heavenly Father cares enough to cloth me in his righteousness for His name sake. In other words, this ain’t just about me, but it’s about His name too, so the longer I stand naked, ashamed and afraid, the longer His name sake suffers. Problem is I am still fighting Him. Pathetic, I know. But like a wounded animal, that has been beaten one too many times, I continue to fight for my right to hold my own head up high in all my naked glory…..ugh!! Instead of embracing….okay, let me drop the poetic here. Instead of grabbing with both hands, arms and legs his righteous clothing for me naked little ass, I choose to stand in my prideful, yet very pathetic place and deny my nakedness….. This might be the very definition of the word ridiculous. Like the story of the Emperor’s clothes, I too have been deceived. The difference between the Emperor and myself is that I don’t believe I am clothed in invisible clothing but rather that I am doing some good by suffering my nakedness, by possibly paying for my own sins. You got yourself into this, now you will suffer the consequences. Take responsibility for yourself already! God extends His shielding robe of righteousness, but I refuse it, I reject it even, in some stupid “holy” attempt to save my own butt from a shame so deep and so awful that not even every human on the planet put together could overcome. A shame so huge and insurmountable that it could only take God’s perfection to blot out. Yet, I figure that little ol me in all my nakedness can take care of.
I know this comes from not knowing my God like I used to, not knowing Him on the intimate level I used to walk with Him on. Before I allowed myself to be corrupted by the religious blah not only in the church but even the world. My Godie and I were connected, I was not part of any church at the time and I was hearing from Him in very real terms. Don’t get me wrong, it is not that attending a decent church is not a good idea, but I truly feel we have churchified God. We have even done this to ourselves. There is this little box we call church, we define it, label it, and try to keep it under this control. God is stifled, we are stifled, but we continue with what doesn’t work and wonder why we have lost all intimacy with the Master, and disconnected our hearts from all that matters. When I first began to find God, completely by accident, and funny enough during a very exposing and vulnerable time in my life, it was a fresh walk with just He and I. I wasn’t allowing man’s opinions of Him to flood my spirit, but rather I was connecting with the one and true living God, and He would direct my paths, He would tell me what preaching to listen to, what preaching I was not yet ready to digest, what opinions to stay away from, which people to connect with etc. We had real conversations, and connected. When did I trade all of that for the latest Christian cliché? Yuck!
Today I realize that I’m alone, I am completely alone and there is no one to turn to with the advice I need. No this is not a self pity moment, but rather a very real acknowledgement of the fact of the matter. Oh trust me there are plenty people I could call for the pet answers and platitudes if I really wanted them, or thought it might help. There is an abundance of people I could even invite to a self pity party and solicit some sympathy from, but I know that won’t help. Actually any of these ideas make me nauseas just typing, let alone acting on.
NO! That is not the answer. None of that is an answer. My life has reached a far too real, far too serious place. My wounds are too deep to fit a band aid over. Hell! I wonder if a surgeon could rescue this mess. The wounds are gaping, raw and bleeding. The depths of these wounds a band aid would only further infect rather than assist. How did I get to this place? When did I get here? Why did I even allow this place? In answer to all of the above…… I have NO idea. The point right now is how to deal with what is.
So what is?
Well, like I mentioned earlier…. I’m butt naked. Vulnerability doesn’t even describe the complete exposed and open place I find myself in. God I could blame for this, but no, it is my heart’s desire to actually be naked enough to not only need clothing, but also humble enough to receive it. Truth be told, I think I allowed this nakedness to happen. Secretly I knew the truth, detested the peeling veneer and have probably been peeling along with God just as the other part of me was furiously restoring the exposing of myself….
I am so desperately trying to drop the poetic wadda wadda here and just call things as they are. So forgive the innuendos and colourful description of some very real and raw wounds I would rather not expose right now. Yup, still clinging to my scraps of surface paint. Bottom line, I am exposed, and suppose just trying to get used to the nakedness, seek the righteous garments God is probably dangling right before my eyes, and then cloth me naked butt before I catch a worse cold….
Maybe tomorrow I can share a little more on the reality of what is in my life, but for now don’t stare at me naked butt.
WHY DON'T I WRITE LIKE I KNOW I SHOULD?
Why don’t I write?
Why do I know I have stuff to share but I hold back?
