"Welcome to the Chart Room"

I have been in the midst of the BRAVE journey with Crossroads and many other churches in our city.  Recently, I spent some time going through the BRAVE experience at CityLink Center.  This interactive prayer experience was one that provided some hands on tools to further explore the places in which God has been calling us as individuals to be brave.

***

I walk into the Chart Room not knowing what to expect. 

I am met by two huge wooden tables that look as though they have maps on them underneath a sheet of glass.  They are surrounded by well lit alcoves filled with messages inviting me to chart out a course. 

The track playing through the headphones I am wearing tells me to look for the message that connects with my heading.

My heading during this BRAVE journey has been: “Find a woman of peace.” 

I landed on this after reviewing a few things the BRAVE app pulled up for me to consider—where I want to be less stressed, where I need change, something I want to do, and looking at my “next spiritual step.”  It was this last area that really drew my attention, since all of these other items felt like areas where I have actively been make changes in my life recently. 

In looking at the spiritual progression—from seeking truth, to receiving Jesus, to focusing on obedience—I really am at the place where these are a part of my story, but I need to step towards replicating my faith in others.  This is something that I have been open to for a long time; and in some ways I think this happens on some level in snippets with many people I meet daily.  I am a teacher and love to share the things I am learning.  I also have the privilege of doing this daily with my Little Love.  However, I am constantly challenged by the stories I hear of others in our community at Crossroads who are actively and intentionally moving with a purpose to disciple others in their lives, encouraging and guiding them along as they seek Jesus in the midst of their life in a more disciplined and regular way. 

I don’t know how pursue this, really.  It doesn’t seem like something I can make happen.  So in some ways this brave challenge seemed to be the one that would require me to trust God to act most.  In the end, that is why I picked this heading. 

Truthfully, it feels risky to me, because I see no way of accomplishing all this on my own. 

However, after too many times of failing, I have learned that when I build up plans in my own way, they fall far short of what I hope for or expect.  God’s way is always better.  I sense that God has been in the midst of the formation of this heading, but nothing in my life at the moment really seems to suggest that this can be accomplished.  Certainly not in six weeks. 

Yet, I’m choosing to follow.  That’s what it is to be obedient, right?  I think of the disciples.   Jesus often asked them to go and do things that probably seemed a bit odd to them.  Yet,they followed and discovered things just as he told them they would be.  I wonder what I will find.

When I am asked to sum all this thinking up in six words or less, I remembered a phrase I have heard used around Crossroads to describe the way they encourage discipleship—“find a person of peace.” 

This phrase was meant to refer to the passage where Jesus sends out his twelve disciples in Matthew: 

^“ Whatever town or village you enter, search there for some worthy person and stay at their house until you leave.  As you enter the home, give it your greeting.  If the home is deserving, let your peace rest on it; if it is not, let your peace return to you.  If anyone will not welcome you or listen to your words, leave that home or town and shake the dust off your feet.”  -Matthew 10:11-14, NIV

It is a phrase to express that our time is best spent sharing the good news and fostering growth in someone who is a willing recipient.  This person is a “person of peace.” 

I have all this in mind as I set my heading.  “Find a woman of peace.” 

I think about all of this in the Chart Room as I look around in these nooks trying to find a message that speaks to me. 

It is the sign that says   “I AM THE AUTHOR OF PEACE” that I keep coming back to.

There is something in this proclamation of God’s character makes me pause. 

I grab a brochure and sit down to consider this.

I am struck by the idea that in this journey to “find a woman of peace” it is God who is the author of peace.  He wants to bring His peace to my life.  I am also amazed by the thought that just as He brings His peace into my life I can trust He will prepare a person of peace for me; and as I consider this, I begin to think that perhaps this journey to find a woman of peace is not primarily an external thing.  I didn’t see that coming! 

As I Set Sail I am aware of God’s love for me.  I am aware of his provision.  I am aware that He wants my good, as I seek him and desire to be part of His vision, where disciples reproduce.  He wants me to be a woman of peace.

