In The Hands of The Master-Poet

An Excerpt by Oswald Chambers

2012-02-13T05:30:00.000Z

I have a soft spot for Oswald Chambers (Or am I just a sucker for a good ol' godly British man when I see one!?). Anything I have ever picked up by him has pierced right to the heart of whatever season I've been tramping through at the time... While home, I often root through my mom's book shelves and this time I fell upon a little gem by Chambers called, quite simply, "The Love of God". Using Jude 1:21, Chambers expounds on my God's love in a way that challenges me to be "driven further and further out into the ocean fullness of the love of God", and I can't help but share it with you!

"Keep yourselves in the love of God, looking for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal life."
--Jude 1:21

"We know how to keep ourselves in health. how to keep ourselves in knowledge, and so on; but to keep ourselves in the love of God is a big order, and our minds are exercised to know what Jude means by this exhortation. Does relaxing all stringency and carefulness mean that we slip out into a broad, humanitarian spirit that says, 'God is love,' and 'God's in His heaven; all's right with the world'? No, it cannot mean anything so natural as that, otherwise we had no need of an inspired writer to tell us to do it, and besides, Jude strikes terrible notes of warning (see vv.17-19). 'Keep yourselves in the love of God' refers very clearly to something distinct and special, something revealed in the direct will of God; a spiritual endeavor that we must consider and consider carefully with the Holy Spirit's help.

'Keep' means work. It is not a lazy floating, it is work. Work, or you will depart from the love of God [I need to stress here that he is not taking about earning God's love here, but about the work it takes to keep ourselves aware of it, to remind ourselves, and to choose to live in the knowledge of it!]. Begin to trace the finger of God and the love of God in the great calamities of earth, and in the calamities that have befallen you. In sweat of brain and spirit, work, agonizing at times, to keep yourself in the love of God. It is our wisdom, our happiness, our security to keep ourselves in the love of God. How do I keep myself in any sphere but by using every means to abide in it? If I wish to keep in the spiritual sphere of the love of God I must use the great organ of the spiritual realm, faith. 'God loves me'. Say it over and over and over, heedless of your feelings that come and go. Do not live at a distance from God, live near Him, delighting yourself in Him. Remove all barriers of selfishness and fear and plunge into the fathomless love of God.

'Keep yourselves in the love of God,' not 'keep on loving God.' None can do that. When once you have understood the truth about your own heart's sinfulness, think not again of it, but look at the great, vast, illimitable magnificence of the love of God. Oh, may we be driven-- driven further and further out into the ocean fullness of the love of God, taking care that nothing entices us out of that fullness again.

'Who shall separate us from the love of Christ?' (Romans 8:35). Oh, the fullness of peace and joy and gladness when we are persuaded that nothing 'shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.'

I want to be driven further and further out into the ocean fullness of the love of God. I want to take care that nothing entices me out of that fullness again. I want to trust that every single day-- even if those days include horrid and hard goodbyes with dear ones I love, and long journeys back to lonely and discouraging places-- He is inviting me to know more of His love. And from that place of receiving it, to every day give and reflect more and more of it. To watch Him transform this world with my own little piece of the mirror reflecting the truth of His love and mercy.

Let's keep ourselves in this love til our every decision, every action, every word, even every hope reflects it out to a dying world...

Thanks again, dear Oswald :)

Beauty on a Bus

2012-02-11T17:17:00.000Z

“Excuse me?”

I swung my head around back toward the bus I’d just exitedand took in the image of the man approaching me. He wasn’t the kind of gent I’dhope to meet on a dark alley. Baggy pants, over-sized winter coat, the hoodieunderneath it worn up, keeping the dark skin of his face in shadows. Whateverit is you’d call a grown boy of the inner-city ghetto, he looked and sounded it as he sauntered up beside me.

“I wanted to tell you back in Chicago,” He spoke when Iresponded to his ‘excuse me’ with slowing my walk and turning to him, “You arebeautiful. Very, very beautiful.”

Of anything that I might have been expecting to hear, thatwas not it. I smiled, a bit taken aback, and squeezed out a timid, “Thank you!”with a bit of a nervous laugh.

“Very beautiful,” he repeated.

I braced myself for what would follow, thinking briefly howI would navigate the uncomfortable come-ons gracefully and politely. I knew for a factthat I looked anything but beautiful that day. I had rolled out of bed at 6am,tossed on some comfy clothes, threw my hair up in a messy bun, and neglected allforms of make-up in anticipation of the 8 hour bus ride I would be making fromChicago to Minneapolis. I had just woken up from napping in a crumpled ball in my restrictive bus seat. It was surely an empty compliment delivered in hopesthat he might achieve something with it…

But as we continued to walk towards the station where ourbus stopped somewhere in the middle of Wisconsin, he said nothing more. I heldthe door open for him, feeling obliged, and he waved it off, stopping outsidefor a smoke instead.

I didn’t see him again the rest of the bus journey. He seeminglywanted nothing more than just to tell me that he found me beautiful; no stringsattached...

And as the fact of his random kindness sunk in, I was puzzled andtouched.

For the first time in perhaps 8 or 9 years, I was in theChicago area for longer than an airport layover. I had had the last few relaxedand pampering days with my dear dear Auntie Melissa. We had existed in anon-going soul-giving conversation of depth and laughter and tears-- while cooking, whilegoing on walks through the neighbourhood, while having facials, while doingyoga at the gym, while driving, while enjoying a glass of sweet white wine. Icannot quite explain the beauty of such friendships as this. A few nights before mylong bus ride home, I had the delightful opportunity of facing one of my manyfears and speaking to my Aunt Melissa’s 8^th grade youth group girlsabout the journey God has me on, and His faithfulness in my life. I had spokento them about self-worth, about the lies we believe as young girls and thetruth of how He assigns to us our worth; how our beauty is intrinsic. Speakingto those girls, remembering being in 8^th grade myself, looking backover the years of His plan for me unfolding, was a powerful reminder to me ofwhat it means to belong to this God.

And as I walked back out to board the bus and finish myjourney, I could only look up at him with a smile. His beauty covers me. Thereis no striving in this beauty, there is no manufacturing it. It is Him, givingHis gift of grace, regardless of what I do.

And suddenly I am reminded again to rest on this journey of life. I am reminded againto stand before Him with open hands, receiving all that He has planned-- what I'd considered difficult as well as what I would consider sweet-- knowing that He is inherently trustworthy (and "why should the heart not dance" in all of it?), andHe is all I need. Realizing that this is what Grace is-- His offering me His trustworthiness through every season, through every circumstance!

Somehow, it’s His beauty and grace which invites me to trustagain and again and again as I walk on in all the unknown...

Approaching the Throne with Faith Like a Child

2012-01-28T03:40:00.001Z

It dawned on me this morning how much the two year old ball-of-adorableness who is my nephew has to speak to me from God's heart.

I was recalling to mind how I'd stopped in at his house last night after Zumba and how he had run up to me and grabbed me around the legs, smiling up at me with his mega-watt grin. "Na-na!" He exclaimed, his baby-talk for 'Auntie'. Then he'd swiftly done the same for my mom. "Maw-maw!", his baby-talk for 'Grandma'. Again and again he ran between us, hugging himself to us, and when I picked him up, he rested his chubby cheek against my face and patted my back.

Ooh, he is irresistable!

I sat at my bible study this morning recalling his joyful greeting and how much it always means for me to see it.

And then it fell into my heart-- "faith like a child". Kenan never for a moment pauses to wonder if he is loved. He never stands back when Auntie (or most anyone! hehe :)) enters the house, debating how he should approach me. He leaps into my arms, with the faith that I will encase him in my embrace and kiss him up from one side of his rosy face to the other! It felt like a revelation this morning when I heard God whisper to my heart, "If you can love this little one so, how then can you wonder at my love for you? Do you ever wish to withhold your love from him? How can you not see Me too aching always to give it out, in mercy and grace?" How often do I run to Him and throw my arms around His heavenly neck, just expecting Him to lavish His love on me, like my Keebie-beebie and I? Not nearly often enough these days...

And suddenly Hebrews 4:16, which I've been dwelling on in my bible study, takes on a whole new meaning as I picture myself confidently approaching His throne of grace like Kenan confidently throws himself into my adoring hugs-- the ones I am so ready and willing and desiring to give!

"Now that we know what we have—Jesus, this great High Priest with ready access to God—let's not let it slip through our fingers. We don't have a priest who is out of touch with our reality. He's been through weakness and testing, experienced it all—all but the sin. So let's walk right up to him and get what he is so ready to give. Take the mercy, accept the help."
-- Hebrews 4:14-16, The Message

And I am so thankful when He opens up my eyes in these little ways to these big, big things...

Goodness, I love that little man!

A Year Out of Africa

2012-01-18T20:49:00.000Z

It has been on my mind a great deal that this time last year, I was in Africa.

I just never saw it coming. Nor could I have seen the irony that, in hindsight, I felt more peace in my heart those crazy few months in Africa than I really have since!

I have never been one of those people with Africa on the heart. But my heart has been forever altered since He walked my timid feet on that dusty red Ugandan soil. From the very first day it was as if I had no choice but to trust Him like never before. My delayed flight meant I missed my ride from the airport, which meant I was on my own to get from the airport out to the tiny village hour away to the home where I was to meet the friend I was going to work with. The problem is, Ugandan villages don't have conventional addresses, and no one had yet heard of the previously nonexistent ministry we were arriving to set up. So getting there on my own, totally jet-lagged and utterly frightened, was only by His intervention. And I could do nothing but follow Him.

My plane arrived in the middle of the night and I was terrified. The months before going to Uganda, I had wrestled with strange fears over everything. I was not prone to such fears. I awoke to nightmares and I wrestled in prayer. But again and again and again, God confirmed that this was His direction and encouraged me to follow Him. But that first night in Africa, I spent in a tiny and sparsely populated airport, afraid to venture out into the pitch blackness of night, having no idea what awaited me outside those glass doors. I spotted 2 cockroaches scurrying around on the chairs near to where I sat with my bags. I wrote Charles a letter, to feel less alone, and I prayed.

An elderly lady who had come in on my same flight sat nearby and in the early hours of morning we exchanged a few words, learned each others stories. She was a German missionary, and this was her 3rd time in Uganda. She was waiting for her pastor friend to come and collect her in the morning. We kept one another company for hours, waiting for daylight, and I know she was God's gift of provision to me. I ought to know by now that He promises to provide when we step out in faith and obey...

Her pastor friend came and invited me to ride along with them to Kampala, where he could put me on a bus toward Jinja, and then have the bus driver point me in the right direction to get out to the village from there. I could have cried in relief, but I was too tired. Instead, I stared wide-eyed out the window of his car at the red dust, banana trees, roadside shacks, free-range goats and chickens, and beautiful Ugandan people dressed in the brightest colours and patterns carrying massive baskets and buckets and general loads on their heads...

What a different world.

And then there were the sunsets. When the sun would start to set on the horizon, it's shape a perfectly massive red-orange orb over the green of the tropical trees, it wouldn't dally. It seemed to take mere minutes to get from the top of the sky to far below the horizon, leaving us in the darkest dark I've ever known. It always mystified me how quickly it happened. And God's grace in keeping us safe and getting us home the nights we didn't make it in before nightfall...

Walking down the dusty streets in Uganda was always an adventure to me, but one I relished so much. In my first month, I would find myself alone to reflect and talk to God and talk to people on these walks about once a week, and I would hop on a boda-boda and direct the driver to take me "home" feeling refreshed somehow. Chatting with the lady in the lean-to shop or laughing with the old man missing his front teeth sitting on the street corner selling fruit on a dusty blanket was somehow... good for the soul. I found the people He led me to there just beautiful souls with so much to teach me just in the way they responded to their lives... And the strange sense of peace which blanketted me those months of facing one unknown after another. I just felt, in a way I cannot possibly explain, as if he tangible "had my back" like never before. And greeted each day with His confidence... It was such a gift.

Mostly, I think of the children.

I think of how my arms just couldn't open wide enough to hold all the little ones I longed to hold, and how every precious pair of big brown eyes that looked up at me incited my heart to grow that much bigger. Walking through the villages and hearing "Mzungu, how are you?" called out again and again and seeing their eyes light up when we waved at them made my heart light. Visiting orphanages where I could literally wrap my arms around as many little wiggly bodies as would fit made my heart dance... And thinking of the babies in Entebbe I cared for and loved on daily makes my heart long to be back, taking in those sunsets, getting covered each day in red dust sticking to my own sweat, and loving the little ones so hungry for attention and a little bit of tenderness. I was made for such nurturing. In that sense, I was made for those few months in Africa.

And will carry Uganda in my heart no matter how many years pass, picturing those pairs of deep brown eyes, sparkling despite being orphaned, abandoned, infected with AIDS, hungry, poor, or homeless. Yet never hopeless.

Oh, the lessons the little ones of Africa have to teach me....
And you?

****You CAN make a difference right from where you are! Help families with the heart to adopt by donating to Lifesong for Orphans. Or get in touch with my friends at Sun Shines Hope International and help to improve the lives of villagers in Uganda, send children to school whose families are too poor to afford it, teach sustainable living and sanitation to needy villages, all while sharing with them the love of Christ! Get in touch!! We are His hands and His feet here. Do you ever wonder if when we ask Him why suffering exists in this world, He might ask us the same thing?****

Intrepid Explorers and Awakenings

2012-01-10T06:33:00.001Z

Being the most non-typical Minnesota winter I have ever seen, it was nearly 50 degrees outside today. I found myself out in it pulling my two favourite little intrepid explorers all over kingdom come in a little red wagon. We wheeled around Grandma and Grandpa's yard, petting horse noses, moo-ing at cows in the pastures, and having conversations at a 2-year-old level about all that we were excitedly observing (Only as the daughter of a funeral director/cattle rancher can you find yourself trekking through a horse arena past farm machinery on your left and burial vaults on your right...)

