sunday song

Love comes down
Michael Farrin

I brought You all my foolish crowns
With trembling hands I laid them down
Expecting wrath to be poured out
But You placed mercy on my brow

Still my best is nothing less
Than filthy rags and emptiness
One drop of blood raised me from death
And You see me through Your righteousness

Oh how sweet amazing grace
Wraps me in a warm embrace
Oh my heart rejoice
I was lost, now found
All my praise goes up as Your love comes down

Now daily I walk safe, secure
Even through trouble You endure
I’m not afraid for I am sure
That You are mine and I am Yours

What a great day that will be
When I stand there at my Savior’s feet
Singing thank you for all eternity
All my praise goes up as Your love comes down

(oh’s over amazing grace)

Amazing grace, how sweet the sound
That saved a wretch like me
I once was lost but now am found
All my praise goes up as Your love comes down

sunday song

                                "Boldly I Approach (The Art Of Celebration)"
                                                       Rend Collective

By grace alone somehow I stand
Where even angels fear to tread
Invited by redeeming love
Before the throne of God above
He pulls me close with nail-scarred hands
Into His everlasting arms

When condemnation grips my heart
And Satan tempts me to despair
I hear the voice that scatters fear
The Great I Am the Lord is here
Oh praise the One who fights for me
And shields my soul eternally

Boldly I approach Your throne
Blameless now I'm running home
By Your blood I come
Welcomed as Your own
Into the arms of majesty

Behold the bright and risen Son
More beauty than this world has known
I'm face to face with Love Himself
His perfect spotless righteousness
A thousand years, a thousand tongues
Are not enough to sing His praise

Boldly I approach Your throne
Blameless now I'm running home
By Your blood I come
Welcomed as Your own
Into the arms of majesty
[x2]

This is the art of celebration
Knowing we're free from condemnation
Oh praise the One, praise the One
Who made an end to all my sin
[x2]

Boldly I approach Your throne
Blameless now I'm running home
By Your blood I come
Welcomed as Your own
Into the arms of majesty

the craftiness of God

It's Tuesday!  As I share this weekly identity verse that tells me whose I am and reminds me of what I am because of it, I pray that it not only helps me on my journey but encourages you on whatever path God is sending you down.  

I'm a crafter.  I mean, I'm many things.  I'm a woman, a wife, a mom, a friend, a daughter, a sister, an aunt, a keeper of our home, a princess in the Kingdom of God (thanks for the reminder AP) and countless others if I stop and pick apart each of the details of my/our life I accomplish.  Each of these roles are exhausting at certain times and amazing at all of them.  I can't pick a favorite because they all come together to make me me, and give me a diverse and sometimes confusing persona, depending on who you talk to and what tasks I happen to be multitasking when you check in to look.  

But one of the things that has drawn me to others, infuses into almost every conversation with friends or family and takes up a fair amount of my brain space, closet space and garage space if you want to know the truth, is my love of crafting.  Creating.  Bringing new life to old things.  Making something useful and meaningful out of objects that on their own have little appeal.  Giving things beauty and purpose.  And I am not alone.

Magazines, Blogs, TV shows, whole TV stations, stores, instagram feeds, twitter accounts, conferences and weekends with just your girlfriends are dedicated to creating.  Producing something out of nothing.  Making art that only you can make.  The reason is not because we are obsessive compulsive crazy people high on glue and paint fumes.  Well at least that's not only the reason.  The reason, which is the reason behind all things, is the Gospel.  The life of Christ.  Everywhere and everything in our world points to Him.  Not just the churchy things or the socially proper things or the things the world deems as important.  ALL things point to Him.  By Him all things were created in the heavens and on the earth.  He came before all things and after all things and in Him all things hold together.  All things point to Him to remind you of who He is and what He has done and that He loves you enough to do for you what He did.  Even crafting.  Maybe especially so.

For we are God's handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.  Ephesians 2:10

God is the ultimate crafter.  The one whom all creativity stems from.  Even Mark Twain said "There is no such thing as a new idea.  It is impossible.  We simply take a lot of old ideas and put them into a sort of mental kaleidoscope.  We give them a turn and they make new and curious combinations.  We keep on turning and making new combinations indefinitely; but they are the same old pieces of colored glass that have been in use through all the ages."  Mark Twain is brilliantly correct because all the ideas originated from a great and beautiful and perfect design, and like the things I and the other thousands of people on pinterest make, I am part of that design. 

