taleof2trees.com

Avatar definition: Avatar is a Sanskrit word meaning “descent” …referring to the descent of a deity to earth (Typically the incarnation in earthly form).

Avatar was a movie released in 2009 by James Cameron. When I began writing this blog, I was intrigued by the inspiration for the story line. In my research, what I wasn’t prepared for was the wide range of comment and critique of the film, citing its inspiration, theology, social and ecological stances and the movie’s proposed intentions by all manner of individuals and many and varied religious groups either claiming it as a representation of their belief system or alternatively, refuting the movie’s spirituality. At the risk of attracting negative comment, I have chosen to follow my initial heart response because the movie itself impacted me and have chosen to use the film purely as a metaphor to explain, to the best of my ability, my own reaction and interpretation of the film, as I experienced it and as such, should be read in that light.

James Cameron’s story is based on a fictitious planet, Pandora and its inhabitants, the Na’vi people and the planet’s geography, geology and biology. The basis of spirituality is Pantheism, where animals and plant life have souls, its source of spirituality being Eywa, a Mother Earth identity. It is the geology and its inherent value to earth that has brought investors to the planet to mine its wealth, along with military and scientific capabilities, the story exploring the differences and interaction between the races based on intent.

On the first viewing after its release, I was unsure why the movie moved me as it did. Although the film is proposed to be based on Pantheism, if we look at the Biblical view and take the Garden of Eden story with God’s design for man’s dwelling in unity and companion with His creation, ( see Genesis 1:27-28 and Genesis 2:19) the relationship of man ( or in the case of the movie, the Na’vi race) with their surroundings …there is respect for all living things, living in awareness and oneness. The story line of the movie sets this ideal against the depravity and recklessness of mankind.

To me, the Na’vi people took their stewardship of their world as sacrosanct. They lived as many of our ancient tribes and first nation’s people, as custodians of the land in which they dwelt…not conquerors. They tread lightly upon the earth, living within the framework and security of their coexistence with their world…a spiritual existence. All their needs were met by their environment. They dwelt within it, took only what they required on a daily or seasonal basis and lived with intent… not contempt…for their surroundings.

As history has shown us even in our own dealings with ancient cultures and peoples, the movie expressed the tokenism used to subdue any aggression or resistance to the goal…the procurement of naturally occurring  raw materials, generally considered sacred or part of the overall environs. Man as the conqueror.

In this case, a scientific team, created “Avatars” or replicas of the Na’vi beings, “indwelt” by humans through complex technological and biological means, taking on the nature and personality of its inhabitant through consciousness. The scientific basis of this experiment was to learn the ways of the native tribes people, discover the planet “Pandora’s” biology and better understand the culture of the Na’vi.

In the eyes of the instigators with their military capabilities, this experiment was tolerated only as a means to get the Na’vi to relocate giving them access to the vast wealth of mineral deposits beneath the ground and amongst the root system of their “Home Tree “settlement.

As history invariably repeats itself, any further telling of the storyline details is superfluous. Mankind has forever been driven by greed and its lack of regard or compassion for anything other than the conquered territory and its reserves for monetary or political gain.

However, for my mind and experience, the redeeming quality of this tale was the coexistence with nature. For example, there was what was referred to as the “Pandora connection”…between a Na’vi rider and a Dire horse, a right-of-passage into adulthood. To ride this beast, a “union” must be made through a neural/spiritual connection by interwoven filaments from each…the rider and the animal. The two become one…of one mind and therefore movement. This evoked in me a heart-longing for that union…that connection…with the Holy Spirit. I believe that is how I am intended to be, in the Spirit’s “indwelling” of me…my mind, will and purpose surrendered to a unified purpose in God. We become as one…as in there is no separation between His will and mine…me co-labouring with God to fulfil His purpose and will in my surroundings and world in which I live.

There is a verse in 1 Samuel 14:7 where Jonathon, David’s son, is with his armour bearer on a reconnaissance mission against their enemy. Jonathon states his plan, to which the armour bearer responds:

“Do all that your mind inclines to, behold I am with you….as is your mind, so is mine.”

That is my take on this level of connection…my mind at one with the Holy Spirit, to do all that God’s mind inclines to…to be an integral part of whatever God has for me to do but it is not of my strength, my working, my idea or timing. I can do nothing on my own. The power comes from and through, that oneness with the Holy Spirit.

Obviously, this was not the director’s intent with his story, but it stirred in me parallels for my understanding, being a visual learner. Now when prayerful about a direction I need, a deeper understanding of God’s will in a situation or even to know now how God intends to use my story to help or possibly influence someone else, that visual of the Pandora connection is helpful in portraying my prayerful longing to feel at one with God.

Another visual from the movie was the drifting of “Wood sprite”, seeds from the Na’vi’s spiritual “Tree of Souls”( the wisdom and souls of ancestors), onto the avatar Jake, one of the main characters, that signalled favour and future success. While treated suspiciously until this point, this resting of iridescent floating seeds upon him was auspicious and a sign to the Na’vi of his potential opening up a trust for ongoing relationship. This struck me as another parallel for the favour of the Holy Spirit on us.

So what is favour? The dictionary definition is approval, support, goodwill, kindness, preference.

This is available to every believer, but like Jake in the parallel, this favour was a gift bestowed with some responsibility on his part. It required of him a humility and hunger to learn…to fail and get back up and keep trying….to gain experience, knowledge, and wisdom.

Proverbs 3:1-4

“If you truly want a long and satisfying life, never forget the things that I have taught you. Follow closely every truth that I’ve given you, then you will live a full and rewarding life.

Hold onto loyal love and don’t let go and be faithful to all you’ve been taught.         

 Let your life be shaped by integrity with truth written upon your heart.

That’s how you will find favour and understanding, with both God and men-                  

you will gain the reputation for living life well.”

This favour and its parallels between the movie character and our relationship with the Holy Spirit continues. This favour meant developing a love-interest in the lives and ways and thinking of the people and a desire to emulate their behaviours and lifestyle…their heart.

His offering to the people was his loyalty…to them and in the charge against their protagonists …a dedication to their cause, safety and security.

He had to be seen to prove his faithfulness, submitting to their ways, authority and rule, confident in their ability and worthiness to lead.

When it became dangerous for the people, he was honest about his flaws, failings and betrayal. It required an admission, confession if you will, of fault and a humility to seek forgiveness.

This is how it must be in our quest for the favour of God on our lives…

A hunger to learn… to know…and a real desire for relationship.

A love interest in seeking God…to know His heart…to emulate the life of Jesus

To be loyal, faithful, dedicated to service for Him

“We need to be blameless before God”. Matthew 6:33

“Lord how wonderfully you bless the righteous. Your favour wraps around them and covers them under your canopy of joy”. Psalm 5:12

Submission to His ways, authority and ruling in all things, even…no… especially when we don’t understand them.

 “God resists the proud but multiplies grace and favour when you are humble”.       1 Peter 5:5

Trusting in His love and desire for us.

A willingness to admit fault and seek forgiveness to learn to become a worthy child of God…a collaborator in His quest for the overall welfare, saving and security of mankind.

“Constantly chase after the realm of God’s kingdom and the righteousness (right standing) that comes from Him.” Matthew 6:33

The last parallel I will draw so as not to be too long-winded was the coming together of the Na’vi people for the benefit of another, one of the avatar scientists, in an attempt to save her from dying.

They came together, encircled, all touching one another in Unified prayer…each connected to each other for a unified purpose…all of one accord, one mind, one heart. The Na’vi were connected neurally through an underground living network with the Tree of Souls.(their ancestral wisdom)

As a church, our coming together in unified prayer, our interconnectedness with each other should be underpinned by our deeper spiritual bond with Christ. The power derived from that approach and purpose…one mind, one accord, one heart, I think speaks to a need as a church, to think and act more collectively. We meet and centre our true worship and need around God, our Source…from where we derive our power and when we act in accordance with…and in union with…His will and purpose we can affect the outcome of that prayer in thankfulness as willing co-labourers of His will in any and every situation.

So, are we willing to step out in faith, to anchor ourselves in complete trust to the our Father God and His love for us, becoming all He intended for us to be  so that we can walk confidently in the surety of that desire He has for us. If we can adopt and accept that level of relationship of surrender to Him, He will use all that we are and have become in Him to co-labour in His desire, will and purpose for our lives as well as the lives of others…our loved ones, our church, our community…anywhere He places us, to affect change.

Shalom.

Never have I been so challenged by a written word. The verse from Romans 12:2 is this:

‘Do not be conformed any longer to the pattern of this world but Be transformed by a renewing of your mind, then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is….His pleasing and perfect will.” NIV

It continually astounds and challenges me, the depths and levels of surrender and sacrifice required to fulfil this advice/command from Paul but all done gradually with grace by a loving Father.

