Love

She found me today

and crept into my heart when I wasn't looking

she didn't stay long

only long enough to touch my emotions

then made her way out again

in a tear streaking down my cheek

Resurrection power

Resurrection power invade this mere frame
launch me into a space and time where I know no limits
transform me from who I was yesterday
never to retrace my steps to that holding place again

Break the grasp of sin that enslaves me
let it master me no more
let me understand like never before that your ways are not mine
but they are better than mine
for you know what is best for me
settle my restlessness with contentment
and thanksgiving for what I already have and know

Resurrection power come and infuse my heart with passion that moves heaven and earth
respond to this aching soul that longs more than ever to be filled with you
completely inhabitited and controlled by you

Psalm 19:14

"May the words of my mouth, and the
thoughts of my heart
be pleasing to you,
O Lord, my rock and my redeemer."

A prayer for grace

Give me grace oh Lord
to scoop up the broken shards of a heart
that's been wounded by a friend
and gently fit them together to keep it beating
enough for life to flow through it again.

Give me words shaped to fit the pain to make it love again.

Poems of the heart

I am overwhelmed by your extravagant love for me
it makes me giggle
it makes me cry
it makes me feel honoured
it makes me feel "why me?"

Why this blessing on my life
when I know of others so near and dear to me
struggling to feel "loved?"

Why me Lord?"
What is it that you intend to do with me?
For me?
Through me?
Beyond me?




I Want To Explode

Sometimes your presence within
makes me want to explode into a million pieces
each one of them burying themselves
into the hearts of those who are hurting
I can't give enough of you away
fast enough
it's more than I can contain
stretch my soul to fit you
but seep through.

Forgive and forget

I saw an image of myself today
that caused me to shudder

As I peered into your word
I realized how selfish I've been

So I asked you to forgive me
again, and again, and again and again

A poem to grow by

How can I escape your love for me?
more than ever before, you call me,
capture me,
like the tugging on my sleeve
you beckon me to turn around
to acknowledge your presence.

You cause my heart to be in constant motion
up and down, down and up,
tears and sorrow,
smiles and joy,
all the time I am seeking balance,
a level place
where I can maintain normal.

The journey exhiliarates me
and causes me to grieve
the growing, the pruning,
the growing, the pruning
someday a beautiful flower will bloom
but for today, there's still more that the Gardener wants to prune

My soul has been stretched

Recently, I was feeling overwhelmed by a personal struggle. It had to do with visiting a place of pain in my past. I didn't go there intentionally, - circumstances just developed that took me there. I experienced guilt and shame and brokenness again as I lingered in this place of desolation. Regrets started to swell up again with my soul.

I believe there will always be areas of our lives, that need to be yielded to God's will, over and over again, ...emotions of the heart, thoughts of the mind, actions of the flesh, that will follow closely behind us like dark shadows tempting us as we press into a deeper walk with the Lord. The enemy will become more skilled at tripping us up. His strategy has to keep evolving, because we are forever changing into the likeness of Christ.

Without the struggle and spiritual wrestling, I cannot discover God's wisdom, grace, or peace. It is in the storms of the sea that I look around and discover that He is with me in the boat.

It is in my complete act of submission to his will for my life that I let go of regrets which have hung around my ankles like weights. The haunting cries that I could have done things differently. The regrets which keep me locked into memories and shame of the past, and keep me from living life to the fullest in the present.

I have moved beyond the stagnant place of regret in my life. I have grown beyond it's grip. I am embracing with whole heart the opportunities that lie before me to give my life entirely to Christ...to allow my soul to be stretched to contain more of his presence within me.

Today, I find myself thanking God for that particular struggle because I know the memory of the past has shown me that I am an overcomer in Christ and I can move beyond what was meant to destroy me. God's grace is forever surrounding me. His mercy is a friend to me.

"My soul has grown because it has been awakened to the goodness and love of God." (Jerry Sittser, "A Grace Disguised")

I carry in my pocket ...

My children are scattered all over the world at this moment. My son is in Nicaragua, my oldest daughter is in New Zealand, and my second daughter is in Germany.

The "mother" in me is struggling a little with this, although I am delighted they are experiencing new cultures, new people, new adventures. Yet, I can't help but long for the time when they are in this very room with me retelling all the adventures and stories and I can look into their eyes and smile with them, and reach out and hug them and hold them tight.

It may be some time before we are all together again at home in our little town. So I thought of a way in which I can remember them more often, pray for them and have a sense of them "being with me".

Since last week I have carried around in my jeans pocket, three little items which I selected specifically for each one of my children.

They are a skeleton key, a polished gem stone, and a gold apple charm.

When I reach in my pocket and fondle the key, I remember to say a prayer for my son. He is in Nicaragua for a month. The image of a key came to me in three distinct ways last Sunday and I just know that this image is significant to his life while he is down there.

The smooth polished gem stone is for my middle daughter who at the moment has completed her mission trip to Tibet and is now back in Germany for her last two weeks and then will return home. It reminds me of how precious she is to me, a treasure from God.

The gold apple charm represents my oldest daughter. She is the "apple of my eye". She has a heart of gold and clothes herself in kindness and love.

Sometimes my hand just slips into my pocket unknowingly and I touch the key, the stone and the gold charm and immediately, I think of my children and whisper a silent prayer to God to watch over and protect them.

There is nothing in this world that I hold more close to my heart than my children. And these small representations of them, in a strange and wonderful sense, make me feel more close to them. Like I am touching and embracing them.

Oh, how I love them.