We are His handiwork.  We are His creation.  His craft that He made useful and meaningful with beauty and purpose.  God in all His craftiness created me and shows Himself to others through the work of His hands.

Enjoy some others thoughts at Inspire Me Monday

galatians and gilmore girls

It's Tuesday!  As I share this weekly identity verse that tells me whose I am and reminds me of what I am because of it, I pray that it not only helps me on my journey but encourages you on whatever path God is sending you down.  

Somehow in the midst of my college career and early working years I completely missed the show Gilmore Girls.  It came at the perfect time, right at the beginning of freshman year and stopped right after I became a mama.  But still I missed it.  One might consider it a tragedy, or at least an entertainment blunder.  Maybe I was just too excited to finally be watching everything I wasn't allowed to at home (a.k.a Dawson's Creek and Friends) to research anything new.  Plus, there was that brief obsession with 7th Heaven during my sophomore year when I was convinced that Barry Watson, and his counterpart Matt Camden, was the most perfect boy ever.

Whatever the reason, I am making amends now after being chastised by not just one friend but MANY who were shocked, and I am not kidding SHOCKED, by the fact that I had never seen it.  It is the perfect show for you, they said.  If there is one person who I would think would be a huge GG fan it's you they said.  Four seasons in and they were pretty much on target.  Isn't it nice when your friends just know you!  I mean what is not to love.  Small town, beautiful New England setting, Edward Hermann, a fun mom and daughter, whitty sarcasm, and I could go on.   

I love almost everything about it but there is just one thing, besides the fact that Lorelei and Rory are known for how much they eat yet have only physically taken about 5 bites of actual food so far, that always gets me.  I'm almost afraid to say it because it will arch the backs of feminists everywhere, but the one thing that gets to me is the fierce independence of Lorelei.  Don't read this the wrong way, independence is a fantastic quality, but like anything it can become twisted and lead you down a path that looks just enough like the right one that you don't know your going to get lost in a place that looks a little more like selfishness or at least self righteousness.

I know I'm supposed to watch it in awe of this girl who found herself pregnant and broke out of her strict and Stepford type upbringing to make it on her own and be her own person so she could raise her daughter in a home of unconditional love, and yes that was a very brave and beautiful thing to do.  But sometimes I look at the scenarios and I listen to the arguments and it starts me thinking of how hard is to keep trying to do it all on your own.  When you are so hell bent on doing it yourself exactly how you want it to be done, you can't help but hinder your own growth and hurt others in the process.  Even if those others are crazy moms like Emily Gilmore.  

Watching it now as opposed to at age 18-25 has me looking at it from this different perspective because I don't think that young thing sitting in a trailer in Auburn would have noticed then.  Then again maybe I would have noticed it and learned a valuable lesson much sooner than my current 33 year old self has just learned when I read... 

 I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me.  The life I now live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.  Galatians 2:20

When rereading this very familiar identity verses for a Galatians study, God smacked me in the face with the oh so frustrating news that I am indeed a Lorelei Gilmore.  While Zach has said and then said again when I mentioned it to him that my independence (read not being indecisive, clingy, and in need of someone to tell me everything) was one of the qualities that attracted him to me.  It can am become an independence that looks like a stubborn person who insists on trying to do things herself.  Who has ideas and plans swimming around in her head that she thinks are the way to go, the only way to go and quite honestly gets hurt if you don't think I am capable of handling it.  All I could envision when reading the words that I no longer live but that it's Christ that lives in me is the number of times that I shove him out of the way to live first.  I ignore His Spirit and His ability to get it done and try to get it done first to prove something to myself, to God, to everyone.  

The truth is I have nothing to prove because the only thing I would accomplish proving is how much in need of Him I am.  The old me is gone, praise God, and I have Christ who lives in me and for me before God, and the only thing I have to do is so simple - have faith in the Son.  Faith in not some random person, but in the One who LOVES me and SACRIFICED himself for me.  It's such a simple concept that I so often try to complicate with my own thoughts and agenda.  Oh to live truly and completely by faith in the One who can accomplish all things.  In the meantime I continue to pray that He will strip me of myself so I will truly see I belong to Him.