My little explorers chattered together as they were happily pulled along down the driveway of my childhood home. The unlikely January weather made it feel like a day in early spring, not the dead of winter, and the earth smelled like a hundred memories of growing up here, making "forts" in the woods, playing house where I pretended to be a settler like Laura Ingalls Wilder, or a Native American princess like Pocahontas, or a lost orphan from England (I grew up constantly putting on an English accent when I played pretend-- go figure!). We turned that old familiar bend in my parents' long driveway and the memory of the feeling of His presence on so many night prayer walks down this driveway throughout high school and summers home from college just struck me like deja vu. The memory of that hunger for Him, that desperate knowledge that nothing else would satisfy but Him, speaking to my heart out under the bright stars hung over my childhood home, singing praise songs to Him as I walked down that dark driveway...

The day gave me a Spring-time feeling; that time when all that has been lying dormant is beginning to awaken, to come back to life.

So many friends in my life have been confessing to me a similar experience of so many elements of faith in our walks with Him feeling like they've been lying dormant. And we have been asking one another to pray-- pray that they will start to feel alive to us again. That moment today, pulling my little men in that red wagon around that bend in the driveway, was like a little experience of awakening.

I know that walking with God is just that-- walking; it is an active journey. It is a series of seasons of life. It ebbs and flows. The weather changes with the seasons and He changes me with them, forever inviting me to trust Him, whether in the summery seasons of faith or the wintery ones. To keep walking that road, exploring its contours whether blanketed by snow, covered by leaves, smelling of fresh spring earth, or humid from the heat of the sun as we walk... And wherever I plant a foot, His have already trod that ground.

I am struck by His mercy. For the way he deigns to walk so close, to lead if we ask, to quiet if we don't genuinely want to hear Him, and to speak up if we do. I just want to live a life which is set up to amplify the sound of His voice, and to have a heart which is poised to receive what He says, and to have feet ready to move on it whatever the earthly risk may seem.

Lord, I know that everything comes from you and there is nothing I can muster up on my own-- Oh, that you would give me a ready faith. And always always make me an intrepid explorer of Who You are, Lord Jesus, in whatever season (And draw my little nephews to seek Your heart above all else as they grow into men, too!)
Amen.

Ardently Loved

2012-01-04T17:25:00.001Z

“The night is beautiful,
So the faces of my people.

The stars are beautiful,
So the eyes of my people.
Beautiful, also, is the sun.
Beautiful, also, are the souls of my people.”
-- Langston Hughes

This little poem struck me deeply when I came across it the other day. All I could hear was God's voice speaking about us. And the idea stopped me in my tracks for a moment. The tangible image of His love and adoration for us, for me.

It struck me that I had forgotten. I had forgotten how great the Father's love for me was. Yes, I know He sent His Son to give His very life as ransom to save mine if I only believe ["...For God so LOVED the world that He gave His only son that whoever will believe in Him will have eternal life." (John 3:16)] Didn't we just remember His coming with our Christmas celebrations? But somehow, the knowledge of it is so constant that I... forgot to remember the extraordinary truth behind it. And what it means to our lives in the here and now.

It was this simple bit of Langston Hughes poetry that grabbed the eyes of my heart and begged them to settle here for a moment and breathe it in...

It was because He's in love with the whole wide world;

captivated by us like a Bridegroom with His bride.

"As the bridegroom rejoices over the bride, so your God will rejoice over you" (Isaiah 62:5).

"How beautiful you are, my darling. There is no flaw in you" (Song of Songs 4:1).

"...that He might present the Church to Himself a glorious bride, without spot or wrinkle or any other defect" (Ephesians 5:27).

"And I will take you as my bride for ever; truly, I will take you as my bride in righteousness and in right judging, in love and in mercies" (Hosea 2:19).

"For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord" (Romans 8:38-39).

Webster's dictionary says that when the word "Bride" is used figuratively, it means, "an object ardently loved." Do you know how ardently loved you are? And if you did, how would it change how you believe, and how you act on what you believe? Somehow, the scriptures upon scriptures which told me so, had faded in my mind, in my experience, and I feel like my life has begun to reflect that forgetting... So, I've been asking God to teach me anew what it means to be ardently loved by the King of the Universe, and what He would have me do resting in that knowledge (because what wouldn't we do with this blink-if-an-eye-existence when we know we are ardently loved by the King overseeing it all?)...

And suddenly, I am feeling more hope than I have in a while.

Maybe you too need to ask Him to show you again how He sees you, and how He would have you live in light of it? It's a brand new year, a fresh slate for His goodness and love to transform our hearts and lives. Let's seek His heart, running out to meet Him by our prayers....

"Behold! The Bridegroom is coming! Come out to meet Him!"
-- Matthew 25:6

"In Him our hearts rejoice, for we are trusting in His holy name. Let Your unfailing love surround us, Lord, for our hope is in You."
-- Psalm 33:21-22

Weeks upon Weeks

2011-12-30T18:54:00.000Z

It has been weeks upon weeks since I've ventured a word here. Those weeks have been so full of His goodness and encouragement that I can't begin to catalog it for you! So here are just a few highlights:

Meandering about Salisbury while visiting some of the best friends I have in the world. Somehow my soul seemed thirsty for the stories that history has to tell, all the intricacies of the lives lived before mine... I soaked it up in Salisbury Cathedral and the tiny village of Britford a country lane's walk away from where my friends live.

Visiting my 7 year old godson Alex. So grown up and so delightful! What a privilege to be entrusted with praying for a child's heart and growth... His family are just dear dear people of God.

Spending my anniversary with my handsome man. He took me up the London Eye after nightfall to overlook the gorgeous city of London...

A getaway up to North Norfolk with a best friend where we stayed in a timeshare house, talked non-stop about all the deep heart stuff, took a boat tour out to Blakeney Point where all the Grey Seals were coming in from the North Sea to give birth to their precious little fuzzy white babies!, took in a Christmas Spectacular Variety show with hundreds of pensioners, and wandered about beautiful sleepy grey-stoned villages! It was too lovely.

Spent a weekend in the Cotswolds with my darling cousin Emily looking after my darling 2 year old goddaughter Lily, the child of some of my best friends in the world. It was so familiar and cosy, and again, such an honour to be entrusted with the care of such a precious little treasure. And in my favourite area of England, no less!

Spent a week becoming acquainted with my cousin Emily's part of England where she's studying for her MA in Bristol! There is nothing like sharing life with someone how is as much sister as friend :) I just felt so enveloped by His love... And I had never known how beautiful Bristol is!

Devon!!!!!!! Charles and I met down in Devon for the weekend and stayed with his fabulous great aunt and great uncle and second cousins on the sea! It was seriously magical. I had no idea Devon was THIS lovely! And it was really precious to me to meet Charles' extended family because his immediate one is so very small. They were so delightful and being in their presence felt somehow familiar, as if they reminded me of being with my own aunts and uncles and cousins :) What a blessing of a weekend!

I visited my old hometown of Gloucester, stayed with a dear friend, and visited other dear friends. The chance to just relax in the presence of old friends was precious-- reminding me of how He has surrounded me with so many families in leaving my own...

My fabulous English travels finished with a few days on the Isle of Sheppey with a bestie, and then a few last days with Charles in London. It was precious to put up his Christmas tree together, spend time with his church friends, have a few lovely dates out in the city, and just relish spending time together. It would be our last chance until the end of February!!

And then on December 13th, I arrived home for Christmas for the first time since Christmas 2008! And walking into my childhood home, I felt as if I was taking a true deep breath for the first time in MONTHS. It is such a lovely feeling... And such a lovely home!

AUNTIE IS HOME!!!

And so blessed to be so...

Sing...

2011-11-10T10:10:00.000Z

"I will sing of your mercy which leads me through vallies of sorrow to rivers of joy..."
-- Jars of Clay

(Mmm, yes. I will sing and sing and sing at the top of my voice wherever He places me this world and I will keep on singing til He finally brings me home to His side.

... Being back in the English countryside is like being home in a deeper sense than being home.)

Blessed are the Poor in Spirit (again and again and again)

2011-11-04T00:37:00.000Z

It's the quiet night that breaks me
I cannot stand the sight of this familiar place
It's the quiet night that breaks me
Like a dozen paper-cuts that only I can trace
All my books are lying useless now
All my maps will only show me how to lose my way
Oh call my name, [Y]ou know my name
And in that sound everything will change
Tell me it won't always be this hard
I am nothing without [Y]ou, but I don't know [W]ho [Y]ou are

It's the crowded room that breaks me
Everybody looks so luminous and strangely young
It's the crowded room that's never heard
No one here can say a word of my native tongue
I can't be among them anymore
I fold myself away before it burns me numb
Oh call my name, [Y]ou know my name
And in [Y]our love everything will change
Tell me it won't always be this hard
I am nothing without [Y]ou, but I don't know [W]ho [Y]ou are

I am nothing without [Y]ou

I remember when I first heard this Vienna Teng song. I was in my second year of uni in England, and on such a journey of growth in my walk with God that every day felt like it held years of tracing my fingertips across His face and taking in its every nuance. They were overwhelming years. They were beautiful years.

My college, and my tree...

I remember listening to this song, and feeling Him breathing in it so profoundly that it stole my breath. I went outside in the wide open back garden in the night, and sat under the large old Redcliffe tree. As the tears streamed down my face, I thought about the lyrics. I felt them. She put my aching melancholy so aptly into words. I felt the frustration of the familiar, and the futility of the books and the maps trying to tell me the way. I felt the loneliness of being in a crowded room and hearing no one speak in my soul's 'native tongue'. And out there under the stars, 'folding myself away,' I felt the awe of my God. This being who is so utterly HOLY, that no matter how many years I had walked with him, and how many years have been added to those years now, I still cannot contain Him, cannot grasp Him, cannot explain Him or predict Him or somehow wrap my little mind around Him. And there was something comforting in singing out these words. There was something comforting about accepting that without this mysterious, Holy-beyond.grasp being, I was absolutely nothing, my life was absolutely nothing. The depth of my neediness... And the knowledge that 'in His love', that neediness was not only perfectly okay, but right.

"Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven..."
-- Matthew 5:3, NIV

I am reading a book on spiritual development which has been entirely His timing in this season of counseling and soul work. It describes our spiritual development in our walk with God in stages. The latest stage I am reading about is basically summed up in this song. Coming to a place of ambiguity, yet certainty. Truly accepting in humility who and what we are, and getting lost in Who He is, even though we cannot even grasp it. Realizing that every "map" we've used for directions on this journey to His heart is an over-simplification of something which really cannot be mapped. That nothing satisfies (except the fact that 'He knows my name'). That it's only in His love that everything makes sense... and even that 'sense' is inexplicable...

This is where I am. Nothing without Him, and yet knowing He is beyond everything I can even imagine to have known He was. And somehow blessed to know how poor and needy I am. Because it's there I can rest. It's there that the kingdom is mine, and I am home.

"How blessed are those who are destitute in spirit, because the kingdom of heaven belongs to them!"
--Matthew 5:3, ISV

"God blesses those who are poor and realize their need for him, for the Kingdom of Heaven is theirs."
-- Matthew 5:3, NLT

"Blessed (happy, to be envied, and spiritually prosperous--with life-joy and satisfaction in God's favor and salvation, regardless of their outward conditions) are the poor in spirit (the humble, who rate themselves insignificant), for theirs is the kingdom of heaven!"
--Matthew 5:3, Amplified

"God blesses those people

who depend only on him.

They belong to the kingdom of heaven!"
-- Matthew 5:3, CEV

"You're blessed when you're at the end of your rope. With less of you there is more of God and his rule."
--Matthew 5:3, The Message

________________________________________________________

"When life gives you more than you can stand, kneel..."
--unknown

Another Journey

2011-11-02T11:53:00.000Z

Oooh, it's been a long wait...

But as the main rush of wedding season peters out, I'm once again saying goodbye to this pretty Nordic city and heading out to spend much needed time with precious friends and family in "my two home countries"!

I will keep up with the blog as much as I can, but Saturday commences about 5 weeks of travel around the UK seeing loved ones and soaking up His presence in those day-to-days with the friends He's given to place hands on and form my life, and the man He's placed there to hold it :) So far the journey is taking me to London, Andover, Salisbury, the Norfolk coast, The Cotswolds, Bristol, Bradford-on-Avon, a village in Devon, Gloucester, and the Isle of Sheppey! Oh, there is no where like England to me!!

And after those weeks, it's home again, just in time for Christmas!! This visiting my family twice in one year business feels quite a treat. Who knows what He has in store!

One thing is sure, He has each of us on a journey, whether they involve planes, trains, and automobiles, passports and border controls, or paperwork at the office and commutes, grocery-shopping, baby-soothing, and storybook reading, or guzzling coffee at 3am to finish that essay due in at 8. He astounds me with His attention to my heart, to my life, and His deliberately always working away at this lump of clay, moving me toward wholeness and holiness through every circumstance of life. He is teaching me a great deal about hope these days.

And it's this verse which holds me the most at the moment:

"May God himself, the God of peace, sanctify you through and through. May your whole spirit, soul and body be kept blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. The one who calls you is faithful, and he will do it." -- 1 Thess. 5:23-24

So, here's to the One who is faithful, and the journey He has each of us on
Your fellow sojourner,
Leah

Made More Faithful in the Wait

2011-10-23T00:24:00.002+01:00

I read a comment left on someone's blog earlier:

"Time to get back to the basics, coffee with cream and sugar; Church with the Word and less fufu."

And it made me smile because as I slog through this lesson on where church goes wrong, and seek Him to restore my faith in what's right about it, that's pretty much the Church I find He's set me in with Brunnen church plant. We are being Church with the Word and less fufu. We have no building walls. Just homes, and cafes, and a disadvantaged part of the city we want to be a Christ's presence in. We have down-to-earth teaching from the bible, in Swedish and English, which feel more like conversations because we can look into one another's eyes gathered around someone's living room. And we have accountability with one another for living out our struggles and our joy throughout the week too. Nothing fancy, just real and down-to-earth. Tangibly His hands and feet to one another. And He couldn't have drawn it all together at a better time.

This week my DNA (accountability/prayer group) friend and I are reading the book of John. We've both done substantial biblical study in our degrees and liked the idea of just focusing in on Jesus in the gospels, like being reacquainted with the story of His life which we've heard all of our lives. It is heartening to look again and again and again at this God as man, to let the familiar stories of what His disciples witnessed with their own eyes just play before my imagination.

