tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3631787276680368012024-02-07T19:41:10.796-08:00Moving to 4th Streetkimberleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12804672126005078796noreply@blogger.comBlogger124125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-363178727668036801.post-30053278527306960882017-11-18T00:12:00.000-08:002017-11-18T00:12:10.542-08:00I've moved...<span style="font-size: large;"><b><a href="http://www.movingto4thstreet.com/" target="_blank">to here</a></b></span>!! Come join me over at my new space, I'd love to see you there!<br /><br />Coffee is still in hand, so maybe you'd like to curl up with a cup too?kimberleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12804672126005078796noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-363178727668036801.post-39798942148421344382017-11-16T22:14:00.002-08:002017-11-16T22:31:15.056-08:00It's Rare...These past two months have found me preparing to speak at a local women's conference on the topic of wisdom.<br />
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There was nothing about the invitation that I was expecting, but I know now that this past year that has felt so quiet, so still, Jesus was preparing my heart for last weekend and using so much of what I had studied to strengthen and encourage my own heart.<br />
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He is so good like that.<br />
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That's one part of why this space has been so quiet.<br />
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The other, is that a local author, who is also a reader of this blog, approached me about helping him self-publish his first book. As busy as I have been, I said yes after sitting down and reading through it first.<br />
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It is a haunting story - hard and broken, yet beautiful and rich in harrowing detail - that finds its setting right here in Yakima, Washington.<br />
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Tonight, the website went live, <b><span style="font-size: large;"><a href="https://arthurzinn.com/" target="_blank">here</a></span></b>, and the<b><a href="https://www.amazon.com/Out-Night-would-anyone-searching-ebook/dp/B077CY4QSJ/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1510896884&sr=8-1&keywords=arthur+zinn&dpID=51rnl9q2apL&preST=_SY445_QL70_&dpSrc=srch" target="_blank"> link for the eBook</a></b> is up on Amazon.<br />
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Come and see Yakima with a fresh new perspective...<br />
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<br />kimberleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12804672126005078796noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-363178727668036801.post-23263454751116507352017-10-23T21:53:00.001-07:002017-10-23T21:53:06.598-07:00November 10-11, 2017<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<br />kimberleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12804672126005078796noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-363178727668036801.post-42281278669755512172017-09-15T23:46:00.000-07:002017-09-15T23:46:46.436-07:00The Way That Leads to Light {A Post by Tony}<div class="MsoNormal">
The woman walks towards us wearing nothing but short shorts and a red bathrobe emblazoned with gold dragons. </div>
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The bathrobe is completely open, her mouth is slack and her eyes are stagnant pools, lifeless. </div>
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I catch the eye of the two older kids sitting behind me. My quick glance sends out the message, “Ignore it, don’t draw attention to her.” </div>
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It’s an eleven passenger van; that leaves 9 little ones that don’t need the shock; they’ve seen enough already I’m sure. </div>
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My mind drifts back to earlier in the week; I was driving by myself. A woman, mid-twenties, in a canary yellow jean romper, riding an old BMX bike, stops next to me. </div>
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Her make-up is beyond done up, and her hair is in little-girl pig tails. Tracks race up and down her emaciated arms. </div>
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She lifts her eyebrows at me and I imperceptibly shake my head and we both pull away from the stop sign, headed in opposite directions. </div>
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While I’m getting a haircut I ask the barber, a local church attendee, “Hey, is it just me, or are you seeing a lot more prostitutes than usual walking around?” </div>
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He pauses, then nods, “Yeah, definitely.”</div>
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If this upsets you then ask yourself the question, "Are you looking at pornography on your phone, or reading some mainstream erotica novel? If so, what’s the difference?" <span></span></div>
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There isn’t one. You’re just as chained to filthy rags as these. <span></span></div>
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I tell kids the same message - sin comes from our nature, we desire to accomplish injustice; it looks good to us. <span></span></div>
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In fact, this excuse is used throughout the Bible, <span></span></div>
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Genesis 3:6 <span></span></div>
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<i>So when the woman saw that the tree was good for food and that the tree was to be desired to make one wise, she took of its fruit and ate, and she also gave some to her husband <b>who was with her</b>, and he ate.</i> <span></span></div>
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Judges 14:3<span></span></div>
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<i>…But Samson said to his father, “Get her for me, for she is right in my eyes.”</i></div>
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Joshua 7:20<span></span></div>
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<i>And Achan answered Joshua, “Truly I have sinned against the Lord God of Israel, and this is what I did: when I saw among the spoil a beautiful cloak from Shinar, and 200 shekels of silver, and a bar of gold weighing 50 shekels, then I coveted them and took them.”</i></div>
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I don’t read Bible stories anymore and think the way I did when I was young, “What’s wrong with these people?” </div>
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I read Bible stories now and think, “I’m what’s wrong with people. I’m inches, seconds, whatever measurement you prefer, away from making the same mistakes.”</div>
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A kid I hired at Starbucks once asked me, “Hey <span>Tony</span>, my dad used to be a really strong Christian but now he’s on trial for rape. What happened?"</div>
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So I told him, “The second you put yourself outside of God's will and start to think that you know better - it might be today, or 20 years from now - the downward spiral begins. Eventually you’re far enough outside of Jesus' will that you end up suffering consequences. Irreversible consequences by human standards. You hurt not only yourself, but your whole family.”</div>
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I love, as much as it breaks my heart, that <b><a href="https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=joshua+7%3A20&version=ESV" target="_blank">Achan clearly articulates his sin</a></b>. It’s not against Joshua or Isreal, or even his own family, but he says, “I have sinned against the Lord God of Israel.”</div>
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I used to run all the time in college. Mostly I was praying and sometimes I would end up doing five miles or more, simply caught up in the process of giving my thoughts over to God and I would forget about the physical pain from the exertion. </div>
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Once in mid-run I was crying out to God about my ‘thorn in the flesh’ and the answer came to me so clearly that I stopped dead in the middle of my run. </div>
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I had been asking God why I had to deal with this reaccuring sin, and the answer went something like this, “This ‘thorn in the flesh’ is not from Me, it’s from you. You’re intentionally sinning because you desire to do what is wrong. You want to sin and you’re making excuses to justify your sins.”</div>
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I can’t say working that out was easy, but God’s grace was sufficient. </div>
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John Milton, in <b><a href="http://www.paradiselost.org/" target="_blank">Paradise Lost</a></b> says, “Long is the way and hard, that out of Hell, leads up to light.”</div>
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Some sins we struggle with are like that. I have no idea how it feels to know I can’t stop stealing. I have never stolen anything; I have no desire to take other people’s possessions. In fact, I’m afraid I might get their germs if I do. However, if coffee was outlawed, like it was by a Pope in Rome in the year 1600, I’d be a first class criminal! I’d be dealing and making all kinds of excuses to my clients and cops about how, “Government can’t regulate me, man!”</div>
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This is humanity - we want our own way, and we’ll be damned if God’s love would EVER send us to hell! That’s just not right! <span></span></div>
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Look at your sins and ask, “Is this a thorn in the flesh or am I doing it to myself?”<span></span></div>
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The answer is often so bitter and self-effacing that like the <b><a href="https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Luke+18%3A18-34&version=ESV" target="_blank">rich young ruler in Luke 18</a></b>, we become very sad; it’s difficult to look at a situation where we know we’ve been wronged and say, “This is my fault too.”<span></span></div>
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The only way out is humility, and I must confess that they only time I’ve ever had any, is when I asked God to give it to me.</div>
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I’ll sign off with this, my go to, super deep, theological prayer: “Dear Jesus, I am such a despicable mess, I cannot escape who I am without Your love. Please help me.” </div>
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If it works for you, feel free to use it. <span></span></div>
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kimberleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12804672126005078796noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-363178727668036801.post-47859830904433036962017-07-25T12:40:00.000-07:002017-07-26T15:49:39.359-07:00For When You are Small and in NeedI drive the roads that connect our two destinations, coffee in hand, while their voices fill the space behind my head.<br />
<br />
Two properties wait for us, filled with animal-life that my girls get to care for while the younger two and I sit in the shade with panting dogs and tumbling kittens.<br />
<br />
<br />
Here, there are no sirens filling the air.<br />
<br />
Here, I can close my eyes and breathe deep.<br />
<br />
Here, I take advantage of these quiet spaces while my girls walk with purpose to carry out their responsibilities.<br />
<br />
Here, I cling to Peace.<br />
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<br />
<br />
I glance over and watch his profile. He is telling me some story while his eyes are on the road. <br />
<br />
His hand reaches over occasionally to brush my own, his eyes beckoning me to run my fingers across his sun-kissed neck.<br />
<br />
<br />
We leave the crush, the heat, of the inner city and wind through mountain roads to beat the bus behind us.<br />
<br />
It is filled with children.<br />
<br />
I imagine their loud voices filling the air behind the one driving. After meeting him briefly, I can only imagine he is smiling.<br />
<br />
<br />
There are no sirens out here.<br />
<br />
There is Peace.<br />
<br />
And we become surrounded by the grins of our campers as they come tumbling out of the bus.<br />
<br />
<br />
The inner city has the tendency to harden the old, yes, but also the young.<br />
<br />
<br />
I watch that hardness begin to fall away from some...<br />
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<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
The nurse leaves Thursday night, and I take over, her phone number in hand.<br />
<br />
I didn't think I would need it,<br />
<br />
but I did.<br />
<br />
<br />
Two girls, so quiet, come to me with their troubles, and I place the call asking what I should do.<br />
<br />
I step back into the room and as I kneel down, tears begin to fall down the face of the older one.<br />
<br />
<br />
We leave for home the next morning and all day the symptoms have been flaring.<br />
<br />
They are preparing for the environments they have left and any hardness that was stripped away is being flung back on.<br />
<br />
It turns into rebellion, talking back,<br />
<br />
sore tummies and hurting heads.<br />
<br />
This gift of time is running out and they begin to fight against it.<br />
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<br />
<br />
A counselor comes down and whispers to us:<br />
<br />
A small boy in his cabin refuses to come in, curled up on a couch and grabbed onto the arm rest, burying his face in the cushions. He won't let go. <br />
<br />
"He's safe where he is", Tony says, after a moment, "Let him fall asleep there. Let him grieve."<br />
<br />
<br />
Sometime during the long night, he is covered with a blanket and he rests.<br />
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<br />
<br />
Working here, alongside staff and counselors, has stripped away preconceived notions and ideas of what camp "should" be.<br />
<br />
<br />
We are a small group, desperately asking for help from those outside of us, praying for each volunteer who would say *yes* to giving of their time to serve those in our community.<br />
<br />
<br />
The mountains gave way to hills, the forests to sage brush as we turned the van back towards home just before lunch last Friday. I voiced the question I had been mulling over all week,<br />
<br />
<br />
<i>How are we going to do this?</i> <br />
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<br />
And Tony, the one who wrestles with God and who has been wounded. Who voices the hard questions and trusts that God will supply every answer, reached over and took my hand.<br />
<br />
<i>This morning, I kept thinking of Gideon.</i><br />
<i><br /></i>
And then he smiled at me.<br />
<br />
<br />
He knows, I know.<br />
<br />
<br />
Jesus, He is gracious. He speaks the words we most need to hear, because He is the Word. <br />
<br />
<br />
He knows that we are in need to order to make the Senior Kids Camp run. <br />
<br />
He knows that we are understaffed and tempted to be overwhelmed.<br />
<br />
He knows that nearly every phone call has been met with an apologetic, <i>"I'm sorry. We can't".</i><br />
<br />
He knows.<br />
<br />
<br />
<i><b><a href="https://www.esv.org/Judges+6/" target="_blank">Then the Lord said to Gideon, "There are still too many troops..."</a></b></i><br />
<i><br /></i>
Taking Gideon from twenty-two thousand men, to just three hundred, <i>God</i> defeated the enemy hell-bent on destroying His people.<br />
<br />
<br />
The enemy looks different here, but it is just as real. There is a war going on around us, our eyes just don't always see it. Drugs, gangs, prostitution, trafficking - these are the weapons that Satan is using to destroy the children we are here to serve.<br />
<br />
At times, it all feels too big and we feel too small.<br />
<br />
And we are.<br />
<br />
However, our God is unfathomably large.<br />
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Our last camp of the summer is happening July 31st-August 4th. The group of us feel our smallness. We are praying that the Lord supplies just a few more. Our greatest need is for female counselors, aged 16 & up with a relationship with Jesus, who are fully aware that <b><a href="https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Ephesians+6:12" target="_blank">our struggle is not against flesh and blood but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers of this darkness, against evil, spiritual forces of heaven</a>, </b>willing to stand with us, pray with us, fight along with us knowing that our Jesus will strengthen and equip us for every good work.<br />
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<br />
Our prayer is that God would be glorified in this camp. That He would move and that these days away from broken environments would cause His Light to be brought back into our communities - both in the areas viewed as <i>good</i> and in the ones that are viewed as <i>beyond repair. </i><br />
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That our eyes would be opened to the truth that we <i>all </i>are in desperate need of Jesus and only He can bring the peace we long for.<br />
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Please call Bob Whitney at 509.594.9185 or Tony Baker at 509.480.2102 for more information.<br />
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<br />kimberleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12804672126005078796noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-363178727668036801.post-85521148415797593322017-07-11T21:17:00.000-07:002017-07-11T23:30:34.502-07:00For When Sorrow SettlesShe started hearing voices across the property line just after the chill of Spring lifted and the evenings turned warm enough to open up the windows.<br />
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Two voices wafting out from behind boarded up windows and then the sound of muted music coming from some device...<br />
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She mentioned it to me at breakfast one morning a couple of days later.<br />
<br />
<br />
This house that has stood empty for two decades has stood for over a century beside my own, silent and dark and ugly.<br />
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<br />
While other homes on our street have stood filled with life, this one was grey with rot and age and dirt while rumors swirled of all the evil that happened inside.<br />
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Hope feels fleeting and it seems to have flown away. The lift that met me when I woke on my birthday is gone and a heaviness has reappeared.<br />
<br />
<br />
The bulky frame of that house cast a shadow over my own and I became used to the shadowy dark and this sadness is no different. A noticeable pall over a life surrounded by life.<br />
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<br />
No one warned me that ministry would be lonely.<br />
<br />
<i>So brutally lonely.</i><br />
<br />
<br />
There are days I feel as though I can hardly breathe and I sometimes wonder what Jesus is doing. <br />
<br />
What <i>we </i>are doing.<br />
<br />
Because all I seem to be doing is flailing and failing.<br />
<br />
<br />
The house beside mine was boarded up 15 years before we came to Madison House. And I think back to where I was 15 years ago. Married for almost a year and turning to my husband and whispering, <i>We need to go. We can't stay.</i> And the process of slowly beginning to end my time as a citizen of my own country and becoming a stranger in the one of my husband.<br />
<br />
<br />
The thing is, with that house, with all that was wrong with it and within it, life still grew around it. It wasn't beautiful, it wasn't pretty, but still, life couldn't be stopped. <br />
<br />
When we first moved in and I began putting our belongings away, a landscaping company came in and cleared out all the underbrush around that house, anything that could catch fire was carried away and the grass left behind scorched yellow in the heat of the August sun.<br />
<br />
But that following Spring, shoots began appearing all up and down the property line and 24 months later, the tallest of the trees reaches past our first story and brushes against the second when the wind blows just right.<br />
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Life can't be stopped.<br />
<br />
<br />
Neither can change.<br />
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Late last week, I was called outside onto the front steps of Madison House by the words I received in a text. I stood there and watched as the bucket from a large yellow digger tore into the roof of the house that has stood watch beside my own for over 100 years, and I couldn't keep the tears from coming.<br />
<br />
There was joy, because that meant the danger that the house represented would soon be gone.<br />
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But there was a deep grief that caught hold and I ran down the street because I didn't want to ever forget what was there before it wasn't anymore.<br />
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I don't know when this season of sorrow will be over. I don't know if there will ever come a point again where I think, <i>Here. We all belong. All six of us belong <b>here.</b></i><br />
<b><i><br /></i></b>
Because, if I am to be honest, it is easy to focus on times that it is obvious that we don't, and when it begins to affect my little ones, that's when I dare to question the plan and intention of my Heavenly Father.<br />
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<i>Why would He call us here to die?</i><br />
<i><br /></i>
<i><br /></i>
But there is this thought that wraps around my heart and won't let go,<br />
<br />
<i>But why wouldn't He?</i><br />
<i><br /></i>
<i><br /></i>
Didn't Jesus Himself say <i>( And didn't I even quote this when I stood in front of a church to share about this ministry given to us?),</i><br />
<i><br /></i>
<br />
<div align="center">
The one who loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me;</div>
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the one who loves a son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. And</div>
