explorefaith.org - Open Your Eyes
Seeking some solace, refuge, quiet stillness and silence...I look for things to help me meditate on where God is and where He may want me to be also. I have linked to explorefaith.org before. This is another way for me to seek God, to be opened up to the possibility of a closer spiritual relationship with Jesus Christ, my savior, King, and friend.
Recent grief has been like a dark cloud over my head the past month. I am remembering, too, the death of my dear friend Julie as we approach the two-year anniversary in another two months. I don't think we ever really finish grieving...as I believe the work that God does in our soul that is all about healing and reconciling us to Himself, is a life long process. Only in the opening of our eyes, in our earthly death do we finally see Him fully, truly, and wholy Holy. He is all of that, but we don't get to see it until we die to this life on this planet.
Dallas Willard has some things to say about dying, and how we never really die. This poem by Richard Guy Miller speaks to that for me.
I also believe that grief is experienced and felt in a variety of ways in each of us very differently from one another. I believe it's not that you can't feel joy or relief from the pain - or that you must act sad when you are in grief. I believe that no matter what you are feeling - that you should feel it fully - and God will meet you there. It may be in a happy memory, in the busy-ness of life, in the sad realization that we are left behind, in the lost hope of a future with our loved one...or whatever, that we must continue to FEEL what is happening to us, in us, and around us. We must give ourselves the grace to be who we are when we are, not just when others think it's appropriate. Time does heal wounds, and feeling the sorry does get less at times, but at other times the flood of emotion and sadness creeps back into my life and I need to allow myself to feel it, and not to stuff it down and ignore it's impact on my mind, body and spirit. To me, this is my spirituality. I may never understand fully the impact of a death on my life. But, I must receive the gift and knowledge of it by allowing my body and emotions to notice where I am and perhaps wonder why I am.
Open my eyes, Lord, to the time and place that is You.
Wednesday, April 28, 2010
Friday, April 09, 2010
Half empty or half full
The night feels very empty...aside from the cold air and loud breathing, dare I say snoring, coming from the other room. It's way past midnight and I'm up writing again. I don't know why but my mind is so full of thoughts at this time of the morning, and I haven't been to bed yet. All the lights are off aside from the one over the stovetop.
It's very cold in this room, at the kitchen table. It was about 55 degrees in the Twin Citites today, and it feels about like that now. I suppose I could get up and get a blanket, or put on a sweatshirt, but then I'd have to leave the dim light of the laptop to move...and quite frankly, my legs are very comfortable propped up on a chair. Naw...just a minute...I do need a blanket. Maybe even a warm cup of tea. I'll be right back after I put some water on the stove...
The heat from the blue flame felt good for a moment. I guess so much of my life, every decision I make seems to be like it's multifaceted...so many perspectives to look at it. I thought I could only see my life from my point of view, but it seems it's rather more complicated than that. I realize that my personality seems to understand or sense how others perceive me. It's a bit weird, and hard to describe. Perhaps someday I'll try.
I guess you'd say I've always been a glass-half-full kind of person. I try to look for the up side, the positive, the stuff to be grateful for, and the stuff that we have in common instead of where we're different. But, I guess we all have moments in our lives - some people more than others - when the glass really does look half empty. I'm having that kind of a season.
If you've read past posts here, you'll notice I've gone mad. Well, those around me really don't know that I'm mad...but it's true. Inside my head is another voice that I'm just not sure I'm able to quiet. That other voice is my strange self who keeps looking for God in things where it shouldn't be. It's just not the same way others think. And, I can write whatever I want to here, because all the gals who follow my other blog because it's cute and all about home and garden stuff would never tread over here to read about my deeper spiritual side - the madness that is who I am when I write.
Oh....another moment please...the water is hot now.
I wish I could take a photo of my mug with the hot water steaming from it, but it's very dark in here. I'm just not sure the image would make it in such low light. See, even an image needs light to be fully seen for what it truely is. You cannot perceive color in the dark because in low light, the rods take over in the back of your eyes when the cones can see color during the well lit times. Sorry...slipped into optometric assistant mode for one moment. Boy, that was something hidden away for several years!
Thus...this season I'm in...where I'm working very hard at listening and watching for God is again more brought to light - the positive in me. But, then how is it in God's strange other-world-type paradigm of oposite is it that I should wait in a cold dark room and experience silence and solitude...and I feel so totally alone in my thoughts? If you're a Kingdom person you know what I mean by paradigm of oposite. This world is not like the other.
I cannot just sit here. I cannot just wait patiently and practice being in that very moment. I must write. I must type and clickety clack with my nails on the keyboard. I must strain my wrists and neck and shoulders to type out this lengthy blah blah blah on such a tiny little laptop. It's NOT ergonomic at all! Why am I still awake at such an hour?
I know I have so much to prepare for in the next few days. I have a large project due next week at work, I'll be covering for a co-worker while she's on vacation in Mexico, my garden needs to be weeded, fertilized, and tended, and my husband's grandmother passed away this week so I should also be preparing photos for his cousins to put to foam poster boards in memory of this dear sweet woman who I miss terribly. Perhaps that's it. That's why I'm struggling with the sleep thing tonight. I don't have an excuse most nights, but I only need one tonight and it will work.