I have been, by nature, a glass half empty girl. I say, “by nature”, but in all honesty that was my upbringing. Negativity was the norm and for many of the past few years, that mindset was defended as being “practicality”.” I’m just saying” … has been a lifelong catch-phrase.

My parents were brooders. Days would go by where the atmosphere was thick with resentment…unspoken, unresolved emotions. Then I came into my beloved’s household where sparks would fly and there was no such restraint. I brought those backgrounds into my marriage and my mothering…my parents, their parents, having brought with them the burdens of generations past.

It is these backgrounds, those attitudes and subconscious traits we hold to, that direct and influence our thinking and then, by matter of course, our responses and reactions to all things in life.

I think the powerful verse that couples to this train of thinking is 2 Corinthians 10:5 “ we destroy arguments and every lofty opinion raised against the knowledge of God captive and make it obedient to Christ.”  ESV

So, “do not conform to the thinking of this world”. There are unspoken societal rules by which we all operate, mostly rules of behavioural standards…what’s acceptable, what’s not, expected attitudes reactions and responses to life, circumstances and our security, whether that be personal, community, national or global. In this realm we can operate almost anonymously and can in most cases, get away with less than honest and transparent behaviours.

The more challenging place to instigate change or transformation on any scale in our behaviours and mindsets is within our own homes amongst those familiar with our pasts, our intimate selves, our foibles and failures…and they are quick off the mark to point out our emerging inconsistencies.

To initiate change…and maintain it…will require a steady and firm mindset based on a solid and confident “WHY”. What is my purpose for this upheaval? Many of us have fallen victim to the New Year’s resolution for change and lasted a mere few days mostly because of not only ours but our loved one’s resistance to change.

I have subscribed to many health forums over the years, my inbox inundated with seminar and summit invites, health tips and the latest do’s & don’t of eating. This, while good information, developed a fear and self-diagnosis into a food and health prison. Proverbs 23:7 says “As a man thinketh in his heart…so is he”…satan’s foothold. He will attack what matters to us most…and did…my health. As this has become such an ingrained habit, I have discovered that I need as much to seek God’s control over all aspects of my life…especially this area and surrender my seat of control over my physical body as well as my heart and especially my thinking.

Our obsession with media…social, radio and TV are another area where what we input into our minds are the opinions of others.  We post things and watch and wait for reactions. Did “they” like it? How did “They” respond? We count the likes and read and review the reactions. Our emotional being is arrested by the opinions of others… the “they’s” of the world, some we know, most we do not. I love Steven Furtick’s comment from his sermon “R U N CTRL? recently, and I quote:

“Don’t outsource your priorities to a world that doesn’t care. A human opinion is nothing compared to a Divine Seal. When God puts a seal on you, nothing and no one can stand in His way to achieve His purpose in and through you”.

The Passion Translation puts Romans 12:2  so succinctly:

“Stop imitating the ideals and opinions of the culture around you”.

That’s pretty clear, I think…yet we live in a world where we are ruled by the very culture we live in. We have been recently thrust into a climate of fear and as time goes by under restrictions, people are becoming fractious and phobic.

So how do we step beyond those norms…those ideals and opinions of what is appropriate, fair and reasonable and especially now, in our Covid ordeal…what’s socially allowed by regulation and now deemed our “new normal”?

The verse continues…” but be inwardly transformed by the Holy Spirit through a total reformation of how you think”.

I do not know what that will mean for you. This verse has taken me on a multi-levelled journey, exposing many things from all aspects of my being and thought life. I chose the word “Exposed “ with all its negative connotations because that is how it has been for me…a  gradual unpicking of a tightly packaged mindset about myself that has fostered and formulated many facets of my thought-life and its subsequent default responses to people, especially family, experiences and events, past and present.

It has required of me a fully conscious surrender and granting permission for God to “unglue” me…again a word chosen because I have been ‘stuck’ in this version of me for my whole life.

It has been said by someone…. Max Lucado, I think…that “God will take you as you are, but He won’t leave you that way”. This has certainly been true for me. There have been many things that needed addressing….aspects, attitudes and atrocities from our pasts that we tuck neatly out of harm’s way, or we’ve adapted strategies to sidestep any suggestion or sense that we don’t have a handle on something. It is these hidden…even from ourselves… hotspots that satan will source to unseat us from our security and identity.

God is in control. I quote Steven Furtick again because he has touched my life through his frank and honest sermons…where he says, “God is in control…but he wont TAKE control” by overriding our free will. That’s why it is important to not only surrender but to give permission to change who you are…to make you more like Christ. That is the aim…isn’t it?

As I am moving towards a dream God has planted in me and have begun to activate ways to fulfil this, I am finding myself under attack…at the core of my identity. Satan is aware of and will use anything he can to keep me from doing what God has placed in heart to do. So, this morning, he went for that soft underbelly…a long held subconscious fear and familial curse that surfaces in my relationships. It resulted in tears and loss of confidence…one of those “crawl into a deep hole” moments. I am reminded that I have THIS blog to write about being transformed by a renewing of my mind and not to allow myself to be distracted or undermined.

TD Jakes, in his speech titled “Step over into the Future” says … “If satan can tie up our minds with unforgiveness, negativity, a loss of our identity and worth in Christ, he can keep us locked in a past that no longer serves us and prevents us from accepting and realising our new identity in Christ Jesus and the fullness of Him. We limit God’s ability to work in & through us when we hold to our old ways of thinking. Our minds are powerful and that is satan’s point of attack….”

So, I had to choose. I gathered myself up, tissues in hand, and walked, as is my daily prayer and meditation mode, asking my Loving Father for help rather than wallowing in satan’s wake. Out loud I stated and claimed my identity as a beloved daughter of the Most High God and His love for me. This I know and trust. I opened my YouTube to listen to some calming “soaking” worship while I walked and prayed but seemingly touched the screen that brought up the message of the day.

“The enemy only attacks what is valuable”! Another Steven Furtick message and was that ever a message from God that met my need in that moment! I will unashamedly plug this message for anyone struggling with their walk or worth!

So, I choose. I choose to take all God has offered me…all Jesus died to release to me …. Forgiveness,  healing, life, love identity, redemption… and as Jesus rebuked the storm, I rebuked my emotional one and worked through 3 questions that Steven Furtick preached on in a previous sermon called “Take Control of Your mind”, from Philippians The questions are these:

1. What does it matter?
2. What is God calling me to do?
3. What will I choose?

As I walked, I worked through these 3 questions in my mind and shifted my focus to what was important in this moment. That is not to squash or deny the trauma or thoughts that were used to tamper with my emotions but that is better dealt with in a more measured and mindful way under the direction of the Holy Spirit….a stronghold that needs by prayer, to be dismantled and destroyed. But in this moment, the change of focus to my true identity and what that privileged place and purpose requires of me in my response to God…not to the subtleties of satan…is my choice.

The verse we began with ends like this:

“This will empower you to discern God’s will as you live a beautiful life, satisfying and perfect in His eyes.”

TD Jakes says, “Decide to be blessed. It is an act of will. Make up your mind to rejoice. Let the past go…the OLD you and step into the NEW you and the future”.

“For as a man thinketh…so is he”. Proverbs 23:7

Blessings and Amen.

References:

#stevenfurtick#stevenfurticksermons

1.“The Enemy Only Attacks What is Valuable”

2. “Taking Control of Your Mind”

3. “R U N CTRL? “

TD Jakes speech #Step Over Into The Future#

 

 #TashaCobbs# #In Spite Of Me# just a great song!

Jeff and I were discussing God’s random unpredictability after my follow up appointment with the surgeon last week. Jeff’s take on it was travelling with no road map, hence the title. And so that conversation gave birth to this post….

If I intend to travel into unfamiliar territory, and I need help to get to my desired destination, I type the place name or address intomy navigation system.

“Maps” (our current and most preferred navigation) calculates the best possible route considering traffic and any other disturbances or obstacles. I have the option to select the shortest route, to avoid motorways and I can, at any point in the designated trip, take an alternative route.

Pam Ayers, a British poet/ comedian tells in one of her stories of driving with her husband, she navigates with a paper map. I would Google it…. “Pam Ayers- Map Reading”… for a laugh but I hope the seriousness of the frustration that led to our purchase of our navigation system- TomTom, purchased while travelling overseas is not lost on you, the reader. Jeff is not as bad as her husband I should say in his defence. However, having called out incorrect directions, lane merging’s and alternate routes too late for him to respond, and being tired from our flight, the tension was palpable.