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whoever doesn't take up his cross and follow Me is not worthy of Me. Anyone</div>
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who finds his life will lose it, and anyone who loses his life because</div>
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of Me will find it. Matthew 10:37-39</div>
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There is a saying that has become popular in Christian circles, especially in women's ministry that has never sat quite right; it feels more than a tad off. It is this mantra that is repeated in conferences and bible studies and best selling books, as though whispering it enough will convince me it is true:</div>
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<i>I am enough.</i></div>
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And I have failed enough in these last few years to know that this is a lie. I am <b>not </b>enough. I will <b>never </b>be enough. <br />
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On my own, I stand broken and rotten and decaying like that house that stands on my street no longer. <br />
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On my own, death is not defeated, but it grows in reach and stench and decay.<br />
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On my own, I am easily torn down, broken, defeated and completely ruined.<br />
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We are <i>never</i> enough.<br />
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Only Jesus.<br />
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<i>Only Jesus.</i><br />
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The One Who spoke to Moses out of a burning bush, the One who declared His Name to the broken, sandal-less man bowed low before Him, <i>He alone</i> has the authority to say,<br />
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<i>I AM enough.</i></div>
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<b>He alone is enough</b> in the season of sorrow,<br />
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in the barren desert of loneliness.<br />
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<b>He alone is enough</b> when I walk up our front steps feeling defeated and broken.<br />
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<b>He alone is enough</b> when He brings me to the end of myself so that I see clearly that <b>He alone</b> brings life in the dead places.<br />
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<b>He alone is enough </b>to lead me to 1 Peter 2 when the pain of rejection stings:<br />
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Therefore, rid yourselves of all malice, all deceit, hypocrisy, envy and</div>
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all slander. Like new born infants, desire the pure milk of the word,</div>
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so that you may grow up into your salvation, <b>if you have tasted that the Lord</b></div>
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<b>is good. </b>As you come to Him, a living stone - <b>rejected by people but</b></div>
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<b>chosen and honored by God - </b>you yourselves, as living stones,</div>
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a spiritual house, are being built to be a holy priesthood to offer spiritual </div>
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sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ...</div>
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But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a </div>
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people for His possession, <b>so that you may proclaim the praises</b></div>
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<b>of the one who called you out of darkness into His marvelous Light.</b></div>
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<b><i>Once you were not a people, but now you are God's people; you had not</i></b></div>
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<b><i>received mercy, but now you have received mercy.</i></b></div>
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The house that stood beside my own, long before I was born now lays in a heap outside my kitchen window, the shadow it cast no longer there.<br />
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I walk into my kitchen to pour myself a mug of coffee and I stand completely bathed in light.<br />
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I don't know when this season of sadness will end, but I choose to trust in the goodness of my Savior. What weighs heavily on my heart can never separate me from His love.<br />
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So I will wait and in the waiting I will fight to proclaim His praise. <br />
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For He is good. And His mercy is never ending.<br />
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And life continues to grow...<br />
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<br />kimberleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12804672126005078796noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-363178727668036801.post-32884365595288874092017-06-28T17:10:00.000-07:002017-06-28T17:10:11.466-07:00She Left Me OneIt was the chaos of the noise outside that grabbed my attention.<br />
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The barking of our dog that lasted too long...it was too shrill. I could hear his body hitting against the chain link, trying to bust out of the run that contains him.<br />
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The afternoon sun tilted down and the clouds had begun to gather and I stood there unsure of what I was seeing.<br />
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Our gate stood open, unlatched by a woman who had wandered in. Bright pink hair sticking out every which way, her body bent over, almost falling over, into the daffodils planted years before we moved in. Her movements were erratic, grabbing and yanking at the tender plants that had recently broke through.<br />
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Barney's barking mixed in with her shouting and I kept standing at the window.<br />
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They were just flowers. Flowers I look for at the end of a long winter - their cheery yellow faces brazenly blooming while there is still a chill in the air. They were flowers I couldn't kill even if I tried - evidence of our Good Creator and His faithfulness each day.<br />
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They were all gone.<br />
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Her head, crowned with pink, was bent over her arms and spilling out of them were all of the daffodils that grace the front yard. She danced and spun across the patch of grass, twirled out the gate all the while looking down at her bounty, gently crooning to the petals that were already beginning to droop.<br />
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"Hey Kimberley, a lady just took all your flowers!", one of the kids across the street yelled at me when I finally came out to assess the loss.<br /><br />"Yeah...I know, Alex", I called back.<br />
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"She took ALL of them!!", came his aggravated response.<br />
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"It's okay, Alex. They'll grow again next Spring."<br />
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His sweet face showed that he didn't agree with me at all.<br />
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We wake up to voices in the street. <br />
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Voices I don't recognize and I lay there frustrated.<br />
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Who needs to be yelling at another person before 6 in the morning? I roll over and pull the blanket up over my ears.<br />
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I'm awoken again to more voices and this time I recognize the names they are calling and I fly up and out of the bed.<br />
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Police cars are everywhere, doors open and flak jackets and helmets on, rifles trained on the house 2 doors down from us.<br />
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I race down the stairs and stand at the window.<br />
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Tony's hand on the small of my back.<br />
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I can't keep back the tears.<br />
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They come out backwards, one by one, hands raised and kneel down onto the grass. I understand the need for caution, but the faces I see, the names I hear...we love them. Our own children pray for them. I've washed clothes for some of the them. I'm terrified that one wrong move and I'll watch one of them die.<br />
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We move out onto the porch slowly, and I can't stop the tears. They need to know that they are seen and loved.<br />
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10 minutes stretch into 30 and suddenly everyone is released. Tony leans over and suggests that we head inside the house.<br />
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I stand in the kitchen and I hear his voice calling my name,<br />
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"Kimberley, we are going to have a few extra for breakfast. Can you get the waffle maker out?"<br />
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My table fills up with gang members and we work quickly to get them fed. All I can think is how I want them to know they are loved, not just by us, but by Jesus. As I set the table for them, all I can do is pray, not just that they would be surrounded by Peace, but that this wouldn't be our last opportunity to serve them.<br />
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I wandered through Costco later on shaky legs.<br />
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<br />
Alex was wrong about one thing, and I didn't see it right away.<br />
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My pink haired visitor didn't take all of the daffodils. <br />
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<br />
She left me one, whether she meant to or not.<br />
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When she first took my daffodils, it felt like she ushered in a season of darkness...or hopelessness. Joy seemed nowhere to be found.<br />
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She came into my yard broken, with a mind that was altered by whatever drug she was on, but she knew she needed beauty. She needed to gather it up and touch it in her hands. It couldn't be abstract for her...it needed to be tangible.<br />
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But when she left with my flowers, she seemed to take my hope with her...<br />
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I turned 38 yesterday, a new year dawning fresh. I opened my eyes and for the first time in months I felt the faint stirring of hope. It has been a season of questioning, of feeling like a failing, unable to even utter a fully formed prayer. <br />
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I pressed in next to the warmth of my husband on the couch in the late quiet after all the small ones were in bed. Laughing at some silly show we were watching online when a knock came at our front door. <br />
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I glanced at the time, 11:38pm. <br /><br />
That can't mean anything good.<br />
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It's a mama from down the street with her daughter, terrified because the other daughter is missing. Have we seen her, do we know where she went, did we hear anything? <br />
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We sit on the front porch with her trying to help in any way we can.<br />
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I give her my number and she takes mine, tells me she will let me know when she hears anything.<br />
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12:20am, I get a text that the police have been called.<br />
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I crawl into bed praying, imagining the worst.<br />
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1:30am and my phone lights up. <br />
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I glance down,<br />
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"We've found her", and I take a deep breath.<br />
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I live in a neighborhood with a culture that isn't my own in a country that I wasn't born in. I've made mistakes and messed up and blundered more times than I'm sure I've gotten anything right. The joy that I felt in the beginning of our ministry has turned bleak with the despair I've wrestled with.<br />
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But last night after knowing she was found, <br />
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Hope found me.<br />
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Jesus said that His people were "<a href="https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Matthew%205:14-16&version=ESV" target="_blank">the light of the world, a city set on a hill cannot be hidden</a>." Through Paul's hand, Jesus reminds that we are <a href="https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Ephesians+2%3A10&version=ESV" target="_blank">His workmanship, created in Him to do the good works He has prepared for us beforehand.</a><br />
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It's His will that has been placed there on the corner of 4th Street...not mine. It is Jesus Christ who wondrously chose me when I was so unworthy of Him and placed me where He has so that His light can be seen through all my imperfection.<br />
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Grace upon grace upon grace.<br />
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So let the flowers be taken, the quiet that I long for, all the outward things I cling to that are not Christ. <br />
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Let it all be taken so that others can draw to the beauty and grace and mercy of Jesus.<br />
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I keep thinking of her, dancing away from our house, arms filled with flowers, yellow daffodils bouncing in the late spring sun...<br />
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<br />kimberleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12804672126005078796noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-363178727668036801.post-33875043394387553532017-05-03T14:56:00.000-07:002017-05-03T15:08:16.401-07:00The Lighter Side of Darkness {A Post by Tony}<span style="font-family: "calibri" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif; font-size: 16px;">“How was your weekend?”</span><br />
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It’s a question we ask each other and the normative response is generally, </div>
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“Great.”<u></u><u></u></div>
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Follow up. </div>
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And you find yourself going down a list of things you did that weekend.</div>
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People ask me this question and I’m always ready with a response based off who they are and what I really think they are asking.<u></u><u></u></div>
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There are people just asking in general how it’s going but they really don’t want to know. </div>
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<i>Let’s use this weekend as an example. </i><u></u><u></u></div>
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So on the follow up question, “What did you do?”, to that person, I would say, </div>
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<span class="aBn" data-term="goog_506500850" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(204, 204, 204); border-bottom-style: dashed; border-bottom-width: 1px; position: relative; top: -2px; z-index: 0;" tabindex="0"><span class="aQJ" style="position: relative; top: 2px; z-index: -1;">"On Friday</span></span> night we hung out with our kids, played games and watched movies. <span class="aBn" data-term="goog_506500851" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(204, 204, 204); border-bottom-style: dashed; border-bottom-width: 1px; position: relative; top: -2px; z-index: 0;" tabindex="0"><span class="aQJ" style="position: relative; top: 2px; z-index: -1;">Saturday</span></span> we cleaned the house, and went shopping at Costco. That evening, Kimberley took our three girls, along with Gane, to the Davis High school production of Beauty and the Beast and I stayed home with my son and watched Monster Trucks, a movie about a family of Friendly Octopus Sharks, or whatever they were, that help kids overcome the evil environment ruining oil company by becoming the engine in their trucks. It was your basic E.T. rip off and my son was none the wiser and loved the whole thing. We went to church, took three Madison House kids with us, took everyone to Starbucks afterwards and then that afternoon had a family of Madison House volunteers over to the house for dinner, just so they knew how thankful we are and how much their help and more importantly friendship means to us." </div>
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That’s so happy! <u></u><u></u></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhZhxVk4QDbM1MnEQreuzyNdduztwTfGJDU1e1Uk9r2MGOAp_X51dQxNMFDc4OJRNMIPLGdWuYyLtEWEmL_gtI5GBcw0bptK8A8kuoMr-93NZJhyphenhyphendqN6KYM6yi7PBVPgr4bd_b_OUU7Oag/s1600/IMG_8912.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhZhxVk4QDbM1MnEQreuzyNdduztwTfGJDU1e1Uk9r2MGOAp_X51dQxNMFDc4OJRNMIPLGdWuYyLtEWEmL_gtI5GBcw0bptK8A8kuoMr-93NZJhyphenhyphendqN6KYM6yi7PBVPgr4bd_b_OUU7Oag/s640/IMG_8912.JPG" width="640" /></a></div>
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Here’s what I left out of that story. <u></u><u></u></div>
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At <span class="aBn" data-term="goog_506500853" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(204, 204, 204); border-bottom-style: dashed; border-bottom-width: 1px; position: relative; top: -2px; z-index: 0;" tabindex="0"><span class="aQJ" style="position: relative; top: 2px; z-index: -1;">10pm</span></span> someone stood in front of our house and unloaded a .45 revolver into the house next door. </div>
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Six police cruisers, all with their lights off, pulled up within a matter of minutes. There was no ambulance so we had to assume no one was hit. With no shell casings, no witnesses and no bodies, the police left within the half hour. <u></u><u></u></div>
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<span class="aBn" data-term="goog_506500854" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(204, 204, 204); border-bottom-style: dashed; border-bottom-width: 1px; position: relative; top: -2px; z-index: 0;" tabindex="0"><span class="aQJ" style="position: relative; top: 2px; z-index: -1;">Saturday</span></span> morning one of the kids that lives in that house, a Madison House regular, came out on the porch to let me know that even though the bullets went through 3 of his walls, he was alright!<u></u><u></u></div>
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Great. <u></u><u></u></div>
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<span class="aBn" data-term="goog_506500855" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(204, 204, 204); border-bottom-style: dashed; border-bottom-width: 1px; position: relative; top: -2px; z-index: 0;" tabindex="0"><span class="aQJ" style="position: relative; top: 2px; z-index: -1;">Sunday</span></span> afternoon the family of volunteers we had over decided they wanted to end the evening playing on the Madison House playground. We headed over but in a matter of minutes we had to leave because an MH kid warned us that, “There’s a guy driving around with guns in his car and my brother said you guys should all get off the street and into your homes.”<u></u><u></u></div>
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As the family got into their car and left I walked back to the house and Kimberley and I could hear gunfire break out from the next street over.<u></u><u></u></div>
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Both those stories are true, I simply tailor them for who happens to be asking and what state of mind I’m in when asked.<u></u><u></u></div>
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Yesterday, <span class="aBn" data-term="goog_506500856" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(204, 204, 204); border-bottom-style: dashed; border-bottom-width: 1px; position: relative; top: -2px; z-index: 0;" tabindex="0"><span class="aQJ" style="position: relative; top: 2px; z-index: -1;">Tuesday</span></span> morning, our daughter Lyla was awakened by a crack addict screaming profanity and pounding on the dumpster in the alley behind our house as he came down off his high. Someone called the police and a cruiser came down and slowly escorted him out of the neighborhood. <u></u><u></u></div>
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Kimberley made mention later that she was feeling anxious that day and I began to pray.<u></u><u></u></div>
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That evening it was nice out and my family, along with Gane' and a couple of the MH kids that live next door all sat out on the front porch drinking Starbucks and talking while we watched Lyla practice with her soccer team across the street. During practice I walked over to the house next door. Gang members were all over the porch as though they were expecting a war and I greeted the ones I know by name and made sure the ones that didn’t know my name now did. I reiterated to them as I have many times that should anything go wrong they can come over to my house and we’ll help them out. </div>
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Jesus did not come to heal those who are not sick. <u></u><u></u></div>
