it just gets better and better...

Whoever reads this... well, I should probably warn you that you might be barraged by Brennan Manning quotes in the next few days! I'm finishing up the last few chapters of The Importance of Being Foolish, and it's just SO GOOD. I've got to share... I can't help myself.

"To be a child of the Father, like Jesus, is really to delight in this relationship and to fully embrace this identity. It is to enjoy thoroughly and take great pride in finding myself so situated. It is to sense the extraordinary privilege that is mine through no merit of my own. It is to appreciate in a very human sense the dignity of the title bestowed on me and to walk with my head held high. It is to have the aristocratic bearing of one born to royalty. It is to envy no man anything, for my privileged position transcends all comparisons, eclipses all worldly honors and titles, and fills my cup with a joy beyond all telling.

"What is my Father like? One day He grew so apprehensive that I might fail to understand how loving and wise, gentle and powerful He is, that He sent me a complete and perfect expression of Himself in His Son Jesus. Everything my Father has, He entrusted to Jesus so that in looking at Jesus, I can see and know my Father. Let me tell you the most beautiful and thrilling thing He ever said to me I wake up to it each morning and lay there sleepy, dazed, and happy because I always hear it as for the first time. 'As the Father has loved me, so do I love you.'"

THIS is the truth that makes me free...

who we are...

"The only possible way to move out of our obsessive self-awareness and into the life of Christ is to surrender ourselves and let God be God. Such a surrender involves mining the field of our hearts and searching for this pearl of God's truth hidden deep within us: we belong to God. This precious discovery makes security, pleasure, and power look like cheap, painted fragments of glass.

"In claiming ownership of our divine status as sons and daughters of the Creator of the Universe, we gain a coherent sense of self. We lose ourselves to find ourselves. This loss paves the way for the Holy Spirit to transform our lives.

"This loving awareness of being the child of the Father moves us out of a life spent pursuing our base desires and frees us to pursue the kingdom of God. Everything we have and are forms but one self, one heart beating with the lifeblood of Jesus. "I no longer live, but Christ lives in me." (Gal. 2:20). Therein lies transparency."

~Brennan Manning

Wow... amen.

...because time in the woods is a necessity

My friend Joelle and I drove to Jim Thorpe, PA last weekend to spend some time in the mountains. What a great weekend we had...

We figured out how to secure my new bike to the bike rack... and it didn't fall off... even for the whole 2 hour drive to the mountains!

Campsite 45... our home for the weekend. We set up our tent in complete darkness... and how relieved were we to find that the tent was NOT missing a pole!Biking along the Lehigh Gorge... so beautiful and so refreshing!

Taking a small detour to hike to Glen Onoko Falls... very beautiful!

And we even made our own fire at night... it might have taken us two hours to get it going and cook our dinner... but it was FUN!
We hiked some more on Sunday and found an old railroad tunnel...

And now we can't wait to go back... =)

to the forest...

The forest is calling my name and has been for a LONG time... ever since I left the Black Forest, I guess. :) My dear friend and I are leaving tomorrow night for a whole weekend of camping, biking, hiking, swimming... all of the above and maybe more. Oh... I cannot wait.

There's something about the forest and the water and the sky and the STARS... that just makes me quiet down, settle down, "center down" (a term that I learned from a new friend) and remember what it means to REST.

I can already feel it coming... I checked the weather report and there's SUN all the way. Not a drop of rain in the forecast. :) Thank you, Jesus. And I just happened to have lunch today with an old friend who just happens to be a Jim Thorpe expert... she filled me on every place to go and the best trails to find. It's gonna be great. Oh... I cannot wait.

Ha... I just remembered with a smile that we have a tent that's missing a pole, a bike rack on my car that we don't know how to use, and WAY too much food for two girls to eat... I think we might have a few adventures ahead of us. :) Oh man, it's gonna be great!

Shoot... Jesus knew that He had to get away to hear His Father's voice. Don't I know it too... LIFE so often drowns out that still, small Voice... but how I NEED to hear it. So I go to the forest to listen, to enjoy, to be still. It's a beautiful thing.

be near...