So, what was my difficulty with reading the maps anyway?

1. The map was in a language I did not know
2. My orientation was skewed…we were driving on the wrong side of the road in unfamiliar surroundings
3. My eyesight for reading the fine details on the map was not conducive to quick sight reading for making snap decisions

With the tear-stained paper map upside down on my lap , because I laid the map out in the direction we were travelling (made perfect sense to me at the time but did add to the problem!), Jeff pulled an unscheduled stop in a town for a soothing coffee and a breather…and purchased TomTom, the system of the time those years ago.

Jeff, familiar with technology, had it up and running in no time. I was relieved of my navigation duties…and I chose that word deliberately! And all was well…at least most of the time!

We were able to select an Australian voice for our navigation…Ken was his name…with a good old Aussie accent and nuances…. a welcome sound when most conversation outside of the vehicle was not understood.

1.Now our navigation was in a language well understood and easy to respond to instructions, giving ample time and notice for lane changes and exits from motorways.

2. The orientation problem was now addressed.

3.The map was on the screen and the eyesight issue resolved as it was clear and well lit both day and night.

This is illustrated by my recent experience. I had attempted to follow my own roadmap to health and healing. I had access to SO much information…books, videos, retreats, workshops and programs that came from each individual’s own experience or research. Navigation it was, but confusing as each spoke their own language based on their approach or expertise. While I had some success and believe the routes I’d assessed and adopted for myself were beneficial to my overall health, no one approach could ever fully encapsulate my whole body’s needs and requirements. Not one had the full road map with each cell’s coordinates to target complete healing and regeneration or knowledge of the how’s and why’s some cells opted to take a route of their own choosing. Neither was the “whole self” considered…mental, spiritual, emotional…all vital factors in ill-health to be incorporated into holistic healing.

My orientation in this journey was skewed. I was operating out of fear…fear of what I’d just experienced in my caring for Jeff’s mum: guilt that for all my research and acquired knowledge, I’d not been able to help her…so what made me think I could achieve it for myself? Now I was on the wrong side of the road! This wasn’t happening to someone else…it was happening to me and I was disorientated, and my judgements flawed and strained.

This affected my vision. My focus became narrow, self-absorbed, obsessive and fear-driven…. all with the illusion of control. I had the wheel, didn’t I? I could override or ignore the navigation system. I was not really in any position to make decisions but clung tightly, out of fear, to that wheel…. asking God, the Sovereign Navigator, on occasion, to guide and bless my efforts, when I remembered or was feeling lost in it all.

Im not sure how God would feel about being likened to our random navigation system but here I go….

Enter “Goat-Track Ken”! This was TomTom’s pet name. Ken had a quirky knack for calculating routes that took us into the “great unknown”. We could be assured it was never the most direct route and, on several occasions, took us on a 2-hour diversion that brought us back a few hundred meters further along the well-established road.

I can enter my preferred destination into the navigation system and once the route is calculated and shows on the screen, I get step by step route instructions. Unless I pull over and consult the overall long-range map view, I have no idea of the route…and the system recalculates and recalibrates according to external circumstances I cannot know. This is So God!!

I can bring my destination to God through prayer, making the desires of my heart known to God.

In fact we are encouraged in the Bible to bring our requests before God in prayer ( Philippians 4:6 “Be anxious for nothing, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And the peace that passes all understanding will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.”).

 But then I am to leave the details to God. Unlike the navigation system where I can intervene and re-route, I am not at liberty to dictate the terms, the routes by which God determines to take me.

I know I have quoted this verse before, but it is so valid…” Trust in the Lord with all your heart…and lean not on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge Him …and He will direct your paths” Proverbs 3: 5-6.

He has the long-range view…He is the map maker…the way maker and will make all the necessary adjustments to our route should we wander down an unmarked or unsealed road or get diverted or distracted. Like “Ken”, God has a knack for calculating some interesting and unexpected routes, most we’d never choose had we the option to do so, some short-cuts to avoid a situation that would cause us distress, disappointment or disaster.  Even in Jesus lifetime and ministry, diversions and interruptions were commonplace, where He stopped to be available to someone in need in the moment.  I cannot know whom God has manoeuvred into my route that He needs me to be His hands, His heart in that moment along the way or He might divert me for a time for an unexplained purpose.

Sometimes He takes us the long way home, because He has something He wants to teach us about ourselves or His character …or to trust Him… or our pre-booked destination was not part of His plan for us. As with Ken, we often arrived at our destination travel-worn and weary but on reflection, we had seen and experienced things we could never have planned for but God, in His grace and love had in store for us

You know, things often do not turn out as we’d planned. I could sit with TomTom….aka” Ken”…and question him as to why he chose one route over another…and we often did!….but no answers would be forthcoming. He just did! My experience of God has been much the same.

God goes into my future and has planned my route…more likely than not, nowhere near my idea of how I should get from A to B. But He has the overall picture/map. Proverbs 16:9 “A man’s mind plans his way, but The Lord directs his steps” and I am reminded  in Deuteronomy 31:6 that “The Lord God Himself, goes before me and will be with me: He will never leave me or forsake me.” I’m not left without direction if I trust Him.

Psalm 139 gives me confidence that God, who knows me intimately, has my best interests at heart. 

Philippians 4:19 says “But my God shall supply all your needs according to His riches in glory by Christ Jesus” so I can be confident that in any and every situation, regardless of how it appears to me, I will be provided for.

Psalm 91 speaks of His protection of us if we look to Him for guidance and and acknowledge Him as our Lord.

His chosen route requires us to trust Him and as frustrating as it can be to not know the details of the journey, we are not meant to know the answers. Like TomTom, He gives us directions as we need them, with just enough forward vision that we need to depend on Him and His love and care for us. Our mission then is to just put ourselves in His hands and follow the instructions He gives…just as we would when we follow “Maps”.

PS…You know, I struggled to pull this post together into a flowing coherent piece. I’ve been shown this morning why…. well, I really knew within myself last night but confirmed in a gentle but firm chastisement during my morning walk.

It was through one of the health forums I subscribe to, where it was suggested a laboratory hair analysis could be done to determine toxicities and mineral imbalances. Given I’d had several PET scans and radiographic tests with isotopes as a lead up to surgery, this was a concern of mine for my complete healing and overall general health. So, I had a hair cut as per the required sampling advice and sent it off for testing. Harmless, I thought and good to be aware and act on anything untoward.

The results came yesterday.

I poured over the graphs and results, then the reported findings and suggested strategies to resolve those things that required attention. My mind swung into gear…and out came the old worn road map. OK. I needed to change this and that, contact a notable naturopath…one that accepted and understood the test findings and would initiate a dietary and supplement plan to address the imbalances and correct the noted findings.

Working, working, working….my mind could not rest!

Then came to spiritual tap on the shoulder! You wrote what in your blog post??? Give it to God was it?

This is what is termed a “stronghold”. For me, a control habit relating to my whole health management and a still not fully surrendered release of my health to God. You would think after all I’ve just been through this would be a no-brainer!!

Two things came to me while walking. First a song….an oldie

“His name is Wonderful, His name is Wonderful,

His name is Wonderful, Jesus MY LORD,

He is the MIGHTY KING, MASTER OF EVERYTHING

His name is Wonderful, Jesus MY LORD.”      It follows on…bow down before Him….

Question? If He was My Lord, Master and King…. who had control again? Who supplies all me needs?

Then the verse from Matthew 6:33…

“Seek first the Kingdom of God and His righteousness” ……meaning placing the pursuit of God’s Kingdom and a relationship with Him above all else….” then all these things shall be added unto you”

And doing this it will follow that all my material needs will be met without worry or anxiety.

Back to surrender! Back to repentance! Praying for the chains, the habits, the illusory control to be broken…again…. completely…. utterly and forever! And for a trust and fullness of the richness of God’s grace to take its place.

1 Corinthians 3:19    True Wisdom

“For what the world says is wisdom is actually foolishness in God’s eyes…. The Lord sees right through the clever reasonings of the wise and knows its all a sham…. actually, you already have everything. It has all been given for your benefit.”

So, note to self…and to you if this strikes a chord with you…. put the burden of needing to know, to be, to hold on to…and let God be God. He does it so much better than me…or you.

Carole King’s album, TAPESTRY, from 1971 has been my all-time favourite all these years. That shows my age, I guess!

The song, Tapestry, came to mind just now while doing my morning devotional from Christine Caine’s book, “Unshakable”, where she reminds me of God’s faithfulness and encourages me to think back over my life, read my journals, to see how God has woven His inexplicable love, protection, grace and provision through life’s situations…good and bad.