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My wife, Gane, our kids and the MH kids all did as we’ve instructed and practiced many times, they hit the ground or piled into the house. <u></u><u></u></div>
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Police showed up and cordoned off the area, tagging shells and taking witness statements. Again, no one was hit and some of the gang members across the street lamented their disappointment that, “They didn’t have a chance to fire back.” </div>
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I silently thanked God they didn’t because it would have meant they were firing in my direction.<u></u><u></u></div>
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I spent the next half hour walking home scared kids that lived close enough and driving home the ones that didn’t. <u></u><u></u></div>
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We have so much to be thankful for and this is where my mind always settles.</div>
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My wife and children, though a little shell shocked are fine. </div>
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This will mark our fourth summer living living on Fourth Street and it’s becoming old hat. That’s not callous, it’s simply true. You live a certain way long enough and what may have seemed crazy or difficult at one time, now seems normal.<u></u><u></u></div>
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Lyla, didn’t seem overly concerned and when I asked her how she was doing she said, “I’m fine. It’s like you always say dad, Jesus is going to take care of us; whether it’s keeping us safe on earth or taking us to be with him in heaven, either way he has our back.” <u></u><u></u></div>
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No Madison House kids or gang members were killed. Praise Jesus. We still have an opportunity to reach them before they stand before God.<u></u><u></u></div>
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I had an opportunity to talk more about Jesus to the kids I was walking or driving home.<u></u><u></u></div>
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If you would like to pray for us, please pray not only for us but that "Jesus' love would continue to be acted out through our lives, and the kids will see our good works and glorify God, accepting him as their Lord and Savior.”<u></u><u></u></div>
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Pray that no one who doesn’t have Christ is killed. <u></u><u></u></div>
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Pray that the community will start to see and act - Nothing changes when you do nothing. <u></u><u></u></div>
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Thank you for all your prayers, volunteering and financial support, but most importantly, your prayers.<u></u><u></u></div>
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kimberleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12804672126005078796noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-363178727668036801.post-30219182552098538522017-03-21T21:17:00.000-07:002017-03-21T23:21:09.601-07:00Dear MiriamI stood in the back of the room looking for a seat,<br />
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looking for someone I knew in the sea of women seated facing forwards.<br />
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I saw her near the front and I headed in her direction.<br />
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Only, by the time I got there, she had leaned forward.<br />
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I could hear her sobbing.<br />
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Women jumped up before I got there and surrounded her with arms and tissues and the quiet murmurings of voices slipping underneath unspeakable pain to help bear the weight.<br />
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I slid into the end of the pew feeling helpless and small, unable to reach through to join in. Feeling foolish for not having seen the pain before.<br />
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We stood to sing together, the tune of the hymn familiar and strong. I opened my mouth and joined my voice to the hundred or so other voices around me.<br />
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<i><b><a href="https://www.hymnal.net/en/hymn/h/789" target="_blank">What a friend we have in Jesus,</a></b></i><br />
<i><b><a href="https://www.hymnal.net/en/hymn/h/789" target="_blank"><br /></a></b></i>
<i><b><a href="https://www.hymnal.net/en/hymn/h/789" target="_blank">All our sins and griefs to bear!</a></b></i><br />
<i><b><a href="https://www.hymnal.net/en/hymn/h/789" target="_blank"><br /></a></b></i>
<i><b><a href="https://www.hymnal.net/en/hymn/h/789" target="_blank">What a privilege to carry</a></b></i><br />
<i><b><a href="https://www.hymnal.net/en/hymn/h/789" target="_blank"><br /></a></b></i>
<i><b><a href="https://www.hymnal.net/en/hymn/h/789" target="_blank">Everything to God in prayer...</a></b></i><br />
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I have sung these words since I was small, learned to play them on the piano and know the feel of the chords beneath my fingers.<br />
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I have known the truth of them and they became my prayer for my friend bowed over in grief.<br />
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There was a book wrapped up and placed under our Christmas tree about 3 years ago now and I eagerly devoured the pages.<br />
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I remember falling asleep in evening services to strong voices around me lifted up in the rich and ancient truths found in the hymnals tucked into the front of the pew near my knees.<br />
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I remember that Sunday the projector made its way on to the stage at the front of the sanctuary, the words and chords laid down on transparent paper and songs like Majesty and Faithful One and guitars and drums joining in with the piano and organ.<br />
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I remember my first worship service that felt nothing like the quiet sanctuary of the small church I had been born into. The rush that I was somewhere modern, somewhere new.<br />
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I remember the joy I felt the first time I heard the beginning chords of a hymn after years of the absence of one. Oh, it had been reworked, yes, but it was beautiful.<br />
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This book I had read, it talked of the importance of the "why" of what we sing.<br />
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We sing during worship, not for our emotional filling or really for anything about us - we sing during worship for each other. As we sing, we are singing praise to Jesus, yes, but more importantly, we sing to encourage the brothers and sisters around us. We sing to strengthen broken hearts and point them back to the tender and holy mercy of our amazing God.<br />
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We sing to hold the gospel out to those around us who don't know Jesus. To surround them with the beautiful truth of a compassionate and loving God who sent His Son to die for the sins of the world and draw us to Himself.<br />
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Every Sunday at the end of the service, our pastor, without fail, closes with an opportunity to know Jesus. With all our heads bowed, he extends the invitation for anyone to raise their hand, to receive the gift of eternal life.<br />
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And then, without fail, he asks us to all join our voices together and lift them in prayer...us who have already prayed and received. Us who have already walked with Jesus for years. I lift my voice and it joins in with the many and brothers and sisters lift up the voice of one who is receiving Jesus for the first time and I am reminded that we are not meant to walk through this life with Jesus alone.<br />
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On the edge of the Red Sea in the book of Exodus the Israelites are found standing. They are facing a charging, angry Egyptian army who are hell-bent on taking the people back who they believed were rightfully theirs. They stood there full of doubt and fear. But God, faithful and steadfast in His love and mercy proved in a mighty way that these weary and broken people were <i>His</i>.<br />
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Moses breaks into a song of praise that wraps around each Hebrew heart and draws their eyes up to the Most High God who had set His love on them and rescued them, first through the marking of blood and now in the parting of water.<br />
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As his song fades away, his sister, Miriam, takes on the song and I wonder if she isn't an example to us as sisters in Christ:<br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><span class="text Exod-15-20" id="en-ESV-1941" style="-webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased; box-sizing: border-box;">Then <span style="font-size: 0.625em;"><span class="crossreference" data-cr="#cen-ESV-1941AQ" data-link="(<a href="#cen-ESV-1941AQ" title="See cross-reference AQ">AQ</a>)" style="box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 0.625em; line-height: 22px; position: relative; top: 0px; vertical-align: top;"></span></span>Miriam <span style="font-size: 0.625em;"><span class="crossreference" data-cr="#cen-ESV-1941AR" data-link="(<a href="#cen-ESV-1941AR" title="See cross-reference AR">AR</a>)" style="box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 0.625em; line-height: 22px; position: relative; top: 0px; vertical-align: top;"></span></span>the prophetess, the <span style="font-size: 0.625em;"><span class="crossreference" data-cr="#cen-ESV-1941AS" data-link="(<a href="#cen-ESV-1941AS" title="See cross-reference AS">AS</a>)" style="box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 0.625em; line-height: 22px; position: relative; top: 0px; vertical-align: top;"></span></span>sister of Aaron, took a tambourine in her hand, and <span style="font-size: 0.625em;"><span class="crossreference" data-cr="#cen-ESV-1941AT" data-link="(<a href="#cen-ESV-1941AT" title="See cross-reference AT">AT</a>)" style="box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 0.625em; line-height: 22px; position: relative; top: 0px; vertical-align: top;"></span></span>all the women went out after her with tambourines and dancing.</span> <span class="text Exod-15-21" id="en-ESV-1942" style="-webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased; box-sizing: border-box;">And Miriam sang to them:</span></i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>“Sing to the <span class="small-caps" style="-webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased; box-sizing: border-box; font-variant-caps: small-caps; font-variant-numeric: normal;">Lord</span>, for he has triumphed gloriously;</i></span></div>
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<span class="text Exod-15-21" style="box-sizing: border-box; font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif; position: relative;"><i>the horse and his rider he has thrown into the sea.” </i></span></div>
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<span class="text Exod-15-21" style="box-sizing: border-box; font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif; position: relative;"><i>Exodus 15:20-21</i></span></div>
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It doesn't say that she led some women, or a few women...<br />
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it says that <i>all </i>the women went out after her with tambourines and dancing.<br />
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And in this beautiful picture of celebration, Miriam sings <i>to</i> them:<br />
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<i>Sing to the Lord, for He has triumphed gloriously...</i><br />
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The Creator of the world around us, the One Who set the sun and moon and stars in place - Who upholds the hugeness of the universe by the very power of His word,<br />
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He created <i>you.</i><br />
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And not just created, as amazingly beautiful and tender as that is,<br />
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but our God who creates and is sovereign over all things, He bent low and He became man, He died for you and for me and He really did triumph gloriously.<br />
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Where can you be a Miriam? Where can I? Where can we pick up our voices in praise and lead <i>all</i> the ones God has purposely placed around us to see the beauty and grace of our Savior...and not just to see, but to <i>know</i> the One who became the Way, the Truth, and the Life for us.<br />
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This road winds and twists and is marked by death and fear and so many unknowns, but <i>this</i> road is one, when we believe in Jesus is one that rings with the song of hope.<br />
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So let your life be one that fearlessly goes out into the broken spaces around you with praise and joy, even through tears of sorrow, <b><a href="https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Matthew+28%3A18-20&version=ESV" target="_blank">because our trust in the last words that Jesus spoke here on earth are the ones that fuel our faith.</a></b><br />
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Sing loud, dear Miriam - we all long to hear you.<br />
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<br />kimberleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12804672126005078796noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-363178727668036801.post-2902102995284065582017-03-10T12:08:00.001-08:002017-03-10T12:09:27.684-08:00Oscar Wilde and Me {A Post by Tony}<div class="MsoNormal gmail_msg" style="background-color: white; font-size: 16px;">
<span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">The great playwright Oscar Wilde once said there was only one thing he couldn’t resist …</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Temptation.<u class="gmail_msg"></u><u class="gmail_msg"></u></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">“Do you want to come over this weekend? My roommate is away and I don’t have plans...”</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">I’m 20 years old and this isn’t the first time a woman has acted interested but it’s the first time they’ve put it so bluntly.<span class="gmail_msg"> </span><u class="gmail_msg"></u><u class="gmail_msg"></u></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">“Oh,” I mumble, “That’s okay, I have plans with family this weekend but thank you for asking, that’s very nice of you.”<span class="gmail_msg"> </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><span class="gmail_msg"> </span>I don’t want her to feel bad, but I’m not coming over, and since we’re in the middle of our shift at the restaurant I don’t want her to feel uncomfortable at work.<span class="gmail_msg"> </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Too late, now it’s out there and we have to face it. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">If I’m honest I have to say I see the reason: generational sexual sin has been an issue in my bloodline for, well...generations.<span class="gmail_msg"> </span>Like the circular marks from a hot stove, I see the scars at family reunions, birthday parties, and weddings.<span class="gmail_msg"> </span>Satan sees this too; I should be an easy mark, but my stubbornness makes me resist this idea even more, the idea that I can be easily duped, manipulated, pulled under.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">There’s this reminder too:</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"> <span class="gmail_msg"> </span><u class="gmail_msg"></u><u class="gmail_msg"></u></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">A couple years before that when I was 18, a girl that I worked with at camp got me alone under false pretext and when she suddenly realized I wasn’t going to take advantage of her she started to cry and admitted that before becoming a Christian she had let men take advantage of her and that she was thankful I didn’t.<span class="gmail_msg"> </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">We talked and she left feeling better, instead of used.<u class="gmail_msg"></u><u class="gmail_msg"></u></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">The opposite sex will often get emotional or angry when you refuse their advances, they take it personally at a very deep level, but later, if you continue to show you care about them they come around to the idea that you’re not hating or judging them. Instead you are loving them in the way God intended, as a brother or sister in Christ.<span class="gmail_msg"> </span>The love you’re giving them is the one they really need.<span class="gmail_msg"> </span>A love that doesn’t selfishly drink stolen waters for the benefit of themselves but keeps those waters safe for the one God intended for them to share it with - their future spouse, or in volatile cases, their current one.<u class="gmail_msg"></u><u class="gmail_msg"></u></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">I can honestly say my wife Is the only woman I’ve ever been with and that not until we were married. I am so thankful to God for this piece of grace in my turbulent life. It can be done but not under your own power. Jesus Christ alone carries you through. <span class="gmail_msg"> </span><u class="gmail_msg"></u><u class="gmail_msg"></u></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">It’s New Year’s Eve and my father is hanging dead from a tree. (Don’t turn away, get in front of it.) I can wrap my arms around my wife and mother while they weep but apart from that there’s nothing else I can do.<u class="gmail_msg"></u><u class="gmail_msg"></u></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">In the next year I spend nearly every moment of every hour going over the day he killed himself and the time we spent talking, where I desperately tried to convince him that we needed him. I could feel him fading away and knew the end was near but there was nothing I could do. He slipped out of the house and never came home.<span class="gmail_msg"> </span><u class="gmail_msg"></u><u class="gmail_msg"></u></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">“Papa go to heaven?" My 3 year old daughter asks.<u class="gmail_msg"></u></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">“Yes,” I choke out.<u class="gmail_msg"></u><u class="gmail_msg"></u></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Her big brown earnest eyes bore into mine, “But why?”<u class="gmail_msg"></u><u class="gmail_msg"></u></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">My voice is a hoarse whisper, and I shake my head, “I don’t know...I simply don’t know.”<u class="gmail_msg"></u><u class="gmail_msg"></u></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">She starts to cry.<u class="gmail_msg"></u><u class="gmail_msg"></u></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">That year was hell and every night after we put the kids to bed I would turn up the music, the football game, the movie, whatever and wrap my hand around a cold glass of scotch and just fade away into evening, never getting drunk but close enough to the rusty razors edge where I could fall asleep as quickly as possible.<span class="gmail_msg"> </span>Anything, anything at all to dull the pain.<span class="gmail_msg"> </span><u class="gmail_msg"></u><u class="gmail_msg"></u></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">But something woke me up.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">I was working at a job where I was the Director of Operations and answered to the president as head of a large number of departments.<span class="gmail_msg"> </span>At 34 it was a promising future; 60k a year, free health care, new car and only 400 dollars a month in housing payments. I couldn’t lose on that career path and I was proud of that position.<span class="gmail_msg"> </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">But something was wrong with every financial report that came across my desk.<span class="gmail_msg"> </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Money was missing but It wasn’t from my end of things.<span class="gmail_msg"> </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">As I dug deeper I found that 250,000 dollars was missing, on top of that another 15 grand, and so on and so forth.<span class="gmail_msg"> </span>It went right to the top and as it turned out the president, the CEO and the chairman of the board had been approving large increases for themselves and then paying off their houses, buying new cars and wardrobes and whatever else they needed for a more than comfortable life, while disguising the loses in the mountains of financial shifting and slick accounting. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">The worst part of it was that they were firing long time employees left and right and telling them with tear filled eyes as they wrung their hands, “We’re <span class="gmail_msg"> </span>experiencing financial trouble and we can no longer keep your position open.” </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">They displaced one family after another, families that had trusted them.<span class="gmail_msg"> </span>I confronted the president and was told, in a round-about way that I could quit or get fired if I didn’t keep my mouth shut.<span class="gmail_msg"> </span>I chose to quit AND not keep my mouth shut.<span class="gmail_msg"> </span>Calling my former boss at Starbucks in Seattle I was immediately rehired and given the option of moving to Yakima or Eugene.<span class="gmail_msg"> </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">The choice was clear to Kimberley and I.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Yakima had a much higher crime rate.<u class="gmail_msg"></u><u class="gmail_msg"></u></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">I’ve presented before you the three basic ideas from 1 John 2:16,</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"> <span class="gmail_msg" style="color: #010f18; font-size: 15pt;">For all that is in the world—the desires of the flesh and the desires of the eyes and pride of life—is not from the Father but is from the world.<u class="gmail_msg"></u><u class="gmail_msg"></u></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Three temptations we all face: lust of the flesh, lust of the eyes, pride of life. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">S</span><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">ex, power, wealth.</span><span class="gmail_msg" style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"> </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Do not be deceived.</span><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"> </span><span class="gmail_msg" style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"> </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">I am not racing ahead of you.</span><span class="gmail_msg" style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">I am not falling behind you, I am not better than you.</span><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"> </span><span class="gmail_msg" style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">I am not worse than you, I’m nothing more than a sinner saved by grace that is clinging to this promise from 1 Corinthians 10:13,</span></div>