I find everything and anything to do but express what I know I need to. I started this blog from the insistence of my caring husband telling me to put myself “out there”. The mere thought of such exposure made me want to run and hide. In hind sight it was probably to aim me in a direction and stop me from firing all over the room like a loose cannon. Yet the idea of putting myself “out there” for every Dick and his dog to take pot shots at just ain’t my style. It conjured up thoughts of me joining the global blog club out there, loosing myself in a sea of over exposed hurting people just trying to make sense of their lives, experiences, pain, and perhaps walk on this earth. Then trying to write from a spiritual point of view…well, let’s just say that adds another whole dimension. Do we really need another Christian perspective on why God’s way’s are not ours. Why very little makes sense, but onward Christian soldiers marching into the dark…. Oh I am cynical on a bad day. Forgive me. It is the place I find myself on this day.
As I said, I can do cynical, and when it comes to all this internet/blog space and a generation that seem to have gone overboard once again even in this area of expressing and sharing to the world, I find it so mass produced like everything else surrounding us. Nothing is sacred anymore. Whatever happened to authenticity, raw talent, or the hard working making it, instead of everyone is now able to place themselves on the cover of a glossy magazine with a click of their mouse into facebook kingdom.
Which brings me to my motive for sharing, am I just another “wanna be” seeking fame and fortune, or is it that search for significance in an ever increasing insignificant world? Like I said, nothing sacred anymore, air your wares, do the necessary to get noticed, turn yourself into a star even if Hollywood won’t. Like that ever helped those people.
Baring all this in mind and my cynical approach to the whole system, I am then faced with the question of what to share. Don’t get me wrong, it’s not that I don’t have an overflowing abundance of emotional, spiritual and mental stuff going on, but then again, who doesn’t. What right does that give me to place myself out there. I mean just because on an average day I sometimes feel I might either explode or implode, fighting to not claim one of the abundant titles this generation seem to crutch…. oops I mean clutch to from OCD to ADD, trying not to believe myself a good case for meds. Does that give me a right to share? My husband would say so with a resounding "Yes!", because he is the one dealing with the wall bouncing antics in our house when expression doesn’t take place.
Well, I suppose it is time to put the cynical aside and stop trying to use it as yet another cop out to not share, because according to popular actions out there, I don’t need a right to share, it’s called freedom of speech and best I take part in it while it’s still around. Everyone is doing it, bees do it, birds do it, even the uneducated fleas are doing it. So here goes, let me do it, stop the many questions and reasons why I shouldn’t and face the real reasons why I don’t. My last question, and probably the most important is: What is relevant? Because perhaps what’s relevant to me won’t be to you, but is this reason enough to not become a blogger and share to my hearts content? No it’s not! That’s the beauty of this blog space, not only are we humans large in numbers on this earth, but we are a diverse species, communicating with the whole globe leaves you in a place to hit someone somewhere with something. So dare I deny you my hit for the day….
Why do I know I have stuff to share but I hold back?
I find everything and anything to do but express what I know I need to. I started this blog from the insistence of my caring husband telling me to put myself “out there”. The mere thought of such exposure made me want to run and hide. In hind sight it was probably to aim me in a direction and stop me from firing all over the room like a loose cannon. Yet the idea of putting myself “out there” for every Dick and his dog to take pot shots at just ain’t my style. It conjured up thoughts of me joining the global blog club out there, loosing myself in a sea of over exposed hurting people just trying to make sense of their lives, experiences, pain, and perhaps walk on this earth. Then trying to write from a spiritual point of view…well, let’s just say that adds another whole dimension. Do we really need another Christian perspective on why God’s way’s are not ours. Why very little makes sense, but onward Christian soldiers marching into the dark…. Oh I am cynical on a bad day. Forgive me. It is the place I find myself on this day.
As I said, I can do cynical, and when it comes to all this internet/blog space and a generation that seem to have gone overboard once again even in this area of expressing and sharing to the world, I find it so mass produced like everything else surrounding us. Nothing is sacred anymore. Whatever happened to authenticity, raw talent, or the hard working making it, instead of everyone is now able to place themselves on the cover of a glossy magazine with a click of their mouse into facebook kingdom.
Which brings me to my motive for sharing, am I just another “wanna be” seeking fame and fortune, or is it that search for significance in an ever increasing insignificant world? Like I said, nothing sacred anymore, air your wares, do the necessary to get noticed, turn yourself into a star even if Hollywood won’t. Like that ever helped those people.