The song goes…” My life has been a tapestry of rich and royal hue

                            An everlasting vision of the ever-changing view

                            A wondrous woven magic in bits of blue and gold

                            A tapestry to feel and see, impossible to hold”

Carole King-       Tapestry 1971

Amongst those blue and golden threads, there are threads of brown and black…events, disappointments, insecurities, uncertainties…but woven throughout, in between, around, are the threads of God in gold, holding it all together, bringing healing and restoration. This is my life’s story, my history, my uniqueness.

Scars on my life’s landscape are part of that story. Scars that bring empathy, compassion, experience for the benefit of others…things to be shared, not as entities in themselves but as part of the bigger landscape of my special life to bring connection, understanding, unity in a common story.

Its not until I step back and view the whole tapestry from a distance that I get any perspective. Still unfinished, I can see “behind” me and the supernatural hand of God guiding and leading me, sometimes following me to protect me from my past. (Psalm 139:5). But overall, His faithfulness throughout. “He will never leave us nor forsake us”.

Be encouraged! He’s brought us this far, every stitch lovingly placed and delicately woven into our story is His unfailing love for us. He has created a masterpiece in us all…we are fearfully and wonderfully made”. No two tapestries are alike.

So, as I look at my unfinished canvas, I can see such potential, even now, for a bright and colourful future. Will there be dark threads amongst that? Almost certainly!! And sometimes a whole block of one colour is woven before adding other hues. So where it seems nothing is changing…life is one boring colour…just know God has the overall view of our masterpiece in His mind’s eye and is waiting to weave into it, through people, places and provision, extraordinary experiences in those rich royal hues.

While we are waiting…and get comfortable with waiting!!….instead of trying to disentangle ourselves from the mess we’ve caused ourselves, allow God to continue to weave His golden thread of the love of Jesus and the knowledge of the Presence of the Master Creator of our tapestry, to exhibit His wondrous woven magic for all to see His glorious hand in our life’s story.

That tapestry is not for our benefit by the way. It is for Him to show His grace and glory to others.

Exodus 11:13

“Do not be afraid. Stand still and see the salvation of The Lord which He will accomplish for you today. For the Egyptians whom you see, you shall see again no more forever.

The Lord will fight for you and you shall hold your peace.

Lift up your rod and stretch out your hand over the sea and divide it. And the children of Israel shall go on dry ground through the midst of the sea.”

I’ve been intrigued at the number of times this story has popped up in my personal Bible study, reading and in my YouTube favourite speaker’s sermons. There is so much to be gleaned from this account. I only hope I can do some of it justice.

 The crossing of the Red Sea by the Israelites is a dramatic and well-known Bible account with Pharaoh and 600 chariots in hot pursuit of their escaping enslaved workforce, The Israelites, following a series of commands from God through Moses, and subsequent plagues to convince Pharaoh of God’s intentions for the freedom of His chosen people. These people had been in captivity in Egypt for some time. The people of Israel, though oppressed, had made some semblance of family life amongst the dirt and blood and sweat of the harsh workload of Pharaoh’s voracious appetite for growth and development of his mighty empire…built on the backs of Israel’s people.

So, post plagues, and supernatural events from the hand of God to convince Pharaoh of God’s intention to have His people freed, we pick up the story of the exodus of Israel from Egypt at the edge of the Red Sea. The people were surrounded on all sides by the pursuit of the Pharaoh and his army. There was nowhere for them to go and they feared certain death. They were enslaved, beaten and worked to death but within that was a perception of certainty unlike what they were now being asked to do and face. The people were being asked to step outside of everything they knew and walk into the vast unknown, trusting God…the God many believed had abandoned them to slavery.

 God made a way for them…..parting the Red Sea, “a wall of water on their right hand and on their left”. Exodus 11:22. They had, at that moment , to step out and walk between the walls of water, trusting God would deliver them.

Its 4 a.m. and I’m woken with this story. I’m in hospital, post mastectomy and I’m seeing the parallels in the Bible story to my experience.

Many of you may know, some will not, of my last year’s journey with breast cancer. I don’t wish to labour the point, suffice to say, God had led me through many Red Sea moments throughout the year…none like this current one. I had prayed diligently…fervently…passionately, for my miracle moment, certain of God’s supernatural intervention and then, as I got closer to the date of surgery and had to endure many frightening procedures and tests, I could feel my hope slipping through my fingers. Here I was, standing at the edge of my Red Sea, my enemy closing in on me.

My captivity? My breast cancer, its causal factors, I believe, my past…past beliefs, battles, betrayals and behaviours, my struggle to let go and give God control.

I had sought to control details of my treatment, having researched natural therapies and been against the narrow-minded, one size fits all medical approach and with the return of my cancer after 8  months, was forced to accept things were beyond my control this time. I have been asked to walk this path and trust God has it all under His control foregoing any semblance of knowing or understanding the why’s, how’s and wherefores. I have declared God’s promises over me, His faithfulness to hold me fast through this challenging time. I have stood at the water’s edge, nowhere behind me to run or escape.

I had to find the courage to step in and walk through the frightening valley with the threatening walls of water on either side of me. Having seen the Prince of Egypt movie, I call to mind the scene of the movement of sharks in the wall of water, like walking through the aquarium tunnel.  I’m not aware there are sharks in the Red Sea but the illusion of monsters of the deep looming in wait has been part of the fear to overcome. There have been huge fear factors for me, having found this cancer in the last months of caring for my amazing mother-in-law in her end-stage breast cancer. …the visuals of that experience seared into my mind and heart have been difficult to override. I have had to anchor myself in God’s faithfulness to deliver on His promises and declare that He is my Deliverer, my Physician, my Provider and that her story and outcome is not mine.

Isaiah 45:2-3 “I have gone before you and levelled mountains, broken down doors of bronze and shattered bars of iron,” has been my mainstay promise throughout.

2 Samuel 22:33   “God is my power and strength. He makes perfect my ways”.

We are commanded throughout Scripture to not be afraid, as many as 300 plus times.1 John 4:18 states “ Such love has no fear, because perfect love expels all fear.”

As with most of life’s challenges, our minds can be our worst enemies, creating for ourselves scenes and scenarios that keep us fearful. In the battle of my mind, I failed to realise I was actually walking on DRY ground. I have sung my way through claustrophobic scanners and lengthy tests; quoted Scripture and promises to encourage myself at times I just wanted to bolt or my emotional state of overwhelm threatened to swallow me whole.

                     “No, in all these things, we are more than conqueror through Him who loved us” Romans 8;37

Ive thought about that Red Sea parting …the dry ground in relation to my story. In my plea for a miracle, I had hoped for the teleportal version…the “Beam me up Scotty” miracle. I wanted desperately to be one of those who experienced that ..not to avoid the pain and discomfort….I just had a need to know God still did miracles today. I wanted to see “ a display of God’s will being done “on earth as it is in Heaven” ….the Kingdom reality in the visible realm,” is how Bill Johnson puts it in his book, “The Supernatural Power of a Transformed Mind”.  I have family and friends who have listened and watched me tout healing and my faith in its possibility. My renewed faith began with a plea that I see and be an instrument in the reality and realisation of God’s word as alive and active in a day of such scepticism and cynicism and that God be a visible presence in my life.

It didn’t happen as I envisaged it.

I didn’t arrive unscathed on the other side of my Red Sea unmuddied and unspoiled. I had to cross the bumpy rocky sea floor with everyone else. I had to experience the miraculous protecting hand of God from a place of vulnerability…

  … To be in the PET scan tunnel and know His strength and presence to overcome claustrophobia;

“Have I not commanded you? Be strong and of good courage, be not frightened or dismayed, For the Lord your God is with you wherever you go. “Joshua 1:9

     …To be singing songs of praise and victory in Nuclear medicine while being injected with radioisotopes.

“Way maker, Miracle worker, Promisekeeper, Light in the darkness…my God that is who you are.” Michael W Smith’s song.

     To be wheeled into theatre still declaring God’s favour and protection over me in my moment of absolute weakness.

“Be Still and know that I am God “ Psalm 46:10 and singing in my head Tasha Cobb’s song, “Fill me up, God..till I overflow”.

I’ve arrived on the other side a bit bruised and battered, tearful and questioning…but not beaten. I spent a quiet day grieving …the loss of my breast…what felt like my failed faith, wondering how I’d managed to misunderstand  so profoundly what I’d believed to be His promise to me… or had I misinterpreted His Word to fit my agenda? Had I not exhibited sufficient faith?

Emotionally spent and feeling defeated, I have gone back to His Word to find the answers…back to pray for understanding and wisdom and insight and to be reminded.

And reminded I was….

