Shepherd......

"Our Lord Jesus...that great Shepherd of the sheep."

-Hebrews 13:20

Hindsight being twenty-twenty, I can look back over my life and see God's providential guidance consistently plotting my path, though I can remember at times feeling no sense of any path whatsoever, feeling more lost than led. 

And yet, all the while, God's hand was firmly holding mine, with unflinching faithfulness.  His rod at the ready, His staff securing my every step. 

Even those prodigal steps I took that carried me far from home could not carry me outside of His reach, or outside of His heart. 

So you think you've gone too far, that Heaven's hand just goes so far?  I can tell you, as a beneficiary of God's gloriously fuzzy math, that He who leaves the ninety-nine to search for the one (my apologies to the ninety-nine), the One who screams "seventy times seven!" in the face of my sin, still tirelessly and tenaciously seeks out the lost. 

When this path leaves us bruised and bloodied, His heart bleeds and bends toward us to bind up our wounds, to take us tenderly back into His arms.  He does not leave us to navigate life's labyrinth on our own, but has immersed Himself in the maze,  and joined us in the journey, with a single eye on leading His loved ones back home.

"I will seek what was lost and bring back what was driven away, bind up the broken and strengthen what was sick."

-Ezekiel 34:16

~*~*~*

Holy hush........

"Be Still, and know that I Am God."

-Psalm 46:10

Where there is great stillness on our part,
there is great movement on God's.

This peculiar paradox is portrayed in scripture time after time: in parables, in proverbs, in psalms and in the lives of the saints.  When we are waiting on God, He is working behind the scenes; when we are quiet, His voice can command even the stormiest sea.

When Mary sat still at Jesus' feet to hear His word, He called that, and not Martha's serving and busyness, the one thing that was needed...

.....The One Thing.....

Stillness, Waiting, Quietness...all fundamental facets of our faith, all integral aspects of His action on our behalf...

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

"Stand still, and see the salvation of the LORD, which He will accomplish for you today...The LORD will fight for you, and you shall hold your peace."

-Exodus 14:13,14

"Stand still, that I may hear what the LORD will command..."

Numbers 9:8

"The LORD is good to those who wait for Him, to the soul who seeks Him.  it is good that one should hope and wait quietly for the salvation of the LORD."

Lamentations 3:25-26

"Sit still my daughter...for the man will not rest until he has concluded the matter this day."

-Ruth 3:18

"Wait on the LORD...and He shall strengthen your heart."

-Psalm 27:14

"Since the beginning of the world men have not heard nor perceived by the ear, nor has the eye seen any God besides You, who acts for the one who waits for Him."
-Isaiah 64:4

"I waited patiently for the LORD, and He inclined to me, and heard my cry.  He also brought me up out of a horrible pit, out of the miry clay, and set my feet upon a rock, and established my steps."

-Psalm 40:1

"And now, Lord, what do I wait for?  My hope is in You."

-Psalm 39:7

"The LORD your God in your midst,

The Mighty One, will save;

He will rejoice over you with gladness,

He will quiet you with His love."

-Zephaniah 3:17

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Puzzle Pieces...(a re-post)

(this post from 12/28/09 recently took on new relevance for me due to a dear friend's influence on my life, on my path, on my puzzle pieces. So I'm pulling this one out of the vault, back into the light of day, this one is for you, my dear friend...)

"...that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the width and length and depth and height—to know the love of Christ which passes knowledge; that you may be filled with all the fullness of God."

-Ephesians 3:17-19

What a rich prizm of perspective is afforded me when I manage to see life not so much as a picture, but as a puzzle, and my particular persuasion as merely a piece of that puzzle among many many pieces that comprise the compostion.

Pardon the mixed metaphor, but mine is not a panoramic lens. There are others who have vantage points that vary from my own, whose vision I benefit from. What a gift to be privy to others' perceptions, especially where our concept of Christ is concerned.

Dozens of denominations make up the fragmented portrait of Christ that we present to the world today. How wonderful would it be if, instead of compartmentalized convictions and stubborn segmented stances, we could, as Ephesians 3:17-19 suggests, "come together", each faction foregoing it's appetite for autonomy, acknowledging that their piece of the puzzle is just that, one piece of an intricate array of pieces that make up a mosaic of our Messiah. When we're willing to do that, this jigsawed picture of Jesus will come together. Broken bread made whole again.

It's an age-old altercation that still ripples through the ranks today, a power struggle first depicted among the disciples in Luke 9:46-48: These factious followers were arguing about who among them would be the greatest. The epiphany that they were one body - making their question moot - had not dawned on them yet.

Two thousand years later we still struggle with that concept, clinging stubbornly to our separatism, but the call of Christ remains:

Come together

that you may know what you can't possibly know apart from one another,

vis a vis, the fullness of My Love.

