In a Month of Flurry

Well, we don't normally do these types of informative blog entries, but we thought we'd make an exception since we've experienced some pretty significant milestones in the last couple of months that we wanted to share with the rest of the world!

It's difficult to know where to begin, so I'll just throw it all up in the air and see where it lands on this page . . .

First off, we're wrapping up filming season three of Decked Out which has been another great year, and even more hilarity. Paul has somehow managed to become even more creative and a little crazy with some of these designs so I'm sure all our avid watchers will really get a kick out of the season.

www.hgtv.ca/deckedout

We also are wrapping up filming season one of a new show called Disaster Decks, which is a spin-off of Decked Out with a little more humour mixed in since Paul gets to make fun of wannabe deck builders and the monstrosities they've come up with in their back yards. It's all in good fun though, and we get to see some really cool transformations (I totally love makeovers so this is my cup of tea for sure!)

Paul was invited to be a judge on Canadian Handyman Challenge this year, which meant he was gone for most of September *tears* . . . BUT he got to have a great experience and hang out with Bryan Baeumler and Scott McGillivray for a few weeks and get to know them some more so that part was good.

Meanwhile, back at the ranch . . . er, suburban detached home . . . Glory was hospitalized for eight days with a burst appendix *poor baby* and Paul and I got to share her hospital room. #thankGodforchiropractors

She's much better now.

Glory at Sick Kids

We also got to celebrate our eldest daughter, Promise's, 12th birthday. It was a very special occasion since we adopted parts of an ancient Hebrew tradition and held a Bat Barakah for her. It was a beautiful Saturday under a big white tent with precious friends and family that we will always remember.

At some point during the commotion, some fairly non-trivial events took place, which I will outline below:

1) We bought a beach house on Georgian Bay.

2) Did I mention we bought a beach house on Georgian Bay?

3) My novel was published (by Safehouse Media, which is of course owned by us) and the first boxes arrived only a week ago. They look fantastico!

Click HERE for the Book Website and a Sneak Peek

4) Our audio CD was finally completed, printed, and shipped. This one is mostly Paul's baby. We started it over six (yes, six) years ago. It sounds really stinkin' good.

Click HERE for Music Website

We got to do an interview with Wayne Jacobsen on his podcast that went really well. You can listen to it by clicking HERE and then look for the short article called "When Grace Overruns Pain." Click on the "play" button near the bottom of that article.

So in the flurry of activity, homeschooling, writing, running the design company, Paul travelling, planning for the future, and making every effort to stay connected with friends and family, some very special things have occurred.

Last weekend, I sat on the deck of our new cottage under an unusually warm October sun and looked out over the sparkling and constant waves and thought, "Wow." I've been learning to allow myself to get excited about things. To stop being so internally reserved. Most people in these circumstances would probably be throwing a party. For me—and for now—my whispered "wow" was a good start.

Thanks for sharing this journey with us. And check back here now and then. Usually we are blogging about different spiritual and life insights and we *love* a good discussion! :P

J.

Courage to Be

Last year, I read one of Brennan Manning's books, called The Furious Longing of God. One of the most impacting things I read there had to do with the power that each one of us has—albeit oftentimes latent power—to give one another the "courage to be."

Every human being desperately needs to be understood. To be known and to be loved. Ultimately, this love can only be pure when it is being received from the Creator. But each one of us has an opportunity, in the lives of those around us, to love others in a way that offers freedom for transparency and vulnerability.

The only way this works is if we are rid of our judgments and expectations of those around us. We must somehow come to the place where we hold each one with open arms and allow them to be exactly  who they are in this moment. Both perceived weakness and perceived strength must be welcome.

Just as we must learn to live lives that are not serving the expectations of others, if we want to truly embrace this freedom that Christ purchased for us, we must also let go of the expectations that we have placed on those around us. We have to allow Him to expose the thoughts that go on in the recesses of our minds; those thoughts that size up the people around us and cause us to secretly raise our eyebrows and wag our fingers in disapproval.

So many of us, without even realizing it, have appointed ourselves as the morality police and wear our gold star like some kind of symbol of governing authority over the people with whom we spend our days. If they suffer, we can't help but wonder if it's because of the way they gossip or that nasty smoking habit they have.