1. Romans 15:13 “I pray that God, the Source of Hope, will fill you completely with joy and peace because you trust in Him…then….you will overflow with confident hope through the power of the Holy Spirit”.
2. Philippians 4:4 “Always be full of joy and rejoice

                                            Don’t worry about anything

                                            Tell God what you need

                                            Thank Him for all He’s done

                                                           THEN…..

                                           You will receive God’s peace which exceeds anything we can understand.”

THEN! ….Hmmmm….THEN!

So, even when I’m afraid, emotional, feeling defeated and disillusioned, confused or shaken, ill-equipped…I’m told to:

1. Trust Him…. which then gives me peace, joy, confident hope and power, thanking Him
2. Be joyful, thankful, unworried…which then leads to my receiving God’s peace.
3. Ask for my needs and expect them to be met

What lessons do I take away with this experience?

I don’t know what anything means.

I do not know nor can I predict the thoughts and ways of God..

Giving it over to God means not trying to impose or implant my vision of who God is or what He should be doing in any and every situation.

Its not about what I can do to impress, impart or improve on God’s plan but just to walk humbly in it….with no foresight, just one step at a time faith, believing He will provide ALL my needs , my next step, my strength and courage, my opportunities, my healing, my growth.

The message then?

“Yet will I praise the Lord.” Keep trusting Him, thanking Him in this moment for His protection, blessings, “still to come” fulfilment of His promises, the surrounding me with wonderful people, the skill of the doctor and anaesthetist and friends and family who love, support and encourage me.

I’m still waiting on the closure but God has brought me through. I’m celebrating in advance the crashing of the waves behind me to signal the destruction of the evil set to destroy me. God already has the victory. Do I look back to see the waters close in behind me or walk on believing it’s done already? I think the latter.

Stepping into the unknown…well, it’s only unknown to me…not to God.

I‘m called to rejoice and give thanks and to trust the Father’s heart for me.

The Lord is my Shepherd. Psalm 23

He leads me, restores me, revives me….my future is in the hands of the Sovereign God.

“For I know the plans I have for you are to prosper you…not to harm you”. Jeremiah 29:11

“And we know that in All things God works for the good of those who love Him, who have been called according to His purpose.” Romans 8:28

I will finish with this passage from Psalm 139:5.

‘You’ve gone into my future to prepare the way

And in kindness you follow behind me to spare me from the harm of my past

With your hand of love, You impart a blessing to me

Wherever I go, Your hand will guide me

Your strength will empower me.”

Philippians 2:13

“for it is God who works in you to will and to act according to His good purpose”.

I declare God’s favour over my life…. and yours.

 Amen.

I began writing this blog post a few weeks ago now. It began as a response to my deep sadness after listening to someone dear to me expressing their being “finished with God”. You know those times of almost bone-aching pain of the soul that threatens to devour you? I was moved by the sound of helplessness, disappointment, abandonment and restrained anger in his voice that betrayed the depth of emotional investment in his declaration.

I get it. I understand that in life’s most challenging moments, when the unspeakable happens…a loved one is snatched from our lives; a diagnosis pulls the mat out from underneath us and forces us to review our lives and it’s priorities; your life circumstances are thrown into disarray by an event or person, an unwarranted, uncensored, unexpected happening and its roll-on effects of anxiety, disappointment, depression and mistrust along with their crippling and life-changing consequences suck the joy out of everything. How do I respond to another in that place?

I have been there in that dark void.

How do I navigate that level of emotional hijacking? How do I answer those unanswerable questions? To whom can I turn and unleash my frustration or unload my pain? How do I find peace or come to a place of acceptance or navigate those feelings and deep ,deep emotions that unseat me from my place of joy, comfort, certainty and security in my circumstances? The answers can be found in the nature of God…the inexplicable  solidity of Him as found in Scripture but that is a process. It takes a determination to explore the possibility of God as the answer to all those unsettling dilemmas and that determination is driven, often, by a desperate need….a need for some kind of resolution or at least a satisfactory, secure, stable place to land.

I shared a little that day of my own experience, but it was not the time or place to share deeply or express my thoughts. I had a sense my experience did not translate well as a comparison to theirs. What I would have said had I the moment again would be that God is in that place of tension between the brokenness and shattered confidence and the yet unrealised hope for healing and restoration that was longed for.

Who is God and what are His quoted attributes that would convince anyone to have any confidence in Him, His ability or even His willingness to acknowledge me or my plight and current situation? Why should I think God would do anything? It starts with some very fundamental truths, beginning with God is Good.

That is one of those quandaries. I have wondered often what has formed my opinion of Who God is and what He is like. I think sometimes we go through life never really questioning why we think the way we do. I wonder too how often we attribute to God the foibles and failings of our own fathers where they have not demonstrated love to us in a way we need, where the very notion of calling God  “Father” is a real and palpable sticking point.

 Historically, a good God has rarely been preached from the pulpit…at least in my earshot. Often, we are entrenched in the Old Testament and Old covenant view of God …the God of rules and regulations read out of context which, when not fulfilled ignites His wrath.  It’s not that I recall growing up with the Old Testament view of a vengeful judging God but have been challenged often lately in my presumption that God is more likely to smite me than love me. This has certainly been a huge part of my processing these questions as I’m challenged in my thinking and responses to events and circumstances.  I need to realise that it is not God who is responsible for the evil in our world or my challenging life situations. Jesus states in John 10:10 that it is “the thief “(satan) who comes to steal, kill and destroy.” The next part of that verse is Jesus saying “I am come that you might have life and have it more abundantly.”

God is Good. What we miss is the tension between who God is and what he does, His desire with His creation of man for relationship and mankind’s insistent rejection of His demonstrations of love and longing for that intimacy.

God addressed this in His sending Jesus, His Son, to be the bridge over that chasm between the Old and the New. The purpose of Jesus was to dispense with the rules…the old covenant law and its oppression and become the New covenant…the promise and demonstration of God’s unfailing love and Goodness and His desire for us.

In Bill Johnson’s book, titled “God is Good…He’s better than you think”, he writes, “His goodness is beyond our ability to comprehend but not our ability to experience. Our hearts will take us where our heads can’t fit.” He cites a verse in Psalm 34:8 “Taste and see that the Lord is good”. Pp33-34

I could type an epistle quoting verses and experiences that would do little to convince most struggling with their situations or those whose minds are steeled against any idea of a good God.

The verse from Psalm 34 about “tasting” God requires an element of belief…of trust …of even a mustard seed of faith in the possibility that God really does love you and is waiting to be asked…to be invited to invade your circumstances… and then overriding your head sufficiently that you can speak out His name and ask for help. We sometimes get caught in that place of tension between our belief and human understanding and the nature of God, the truth of His Word, His proclaimed promises in The Bible, His purposes for us and the realisation…or not…of our faith in the goodness of God. How do I reconcile that faith stand in the face of tragedy, of unchanged circumstances, of unanswered prayer? God has claimed to love us beyond our human reason or understanding… and wants to grow us into a relationship of trust and love.

It struck me while writing this that the list of negatives we use to our detriment are what stifle our faith and future. The belief that God cannot, does not, should not, would not are the lies were told and instead we are advised to trust ourselves.

 The new paradigm is to find our answers “within ourselves” through self-help literature and programs, the concept being that we have no need of anything or anyone external to ourselves and we have been launched into a world of self-absorption, self-importance ,self-reliance.

What is difficult is we are asked to trust God…to give up our need to know and understand, to surrender ourselves to Him.  To many, this is an unsatisfactory and seemingly irrational response. It does not make any sense. It flies in the face of reason, of common sense, of reality as we understand and experience it. Yet it is the mainstay of faith.

Proverbs 3:5-6 “Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and do not lean on your own understanding.”

So, to begin I must believe and trust that there is a Divine Being who loves me, is interested in all that I am and have and desires to act for me and on my behalf. That’s a fairly important first step.

Psalm 52:8 states “I trust in the steadfast love of God”

Psalm 4: 3 “Put you trust in The Lord”.

His Word, the Bible is the foundation of our trust…our faith that what is written in the pages of The Bible is truth.

“For the Word of God is living and active…it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart.” Hebrews 4:12

“For every word God speaks is sure and every promise pure. His truth is tested, found to be flawless and ever faithful. It’s as pure as silver refined seven times in a crucible of clay.” Psalm 12: 6

Proverbs 30:5 “Every word of God is flawless: He is a shield to those who take refuge in Him”.