I step into the Storm Room and take a seat on steps.   I watch as people walk out on the water.  Like Peter, when Jesus says, “Come,” these people step out in faith.  The waves are churning and still they go.  I spy a spot high up and walk across the waters where I find a place to rest on the edge of a wave.

I sit and think about the storms that have been raging in me during this BRAVE journey.  Fear is something I have battled again and again in my life.  This time fear comes in the form of a full life.  How does this challenge fit into it?  I am not sure I see that yet.  I am afraid of being overwhelmed.  Yet, I realize, Jesus knows my capacity better than I do. 

I keep coming back to that chart room message: “I am the author of peace.”

All I can think is that God will take care of finding a woman of peace.  He wants me to concentrate on the internal journey of finding my peace in Christ.

With this revelation I move into the sanctuary.

I move through in the sand up to the front and find a spot to sit on a wooden bench.

I sit and listen to the music.

I lift up praise.

I thank God for speaking to me.

It is good to rest here in His presence.

In His presence I find peace.

As the minutes pass and I finally stand to leave.  I leave knowing that I do not go alone.

The peace of Christ goes with me.  He is with me wherever I go.

“Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you.  I do not give as the world gives.  Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid.”  -John 14:27 NIV

***

Grace and peace be ours in abundance as we seek Christ and step boldly into the plans He has laid out for us—especially when they seem bigger than we can handle.  May we find that He is the peace in the midst of the stormy places.  May we keep our eyes fixed on Jesus.  May we discover that He never leaves us or forsakes us.  May we come to know His faithfulness anew.

Jessica :)


A big thank you to my dear husband for capturing some photos of the prayer experience for me.  It wasn't until long after I returned I wished I had thought to pull out my camera!

Drink Deep

As I think about how I am to begin practicing the goodlife I figure it might be helpful to pick a focus. 

I choose to consider taste.  In hind sight, I’m not sure why I pick taste other than perhaps it is something to do with the way my Little Love has been putting things into her mouth with such relish lately.

In the living room, she spots a piece of lint on the floor that fell from the laundry basket or was tracked in on a foot and grins big before quickly shoving it into her mouth.  She does all this lightning quick, before I have time to pluck it from her little hand.  That edge of the carpet that has been pulling away from the kitchen threshold?  Yeah…she’s swallowed that up a time or two when I was looking the other way.  I can tell by the way she coughs as I catch her looking guilty with another piece in hand.

At the table, she grabs strawberries and bites big with the pink juice dripping gloriously down her chin, accompanied with a squeeze of each berry that leaves them in mangled bits that cover her hands and booster tray.  She smears it around with an artist’s flourish and concentration that is quite endearing, if sticky.  She takes bites of mama’s food and sometimes dada’s to—the vegetables, the curry, the beans and rice.  She tries it all, and loves most of it. 

Outside, as I pull weeds she sits nearby on the sidewalk grabbing blades of grass.  Knowing that she often tries to put these in her mouth, I tell her she can pluck them, but not eat them.  She listens, but takes it as an invitation to scrape up a bit of dirt to sample instead. 

In the swimming pool, she is ready to try the leaf that is crumpled at the bottom of the shallow pool.  I distract her with something else for a few moments only to find that while I have been surveying the cloudy sky she has grabbed the hose end and placed it in her mouth instead.

In the bathtub, she nimbly folds her head forward into the water and drinks deep of the soapy water.  She must know that Natalie Babbit wrote that it was delicious. 

I can’t help but laugh.  This girl has tasted and seen the Lord is good.

 

In many small moments, I have for a few seconds caught a glimpse of God’s goodness, but I feel like I’m so busy managing all the messy bits that I don’t often just delight in them.  How to move beyond this? 

Jason reads one night: “You’ve had a taste of God.  Now like infants at the breast, drink deep of God’s pure kindness. Then you’ll grow up mature and whole in God.” 1 Peter 2:2-3

Drink of God’s kindness.  Taste it.