John 6:35 stood out to me today. Mostly because it is Jesus Himself saying in no uncertain terms that anyone who trusts in Him will never be spiritually hungry or thirsty again, and I tell you what, I feel so deeply dissatisfied right now that I can't think of much else beyond how hungry and thirsty I am. Instantly, my disillusioned side starts going, "Huh. Well... You're saying this one thing, and I'm feeling entirely another. That's rather disappointing, God." He told me to look it up in more depth later... So, here I am, 29 minutes past midnight, looking up John 6:35 in the original Greek and seeking God to encourage me with it.

In English, the verse says, "Jesus replied, 'I am the bread of life. No one who comes to me will ever be hungry again. Those who believe in me will never thirst'."

The original Greek for hunger and thirst are peinasē and dipsēsei respectively, and they both conjure up similar translations; 'to have hunger, to have thirst, to have need, to desire earnestly'. The Greek transliteration for 'Never' is ou. There are many translations for this, but my favourite was more of an explanation. Strong's said ou means basically, "ruling it out as fact." All pretty straightforward to what I read in my NLT bible without going in deeper.

But then the Greek for "who comes to me" and "believe in me"...

The phrase 'who come' is transliterated erchomenos, and can also be translated as 'brought to,' or 'accompany'. I like the idea of being brought to Jesus. Like the little children he welcomed when the disciples wanted to turn them away. Because the kingdom belongs to such as these (Matt 19:14). But the richest discovery for me was 'accompany'. I love the image of "accompanying" Jesus. Isn't that what walking with Him is? "No one who accompanies me will ever be hungry again." And isn't it in that daily interaction with Him, that daily keeping company with Him, that we are refreshed for the journey? If there is one word to describe the overriding feeling around this time in life for me right now it is: dissatisfied. I have such earnest and frustrated desires I can barely breathe with them. But must just keep waiting and see the season through... Sometimes so deeply dissatisfied and seemingly disappointed that I don't recognize the sun when it pokes through the clouds as Swedish winter descends. How is that 'never hungering or thirsting,' Lord?

But then the final word I looked up. 'Believe' in 'Those who believe in me....' The Greek transliteration is pisteuōn: 'To believe, have faith in, trust -- to entrust, especially one's spiritual well-being to Christ'. This is not earth-shattering but for the moment, for MY moment, it's kinda huge.

Working through a book about Spiritual Abuse as I walk this journey of Him restoring my soul, the chapter which has most stood out to me has been a rather simple re-teaching on the foundations of my salvation in Christ. On how Grace works. It's only in admitting our brokenness, our neediness, our sheer not-enoughness, truly realizing that we NEED His grace, that we can then realize truly what He means when He says He has done it. If we believe, pisteuōn, to have faith in, TRUST, "especially one's spiritual well-being to Christ", it is DONE. His grace has done it all. And if we believe Him, we can rest and know His love, and be anxious for nothing, strive for nothing, have no lingering fear of not being good enough, or fear that the grace will run out, a bit used up for every sinful act or attitude. He knew every single one before He paid the price for them. He knew how messy this life would get, and how discouragement would sometimes knock us right to the floor. He knew how even His church would be deceived and tainted-- made of humans after all-- and how it would hurt and deceive ones of His. But He still did all of the work of redemption that day on the Cross.

I am recognizing again how truly poor in spirit I am, and so how the Kingdom of Heaven has been unlocked for me (Matthew 5:3). And accompanying Jesus, I must keep TRUSTING Him with my poorness and my neediness, my aching dissatisfaction and unmet desires, and laying it out before Him as I accompany Him every day, every hour... And somehow, it's in being hungry and it's in being thirsty, that I am filled with His grace. With purpose. With hope. It's in being empty, that I am full. It's in being full of emptiness, that Grace works.

And I cannot express how thankful I am for the richness of this grace...

"When I can't feel You, I have learned to reach out just the same
When I can't hear You, I know you still hear every word I pray
And I want You more than I wanna live another day
And as I wait for You, maybe I'm made more faithful..."
--Brooke Fraser, 'Faithful'

Life-sustaining Water

2011-10-19T00:53:00.000+01:00

My God is faithful. Frustratingly beyond working out, yes, but faithful. And I am so thankful.

I am forever blessed by the church plant He has me involved in here in Göteborg for this season in life. Missional, authentic, genuine. We've called it 'Brunnen' which in Swedish means, "The Well". The well in Bible days was the meeting place in a community, a place of fellowship. A well is also where one can find life-sustaining water. I think that as the body of Christ, doing church together should feel like life-sustaining water...

We meet bi-weekly for a church service which helps refresh the faith in me-- and I think this is what meeting together as the Church was always meant to do. And we also break into little accountability groups-- prayer groups, really-- once a week. We call this DNA-- Discipling, Nurturing, and Accountability. DNA with my girls (there are 3 of us) brings the broken bits in me back together. I find this kind of authentic sharing of lives and hearts is to me the tangible touch of God in this aching world.

And I am so thankful.

Sometimes His beauty catches me unaware. Tonight after sharing lives, hearts, a meal, and prayer with my awesome friend and one of the leaders of our precious church plant, I took a walk with God across the Göta Alv under the stars. The city line on the shore of the river coming in from the North Sea was glowing against the inky black sky. And as the bitingly cold wind rushed over me, I found rest there in His presence on the bridge-- cars, trams, and buses bustling by.

Tonight after I'd poured out my heart to my dear DNA friend, we prayed, and as we prayed the song playing was saying, "It's only temporary, it's only temporary." I keep calling this time of processing my grief over church gone wrong and the way I feel so damaged by it sometimes "a season." Only a season. It won't always feel this open and raw and ambiguous and heavy. It was as if God was just laying a hand on my shoulder and reassuring me in common words, "It's only temporary, love. Keep working at this. You'll see. You'll come out the other side."

And one simple evening, over one simple meal, with down-to-earth, "this is really what's inside my head" conversation, He graces me with renewed strength for the journey. It is Who He is. This gracious, this strong, this faithful.

And I stand on the bridge overlooking the murky waters to the shining shore in awe.
So thankful to belong to this faithful God.

I'm not only wishing you strength for your journey, friend; I'm telling you where to find it.

As the deer pants for streams of water,
   so my soul pants for you, my God.
My soul thirsts for God, for the living God.
   When can I go and meet with God?
My tears have been my food
   day and night,
while people say to me all day long,
   “Where is your God?”
These things I remember
   as I pour out my soul:
how I used to go to the house of God
   under the protection of the Mighty One
with shouts of joy and praise
   among the festive throng.
Why, my soul, are you downcast?
   Why so disturbed within me?
Put your hope in God,
   for I will yet praise him,
   my Savior and my God.
Psalm 42:1-5

With His Love...

2011-10-16T21:29:00.001+01:00

[A new song discovery to read by: http://bensollee.bandcamp.com/track/hurting-2]

You know, I used to be really really into this blog world. Not this one here at blogspot, but at xanga, where I kept a blog all throughout highschool and basically grew into myself through writing out my thoughts of all kinds.... I made friends with other bloggers in the community and we grew up together. I have to admit, I kinda miss it. But once in a while, I still read blogs, and when I stumble upon a blog of someone who writes from a genuine and honest and searching place, a "hey, we don't have it all together, but together we might be able to deal with it" kinda place, I am touched and humbled and inspired to share a little deeper, to make this place a space for other people to think genuinely, share honestly, and search deeply too. We don't have to agree on everything, we just have to be honest with ourselves and honest before God, who loves us whether we've got it all figured out or not. (And honestly, we're talking about God here. If you think you have ANYTHING all figured out in light of Him, honey, you have got some re-evaluating to do.)

I like this randomly stumbled upon blogpost today: http://www.alise-write.com/2011/02/ugly-bride.html

In the end, she asks what our favourite bible passage is that let's us know that we are loved. I instantly think of Zephaniah 3:17 which has held me through the years: "For the Lord your God is living among you. He is a mighty saviour. He will take delight in you with gladness. With His love, He will calm all your fears. He will rejoice over you with joyful songs."

Maybe this post resonates with me so much because the season Jesus is currently walking with me through involves dealing with some deep places of hurt incurred in working in ministry, and with and for The Church. Early this month I took a deep breath and a hard gulp and decided to start having some counseling for issues of spiritual abuse. Yikes-- those are intimidating words. I kinda don't even want to write them. It feels like admitting some kind of defeat to it. That yes, it hurts this much, perplexes me this much, and presses down on me this much. Still. But maybe that desire to not let it show how disillusioned I feel is exactly why I need to be speaking up in this season. Not sure where one would find a Christian counselor in Sweden even if one could speak Swedish properly, I looked up a Christian counselor in London so I can set up sessions whenever I'm over visiting Charles. Initially I thought, "Ah, I just need closure on this. One session to just help me sort it all out in my head." But that was rather naive of me, I think :) And having never done counseling outside of meetings with campus counselors in University, I guess the whole thing is rather an adventure. And maybe it's best that way. I'm in way over my head anyway, and that usually means God's got to be all in all to me.

Seeing the body of Christ used to wound and kill one's spirit has been a bit too much for me. And I begin to see it everywhere, like my eyes have been opened to what they hardly saw before. And it's like heaviness upon heaviness upon heaviness in my little heart which just wants to have faith like a child. And it makes me furious. Furious at an enemy who slinks into whatever form he can take to deceive The Bride. The best deceptions are the ones which look so very close to the truth that the error is almost imperceptible...

In my best moments, it makes me even MORE passionate about loving well and actively, to be a mirror which reflects His face. Because this aching world will see Him no other way. And we, you and I, individuals, are what make up The Church. But sometimes my best moments feel very distant. And it's more like slogging through than running a steady race.

I think this season is a time of grief in me. Over the damage the enemy has done in The Church, His Bride. And over the way that damage has entered my life and my experience of His Church, and broken whatever frail veil of innocent, childlike hope I had hanging in my heart. Sometimes the hurt colours over everything I thought I believed, and I am left gasping for air, wondering where one goes from here. Because where God was meant to be living among me, the Church, turned out unsafe, abusing its power, and I wonder if He was living there at all. And sometimes I can't see or feel His might, I can't see or feel Him saving me, or intervening in the suffering all around as our mighty saviour. But that's where His Love reassures. That's where His love wraps me up so tightly that the world stops spinning. It's His unfailing love that can be trusted when nothing else makes sense anymore. It all begins and ends there. With His love, He will calm all your fears...

"For the Lord your God is living among you. He is a mighty saviour. He will take delight in you with gladness. With His love, He will calm all your fears. He will rejoice over you with joyful songs.”
-- Zeph. 3:17

And the Winner is...

2011-10-10T13:07:00.001+01:00

So... the first giveaway at In The Hands of The Master Poet has been rather a disappointment...

Only 2 people left comments! And as I know both commenters and think they both should get the book "The Heart of the Story" by Randy Frazee, I couldn't choose one, could I? So I enlisted my handsome boyfriend to help me by giving him the comments to read anonymously and judge the most worthy winner...

Only, he couldn't choose one more worthy than the other!! So, we were back at square one. At least he's handsome :)

So, I've decided with only 2 commenters, you both should read the book! I think I will send my sister who commented the free copy. And I will lend my copy to my friend who commented! So, this way, everyone gets to read it :) Kind of all winners, then? :)

And just because he's adorable and did try to help me, you get a photo of my mighty fine man! Oh, what a lucky day all around :)

In The Hands of the Master-Poet's First Ever Giveaway! -- Now Closed

2011-10-06T13:43:00.001+01:00

The bigger picture has always captivated me.

The idea that God is on a rescue mission to restore the world He created and the people in it to relationship with Him-- and how everything in the story of our lives, and all the individual stories we're living, are all working together to that end, and how, in fact, we are invited to play a part in that rescue mission story... It puts things in perspective.

Randy Frazee calls this bigger picture the 'upper story' in his book The Heart of the Story: God's Masterful Design to Restore His People. He calls our circumstances as we see them through our human experiences the 'lower story'. What I loved about this book was the idea of taking the whole entire bible--the hundreds of memorable and not so memorable 'lower' stories of human experience -- and making a basic summary of it to repaint it in light of the upper story, the bigger picture. In these stories innumerable many of us have grown up hearing about, the characters were firmly entrenched in their own lower stories of human circumstance, just like you and I. And yet, when we stand back and look at the bigger picture the Word of God is showing, we can see the upper story significance of each individual character's lower story (Have I driven home enough the 'story' idea yet?). There is something so innately encouraging in that. I happen to be firmly entrenched in my own lower story, and need constant reminders of that upper story God's unfolding just beyond my human vision, closer than my circumstances tell...

I was excited when I was offered this book for review because I relished the idea of digesting the whole entire story of the Bible all in one big gulp. Frazee, a teaching pastor by vocation and the author of numerous previous books, didn't disappoint in his anecdotal summary. I often get tripped up in the minor prophets. I take them one by one as moving pieces of literature, but struggle to fit them into the chronological narrative of Israel's story. The Heart of the Story helpfully wove the myriad of true tales together in a way that I could cognitively see where they fit into the story in history. And Frazee did it while also lifting the reader's eyes up to the way it all fits into the bigger picture / upper story.

If I could make any criticisms about this book, they would be only from a point of view of my admittedly snobby literaturary tastes :) I sometimes found his writing style a bit juvenile, as if he was trying too hard to sound 'cool', but because I believe this was an effort to make God's Word approachable by anyone, I think we should let it slide ;) It was extremely readable and that can be hard to find when it comes to wrestling with Biblical literature and matters of Theology.

All that said, I think you should read this book! Who doesn't need some help to focus on the bigger picture when we are so caught up in our day to days? So... to aid you to that end, I'd like to offer In The Hands of the Master-Poet's first giveaway! I have an extra copy of Randy Frazee's The Heart of the Story: God's Masterful Design to Restore His People to give away to one lucky reader of this blog :) Ooh, exciting :) All you have to do to receive your free copy is leave me a comment explaining why you would like to read this book, and giving me some way to contact you so we can be in touch about where I should mail it if you win the giveaway.

