Bikes

There are just days where the craziness of life and the pressure of it's situations just seem to overwhelm you. Your feet feel like they are lacking the strenght to stand in faith, and your thoughts just seem to consume you in negative ways.

In these times, religious sayings don't seem to help, scriptures don't seem to speak, and testimonies seem to be for everybody else but you.

Today was one of those days. But tonight, we pulled out the bikes. I rode my bike with Adie on the back and Paul drove his awesome "old school" beach bike with Kai attached to his tummy in a carrier. We rode and enjoyed the weather and just the peace. After a little sweat and some laughs, life gets put back into perspective.

Praise God for bikes.

Longings

Pr 13:12 says "Hope deferred makes the heart sick, but a longing fulfilled is a tree of life."

The subject of longings is one that seems to be coming up in my conversations on a regular basis right now. People longing for their dreams, people longing for their mates, people longing for a change, people just longing...

The Lord began to speak to me about longings. Sometimes in the midst of wanting to avoid hope deferred or to avoid the attacks of the enemy, people avoid the longing. It seems easier to squelch the longing, push it down, and pretend like it doesn't exist. We believe that we are helping ourselves function, but there is a slight problem. We begin to live in denial......denial of our heart's longing. Instead of learning how to embrace the longing, we avoid it.

So I may be talking in generalities so let me talk a little more specific. Say you are a single young woman who would one day like to be married and have a family. It's a longing that is very real and very true. But sometimes the enemy attacks and makes you feel undesired, undeserving, and everything else in between. So the easiest way to live is to push down the desire and wait. But in the waiting it can seem so hopeless and like there is nothing you can do. So many swing to the opposite. The flip side of the coin is to engage the longing in an improper way. By dwelling, worrying, and fantasizing. 

Obviously the correct answer is to "take the longing to the Lord." But sometimes cliche' statements seem to hold very little power. They don't seem to convey a practical way of handling the age-old truth of taking it to the Lord. Maybe I am just speaking for me, but I tend to take the longing to the Lord, let go, and then if it arises again, squelch it.

I think the kingdom way is not to avoid it.....not to fantasize, but to embrace it with purpose. I am learning that I have not done this very well in the past. I believe there has to be a healthy way to engage heartfelt full longing without wavering to and fro.

There is a place in the psalms where David says, "All my longings lie open before you, O Lord; my sighing is not hidden from you." 

To have your longing open before the Lord means you can't hide it or manipulate it. You allow yourself to feel the raw emotions that are evoked by such a place of yearning.

So what does this look like. Instead of having a longing but being too scared to feel that deeply for something you don't have....why not take a healthy amount of time to embrace that longing. Now, I'm not talking about dwelling from it, but take some time to feel deeply what you want, let it drive you to fasting and intercession for what God has for you. Truly embracing it and leting it lie open before the Lord.

So for me..right now.....I am in a season of letting my desires rise to the surface. Letting my longings truly be that....something I long for. Letting my sighs not be hidden, and being determined to long rightly. With purpose and vision for the "PROMISE" from the Lord. Because for me, that is the key. Living from faith for what God has for me coupled with the understanding that in the "now" I must embrace that which seems overwhelming.

A thought fulfilled doesn't produce a tree of life... .....An idea fulfilled doesn't produce it either. BUT a longing fullfilled does.  So I am now determined to long, that I may be fulfilled.

Last Ditch Efforts

Enemy. You are going down. No more messing around. Period. 

I've had it with his foolish antics. Why does he think that he can run us away from our promises. We will break through into the new wineskin. We will birth a movement of love. 

I just hate that his attacks are so timely. Paul and I are trying to faithfully walk out this transition. Living in the fine balance of faith and action. In the middle of looking for jobs, where does he attack....finances. 

Well, I've had enough. I am making a declaration to all who hear. We won't be detered. We won't turn back, and we will advance into everything He has for us. We will be a Cyrus. We will shift. We will. 

Oh yeah, and stop messing with my friends too.

Good Friends

Sometimes all the day needs is some time with good friends. 

In a season of releasing performance in relationships, I've had a longing in my heart for deep friendship. Have you ever been in a room of people that you feel deeply connected to in mission and in purpose, but still feel lonely? I've been there recently. At first I felt that it might have been an attack from the enemy trying to isolate me, and there might have been some of that going on... but sometimes the Lord allows an area of life to get frustrated so that you are willing to break into a deeper level of that area.

So the the frustration is driving me to a deeper level of intimacy with people, specifically in the area of friendship. Our relationships must dive deeper than a common purpose, they must encompass risk and vulnerability so that we have true friendship....the kind that scares you and entices you. 

It's easy to think about friendship with people you have known forever, but to Develop friendship is totally different. It must be intentional and raw, able to change with the tides, ready to weap, and anxious to rejoice. 

