On a deck at the top of the hill where the river runs wild and loud as the hummingbirds dance ~ while I sing my head off. Peaceful Valley, Colorado. The Powers’ family cabin.
2.
The meadow in my (recurring) dreams, tall, soft green grass, yellow dandelions grow free and bright ( a place where they are not known as weeds) and I am about four, twirling and dancing and running around. And the sun is shining warm, and I am aware that God is smiling at me, and so pleased.
3.
In the house on any given night when the family all gathers and the room roars with love and laughter and the sound of the grandbebes’ little feet traipsing merrily up-and-down the stairs and gift-wrap paper-wad fights break out and people say nice things to each other and good memories are recalled and released for future times.
4.
In the early, dark morning when Dave puts his hand on me and I know he is praying over my life and my heart, a surge of peace blankets my soul.
My mom was raised on Gene Autrey and Roy Rogers’ westerns and spent her childhood going to the Saturday double-feature for 25-cents in the 40s and 50s. She loved those movies and wearing her jeans and spurs, when she could get away with it.
But then she became engaged to a Nazarene preacher and there were things the holiness crowd just did not do. And going to movies was one of them.
So for years, she has adhered to the old teachings, to the sound of the voices of the older pastor’s and their wives who mentored her and told her that the word said not to “sit in the seat of mockers ” (Ps 1), which being interpreted {by them} meant: don’t go to the movie houses and sit in seats next to godless people. Now-they never mentioned sitting next to the godless at, say, a doctor’s office or a PTA meeting or even church. That verse, they were immovable in their stance, meant one thing: movie houses! Or maybe several things, because places like Disneyland were off limits, too. But mvies, most assuredly.
Over the years, especially as the grandkids came along, I heard her question that whole thing. She’d wish she could go ‘find Nemo’ or see a re-release of some Disney movie or another she’d watched growing up. She would brightly and hopefully say she really thought she could attend a movie and probably still go to heaven. But to actually risk it was another story.
:)
It happened. Finally. The movie that helped her break a 55+ year ban on the movies in her life? The man who moved her enough to make it happen? Lincoln!
President Lincoln was her favorite president ever and my history-teaching brother, Dan, was able to get her to go to support Lincoln if nothing else.
She loved it!
I said to her, “Oh, mom, how scandulous,” to which she replied,
“I did not feel the heat of hell.”
What was she expecting? *Hahahaha.* And she told me, “I don’t really care what people think. I was not sinning” Who is she now? Makes me laugh.
Oh and…
She had actually been in a theater a few years ago when “The Passion” was coming out and the marketing peeps were hauling in truckloads of religious-sorts to help them get the word out. But, she informed me, “It was all church people. That didn’t count.”
Happy Birthday to my dad – a strong warrior in spiritual things, a courageous man, resolved to overthrow the enemy’s strongholds. His love is deep and active, growing and cascading over crevices and stony barriers meant to keep it bound, ah, but they are no match. I love him more as time goes by, and my gratefulness for who he is increases with the years.
I love that at 74, he still grasps for understanding and wisdom, he continues to reach out to the God who saved him, to the God he is only even now learning to embrace as the Father, his Father. And that everything he discovers is a new gift for me. And will be for my children and theirs.
In October, when he called us kids home to hear his heart
My dad is not content to look back over the successes of his life (he has without doubt gone from glory to glory) and rehearse them as echoes of what once was. He, this very day, is seeking to do the will of God, is actively living for Jesus. In this way, I come from such rich, rich heritage.
I learn from him. I learn from him. His example to stand upright no matter what battle rages, for the right, is ever and always going to be my paradigm for life. Because whatever you must venture into, with unceasing tenacity, you must endure and remain standing with a steadfast heart. Wholeheartedness is the measure.
I love you, Papasan. I bless your birth and all the days you have lived. I bless the God of the universe finding you on a Missouri farm and capturing your heart. I bless the mistakes you made and the pain you hid and the amazing things you accomplished in work and life and ministry against all odds for a boy whose father was killed before he was even born. I bless you for choosing the right woman with which to make a life and for continuing to do and be all God has called you to do and to be.
I was moved this morning to pray for you with this scripture passage, Psalm 92.10-15 because it has your name all over it – a righteous man with a wild-ox anointing. The years cannot harness a person under the flow of the fresh oil. He’ll be like a young, strong ox that has never been yoked or broken or told he can’t. That is my daddy – strong as the day is long, anointed with fresh oil – verdant and green, a living memorial to the faithfulness of God. It’s true, dad!