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<span class="gmail_msg" style="color: #010f18; font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif; font-size: 15pt;">No temptation has overtaken you that is not common to man. God is faithful, and he will not let you be tempted beyond your ability, but with the temptation he will also provide the way of escape, that you may be able to endure it.<span class="gmail_msg"> </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">God provides a way out of all temptation, and I’m acting out in faith on that promise.<span class="gmail_msg"> </span>In the iconic movie Jurassic Park, when the T-Rex attacks the children the lawyer runs away and hides; the little girl is left alone to defend her younger brother. Deep in shock, she repeats over and over again, “He left us, he left us.”<span class="gmail_msg"> </span>The protagonist calmly puts his arm around her, looks her in the eye and says, “But that’s not what I’m going to do!”<span class="gmail_msg"> </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Many people in your life will allow themselves to slip into sin and betray or leave you but that’s not what Jesus is going to do. He’s there with you every step of the way, praying for you, holding you up and fighting every battle for you. The way of escape.<u class="gmail_msg"></u><u class="gmail_msg"></u></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">A final story<u class="gmail_msg"></u><u class="gmail_msg"></u></span></div>
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<span class="gmail_msg"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Gane and I make another attempt at getting her to play.<span class="gmail_msg"> </span></span></span></div>
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<span class="gmail_msg"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">She's only been at Madison House for a couple of weeks.<span class="gmail_msg"> </span></span></span></div>
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<span class="gmail_msg"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">She disappeared for a week, but she's back now.<u class="gmail_msg"></u><u class="gmail_msg"></u></span></span></div>
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<span class="gmail_msg"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">"Come play with the rest of the kids, there's nothing to be afraid of."</span></span></div>
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<span class="gmail_msg"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">We smile and encourage but her eyes drop down and she quietly shakes her head.<span class="gmail_msg"> </span>Gane looks at me and I shrug.<span class="gmail_msg"> </span></span></span></div>
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<span class="gmail_msg"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Nothing we can do.<span class="gmail_msg"> </span></span></span></div>
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<span class="gmail_msg"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">She's the second oldest with a few younger siblings. </span></span></div>
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<span class="gmail_msg"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">They have all joined in the game. </span></span></div>
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<span class="gmail_msg"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">One younger brother, about 6 years old didn't show up, <span class="gmail_msg"> </span></span></span></div>
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<span class="gmail_msg"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">he normally does.<span class="gmail_msg"> </span><u class="gmail_msg"></u><u class="gmail_msg"></u></span></span></div>
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<span class="gmail_msg"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">I start to walk away because we've reached the point where I will just annoy her.<span class="gmail_msg"> </span><u class="gmail_msg"></u><u class="gmail_msg"></u></span></span></div>
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<span class="gmail_msg"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Later Gane tells me the girl took her aside and partially pulled up her shirt exposing a swath of bandages around her abdomen.<span class="gmail_msg"> </span></span></span></div>
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<span class="gmail_msg"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Bullets started flying through their house a week ago and she flung her younger brother to the ground.<span class="gmail_msg"> </span>She was only grazed but as we find out later her 6 year old brother got the worst of it.<u class="gmail_msg"></u><u class="gmail_msg"></u></span></span></div>
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<span class="gmail_msg"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">He had to be flown emergency style to Harbor View.<span class="gmail_msg"> </span></span></span></div>
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<span class="gmail_msg"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">The surgery was successful but they are not sure if he'll ever be able to use his hand properly again.<span class="gmail_msg"> </span></span></span></div>
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<span class="gmail_msg"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">The bullet entered at the elbow, traveled up his arm, and came out his palm.<span class="gmail_msg"> </span></span></span></div>
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<span class="gmail_msg"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Another week goes by and I'm standing on the front steps greeting children when I see him coming toward Madison House.<u class="gmail_msg"></u><u class="gmail_msg"></u></span></span></div>
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<span class="gmail_msg"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">"Hey" I ask with utmost concern, "How are you?<u class="gmail_msg"></u><u class="gmail_msg"></u></span></span></div>
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<span class="gmail_msg"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">His young face flushes with happiness.<span class="gmail_msg"> </span>"I GOT SHOT!"<u class="gmail_msg"></u><u class="gmail_msg"></u></span></span></div>
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<span class="gmail_msg"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">"Oh, okay," I'm not sure what to say next, so I say, </span></span></div>
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<span class="gmail_msg"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">"Well, are you going to be okay?"<u class="gmail_msg"></u><u class="gmail_msg"></u></span></span></div>
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<span class="gmail_msg"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">He is hopping up and down with excitement.<u class="gmail_msg"></u><u class="gmail_msg"></u></span></span></div>
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<span class="gmail_msg"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">"It was awesome!"<u class="gmail_msg"></u><u class="gmail_msg"></u></span></span></div>
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<span class="gmail_msg"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">"Why was it awesome?"<u class="gmail_msg"></u><u class="gmail_msg"></u></span></span></div>
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<span class="gmail_msg"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></span></div>
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<span class="gmail_msg"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">"I got to fly in a helicopter to Seattle!"<span class="gmail_msg"> </span><u class="gmail_msg"></u><u class="gmail_msg"></u></span></span></div>
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<span class="gmail_msg"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><span class="gmail_msg"><br /></span></span></span></div>
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<span class="gmail_msg"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">His feet dance and his smile never fades, he has a monstrous cast that covers his arm from mid bicep to the tips of his fingers, he waves it like a flag an exclamation point to his every word.<u class="gmail_msg"></u><u class="gmail_msg"></u></span></span></div>
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<span class="gmail_msg"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">"And do you know what Tony?!"<span class="gmail_msg"> </span><u class="gmail_msg"></u><u class="gmail_msg"></u></span></span></div>
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<span class="gmail_msg"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">"WHAT?!"<u class="gmail_msg"></u><u class="gmail_msg"></u></span></span></div>
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<span class="gmail_msg"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">"At the hospital in Seattle you can order whatever you want to eat and they have to bring it to you! It was amazing!"<u class="gmail_msg"></u><u class="gmail_msg"></u></span></span></div>
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<span class="gmail_msg"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></span></div>
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<span class="gmail_msg"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">He pushes past me into Madison House, running up the steps and out of site.<span class="gmail_msg"> </span></span></span></div>
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<span class="gmail_msg"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><span class="gmail_msg"><br /></span></span></span></div>
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<span class="gmail_msg"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">For the rest of the day I can hear him from different points on the playground yelling excitedly, "HEY GUYS, I GOT SHOT, AND IT WAS AWESOME! "<u class="gmail_msg"></u><u class="gmail_msg"></u></span></span></div>
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<span class="gmail_msg"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">He is the star of Madison House for the day and he deserves to be.<u class="gmail_msg"></u><u class="gmail_msg"></u></span></span></div>
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<span class="gmail_msg"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">That family is with us for another week and then they move away to a safer town.<u class="gmail_msg"></u><u class="gmail_msg"></u></span></span></div>
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<span class="gmail_msg"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Not because of gang violence, drugs, or poor housing.<span class="gmail_msg"> </span>I quickly learn from the neighborhood rumor mill that there is more than one father involved in creating this particular family.<span class="gmail_msg"> </span></span></span></div>
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<span class="gmail_msg"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Before you judge that too harshly, read Genesis.<u class="gmail_msg"></u><u class="gmail_msg"></u></span></span></div>
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<span class="gmail_msg"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></span></div>
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<span class="gmail_msg"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">One of the fathers didn't appreciate being cut out of the picture and came back with a gun.<span class="gmail_msg"> </span><u class="gmail_msg"></u><u class="gmail_msg"></u></span></span></div>
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<span class="gmail_msg"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">How does it feel to be betrayed by your own father? How does it feel to hit the floor as a bullet ruins your arm, knowing that a man you call ‘father’ is the cause of your wounds instead of the healing balm, the protector they were created to be? I can tell you from first hand experience it doesn’t feel great.<span class="gmail_msg"> </span><u class="gmail_msg"></u><u class="gmail_msg"></u></span></span></div>
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<span class="gmail_msg"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">I was either going to break or fight back.<span class="gmail_msg"> </span><u class="gmail_msg"></u><u class="gmail_msg"></u></span></span></div>
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<span class="gmail_msg"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Nothing could have been easier for me at the loss of my father to give up; to float away, to slowly weaken myself to the point where even the most innocuous seeming temptation would have broken me.<u class="gmail_msg"></u><u class="gmail_msg"></u></span></span></div>
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<span class="gmail_msg"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">But that's just not me. How WE feel, or what WE want is immaterial to the mission of Christ and the Cross.<u class="gmail_msg"></u><u class="gmail_msg"></u></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><span class="gmail_msg">I encouraged one of my brothers by telling him that, "With dad gone, we're already a man down.<span class="gmail_msg"> </span>If you drop your weapon and flee that's exactly what the enemy wants, to pick us off one by one, until we give in to subtle attrition and fade away into the night.” <span class="gmail_msg"> </span></span><u class="gmail_msg"></u><u class="gmail_msg"></u></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Once you present yourself before God as an act of service, the enemy, Satan, our real adversary, takes immediate umbrage and starts shooting and he doesn’t stop until he kills your ministry or you go home to be with Jesus.<span class="gmail_msg"> </span>When I finally die and lay on my face before God, he’s going to ask me, “How did it go?”<u class="gmail_msg"></u><u class="gmail_msg"></u></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><span class="gmail_msg"> </span>I’m going to answer in praise, </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">“I got shot and it was awesome!” <span class="gmail_msg"> </span><u class="gmail_msg"></u><u class="gmail_msg"></u></span></div>
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kimberleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12804672126005078796noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-363178727668036801.post-50616670760503793162016-12-31T16:54:00.000-08:002016-12-31T16:54:28.354-08:00Verses for the WildernessI wake up the last four mornings barely able to breathe.<br />
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Panic clings close and all the unknown things lurking in the future loom large.<br />
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Suddenly, time has moved too quickly, and it isn't slowing down and how can the oldest of my four be less than a year from middle school?<br />
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How can I be thisclose to 40?<br />
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Shouldn't there be more time?<br />
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I wake up this morning and think of his dad. As the second hand clicked closer to 10:30 a.m. the memories did too.<br />
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<i>The sound of the door opening.</i><br />
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<i>The sound of his voice.</i><br />
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<i>Celia's breath catching.</i><br />
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<i>Elias trying to roll over.</i><br />
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<i>My frantic phone call to my best friend.</i><br />
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The story never changes, year after year.<br />
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These memories are solidified.<br />
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I wondered, as I ran last minute errands this afternoon, if I would still be grieving like this 50 years from now? Would the pain always feel this fresh?<br />
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This past week, the words for this year changed suddenly.<br />
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And I was okay with it, until I saw the verse that went along with it.<br />
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It's been a long battle for me to fall in love with the pages of scripture. For so long portions of it were associated with people and events connected with pain. It was easy to skim, rather than dig. Easier to rush through rather than to sit long and slow.<br />
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The battle was slow and unrushed, and my love has grown deep and true. But there are still prickles of pain that snake up my spine when certain verses or words brush too close.<br />
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This verse is one of those.<br />
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In my kitchen, the day after Christmas, seated at my desk with my pen and journal in hand, I gave into the pain.<br />
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A few years ago, the year was named <i>New, </i>all tucked in with the verse found in Isaiah 43:19,<br />
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Behold, I am doing a new thing;</div>
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now it springs forth, do you not perceive it?</div>
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I will make a way in the wilderness</div>
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and rivers in the desert.</div>
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The verse for this year, while different, represents a portion of my life that is a wilderness - that has represented death and brokenness for so long. And so I wasn't really surprised when both verses of scripture were laid out on the same page of a book under my nose while I sat there wrestling with pain filled memories and emotions.</div>
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I rush through books.</div>
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Because I want to know how the story ends.</div>
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I run away from pain.</div>
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Because I don't want to live with the hurting.</div>
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I push against the unknown.<br />
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Because I want to know how it all turns out.<br />
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But that isn't my place.<br />
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It's Christ's.<br />
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As I prayed over this year ahead, all I've sensed was a call to <i>Be still.</i><br />
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Not "being still" in the sense of doing nothing, giving up, and burying what little talents I have in the ground and just waiting.<br />
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No, the call to <i>Be still</i> is one with a purpose.<br />
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God, through the Psalmist, calls out clearly,<br />
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<i><a href="https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Psalm%2046:10" target="_blank"><b>Be still and know that I am God...</b></a></i><br />
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Being still walks hand in hand with action. It's joined in with the action of <i>knowing</i> and this knowing has a very specific result - to know God is God in and over all things.</div>
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I don't know what this coming year will look like.</div>
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But I know what my role is to be.</div>
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In all my living, in all the moments given, </div>
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my heart is to be in a posture of stillness, no matter how quickly everything around me spins.</div>
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The purpose of this life He has given me is to glorify and honor Him, yes. </div>
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Always.</div>
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<b><a href="https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Psalm%2046:10" target="_blank">But can it also ignite a longing to know Him exalted among the nations and in all the earth, </a></b></div>