Baring all this in mind and my cynical approach to the whole system, I am then faced with the question of what to share. Don’t get me wrong, it’s not that I don’t have an overflowing abundance of emotional, spiritual and mental stuff going on, but then again, who doesn’t. What right does that give me to place myself out there. I mean just because on an average day I sometimes feel I might either explode or implode, fighting to not claim one of the abundant titles this generation seem to crutch…. oops I mean clutch to from OCD to ADD, trying not to believe myself a good case for meds. Does that give me a right to share? My husband would say so with a resounding "Yes!", because he is the one dealing with the wall bouncing antics in our house when expression doesn’t take place.
Well, I suppose it is time to put the cynical aside and stop trying to use it as yet another cop out to not share, because according to popular actions out there, I don’t need a right to share, it’s called freedom of speech and best I take part in it while it’s still around. Everyone is doing it, bees do it, birds do it, even the uneducated fleas are doing it. So here goes, let me do it, stop the many questions and reasons why I shouldn’t and face the real reasons why I don’t. My last question, and probably the most important is: What is relevant? Because perhaps what’s relevant to me won’t be to you, but is this reason enough to not become a blogger and share to my hearts content? No it’s not! That’s the beauty of this blog space, not only are we humans large in numbers on this earth, but we are a diverse species, communicating with the whole globe leaves you in a place to hit someone somewhere with something. So dare I deny you my hit for the day….
Monday, June 2, 2008
God speaks...... Cat demonstrates....
I have had a rough ride in the last week, and I'm ashamed to say it ended up in a very defeated place. You know those places of: “PLEASE help me give a damn because I truly can't.” I suppose a perfect case for a position on Joyce Meyer's couch, I could just hear her saying "Stop feeling sorry for yourself, get up, you don't have to be in this place!!" Yet such a heavy spiritual and empty emotional place was this, that I could actually feel it in my physical body.
This morning, from a very indifferent place I tried to cry out as best as I could. It was awful trying to cry out from a numb heart. You feel dead to any emotion, you know it is the most dangerous place of all, yet not even that fact moves you. I HATE indifference. I remember years ago as a complete baby Christian (not that I feel that grown up now) I beat my steering wheel and cursed all my way to work as I screamed my four- letter frustrations at God for the circumstances I not only found myself in, but truly believed He was responsible for at the time. After loads of angry ranting, like an exasperated child that had cried herself out from a temper tantrum, I found myself begging God for forgiveness, for my stream of four-letter words not to mention bad ass attitude. He gently answered with: "My girl, your anger doesn't offend me. It doesn't even scare me. (Yeah! like I even thought I could get that right) It is rather your indifference that hurts me. Anger is still an emotion, it shows that you care deeply, no matter how you choose to express your caring heart, so long as it is still feeling and caring it is good. Indifference however, is a state of death. So long as you are expressing, you are alive. Yes, we will need to work on how and what you choose to express, but for now my child, keep expressing to me and NEVER STOP!!! For it is this that keeps your heart open to receive from me and as you continue to draw near to me, so I will transform you into the image of My Son, and small issues of bad attitudes and language will fall off of you"
Needless to say my sails were windless....
This was 7 years ago, while I was believing God for what seemed like the biggest faith project on the planet (more on that later). 7 years down the line, a lot of expressing, a lot of going my own way and biting the dust, more injuries than I care to count and way too many trails of blood from from untreated wounds, I sadly learnt the place of indifference. I learnt to go numb, to check out, to not bother, to give up. And as with anything I do, I have done this well and with excellence. You see, the initial gifting’s and pieces of Himself that God places in you don't go away because you happen to be a sinner at the time, or happen to be temporarily off His path cutting your own, they just get used by the "other side" (kingdom of darkness) at the time. Doing things with excellence has always been who God is and what He is about, and I believe that this characteristic along with so many others has been placed in every human being on the planet, saved or unsaved. These characteristics are ingrained in us as they are ingrained in God, since we are made in His likeness and image. We become more in His likeness once we choose Him, His life and to go His way, but the point is the enemy can do nothing to take these characteristics from us, and since he hates anything Godly with a passion he will do all he can to pervert or twist them as he does with everything. He will work to either stop you doing things excellently for God or cause that characteristic to be used for HIS plans and purposes.