I think of what this picture has looked like in my own arms this last year—my baby drinking deeply.  This is the way God wants me to experience him?  He wants me to drink eagerly, letting his kindness pour in as much and more than I can take in.  Somehow this will grow me up mature and whole in Him.   

It’s a beautiful image.  Babies are made to drink deep, but they do learn in those early weeks how to do it.  So how do I learn to drink deep of God’s kindness? 

How do I move away from managing moments to delighting in them?

I think of the Revolution in World Missions book I have been reading this week.  K.P. Yohannan writes of native missionaries and their children going hungry overseas and here I am wondering how to taste the Lord’s kindness.  Something in me is unlocked in reading this. 

I think He must be teaching me how to drink.

I recognize that God has been watching me struggle.  He knows what I have not seen until now.  I have been living the good life all along without really recognizing it or giving thanks.  He opens my eyes to see all this grace right before me.  His kindness has been there all along.

Left-over lentil sloppy joes in the refrigerator.

Fresh clean water to drink straight from the tap. 

The pineapple and melon on my counter top. 

The jars of legumes, grains, and nuts hanging on my wall. 

The English muffin with egg and cheese I share with my little love at breakfast.

And this is just the start of what is sure to be a long list.

I repent as I consider these brothers and sisters.  I wonder how do they drink deep of the Lord’s kindness? 

How myopic I have been. 

If I am honest, I often too easily tire of my own good food.  I like the luxury of eating out.  I ponder whether I make a bad choice when I buy conventional foods.  I think of that potato I threw out earlier this week, somewhere around the world someone would have salvaged it to make dinner.

In so many ways, I have failed to interpret all this abundance in terms of God’s goodness.

It is dangerous to forget the abundance of God.

“Make sure that when you eat and are satisfied, build pleasant houses and settle in, see your herds and flocks flourish and more and more money come in, watch your standard of living going up and up—make sure you don’t become so full of yourself and your things that you forget God, your God, the God who delivered you from Egyptian slavery;
the God who led you through that huge and fearsome wilderness, those desolate, arid badlands crawling with fiery snakes and scorpions; the God who gave you water gushing from hard rock; the God who gave you manna to eat in the wilderness, something your ancestors had never heard of, in order to give you a taste of the hard life, to test you so that you would be prepared to live well in the days ahead of you.

If you start thinking to yourselves, “I did all this. And all by myself. I’m rich. It’s all mine!”—well, think again. Remember that God, your God, gave you the strength to produce all this wealth so as to confirm the covenant that he promised to your ancestors—as it is today.

If you forget, forget God, your God, and start taking up with other gods, serving and worshiping them, I’m on record right now as giving you firm warning: that will be the end of you; I mean it—destruction. You’ll go to your doom—the same as the nations God is destroying before you; doom because you wouldn’t obey the Voice of God, your God.”  Deuteronomy 8:11-20

With eyes opened I can see how good God is.  I can see that I have a lot to learn about being disciplined and allowing the Holy Spirit to bear the fruit of self-control.  I know my heart will be better for being open to it. 

As I have been thinking about those native missionaries, it comes to me.  They go hungry holding out food that is greater than the stores of my pantry and the contents of my refrigerator—the Bread of Life that transforms a life.

“While they were eating, Jesus took bread, and when he had given thanks, he broke it and gave it to his disciples, saying,“Take and eat; this is my body.”  Then he took a cup, and when he had given thanks, he gave it to them, saying, “Drink from it, all of you.  This is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins.  I tell you, I will not drink from this fruit of the vine from now on until that day when I drink it new with you in my Father’s kingdom.”   Matthew 26:26-29

They know what it is to really drink of the pure kindness of God.

Through them, I am learning too.

***

Grace and peace be ours in abundance as we drink deep of God’s pure kindness. May we be overwhelmed by the changes it works in us.  May we find Him gently drawing us into disciplines in our lives in order to allow us to bless our brothers and sisters around the world out of His more than sufficient abundance.