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even if the only glimpse I ever see is here on 4th Street.</div>
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So, I stand here, on the edge of the end of the year of Grace, ready to walk through the unknown wilderness of this coming, whirling year learning to Be still.</div>
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May I know Him more deeply at the end of it all.</div>
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kimberleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12804672126005078796noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-363178727668036801.post-65608100718675151962016-12-11T13:52:00.000-08:002016-12-11T13:52:31.041-08:00The Year the Gifts Were Stolen {A Letter to My Four}The snow started falling last Monday.<br />
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The flakes were small, hardly noticeable.<br />
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Really, it was barely a scattering compared to the heavy fall of Thursday.<br />
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But as your faces were lifted up in wonder in the parking lot of that church, trying to catch bits of white on your tongue,<br />
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your Christmas presents were being lifted out of their hiding place, unbeknownst to us, and the gifts we had purchased for you were now in the hands and homes that they were never intended for, security cameras capturing it all.<br />
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I remember telling a Sunday School teacher once how much I loved the nighttime, how my soul felt like it was reviving when the days started growing shorter and dark would settle earlier.<br />
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He didn't give me any time to explain why before he told me he questioned my faith. Questioned whether or not I had given my life to Jesus. Encouraged me to question my eternal state.<br />
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Only two of you have faint memories of living in the places where I spent my years growing up. You only remember the flatness of the Albertan prairies from pictures I show you. You have no concept of a town of less than 2000 people, of the nearest major stores being over an hour away, of an Arctic wind blowing from the north and freezing your skin in less than 30 seconds if you weren't properly covered.<br />
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Your memories of those things come from my own.<br />
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You don't remember the long drives from a trip in to the main cities in the black of night that had settled in just after 4pm on a highway that seemed to go on endlessly while a moon reflected off of the fields covered in a hard packing of snow.<br />
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But I do.<br />
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I loved those drives, not just for the quiet hush with only an occasional lone car passing us, lighting up the spaces around us for just a brief moment,<br />
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I loved it for the way light became a beacon.<br />
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Dotting the empty vastness of space around us, light would flicker bravely from farms and homesteads planted firmly in their places reminding us in our state of motion that we were not alone in our traveling.<br />
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I found that when the moon was new and gave no light, when the air dropped to -40 C and the cold around us was bitter, light would appear to be shooting straight up in to the dark whether it was from an approaching car or a single bulb hanging over the door of a barn.<br />
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The colder and darker the air, the straighter and bolder the light would appear.<br />
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I never got to tell my Sunday School Teacher that,<br />
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but I am telling it to you now.<br />
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Because last Thursday, when we had discovered your presents had been stolen, I tried to be brave and have hope.<br />
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But on Friday, once names and faces were known, I crumbled and felt like all I was doing was failing in this place where we live and work.<br />
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Failure can make air around one's soul grow dark and cold.<br />
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The four of you don't even know of this space that I sit down to write in yet. None of you are aware that I am trying to preserve memories for you in pictures and prose. None of you will know until you come across this specific post of <i>this</i> year: the year that your Christmas gifts were stolen.<br />
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I want to keep it that way.<br />
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Because tonight in the quiet hush of the dark, we will light the third candle for Advent and the space above our mantle will grow brighter, the other candles that I've placed around them waiting for the celebration of the day of Christ's birth, heightening our anticipation.<br />
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The name of this candle is Joy.<br />
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I want <i>this</i> to fill your memories of this season.<br />
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Yes. You saw me grieve on Friday, cry out my anger and my hurt and frustration. You saw loss in my tears without knowing the why behind them.<br />
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You bear witness to my wrestling, yes, but you will also bear witness to Christ's Joy ringing triumphant.<br />
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I know this.<br />
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In the moments before we discovered the theft and the loss of the things we had purchased and hidden away for you, we opened an envelope passed to us across a table at a dinner we had attended that same night.<br />
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Tucked in the folded crease of a Christmas card full of cheer was a reminder that God knew long before we did of the things that would be taken and had provided enough to cover what we had lost to the greed of another.<br />
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I love the dark and the cold of the winter because it is a continual reminder, every year, of the truth of who Christ is.<br />
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You who were so small and filled my arms now stretch tall and only the smallest of you can still curl up on my lap and I know that the days are coming when you will begin to know more fully the dark and the cold of the world around you.<br />
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The darkest days can seem like the most endless. And when it can't seem to get any darker, the fiercest winds can pick up and freeze you in your place.<br />
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But you <i>must </i>keep your eyes open.<br />
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You <i>must </i>wrap yourself in the truth of Who Jesus is.<br />
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<b><a href="https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Matthew+1%3A23&version=ESV" target="_blank">Because Jesus, Emmanuel, He came into the darkness of our world.</a></b><br />
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<b><a href="https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=John+8%3A12&version=ESV" target="_blank">Because Jesus, Light of the World, pierced the darkness of the world in the piercing of His own flesh.</a></b><br />
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<b><a href="https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Matthew%205:14-16&version=ESV" target="_blank">Because Jesus, Risen and Conquering King, fills us with His light who believe in His name and place our faith in Him.</a></b><br />
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I long for the dark roads some days, my heart longing to see the flame of light stretching straight and true up through the dark.<br />
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But then I look at you, the four who love and laugh and live loud, and I can see it beginning, that flame flickering within you.<br />
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And should the sky grow darker around us as time spins with chaos all around us, I'll keep my eyes open and look,<br />
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Christ's Light is all around and within us, guiding like a beacon, pointing us Home.<br />
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<br />kimberleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12804672126005078796noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-363178727668036801.post-70667281930763404852016-11-13T16:09:00.003-08:002016-11-14T12:59:58.653-08:00When You Find Yourself in the MiddleThe middle days of October found us driving miles east, winding through the last bits of Washington, across the state of Idaho and finally stopping in the middle of the vastness of Montana.<br />
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I didn't know what to expect of those days away from home while my four traveled west to spend days with aunties and uncles and cousins and a Nana. </div>
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What I did know is that I would be out of my comfort zone, out of what felt familiar and known. </div>
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It was the height of Autumn as we wound through the foothills and mountains, as the light felt heavy with the gold of Fall and as the sky grew large and blue my eyes kept being drawn to the the rich dark of the pine trees that had grown up the sides of peaked rock.</div>
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The atmosphere around all of us has felt heavy...I'm sure you have felt it too? It doesn't seem to matter whether one lives in the middle of the inner city or in the open expanse of the prairies, the air has felt oppressive, thick with apprehension and anxiety.</div>
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They popped their heads around the corner back in September, two boys who are often unruly and difficult to handle and I felt the sigh creep up my throat. The bright and sunny renovated classroom was ready to welcome the new group of kids to be tutored this year and they were the first ones in the door.</div>
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How does one love another who doesn't know how to receive love but instead pushes away kindness and grace?</div>
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How does one not give up?</div>
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Because I was ready to, if I am to be honest here in this space.</div>
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That week, I stood up in front of our motley crew of little ones gathered around tables and small group leaders to lead the new Bible Study we had chosen for the year: the impossible task of teaching a small number of children the large number of Names of our even unfathomably larger God.</div>
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This day though, we would start small.</div>
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We would learn that our own names had meaning and what those meanings were.</div>
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The oldest of these two boys was sitting beside Tony with his paper in front of him, waiting for his turn to find out what his name said about him.</div>
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Only, he didn't want to know the meaning of his name, because his name was the same as his father's, and to him the result of that name search could only mean bad things for him.</div>
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Tony paused in that moment, and then he opened the pages of his Bible because his name was found right there in the Words that hold Life. And this particular name found throughout the Old and New Testaments speaks of God-given bravery, strength and courage. </div>
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Those small shoulders so often hunched over in defeat or scrunched up in anger, for the first time seemed relaxed. </div>
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He sat up straighter.</div>
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After leaving the beauty of Montana, the quiet, almost Canadian-ness of it that made me homesick and nostalgic all at the same time, we gathered together as our family of six and traveled down the coast to the ocean and beaches of Oregon.</div>
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It was the same there as it was on the foothills and prairies of the east - the dark pine and spruce that covered the ground we were passing. But it was on this trip that I realized why my eyes were drawn there.</div>
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It was the brilliant and wild light of the maple trees, the aspen and birch trees. Each leaf that reflected gold and burnt orange and the deepest crimson was held in stark contrast to the depth of dark around it.</div>
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I kept trying to capture it in picture as Tony drove, as the lesson was sinking in.</div>
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Yes, so much around us feels uncertain and tense. Fear seems to be everywhere. Nowhere online seems safe from anger and outrage while families and friendships and communities fracture and break apart. How do we lament and grieve <i>together</i> for one another no matter what side of the mess you find yourself on?</div>
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Jesus, Light of the World, has placed His Light incredibly within the brokenness of His own children. That means, in the dark of the chaos around us right now, we are to stand and let His light blaze out through us while we stand with, not against, those who stand next to us. </div>
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Joshua, before he was to take the land of Jericho, looked up and saw a man standing in front of him with a sword drawn. Joshua approached and asked the question that I think we all have, </div>
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<br /></div>
<div>
<i>Are you for us, or for our adversaries?</i></div>
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<i><br /></i></div>
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The armed man spoke words that echo across thousands of years and still ring true today,</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<i>No; but I am the Commander of the Army of the Lord. Now I have come.</i></div>
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<i><br /></i></div>
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We are out of line when we think Jesus takes sides. We are out of line when we demand He takes our side. Instead, we are to press into and align ourselves with <i>Him.</i></div>
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<i><br /></i></div>
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When Joshua realized Who it was standing there before him, he fell to the ground and in worship asked what he was to do.</div>
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<br /></div>
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This Commander's only order?</div>
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<br /></div>
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<i>Take off your sandals from your feet, for the place where you are standing is holy. </i></div>
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<i><br /></i></div>
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<b><a href="https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Joshua+5%3A13-15&version=ESV" target="_blank">And Joshua did so.</a></b></div>
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<b><br /></b></div>
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The spaces around us, where we have the awesome privilege of speaking with those around us online or face to face...these spaces become holy with the presence of Christ. As a follower of Jesus, this holds weight.</div>
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<i><br /></i></div>
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The pastor spoke it from the front of the sanctuary this morning, the words that brought everything together and held me still. He said that it was in the dying of the leaf that the brilliant colors came out.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div>
Until the maple leaf began to die, the deepest red could never bleed out. The gold of the aspen leaf would never be seen unless its life began to fade away.</div>
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<br /></div>
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It is the same for the one who loves Jesus.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div>
Our life becomes His as we die to ourselves, and it is here in this dying that we are transformed and made into His likeness, </div>
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<br /></div>
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and this is how His Light shines through.</div>
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And how all the ground around us becomes holy.</div>
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<br /></div>
</div>
</div>
kimberleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12804672126005078796noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-363178727668036801.post-91836311422363748072016-10-16T00:10:00.003-07:002016-10-16T00:10:45.264-07:00When He Writes Love {A Post by Tony}<div class="MsoNormal">
I was speaking with someone the other day about a job I needed
done on my house.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></div>
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<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"><br /></span></div>
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Near the end of the conversation they made some comment about
Madison House and then followed up with this, <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
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“I’ve heard a lot of good things about you.” <o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
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I hesitated for a second and then responded with a smile, <o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
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“Thanks. If you hear anything bad about me I would think
that is true as well.” <o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
They laughed, but not really. I think the nakedness of the
idea caught them off guard. They recovered quickly, a very classy man, he was. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></div>
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<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"><br /></span></div>
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<div class="MsoNormal">
Kimberley is an amazing woman. She’s always writing
incredible things about me. I don’t have her same perspective on me.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I see a never ending mess ahead of me that I’m
struggling to give back to Christ on daily basis, mostly failing but with
patches of light that help me continue. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
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<div class="MsoNormal">
Kimberley is electric, an Adonis, a blazing fire on a long
bitterly cold day.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>She is entirely the
funniest woman I’ve ever met and the gentlest heart. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
To hear other men talk about their wives, then listen as Kimberley
imparts to me marriages she catches glimpses of, I feel sorrow and joy and the
guilt of a survivor.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>With Kimberley in
my life I KNOW I went through the war and came out on the other side; wife,
children, and job, all intact and accounted for.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"><br /></span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So here it goes: Kimberley is always writing down lists of
things she is thankful for, so here is my list of Kimberley’s joys and the
treasure that I have found in being with her. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">1.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]-->She gets up and does devotions for over an hour.
<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">2.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]-->No, seriously, she gets up EVERY MORNING and
does devotions for over an hour! <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">3.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]-->She never nags. I can’t explain that, it never
happens. I’ve never felt nagged. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">4.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]-->She is incredibly respectful of me in front of
the kids. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">5.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]-->She is respectful of me in front of the kids and
others even though I don’t deserve it. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">6.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]-->Kimberly respects me in private, public,
socially, and at work, even when we’re in the middle of an idiotic fight. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">7.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]-->She spends hours sitting with me and gently
rubbing her hands over my back while we read and listen to music together in
the evenings. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">8.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]-->During this time a kid will inevitably poke
their messed head of hair around the corner and yell, “Mommy, I poop my pants!”