Enduring the Hard Times

"Vocation, temptation, and formation are life-long challenges. We are called not once, but day in and day out, and we will never know precisely where our demons will appear. This lifelong tension between vocation and temptation opens up for us the difficult but promising task of listening to the church, the Book, and our heart, thus discovering the real presence of God's Spirit within and among us."

"We will never be without struggle. But when we persevere with hope, courage, and confidence, we will come to fully realize in our innermost being that through the downward road of Christ we will enter with him into his glory. So let us be grateful for our vocation, resist our temptation, and be ever committed to a life of ongoing formation."

The above passages are from Henri Nouwens' book, The Selfless Way of Christ.

I keep asking God to fix in me what is broken; mend the holes; repair the worn-out. And I believe He will to some extent, but the work will never be finished here on earth but in Heaven, therefore the struggles still remain. Temptations of all sorts will still trip us up; we will hurt the ones we love the most; we will lose ground momentarily until we press forward again.

Is it worth all the struggles?

Yes, I believe it is.

Through the tough and lonely times we have the option to grow. We can choose to be changed and transformed by our circumstances or allow them to weigh us down in despair. Each victory over temptation equips us to conquer the next. Each heartache can bring us closer to a comforting God who understands the pain and weeps with us.

The formation that happens to us can be amazing if we allow it.

Another Early Morning

I awoke early this morning experiencing a moment of anxiety with regards to my middle daughter who is away on a mission experience and soon to travel home. These moments bring me out of a deep sleep and I am startled as I come to my senses. I immediately felt the need to get up and spend some time in prayer.

I wish I could say that these early morning events were precipitated by a deep passion to draw closer to my God, and sometimes they really are, but other times they are mostly an awareness of my great need for him to continue to do his work in me, and for his strength to carry me through some difficult and anxious times.

It seems the closer I walk with him, the more he reveals to me what I still need to surrender to him. And it is this tremendous need that keeps the pursuit of him, alive and fervent.

As I began to walk downstairs, I suddenly stopped at the top step because I thought I heard a noise from the living room. Within moments I sensed fear and didn't continue down. I stood there in the pitch black and imagined someone in the house. Now, just so you understand where all of this fear comes from, it is indeed somewhat legitimate. Paul and I have had in the past few years since we have lived here, "unannounced guests" who have made their way either up to our attic or to catch a snooze on our livingroom couch.( This has something to do with friends of our son.) So I was unsure for the moment whether to continue down the steps or go back to my warm bed.

Well, I headed back to my warm bed, snuggled under the arms of my husband and sheepishly told him I thought I heard something and became fearful and couldn't go downstairs. Then I said to him that my "good" intentions were short lived and I succumbed to a silly notion of fear. Feeling somewhat humiliated, I asked him if God was disappointed in me for my lack of discipline and he wisely said, "Robyn, that is not the kind of God you serve, nor the kind of God who loves you."

I laid there in that warm, safe place with him, and began to pour my heart out to my God. Within seconds tears were streaming down my face as I experienced once again, God's amazing love for me. I acknowledged his love for me by repeating over and over "I receive your love for me, I receive your love for me, oh Lord".

As his love entered my heart, my fear and sense of inadequacy disappeared and I threw back the covers and headed downstairs to spend some quiet time with Him. I made myself some coffee, grabbed my laptop, turned on the propane fireplace and snuggled up with a blanket in the corner chair. His perfect love had cast out fear.

If I have discovered any secret at all to living my Christian life, it is that God's love, when appropriated and received deep down in my heart, fully believing he loves me, changes and transforms me. Nothing else has had such dramatic results for me.

A pastor friend of mine has often said, "you cannot grow until you know how much God loves you." So I am becoming more and more aware of his limitless compassion for me and it is indeed changing me.

My Search for Compassion

It's been such a long time since I last blogged and it's not because there hasn't been changes going on in my life. There is still a growing passion to know my Lord in a deeper way. I've just been hesitant in putting it into print, out there on the world wide web for the few who visit my blog to see.

But I've felt the "nudge" to get at it again, so I will hopefully be more faithful in my posts.

I'm seeking to know more about compassion. So I am reading a book from my favourite author, Henri Nouwen entitled "Compassion" and have recently finished another by him entitled " The Way of the Heart", which I absolutely loved.

I must confess that when I read a book, I am a compulsive highlighter and underliner and a reckless reader that "dog-ears" pages that I want to find easily again. I have a friend that considers this an absolute torture to a beautifully perfect piece of print. For me, I want to be able to find the phrases and words that so powerfully spoke to me and so my books really become like friends to me - I use them well, in the good sense of the word. (Pity the poor person who asks to borrow them to read!! They may be shocked at my abuse and creative license with "highlighters and pen".)

Here is a quote that I love.

"Compassion is the fruit of solitude and the basis of all ministry. The purification and transformation that take place in solitude manifest themselves in compassion. Compassion is hard because it requires the inner disposition to go with others to the place where they are weak, vulnerable, lonely, and broken."

And another ...

"Compassion can never coexist with judgment because judgment creates the distance, the distinction, which prevents us from really being with the other. Compassion means full immersion in the condition of being human."

My study so far, leads me to believe it is not an easy gift to acquire and perhaps more difficult to live out once one receives it. But oh so important to long for if we really want to embrace and comfort our hurting fellow humans.

And I wonder why at times it is so easy for me to "love" some, and yet very difficult to "love" others. Over the years, and more than once, I can recall asking God specifically to give me a measure of love for an individual that I just knew in my heart I struggled in loving. He was faithful to my requests and indeed, filled me with "His" love.

So as I continue my reading and studying, I will share further insights in hopes that whoever reads my blog may find that my times of reflection and contemplation are encouraging and comforting as they journey along the path to discovering who this God is that calls them forth to serve and know him.