In my struggles with "not hearing God" these past months...I have been blessed by several women who are older than me. Some closer to my age and some much further along life's path. Grandma Swan was a genuine blessing to me the past 28 years that I knew her. She usually saw life as half-full, of course she birthed and raised ten children and had to see life that way to survive. I never got to ask her how she did it. But, she did remember the details about each of her children...secrets they thought she didn't know and praises she was sure to tell about them when they weren't looking. As a working mom, is my life much different? Her full time job was raising this brood...and she did a fine job at that. I just don't know if my life is all that different - but it is.
Here I go seeing the similarities again. Perhaps that's all that it is. The madness of positive attitude is the madness of loving others even when you don't want to. hmmmm...I've got myself thinking so hard I'm finally ready to begin nodding off in a more comfortable settting. Good morning to you if you are waking, and good night to you if you are like me in this moment. Until we meet again here.
Same bat time, same bat channel.
It's very cold in this room, at the kitchen table. It was about 55 degrees in the Twin Citites today, and it feels about like that now. I suppose I could get up and get a blanket, or put on a sweatshirt, but then I'd have to leave the dim light of the laptop to move...and quite frankly, my legs are very comfortable propped up on a chair. Naw...just a minute...I do need a blanket. Maybe even a warm cup of tea. I'll be right back after I put some water on the stove...
The heat from the blue flame felt good for a moment. I guess so much of my life, every decision I make seems to be like it's multifaceted...so many perspectives to look at it. I thought I could only see my life from my point of view, but it seems it's rather more complicated than that. I realize that my personality seems to understand or sense how others perceive me. It's a bit weird, and hard to describe. Perhaps someday I'll try.
I guess you'd say I've always been a glass-half-full kind of person. I try to look for the up side, the positive, the stuff to be grateful for, and the stuff that we have in common instead of where we're different. But, I guess we all have moments in our lives - some people more than others - when the glass really does look half empty. I'm having that kind of a season.
If you've read past posts here, you'll notice I've gone mad. Well, those around me really don't know that I'm mad...but it's true. Inside my head is another voice that I'm just not sure I'm able to quiet. That other voice is my strange self who keeps looking for God in things where it shouldn't be. It's just not the same way others think. And, I can write whatever I want to here, because all the gals who follow my other blog because it's cute and all about home and garden stuff would never tread over here to read about my deeper spiritual side - the madness that is who I am when I write.
Oh....another moment please...the water is hot now.
I wish I could take a photo of my mug with the hot water steaming from it, but it's very dark in here. I'm just not sure the image would make it in such low light. See, even an image needs light to be fully seen for what it truely is. You cannot perceive color in the dark because in low light, the rods take over in the back of your eyes when the cones can see color during the well lit times. Sorry...slipped into optometric assistant mode for one moment. Boy, that was something hidden away for several years!
Thus...this season I'm in...where I'm working very hard at listening and watching for God is again more brought to light - the positive in me. But, then how is it in God's strange other-world-type paradigm of oposite is it that I should wait in a cold dark room and experience silence and solitude...and I feel so totally alone in my thoughts? If you're a Kingdom person you know what I mean by paradigm of oposite. This world is not like the other.
I cannot just sit here. I cannot just wait patiently and practice being in that very moment. I must write. I must type and clickety clack with my nails on the keyboard. I must strain my wrists and neck and shoulders to type out this lengthy blah blah blah on such a tiny little laptop. It's NOT ergonomic at all! Why am I still awake at such an hour?
I know I have so much to prepare for in the next few days. I have a large project due next week at work, I'll be covering for a co-worker while she's on vacation in Mexico, my garden needs to be weeded, fertilized, and tended, and my husband's grandmother passed away this week so I should also be preparing photos for his cousins to put to foam poster boards in memory of this dear sweet woman who I miss terribly. Perhaps that's it. That's why I'm struggling with the sleep thing tonight. I don't have an excuse most nights, but I only need one tonight and it will work.
In my struggles with "not hearing God" these past months...I have been blessed by several women who are older than me. Some closer to my age and some much further along life's path. Grandma Swan was a genuine blessing to me the past 28 years that I knew her. She usually saw life as half-full, of course she birthed and raised ten children and had to see life that way to survive. I never got to ask her how she did it. But, she did remember the details about each of her children...secrets they thought she didn't know and praises she was sure to tell about them when they weren't looking. As a working mom, is my life much different? Her full time job was raising this brood...and she did a fine job at that. I just don't know if my life is all that different - but it is.
Here I go seeing the similarities again. Perhaps that's all that it is. The madness of positive attitude is the madness of loving others even when you don't want to. hmmmm...I've got myself thinking so hard I'm finally ready to begin nodding off in a more comfortable settting. Good morning to you if you are waking, and good night to you if you are like me in this moment. Until we meet again here.
Same bat time, same bat channel.
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