Jessica :)

Freedom Calls

I wrote a poem in response to reading Isaiah 25 a few months back.  The joy and freedom seem especially appropriate to me for this Easter season.  

“The unassailable fortifications of your walls He will bring down, lay low and cast to the ground, even to the dust”  Isaiah 25:12  

I peek out from behind the citadel

In hopeful wonder, I hear His words:

“Let’s break down the walls!

Come to the feast!

(A place where the fear, the schedules, the life, the friendships

                are handed over to One who knows the way to thrive.)

Come eat! 

Come drink!

Come LIVE! 

Come enjoy! 

Come trust me with all things—the cares, the woes, the joys and sorrows, the dreams!”

Could there really be a place for me

At such a table, so full and inviting?

I hear Him now,

Freedom calls.

He says,

“Come out!”  

I pause and call,

“What if I can’t—

The locks, rusty and old. 

Will you…

Can you break me out like a maid trapped in a fairy tale?”

“Oh yes!”

He responds.

“The stones will roll at my command.”

“Then break away!

I want to sit with you at your table today!”

I say with longing delight.

A voice rumbles like thunder

The walls!

They fall down!

He is running toward me.

I am running toward Him.

We meet in His wide open arms.

He holds me close and whispers

Of the journey ahead

The way out through the rubble all around.

“Stay close!  Walk near! 

There will be nothing to fear

Though the way may be treacherous all ‘round.

In freedom, now walk!

Follow me, Dear.

You’ll know the way by My path of Light.

Ever closer you’ll shine because you are Mine.

A beacon to draw others near.

We’ll be a winsome, formidable pair

Speak to them of freedom and peace. 

Invite them to the feast.

It will be a lavish banquet—

A wedding celebration.

The guests once Lost in darkness, now Found in Light.

Those once Least, greeted joyously in places of Honor.”

“It sounds so marvelous.”

I muse.

We’ll tell the story of Love.

Then we’ll dance,

Him and me.

Evermore and evermore.

***

Grace and peace be ours in abundance as we allow Christ to cause the walls of pain and hurt and sin to fall down.  May we find Him holding us steady and with Him freedom that is full of love.  May we walk with Him sharing the story of Love He has written on our hearts.

Jessica :)

P.S.  The really fun photo is courtesy of my husband and his trip to Krakow, Poland.  It is a photo from his tour of Wawel Castle.

Blessed are the Poor

It was as I was driving back from a trip to the store for a few baby items that I saw her sitting on a bench holding out her cardboard sign.  She was bundled in a coat and scarf, with bare hands holding the words “Anything Helps.”  The temperature was chilly, but not terribly cold.  I found it a bit odd as the only people I had seen there before were waiting for the bus.  

I looked at her, really looked and got all knotted up inside as I recalled that I did not have any food packs in my car.  I had recently finished making up the latest batch, but they were sitting inside the front room at my home.  A year or two ago, I would have run home and circled back, but life with an infant makes it a bit harder to do that.  Instead, I offered her a smile, lifted up a prayer, and when I got home I moved the packs to just inside the front door so I would see them next time I left the house.

I think of this as I listen to the story of Bartimaeus again.

Then they came to Jericho. As Jesus and his disciples, together with a large crowd, were leaving the city, a blind man, Bartimaeus (which means “son of Timaeus”), was sitting by the roadside begging.  When he heard that it was Jesus of Nazareth, he began to shout, “Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!”

Many rebuked him and told him to be quiet, but he shouted all the more, “Son of David, have mercy on me!”

Jesus stopped and said, “Call him.”

So they called to the blind man, “Cheer up! On your feet! He’s calling you.”  Throwing his cloak aside, he jumped to his feet and came to Jesus.

“What do you want me to do for you?” Jesus asked him.

The blind man said, “Rabbi, I want to see.”