God has been working with my husband and myself to get us back on track for what seems like a long time now, and recently it has felt as though things are coming to a head in certain areas. The closer to our goals we get the more opposition heads our way, but I am proud to say we have fought back, we have conquered what we never thought possible in the past. I suppose I should be happy to report that the enemy needed to use a new tactic against us, he needed to up his game against us in the last week, he hit us from an area we didn't see coming. I see it now and won't let it happen again, but never the less he threw a curve ball. It has been a rough week of falling, falling, falling, and no ledges in sight to grab onto, the few I reached for crumbled and more falling. This morning as my dear husband tried all he knew to talk me back to a place of sanity, vision and hope, the angrier I became.
It was only as I sat alone with fear enveloping me, that I tried one last time to cry out for help. I was begging God to help me to care enough to fight. It's all very well telling someone to fight and explaining the benefits thereof, but when the despair has reached a place of pointlessness, emptiness and sheer blackness it truly is difficult to fight and shout da victory shout. It's such an awful place that even if you knew you would die and go to hell at that very moment if you didn't fight back, it would make no real difference. There truly is NO fight left. Just for the record this is a place that has become a distant bad memory for me, it used to be a regular occurrence in my life, but thanks to a brilliantly, perfect God I have found myself more free than I ever imagined possible. Yes, it has taken a huge fight on my behalf, I have had to learn to stand on those good days and the not so good days, to hate or more like completely despise the "pit place" more than anything. It seems that only when we hate our sin as much as God does, are we in a place to be delivered from it. My man used to often say, it is only when you hate this place you are in enough that God will be able to deliver you from it. It used to make me so angry. I would shout back "Can't you see how desperate I am to be out of this place, do you honestly think I like being here!" Yet the truth of the matter was, part of me was reveling in it, a part of me was feeding off of this behavior and all it represented, all the while I was throwing the biggest pity party topped with streamers and ballons in the pit.
Thank GOD and God alone, (and the amazing man he gave me to share my life with for not giving up on me) that a time came where I not only grew tired of being in these places, but I got angry, and I’m talking “annihilate it’s ass angry” with the true enemy. This morning I was crying from a place of indifference, but deeper, even though my emotions were numb, my spirit was rising up, as I cried out to God and felt absolutely NO sincerity whatsoever in my attempts, I just kept crying out till breakthrough came, till sincerity came, and eventually the emotions followed.
At the time of this transition from black to grey I heard a HUGE commotion near our front door. I knew it was our cat, and it actually sounded like a lion had gotten a hold of her. I rushed to her rescue expecting to find blood, guts and fur due to the horrific screeching taking place, only to discover the lion at the door was not a lion at all, but rather MY sweet kitty cat pouncing through the cat door in hot pursuit of a black cat that had clearly stepped over her boundary line. The cat on the other side of the flap was a little slow on the uptake and didn’t seem to be receiving the very clear message that was being sent his way. My cat would half pounce through the cat flap slap the intruding cat's head and bounce right back, she did this three times with wild hissing and all the ferociousness of a mad, wild animal, as soon as I approached her back, and she sensed my presence behind her, she dived through the door and chased the intruder as far and as fast as she could. Afterward she triumphantly pranced up the stairs with fur appropriately fluffed out to twice her size, she gave me a casual “meow!” as she passed me and my vacant stare and headed to her dish to grab a bite.
God immediately spoke to me. "This, my child is how it is done." You deal with the enemy swiftly and effectively, you don't allow him to get near your doorstep, and when he does, you make sure he knows NEVER to come back again, and you do it all in your stride, all in a days work. It is not difficult, it is not some long drawn out issue, the work has already been done thanks to my blood. It is just simply asserting your authority and claiming what is rightfully yours. Note how, she jumped at the intruding cat and jumped right back into safety and as soon as she knew she had your backing she took the opportunity to pounce and chase. This is how I need you to be, at my instruction you take the pounce, you wait for me and my go ahead, but in the mean time you stay under my wing of protection, you jump through slap his head and jump right back under my protection."
Yes, this is exactly how my God speaks to me, this is exactly why I have a blog to express on, because my walk has NEVER been conventional, and therefore never well received, but it truly has been relevant to ME. I can only hope that it finds some relevance to any of you that read these ramblings, because I know I am not alone in my unconventional experiences with The Creator Of The Universe.