So, comment, comment, comment! The contest will be open over the weekend and I'll contact the winner early next week. Let's seek out this God actively working to restore us to Himself, and let's equip ourselves to let the upper story, the bigger picture, the greater purpose influence the way we live our lower stories day to day. Let's be encouraged: "since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles, and let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us" (Heb. 12:1).
What a gift it is to live wrapped up in such purpose! And what a gift it is to have The Bible to be told of all the ones who lived out their stories for such a purpose before us. What did they do before they had those testimonies to look to and be encouraged by?

Yay for free giveaways of encouragement :)

How Can I Not Be Moved?

2011-09-18T22:20:00.004+01:00

It's not the first time I've seen this drama. And it's moved me before. But tonight, I cannot stop playing it on repeat. I cannot stop staring at the epic story being played out-- my own epic story with The King, right before my eyes-- and letting the lyrics wash over me.

I have been that girl. I am still that girl.
And He has wrestled darkness for me, and still does.

Tonight, something is clicking. Tonight, I am staring at the screen, tears popping to my eyes every time the music picks up and she drops the gun, every time I see the face of the Jesus figure as he shouts for her and pulls for her, and then conquers the darkness and wraps His white jacket around her and holds her...

This is our story. This is what He does for every single one of us. How do we reject Him, or perhaps even more unbelievable, how do have this with Him and then, gradually, forget? Lulled by strategically-placed distractions and seduced by misplaced desires, we are deceived. And it still surprises me.

It also surprises me how I can go a single day without losing myself completely in worship of this Jesus for all that He has done and still does. For how He loves me, fights for me, pursues me. How can we not literally MOVE! Whether that be bowing before Him in awe, or jumping up, selling every bit of "wealth" we've amassed, and running to the ends of the earth to be a witness of this kindness, grace, and hope?! Oh Lord, that you would give me eyes to see You at work moment-to-moment! And more mercy for how much I forget...

"You're all I want
You're all I need
You're everything, everything...
How can I stand here with You and not be moved by You?
Would You tell me, how could it be any better than this?"
-- Lifehouse, "Everything"

...Putting it Back

2011-09-13T00:46:00.000+01:00

This quote is resonating with me tonight. "There are people who take the heart out of you..."Oh yes, there are. As much as my romantic little heart just doesn't want to accept it; just wants to love on, love on, love on and watch His love pouring through it change the world all around it. I want so desperately to believe Him when He speaks of the way of obedience being the best way, when He teaches us to live with hearts wide open, always hoping, always trusting, always persevering in looking for the good in one another, in choosing to love one another even when we don't feel it, trusting that He will not waste a drop of that effort... I believe this. I choose to live like I believe this. But sometimes, oh, sometimes after a long haul it feels like the heart is drained right out of me... I know you know the feeling.

But... I also know that... somehow, in time (that all-important quality)... "there are people who put it back." And there may not be a moment where it all lines up and all is made well again, but somehow you find that your heart is just... back. And that God, throughout that all-important quality of time, has used ways too various to describe and too numerous to count, but usually requiring much of the tangible human hands around us, to restore to us our hearts which had been so drained away...

I'm working through some difficult experiences of heart-drainage which has been following me around for too long. I just haven't known where to start in dealing with it. Even now I don't. What do you do when the same people who at times have put the heart in you, are the same ones to take it right out? What about when it's a church experience? When the hurts happen in what should be the safest place? And you don't want to say aloud what hurts lest someone feels you're pointing fingers (surely every time you point a finger, there are 3 fingers pointing back at you, right?) and you set boundaries but people are offended by them (and the last thing you want to do is hurt anyone so that more hurt comes from the hurt you've already been carrying for years now, not knowing how to deal with it and feeling it growing more and more stale the longer you let it sit there locked away but never too far away...). The perfect entanglement. Feeling stuck to do anything but just go on, discouragement heaps on discouragement until one day, life has calmed down a little.And you find yourself taking deep breaths again, and there it is, just waiting to be dealt with and set aside once and for all. But the 'dealing with it' can feel more painful than the carrying it around.

Funny how again and again, it all comes back to this. So so so tired of that. But maybe that's what will fuel me to keep on working it through. I wish I could speak plainly without anybody taking offense. Instead, I form vague thoughts in the middle of the night, not expecting anyone to read them, and if they do, not expecting anyone to understand.

And all because I read somewhere that "There are people who take the heart out of you... and there are people who put it back." I think we have a very real enemy. And I think he will take the heart out of us using any means possible. But I believe we have a victorious Lord, who will reach in and restore our hearts, using His children to reach out to us with His hands and feet. Even if the wounds those hands and feet of His children are reaching out to soothe were put there by the hands and feet of other children of His.

Doesn't it make you want to cry out "Maranatha!" Yes, it makes me desire His coming to restore all things... But it also gives me a passion to BE a glimmer of His Kingdom here and now. To "do church well". To truly be the kind of person who can be a part of a community of hopeful people needing His grace, which create a space where His Kingdom is exemplified here and now, for a world dying to see it.

Perhaps... in the end... that's exactly why I walked through my bad experience with Church to begin with. To make me as earnest as can be about being a Church which genuinely exists to be a glimmer of His Kingdom.

"I'm convinced that one of the reasons Jesus didn't confront the might of Rome or challenge the religious powers in Jerusalem was because He knew the story we long to hear is not one of military victory or political control. It's the story of a God who restores the lost and offers hope to a cynical world. The rumors of God are true. Jesus rose from the dead, and so did the hopes of all those who are looking for revolution..." -- 'Rumors of God' by Darren Whitehead & Jon Tyson

"...Love of God overflow, permeate all my soul...
Fill me up, God, fill me up..."
--Fill Me Up by The United Pursuit Band

Rumors of God

2011-09-09T17:30:00.000+01:00

"And this is precisely what Christianity is about. The world is a great sculptor's shop. We are the statues and there is a rumor going round the shop that some of us are some day going to come to life."
-- C.S. Lewis

You know what you finish a book and as you reach the last page all you want to do is turn to the beginning and start it all over again? The truths it spoke were just that thirst-quenching, the ways in which it spoke them are just that captivating. "Rumors of God" by Darren Whitehead and Jon Tyson was just that book for me.

Captivated by the C.S. Lewis quote above, the two Aussie pastors in America set out to explore various "rumors" of the Christian life, what truths can be found in the rumors, and how those truths are holding up in the life of the average Christian. Where we are lacking, why are we lacking? What does this say about God? What does this say about us? It looks challengingly at the claims we make about Jesus and about what it looks like to be His followers and examines the way our lives reflect that to a world which has only heard the rumors... Painting pictures with historical stories of experiences of faith, on both an individual and a corporate level, this book has influenced the way I pray, and awakened in me a greater desire not only for His Kingdom come on earth, but a greater passion to BE His Kingdom coming TO the world He's placed us in.

My copy is now riddled with underlining and stars in the margins :) I'd love to lend it to you, if you're in my neck of the woods!! Because He is so much more than a rumor, and our lives are meant to say so much more than we are letting them...

**I received this book free from the publisher through the BookSneeze®.com <http://BookSneeze®.com> book review bloggers program. I was not required to write a positive review. The opinions I have expressed are my own. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255 <http://www.access.gpo.gov/nara/cfr/waisidx_03/16cfr255_03.html> : “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”**

English Weddings and Grey London Love

2011-09-01T16:50:00.000+01:00

I went "home" to England last week. And my soul was refreshed.

My college friends Adelina and James got married and I had the distinct pleasure of being a bridesmaid at the celebrations. It was a beautiful day in every way-- from the look on James' face when he first saw his stunningly beautiful little bride walking toward him down the aisle, to the laughter and joy on every guest's face throughout the day. The Clarke wedding reminded me of why I like weddings so much. A celebration of love, indeed!

Adelina's friend Abi and I had such fun serving her together on her big day! And praying for her and supporting her in the months beforehand. Friendship is such a beautiful gift from the heart of God!

James was a total British jokester in college, and Adelina was a perfect Ukrainian angel. They hardly seemed an appropriate fit at first. But what a beautiful journey it has been to watch God use each of them for one another's good. Adelina's maturity and heart has mellowed our crazy James out, and his confidence and fun, has made her glow :)

I couldn't help but be a bit teary when James exclaimed over God's grace at giving Adelina to him as his wife in his speech at the reception. He was astounded at the way this woman loves. And she does. She is one of those rare people who just seem to exude gentleness and kindness and tender love. She has alot to teach the world, but she doesn't realize it at all :)

And of course, no trip to England would be complete without some good old-fashioned girlfriend time!! Amanda, Abbie, Ali, and I managed to sneak a girlie slumber party into the wedding weekend schedule :) And my heart was filled right up!

(Oh college years! You have been better to me than all the rest combined. So so so many lessons learned and experiences had and so much love shared and tears shed and wiped away and always endless laughter and joy underneath it all... It was such a delight to revisit you for a weekend :))

**********

After a few days staying with dear friends in the Cotswolds, where my heart just about comes home, and the mad rush of the deliciously fun wedding weekend, I had a few days at the end in London with my man, to fill up on hand-holding and being wrapped up in long, warm arms for the next month of being apart again...

I visited a friend on her lunchbreak in the downtown hospital where she's a nurse, reveling in the wonder that I still feel every time I look at the skyline of this city and see the gothic architecture of Parliament and Big Ben looming over my little mid-west farming country head...And afterwards, I walked along the south bank of the Thames in the bright grey London day and I thought about Jesus and the adventure it is to love Him and the places His love takes us if we let it. I thought about all the heavy things I carry and heard Him ask again if I will just lay it all down and let Him do it. I meandered through an open-air secondhand book stall under a bridge and sat on a bench overlooking the Thames with the masses rushing by. A homeless man approached me asking for a pence or two, and I felt the smallness of what little I could do to make things better in this world, and as he walked away with a "Thank you, Miss", I thought about the paradigm of being His Kingdom here on earth, and yet waiting for its arrival with every breath.

We are only here to extend our feeble hands in love. Every time. While the real work of bringing that Kingdom is left up to Him.

And He reminded me of what it is to rest in His Bigness in light of my littleness that grey day strolling along the Thames.

Thank you, lovely London.
Thank You, lovely Lord.

Rainy Day Thoughts

2011-08-19T10:47:00.000+01:00

Kingdom Planting and Miracles

2011-08-14T23:19:00.000+01:00

"But a church for the city, most simply, is a church that practices healthy contextualization. It’s a church that soaks in the Scriptures and is saturated with the gospel. The gospel message should flow down deep into the church, like a marinade that flavors and tenderizes a piece of meat. A gospel-saturated church then takes the gospel into its culture. Submitted to and saturated with the gospel, the church does not have to fear the culture or become the culture, but it can influence the culture, redeeming it, and presenting it back to God as an act of worship. And because the church is securely rooted in the gospel, it is free to consider the information it receives from culture and adapt its methods of gospel proclamation to most effectively influence the culture." -- Pastor Mark Driscoll

So, I am very excited to be part of a church plant here in Gothenburg coming out of a Swedish church (with a sistering denomination in the states called Covenant) where I was involved with an international student ministry last year called The Well. I have watched the leaders of the church plant-- a pastor from MN, actually, and a dear Swedish friend-- going through all the hoops of following this call through their denomination here and mission board in the states. And today, finally, after many months of praying and preparing and taking steps, we had our first official meeting as a new little church family. And it's exciting.

It's exciting to sit in a family living room, with people from all over the world mixed in with a handful of Swedes, and unite on a vision to see God glorified in our lives, in our relationships, in our community. The church is being planted in a rather down-trodden area of the city. It's just exciting. It's exciting to "do church" in a way that gets away from so many religious traditions made by man, and in a way which is just people who love Jesus and want to know Him more and want to bring this love of His out into a world aching for it, meeting in one another's homes and sharing one another's lives, praying, digging into His word, encouraging one another, and eating together. I'm excited about this church model. I have never been very excited about "normal church". haha. We have a vision and a passion for being a city on a hill, being a reflection of His Kingdom here and now, in this city; seeking His Kingdom in our own lives.

We are meeting as a small group in someone's home every other week initially, and in between, we are encouraged to meet with 2 or 3 of us weekly for DNA-- Discipleship, Nurturing, and Accountability. This is what church is meant to look like. Vulnerable and deep, praying for one another where it really matters, where we really need it. Challenging one another on what needs challenging, encouraging one another where we need support. Last week was my first time meeting with my DNA ladies-- whom I love. We talked and laughed and shared and challenged and prayed. We are encouraging one another weekly to do BELLS. Hehe. B stands for Blessing Others. We need to keep our eyes open for how we can intentionally bless others and then we need to share with one another at the end of the week, for the accountability. E is for Eating Together. We hold one another accountable to eat with 3 different people throughout the week, as it encourages us to be hospitable and to reach out. The first L is for Learning Jesus. Encouraging one another to be in the Word. The second L is for Listening to the Holy Spirit, to encourage one another to be keeping our eyes open to what He's doing and how we can be a part of it in our day to day. And the S is for Sent, holding one another accountable about the people in our sphere of influence that He may be sending us to these days. It's an awesome model for accountability and just makes you so proactive about your faith and being missional.

After we shared our BELLS, we had a long prayer time for one another. As we were sharing, one of my DNA ladies was literally laying on the floor with her feet up on the couch, aching in pain with a terrible sore back which she had developed over the last few weeks and which was just not going away no matter what she did. So, when it came time to pray, she asked for prayer about that. So, we simply prayed for her and carried on praying for everything else we'd discussed praying for. And by the end of our evening, she was literally feeling better. She was standing up and stretching and trying to decipher what it was feeling like. She felt literally better for the first time in days. But she thought it was probably psychological. She'd never had such a healing before. Because the back pain was always the worst when she first got up in the morning, she figured that would be the real test, and remained dubious til then.

But when the next day came, she awoke with no back pain whatsoever. And praised the Lord.

And it was very encouraging for us just starting out this church plant. Today we talked about His Kingdom and how the world is aching for it and how He's commissioned us as His hands and His feet to carry it to an aching world. Seeing Him answer our simple, down-to-earth prayers for my DNA friend last week was heartening. A glimmer of His miraculous Kingdom breaking through the brokenness of this world. We were asked at church today, if we could ask God to show His Kingdom in any area of our own lives this week, what would it be? What would it affect? And it just sets me to thinking... and I think it will change the way I pray. The way I trust.