or, “Mommy, Lyla throw up on her bed and it stinky!” Kimberley works with me to
clean up any mess. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">9.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]-->I sleep very little but when I do I may as well
be dead, and Kimberley, who Is a lite sleeper will deal with most of the 2am
kid problems without trying to wake me or making me feel bad the next day. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">10.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";"> </span></span></span><!--[endif]-->I
interrupt people. It’s a really bad habit, worse than smoking, and Kimberley quietly
waits while I jibber jabber about whatever nonsense was in my head and then
quietly continues after I’ve wound down.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">11.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";"> </span></span></span><!--[endif]-->Kimberley
is amazing at taking a dollar and making it stretch out to the end of forever.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">12.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";"> </span></span></span><!--[endif]-->The
bed is always made. It is with great joy that I enter our bedroom to find that
the covers are clean, warm, and soft. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">13.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";"> </span></span></span><!--[endif]-->I
wake up with Kimberley’s arms wrapped around me.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">14.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";"> </span></span></span><!--[endif]-->If
I complain, it’s not at Kimberley. It is for more time with Kimberley. The
communication is strong; I want to be with her, I want more of her, she is the
safest place on earth.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Whenever there is
gunfire and sirens outside the house, I’m not worried; Christ is with us and
Kimberley is with me. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">15.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";"> </span></span></span><!--[endif]-->Don’t
you think Kimberley is a sexy name?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I do.
Kimberley, Kimberley, Kimberley…<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">16.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";"> </span></span></span><!--[endif]-->Hair,
make-up, clothes, I don’t know how she does it but she always looks like fire
from the gods and I often find myself staring like an idiot.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Yes, idiot. Wake up you fool! But I don’t
want to wake up, I want to stay here forever, with only you. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">17.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";"> </span></span></span><!--[endif]-->Other
women just aren’t getting in the door. They may as well be blind. Where is the
door? <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Only Kimberley knows, and she can let
herself in and take up residence whenever she pleases. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">18.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";"> </span></span></span><!--[endif]-->I
love making Kimberley laugh. I’m so thankful she likes my sense of humor because
it gives me great pleasure to see her throw her head back and enjoy the peace
of laughing. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">19.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";"> </span></span></span><!--[endif]-->In
an age of such sexual, unmitigated, dis-holy catastrophe, Kimberley is a very
modest dresser. Not Amish, stylish. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">20.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";"> </span></span></span><!--[endif]-->Eric
Clapton said it better, “Yellow Tigers crouched in jungles in her dark eyes.” <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">21.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";"> </span></span></span><!--[endif]-->Not
much phases me, but I have to admit, if Kimberley is gone 15 minutes later than
she said she would be I get dry mouth and start internally freaking out that
she is dead or maimed or has been kidnapped by terrorists or all other manner of
hideous horrible.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Then she breezes in
the door, laughs, and kisses away all the ugly manifestations of the monsters
of my imagination.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">22.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";"> </span></span></span><!--[endif]-->Lastly,
for this list, “My baby don’t mess around because she loves me so and this I know
for sure.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>-Andre 3000- <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -.25in;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjopWj-cyDDkJip6FaA9penGSh7Y6x2pS1vGQ3_LGavFNY-iSQ8b7F8YdG9yZwoGvndb5TWfmh0Snp2WROxFshVAZ8bUt33CgWMFgNefBxb22J04wZchWODvVNxD3Kp0UhOSV9uiP-2xnY/s1600/2016-05-19_16-13-24_552.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjopWj-cyDDkJip6FaA9penGSh7Y6x2pS1vGQ3_LGavFNY-iSQ8b7F8YdG9yZwoGvndb5TWfmh0Snp2WROxFshVAZ8bUt33CgWMFgNefBxb22J04wZchWODvVNxD3Kp0UhOSV9uiP-2xnY/s640/2016-05-19_16-13-24_552.jpeg" width="480" /></a></div>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiqMu8tB-MtR3tv_355czIWgFqtODWNq5T7tI1mGvhO9tssANIPTtGFlqT5SYMrc-lakxaLKMTpiEDs_KWSpx5LzI46zUnjURleENlWDVJ0y8mLF2wHt0AAb3zFHAaq1-R8vT7BApjrvnw/s1600/2016-05-19_16-06-47_395.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiqMu8tB-MtR3tv_355czIWgFqtODWNq5T7tI1mGvhO9tssANIPTtGFlqT5SYMrc-lakxaLKMTpiEDs_KWSpx5LzI46zUnjURleENlWDVJ0y8mLF2wHt0AAb3zFHAaq1-R8vT7BApjrvnw/s640/2016-05-19_16-06-47_395.jpeg" width="480" /></a></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpLast">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I love you Kimberley and it is a logistical impossibility for
a me to encapsulate the essence of your radiance with a list of poorly stated, “22
reasons.” <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
You are the only woman that can break me with a flash of her
eyes and a tilt of her head.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>All other
woman are wax candles, dissolving in a river of imprecations before your insatiable
flame.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I have only ever been with you; I
will only ever be with you. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>16 years
have been too short to know you and a 1000 more will never do. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Eternity will have to suffice.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I love you, I love you, I love you. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraph">
<span style="display: none; mso-hide: all;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraph">
<span style="display: none; mso-hide: all;">e00 more will
never do,f humor,y guy, he was. o suffice.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>i<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>fire. s of the monters of
imagination. ll other mannner s into, i <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraph">
<span style="display: none; mso-hide: all;">e00 more will
never do,f humor,y guy, he was. o suffice.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>i<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>fire. s of the monters of
imagination. ll other mannner s into, i </span><o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
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kimberleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12804672126005078796noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-363178727668036801.post-84565788085680211592016-10-06T12:08:00.000-07:002016-10-06T19:45:56.426-07:00For the First FifteenI walked down that aisle 16 days before he turned 27.<br />
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I can never forget that look on his face.</div>
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I don't ever want to.</div>
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There are men who use words as cruelly as they use their weapons and their fists.</div>
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Men who see a weakness and exploit it,</div>
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abuse it,</div>
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break it even further down.</div>
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There are men who see their work as an escape, an excuse to stay far away from the women they married, the children who call them Daddy, the life they said yes to as a covenant was being formed with words and bodies and love.</div>
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It was in a little country church that I met him all dressed in white with a bouquet of roses and heather clutched tightly in my hand, saying those ancient words that would entwine my life with his as long as both our hearts were beating.</div>
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There were words I had never said to him - words about my life and my mistakes that I had never shared with him. Afraid of rejection, afraid of not being his.</div>
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He lifted that veil over my face to seal those vows with the only kiss we had ever shared, but I allowed a veil to remain over my heart.</div>
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It took well over a decade of days with this man and his loving and our 4 babies to loosen my tongue - to unveil a veiled life and lay myself bare.</div>
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Jesus, He had taken my life that wanted Him in name only, wanted nothing to do with His Church or His people or His Word and over a decade of days He wooed my heart and made me desperate for Him and His holy grace.</div>
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It was Jesus who loved me into lifting every veil from my heart and it was Tony who, in the middle of his own pain, tenderly took the bloody mess of my hidden secrets and helped me lift them up to the Light of forgiveness.</div>
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There is a man who walks fearlessly in the dark places. I've watched him from the quiet of our front porch. He reaches out to those who others would turn away from and loves deeply enough to point hard and broken hearts back to the truth of Jesus and His Word.</div>
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I've heard this man's strong voice call hope into the mess of a drunken haze leaning on those old front steps of ours - the firm words that reminded as long as there was breath in the lungs, no one was ever too far gone.</div>
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My ears have caught his voice singing hope to our children as he prays words over bowed and sleepy heads.</div>
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I know a man who walks with me on a road that leads us to Jesus, who lovingly traces the scars of my past and lifts my eyes off of those broken days and points to the One Who is calling His Bride to Himself.</div>
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I know a man whose life has been one with my own for fifteen years. His arms hold the dearest comfort, his heartbeat is more familiar than the thrum of my own. </div>
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I know a man who walks in the ways of our Savior, whose eyes hold the Light of Life. </div>
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Fifteen years of moments and days and I selfishly want more of more gift of him. </div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjIGJ4PJb2a9AWON3265LmgoiudS_OjknJ4Xeo0CbPqndK8RxbftnGTn5EhjIyOgiF02VNA9l6Xm4gUMPaFg4vzkc0wHPQxHZWzpp_C1tU5eM8fPzX-BLgdJcfrDpbFCuVotnOzj63uDp4/s1600/328703_10150298623925966_393959462_o.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjIGJ4PJb2a9AWON3265LmgoiudS_OjknJ4Xeo0CbPqndK8RxbftnGTn5EhjIyOgiF02VNA9l6Xm4gUMPaFg4vzkc0wHPQxHZWzpp_C1tU5eM8fPzX-BLgdJcfrDpbFCuVotnOzj63uDp4/s640/328703_10150298623925966_393959462_o.jpg" width="498" /></a></div>
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My dearest Tony,</div>
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Your love has been the greatest gift I have ever received. Thank you for the ways that you give yourself to me...to us. Thank you for loving me and for leading me back to the love of Jesus. Thank you for loving me as Christ has loved the Church - for giving me a glimpse of the beauty of our Heavenly Bridegroom and the way that He loves us.<br />
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Thank you for fifteen incredible years. You have my heart and my love.</div>
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Always,</div>
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Kimberley</div>
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kimberleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12804672126005078796noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-363178727668036801.post-49217383307348601562016-09-25T17:15:00.001-07:002016-09-25T17:15:05.376-07:00Sunday's Sabbath {List Two}The sunflowers hang heavy in the front flower beds while the sweet peas blaze bright pink in the softening autumn light.<br />
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We left church this morning and my heart was aching.<br />
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We eat lunch and while Tony lays on the floor watching football, I curl my body around his and sleep with my forehead pressed into his back.<br />
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There is much to prepare for the coming week, but for a hour or two I rest, pressed close to the one who shows me Christ's love and the ache that was there has eased a little.<br /><br />And while I wait for the oven to heat, I'll slip over here and share what has been filling my book bag of late.<br /><br /><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj3LllYuuxhyIFLijtRwKrYQ1iqOmQDKAhs41IwjyaoqyHJss27Pj0EBSo-ISA9vEYzhHjrw2gBIOrKhTePwNryXlAAGKHCUOoUgsgfBQOfCKnnEgyq4HNWRsppkj6U0S6VDGWiiBteWmc/s1600/IMG_6245.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj3LllYuuxhyIFLijtRwKrYQ1iqOmQDKAhs41IwjyaoqyHJss27Pj0EBSo-ISA9vEYzhHjrw2gBIOrKhTePwNryXlAAGKHCUOoUgsgfBQOfCKnnEgyq4HNWRsppkj6U0S6VDGWiiBteWmc/s640/IMG_6245.JPG" width="480" /></a></div>
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<a href="https://www.amazon.com/None-Like-Him-Different-Thats/dp/1433549832/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1474848146&sr=8-1&keywords=none+like+him" target="_blank">None Like Him ~ Jen Wilkin</a><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgQ-1ZdwhJJbo0zgvcdYMDpZjMH_tsBvs0qv0nbk0YnPhliT68zGPhBU79VuxPguEKEeUR-k64fbDKJNX024OZMO4XWSrgeJhj0XlljE8Qv-43R1IrduiGjfNq_bLzIlvYngUcBLONH_Jw/s1600/IMG_6246.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgQ-1ZdwhJJbo0zgvcdYMDpZjMH_tsBvs0qv0nbk0YnPhliT68zGPhBU79VuxPguEKEeUR-k64fbDKJNX024OZMO4XWSrgeJhj0XlljE8Qv-43R1IrduiGjfNq_bLzIlvYngUcBLONH_Jw/s640/IMG_6246.JPG" width="614" /></a></div>
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I didn't really know what to expect from this book. I was<i> born into</i> the church before I was ever <i>born again</i>, and so there are times that I wrestle with thinking <i>I've heard it all before</i>. And while many of the truths in this small book are ones that I have lived my whole life knowing, they are presented in a way that rarely is in the church. How often are our eyes positioned fully onto God and His glory? How often do we hear sermons or read articles that end up focusing our eyes and our hearts and our minds on <i>us.</i> The glory and majesty of God is so much larger than we could ever fathom and this book here has been redirecting my selfish thinking and I'm so grateful.<br /><br />(And if you would like to hear a glimpse of Mrs. Wilkin's thoughts on the way the Church tends to view scripture and present God - <b><a href="https://www.crossway.org/blog/2016/06/reclaiming-psalm-139/" target="_blank">listen to this.</a></b> I loved every minute of it and was so grateful for the tender and funny admonition.)<br />
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<b><a href="https://www.amazon.com/Sidney-Chambers-Forgiveness-Sins-Grantchester/dp/1632861038/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1474848202&sr=8-1&keywords=sidney+chambers+and+the+forgiveness+of+sins" target="_blank">Sidney Chambers and The Forgiveness of Sins ~ James Runcie</a></b><br />
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Apparently, this book series has been turned into a TV series ~ but I didn't know that until I read the back cover of this book just today, and I'm already halfway through these pages! If you have been watching The Granchester Mysteries on PBS I would love to hear your thoughts. All I know is that when Autumn rolls around, my love of Mysteries comes out and these books set in 1964 London, England are the perfect fit to the darkening days and cooler air. If you love the <b><a href="https://www.amazon.com/Mitford-Years-Complete-Set-Volumes/dp/B00IGFL8IE/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1474848280&sr=1-1&keywords=the+mitford+series" target="_blank">Mitford Series</a></b>, you would probably love the nosy and loving Curator as he tries to balance family, ministry and crime. I think the New York Times sums up this series the best:<br /><br />
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<i>The coziest of cozy murder mysteries...These stories present a </i></div>
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<i>consistently charming and occasionally cutting commentary on</i></div>
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<i>a postwar landscape. </i></div>
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<b><a href="https://www.amazon.com/Hole-Our-Holiness-Paperback-Godliness/dp/1433541351/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1474848249&sr=1-1&keywords=the+hole+in+our+holiness" target="_blank">The Hole in Our Holiness ~ Kevin deYoung</a></b><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg-JfHr0Kc4qJhzHb78eEr_1TZCboW7qbJT1vBq24taGzFt5blK8fWVGRL0Jnyp9EPPQiTRWUFo9uFDPEHsVUvohPNM7AiTqm29vKICX_uL6LIoQjSt4u7eGdA5zWeq06IgbkQ9R41MLWA/s1600/IMG_6248.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg-JfHr0Kc4qJhzHb78eEr_1TZCboW7qbJT1vBq24taGzFt5blK8fWVGRL0Jnyp9EPPQiTRWUFo9uFDPEHsVUvohPNM7AiTqm29vKICX_uL6LIoQjSt4u7eGdA5zWeq06IgbkQ9R41MLWA/s640/IMG_6248.JPG" width="576" /></a></div>
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Tony and I spent my birthday out in a little house nestled in the quiet of an apple orchard. This house, during the school year, is used for <b><a href="http://www.gcmacts.com/" target="_blank">one of the most beautiful ministries</a></b> I have come across. During the quiet evenings we were there, I would slip down to the little coffee shop area where they had a wall full of books and this one caught my eye. I had mentioned to the wife of the director that I wanted to purchase it and she said she would bring it to church on a Sunday we would both be there. When she placed it in my hands, it was wrapped in a ribbon and she refused to take payment for it. This has proven to be a powerful gift that has both convicted and challenged me. This is another book that I am working through slowly, but I don't think it's meant to be rushed. I highly recommend this book to new and not-so-new believers.<br />
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<br />
<b><a href="https://www.crossway.org/bibles/esv-ultrathin-bible-none-tru/" target="_blank">The Holy Bible - ESV</a></b><br />
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This past month, I have found myself in the books of Isaiah, Philippians and now Romans and while I am still not a morning person, and probably never will be, the morning hours have solidly become my favorite time of day to spend within these pages. I once listened to a sermon of John Piper's where he shared his prayer that he prayed before he ever opened the pages of scripture and I have begun to make it my own. It is something like this:<br />
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<i>Lord, open your Word to speak to my heart</i></div>
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<i>and open my heart to receive Your Word.</i></div>
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Most mornings, I have kids running around me, but most of the time, in all the sleepy chaos, He settles my heart and my mind to meet with Him there at my desk in the kitchen.</div>
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I'm including a link to the printable schedule <b><a href="http://shereadstruth.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/12/SRT-BIAY_PRINTABLE.pdf" target="_blank">here</a></b>.</div>
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I also enrolled myself and Lyla, Olivia and Elias into a weekly BSF class and we're digging into the first portion of the book of John and this has become our Bible lessons that we use as we begin school each day. If you are part of a local BSF class, I would love to hear how you are doing! I've already loved being a part of this.</div>
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May your coming week be filled with Christ's steadfast love and faithfulness. May His peace surround you, no matter the circumstances you find yourself in. May the rest that He gives on this day be one that sustains you until the next.</div>
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<br />kimberleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12804672126005078796noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-363178727668036801.post-82999549772648418922016-09-07T22:56:00.001-07:002016-09-07T23:00:22.836-07:00For the Golden EdgesMaybe it was the late arriving curriculum that put that pit right there in the center of my stomach.<br />
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I don't know.<br />
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All I know is that somehow, over the summer, my oldest daughter is now only 10 1/2 inches shorter than my 5'11".<br />
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She is all smiles about this,<br />
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but me?<br />