How do I trust God and how does anyone “get to know” Him? Jesus is the exact representation of His Father, He mirrored God in all His ways, His interactions, His acts of grace, healing and love.  So, to know the Son is to know the Father. My readings of Jesus’ ministry recorded in the gospels show love, compassion, patience, understanding, tenderness in all his interactions with people. He healed everyone who came to Him. He spoke with authority yet with gentleness. While He spoke to crowds He was concerned with individual’s welfare, social, religious and political injustices, the details and everyday issues of life which He used in His sermons and teachings as metaphors to explain, in human terms, God’s love for us and how we should interact with Him and with others.

He loves us with a love beyond measure. Ephesians 3:17-19 states:

“By constantly using your faith, the life of Christ will be released deep inside you, and the resting place of His love will become the very source and root of your life.

Then you will be empowered to discover what every holy one experiences- the great magnitude of the astonishing love of Christ in all its dimensions. How deeply intimate and far reaching is His love! How enduring and inclusive it is! Endless love beyond measurement that transcends understanding- this extravagant love pours into you until you are filled to overflowing with the fullness of God.” The Passion Translation.

 But His love needs to be reciprocated. The only way to know and experience His love and goodness, in the measure He longs to express to us in relationship and intimacy, is for us to choose Him. He chose us in the beginning. He now wants us to invite Him to act on our behalf, to love and care for us as only a Good Father would. It is not assumed that He will just do it because we have decided He should and will. He already decided that. Jesus reset the stage for that level of intimacy again with God by example, living as man amongst us but being Divine and in constant communion with the Father. He only did what He saw the Father do and what He was told to do. We have been invited to live in that same realm of reality…Kingdom reality through Jesus redemption and example.

Our greatest sticking points are letting go of our illusory control of our destiny and that of our believing we know the mind of God.

“Isaiah 55: 9 “For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways My ways. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are My ways higher than your ways and My thoughts higher than your thoughts.”

This past year has taught me a lot. I began as this blog began, my faith in tatters after crushing disappointments for which I blamed God. I wrote Him off. I turned my back on my lifelong see-saw faith which was great when all was well, and the wheels fell off when things did not go according to my plan and expectation.

I have been that person who, out of desperate need in the midst of my health crisis, has searched back through those tatters of faith, looking for some substance, some truth, some help. I found it…or rather, God found me. We have been working together through my past, peeling back all the layers of my perceived beliefs about myself, my history, my faith and I can announce I am a work in progress …loved by God, saved in every way possible, trusting Him for my future. It has meant letting go of the “striver “in me…the need to keep up the appearance of being the Good Girl, always trying to please and insisting on my own way. It’s been a huge leap to trust God and it has released me from fear and stress of the responsibility of being in control of something I have no control over. So, even though I still wait for answers I am confident in my relationship with God and His love for me. 1 John 5;14 says “And this is the confidence that we have towards Him, that if we ask anything according to His will he hears us”. It has been freeing to allow God, who knows my innermost being and supplies all my needs, to do what He does best. I revel in His goodness. It’s quite the adventure!

Another title: probability vs possibility, potential and promises

Two mornings in a row, my husband sat beside me in bed with a cuppa and proceeded to write in a notebook, ideas connected to his work, that God had given him overnight. The First morning, I was a bit miffed…. why doesn’t God speak as clearly and precisely as that to me? Then when my husband left to start his day, I had a small meltdown in God’s direction regarding my confusion over what, if any, alternative treatments I should pursue. My inbox is currently inundated with information and health summits. I held my Bible upwards and railed at God, “I want to believe what’s written here. I want to show that this Word of Yours is living and active and relevant. I began this cancer journey last year with the claiming of a promise. I want to be able to tell my children and grandkids that You and Your Word can be trusted. I need You to show me it’s true.”

I opened the bible randomly and read……Philippian’s 4:4 in the Passion translation.

It read…” Do not be pulled in different directions or worried about a thing. Be saturated in prayer throughout each day, offering your faith-filled requests before God with overflowing gratitude.

Tell Him every detail of your life, then God’s wonderful peace that transcends human understanding will make the answers known to you through Jesus Christ. So keep your thoughts continually fixed on all that is authentic, real, honourable, admirable, beautiful, respectful pure, Holy, merciful and kind. And fasten your thoughts on every glorious work of God, praising Him always.”

Ok then! That was clear, I thought! Thank you, God. Well, that changed my tone. I probably just did not allow for the fact that God speaks to us differently.

This morning then, our second morning of significant revelation where my husband was writing points and plans, he’d woken with, I asked him what it was he did to open himself up for this level of communication. He said he puts all thoughts out of his head, and it has taken years to learn. He may have an idea but instead of running with it he just shelves it until he gets more or confirmation. Ahhh…The old “let go and let God” technique!

It had me thinking…what would it feel like to be that at ease …not something I can say I’ve been able to achieve thus far. What would a life without limits look like? Is that not the way we should be living everyday as Christians? If all things are possible for God and He is the Source of our supply, and all our needs are met in Christ, can we trust Him when He says, “All things are possible through Christ Jesus”?

I have been speaking declarations of God’s favour, health and promises over myself, one of which is “My life cannot be limited. Christ within me is my freeing, forgiving and releasing power. God is the Source of my supply.  All my needs are met in Christ, today and every day.” It is pretty much the prayer we all refer to as The Lord’s Prayer. “Our Father, who is in heaven, Holy is Your name, Your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread. Forgive us our sin as we forgive those who sin against us. Lead us not into temptation. Deliver us from evil”.

So, as I’ve declared this, my challenge is do I believe it? I think I need to begin with what I perceive my limitations to be. My walls, my defences, my diagnosis, my past, my present circumstances, my race, my creed…. I’ve heard it said that walls that we build for safety…for self-preservation, actually imprison us. I am imprisoned by my illusion of self-sufficiency because while I insist on staying in this state, feeling that while here I have some element of control over my circumstances, it denies Divine help.

A picture came to mind of a view from space of the earth with its surrounding visible atmosphere, then there’s space, stillness, stars.  I place around myself these invisible limits….perceptions of where I believe the boundaries are…boundaries of my capability, boundaries of known experience, boundaries of available information, boundaries of calculated probability…and yet there is beyond all that, a vast unexplored, unrealised potential that needs me to dare to dream its possible…that more can be possible. Just because I have not seen it, experienced it, believed it, doesn’t mean its impossible. I have just limited my experience. And I can be held there in that predictable orbit by others, who are in the same holding pattern. I remain bound…imprisoned by my own lack of imagination and faith. I either Don’t dream or dare to believe there is anything beyond or I am afraid of the unknown so its safer to stay within the known boundaries and accept mediocrity or even worse, convince myself that this is my lot.

I am reminded of the 1998 movie, The Truman Show featuring Jim Carey, a carefully constructed social experiment where a whole community was created around the life of Truman…from birth onwards, televised as a serial in which all of life’s dramas and successes, triumphs and joy was manipulated by script from its creator/director, with Truman being the only reality, the rest actors. The link between his “world” and real life was a bridge and several attempts by him to broach that in his curiosity and longing to know more…be more… were thwarted. Storms, accidents, dramatized threats of all kinds prevent Truman from his discovering the truth and his fulfilment…until one day he defies all odds and despite attempts to destroy his will by the creator of the show, even to the point of destroying him personally, he persists in his belief that there must be more and he battles through and discovers the “set” door…and the truth sets him free.

Could it be that the walls I have constructed around myself…or others have constructed for me and around me, in the name of security are just that…self-made constructs…perceptions?

God has no constraints. He is not bound by our concept of time or space…those things that create and define our physical world and experience. His power knows no bounds. He is not constrained by my limitations, by the limitations of my physical body, by the limitations of medical science.

He wants me to see through His eyes, His perception, His experience, His ability, His potential, His promises. When Solomon says in Proverbs 3: 5-6, “Trust in the Lord with all your heart”, I believe I am being instructed in the concept of a life without limits. ‘Lean not on your own understanding’, a directive to not hold to my punitive ideas and “wisdom”, acknowledge  that God’s thoughts are not my thoughts nor are His ways my ways” Isaiah 55:8-9, and allow Him to take total control.

I heard today that the Greek concept for “Be Still” is “To hand over”. Surrender. God wants me to depend on Him.

I am challenged to extend my vision beyond what I can physically see and experience…beyond my understanding and what’s probable and contemplate no limits…even more…expect excellence, extraordinary, impossible…

But there is more….

While I trust and declare God is the Source of my supply and meets all my needs, Philippians 4:19 there is , in economic terms, a concept of supply and demand. I was praying about how to word this and it came to me so clearly. I have heard this before but today it was my very own  “Ah  Ha!” moment.