We preach the gospel of grace but we live our lives under the law of sewing and reaping—of performance and earned privilege. We're so worried people are going to be flagrantly wasteful with the precious grace by which we are saved, that we forget what grace even is.

If we hope to see people set free by the love that aches to be released from within us, then first we must stop living by the law of shame. We must rise above the way of religion and embrace the reality that Christ Jesus has already paid for our freedom and for theirs. That grace, is by definition, undeserved favour.

From the beginning, shame separated us from God. Shame is at the root of so much of our pain; our rebellion; our anger; our self-hatred; our fear.

Shame is lifted when we choose to embrace and live inside of His relentless and undeserved love, and when we choose to offer that same love, which has been offered to us, to those precious ones around us.

We use shame to manipulate one another to conform to our rules and expectations, and we allow the enemy to hold us down under a blanket of our own shame that clouds our vision and forces us to our knees when we were made to fly.

We have an incredible opportunity—YOU have an incredible opportunity—to stand up and walk out of the shame that has imprisoned generations of His precious children. I believe that freedom will be inseparably linked to the way we love others. The degree with which we allow His grace to flow through us toward those around us will be the degree to which we experience that grace ourselves.

True freedom comes when we are able to stand in the light. When we find a safe place in which we can truly be ourselves—truly express our doubts and our fears—where we can be honest about what we enjoy and where we struggle—where we can be embraced by kindness and acceptance and be looked upon with love and the absence of judgment.

The Father embraces the son covered in stench, and welcomes him home. The Son embraces the girl who soaks him in poignant perfume oil that wreaks of a whorehouse.

This is who we are. Foul-smelling and dripping in the excrement wrought by independence. That is who we all are. And that is who He loves—passionately and infinitely.

The Dawn is Coming

I have had this reoccurring vision of a dawning sun. It is bright. Glorious. This glowing orange orb nearly too bright to look upon without squinting. It burns away the darkness and the cold. It spreads out its wings across the land and sky. And it is imminent.

Over the last several years, so many loved ones have suffered. At times it has been almost unbearable to walk along-side. At times, we have had to stop to just cry. The lyrics from Florence and the Machine's anthem, "Shake it Out," resonate in my spirit: It's always darkest before the dawn.

At times, we have sensed God's golden purpose threading its way through the tapestry of conflict, betrayal, and uncertainty. We have heard the faintest whisper of His promises. And there are days when we are overwhelmed by them. Moments when all we can see or feel is His all-consuming Love. Thank God for those days.

Today, my heart is squeezed. Too much on my plate. Too many loved ones broken. Weak.

And He whispers, "My strength is perfected in your weakness, my child. My love." Could it be His grace to allow this suffering? Could it be His furious love that allows us . . . even leads us down a path that seems to end in absolute darkness?

Could it be His long-suffering passion that allows us to hate Him? To question Him? To feel betrayed by Him?  Because He knows that we were created to be in-dwelt by Him. To be fully reliant upon Him. To live inside of His strength. To be one with Him.

Does He allow us to follow this dark path, which we have chosen because we still have some measure of independence—some notion of self-importance and indispensability, because He knows that, once we have come to the end of ourselves, we will finally be ready? We will finally say, "Not my will but Yours." We will finally experience that surge of power that comes from His Spirit within us, which raises us to our feet with the triumphant cry of the resurrected!

Yannah Mary

The Carpenter's Cry

Have you ever been in a church service or meeting of believers engaged in worship where everyone is singing in unified song, something about asking God to come and meet with us?

I have been involved in some of the most utterly amazing meetings like that.  A thousand voices lifted in song, dozens of drums beating in varied unison.  We cry out to God, "Let it rain! Let it rain! Open the floodgates of heaven and let it rain!"

The other day, I was listening to that very song.  It was a live recording, and I was moved to tears listening to the multitude of voices bellowing out this prayer.  My heart lifted and swelled in agreement.

And then the strangest vision came to mind.  I saw Him.  The Carpenter.  He stood on the earth, His face raised, eyes closed, and arms stretched out to His heavens. And He cried out, "Let it rain!  Let it rain!  Open the floodgates of heaven and let it rain!"

"This was My prayer first," He said.  "This is My intercession.  You have heard My cry and have come into agreement with Me."