So... I ask you who know this God and the Kingdom Jesus taught about in His thirty-some years on this earth. What is it in your life that you want to see God bring His Kingdom into? Why don't you tell Him so? His love is so much bigger than we know, His plan so much wiser than we could wrap our minds around. May you follow Him right into forever...

Love,
Leah

"Let us be grateful for receiving a kingdom that can't be shaken, and thus let us offer to God acceptable worship with reverence and awe."
– Hebrews 12:2

And more...

2011-08-07T14:28:00.002+01:00

More Wordy-Art...

2011-08-07T13:30:00.000+01:00

"...On Fear, Confession, and Grace"

2011-08-06T13:06:00.001+01:00

We all have them. Those moments when everything which keeps us going sort of fades into the background and we stand face-to-face with our own darkness, with the hollow places in us, with the gaps of disappointments and hurts and rejections and all the things which make us feel empty. An aching dissatisfaction. What can I do to just be happy? We ask ourselves, as we close our eyes against the memories which haunt us or the unmet desires which taunt us…

Some days, I am more thankful for God’s mercy than others. Most days, if I’m honest, I simply breeze past it without giving it any notice at all. Today, I stop, look at it, breathe it in deep, and am thankful.

I was looking through some photos from college the other night. First of all, one should never sit alone in the dark of a lonely apartment in the middle of the night feeling a world away from everyone she loves and adrift in a stage of life she didn’t see coming, and take that opportunity to look at old photos of times with friends. But, I did. And they documented some of the best years of my life, and some of the worst, and brought up the shiny faces of friends whom have stuck with me through the nitty-gritty. There are photos of dances and meals and parties and trips. Of goofing off in the college garden on sunny afternoons after classes, throwing “hen-dos” (kinda like a bachelorette party/bridal shower), playing games in the common room, chilling at the pub, and visiting the beach. There are Christmases and Easters and Bonfire Days (a holiday in the UK called Guy Folkes Day where there are always bonfires and fireworks on the 5^th of Nov). Church retreats, worship times, studying in groups, and just being silly with friends. It’s strange to look back at the photos and remember exactly the state my heart was in whenever they were taken. His mercy reigns across all of it—the common thread tying together the happiest of seasons, and the ones I wasn’t sure I’d make it out of alive.

I just read a wonderful book by Anne Jackson called “Permission to Speak Freely: Essays and Art on Fear, Confession, and Grace” and all the while I took in her story of becoming real, of learning to live vulnerably like His heart, I was thinking of my own. It happened at college in England, those 3 years surrounded by people from every nation in the world all coming together to live in one big old mansion and learn to love Him and one another while maneuvering the stress of attaining a degree (Goodness, I love Redcliffe College). Anne wrote of brokenness; of being real people needy of Him, with flesh and blood hearts which wound and break, caught up in the flood of this world of sin. She wrote of the common thread we all share as people: our neediness of Him, and how we try to fill it without Him in so many ways and how we ache and feel alone and hopeless, and how the only way out of these pits is through reaching out to one another, sharing our brokenness and sin, and giving one another His grace—acting as His hands and feet, living out His heart of mercy, carrying one another until it’s our turn to be carried…

I walked through a season in college where the darkness of my own brokenness threatened to swallow me up. I did a bold thing for someone whose self-esteem was in such tatters as mine was, and I fell in love. But, among other things, I felt the inexplicable sting of rejection, and believed lies God had never spoken over me, but it seemed everything else had from the time I was small. I felt unlovable. I honestly thought I had no worth, and this only reiterated it. And I punished myself for it. When everything hurt inside, I wanted the outside to hurt too—a residue of bad habits born back in teenage angst. My torture of choice then and whenever things would just get too overwhelming was, let’s say, disordered eating—Anorexic behaviours, Bulimic behaviours, sometimes cutting, sometimes just running until my lungs wouldn’t let me go on and I’d be sick til I could no longer stand. It was always “one-off” experiences throughout school and into my first year of college. Like everything would come to a head, and then I’d feel awful for coping as I had done, and He’d restore me, and it would be months before another few days of panic would come around. By the time I was in college, this merciful God had dealt with so much of this in me that it was a shock when it all came to a head again... I was hurting more than I had ever known before and feeling this overwhelming sense of worthlessness more over-powering than ever. But my sinful response to the hurt— to my neediness of His truth over the lies—was not something I felt I could share with anyone. Until that year. It was too sinful. It was senseless and shameful. And it hurt too much to admit out-loud how worthless I felt. But in the deepest days of my long season of darkness, Jesus made Himself tangible in the people I was living with from every corner of the globe. He saw me struggle, and He let me struggle because I had much to learn in it, but He led me to people and encouraged me to open up and let them into my struggle, to let them hold me in the midst of it. To be real, to be vulnerable, and to experience what His love is meant to be. Grace-filled through His mercy.

(I cannot tell you how deeply thankful I am; how deeply this season has affected my entire life. It’s this which is, I think, my testimony. Something in me was brought to life in His love which had never really lived before. But it took crawling through a long dark night of the soul, and being forced to lay bare my shame to the people around me, feeling exposed and undignified, to end up at the sunrise…)

Confessions were tearful. More than that. “Tearful” makes it sound all graceful and elegant. Broken-hearted confessions are messier than that. Mine were usually loud. We’re talking sobbing and undignified. But every one of the women I timidly opened up to in those weeks, put an arm around me and prayed. I am convinced that is hugely what pulled me out of the darkness which would otherwise not seem to dissipate no matter how hard I tried. There were nights I would literally sleep on the floor of a friend’s room so she could see to it that I was okay, and keep me from self-destructing. And when the fog began to clear over this long, hard season… It was such friendships which led me into more healing and wholeness than I can ever remember having my whole life through, and it has literally changed my life. Friendships where I was real and vulnerable about my brokenness, and met with grace and love, and with vulnerability about their own unique brokenness. In the book, Anne Jackson calls that ‘the gift of going second’. When we are bold enough to share with someone our mess that we keep hidden and so are trapped by, we lend them a bit of courage to share theirs and also take a small grasp on freedom from it. Anne also comments on how we are always as sick as our secrets. How true it is! And how desperately I never want to get trapped in a secret darkness again. To that end, I sought some professional counseling in this season as well. My college had an excellent personal development program in place and caring counselors willing to show Jesus’ heart to the hurting. The thing is, when we’re living in our own secret darkness, we always think we’re the worst. The enemy shames us into staying there. Professional counselors are great because they’ve seen it all, and your mess is never so huge. Puts it in perspective. There’s really no shame in admitting we are broken…

I am convinced that God broke that destructive cycle of sin caused by terrible self-esteem in my life through my honest confessions and His touch of grace through people who showed me love in those times. People who gave me permission to speak freely. I trembled in fear of how I would be received (and still find it does not come most naturally, when the desire to self-protect is so strong! ... Writing this post has been hard!), and yet experienced again and again the bolstering embrace of love and grace and compassion, and admissions of “I’ve been there, in my own way,” a reminder that we are not alone. That humanity hurts (proof of our need for a Saviour? And this longing for wholeness and happiness, proof of a coming heaven?). And that we are only called to meet one another where we are at, and hold out His hope, His grace, His love, until that person can begin to breathe it in for themselves and stand up straight again. The next time, you might be the one needing them to wrap their grace-saved arms around you…

I believe in being real. I believe that being authentic about the hollow places is the only way we can allow Him to fill them. And that He uses the hands and feet of His church to do it, Christ’s body here on earth. Like the writer of this excellent book, having known my own brokenness I feel passionate about being the kind of hands and feet Christ would have making up His body. We often feel so alone when alone is the last thing we ever really are. Let’s endeavor to make that tangible to each other. Let’s be bold enough to lay ourselves bare, and let’s effect a change toward authenticity about our own humanity and neediness of Him in His Church by giving one another ‘the gift of going second’. May we live to show one another the face of God. May we sow His mercy, grace, and love, and may we reap His healing, His holiness, for this entire broken body we are a part of.
Everything is at stake.
And He is endless Hope…

Love on, love on, love on!
--Leah

*I received this book free from Thomas Nelson Publishers as part of their [...] book review bloggers program. I was not required to write a positive review. The opinions I have expressed are my own. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission's 16 CFR, Part 255

Message in a Banana

2011-08-04T11:09:00.000+01:00

This is the SMS I received today from a certain adorable (and somewhat zany) boyfriend. Hehe. Oh, the creativity :)

Kisses from Katie

2011-08-02T00:17:00.000+01:00

I want to shamelessly plug this book, "Kisses from Katie", coming out in October. I met this girl Katie when I was in Uganda. My friend Gabi pulled me into her huge van and we bumped along the dusty roads of Jinja with her 13 girls spilling out all over the place. I didn't know them at all, but when we arrived at their home, which they welcomed me right into, her 4 year old Grace jumped into my arms and wouldn't leave them :) I think they learn their love from their mama, 22 years old and in the process of adopting 13 Ugandan girls. She was so down to earth, and yet so much like His Holy Spirit. Her girls totally wrapped my heart around their pinky fingers :) I still carry around in my bible notes and pictures that her girls wrote and drew for me :) Get the book, know the Jesus she serves, love the orphans and the widows, change this world...

A Poetry and Art Kinda Day

2011-07-31T23:08:00.004+01:00

I used to have this poem hanging on my wall near my desk in college, so that every day I would read it and let it instruct my heart's prayers again. I wish I had it scrawled across my walls in giant letters...

Flame of God
by Amy Carmichael
(missionary to India 1895-1951)

From prayer that asks that I may be
Sheltered from winds that beat on Thee,
From fearing when I should aspire,
From faltering when I should climb higher,
From silken self, O Captain, free
Thy soldier who would follow Thee.

From subtle love of softening things,
From easy choices, weakenings,
(Not thus are spirits fortified,
Not this way went the Crucified)
From all that dims Thy Calvary,
O Lamb of God, deliver me.

Give me the love that leads the way,
The faith that nothing can dismay,
The hope no disappointments tire,
The passion that will burn like fire;
Let me not sink to be a clod:
Make me Thy fuel, Flame of God.

*******************************

And on another note altogether, I love quotes. I catch them everywhere and scribble them across everything. I have hundreds of them collected, and it's growing every day. Sometimes, I like to take photos I've snapped and attach a quote to it. It's been awhile but I was inspired today to do so again! A few pieces:

(This photo I didn't take, but found online and fell in love with!...)

Truth

2011-07-31T09:40:00.000+01:00

A Story of Boy Meets Girl

2011-07-23T00:52:00.000+01:00

Soooo… you know the familiar story of boy meets girl? I have one of those I am privileged by God’s grace (and stand in delighted awe over still…) to tell :)

Once upon a time there was a girl who fell in love with Jesus and into a life of following Him. He walked with her down MANY a road from the time she was small, and as they walked, He loved her, and taught her to love like His heart. He began to teach her quite early the importance of trusting to Him everything in surrender, even her own story of boy-meets-girl.

Along the way there were stories of girl meets wrong boys. And there were some stories of girl meets really-great-but-not-right-boys and even girl meets boy-she-thinks-she-wishes-was-right-boy-- until she actually gets to meet REAL right boy... But in all these stories, He held the writing pen firmly in His hand and she watched it scrawl across the page from her position snug at His side next to where He carried all her hopes and dreams (and it was snug, because there were a great deal of them!).

This great and loving God who carried all her hopes and dreams continually asked her to trust Him, and to keep on surrendering her everything to Him. And as she did, He brought her all over His world, teaching her always about His love for it and the people in it, and her place in it and His love for her.

Then one day, girl met boy. It was September 10, 2009.

It was rather unlikely for most, but really rather appropriate for her that they met in writing, and communicated that way for the first 7 months that they knew one another. Boy was in London, girl was in Gothenburg. They spoke of everything from what annoyed them (girl couldn’t stand it when people didn’t put things back where they belonged, and boy hated it when people would double-dip in the salsa…), to their childhoods with their families (girl was the middle of 5 kids and grew up on a ranch in the countryside of a rural state; boy was an only child to a single mum and grew up in one of the biggest and most multi-cultural cities in the world), their church experiences (girl was walking through a difficult experience in serving in a church ministry after just finishing her degree in Theology; boy had been deeply involved in the same church family since he was small and was taking a class on preaching and giving his first sermons), their walks with God (they both loved Him and desired Him deeply, and would share with one another how they were seeking Him throughout the seasons), their walks with those around them (girl had roommate trouble to pray through! Boy had the responsibility of caring for his chronically-ill mother), their own personal brokenness and scars collected in living, and their ideas of the purpose for why they were put on this earth—to love and serve Christ and show His love to a world dying for it...

And the sovereign and love-story-writing God smiled in anticipation of all that He would teach girl and boy in the months to come, using them to teach one another facets of His love He had been saving up for them each to discover in good time...

When girl met boy, they simply recognized a similar heart each in the other, and they became friends; friends who began sharing everything with one another. Soon they began to feel odd if they missed a day of communicating. And so they prayerfully decided that they really needed to meet up and speak face-to-face. Girl was beginning to feel more for boy than they spoke about out-right and it frightened her… Boy felt more for girl too, and began to tell her frankly so…

So a date was set for a long-awaited walk through Hyde Park for the next time girl was travelling through London – April 28th, 2010. Girl picked out her favourite ‘casually cute’ outfit (button-down denim skirt, brown leather boots to the knees, blue polka-dot top, and grey cardie), and spent the afternoon beforehand having coffee with a friend and talking herself through her nerves! She really felt there was something different about this boy, something different about this date… She walked to King’s Cross station, held her breath, and waited to see if she could spot him first in the jumble of people coming and going…

She couldn’t have known when she first glimpsed them across the crowd how very special those gorgeous brown eyes would become to her… Or how she would come to want to hold forever that hand he placed in the small of her back as he led her along protectively.

Girl and Boy finally said goodnight near to midnight after wondering all over the city soaking in one another’s presence. It would be the first of many such wanders about London together, making somewhat awkward and stinted conversation after already pouring out their hearts in written words for endless hours in months past. Girl and Boy continued to go on such dates for the next 7 months, strengthening their friendship and praying for wisdom in what God would have them do. Girl was also praying for some courage to let herself be that oh-so-scary thing-- truly loved.