You must take on the task of making and developing these friendships, because if you want friends, show yourself friendly. 

So to those of you who have been intentional with me and Paul, thank you. We love you and welcome your friendships. And know that we plan on being just as intentional in getting into your family's world! 

So Lord, come and be our friend that we may know how to truly enter into deep friendship.

Glory

What a wonderful word. Some revelations are awesome and such, but some revelations just seem to speak your DNA. Revelations with or about the word "GLORY" do that for me.

So this blog may touch on glory often. What it is, how we display it, and the effects of it.

But for tonight I wanted to expound a certain thought.

We as the body of Christ can't just contemplate the glory of God. We must display it. The world is contemplating it, and it's our job to give them something to talk/think about.

We must be the carrier of His glory....the jars of clay that show this curious world just what the "Light of Life" looks like.

So how do I not just get religious about talking about glory. It's by experiencing it and letting it change me. It's by the encounter of the pressence of the one true living God. Then we "expand" and allow glory to flow.

Pharisees

Pharisees. Wow that word holds alot of punch with it, doesn't it? If you have ever been in a religious arena or read your bible for that matter, that word holds a specific connotation that is very charged. Pharisees. You can just feel it....

Anyways, the Lord brought these 2 questions by me today and they have had me thinking ever since. So here goes....

Who are you going to offend?

See, it is bound to happen. You can't please everybody, so who are you going to offend. The second question was....

Would you spend your time appeasing the people that Jesus offended?

In a season of casting vision for myself, I am pondering many questions. So these 2 came at the perfect time. Jesus offended the Pharisees and touched the rest of the world. If my actions are going to offend someone, then I want the right people offended.

I am not suggesting that we purposely go and offend the religious, but I don't want to run from offense either. I want to walk as Jesus walked...loving, freeing, delivering......and He did it in a way that didn't seem to fit what the religious thought of as the "right way to handle things."

With recently having been established in my identity deeper, and having had performance cast off of me, I feel that I have been dealing with a good portion of my fear of man issues. So now these questions have helped my resolve to walk forward without apologies.......chasing my Jesus and the way that He transformed the world.

p.s. -- silly side note -- I think the English word for Pharisees is ironic. phari - (sees) --- when they obviously didn't see!!

Expansion

Sometimes there are just things that you read that sound bells within your spirit. Tonight I was reading an article from the Elijah List that did that. I don't know that I understand it all yet, but something true hit a chord within my soul.

It was about expansion. And so much more. It was about how God does not function in time....no past present or future. But in a sort of fourth demension. Seeing all and being present present. So time does not flow how we function, but from a kairos type way. A perfect timing of God type of way.

Let's start with scripture. Take Ezekiel 1 and the four living creatures. They were all pointing in a different direction, all going straight and not turning when they went. So how were all four creatures moving if it says that their wings were touching as they went.

EXPANSION

And as Conrad Lampan explains....

Then it dawned on me—if you are expanding then you are moving like a balloon in every possible direction. Moreover, because you are moving in a different dimension, you do not need space to expand into, but rather, you make the space as you expand within His glory

 I think Mr. Conrad is touching on something very specific and very fresh. The Kingdom is about expansion. We are suppossed to be about expansion. Expanding to hold his pressence and then letting the atmosphere around us expand to bring the glory of the Lord. Expanding His Kingdom. And expanding in perfect ebb and flow with His kairos timing.

Forward movement in different directions....with focus and vision....without decrease, without turning back. Always pressing forward by taking more "pressence" in. Beautiful Mr. Conrad Lampan. Beautiful. 

Foxes

Why is it that the enemy does so many little things in the midst of change? So many of the things that you can normally just blow off just seem to happen at a much faster rate. 

It's like the 2 year old pushes more buttons, the 8 month old puks (a mini puke) all over your clothes.....several times, the new job possibility falls through, the air conditioner breaks, and you still have weeds in the new grass out the wa-zoo. 

It reminds me of Song of Solomon where it says "Catch for us the little foxes that run the vineyards, our vineyards that are in bloom."  (S.S.2:15) This is the Lover speaking to the Beloved. We are the Beloved. It is Jesus telling us to catch the little foxes....to stop the little annoyances from stealing our life. Because life IS going to go forward, and if you don't stop the foxes, your joy, your hope, and/or your faith will suffer. And maybe more importantly, your fruit, the grapes in your vineyards, may get ruined. And it is YOUR responsibility to catch the foxes. 

So what does that mean.....I mean these foxes....these circumstancial things that I have no control over keep happening.  I think it means to stop them from stealing your place in the heavenlies. Catch them....stop letting them mess with your fruit....the fruit of peace, patience, and kindness.....and the whole gamet of the Galatians fruit of the spirit.