Sometimes I think we think we are stretching and trying to reach God, who we believe is just out of reach.  We couldn't be more wrong.  We are crying out and fasting and praying for Him to move.  For Him to visit us.  For Him to heal us.

The truth is, He is closer than our skin, and this was all His idea to begin with.  He came to us before we ever asked.  He suffered and bled for us when we had abandoned Him.  And He is our Intercessor.  He cries out to the heavens and - every now and then - we come into a place where we can hear His prayer and we join in.  We lift our hands to His heavens and invite the rest of the story right along side Him.

Beauty

I spent five weeks in a third-world country without a mirror once.  It was one of the most liberating experiences I have ever had.  It's funny how your perspective changes when you don't have one of those reflective surfaces staring you down at every turn.  It's funny how you are suddenly able to think about things that matter infinitely more.

You are beautiful.  Just as you are.  Can you hear me?  You have devoted too much of your time thinking of ways to better your physical appearance.  You have reserved a large part of your conscious mind to being conscious of yourself.  You have believed a lie.

How do I know this?  Because I too have believed a lie.  It is devious in it's play.  It hides itself by making itself obvious.  Books, magazine articles, talk shows; they have all talked about the lie so much that we think we understand it.  But we don't.

We have over-talked and over-analyzed the concept of "inner beauty" and "social stereotypes".  They are such common topics that we no longer see them as relevant.  But they are relevant, aren't they?

We justify crash-dieting and starvation, eating disorders and obsession, by saying we are "just concerned with our health."  But that is a lie.  And as long as we are selling that lie, we will be in the dark.

The truth is, none of it will ever make a difference.  You will be a slave to a mould that was fashioned by someone who hates you violently.  Do you hear me?  There is an enemy who hates you and he is the one who has fashioned the mould for you and deceived you into believing that the only way for you to be beautiful - the only way for you to be happy - the only way for you to be of value - is to squeeze yourself into it.

But he doesn't play fair.  He shrinks the mould and distorts your view.  It won't work.

You feed the lie when you believe it and play by it's rules.  It's time to lay down your game pieces.  It's time to get up from the table and walk out of the room.  It's time to walk outside into the light and the clean air and find out who you really are.

And the truth is, the only way you will ever know just how precious - just how radiant and lovely you are - is by looking in the face of the One who created you and loves you more passionately than you could imagine.  Go ahead.  I dare you.  Imagine.

Try to imagine, just for a moment, that there really is a God who made you, who is close to you, pursuing your heart.  Try to imagine that He loves you with such furious passion that He would do anything to rescue you from your pain.

Even the most wild imagination can't touch the intensity of His love.  You can't conceive of it.  But you can taste it.  And it will forever change you.

Eve

So many stories have been told of the damsel in distress ~ the princess being rescued ~ the bride and the bridegroom.  Often I wonder, how on earth are the Sons of Adam meant to relate to this great love story?  I get how they can relate to the rescuer at times ~ how they can embrace their Godliness and His likeness and begin to see themselves as the warrior ~ as the knight.  But how can they possibly become the Bride? How can they embrace this story of the prince rescuing the princess as though they are the ones in need of rescuing?

It is a difficult thing to conceive of God not being a man, particularly when the most trusted source we have for His description refers to Him as a Him and as a Father.  I think most of us accept that God is genderless and that He indeed did make both Adam and Eve in His image.  So then, it is logical to conclude that a woman equally reflects the nature of the Creator as does a man.

So if our Maker and Saviour and the Lover of our souls is revealed to us in both Adam and in Eve, then would it be possible to accept that a man could have a relationship with the Maker and relate to God at times as though He is a She?

I look around at the religion we have formed to contain our Maker and I see that we have been afraid of this idea.  Mystics and non-Christian spiritualists don't seem to have a problem with it all and, in fact, that may well be one of the reasons that the notion has been shunned by the organized church we have today.

The reality is that God has created woman in "His" image as well and there is a great mystery that lies in that fact.  That God is fierce and yet gentle ~ a warrior and kind ~ valiant and soft.  God is Nurturer ~ El Shaddai ("many breasted one").  Deeply passionate and intuitive ~ affectionate and inviting.