THANK YOU DAD!!!! There are so many facets to you, so much undiscovered territory, if we could all, myself included, learn to loosen up and set you free of our preconceived ideas on how we and religion has defined you… there is NOTHING that holds you except our small mind-sets. Father I pray you free us, free your kids, Dad, free us of the prisons that we have not only placed you in but consequently placed ourselves in too. Thank you for blessing me with a simple creature covered in fur that you have spoken through on many occasions, when human voices were too demanding, judgmental, opinionated and far from free. Yet, I do thank you for every human voice that you have spoken to me through, I know this is your first choice and I pray for a freedom that only You can bring to your body to allow you to express Your unexpressed, and to receive Your expressions taking us into deeper dimensions of yourself, to the unchartered waters, and undiscovered lands of your multifaceted heart of pure, pure love.
LOVE YOU GODIE, MY DAD, MY KING, AND MY LORD. YOU ROCK!!!!!!!!
Your Rocking Princess
This morning, from a very indifferent place I tried to cry out as best as I could. It was awful trying to cry out from a numb heart. You feel dead to any emotion, you know it is the most dangerous place of all, yet not even that fact moves you. I HATE indifference. I remember years ago as a complete baby Christian (not that I feel that grown up now) I beat my steering wheel and cursed all my way to work as I screamed my four- letter frustrations at God for the circumstances I not only found myself in, but truly believed He was responsible for at the time. After loads of angry ranting, like an exasperated child that had cried herself out from a temper tantrum, I found myself begging God for forgiveness, for my stream of four-letter words not to mention bad ass attitude. He gently answered with: "My girl, your anger doesn't offend me. It doesn't even scare me. (Yeah! like I even thought I could get that right) It is rather your indifference that hurts me. Anger is still an emotion, it shows that you care deeply, no matter how you choose to express your caring heart, so long as it is still feeling and caring it is good. Indifference however, is a state of death. So long as you are expressing, you are alive. Yes, we will need to work on how and what you choose to express, but for now my child, keep expressing to me and NEVER STOP!!! For it is this that keeps your heart open to receive from me and as you continue to draw near to me, so I will transform you into the image of My Son, and small issues of bad attitudes and language will fall off of you"
Needless to say my sails were windless....
This was 7 years ago, while I was believing God for what seemed like the biggest faith project on the planet (more on that later). 7 years down the line, a lot of expressing, a lot of going my own way and biting the dust, more injuries than I care to count and way too many trails of blood from from untreated wounds, I sadly learnt the place of indifference. I learnt to go numb, to check out, to not bother, to give up. And as with anything I do, I have done this well and with excellence. You see, the initial gifting’s and pieces of Himself that God places in you don't go away because you happen to be a sinner at the time, or happen to be temporarily off His path cutting your own, they just get used by the "other side" (kingdom of darkness) at the time. Doing things with excellence has always been who God is and what He is about, and I believe that this characteristic along with so many others has been placed in every human being on the planet, saved or unsaved. These characteristics are ingrained in us as they are ingrained in God, since we are made in His likeness and image. We become more in His likeness once we choose Him, His life and to go His way, but the point is the enemy can do nothing to take these characteristics from us, and since he hates anything Godly with a passion he will do all he can to pervert or twist them as he does with everything. He will work to either stop you doing things excellently for God or cause that characteristic to be used for HIS plans and purposes.
God has been working with my husband and myself to get us back on track for what seems like a long time now, and recently it has felt as though things are coming to a head in certain areas. The closer to our goals we get the more opposition heads our way, but I am proud to say we have fought back, we have conquered what we never thought possible in the past. I suppose I should be happy to report that the enemy needed to use a new tactic against us, he needed to up his game against us in the last week, he hit us from an area we didn't see coming. I see it now and won't let it happen again, but never the less he threw a curve ball. It has been a rough week of falling, falling, falling, and no ledges in sight to grab onto, the few I reached for crumbled and more falling. This morning as my dear husband tried all he knew to talk me back to a place of sanity, vision and hope, the angrier I became.