But my horn (emblem of excessive strength and stately grace) You have exalted like that of a wild ox; I am anointed with fresh oil. My eye looks upon those who lie in wait for me; my ears hear the evildoers that rise up against me. The [uncompromisingly] righteous shall flourish like the palm tree[be long-lived, stately, upright, useful, and fruitful]; they shall grow like a cedar in Lebanon [majestic, stable, durable, and incorruptible]. Planted in the house of the Lord, they shall flourish in the courts of our God. [Growing in grace] they shall still bring forth fruit in old age; they shall be full of sap [of spiritual vitality] and [rich in the] verdure [of trust, love, and contentment]. [They are living memorials] to show that the Lord is upright and faithful to His promises; He is my Rock, and there is no unrighteousness in Him.
I love you dad, and guess what? Almost everyday since you told me to in October, I have remembered to say:
I receive my father’s blessing on me today.
And I am cognizant of the powerful, rich and freely flowing blessing you are pouring out to heaven for each of us kids daily and I receive it, dad with gratefulness and so much love. And dad? I bless you back. Happy Birthday to my hero.
Strength, courage, resolve. That is what I see in his eyes. I love this man.
Sometimes things on Pinterest actually encourage me.
Words (I love words!) + visual (‘cuz I am a visual person) = I get it!
So when I need a boost, when I am doubting myself or wondering what comes next, I sometimes go back and check out my words-are-all-I-have Pinterest board and re-read something that once struck my fancy or spoke some truth to my heart and I am thoroughly inspired and reignited. Yep. That easy sometimes.
These are some that made me crazy-courageous once. When I really needed it.
Wholeheartedness is really a strong value for me.
Isn’t it so cool to think of God delighting over you?
This one is practically scandulous – but I think it is just saying it is OK to let go of people and things in exchange for something new.
Happiness is not the focus. But when you get whole and walk holy, happiness shows up. I don’t just “want to be happy.” I want to be holy. In Christ alone.
Again with the wholehearteddeness theme. I believe in giving whatever you do your all.
People share their prayers. It’s cool.
I am not always all Pollyanna, you know. :) I am up for seizing what needs seized.
Totally taught my kids this:
These are lyrics from a song. And these are powerful questions to consider. And the possible answer can see you through some really tough stuff..
This is possible. It isn’t too late to shine the light you were meant to shine.
Life is good. Amen and amen.
I am not too old to be myself again. You, neither.
You only find out how true this is when something unthinkable happens.
Encourage yourself with these words.
The winds of change. You ain’t seen nothing like me yet.
“Nothing is more powerful than allowing yourself to truly be affected by things…”
This word is important to me. A simple graphic like this reminds me.
Sometimes you just need the most basic truth and this one is enough:
Now that I am up to 7 {SEVEN!} grandbebes and another due in late March, I am very laissez-faire over their antics. Once perhaps overly cautious, I now tend to live and let live.
Which is why, when I heard Gavin say to Hunter, “Let’s go to the garage and get our tool belts,” not only did I choose not to interfere, I allowed them to borrow my {kitchen drawer} tools for whatever they were up to.
They found lumber and built a balcony on the swing set. No hammered thumbs, no one fell off the balcony onto their heads. All in all, a good day.
Oh, man. I had so much more to share about Christmas 2012
But alas, I didn’t get around to it.
Christmas to me is: baking day and the grandbebes getting their hands and feet into paint for me. It is searching for the gift that isn’t costly, but says in the deepest richest way: I do love you so much, please don’t forget. It is lots of family events and traditional music and seeing friends and easily THE most evangelistic month of my life each year.
Celebrate with great joy BECAUSE you understand!
Really? You can “Go Tell it on the Mountain!” You can declare “Joy to the World” and tell people how the bells are peeling the message that “God is not dead, nor does He sleep,” and so much GOOD NEWS, great tidings of joy and Peace on earth! :)
Um, yeah- don’t get me started. Guaranteed, the Lord willing and the creek don’t rise, I will be back here in 10 months writing my head off about the sights and sounds of Christmas and celebrating most of all, a SAVIOR!
However, today being January 25th, I shall end Christmas 2012 (I meant to do this by Epiphany on the 6th) with this little presentation of a few images and a short video of the fam at Christmas.
Nehemiah said, “Go and enjoy choice food and sweet drinks, and send some to those who have nothing prepared. This day is holy to our Lord. Do not grieve, for the joy of the Lord is your strength.”…Then all the people went away to eat and drink, to send portions of food and to celebrate with great joy because they now understood the words that had been made known to them. Neh. 8.10,12 NIV
Is Christmas an awful lot of work and effort with the shopping and baking and cooking and decorating and wrapping and crafts and everything else? It sure is. To have a big celebration to show your love to the Savior and to your family, it IS an awful lot of work. But if just one or two of grandbebes grows up and remembers the satin running through our main tree, as it represents the scarlet thread of the blood of Jesus which washes sin whiter than snow for all time, if they recall the trouble I went through to communicate that message so they could know that blood cleanses them – well, then, I can assure you, I will never regret the work of it.