"Behold, how good and how pleasant it is for brethren to dwell together in unity!...For there the LORD commanded the blessing—Life forevermore."

-Psalm 133:1,3

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Heaven scent.....

"For we are to God the fragrance of Christ..."

-2 Corinthians 2:15

Do we evoke in others a desire to inhale deeply, to breathe in the perfume of our presence?  Does Christ dwell in us so richly that there is an effusion of His essence wherever we go? 

Our lives are a bouquet, given by God to a world He so loves.  He designed us to bud, to blossom, and to fill the earth with the fragrance of Christ.  We are the aroma of our Maker, the censers through which His ardor is diffused.

May these, the gardens of our lives, be so given over to God, that the world cannot help but fall in love.

"Awake, O north wind, and come, O south! 

Blow upon my garden, that its spices may flow out."

-Song of Solomon 4:16

~*~*~*~

Rest...........

D2 Photography

"Come to me, all you who are weary and heavy laden, and I will give you rest."

-Matthew 11:28

Come, lay back into my arms, let your head fall back against my shoulder.....Rest......

Feel my steady breathing and let it become yours...Listen to my heartbeat and relax into its rhythm.....Rest......

Feel me around you and exhale in my embrace.....Rest.......

Hear my still small voice whisper over and over, "I love you, I'm here, all is well......."

.......Rest......

Close your eyes, let the day diminish, let my love enfold you, let me hold you close...

Let go your worries, you're safe here now...

You are mine, I am yours

All is well, my love...........

Rest

~*

Chiaroscuro

"Praise God, Who has called us out of darkness, into His marvelous light."

-1 Peter 2:9

Chiaroscuro paints a picture of paradox, denoting the division between light and shadow.  This sacred interplay was formed in the beginning, Creation's first order of business: 

"God said, 'Let there be light', and there was light.  And God saw the light, that it was good; and God divided the light from the darkness."

-Genesis 1:3,4

God could've done away with darkness completely, but He didn't; Genesis 1:5 tells us that He allowed darkness to remain, calling it Night.

We are surrounded in Creation by pictures of God, lessons of His love, reminders of redemption.  The powerful paradox of light and darkness is no exception.  God allowed this juxtaposition to serve as analogy, to shepherd us into a deeper understanding of amazing grace. 

When Adam and Eve crossed that fateful border from from the land of the living into death, from God's Light to the devil's darkness, there was no way back.  Imprisoned in shadow, chained by their choices, they had passed over into a place from which, humanly speaking, there was no return, for them or their posterity.

But God, Who is rich in mercy, Whose lavish love for us is not beset by boundaries, and Whose anguished heart would not settle for such separation, left the light of Heaven and crossed over into our night.  He knew we'd never find our way home in the darkness so He became flesh and the lost became found.  

He Himself became the Way, disarming darkness, bridging the distance from Night to Day.

Praise God indeed, Who has called us out of darkness into His marvelous light...

"Your hand shall lead me, and Your right hand shall hold me.  If I say, 'Surely the darkness shall fall on me,' even the night shall be light about me; indeed, the darkness shall not hide from You, but the night shines as the day; the darkness and the light are both alike to You."

-Psalm 139:10-12

~~~~~~~~

Drought...

~*~*~*~*~*

Roots straining deep for water

Pushing past unforgiving stone and seared soil

Seeking out the succor of hidden streams

and forgotten fjords...

Buds aching to burst into blossom
bearing seed, swollen with sweet promise
Fingers probing for precious pools
Willing these waters into its hands

Till Finally, the Treasure is tapped
Till this field is flush with fruit
Full, Heaven's harvest
hanging heavy on the vine...

~*~*~*

-E.A.A. "Hindsfeet" 5/9/10


"He turns a wilderness into pools of water, and dry land into watersprings."
Psalm 107:35

Rolling Stones.....

"I Am the Resurrection and the Life."

-John 11:25

God has a knack for rolling away stones...

A thing can seem so completely dead, so entirely outside the realm of re-animation: perhaps a dream, maybe a hope, or, tragically, a life not lived.....

We so readily resign ourselves to these requiems, tending to their grave clothes and ascribing to death the final word.  We all too easily turn our backs on soon-to-be bursting cocoons, and seal in stone these resting places of the heart, taking fate at face value, assuming destiny has been decided...

But catacombs are often chrysalises in disguise...Divine Do-overs in the making...

There are verdicts yet to be unveiled, faith yet to be finished, tenuously sealed tombs waiting to be opened...

There is One Who is greater than death, Who triumphed over it on the cross, Who holds sway over the grave and all that is in its grasp...

His fingers flung out the stars; it's nothing for Him to fling away a few little stones...

 

"For I know the plans I have for you," declares the LORD, "plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future."

-Jeremiah 29:11

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Here Comes the Sun

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