It was only as I sat alone with fear enveloping me, that I tried one last time to cry out for help. I was begging God to help me to care enough to fight. It's all very well telling someone to fight and explaining the benefits thereof, but when the despair has reached a place of pointlessness, emptiness and sheer blackness it truly is difficult to fight and shout da victory shout. It's such an awful place that even if you knew you would die and go to hell at that very moment if you didn't fight back, it would make no real difference. There truly is NO fight left. Just for the record this is a place that has become a distant bad memory for me, it used to be a regular occurrence in my life, but thanks to a brilliantly, perfect God I have found myself more free than I ever imagined possible. Yes, it has taken a huge fight on my behalf, I have had to learn to stand on those good days and the not so good days, to hate or more like completely despise the "pit place" more than anything. It seems that only when we hate our sin as much as God does, are we in a place to be delivered from it. My man used to often say, it is only when you hate this place you are in enough that God will be able to deliver you from it. It used to make me so angry. I would shout back "Can't you see how desperate I am to be out of this place, do you honestly think I like being here!" Yet the truth of the matter was, part of me was reveling in it, a part of me was feeding off of this behavior and all it represented, all the while I was throwing the biggest pity party topped with streamers and ballons in the pit.
Thank GOD and God alone, (and the amazing man he gave me to share my life with for not giving up on me) that a time came where I not only grew tired of being in these places, but I got angry, and I’m talking “annihilate it’s ass angry” with the true enemy. This morning I was crying from a place of indifference, but deeper, even though my emotions were numb, my spirit was rising up, as I cried out to God and felt absolutely NO sincerity whatsoever in my attempts, I just kept crying out till breakthrough came, till sincerity came, and eventually the emotions followed.
At the time of this transition from black to grey I heard a HUGE commotion near our front door. I knew it was our cat, and it actually sounded like a lion had gotten a hold of her. I rushed to her rescue expecting to find blood, guts and fur due to the horrific screeching taking place, only to discover the lion at the door was not a lion at all, but rather MY sweet kitty cat pouncing through the cat door in hot pursuit of a black cat that had clearly stepped over her boundary line. The cat on the other side of the flap was a little slow on the uptake and didn’t seem to be receiving the very clear message that was being sent his way. My cat would half pounce through the cat flap slap the intruding cat's head and bounce right back, she did this three times with wild hissing and all the ferociousness of a mad, wild animal, as soon as I approached her back, and she sensed my presence behind her, she dived through the door and chased the intruder as far and as fast as she could. Afterward she triumphantly pranced up the stairs with fur appropriately fluffed out to twice her size, she gave me a casual “meow!” as she passed me and my vacant stare and headed to her dish to grab a bite.
God immediately spoke to me. "This, my child is how it is done." You deal with the enemy swiftly and effectively, you don't allow him to get near your doorstep, and when he does, you make sure he knows NEVER to come back again, and you do it all in your stride, all in a days work. It is not difficult, it is not some long drawn out issue, the work has already been done thanks to my blood. It is just simply asserting your authority and claiming what is rightfully yours. Note how, she jumped at the intruding cat and jumped right back into safety and as soon as she knew she had your backing she took the opportunity to pounce and chase. This is how I need you to be, at my instruction you take the pounce, you wait for me and my go ahead, but in the mean time you stay under my wing of protection, you jump through slap his head and jump right back under my protection."
Yes, this is exactly how my God speaks to me, this is exactly why I have a blog to express on, because my walk has NEVER been conventional, and therefore never well received, but it truly has been relevant to ME. I can only hope that it finds some relevance to any of you that read these ramblings, because I know I am not alone in my unconventional experiences with The Creator Of The Universe.
THANK YOU DAD!!!! There are so many facets to you, so much undiscovered territory, if we could all, myself included, learn to loosen up and set you free of our preconceived ideas on how we and religion has defined you… there is NOTHING that holds you except our small mind-sets. Father I pray you free us, free your kids, Dad, free us of the prisons that we have not only placed you in but consequently placed ourselves in too. Thank you for blessing me with a simple creature covered in fur that you have spoken through on many occasions, when human voices were too demanding, judgmental, opinionated and far from free. Yet, I do thank you for every human voice that you have spoken to me through, I know this is your first choice and I pray for a freedom that only You can bring to your body to allow you to express Your unexpressed, and to receive Your expressions taking us into deeper dimensions of yourself, to the unchartered waters, and undiscovered lands of your multifaceted heart of pure, pure love.
LOVE YOU GODIE, MY DAD, MY KING, AND MY LORD. YOU ROCK!!!!!!!!
Your Rocking Princess
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