Any more Loreleis out there?
                                                             
                                                                
                                            

Sunday song

Moving Forward - Colony House

I found life and I found laughter
In forgiveness I found rest
On the shoulders of redemption
I found hope when hope was dead
I could lose it in a moment
So I dare not close my eyes
Or watch fear fall with the sunset
And see hope rise with the tide

And when the pain is true
Sometimes these troubles prove that I’m alive

My eyes are open, my heart is beating
My lungs are full and my body’s breathing
I’m moving forward, I’ve found my freedom
I’ve found the life that gave me reason to live

As this dusty road now settles
And I see what lay before
Every tear that held a broken dream
Is now shattered on the floor
And now bursting forth in splendor
Are the blossoms of second tries
Because dreams that bear the mark of love
Are dreams that never die

Sometimes
Life can feel so unkind
But sorrow won’t define me
So just reminds my soul
My soul

My eyes are open, my heart is beating
My lungs are full and my body’s breathing
I’m moving forward, I’ve found my freedom
I know the sorrow, I know the heartache
I know with fear comes a tragic heartbreak
But I’m moving forward, I’ve found my freedom
I’ve found the life that gave a reason to love

2 timothy 1:7

Good evening, late evening, but good nonetheless.  It's such a blessing to be able to say that.  I know when you look deeply good can be found in all things because God is in all things and works all the things into good for me, His daughter, but actually being able to feel that goodness without looking too deeply is almost too much goodness for my heart to handle.  When His goodness feels so near the surface that bubbling out is eminent, who am I deserve such a feeling.  Did I say the word goodness to many times!?  Sorry I just couldn't help myself.

  I know the other side all to well.  The side where you have to search and search to find Him, not because He's gone anywhere but because I have or because I'm in unfamiliar territory that I've never let Him into and am stumbling around in the darkness searching for the light. But tonight I feel that goodness and mercy that follows me all of my life and I want to savor.

   As I share this weekly identity verse that tells me whose I am and what I am because of it, I pray that it not only helps me on my journey but encourages you on whatever path God is sending you down.  

Because I am struggling to love and because I constantly struggle with fear it is good to know that 

for God gave us a spirit not of fear but of power and love and self-control

God has given us every spiritual blessing through Christ and of those blessings, FEAR is not included.  It's not of God.  He didn't give fear to me.  I was tempted with it and fell to it and then took it on my own to coddle and let seep into my heart and throughout my life.  It's a guest that has been around so long I don't even bat an eye when it runs next to me and holds my hand on my day to day adventures subtly and not so subtly veering me down other roads.  But God didn't give me that and not only didn't He give it to me but He gave me other things instead. things that when held make fear disappear.

He gave me power, and He gave me love and He gave me self control.  The spirit within me, gifted by my heavenly father through Jesus Christ alone, gives me power over fear, love to fill up the space and the control to never pick it up again.  

It's right there for me to have while I abide in Him and it moves me onward, ever onward, to the next steps of being deeper in His presence and farther along on the journey.

  

Sunday Song

Jesus, lover of my soul,
Let me to Thy bosom fly,
While the nearer waters roll,
While the tempest still is high.

Hide me, O my Savior, hide,
Till life's storm is past;
Safe into the haven guide;
Oh, receive my soul at last.

Other refuge have I none,
Hangs my helpless soul on Thee;
Leave, ah! leave me not alone,
Still support and comfort me.

All my trust on Thee is stayed,
All my help from Thee I bring;
Cover my defenseless head
With the shadow of Thy wing.

Wilt Thou not regard my call?
Wilt Thou not accept my prayer?
Lo! I sink, I faint, I fall—
Lo! on Thee I cast my care.

Reach me out Thy gracious hand!
While I of Thy strength receive,
Hoping against hope I stand,
Dying, and behold, I live.

Thou, O Christ, art all I want,
More than all in Thee I find;
Raise the fallen, cheer the faint,
Heal the sick, and lead the blind.

Just and holy is Thy Name,
Source of all true righteousness;
Thou art evermore the same,
Thou art full of truth and grace.

Plenteous grace with Thee is found,
Grace to cover all my sin;
Let the healing streams abound;
Make and keep me pure within.

Thou of life the fountain art,
Freely let me take of Thee;
Spring Thou up within my heart;
Rise to all eternity.