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Her small, downy head used to fit in the palm of my hand while her toes curled into the crook of my elbow. That's all I needed - one arm to support all 9 pounds of her and when did she unfurl into all arms and legs and emotions? There are times when it feels like the whole of me can't be enough.<br />
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The pictures are all over Facebook and Instagram, those "first day of school" pictures with rosy cheeks and nervous smiles and brand new clothes and backpacks with zippers that are working. Even the homeschoolers join in the fun.<br />
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Only this year, I sat there shocked.<br />
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When did all of these children hit middle school? And high school? Even the sweet babies are now in kindergarten.<br />
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I'm on my porch in the early morning light this past Tuesday, putting food in the dog dish and I hear my name being called. Sleepy smiles greet me as they walk to middle school and these faces on the other side of the fence used to be so much younger. They used to be small.<br />
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When we started at Madison House just over 4 years ago this past August, the ones who spend their days in High School were the same ages as Lyla and Olivia are now.<br />
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4 years.<br />
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I'm sure I only blinked.<br />
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I used to inwardly groan when I heard the saying,<br />
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<i>Enjoy it. It goes by so fast.</i><br />
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Only, a full decade <i>plus</i> of diapers feels slow moving in the middle of it, until the littlest one finally decides that she's a big girl who will do big girl things and while the Costco bill seems a bit lighter, I felt a certain wonder when I looked at Tony Saturday night and marveled: we bought diapers for <i>10 years</i> and <b>now we're done</b>.<br />
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<i>Done.</i><br />
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How did a decade go by that fast?<br />
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The leaves are beginning to turn golden around the edges and I find myself beginning to understand.<br />
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There is an ache in this mothering that I didn't even think of in those days of dreaming of <i>these days</i> before life ever lit up the dark spaces within me.<br />
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I'm sure I still don't understand it, and maybe I never will, but it's those leaves that Jesus is using to turn my eyes on to Him.<br />
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The years are growing shorter, no matter how much I long for it all to slow, but in the midst of vibrant life, it's the glowing, golden edges whispering of one season moving on to the next that is causing a tendering within me:<br />
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Let's not rush around the table,<br />
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let's linger over spelling lists and math problems and science experiments.<br />
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<b><a href="https://www.amazon.com/Door-Wall-Marguerite-Angeli/dp/B000NY64DA/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1473313650&sr=8-2&keywords=a+door+in+the+wall" target="_blank">Let's read one more chapter in our read aloud</a></b> because all of us snuggled together on the couch has us asking questions and imagining the sights and sounds of a time long passed.<br />
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Where there are struggles, let's slow and breathe and ask one another how we can give God glory right <i>here</i> in this moment where we want to give up, and then laugh, because the sound of someone blowing their nose really and truly is funny.<br />
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My little notebook has stayed closer than ever this past week. September comes and Fall's air already feels so different.<br />
<br />
I don't want to miss the wonder of them, or this life that God has so graciously given to us.<br />
<br />
I want to remember these days when only 10 1/2 inches separated my oldest girl and me.<br />
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31. <b><a href="http://www.esvbible.org/Psalm+107/" target="_blank">Psalm 107</a></b><br />
32. His Hope that lifts my eyes<br />
33. <b><a href="https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Acts+14%3A22&version=ESV" target="_blank">Acts 14:22</a></b> ~ What my words should do<br />
34. Slow dancing in the kitchen with Zee<br />
35. The last of the farm fresh eggs<br />
36. Clouds that whisper of Fall<br />
37. 5:45am<br />
38. Rain that fell through the night<br />
39. A boy and his dog all curled up in sleep<br />
40. Quiet hush before everyone wakes<br />
41. <b><a href="http://www.esvbible.org/Psalm+106/" target="_blank">Psalm 106</a></b><br />
42. <b><a href="https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Isaiah+40%3A11&version=ESV" target="_blank">Isaiah 40:11</a></b><br />
43. Apple muffins baking.<br />
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So teach us to number our days that</div>
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we may get a heart of wisdom. </div>
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Psalm 90:12</div>
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<br />kimberleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12804672126005078796noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-363178727668036801.post-37109660460017368282016-09-04T19:50:00.000-07:002016-09-04T19:53:12.305-07:00Sunday's Sabbath {List One}The light is shifting,<br />
<br />
do you notice?<br />
<br />
September begins to unfurl her colors and I just want to sit and whisper,<br />
<br />
<i>Welcome.</i><br />
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September makes me long for a slowing, even though I know acutely that with school beginning in just 2 short days the feeling to urge a rushing of small hearts will be strong and I will wrestle.<br />
<br />
Again.<br />
<br />
<br />
August holds days of heat and a rhythm that follows the tune of the unstructured.<br />
<br />
It was lovely and good and needed.<br />
<br />
And in the wild and lazy chaos of days to <i>just be</i> - to just paint, to just nap, to just do nothing at all, I felt the stirring of a desire for Sabbath.<br />
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<br />
Growing up, Sundays were for church and for napping and I hated the forced rest. When I fell in love with reading, I would sneak a book under my pillow and reach my fingers around those covers after the sounds of sleep filled the hallways and I would read until my eyes couldn't stay open anymore.<br />
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I'm still processing what Sabbath is to look like now as an adult with a choice, but I thought, no matter how silly it might be to put here, that Sundays could maybe be a day to slip a listing of books on screen of what I'm reading, so maybe you too might be able to still for a time - find a time of rest on this day that God has given as a gift.<br />
<br />
Monday's Thankful List will be moved to Wednesday, because by Wednesday, my heart needs a reminder that there is joy in the very middle of the mundane and ordinary and that if I'm at the middle of the week, there is hope -<i>Rest</i> is coming.<br />
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It's rare for me to only read one book at a time - I tend to have 4 or 5 books going at once. I don't know if this is due to the digital age where attention span is short, or if it is the security blanket of the introverted. Regardless, I have a bag that is sagging and worn and within it's ripping seams sits a pile that weighs gloriously heavy on my shoulder.<br />
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So, without further ado, here is <i><u>Sunday's Sabbath {List One}</u></i><br />
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<a href="https://www.amazon.com/How-Teach-Your-Children-Shakespeare/dp/0307951502/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1473043222&sr=8-1&keywords=how+to+teach+your+children+shakespeare" target="_blank">How To Teach Your Children Shakespeare, by Ken Ludwig.</a><br />
This is a book I have been wanting to read for awhile, especially as our focus in both History and English will have some Shakespearean flair this year. I'm barely a third of the way in, but I am already encouraged and greatly inspired, and John Lithgow's intro alone had me convinced that this was a *very* good choice.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgE_FnvEKoH8q2RREAKhesErzKK_lVGEEOyPdjpWan7KZlG4NeQq4KIWGYKfDX2e48WROTSUeDC56bhw_syddbcVacQ_mEp0FAZjWZPX57CxrNW7KDXpW68jubewykV9a40wFniIiiu_M0/s1600/IMG_6019.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgE_FnvEKoH8q2RREAKhesErzKK_lVGEEOyPdjpWan7KZlG4NeQq4KIWGYKfDX2e48WROTSUeDC56bhw_syddbcVacQ_mEp0FAZjWZPX57CxrNW7KDXpW68jubewykV9a40wFniIiiu_M0/s640/IMG_6019.JPG" width="640" /></a></div>
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<a href="https://www.amazon.com/Vinegar-Girl-Novel-Hogarth-Shakespeare/dp/0804141266/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1473043263&sr=8-1&keywords=vinegar+girl+by+anne+tyler" target="_blank">Vinegar Girl, by Anne Tyler</a><br />
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I don't read much fiction, but when one comes highly recommended, I place it on the holds list at the library and wait impatiently to finally get the text that it is in. I really just started it this afternoon and found the first page to be perfectly charming. And the fact that it's a retelling of The Taming of the Shrew makes me feel like my ordering of the title above this one is a very happy one indeed.<br />
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<a href="https://www.amazon.com/Disciplines-Godly-Redesign-Barbara-Hughes/dp/1433537915/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1473043298&sr=8-1&keywords=disciplines+of+a+godly+woman" target="_blank">Disciplines of a Godly Woman, by Barbara Hughes</a><br />
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I have been reading through this book slowly - I think I ordered it in May and just now only have 1 or 2 chapters to go. This is an older book, written in 2001, or 2003 and so her thoughts on the future of the church are both alarming and encouraging. I read somewhere once, that when mentors are few to find them in the pages of a book, and this is what Mrs. Hughes has been to me, a mentor of sorts who continually points my eyes and heart onto the glory and holiness of God. I highly, *highly* recommend this book.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjduhJyNT4pRTrQvL03wSH1GDmMbexQRwnUK03EWzY8Et-QaXxxTw3imvjFEjB6b6z2EwuoWWGmpNax2mDqkrIVWu7UQqX3ZkrHtpLOOuFrXs4fhVQKxTShPjYRDIA5mSUAv21NdECTGYY/s1600/IMG_6020.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjduhJyNT4pRTrQvL03wSH1GDmMbexQRwnUK03EWzY8Et-QaXxxTw3imvjFEjB6b6z2EwuoWWGmpNax2mDqkrIVWu7UQqX3ZkrHtpLOOuFrXs4fhVQKxTShPjYRDIA5mSUAv21NdECTGYY/s640/IMG_6020.JPG" width="640" /></a></div>
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<a href="https://www.amazon.com/Moments-Days-Celebrations-Shape-Faith/dp/1631464639/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1473043330&sr=8-1&keywords=moments+and+days" target="_blank">Moments and Days, by Michelle Van Loon</a><br />
I have always loved the beauty and sacredness of liturgy and the Church Calendar but feel lost in how to observe this rich heritage passed on through the millennia in the context of our North American churches that no longer observe the days that have marked our faith. This book arrived on the porch on Friday and so I haven't really had a chance to get to far into it, but Mrs. Van Loon begins by going through the Jewish Holy Days and how they have laid the foundation for the Church. She includes this quote by Pastor Tom Olson, "Learning to number our days means recognizing the unnumbered days of God". I know already I will love this book.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhniAtopoiwuSsnfGe8kcKoybhJSxBtI1ESd4yHH_jqAg5gBFfRfdVsJtvl77ZNXKFFLOGVHuFV0NFpRNx_Ys0NXl_5fnMpXXnGRtVurCnr-MMY0lg333kqTNzmJXyaBE5lqNrxZ9peaCE/s1600/IMG_6025.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhniAtopoiwuSsnfGe8kcKoybhJSxBtI1ESd4yHH_jqAg5gBFfRfdVsJtvl77ZNXKFFLOGVHuFV0NFpRNx_Ys0NXl_5fnMpXXnGRtVurCnr-MMY0lg333kqTNzmJXyaBE5lqNrxZ9peaCE/s640/IMG_6025.JPG" width="640" /></a></div>
<br />
<a href="https://www.amazon.com/Single-Column-Journaling-Antique-Floral/dp/1433548402/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1473043365&sr=8-3&keywords=esv+single+column+journaling+bible" target="_blank">ESV Single Column Journaling Bible, Crossway</a><br />
<br />
I'll just say right here that this will be featured every week. For almost 2 years now I've been following the #365daysoftruth through the She Reads Truth App and I have (to be horribly cliche) fallen completely in love with God's Word. I have no other way to put it. I feel it deeply when I miss a day, not out of legalism, but because I haven't stilled my heart before Jesus. These holy words alone are foundational to everything else.<br />
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<i>Honorable Mention:</i></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgj_gG-JOymTd2nF1parCqRo0hWszX2ojTHk-vVhVpPn3GaIkd92kUfhfH9lSXVFDfg_SkxNrpuyx5rPU9FjerfFKUMKMH-bYdbjejSlQmWQoRzOwN31xNRP93IbjsxIPqy2qdJ-zWKjNI/s1600/IMG_6027.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgj_gG-JOymTd2nF1parCqRo0hWszX2ojTHk-vVhVpPn3GaIkd92kUfhfH9lSXVFDfg_SkxNrpuyx5rPU9FjerfFKUMKMH-bYdbjejSlQmWQoRzOwN31xNRP93IbjsxIPqy2qdJ-zWKjNI/s640/IMG_6027.JPG" width="640" /></a></div>
<i><br /></i>
<a href="https://www.amazon.com/Secret-Thoughts-Unlikely-Convert-ebook/dp/1884527388/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1473043407&sr=8-1&keywords=secret+thoughts+of+an+unlikely+convert" target="_blank">The Secret Thoughts of an Unlikely Convert, by Rosaria Butterfield</a><br />
<br />
There are some books that Tony and I will read to each other in the evenings once the kids are in bed and quiet is finally descending around us. This book was the latest and it was life changing for me. Everyone should read this book, no matter your views on a subject that needs to be discussed and viewed in the Light of God's Word and covered with the tenderness of His Grace and Mercy. Her second book came out this year and it should be landing on our porch later this month. I. Can. Hardly. Wait.<br />
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{None of the links listed above are affiliate links - it's just a fun sharing of what is in my book bag.} </div>
kimberleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12804672126005078796noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-363178727668036801.post-19526987000848249632016-08-29T19:27:00.001-07:002016-08-29T19:38:17.652-07:00A Grief Revisited {A Post by Tony}<div class="MsoNormal">
1989. <o:p></o:p></div>
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We are all sitting around the table at our home in Hailey,
Idaho playing Trivial Pursuit; teams boys vs. girls. The girls are at a serious disadvantage for
three reasons:<o:p></o:p></div>
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<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="font-family: "wingdings"; mso-bidi-font-family: Wingdings; mso-fareast-font-family: Wingdings;">v<span style="font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 7pt; font-stretch: normal;"> ~ </span></span>they are just playing to be nice<o:p></o:p></div>
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<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="font-family: "wingdings"; mso-bidi-font-family: Wingdings; mso-fareast-font-family: Wingdings;">v<span style="font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 7pt; font-stretch: normal;"> ~ </span></span><!--[endif]-->my father is fiercely competitive<o:p></o:p></div>
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<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="font-family: "wingdings"; mso-bidi-font-family: Wingdings; mso-fareast-font-family: Wingdings;">v<span style="font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 7pt; font-stretch: normal;"> ~ </span></span><!--[endif]-->he has an amazing memory. <o:p></o:p></div>
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My mother pulls the next card and reads to my dad and I, “What
is the name of the theme song of MASH?”<o:p></o:p></div>
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Since I’m only in 9<sup>th</sup> grade the question is way
before my time, but after a long pause my dad says, “Suicide is Painless”.
There is a weighted look between my mother and father, a look only they
understand that will take me years to grasp, and only in a memory. <o:p></o:p></div>
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We roll the dice and move forward, or is it around in
circles?<o:p></o:p></div>
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<div class="MsoNormal">
1966. <o:p></o:p></div>
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On a bridge overlooking the Willamette River outside
Portland, Oregon the police pull a young man from the edge. He looked ready to
jump and friends and family had been searching for him for hours. He was the
president of his high school student body and was supposed to make a speech at
graduation but skipped the festivities for a bottle of pills - the police also
take these. I don’t know of this story
until it’s too late to do anything about it.
Days like that day are when I hate H. G. Wells, nothing but false hope.
At least I can channel my rage onto someone dead, inanimate, without hurting
anyone. <o:p></o:p></div>
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<div class="MsoNormal">
December 31<sup>st</sup> 2009. <o:p></o:p></div>
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We’ve driven miles up into the mountains, almost at 10,000
feet now and still no trace of my father.
My two younger brothers are in the truck ahead of me and we’ve already
been nearly stuck or gone off the road half a dozen times. My father taught us to love the wilderness
and outdoors when we were very young. He
used to say, “A day above 10,000 feet is better than 365 days at on the
flatland.” Made me laugh. Nothing makes me laugh today. We finally spot his white truck covered in
new snow and leap from our vehicles but his is empty. Up the hill there’s a ladder next to a tree
and our minds break, after this everything will be broken, forever, and now I
know it always has been and always will be, until the end of the world. That’s all I need to share about that day
except to say that the last time a son hugs his father it should never be
around his legs.<o:p></o:p></div>
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Yesterday. <o:p></o:p></div>
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I have three beautiful daughters and one amazing son. Like all 7-year-old boys, my son loves cars
and playing guns and yelling excitedly at explosions on TV. I have tried hard to train him up in God’s
Word like my father did for me. He’s
tucked into bed and is smiling up at me and as I lean down to give him a hug
goodnight I say, “Grandpa would have loved you.” He frowns slightly and then says, “Dad, how
did Grandpa die?” <o:p></o:p></div>
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I have been avoiding this for too long,</div>
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it is time. <o:p></o:p></div>
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I start to tell him but find out our middle daughter beat me
to punch, “Olivia says it was ‘sewer side’ what is sewer side?” </div>
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He is so eager to know, and I am grating to
acquiesce. I plunge. <o:p></o:p></div>
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“It’s called suicide, we hurt ourselves so badly that our
consequence is death.” He understands
consequences, he gets them whenever he is disrespectful to his parents or mean
to his sisters. <o:p></o:p></div>
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“It’s death. Why is it death?” <o:p></o:p></div>
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“Well, when you hurt your sister, dad and mom take away your
toys or you don’t get to play on the family tablet for a few days right?”<o:p></o:p></div>
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He nods. </div>
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I continue. <o:p></o:p></div>
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“To God, all sin is sin but some sin carries a heavier
penalty than just toys being absconded - the penalty is death. The worse the sin you commit, the greater the
payment. That’s why Jesus died, to cover
the sins of the whole world so we would have eternal life with Him.” I am internally collapsing now and just want
to run from the room and vomit but I know the conversation is not over and I
need to be strong for my son. Quitting
on him in this conversation would be everything I promised myself I wouldn’t
do. <o:p></o:p></div>
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He’s just staring at me now and I take his little hands in
mine and looking him right in the eye I say, </div>
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“Don’t be afraid, I am never going
to do anything to hurt myself, I will always be here for you as long as God
allows and whenever you feel like you are going to do the wrong thing you can
pray and ask Jesus to help. He nods
affirmatively, I stand up and mess his hair one last time. “I love you son.” <o:p></o:p></div>
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“I love you too, dad.” <o:p></o:p></div>
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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So many parts of me died that day in the mountains. But something else was also born. </div>
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<div class="MsoNormal">
I told my wife that evening, “This is it, Satan is coming,
he is going to use this to destroy us and destroy our family and with Dad gone
there will be no one left to stand in the gap.
I’m not going to let that happen.