This morning, I found myself driving to work, repeating the same line out loud over and over again... "Thank you, Jesus for coffee." It was sort of subconscious... I didn't even realize what I was saying. But when I did realize, I had to smile.

Anyway, I stopped at one of my favorite Starbucks, got out of the car, and started walking up the sidewalk to go into the store. A strange thing started happening on my walk up that sidewalk... all of a sudden, small brown birds started LEAPING--literally, LEAPING--onto the sidewalk in front of me. I almost stepped on them! But they weren't afraid of my shoes or the prospect of being squashed by my shoes... they just kept jumping in front of me as I walked. That's when I realized that the grass was pretty much COVERED by these birds... but being that the grass is mostly brown these days, the birds blended in quite well. I'm not usually a fan of birds, but I have to admit that these little guys were kind of cute.

I've come out of a week that's been rather rough. I received a hole in my head at the hands of a plastic surgeon, and I still have the stitches to show for it. And I said good-bye to my mom and my dear sister, both within one week of each other. I wasn't prepared for how difficult that would be for me... or how hard I'd be hit by it.

Anyway, along with thanking God for coffee, I found myself praying this morning that He would just show up today as only He can... because honestly, I feel pretty desperate for Him. Enter the birds... practically jumping on my feet so that I can't miss them! Ha... I swear God has a sense of humor. And my thoughts drifted to Matthew 6. God seems to like to take me to those verses.

Look at the birds of the air: they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your Heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they? And which of you by being anxious can add a single hour to his span of life? ... For the Gentiles seek after all these things, and your Heavenly Father knows that you need them all. But seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things will be added to you. Therefore do not be anxious about tomorrow, for tomorrow will be anxious for itself. Sufficient for the day is its own trouble.

Sometimes I just need to be reminded how aware He is of us... how well He knows our needs and our hurts and our desires. And I continue to ask Him... be near, O God. Be near.

one special girl...

I love my sister, Shannon... and I will miss her terribly. Godspeed, my sis.

life raft

It's my turn to teach Bible Study on Tuesday night. I have several pages of reflections from things that God showed me while I was in Germany... I eagerly scribbled them in my excitement to share them. Amazing TRUTH, the Voice of God speaking in my own ears. What blessed times.

The tough thing is that I can't hear Him in the same way right now. The reflections that I wrote down are TRUE... but honestly, they don't FEEL true right now. I sort of just want to return to my old German balcony and SIT there... my ears didn't seem so stopped up there. I was able to LISTEN and I HEARD. I want to go back. I don't want to sit here and not hear. This is a familiar phenomenon that happens every August when I return from Germany. I just miss those sweet times.

Does Jesus change? Of course not. Why does it seem like He does? Maybe I'm the one who changes. Something happens to me when I get on that airplane and fly across the Ocean and land on foreign soil. The "stuff" that normally holds me back just seems to fall away... and I feel more free. And then I get back in that plane and return to this side of the Ocean... and the stuff somehow re-appears again.

Sometimes I wish I had a mirror that would only reflect to me the way that God sees me. Oh man... I remember what HE says... He has clothed me in garments of righteousness; He has planted me like a tree by streams of water which yields its fruit in season and whose leaf does not wither; He has made me His very own planting for the display of His splendor; He delights in me as He sings His songs over me; He considers me His friend and wants to share His thoughts and plans with me; He has chosen me to be His own daughter and seated me right next to Jesus at His table.

Shoot. Thank God for truth! We all have those moments when we start to sink into the mess of wrong thinking. How I need eyes that see and ears that hear... how I need TRUTH. How thankful I am for the truth that has already infiltrated my heart... that when I start to sink, it's not long before the life raft is thrown to save me... if I choose to jump on and be saved.

Let me not be surprised by the mess that is still in me, when I so wish it wasn't. May the mess continue to remind me of my need for a Savior... and may my need draw me to gratitude that I HAVE a Savior. He came for people just like me... who can't do this "life" thing on their own... who LONG for His voice. And it will just make me all the more grateful for the precious moments when I HEAR His voice again.