And if they remember they felt loved and cherished and over-indulged, then maybe I will have imparted a little of the love of the Father to them through us, and that is good, too. He gave it all.
The sound of rejoicing…could be heard far away…
And on that day they offered great sacrifices, rejoicing because God had given them great joy. The women and children also rejoiced. The sound of rejoicing in Jerusalem could be heard far away. Neh. 12.43
So….anyway. It was merry and these are a few of my memories. One month ago, to the day!
See short video!
This was a gift to Dave from the cast of “Merry Gentlemen”
This is a promise that reminds us to put one foot in front of the other. It tells us that our present sorrow, the distress we are smack dab in the middle of – is not the end, but is the time to sow.
Sometimes, when all seems hopeless, we do the right thing – that thing we should/must do – and we may cry right through it. Then we do the right thing again and we cry. And maybe our tears are for things we have lost, for situations that seem hopeless, for the efforts we’ve made that seem utterly futile. But there are things you do because they are the right thing. And it is the time to do them.
Don’t be deceived. God is not mocked. You will reap what you sow. Galatians 6.7
You pray and you sow and you use lots of tissue.
Humble yourselves under God’s mighty hand, that He may lift you up in due time. 1 Peter 5.6
In due time.
And when the time is right (when it is “due”), you not only reap a harvest, you reap an arms-full harvest of rejoicing, of over-the-top-songs-of-joy and rejoicing! This is the promise of a God who is watchful. And He keeps His promises.
They are thoroughly wonderful people and completely uncontrollable (in a good way) and totally a gift from the LORD to us. Undeserved – but isn’t that what a gift is? Otherwise, they’d just be some sort of payment for anything right we might have done. Not, though!
Children are a gift from the Lord and grandchildren are sent to just thrill-you-silly.
He sets the lonely in families. Psalm 68.6
Children are a heritage of the LORD. Psalm 127.3a
The fruit of the womb [is a] reward. Psalm 127.3b
The blessing of the Lord definitely includes getting to “see your children’s children.” Psalm 128.6
Jacob told his brother, “These are the children whom God has graciously given your servant.” Genesis 33.5
Stormie did this print for me. To be framed and hung soon! Note the “pregnant” Jovan :)
“What pleasure God has taken in planning” to make us part of HIS great family through Jesus Christ!
How blessed is God! And what a blessing he is! He’s the Father of our Master, Jesus Christ, and takes us to the high places of blessing in him. Long before he laid down earth’s foundations, he had us in mind, had settled on us as the focus of his love, to be made whole and holy by his love. Long, long ago he decided to adopt us into his family through Jesus Christ. (What pleasure he took in planning this!) He wanted us to enter into the celebration of his lavish gift-giving by the hand of his beloved Son. ~Ephesians 1.3-6 The Message
The adoption is bringing me understanding about the Father. If I am head-over-heels full of love towards the family God has given me, how great must His love be towards us!
On a winter day early in 1968, Mrs. Weiland, my 2nd grade teacher, showed us the landmark “I Have a Dream” speech, which had been given just a few years before in front of the Lincoln Memorial in Washington DC.
In my mind, it is grainy and black and white, which is maybe because that is the footage we can still see. And our educators were explaining the civil rights movement and what it would mean to end racism, a concept hard to understand in our very integrated school. We were in an incubator, we all got along and treated each other respectfully – why couldn’t everyone else just see?
I was too young and naive to understand the brokenness of our nation and outrageous struggle being waged to right so many years of wrongs.
But I knew Martin Luther King’s speech moved me. It was strong, I could see it. I could visualize his dream coming to pass.
Just a couple months later, he was gunned down. My heart hurt. I poured over srticles and pictures in the Des Moines Register and the Tribune. The school flag was flown at half-mast the next day and after we said the pledge that morning, at Wallace Elementary, we observed a moment of silence. It felt, to my little second-grade mind, like it should go on and on.
In part he said:
I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: “We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal.”
I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave owners will be able to sit down together at a table of brotherhood.
I have a dream that one day even the state of Mississippi, a desert state, sweltering with the heat of injustice and oppression, will be transformed into an oasis of freedom and justice.
I have a dream that my four children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.
I have a dream today.
Today is the observance of the birth of Martin Luther King Jr. The dream lives on.