Boy started writing her poetry on July 1st, 2010. He was already in love with her, but he was patient and strong, giving her as much time and space as she needed, and yet proving to her again and again with his very character that he could be trusted, and that with Jesus, he would do everything he could to remain worthy of her trust, to love her well, so she would have no reason to fear. He held out his heart to her in open hands, and then waited…

And girl, though frightened of letting go, was falling for boy, and falling hard.

14 months after first meeting, boy came to visit girl in Sweden, and on November 12th, 2010 they decided to make it official. They stood on a ferry in the moonlight on the North Sea after just deciding that this was it, and they both prayed to a great, big, masterful God who had seen that very moment even all throughout the twenty-some years of their very separate lives full of very different experiences on different continents. They thanked Him, and asked for His guidance, which they had been seeking all those 14 months, to go with them still. Making this decision to be an official couple was a very serious matter because they had both been deliberate about waiting to date anyone exclusively until they were ready to be married. They knew that this would be the first step toward forever, or they wouldn’t be together. (Afterwards, they discovered that they had both been praying in that moment the same, but neither of them had known as they stood cuddled together in silence watching the moon reflect off the water :))

That night was the first time boy asked girl if he could hold her hand :)

Very soon after, in January 2011, girl was headed off to Uganda to have her heart broken by the beautiful little ones left desolate by poverty. Boy held her across the miles with his prayers and his love letters and the broken phone calls which he would spend much mula to make in the deep darkness of the African nights. By March, girl knew that she would have to come back there to adopt some of God’s little ones of Uganda when the time came. Much to her delight, boy put up no fight. And by the end of their separation, boy and girl felt strongly that they knew they wanted to build their lives with no one else… and it became only a matter of time.

In June 2011, boy came all the way over to America to meet girl’s family and to spend 2 weeks with them in her family home. For girl, this ‘test’ sealed the deal. Having her handsome British boy in her rural, midwestern, childhood home was surreal. And somehow, she loved him even more afterwards than she had before.

This boy meets girl story isn’t finished yet (and they hope it never will be!) but the testimony of God’s grace and gentle leading is already evident in it. Girl only dreamed that she would ever be treated so well, like so much precious treasure; like her Father in Heaven has always said she is, but she’s struggled to believe. And boy takes nothing about this gift for granted. And every day the boy and girl continue to examine their hearts and their relationship and learn what it means to love and be loved—through the good and the bad, the joys and the harsh realities, expectations, disappointments, beauty and pain—and to understand love’s place in His plan. He’s still carrying their many hopes and dreams, but now they press up close to Him together to watch what He’s doing and to learn love from the very Master of it…

It's about time I introduced you all to the man I love :)

“I love you from depths of my heart that have been untapped. That all the while in my life God decided through you he would show me a new kind of love, a new way of living for him. You’ve graced my life and it’s still so incomprehensible that I can call you mine. I don’t think I will ever come to terms with it. But I don’t really want to either, I much prefer standing in awe of God’s biggest blessing in my life next to saving me... giving me your heart to hold.” – Charles to Leah, February 2011

'Jesus, My Father, The CIA, and Me' by Ian Morgan Cron

2011-07-18T23:31:00.002+01:00

I had a sweet surprise as I delved into a random book sent to me by an editor to review this summer. “Jesus, My Father, The CIA, and Me: A Memoir of Sorts” by Ian Morgan Cron wasn’t some manly thriller complete with blow-out violence and car chases (though, the author did have a tale to tell of his engine over-heating and starting on fire on a drunken drive down the interstate…) and drug-busts (though it did revolve around the damage caused by his father’s addiction)— the kind of “un-like-me” theme I envisioned when told the title. It was a family drama, deftly told, about a healing man who was once a boy broken by an alcoholic father, and held together by a dysfunctional family and a faithful God.

Cron is a masterful story-teller. I was tickled by his sense of humour and conversational way with words peering through lines like, “Behind the wheel, Marcus was like a retired stuntman with dementia" (pg. 24). Intermingled with the down-to-earth humour, he also speaks in a poetic voice: "God provided me with music as a spiritual foster home until I could find a permanent place to live" (pg 115). In fact, Cron interprets much of his experiences with a poetic eye, like in how as a child Cron was drawn to this Lord who is bigger than any religious method made of man in the Catholic practice of Eucharist. And by how his eyes were called heavenward through such simple things as a fawn in the woods or a water stain on his bedroom ceiling.

Cron’s over-arching story was a testimony of a walk with a Father God who reaches out to us in whatever our circumstances. I was touched by this fearless portrayal of his own doubt and questioning in His walk with God through the years of learning to see Him reaching out, his honesty about the journey that it is, and his gradual discovery that He is breathing in everything around us, and we only must train our ears to hear it. “There is no event so common place but that God is not present within it,” says Fredrick Buechner, “Always hidden, always leaving you room to recognize Him or not to recognize Him.” God walked beside Cron as he maneuvered his way down a winding road, sometimes he could recognize it, and other times he could not. This is one man’s story which, despite growing up across countries and the child of a drunk CIA agent, is really not so very different from any of our own in this human condition-- and the enduring truth of it is God’s faithfulness on that road.

* *I received this book free from Thomas Nelson Publishers as part of their [...] book review bloggers program. I was not required to write a positive review. The opinions I have expressed are my own. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission's 16 CFR, Part 255

Celebrating my B-day with Family!

2011-06-20T22:25:00.000+01:00

To celebrate my 25th, we took all 4 kiddos on a bike ride down the heartland trail. We stopped for a picnic lunch on a lake, under a bridge, and then made it back to Dorset just in time for ice cream cones :) It was precious!

Then the next day, on my actual birthday, my Mom, sister Hannah, sister-in-law Paula, and I went to Walker for a girly lunch at Chase on the Lake, and then boutique-ing! It was such a fun afternoon. We finished up the day back at home for a night of pizza and games with the whole family. This is the first time I've spent my birthday in the states since I turned 21 :)

25 and Thankful

2011-06-18T11:59:00.000+01:00

Today is my 25^th birthday. Unreal! A part of me feels like by now I really should be settled somewhere and have “everything figured out”; the other part of me is just in awe of all that journeys the Lord has had me on in these years, all the facets of His heart He has shared with me, all the faces of His people He’s led me to look into, all of the stories I have heard on their lips and seen in their eyes. I believe that our every day, every hour, every moment is engineered for us to know and love the God who knows and love us, and every experience we encounter in those moments, to draw us deeper into that. How incredible to have had 25 years of such moments…

“…With unfailing love I have drawn you to Myself…”
-- Jeremiah 31:3

In the style of Ann Voskamp’s “One Thousand Gifts”, I want to set down now 25 gifts He’s given my life. A mere, random 25 out of the hundreds and thousands. 25 for each year I’ve been alive. 25 random things I am thankful for in this moment after a beautiful day spent at home in MN with my family, celebrating my birthday (the first time since I was 21)…

1.) Him. How He never gives up on me. More than that, how He chooses to love me with an everlasting love, forever drawing me with loving-kindness (Jer. 31:3-4).

2.) For my family. I love them. I appreciate us all more and more the older I get.

3.) For 2 little nieces and 2 little nephews who delight my heart to no end!!!

4.) For my handsome British boyfriend and the way he’s forever winning my heart. I don’t know anyone with quite his character and heart, and I am blessed and continually amazed that he wants me to be his!

5.) For summer days.

6.) For this majestic pastureland around my home and for long walks through it, seeking His face.

7.) For the way He lets me find Him…

8.) For Doris Day films, so light-hearted and glamorous :)

9.) For Hot Cocoa, or as Charles calls them, “Internal Hugs”—especially in a gorgeous new and unique mug from a certain brother, sis, and Tucker-man!

10.) Chocolate and peanut butter. Yum!

11.) For my aunties. I have been given so many admirable aunties so willing to invest in me as I’ve grown and still today come along side me in friendship and wisdom. I have been so blessed to grow up with such mentors in my life!

12.) For my sister who is, against all odds and after many childish fueds, my friend :)

13.) For lilacs in summer air!! Mmmmm…

14.) For the dearest of dear friends He’s placed in my life, whom “just get it” and with whom I can and do walk through everything. I don’t know why He blesses me so!!

15.) For nostalgic, romantic music…

16.) For babies, and all the dust of heaven they still carry in their tiny grasps…

17.) For His Word and how it replenishes the hungry spirit…

18.) For the way He’s given me true family and friends spread across the world— especially England, Sweden, and now Uganda.

19.) For my little brother Jonah, who has always been very precious to this big sis, but whom has become more and more of a friend over the years. I love this kid so much. My buddy.

20.) For literature and the way it can communicate to the very soul. So so thankful for books and novels and poetry and every bit of the power of the written word!

21.) For kindness in people that continually points me to Him, to the bigger picture He’s written us into, and to the reason why we are here at all. For that sense of purpose.

22.) For the amazing foundation I was given as a child in a beautiful home, in a family which stayed together, in a charmed Northern MN existence. For the conviction that we are not so blessed if not to use it as a platform to bless others.

23.) For laughter-- lots of it!

24.) For His hope.

25.) For His grace.

25 years of blessings... Thank You, Lord.

"The world is full of magic things, patiently waiting for our senses to grow sharper." --William Butler Yeats

2011-06-14T06:46:00.000+01:00

A Restless Soul and the Peace of the Pastures

2011-06-12T20:38:00.001+01:00

I came home feeling rather used up and exhausted. And I have struggled with discouragement at the thought that after weeks home, I have still felt daunted by the thought of moving on. I have felt God has been somewhat distant. I have taken long walks crying out to Him to just show me what's going on, and felt as if my cries echoed back to me empty. And I have wondered how long this season would last, and would I ever feel more myself again (because I am nothing but lost without Him), and would everything always feel so ambiguous and confusing, and would it always look as if everything takes so much more emotional energy than I have? A weariness had settled over my soul in such a way that I started to fear it would never leave.

... But even in the frustrating weeks of privately thrashing about trying to put things back together, when I didn't even know what had broken, He began to minister quietly to my soul. Through lyrics playing over the Christian radio in the car (Christian radio stations?! They are rare in Europe...); through the Francine Rivers novels I have been revisiting (The Mark of The Lion Trilogy is speaking to me more profoundly now than ever before... a MUST-read); through the priceless abject lessons found in cuddling my precious nieces and nephews (How can what God feels for me be GREATER than what I feel for these children??)-- quiet whispers in the day-to-day, nothing obvious to be found in my current bible study workbook or a revelation while listening to a sermon. He slowly started tuning my ears to His quiet whispers sent to my soul.

And, again I find it is in wandering the pastures of my father's ranch that it all comes into focus, and I can feel His presence thickly, wrapped up in all of His beauty. And it's there, in His presence, where I am healed and made whole again.

It has felt as if I just couldn't put my finger on what I needed to do to make things right-- so the vice-like grip of anxiety has been draining me of life-breath and leaving me battling for hope; forgetting that it has never been about what I can or can't do to begin with!

Sitting under the majestic beauty of these blue skies, this prayer falls from the tip of my pen and even as it comes from my heart, He is breathing into that heart some perspective again:

"Thank You for being mine, no matter the circumstances or the quagmire-y days, weeks, years I trod through. Lord, I am counting on You now, as ever, to renew my passion. Be my joy and my strength. Give me wisdom by Your Holy Spirit that I do not hold on my own. Give me grace in my speech and my deeds that can only come from Your overflowing wells. I need You, Father God. You know that. So please, break through whatever barrier I knowingly or unknowingly put up and be all to me. Every breath, every word, every thought, every hope, every deed. Be all. May my life, my attitude, my words, my every action, speak one long story of You, that draws anyone who hears it, reads it, or sees it, to Your heart, Lord God. Give me boldness in the fear, trust in the anxiety, love in the hurt. Lead me to always forgive as You have forgiven, a radical choice of love in a world of hate... Give me the humility of one who knows who she is as Yours. Yes, Lord. That's what I need. A clear knowledge of who I am in light of You.

I sit here in the emerald sea of the pasture-lands of home and I know You are here because I can physically see all the beauty around me. Thank You. Thank You for coming to redeem me. And then for not leaving me all alone in my own mess in this world, but leaving Your imprint of beauty on everything to lift my eyes and my heart to You. And for leaving Your Holy Spirit. Lord, teach me how to walk anew with Your Holy Spirit guiding every step, every breath.

I am Your vessel; nothing more, nothing less. I do not have to worry about tomorrow or about how I should or shouldn't plan my days. You will lift me up and carry me in Your purpose. Oh Lord, renew my faith. Show me how to rest in Your will and Your grace, knowing it is more than enough for even me! Give me work to busy my hands and inspiration to guide my life. And teach me to rest. Then draw everyone around me to You with the fragrance of Your presence, Abba God. You love us all so. May my life endlessly proclaim Your praise because of it..."

If any of you know what it feels like to be aching for peace, may you find somewhere to curl up next to Him and just pour your heart out, waiting for Him to come in and fill it. He meets us wherever we are. Again and again, I stand amazed at His majesty reaching down to wrap little old me up in His embrace...

May you know this Love; may you love this Lover.
Love,
Leah

"You will keep in perfect peace all who trust in You, whose thoughts are fixed on You! Trust in the Lord always, for the Lord God is the eternal Rock."
-- Isaiah 26:3-4

"I am no longer anxious about anything as I realize this, for He, I know, is able to carry out His will, and His will is mine. It makes no matter where He places me, or how. That is rather for Him to consider than for me; for in the easiest position He must give me His grace, and in the most difficult His grace is sufficient...So if ...God should place me in great perplexity, must He not give me much guidance, in positions of great difficulty much grace, in circumstances of great pressure and trial much strength? No fear that His resources will prove unequal to the emergency! And His resources are mine, for He is mine, and is with me and dwells in me!"
--Hudson Taylor

Bold Decisions...