“Go,” said Jesus, “your faith has healed you.” Immediately he received his sight and followed Jesus along the road.

Mark 10:46-52 NIV

Bartimaeus calls out and will not be quieted.  In the face of opposition he is persistent.  And Jesus stops.

In her book, Come Along, Jane Rubietta writes of this moment:

“He throws away his cloak.  If you were blind, you would never do this, because if you let go of your cloak, you lose your primary possession, the one thing that keeps you warm on a cold night, cushions your seat, pillows your head, perhaps even collects the fruit of your beggings. 

No hesitation: he scrambles to his feet with the nimbleness born of desperation and hope.  He is not begging for crumbs or coins.  He is asking for what only one person can give him.  The man who just walked down the road.

Bartimaeus moves carefully to where Jesus’s voice sounded and halts in front of him. 

“What do you want me to do for you?” Jesus asks.

What a world-opening, eye-opening question.

Bartimaeus sucks in a huge breath.  This is it.  It’s all or nothing. And he leaps into that chasm called faith: “Rabbi, I want to see.”

There it is, out in the open, for everyone else to see too.  What gall!  What temerity!  What gumption for this beggar, this street person, to call out to the very Messiah, the miracle worker who walked the streets and talked with anyone, so different from a regular king or other royalty.  To ask for a miracle, to ask to see.”   (p.49-50, 2008, used with permission)

Download the template for my food pack cards here.

I think of the woman on the bench again, with her desire right out there on a cardboard sign for all to see.

“Anything helps.”

Anything? 

Relationship.  Money.  Work.  Home.  Health.  Education.  Love.  Jesus. 

In baring her heart, is she being brave?  Manipulative?  Honest?

Is it desperation that brings her here to this place? 

Could it be that she, too, wants a miracle? I wonder.

Could it be that she is calling out in the only way she knows how in this busy world? 

I wonder at her poverty and think of Jesus’ words. 

“Blessed are you who are poor, for yours is the kingdom of God.”  Luke 6:20

I wonder about Jesus’ words. 

I wonder about my own poverty.  Where am I poor in spirit?  

What would my cardboard sign say on it today? 

Could it be this woman with the sign is more in touch with her own poverty than I am right now?

 She knows what she wants.

Jesus asks, “What do you want me to do for you?”

Am I desperate enough to reveal the desire of my heart for all to see and bring it to the Messiah?  Do I even know what it is?

Blessing waits on the other side of this revelation.  Healing waits.  Do I want it?

Will I receive what Jesus gives? 

If I do, might it be that he will open my eyes to the signs written by hand on cardboard and others written on the hearts of the people I encounter each day. 

Photo by Missi Kershner, used with permission.

Do I want to bless others? 

Jesus says, “Very truly I tell you, all who have faith in me will do the works I have been doing, and they will do even greater things than these, because I am going to the Father.  And I will do whatever you ask in my name, so that the Father may be glorified in the Son.  You may ask me for anything in my name, and I will do it.” John 14:12-14 TNIV

Perhaps the woman with the sign is waiting for the blessing that will come as I identify my own poverty, receive the miracle of the heart, and allow the Spirit to work in me.

 I consider this and bring to Jesus a longing to be fully present in the moment.

I receive and along with Bartimaeus, I follow Jesus down the road.

***

Grace and peace be ours in abundance as we bring our desires to Jesus.  May we receive the miracle and find that in our poverty, He gives us the kingdom of God.  May we live changed--following Jesus, allowing His Spirit to work in us, making us a blessing to everyone we meet.

Jessica :)

P.S.  Enjoy a free download of the insert that I created for food packs here.  You can print them on cardstock, color them (or let your kids color them) and cut them down to size or be a little more creative than that as time allows.  The food packs are put together in a quart size bag include a fruit cup, a can of Vienna sausages, peanut butter crackers, granola bars, a mint, a utensil pack, and a card.  We keep bottles of water on hand to go with them.