God is our Source. All things come from Him and He has promised to meet all our needs…and God has a warehouse overflowing with abundance and is eagerly waiting to supply us with that abundant blessing. We need to provide Him with our order, asking specifically for what we want …offering your faith-filled requests before God with overflowing gratitude ….arrive with the truck to load up, in eager expectation that the order has been filled ..thanking Him in advance for what we have asked Mark 11:24…..and is waiting for us to pick-up the order.

Once loaded, our task then is to distribute the blessings…. freely you have received, freely give. Matthew 10:8

I heard a challenging talk today, where the premise about our perceived unanswered prayer was our blessing was just a step of faith away. I have been waiting for God but God, is in fact, waiting for me….to believe, to step out in faith, to acknowledge my total dependence on Him, to let go of control…and to be prepared to live beyond my limitations, accepting that God has gone ahead of me into my future, set things in motion for my breakthrough and all I need do is open myself to receive all He has for me, moving forward in eager expectation and hope. Philippians 1 :20

So here I am in the waiting…

I have a sense the Holy Spirit is brooding over me in this darkness I find myself in. Its not a new concept. I think many have written before me on this topic of change and growth all having their beginnings in darkness. In Genesis 1:2 the Bible says “the earth was without form and void and darkness was upon the face of the deep. The Spirit of God was moving over the face of the waters.”

This suggests a creative intention.

Germination of plants happens in the depths of the dark soil, conception and growth all happen in darkness. We tend to equate darkness with inactivity, doom and gloom when in fact it’s a place of brooding…of potential.

As I write this I’m taken back to my memories of my pregnancies…in the years before 3D ultrasounds, when it was all about the mystery. The discovery of a new life forming within me…the anticipation and excitement…..the awe and wonder. At first there is little evidence of the fact (I was lucky to have escaped the morning sickness!) As the months progress, others see growth, but I could feel it. In the darkness God was creating a life, a story entwined with my own. I loved the child sight unseen. My imaginations were stirred, and I held that child in my arms before I had even seen it, even without a previous experience of having birthed. So even in a time of darkness there can be anticipation.

We used to play a game together when I was home-schooling the kids. One would be blindfolded and the others would scramble around the kitchen gathering tasty…and not-so-tasty morsels ( as only siblings would) …as well as utensils or Knick knacks to be handed over for the guessing .All senses were available to the blindfolded one bar sight. To add to the disorientation, there would be some guiding around the house and being turned quickly before being seated for the presenting. It was all a bit of fun, although not when you were on the receiving end of something gross conjured by the inspiration of Roald Dahl’s “George”, in his book “George’s Marvellous Medicine”. In this instance of darkness, one could be forgiven for having a sense of foreboding, depending on who was the administrator.

I was reminded of this this week. How vulnerable we are when we can’t see. We are limited to and totally reliant on, feel, sensations, perceptions and trust.

Yet in this place of uncertainty is learning. You have no light to guide you. You must listen for guidance, feel your way, discern whether what you are being told is trustworthy, go with your gut, trust your source, dream, move forward in expectation.

I find myself in the darkness…in a place of uncertainty. It is a place dominated by fear, vulnerability, powerlessness. All these emotions and sensations are palpable and, in the moment, terrifying as I am subjected to invasive tests, unfavourable results and disappointment in the face of my long-held belief I had been healed completely. It is disorientating and unsettling.

So here I sit, in the Day Infusion Ward commencing treatment for the return of breast cancer. This is not a place I envisaged being in again. So certain of God’s healing grace, I was, as I walked away from treatment and surgery this time last year. I was deep in prayer and in the Word. All of God’s promises for healing were, to my mind, clear for me and while I prayed continually and declared His promises, I battled crippling anxiety attacks. I prayed for healing and God did heal me…first from fear, then anxiety, then unforgiveness, then disappointment and on it went.

One step at a a time…one trait surrendered then another. I was challenged by God as to how I viewed Him and His love for me and how I responded to that love. He is a good Father. It was a difficult realisation that I did not understand love at all. My upbringing had not fostered love that in any way reflected what I was reading and hearing in the Bible. I was a striver, a people pleaser so “love “was something earned. This was new and confronting and confusing. I found I did not know how to receive. That screws with trust. Suspicion, withdrawal, a lack of understanding of what is required of me plagues my thoughts. What do I need to do? On more than one occasion I’ve been drawn to John 6:29. Jesus told them, “This is the only work God wants from you. Believe in the One He has sent”.

Graham Cooke is a pastor I found on YouTube. He does a Prophetic Soaking experience on God’s favour…a meditation of God speaking of His love and intentionality. As I listened, tears just streamed down my face. It spoke of complete surrender to His intentionality…His desire for my life and the challenge of my willingness to say “yes” to that desire by whatever means He chooses. …surrender to His creative intention. With no real understanding of the processes involved but a new and somewhat nervous surrender to this God who claims to love me, I said yes. I just knew and said as much…I can’t go back. I didn’t want to go back to the person I was before. I have experienced real change in my life, my attitudes, my approach and responses to circumstances and events.

As I have released, bit by bit, this is where I now find myself…in the darkness….back to face my giant, to surrender all I railed against, to let go of control of the processes and obsessions of diets and alternative treatments, to step, albeit tentativley…and trust that God loves me and will meet all my needs. That means a belief in His absolute love for me and a trust that He knows more than I do about my needs in this moment.

Here are the 2 trees… Do I believe that God is good? Do I trust that He is the source of all my needs? I have a choice to rest in the knowledge and faith in God, my Father…the good good God who will be with me through it all…. or become bitter and blame Him for my predicament? I mean, that’s what we do…right? I have all the healing promises written out and declare them faithfully and with conviction. I believe it when the Jesus says, “Ask anything in my Name and I will do it”. So why then am I here? Is God still good even when He says “No”?

I am back to my determination to show God can be taken at His Word. I need to prove this for myself. I am not completely in the dark…and if ever I was walking in the valley of the shadow of death…this is it but I’m not walking by my sight thankfully. God can see well ahead where I cannot, so I trust His timing; I declare His promises of healing over myself; I believe in miracles. What I do know is that I’m back here because He has put me here. Don’t get me wrong…I am struggling with the concept. I’ve spent many an hour on my knees asking for understanding but am taking a step at a time to try to be faithful and trust. I don’t like it. I don’t understand it. But I’m told to “Rejoice. Have no anxiety about anything. Pray with thanksgiving .Then I’m given this….

I listened to a sermon by Steven Furtick titled “Need Meeters” based on Paul’s letter to the Philippians 4:19 “My God will supply all you needs according to His riches in glory in Christ Jesus.”

He speaks of God using our “need” by placing us in the situation of that need…to bring about the fulfilment of someone else’s need. It’s not about me…yet I will be blessed in it. That’s a tough place to be when it feels like it should be all about me. It requires me to shift my focus.  My mission…should I choose to accept it….is to be a reflection of Christ in this place where hope can fail. We are called to use, in our circumstances, whatever we’ve been given creatively and gifted.

In a moment of bravery, I thought…ok…I make cards. So I took some cards with me expecting to have the opportunity to gauge the room, see the need, or be led to a need…and found myself placed in a private room, screened off for 3 hours for the duration of my treatment and I had the cannula in my right hand so couldn’t write. Resigned to the idea that today was not the day, we left. I made eye contact with a woman in the waiting room as I left. We smiled at each other, but hers was a polite smile as she waited for her treatment…her head scarf testament to the chemo she was having… and as I got in the lift, I kicked myself mentally at the missed opportunity to gift her with a little encouragement, but I had not completed the card with a verse or text. Note to self…always be ready! I pray the recognition in the eye contact and the smile was at least something…a knowing.

As I left the clinic, I was still feeling ok, then the pain started on the trip home…an indication the treatment was in full swing and as the evening progressed, my “I can do all things through Christ” attitude flagged and I was tearful and asking God to free me from this. David asked God often why He was in the situations he was in and complained to God. If he could do it, surely God can hear it from me! The roller coaster of faith, emotions, will. I will to be strong, brave, invincible but truth have it, I’m more often not. So to what or whom do I turn for help?

“I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me” Phillippians 4:13 Great verse to cling to. I am finding singing an enormous boost to the morale. Its amazing to me how my mind just switches to an old timely hymn in my moments of greatest need. Thank you Holy Spirit! My Prompter.

I have no idea of God’s plan other than He will use whatever circumstances I’m in as long as I remain open, willing and obedient to the Spirit’s leading. I pray I am and will be given wisdom and understanding by the Spirit as I need it and be given God’s eyes…His perspective, taking the focus off myself and look for ways and means to shine a little light on someone else’s day from a place of real empathy. More than that even….I pray for the guts, the tenacity, His Divine strength in my weakness to “stand still and see the victory the Lord on my behalf”…to show my kids and anyone else looking on that, in the words of Steven Furtick…I’m stationed…not stuck and it’s not the end of the story. Its not over. I just need to be faithful in the situation in which I’m planted and trust Him to see me through.

