Delighting in the Divine
Yes to freedom, yes to play and yes to celebrating the moment!
Delighting in the Divine
Yes to freedom, yes to play and yes to celebrating the moment!
All tagged breakthrough
It is my thirty-second birthday this week. That comes as a surprise to me because I have been thinking I am thirty-two for several months now. It might be something to do with the Peruvian habit of always referring to the age you are going to be next birthday when you are asked how old you are...
Do you ever have times when you know you are processing something in your mind but you can’t quite grasp what? There has been an unsettling in my spirit about the new year that I haven’t been able to put my finger on but has manifested in a holding back.
When I think about my life and our ministry in Peru, I want to see God do everything He wants to do through us. But present in my heart is also a fear and resistance which says something like: ...
I remember waking up the first time I lost a baby a few days after the delivery. It was the middle of the night and I felt an extreme sense of joy welling up inside me - I could almost hear angels singing around me. It seemed so foreign and wrong to be feeling so joyful only a few days after losing a child. My first reaction was, ‘God, is this You?! How can it be You?!’ His reply came clear and strong: ‘the joy of the Lord is your strength.’ ...
About a week after the miscarriage life was pretty intense for some other circumstances and with the stress of grieving the miscarriage, being thrown straight back into leading stuff out here with Mark and readjusting to living life back in Peru after two months of travels led me to really question whether or not I wanted to carry on leading out Oikos with Mark. Not that I had anything else I wanted to do, or any idea of where we would go, but I felt the enemy strongly trying to get me to give up and ‘go home’ wherever that would be! If God had offered me an accelerated ticket to heaven, I may well have taken Him up on the offer! ...
Have you ever seen a canal lock being opened? In order for the water levels on the canal river to align, a large metal key is wound into the lock gate which slowly opens sections of the lock gate to allow water to flow through. The more the key is turned, the more water is allowed through until finally the water is at such a level that the gates of the lock can be opened and the flow of water is aligned...
I need joy! I crave joy - that sanctified radiating witness of the Holy Spirit in my life. The empowering strength of the Lord, that springs into praise of my Creator.
I need the joy of the Lord to be my strength but I often find that joy does not come easily or naturally to me. Despair, grief and lethargy seem to creep up on me and try and cloak my spirit instead...
Last night, a good friend and I sat and chatted in her new apartment until just past my bedtime.
The last week has been incredibly busy. A close friend and teammate has just had her first child and I accompanied her husband and her during the labour, birth and post birth which lasted 3 days. When I wasn’t with them at various clinics, I was trying to keep my children from writing too many letters or complaining too loudly in protest at my absence! (Yes, the first day I came home, I was faced with a paper stuck to the door reading ‘why do you love them more than us?’!) Sleep was not had and other responsibilities remained, even if homeschool did go out of the window for a few days (the boys got the holidays they'd been asking for!) ...
Sometimes the questions are too big. The future is too unknown. Sometimes the answers are not there. Or not what I want to hear. Sometimes I don’t need the answers, but rather just the assurance that it’s going to be okay...
As Christians, we know that we are in a battle. But there are seasons. And sometimes we find ourselves on the frontline.
Think World War One trenches. You know the enemy is nearby. You can feel the guns going off and every now and again a bullet flies close and it may even wound you or a friend. At that moment there feels like every justification to scream and panic and run home. To forget that you may be just one soldier but you are in a battle which is part of something larger...
When I had a newborn baby, I expected to be changing a lot of nappies (or diapers for my American friends!). Perhaps, I was surprised by the sheer quantity in the first few months, but I knew that much of the early months would be spent changing and changing nappies and clothes.
But when God gives me a spiritual baby, suddenly I am surprised when things aren’t easy or fun at times. I mean, they can be fun. I’m not saying cleaning up poop is fun, but most parents do have good memories of tickling tummies and smiles and giggles as a nappy change is done...
Often we think our emotions are the enemy.
As I was sitting last night with a friend, we talked about emotions and how they have so much influence on her life. She made a comment about just needing to ignore her emotions and look at the logic of a situation.
But emotions can be incredibly useful if we know their proper role in our lives...
Lima is currently passing through the coldest winter in my lifetime. Now compared to England, the daytime temperatures for winter are good (11-16’C/51-60’F), but we have no heating in our houses here, the sun never shines and it is damp and windy! So, since May I have been in at least quadruple layers on top and bottom and we had to buy extra blankets for many of the beds. On the upside, the rain has been more frequent - which in a desert, the plants are loving and so am I as I haven’t had to water the garden!
But the strangest thing for me has been our peach tree. I planted it in the first year of being here and it did nothing for two years. At least, nothing visible...
The most helpful and inspiring workshop I ever went to at University was a voluntary one.
Only 6 or so students turned up, all seeking the answer to the same question: How can we get top marks in our essays with this teacher? (From what I remember the class was on French existentialism!)
I think we all expected to be pointed to key academic texts we could discover the answers to the varied essay questions in, or to be given a secret or two by the teacher. But as far as I recall, there was none of that...
Sometimes I look at a bad situation and I start praying.
And that is the right response...
Last post talked about days I trudge through mud. I don’t want the implication to be that we just have to wait for joy to come back to us – I am just saying there are days when joy seems to be there waiting for me when I wake up, and others I really have to fight against a dark cloud.
So what are the things I do to fight?