2011-05-21T06:55:00.000+01:00

So… you know when you end up reading a book in a season where you just know that you didn’t just “end up” reading it, but that it was placed in your hands for such a time as this? I’ve recently read such a one. Upon returning to Sweden from Uganda, “One Thousand Gifts” by Ann Voskamp arrived in the post from my auntie in the states. In the quiet weeks of recovering from being struck by a few different illnesses one after the other, I became addicted to its message, but in such a way that I had to take long pauses between chapters to digest what I’d just been chewing on. An Abba-God I used to know was calling out to me from its pages, and asking me to get to know Him this way again…

Meanwhile, I’d just returned from a few months serving in Africa, upon the heels of a difficult year of serving in Sweden, and in the midst of preparing for a big move to a new ministry in the UK which I’d been working out for a little over a year by this point. I was tired-- the kind of tired which isn’t so much in body, though my body was definitely making me face up to its own brand of exhaustion, than it is soul. I didn’t even realize until getting lost in the pages of this book, where an ordinary woman falls deeply in love with her God through thankfulness in the every-day things, that I had plodded myself into this space where I had lost the wonder of being His. That I had served my way into “doing” for Him instead of “being” in Him. That I was sort of getting caught in running this race on auto-pilot instead of with the passion of my heart. And the awakening, though gradual, was shocking. And powerful.

He, being all kinds of wonderful, was gentle with me in the awakening. Wooing, with a familiar call, through all kinds of elements of life in these past 6 weeks (and even before, had my eyes only been open). And it’s nearly impossible to explain, but somehow, even though I’d never left Him and He’d never left me, I started to miss Him. I started to miss what we once had, when my eyes were open to the wonder of being His. That’s what ever got me into this crazy life of serving Him in whatever capacity half-way across the world. It was a reaction to such awesome, unfathomable love and grace. It was a stunned acceptance of what He is and what He wants to draw us into in walking with Him, an acknowledgement of coming to an understanding, however meager, of our place in His cosmic, redemptive plan and history. And it was, most simply, a love reaction from my heart to His because of His heart’s love for me.

And I suddenly became afraid of what it would become if I lost that wonder, that put-in-your-rightful-place gratefulness, that sense of “eucharisteo” as the book expounds on: Communion with God.

I fumble for words to describe what I mean and I know it will not come out in full… But basically, that was the base I was sitting on as I continued to work out details with the new ministry in the UK and the team I was joining. Between my starting date in July and those final weeks in Sweden, I had before me about 2 months back in the states to process work visas and fundraise thousands of dollars to make it possible to work endless hours on a voluntary basis. One week there were details of acquiring a visa which suddenly made it look like what we’d been working toward for a year would suddenly be made impossible, and I had to rethink it all. Then that was sorted, and everything was full-speed ahead again when an off-hand comment from the great team leader of the team I was about to join in the UK made me stop and reflect and see it all in a way I had never chanced to see. And suddenly within the span of 2 days, the Spirit of God was prompting me to make a decision to make a 180 degree change in plans. Some of you might know I’m not the most decisive person, and when I am, it is usually due to a gut reaction, a just “knowing” what it is I need to do. This time I didn’t have that, at least not strongly—a symptom, perhaps of being so out of touch with my intrinsic motivation of belonging to Him. The decision instead was made on a lot of logic and advice from people wiser than I. And as I sought Him and considered in those 2 days, elements of the “just knowing” began to return.

I had to decide that the time was not right to start a new challenge with a new ministry role.

There were many elements to the decision, perhaps too many to categorize here.

I felt that my perspectives on living a life of ministry were somewhat different to the team leader’s and I anticipated tension as we worked together and just wondered if I had the soul-energy to deal with that just now. I believe a team needs all kinds of personalities to work well, all of us learning from one another, and learning to bend and bounce with one another, so I knew that God would use that regardless to shape and form us if I were to go ahead. So it wasn’t the deciding factor, but it was a factor.

I was also very conscious that between the time I began discussing a partnership between this ministry and I, and now when I was about to take the step, I had started a relationship with a man which God may very well be leading into a lifelong relationship of serving Him together. My year with this ministry suddenly became somewhat illogical in that I would be starting a whole new challenge which he would not be involved in, pulling us more apart in experiences instead of making the space for us to emotionally build our lives and hearts more and more together. And practically, though I would be back in the UK (which we have been very much looking forward to) the time and expense it would take to see one another by train in the same country would be comparable to the time and expense it takes to see one another now by plane in two separate ones. Plus, a full-time ministry schedule is MANIC. My time would forever be farmed out with a combination of days, nights, and weekends, making visits few and far between anyway.

The idea of starting a new challenge which separates our experiences greatly might not have been that big of a deal under different circumstances, as we are two separate people, but the work with this team was never a long-term deal, but more of a “foot-in-the-door” to work with this mission agency overall. The agency and I had begun talking with an eye toward my doing work with their Member Care down the road if I were to continue studying and get qualifications in counseling and pastoral care or missionaries, which was a practical ministry we discussed which was on my heart. This particular team had nothing to do with that, and that work discussed was much further down the road, practically speaking, after further studies, age, and experience. So, it was, in effect, a ministry to bide my time in—though I believe that God is working in everything and by no means want to belittle it. It would have been the experience He was after using to shape and form me more into the image of His Son and to train me for His kingdom work, had it been the direction I went! But it was becoming more restricting to what God seems to be up to with me than releasing now…

Which leads into the reflection on what my heart seems to be shaped for in serving Him anyway, and the realizing, again, that all along my desire for ministry work has been to write, to serve Him in writing. With all the craziness of serving Him in the ministries He’s put before me, while also maintaining my support teams and finding part-time employment in whatever way I could to keep afloat, I have managed to write a bit here and there, and to have a few pieces published, but it has not been given the focus I would so love to give it. And taking on the pressures of fitting into another formal ministry position which didn’t have a focus on a writing ministry didn’t look like a promising step in the right direction…

And finally, and most importantly, really, God had been opening my eyes to my need to slow down and reflect, to get out from under the pressure, to rediscover my place in Him. My body was voicing its exhaustion in all kinds of ways, my emotions and soul were starting to wake up to it, and my God was calling me back to the faith like a child I had started with. What would best lend itself out to focusing on this? It is the deepest thing in life, this relationship. All the rest fades away.

And in that light, I knew.

After my year with Rescue Mission, I was already asking God, “please, Lord, can my next step be a paid job to live a life of ministry with?” So tired of the support-raising life and the pressure of formal ministry. And yet, when He literally handed me a paid job I like doing in preparation for Uganda, I didn’t seem to see it as an answer to prayer. Silly closed eyes! Here again, this job in Sweden was held out to me and I didn’t see it as the answer to that prayer. And then in the 2 days in which I had to make the decision about joining the new ministry even if my heart wasn’t fully in it, I was crying out to Him constantly for wisdom on what to do, and suddenly it hit like a flash, “Isn’t this what you prayed for? Open your eyes!”

And so… all of that to say that I’m entering a new season of following Him. I am not joining any official ministry. I am taking a job I really like and which has been just handed to me in His grace to “tent-make”, with the flexibility to continue building up this relationship with my Londoner as we navigate our way toward a life of serving Him together (Oh, the lessons He is teaching me in Love! Perhaps now I’ll take the time to soak them in...). I am getting involved with an exciting church planting project in my city, reaching out to internationals (which my heart loves). I am finally going to try to lend a bit more focus to a ministry of writing (hence the new blog look—perhaps to document the journey! Or, at any rate, to hone the skill and exercise the mind/heart partnership involved :)), which, in turn, will mean practicing reflection again, practicing the presence of God in the moments, in the happenings, in the thoughts and experiences. It’s how I ponder the wonder of being His. And that relationship is what matters most. And out of that relationship, ministry happens unforced and organic. More of Him, less of me (John 3:30).

It feels a bit scary, it feels a bit bold, to choose to alter the whole of a life plan to focus on getting back to what matters most. But I know that I know that I know, that it’s worth it all. And so, I greet this new season with a mix of trepidation, weariness, excitement and joy (because, after all, belonging to Love itself, “why should the heart not dance?”). And I would love for you to join me on this journey. Let’s scale any wall, forfeit any plans, face any fear to climb up so close to the heart of God that we move with its rhythms. This is how I want to want Him. This is the trust He wants to teach me. So, onward with the lessons…

Here we go.

Big Decisions...

2011-04-23T16:17:00.002+01:00

“All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given us.” –J.R.R. Tolkien

I am deciding.
Watch this space...

FINALLY-- an African Recap

2011-04-15T23:23:00.002+01:00

"All around you, people will be tip-toeing through life,
just to arrive at death safely.
But dear children, do not tiptoe.
Run, hop, skip, or dance, just don't tip-toe."
-Shane Claiborne

I’m not sure how it’s happened. A mere 5 months ago I was still quaking in my boots about the next step in my walk with God—following Him into what to me felt like a “deep-end”, following Him into a few months serving Him in Africa. Uganda, specifically. A country that I, to be honest, had no special affinity for on a continent I had only curiosity about, not fondness. I have already been back to the continent where He’s planted my heart for 46 days (O Europe, I do love you). 46 whirlwind days of happy reunions, meetings, work, and some scary bouts of serious illness (just thankful that didn’t happen in Africa!!), and sorting out all the details of the move to the next step in ministry, and all these days of reality later… I still feel a sort of vague, “So God, what was that all about?”

Some Unforgettable Moments (both the beautiful and the haunting)…

- Swimming in the Nile River. The water was so clear and cool & refreshing, yet sun-warmed. We dipped completely under it in a little naturally deep pool under a small waterfall. Some hundreds of mile upstream and some hundreds of years ago, the baby Moses was hidden in a basket in the rushes at the river’s edge. And we swam in its flow, rode its mighty current. Incredible!

- Meeting the street children near Garden City in Kampala. They were mere babies. One little girl sitting by the side of the road all by herself couldn’t have been more than 2 years old and her tiny little unsmiling figure sitting so close to the crazy Kampala traffic literally jarred me. I walked on with stunned tears saying again and again, “But she’s just a baby...” We are told the parents use them to beg and are only hiding nearby, but the image jarred me nonetheless and I felt every bit of my little helplessness the rest of the way home that night and hugged the babies at the home where we were working extra closely the next day…

- Being witness to little John Mark’s arrival to Acacia Tree on the afternoon of our very first day there. His frightened 15-yea-old mama was sitting outside the front gate for hours as if trying to gain the courage to come. Robin, Acacia Tree’s director, asked her if everything was alright, but was turned away. We could hear his little baby cries through our open windows throughout the day. Finally, Robin sent Blessed, one of the Ugandan staff, out to ask after her. And suddenly a VERY smelly baby boy wearing a dress, and wrapped up in layers and layers of awful, smelly blankets, despite the unbearable heat (I CANNOT understand that about Ugandan mamas…), was laid in my lap. He was beautiful, just about 4 weeks old, and hungry, but otherwise healthy. I very swiftly fell in love and my favourite way to spend the hours at Acacia Tree each day became to cradle him in my arms and rock him in the corner rocker, whispering prayers over his little life as I did…

- Experiencing a miracle when my Boda-Boda wiped out! I LOVED riding boda-boda, which is one of the main ways of getting around in Uganda. They are simply motorbikes, ordinary motorbikes, used like personal taxis. One day the one I was riding hit a patch of road where the driver lost control. It was only a few God-designed acts of grace that kept me from being seriously wounded or killed when I went flying over that driver’s head. First of all, I was riding “like a man”. Usually when I was riding a boda alone (I most often was riding along with a friend behind the driver), I would sit “side-saddle” as that’s how most usually women ride in Uganda. But that day I was fed up with it and decided to just let people look at me if they wanted to (they were always looking at me anyway because of my white skin and blond hair!) and sit “like a man”, astride. If I had been sitting like a lady when the bike went down, I would have smacked the back of my head against the pavement and that would have been it… And we were on the open highway going at top motorbike speeds for about 7km. When the driver lost control our turn was not far up ahead so he had just stopped accelerating… It all happened so fast I hardly knew what hit me, but suddenly felt the right side of my face scraping against the hot pavement and then… for a moment… had no idea what was happening. When I heard the driver saying to me, “Get up! Get up!” I was surprised to find that I was getting up, pushing myself to my knees, then standing to my feet. I found myself reaching up and stroking my cheek then holding my hand back to check for the blood which must be there for touching my face, but finding none, again and again. There wasn’t a single scratch on my face… The bike was totaled, and I was in too much shock to think clearly, so on wobbly legs I simply started walking the rest of the way home, about a half a mile down dusty red roads through the village. Everyone was running to the edge of their yards shouting, “Mzungu! How are you?” and I blinked the tears of shock away as I limped along, the blood running from my shoulder and my leg, and called back, “Fine, thank you. How are you?” It was a long limping walk home where Gabi jumped up to clean every bit of dirt out of my wounds and bandage me up, but the whole way I was whispering praises under my breath. It was an act of God which kept me from cracking open my skull on that highway in the middle of Africa, let alone not breaking a single bone, or even spraining anything. Instead walking (albeit limping…) away. It was nothing but His grace… And I felt like I was treading on a miracle. I was very sore for the next few weeks, my neck and knee especially, but the nasty cuts were healed up within the month. And though I felt that I couldn’t share about this experience until after I left Uganda, so as not to worry my family as I had another month to go at this point and much more travel to do via boda-boda and other risqué African means, I cannot help but share of His protective hand on me made so real in those moments… “What is impossible with men is possible with God” – Luke 18:27

- Being rowed along in a wooden, weather-worn boat (by a new friend who owned the quiet island where we were staying) while watching the sunset over the rapids of the mighty Nile river. The sun sets SO quickly on the equator. Within minutes the massive, clearly-defined orange orb slipped behind the silhouette of the trees along the shore. This may be the most powerful “pinch me” moment of my whole 2 months in Africa. My heart was completely lost in praise, as if gazing directly at the beauty of the Lord Himself, and so overcome by gratitude. I can’t find the words to describe how it touched me…

- Our every day with the boys of Acacia Tree. The four of them joined together to steal my heart away. Moses was especially charming when he started taking my hand in his and pulling it to his lips for a princely kiss on the knuckles one day when I was bathing him in a bucket in the sunshine :) And one of the days that Em and I had all 4 boys playing out on a blanket in the yard and a fussy little zac crawled into my lap and fell asleep, so precious and vulnerable in a world with so much stacked against them. I could have taken them home and loved him forever…

- The ridiculous come-ons from the men EVERYWHERE we went. They would look us up and down at the markets and say, “My size, my size” when they liked our figures, or call out, “My wife!” after us as we walked by… Of course there was the common, “Hey baby”, but most often it was the overly-friendly, “How are you, beautiful?”-- always accompanied by the classic straying eye. Oh dear. The boda-drivers were the most aggressive and there were times Emily couldn’t control her temper when they were persistent and she’d have a little shriek at them to leave us alone, which always rather cracked me up :) We grew bolder and bolder as time went on and stopped trying to remain polite despite being treated like fresh meat… Especially whenever we had to pass through Kampala. We HATED Kampala. SO crowded with people and traffic all vying for every bit of conceivable space. We saw a man on a bicycle have his hands crushed on his handle-bars by 2 public taxi buses on either side of him. And we had to walk amongst that, squeezed between moving vehicles. So scary! But the scariest bit was the way the men in Kampala wouldn’t just look us up and down or greet us, but physically GRAB us and try to pull us to them!! This would really shake me up and make me angry, and it seemed to happen to me most often so Emily would constantly be yelling at people to let me go…. NOT fun. We were also pick-pocketted here (some guy stole my alarm clock out of a zipped pocket of my backpack) and Emily had a guy run by and rip her necklace from her neck… Ugh. NOT a fan of Kampala!!! But so grateful for God’s constant protection over us.