Some of the great worship leaders of our generation have written about the great romance between God and the sons of Adam.  David Ruis wrote, reflecting on King Solomon's words, "Let me know the kisses of Your mouth, let me feel Your embrace, let me smell the fragrance of Your touch, let me see Your lovely face." Kevin Prosch quotes King David when he writes, "I bow down and kiss the Son."

There is an intimacy and abandonment which I believe will come as the Sons of Zion begin to realize that their Maker ~ the Lover of their souls ~ the One who calls to them in the midnight hour and from the depths ~ is the Beautiful One ~ the fulfillment of their hearts' cry.  The one to nurture their broken bodies and souls.  The one to ravish them and love them back to life.

J.

A Place at the King's Table

Did you ever reach a point in your life when you realized you might never have it all together?  For some of us, we reach that point on a daily basis.  Others may not have reached it.  Or you have, but you've ignored it.  Because who has time to consider such things?

The reality is that most of us have constructed a socially acceptable persona that moves in and out of relationships, grocery stores, church meetings, and bank line-ups every day for most of our lives.  He or she is the one that most people see and love, and whom we to some degree despise.  Because others have loved him or her but not our true selves.  And God forbid they should ever meet that wretch.

Okay, so it might not be that dramatic.  Not for all of us.  But the point is, all of us have an inherent need to be loved, understood, and accepted.  Yes, by others around us but, I believe, primarily by our Maker.

So that's where it can get tricky.  Because we come to Him hiding inside of our persona and try to present the most acceptable version of ourselves.  We know that He can see all the rest but we just don't really want to go there.  If we do, it's at a scheduled time and place where we bare our soul, admit to our weakness, and pray that He would rescue us from our wretchedness.  If we have realized that we are wretched, that is.

You see, the more I live, and the more people I meet and really get to know, the more I realize that all of us are deformed in some way.  Neglected as children, abandoned by friends, abused, forsaken, betrayed . . . these experiences mess up the physical development of our minds, and we end up operating out of a place of mental and emotional dysfunction without really even understanding why.  We just try to cope.

Sooner or later, we decide that we do want to meet the Healer and we do want to spend the rest of our lives finally resting in His presence.  So we go about the business of getting ourselves fixed.  Presentable.  Some of us even realize that He alone can heal us and so we ask for His mercy and trudge along, hoping that one day we will finally arrive and earn a place at His table.

What we don't realize, though, is that He loves us just as we are, in all of our brokenness and dysfunction.  He doesn't love us for who we should be but exactly as we are.

There is a story in the book of Samuel about a man named Mephibosheth.  He was the son of Jonathan, and grandson of the late King Saul.  David had defeated Saul and was now king.  In the old days, if someone was de-throned, their family would normally be killed off in order to prevent any kind of uprising.  When the news arrived that David was coming back to take the throne, Saul's family split, including Mephibosheth, who was just a boy at the time.  In her haste to escape, his nurse dropped him and both of his feet were crippled.

Years later, King David inquires as to whether there are any remaining relatives of Jonathan (with whom he had been close friends.)  He is told that Jonathan's crippled son still lives.  David calls for Mephibosheth who, upon his arrival, prostrates himself before the king and begs for mercy.

Rather than have Saul's remaining descendant killed, David gives him land, a home, and, believe it or not, a place at his table.

From that day on, Mephibosheth eats at the King's table regularly, along with David's own sons, as a guest of honour.

In many ways, we are like Mephibosheth.  We have been broken from when we were young.  Oftentimes, because of the choices of others and at no fault of our own.  We spend so much time trying to make ourselves worthy of His love while the whole time, He is offering us a place at His table just as we are.

I believe that true healing comes only after we have not only accepted but embraced the love which our Father has freely given us.  It is only once we have risen to our feet before Him and followed Him to take our place as His sons and daughters, crippled feet and all, that we will be in a position to receive the true healing of our hearts and minds.

This is a difficult thing to do, and perhaps even more difficult than it sounds.  For to rise and take a seat as the guest of honour at the table of the King of all kings requires humility.  Our carefully crafted persona has no place here.  Only our true selves are invited.  The broken one.  The shameful one.  The one we have hidden for our whole lives.

The beautiful one.  The chosen one.  The one for whom He has died.

He calls, "Come.  Dine with me.  I have prepared a place for you.  Your time to rest has finally come."

J.