And the best part of all of this is that the inferred thing is that the foxes only come when the vineyard is in bloom! See, we've crossed over. No turning back. We're heading to take our promises. We have shaken off the old cycles and are moving in the new wineskin. We are running with the Lion of Judah, and we are not afraid to take risks. So of course the foxes would come now....when we are advancing the kingdom in our little world and the big one around us. So praise God....we are advancing enough that the enemy thought he needed to send foxes. Praise God we are not stuck in the same pattern we used to live in. Praise God.

So what did I do today to catch my foxes? I let redemption come for the day. I jumped on the trampoline with my 2 year old until she remembered that mom can be fun. I fed my 8 month old m & m's til I got way too many smiles to care if he puk-ed again. Then I hung out on the patio with my husband just getting connected. So the foxes from today have been rounded up and put down and redemption has come in the promise that change and fruit has arrived.

Establishment

Transition is a funny thing.....

Ok let's qualify that statement. The Lion of Judah is running and He is asking us to run with him. The last season was a "just stand" (eph 6) season, but the season HAS shifted, and there is now an open invitation to run with the Lord. Run into the new movement. Run into your promises. Run into you destiny. And to do that....we must run through the transition.

However, the transition and the excitment of movement, as awesome as it is, is still rought with tough things. I enjoy being in a place where I am understood and known. But there is always an establishing that comes with transition. 

I remember that when my babies were born, there was always an establishing time. With Adie, it was about 6 months before I truly felt like life was back to normal. (however, when kids come...the old "normal" is gone!) It took less time with Kai, but there was still an establishing time.

So here we are in transition....and we are being established. Sometimes that process takes longer than we would like. When our spirits and hearts are connected immediately, we think that everything else should come with pure ease. 

And in truth....it does. That's His promise in transition. He does establish you. It's His nature to bring purpose and promise.  Only it sometimes takes longer than our hearts would like. But praise God, I know that when I am where He's at, He WILL establish me.

Change....

What is it about change that makes people insecure.......

If someone else is changing, we almost instinctively become introspective in a manner that is usually unhealthy. And when we change, it seems to make others shrink back.

I am tired of it. I am tired of feeling like I have to hide my changes. (oh, of course we are talking about positive changes and situational changes....not the I started using drugs type of changes!!)

I mean it though. I am tired of feeling like I have to hide my changes as not to step on toes or hurt someones feelings. When we do this, it takes testimony out of the change. I want to speak forth the things the Lord is doing.....even if it leads to the uncomfortable silence or makes you question where you are standing. Maybe that is the whole point of this......If we were vocal about the changes, and I mean honestly vocal about them, then hopefully a cycle would be perpetuated. My change would lead you to question yourself. Which might lead you to change and to another testimony that causes someone else to change. And so on and so forth.

And the flipside of it is this.....I must stop psycho-analyzing and beating myself up when another person changes. Asking questions, healthy questions is not what I'm talking about. That is good and productive. But what is it about when you lose the last 10lbs that causes me to wonder why I am unsuccessful at it and what's wrong with me....blah blah blah, instead of being joyful with you for your change. That you finally made you mind up to do it and that you succeeded. 

I want to celebrate change with the Body of Christ. Unfortunately that may make me uncomfortable because when someone else makes a change based on the word of God to them.....it may not be the word of God to me. I want to trust the Holy Spirit and the work of the Lord.

And I want the Body of Christ to celebrate with me as well. Even if that means that I am the cause of the uncomfortable silence or the awkward pause. I want to press in to truly testify of the changes that I am experiencing and I want to do it even if that means our relationship changes............oh there's that word again.......

Bigger Cups

The past 24 hours or so, we have been experiencing some odd happenings. We have gone to get something to eat, and everytime we have, they have been out of medium cups and have had to give us our drink in a large cup. I am talking both me and Paul......everytime. It is so odd. 

So of course this got me asking.....Lord, what are you telling us? 

He reminded us of a prophetic word that He gave us in March 2008. It was delivered in what He told us was the beginning of "the time between times." There were four descriptions given about how if we didn't enlarge our thinking, break out of old mindsets, that we would miss the next season.

One of the four was...the cup that we have had used to be big enough to receive what the Lord was pouring out, but in the new season, we would need a larger cup to contain what He was doing.

OH MY!!! We have been praying and preparing our hearts and our actions to move ahead in this specific timing....and the Lord is so gracious....He shows us that He has indeed inlarged us and is setting us free to receive a larger cup that we may hold more of HIM!!

I love prophetic signs....they make life way more interesting!!

Here we go.....!!

Alright, I've finally done it. I decided that I wanted to blog about 4 months ago, but never wrote anything!!! I didn't know what to say. Blogging is different than journaling, and I just didn't know what flavor I wanted to throw into the mix.

So this is my first posting. I have recently been compelled by the Lord to begin to write some of the revelations and prophetic words that He gives me. This audience, however great or small, will be the sounding board for which I post them. 

I hope you enjoy!!