- Just setting up everything with Gabi in the first month. It was all new and different when doing it in Africa! Everything from stringing up a clothesline in the garden (which was soon overrun by ants crawling all over the rope and anything we had drying on it…), to meeting with Ugandan officials and praying silently under our breath for the paperwork process of starting the ministry, to hiring a guard for the compound with a bow and arrow because they are more feared than the guards with guns (and cheaper!). Unreal.

- The days that our little Autistic/Down’s Syndrome 4-year-old Jonathan at Acacia Tree would feel cuddly and want to be snuggled. He’s wrap those little arms around my neck and just rest his whole self right into me with such trust and abandon. A little like God wants of me. Jonathan was the first HIV-positive child that I have ever worked with and what a trooper…

- Being asked to share in my new Ugandan friend Dan’s lecture at Uganda Christian University the morning of our visit! We didn’t know what was coming and blundered our way through a few minutes of telling the 2^nd year University class about what we knew of nutrition in developed countries. We found it rather surreal and laughed long and hard about the experience later. We’re determined to add “guest lecturer” to our CV’s now ;)

- Showering in a bucket. Hehehe :) The only showers I took in Uganda were cold ones—firstly because that was the only temperature available, then in the second month, because the only alternative temperature was scalding hot :) And how the red dust would just pour off of our bodies at the end of each day!!

- Visiting Divine Orphanage for the first time and being literally swarmed by the most precious little children. We couldn’t communicate together in words, but only in touches and in smiles. My 2 months in Uganda were completely precious but always kind of a mystery to me. Like, “God, why am I here?” But that afternoon, loving on those beautiful orphaned and abandoned children so delighted by any bit of attention, I felt instinctively that even if this afternoon was the only reason why I came all this way, it would be enough just being given the chance to show these little ones His love for them in whatever way possible for whatever bit of time allotted. I was drawn specifically to one little girl called Shianna, who seemed to keep to herself, rather quiet and sullen. But once I scooped her up, she wouldn’t be put down. And she’s still being held in my heart. These children need sponsors to help see them through the treacherous life they’ve been thrown into as orphans or abandoned children. PLEASE get in touch with me if the Lord speaks to your heart at all about loving the fatherless… The lady taking them in is kindness itself with a heart bigger than the whole of Uganda. She would love to be in touch with you. And of course, if you can visit these little ones, do!! They will greet you with arms wide open (and probably want to run their hands through your hair for hours on end like my experience :)) and neither they nor you will ever be the same…

- Deciding that Emily might have come down with Malaria one night at an hour to midnight and calling a boda-boda to the hostel gate under the starlight to be whisked away to the nearest clinic for treatment in the dark of night (we didn’t like being out after dark as a rule, and held hands as we walked along afterwards, looking for a boda and ignoring the come-ons of the men walking down the same road….eek!). Oh the adventure! She was a great sport about it and we giggled our way through it, got the meds, and within days she was feeling 100% again. Possibly the most unreal part of the night was the way the hostel’s guard, Joseph, asked Malaria-ridden and feverish Em if she would cheat on her boyfriend with an African man (meaning: with HIM, specifically. Ha!) Her response was a quick, high-pitched squeal of, “That is WRONG, Joseph!” And she put him right in his place :)

- The kindness and huge-hearted generosity of the people I met. My overriding opinion of Ugandan people is that they are the most generous people on earth; so welcoming. I was so blessed by how quickly I made friends, and how precious the friendships were. I would go back in an instant :)

- Making friends with the children wherever we would go. We walk everywhere in Uganda and whether during the first month in Jinja or the second one in Entebbe, the children living along the route we walked each day were very quick to run out from their homes and introduce themselves. Soon it was an everyday occurrence to be escorted down the red dirt road by our young friends who would drop everything to walk along and hold our hands and have a little conversation with us on our way to and from work :) Precious precious precious!

- On our last weekend Em and I went away to a place we heard of called Hairy Lemon Island about 5 hours away (when we stayed on the Nile). We stayed two days and on the second day when we opened the door to our dorm there was a gigantic toad sitting right inside the door. Em shrieked and I tried to nudge him out with my toe, but he hopped away under a bed and we forgot about him. Then we made the LONG journey home, over 6 hours due to traffic jams around Kampala, bumping along awful roads, shoving ourselves into crowded public taxis one after the other for hours at a time, with our weekend luggage packed in on our laps. When we finally got back to Entebbe and unpacked our weekend bags to pack our suitcases to fly out, I heard ANOTHER shriek from Em, and the hostel guard came running to our room. As she unzipped her bag to unpack, there, sitting right at the top of her things, was the giant toad! She brought him all the way home with us from that island on the Nile!! It was hilarious :) :)

- Gabs and I making makeshift meals without a kitchen. At first we didn’t even have a fridge! We were hungry a lot. Ha. But when we finally got a gas burner we’d go to the market and pick out delicious fresh organic veg, which is just so plentiful in beautiful, tropical Uganda, and make gorgeous simple veggie dishes :) And I became addicted to Guava juice and Hibiscus juice! Ooh, yum. Also, I have never tasted pineapple like Ugandan pineapple! The markets are crazy with people and everyone trying to sell you their wares, but it is totally worth braving just for the experience of all the colourful fruits and veg! I had fun experimenting with making fresh juice from scratch—a lot of fresh lemonade and fresh passionfruit juice! Mmm.

- I missed chocolate. The only chocolate to be found in Uganda was very very expensive and looked as old as the hills in its packaging (My wonderful boyfriend had a bar of Galaxy waiting when I got back to England, cuz he’s sweet :)). Your best bet for anything sweet in Uganda, in fact, was juice and fruit, or chewing on, then spitting out, bits of sugar cane!

- The stillness of the long African evenings at home when the day was done. Especially the first month there were endless hours to read (Charles Dickens' "David Copperfiled") and write (So many thousands of words!) and spend time with God. I ate up my Bible Study and wished that time would just stand still like that in Europe more often to get lost in The Word. In the evenings, the temperature would cool to just about perfect-- maybe in the 70's?-- and the light would slowly fade and I would sit on the porch and dwell in His beauty and lay out the contents of the day to Him to whisper to me through.... Precious moments Africa gave me!

I actually loved it. I was surprised by how quickly it grew on me; by how even the difficulties of the culture and the weather and the dirt and the distance and the bugs and the inconveniences and the stares and the aggression and the misunderstandings and the overt poverty and the begging and the heat and the brutality and the sheer “lack”, became just part of the whole experience. It is an experience I may never fully understand, but will never ever forget. And it changes me-- it changes the way I see-- to step so far outside of my own comfort zone and deep into facets of His heart I've not had to know before. I may be back in Uganda at times.

People always think of Africa as the most needy, the main area for mission. I suppose the needs are so obvious and so vast. It's undeniable. And I suppose that's why He brought me there, to teach me to hold my hands against the wounds on the dusty red equator. But only so long as I see with His eyes that needs go beyond the obvious, that neediness goes beyond the traditional missionfield of Africa, that it's never been about a place, but about His heart. It's about the fact of His love and the fact of a world bustling with people of every colour, tongue, and tribe who need to come to realize that they are loved by the King...

And so, He brings me back to a stoic and unbelieving Sweden, and He brings me next to an unlikely place in the midlands of England, the job description and the demographic always different, but always with the same overriding message being whispered through this needy-and-touched heart to touch the neediness the world over, "You are loved" and "Jesus"...

May you know this faithful Lover, may you know this ceasless Love.
Love,
Leah

When it Rains, It Pours...

2011-03-19T14:32:00.001Z

I can do nothing but apologize for my long silence here!

Em and I left Uganda on the 1st of March-- Em for home, me for England. I had a lovely few days with my handsome London man, meeting up with my upcoming ministry team in Birmingham (and letting them meet him!), and seeing some friends. When I arrived back in Sweden a week and a day ago, I instantly came down ill with an awful cold but pressed on and went back to work Monday morning. On Wednesday, due to some kind of malfunction in an accessory of my insulin pump, my blood sugars sky-rocketed to the point of my body starting to go into shock. I was at work and desperately rang everyone I knew with a car to help me get home to my insulin syringes which are an emergency backup if something's up with the pump. The Lord sent along friends just in time, and one of them who's never given an injection before was able to give me a jab while the other supported me to keep from falling over while I threw up repeatedly... Nice. They stayed with me til I was feeling more myself again. And I am so very thankful for how He provides!

I went back to work the next day but could only manage to stay half a day for feeling so very weak and ill, not an uncommon after-effect of having an extreme high blood sugar like I had suffered the day before. I worked at getting my blood sugars stabilized and tried not to be worried as instead of feeling better, I only grew worse throughout the day. Too nauseous to eat since about Tuesday, I drank as much water as possible and tried to keep little bits of food down. I was reading up about what to do after the Diabetic shock I had had, and found I had all the symptoms of Diabetic Ketoacidosis, which can become very fatal very quickly. I tried not to panic and worked on regulating my blood sugar numbers. By 6pm thursday night, I started having very good, regular blood sugar readings, and they remained that way as I checked every hour the rest of the evening, yet I grew sicker. And more and more frightened... Afraid of the costs of visiting a foreign Emergency Room, I wanted to be absolutely sure that my body wasn't getting better with the regulated blood sugar numbers before I went in, so decided that if I still felt so awful by tomorrow (friday), I would go in and see a doctor, but I hoped for a turn in my health in the night.

It only got worse.

By 1:30am I was unable to sleep for the most horrific pain in my lower back, a racing heart, and difficulty breathing, on top of the nausea, headache, weakness, and dizziness that had been with me for a few days now. I prayed from 1:30 to 3:30 about what to do, extremely disoriented and just plain frightened. Finally, at 3:30, I knocked on my friend Teri-Anne's door and woke her to say I thought I needed to go to the hospital. This woman is amazing. She popped out of bed, totally calm, speaking in soothing tones. It had begun to snow in the night and she felt scared to drive in it, but didn't let her worry betray her.

By 4am, we were at the emergency room of Sahlgrenska, the main hospital here in Gothenburg. They got me on a stretcher and hooked me up to a heart monitor by about 6 huge tubes. Weird. They drew blood, they took down as much information of my condition as I could tell them through short, rapid breaths (with T-A interpreting in Swedish where needed), they inserted an IV, then they wheeled me into an observation room. And we waited. And we waited. I was totally impatient, in extreme pain, having trouble breathing, and gagging with nothing to vomit. Finally, about 6:00, a doctor came and drew some blood from an artery in my inner wrist (Ouch! I'm still bruised and tender there!) to check for Acidosis in my blood. They hooked me up to an IV drip (so strange to be on!) of electrolytes and gave me some pain killers. And we waited some more (so strange to lie there watching the drip and listening to everyone around you carrying on in a foreign language...). Teri-Anne never left my side, and I cannot tell you how much it meant to have her there. She even canceled her day of work and her lovely husband Anders took the kids to school by public bus since we had the car!

We were in the ER til noon. After being on the drip for awhile, I began to breathe more easily. My mouth was no longer dry for the first time in days. The pain killers took the back pain away. They took a urine test and the very kind doctor came to tell us that it is not Ketoacidosis, that every test came back negative (praise the Lord!) and that I seem to have a viral infection which has just been aggravated by the high blood sugar shock I had on Wednesday which dehydrated me. As I have felt so ill and haven't been able to eat properly, I haven't been able to get re-hydrated after the shock. And most of the pain and the ill-as-death feeling comes from being so dehydrated! So, a liter of electrolyte drip later, I was able to go home and crawl into bed for as many days as it takes to be well again...

And so, here I am. My biggest challenge is trying to eat. Blah... Not being able to eat can be a bit of a problem when you're Diabetic and have to keep your blood sugar numbers in just the right range-- which involves an intricate dance of insulin and diet! I appreciate any prayers you have to offer...

It has been terrifying to be so very ill, and with the complications of the Diabetes, and so far from home. I think it's perhaps safe to say that I haven't been so scared for my health as I have these last few treacherous days. But God is so good to me in my friends. Teri-Anne was a total hero that night, and even now watches over me carefully as I try to recover but remain very very ill. He even had a couple of friends who adamantly don't believe in Him praying for me when I went into hospital :) And the way Mike and Brona dropped everything to come and literally rescue me on Wednesday when I was going into Diabetic shock. I know it is all from Him. And He touches my heart with how He surrounds me with His goodness. And just imagine if this would have happened while in Africa (which it easily could have done, as I was using the same insulin pump accessories there!)??

I do hope to write a final post on my months in Africa soon... Just after I'm well...
For now, I thank each of you who have been praying for me!! And I sign off to sleep...
Loving you. Loving Him. And healing,
Leah