For He who began a good work in me is faithful to complete it.” Philippians 1:6

This post has taken a while to write. I had the main text written weeks ago but just before posting it, the title I’d chosen became my challenge in my own circumstances.

My 8 month living my belief of being healed has been shattered with a sudden overgrowth of a lump in my breast and confirmed today by ultrasound and biopsy, it seems evident that the cancer has returned  with a need for urgent treatment imminent.  So here’s where I began with the post…

Anyone who knows me at all will be familiar with my tendency to be a control freak…and a tad OCD. I was thinking on that this morning in my prayer time and the questions is, how do I “let go” of things that are bothering or consuming me when I am plagued with that tendency?…that need to hold to that illusory control?  Where has that come from?

So deeply ingrained in our being from a breakdown of trust in our past, where someone has let us down, hurt or disappointed us, we vow to keep a tight grip on our emotional reins in order to protect ourselves again from such a painful event(s) and develop our protective strategies to such an extent that we cripple our growth and our capacity to receive.

To let go means we must allow ourselves to be vulnerable. Already all the alarm bells are ringing!! What about all those walls we have put up? The strongholds we have built around ourselves with those impenetrable walls.

To be vulnerable means exposure to another’s capacity to change the course of our situation and possible override our control and challenge those personality traits not beneficial to ourselves. It allows an ability to heart-connect …raw and honest with one another, and more importantly, to God. We cannot heart connect through the wall. We risk being hurt when we let the guard down but also open the way for a chance of receiving love and grace.

Part of letting go of control and handing our situation over to God requires us to change our focus, from ourselves… to God and His goodness and ability, with praise and thanksgiving for all He has already done for us

What in heaven’s name causes us to doubt God’s overarching power to do what we deem to be impossible…or question His plans or purpose?

I am being faced with this very dilemma today. I made choices …. the 2 trees…about leaving treatment last year, that defied all logic…human logic, yet I felt confirmed and blessed in those choices. Even so, I still hung on to doubt because I had not experienced healing in the way I had imagined it should have been. Over the past year though, God has healed me in so many ways and has brought me through crippling fear and severe anxiety attacks, challenged all my preconceived ideas of who He is, exposed many barriers and questioned my belief in His love for me.

One major hurdle for me has been dealing with my disappointment. My children can confirm my use of disappointment as a bludgeon when they did not meet my expectations. One daughter scrawled it on her wall in permanent marker as a protest in her teens.” I’m not angry, I’m just disappointed”. I’m not proud of that statement or its long-term effect and even worse…its memory in the minds of my kids.

It is current still as I have prayed for some time now for a particular outcome and have not yet seen it realised. I still have a lump in my breast which, despite prayers, petitions and pleadings, has not been healed. I am well and have never doubted God’s promises that “By His stripes I was healed.” In the face of all Gods promises and declarations I have struggled to stifle my disappointment. That very attitude brings me before God questioning His plans and purpose. I have had to bring this word and its wake before God and confess it and ask His forgiveness for it and all its run on effects and consequences. I do not have the luxury of questioning God. More than once I have been given the Scripture in Isaiah 45:9

“Shame on the one who argues with his Creator, like one clay pot among other pots arguing with the potter, “What in the world are you doing with me?”

Recently, God brought me through a very tearful few hours to a place of complete surrender of all my barriers and walls.

I must let go of the attitude and once I give it to God and the past is confessed, it is forgotten and illegal to go back.  It is not letting go for a moment…it is leaving it with God and walking away knowing the sin of that past is dealt with. Now we must move forward and never look back.

Easy to say….. but since then, I am forced to face a recent change in the nature of the breast lump. I have prayed so diligently for healing and for whether I needed to have proof of that healing for myself and others. I have accepted it as a “finished work” in full belief that my miraculous  deliverance was just around the next corner…maybe once I’ve confessed this trait or surrendered that fault…am now having to go back and have it investigated. It just hasn’t made sense to me, but I did not dare doubt what I’d professed to be the truth of the matter.

My greatest hope has been to show the Bible can be taken as truth. That was my whole hope in my quest to live out the truth of what I believed to be God’s will…to “hold unswervingly to the hope that is in me For He who has promised is faithful.”

Proverbs 3:5-6 is a well-known scripture.

“Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge Him and He will direct your paths.”

Having just this day had ultrasound and biopsy and seen the films, I am shaken and very emotional. It is a battle with my mind that requires me, in the midst of this to be constantly reminding myself of God’s word and promises and to not lean on my own understanding. I have no idea where God is taking me or why. Last year when I was in this same place, I rallied and took charge! I poured myself into research, poured into myself all manner of supplements, pills and potions, sought out all alternative treatments, elbowed my way through the medical system and defied advice in my determination that “God” was in control.  Who again?

This time it’s a new ballgame. The cancer is back & I believe I’m being taken back to face my giant after a year of God challenging me about who did I really want to be in charge.

Ahhh, that sticky word TRUST again! And lean not on your own understanding requires…you guessed it! Letting go! Letting go of our need to know and to see in advance the outcome, to accept that God knows best and has our best interests at heart even when it does not make sense to us. Never has this truth been more real to me than now. Do I trust God’s love for me?

 I am walking, one step at a time, one foot in front of the other, having to stand in the temporal truth of my circumstances but claiming His promises, trusting that His grace is sufficient for me this day and declaring, out loud to all who will listen, His authority, dominion, power over cancer (insert any other word that is true for you in this moment) and God’s goodness in all circumstance…the truth according to my faith and His Word.

Give thanks in all circumstances? That’s tough in the moment when the ground seems to give way beneath you…. I stood late last night in the dark of my living room, looking out at the moonlit yard and through my tears of absolute vulnerability & surrender, I declared…out loud…as miracles are in your mouth…(ie you must declare verbally your promises) the promises God has given me for healing and restoration and claimed His victory over that which I have no control…in advance…. and trust His heart for me. God is good. He is always good.

I have a fridge magnet of my mothers that now sits above my bedhead. I repeat this often to myself as a mantra of sorts.

TRUST IN HIS TIMING

RELY ON HIS PROMISES

BELIEVE IN HIS MIRACLES

REJOICE IN HIS GOODNESS

WAIT FOR HIS ANSWERS

RELAX IN HIS PRESENCE

Give the reins to over to God…and let Him reign. After all, He is Sovereign. This is my message to myself. Feel free to take it for yourself.

Many years ago I was given one of those head massagers…fine wires with plastic tips attached to a handle. As you push the wires down over your scalp, the apparatus spreads and cups your head, then as you move it over your scalp it massages the scalp and gives the tingles. I loved it. I’ve always loved having my hair played with & combed. It is one of life’s great pleasures and I think most women, based on the time and money spent at the hairdressers would agree.

Most would be familiar with the song Big Yellow Taxi from years back. The line “Don’t it always seem to go that you don’t know what you’ve got ’til its gone”, comes to mind here. As part of my cancer treatment, I had chemotherapy. After 2 rounds, as stated, my hair began to fall out..in clumps. I’d find it on my pillow; it clogged the shower drain; it tangled in my fingers when I tried to wash it. It was thin and matted and dull.

It was one of those defining moments when you are faced with the harsh reality of your situation. I had been to the clinic and seen the plight of many a woman there and that day I determined I would not go there, at least in my mind. I sat in the kitchen on a chair, draped a towel around my shoulders and handed my son scissors and shaver and said, “Cut it all off!” I wanted to feel I had at least some control over my current situation.

It was a humbling experience, to surrender my crowning glory to the kitchen floor. I stared at all my hair on the floor then looked at myself in the mirror and wept at this odd looking face staring back at me, red rimmed eyes and pale bald head. How did I end up here?

Proverbs 4:23 says “Out of the heart flows the issues of life.” Its sad that it takes some jolt…some trauma..to make us really look at ourselves and take stock…force us to realign our thinking…challenge our perspective on our attitudes, confront ourselves that all the issues, dramas, material possessions and things we thought important are “striving after the wind”Ecclesiastes 1:14.

It was such a simple thing but tonight when I walked into my wardrobe and found that $2 shop head massager and enjoyed the sensation of it combing through my hair, I found myself sobbing with gratitude to God for the gift of my hair. Such a simple yet profound thing and a reminder of all we take for granted and forget to thank our Heavenly Father for.

Matthew 10:30 “Indeed the very hairs of your head are numbered.”

That’s how intimately He knows and cares for you. Look around you…thank Him for the ordinary things in your day because everything you have is a gift!