Jesus will guide us through this but we have to trust Him no matter how
dark it gets.”<o:p></o:p></div>
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It was dark, fast, faster than I could have thought
possible; in less than a year nearly everything was taken from me except my
wife and children and I had to start all over in a different country, state,
city. <o:p></o:p></div>
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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I can never remember a time where I have been more at peace
than this last year. Six years of
separation from falling down in the snow and nearly going insane have proved to
be an incredible adventure. Beth Moore, in a teaching she did once said, “Daniel is not in heaven regretting having
been in the lions’ den, he is in heaven reaping the reward of having trusted
God through the lions’ den. “<o:p></o:p></div>
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I will not be taken down by generational sin, and there are
many to choose from, but as Paul said, <o:p></o:p></div>
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“I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I
have kept the faith. Henceforth there is
laid up for me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous judge,
will award to me on that Day, and not only to me but also to all who have loved
his appearing.” <o:p></o:p></div>
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Found in chapter 4 verse 7 of the book my father was named
after. <o:p></o:p></div>
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All photos from <b><i><a href="http://peakpapa.blogspot.com/" target="_blank">here</a></i></b></div>
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kimberleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12804672126005078796noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-363178727668036801.post-73085728061608988222016-08-16T00:35:00.001-07:002016-08-16T00:40:56.502-07:00For When it All Falls ApartThe fridge goes first, warming instead of cooling the food inside.<br />
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Then the car, with smoke pouring out from under the hood.<br />
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And it all happens suddenly - no one is prepared. One day the milk is ice cold - the next day, I reach in and grab hold of a jug that pours out lukewarm and soured liquid.<br />
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I'm reminded that there's no preparation for when everything begins to go sideways. Just when one begins to think that everything is moving along smoothly, that all four kids have been playing peacefully, the neighbourhood is quiet and calm, the car will get us from point A to point B with no problems...that's when everything begins to fall apart.<br />
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Can I write here, how much I loved my fridge?<br />
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Because I did.<br />
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It was the fridge that I had always wanted with almost all the bells and whistles that could be had.<br />
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Tony had purchased it as a surprise and grinned from ear to ear the day it was delivered.<br />
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And when it started to go - when I discovered how much the repairs *could* be on this bells-and-whistles-fridge, I began to wrestle.<br />
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Because no matter how much one has let go of - there's always more.<br />
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Even a fridge can become an idol.<br />
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And so on the evening that our car broke down, the evening before the repair man was coming to assess the cried-over fridge, I sat in my green chair in the dark and the quiet and I prayed.<br />
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I knew we couldn't afford this repair on top of the car - and I knew that holding on to the illusion of control was only going to make things worse and so I opened my hands and let it go.<br />
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Kneeling before Jesus, acknowledging Him as Sovereign over all things, coming before Him as a child before her Father, I lifted up our needs before Him. The fridge could go - it really could. Just a plain simple white fridge would do. I was done with fancy.<br />
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I have a print hanging in our dining room that boldly proclaim the words of Matthew 6:25-26<br />
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<span class="text Matt-6-25" style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: "helvetica neue" , "verdana" , "helvetica" , "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 24px;"><span class="woj" style="-webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased; box-sizing: border-box;">Therefore I tell you, <span class="crossreference" data-cr="#cen-ESV-23308B" data-link="(<a href="#cen-ESV-23308B" title="See cross-reference B">B</a>)" style="box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 0.625em; line-height: 22px; position: relative; top: 0px; vertical-align: top;"></span>do not be anxious about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink, nor about your body, what you will put on. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing?</span></span><span class="text Matt-6-26" id="en-ESV-23309" style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: "helvetica neue" , "verdana" , "helvetica" , "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 24px;"><span class="woj" style="-webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased; box-sizing: border-box;"><span class="versenum" style="box-sizing: border-box; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 12px; font-weight: bold; line-height: 22px; position: relative; top: 0px; vertical-align: top;"> </span><span class="crossreference" data-cr="#cen-ESV-23309C" data-link="(<a href="#cen-ESV-23309C" title="See cross-reference C">C</a>)" style="box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 0.625em; line-height: 22px; position: relative; top: 0px; vertical-align: top;"></span>Look at the birds of the air: they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. <span class="crossreference" data-cr="#cen-ESV-23309D" data-link="(<a href="#cen-ESV-23309D" title="See cross-reference D">D</a>)" style="box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 0.625em; line-height: 22px; position: relative; top: 0px; vertical-align: top;"></span>Are you not of more value than they?</span></span><br />
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As I went to bed, leaving our needs and my dependence on possessions at the feet of Jesus, I fell asleep thinking of those verses.<br />
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Morning came and Tony woke up to a text on his phone, letting him know that a rental had sold and the buyers didn't want the fridge - would we like to have it?<br />
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Tony's mom texted, asking if she could drive over the mountains and stay at our home for a couple of days - and there was relief knowing that by the time she arrived we would have a working fridge and food of the right temperature to feed her.<br />
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Only, she had a surprise of her own...<br />
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Even before our car had broken down, even before she knew about the uncertain future of our vehicle, she had wandered through a car lot after seeing a flyer with the words, "Matthew 6:33" printed on it. She had written down our story and handed it in with the hopes that maybe a donation could be given.<br />
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And it was - Because <i>God knew.</i><br />
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So she drove that car over the mountains and in the middle of the girls soccer game, she smiled wide and told us that car parked in the back was ours and then waited for that realization to sink into our weary heads.<br />
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There's the temptation to feel foolish writing this down in light of loss of tragedy and pain all around me...all around the world.<br />
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And yet.<br />
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I go back to the early years of our marriage, when I would begin to panic over all the "what-if's" that could happen, the hypothetical scary things that would keep me awake at night. In those moments, Tony would go back over all the ways that God had shown Himself faithful in my life, in his life and in our life together, and my heart would slow and I would nod and those moments of His faithfulness became strongholds for me to cling to.<br />
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Because the moments of shock and pain and devastation were sure to come, and they *did* come in huge and unrelenting waves, but because of Christ's faithfulness, His steadfast love that He made evident over and over, I knew that He was trustworthy and sure.<br />
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So, yes, it's just a fridge, just a car, in some ways. But in the other ways, in the ways that matter most, it's a demonstration of His care for His own, His provision for His children who are learning what it is to be dependent on Him. It's another marker to look to when more moments come that threaten to undo my faith.<br />
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They are two more tangible gifts that lift my eyes off of the fleeting and uncertain moments of <i>now </i>and lock them firmly onto the beauty and greatness of the Most Holy God Who calls me daughter.<br />
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And grace becomes just a little bit more understood.<br />
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11. ice cream on the porch before bed<br />
12. arms aching from the painting<br />
13. hearing our four laugh with their daddy<br />
14. the way Tony determinedly gives thanks when everything begins to fall apart<br />
15. the friend who steps in to take care of animals when the car has broken down<br />
16. the way Jesus tenderly lets me wrestle<br />
17. a fridge!<br />
18. a car!<br />
19. moments with Nana<br />
20. teasing Liv<br />
21. afternoons at the farm<br />
22. those crazy tall sunflowers<br />
23. picking peaches<br />
24. even when everyone is overheating<br />
25. even when everyone is crying<br />
26. even when we have to drive another hour<br />
27. front porch meetings<br />
28. golf cart afternoons with him<br />
29. Olivia's last night being 8<br />
30. breakfast birthday cake tradition and how everyone looks forward to it, year after year.<br />
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<br />kimberleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12804672126005078796noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-363178727668036801.post-1272149417410967392016-08-01T22:14:00.000-07:002016-08-01T22:14:51.889-07:00Going Back to What I KnowI sat down this evening to finalize lesson plans and curriculum choices and organize them all neatly and send them in.<br />
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That was the plan, but there are <i>so many choices.</i><br />
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Last year we stepped back from practically everything and just focused on rebuilding small hearts, and it was a good thing and a needed thing and in the praying over this coming year, I'm sensing that we are to begin to open up again. Slowly, yes, but with intention and grace.<br />
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<i>Ah, grace.</i> The word I have wrestled with so much this year.<br />
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August comes and the heat lessens and I look ahead to a school year with a knowing of all the hard work that comes with it. The temptation to rush, when small ones need to slow and absorb. The temptation to be lax, when self-discipline needs to be exercised.<br />
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This life we have been called to is one that I love, one that I'm still learning to navigate all the tensions of, one that I'm still learning to turn over to Jesus completely.<br />
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In the quiet of my Bible reading each day, there has been one phrase that has been jumping out at me over and over again to the point that I finally took note of it and realized it's what I've let go of in the rush of living.<br />
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It seemed almost cliche, you know? It all began for me in the late fall of 2010 in the middle of upheaval and deep sadness. I came across <a href="http://www.aholyexperience.com/" target="_blank">this blog</a> and I grabbed hold onto her idea of writing down 1000 gifts. And I did it. And then I slowly stopped after the popularity started to fizzle and it seemed silly to continue when even the posts on her page slowly ended and disappeared.<br /><br /><span class="">I just stopped giving thanks.</span><br />
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<span class=""><br /><br /><br />And as I look back over the last 2 or 3 years, I can see a hardening in my heart - a sort of callous that I've allowed to form to protect myself from a life in ministry. </span><br />
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But the truth is, giving thanks isn't a movement or a novel idea or something reserved for certain holidays and seasons.<br /><br />Paul exhorts us, in the middle of his darkest moments while chained in the darkness of a prison to,<br /><br />
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Put on then, as God's chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassionate hearts, </div>
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kindness, humility, meekness, and patience, bearing with one another, forgiving</div>
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each other; as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive. And above</div>
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all these put on love, which binds everything together in perfect harmony. And </div>
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let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, to which indeed you were called in one</div>
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body. <i style="font-weight: bold;">And be thankful. </i>Colossians 3:12-15</div>
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Giving thanks is to happen in all things. Why? I'm sure there are many reasons, but the one that seems to be resonating with my heart most deeply is it's a way to remind my heart that God is faithful and good and sovereign when everything else around me feels shaky and uncertain.</div>
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Protecting my heart only hardens me and makes the situations around me more difficult. But pausing and choosing to see the goodness of God, even in the darkest moment, it keeps my heart open and it makes my faith in Jesus stronger.</div>
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So, I start again. Every Monday I'll sneak back here and add to the growing list with no goal, no end number in sight. I'll just keep building a foundation to remind my heart in the trustworthiness of the One Who created me and placed us here.</div>
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1. That sunflower *almost* ready to bloom</div>
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2. The lavender beginning to blossom</div>
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3. Those tomatoes on the vine</div>
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4. The smell of bacon frying on the stove</div>
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5. The way Lyla chooses to watch Anne of Green Gables over and over</div>
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6. Visits on the porch with the dearest of friends</div>
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7. Summer sun and finally, almost, beginning to love it</div>
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8. Hint of Fall in the air</div>
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9. Those 2 books wrapped in ribbon handed to me at church</div>
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10. The sister who holds me accountable</div>
kimberleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12804672126005078796noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-363178727668036801.post-3622463204623288552016-07-26T00:00:00.000-07:002016-07-26T00:00:46.578-07:00To LoveHis sister dropped him off with those two bags filled with his dirty clothes right outside the abandoned house beside us.<br />
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I caught a glimpse of his face, just before I turned back inside the house,</div>
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just before I cleaned out the rest of the clothes from the washing machine.</div>
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He had called Tony and asked if he could do his laundry at Madison House because we were all leaving for camp in the morning, but when the washing machine here in our home is large, and there was already crazy chaos happening, why not just do his laundry here?</div>
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He said yes in his quiet way.</div>
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We've almost been at Madison House 4 years. Not long, I know, but long enough to have memories that are embedded deep - long enough to know that first impressions are rarely correct.</div>
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He scared me, in that first year, and I'm not sure why anymore. I just know at some point, it changed. At some point, he began yelling my name across the street and waving as I would walk by with my little ones up the front steps. At some point the guard came down a little.</div>
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So when he walked in our front door and filled up the washing machine with his things, it didn't feel odd to have him in the house. I know it probably seemed a little odd for him, but he is loved by the people who live here.</div>
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Tony and I, we slipped out for a quick dinner and while we were gone, he must have slipped out too, promising to be back to finish up the wash.</div>
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Only we got home first, and I still had laundry to finish while his last load spun 'round and 'round in the dryer.<br />
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He kept telling me that he could do his own laundry, switch the loads and put it away - but he wasn't here and I stood in my laundry room completely unsure what to do. Not wanting to do the wrong thing, or offend in any way.<br />
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There's a sign just above the washing machine that a friend made for me in Canada that traveled with us here and that just keeps getting hung back up wherever I find myself washing clothes - a reminder of what I'm actually doing when I'm bent over those tubs and filling with soap or changing loads...I'm not sure if he saw it, but the words, "Blessing Room" stop me each time I take the time to read them and so that is why I did what I did.<br />
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Because folding his clothes was no different than folding the clothes of my own children - praying over him as the stacks grew taller was just as natural as praying over the piles for each of my four. One doesn't have to bear the title of "son" to be loved like one. Loving others takes place in the mundane and quiet moments - and sometimes actions are the only way to show the truth of it.<br />
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I had to run home the next morning before we headed out of town and away from wifi for the week to rescue a blanket a certain 3 year old had forgotten, and as I jumped out of my car the first yellow bus drove by and his face looking out at me from near the back windows beamed with a joy I rarely see.<br />
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And I have to ask myself why I am so often afraid to be bold enough to love? A woman who sits regularly under the shade of a tree across the street wanders by our front gate tonight while I sit on the porch reading and as she gets to the end of our property line, she begins to jerk around erratically. By the time she crosses the street, she is having a full on conversation with the air and the man in the blue house sits calmly and watches with his cowboy hat pulled low while he brushes his dog. When she double-backs 20 minutes later, she is calmer, her walking smoother and I keep rocking in my chair.<br />
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And I think, "Water. Why didn't I offer her water?" If I am to love like Jesus, offering water should be a natural thing.<br />
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I don't even know how to pray.<br />
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Neighbourhood kids leave our yard half an hour later and as we are cleaning up the last of the mess, Olivia whispers to Tony and I, "I think the lady in that car is dead".<br />
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Tony's eyes meet mine and he quietly walks out the gate towards the Suzuki that's been parked by our house for the last 2 days. Windows are rolled down, and that's when I see her face, mouth open, eyes closed.<br />
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"She's breathing", Tony calls to me and as everyone heads to the door he leans close and says, "I think you should give her some water".<br />
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And that fear settles in as I walk to the end of the kitchen and pull down that mason jar and fill it with water, as I reach for the biscuits Liv had made for dinner...the ones that were in the shape of a heart.<br />
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And Tony and I, we go to the passenger window and 3 minutes feel like an eternity when you are trying to wake someone up you don't know and as she's jolting awake, she's trying to convince us she's fine, even though we all know she isn't.<br />
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But she takes the water. And she takes the bread baked into a heart.<br />
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And as I mopped up the water spilled on the kitchen floor later, I *know* that could have been me. It could have been me just as easily strung out and asleep in a car with the windows duct tapped together, I know the wickedness of my heart and where I could have followed it to.<br />
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Moving down to 4th Street was nothing heroic or grand on our part - as Tony said this past week at camp, "There's no good or bad parts of town - they are all bad apart from Christ. Our sinfulness is just expressed differently in different ways and places". <br />
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My sinfulness is exposed more here than maybe anywhere else - but the beauty of Christ's grace is that He allows me to see it so much faster and He gives me opportunities to try again in ways that I can easily recognize.<br />
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I picked raspberries in the garden of a dear friend while she was out of town at the beginning of the month and at first, I found it hard to know where to begin. It wasn't until a cat brushed against my legs and I looked down that I found the heaviest and sweetest fruit was hidden under the leaves and branches near the bottom.<br />
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And it's true here...and there...bending low in service, worship, and love - it can be difficult - it can be hard and hurt deeply, but in the quiet, in the Shadow of the Almighty, we can find the sweetest Peace and Joy.<br />
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kimberleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12804672126005078796noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-363178727668036801.post-26374935886624433722016-05-08T22:22:00.000-07:002016-05-08T22:22:43.051-07:00For the Ones Who Call Me MamaI opened my eyes in the morning light of my tenth Mother's Day to find the littlest one had crawled into our bed in the early hours of the night and curled up into the curve of my hip with a sleep-clenched hand resting on my face.<br />
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Lyla, she turned 10 just a few short months ago - went and spun my heart in bewildered circles with how fast time really does go.</div>
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She laughs when I ask her to stop growing, to become small again. </div>
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<b><u><a href="http://kimscorner1.blogspot.com/2006/05/i-should-be-sleeping.html" target="_blank">I look back onto the very first post I ever put on the internet</a></u></b>, the one where she is only 4 months old and still able to be held, all curled up in my arms and my brain can't fathom at how all those fully lived days have become wispy and faint memories. </div>
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Our lives looked so different - he and I were so different.</div>
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We were at the very tender beginning, still wondering how many babies we would have, still figuring out how to relate to one another as husband and wife now that we were also Daddy and Mama.</div>
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Our families, both immediate and extended looked so different - I never could have imagined the great gaps that would be left where people should have been.</div>
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I thought mothering would look like the ideal picture in my mind that had grown large since I was small - </div>
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but that's just it...my picture of mothering was based on my own ideals and dreams.</div>
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There's a little one who pulls up her chair beside me in the tutoring room Monday-Thursday. She always has something left over from lunch, and as she pulls out her sheets of homework, she'll pull out something to nibble on too.</div>
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She has my heart - I'm sure she doesn't realize this,<br />
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her mothering hasn't turned out the way she thought it would either.<br />
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This small one, she had curled up beside her mama just a few short years ago, curled up for a nap in the early afternoon pressed up against the one whose heartbeat she had known since her very beginning...but when she woke up, her mama didn't.<br />
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Medications were unknowingly mixed and turned lethal.<br />
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And this daughter was left without a mother.<br />
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She came in one afternoon a few months ago and plopped her backpack right beside my feet. Started pulling out her homework and as she laid it on the table, she turned her eyes on me and asked,<br />
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<i>Can I call you Mom?</i><br />
<i><br /></i>
<i><br /></i>
My own four had been running in and out of the room, homework done and freedom calling and shouting my name over every little thing.<br />
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The juxtaposition of both situations made my breath catch.<br />
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When was the last time she had even said the word, <i>Mom</i>? And here were my children yelling it freely and without thought.<br />
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I wrapped my arm around her and told her how much I loved her - how much I wished that she could. I told her how everyday I looked forward to her showing up, how my day was that much brighter when she came around the corner and sat down beside me.<br />
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I told her that I could never be her mama, but that I could always be her friend.<br />
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It made me think of my own family, my own small four - how where there has been lack, God has always been so faithful to provide.<br />
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It may not look like what I imagined and dreamed about all of those years ago, before there was Tony and the life that we've made...but we have never lacked love.<br />
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A decade into this journey where all four of my children are under my roof and I don't know what the future will look like for all of us.<br />
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I know what my dreams and my hopes are for each one -<br />
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I know that I hope they will always love and follow Jesus, that their faith will be strong and grow...<br />
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that, should they become mamas and a daddy themselves, that their marriages will be ones that are grounded in the beauty of the gospel...their love for the other would be deep and faithful and lasting.<br />
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That the faith that we are sharing with them now would be passed on to the next generation of grands that we don't yet know.<br />
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I can hope these things and pray for these things,<br />
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but I can't guarantee it. <br />
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The world around me, with all of it's statistics and foreboding predictions would have me believe that hoping for good is foolish, to prepare for the worst instead.<br />
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But just when I begin to worry, just when I begin to think that maybe the darkness will win out in the end over my children, I am reminded of the verse that begins the recounting of those before me who had faith and hope in the sovereignty of God alone:<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-style: italic;">Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.</span></div>
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<span style="font-style: italic;">Hebrews 11:1</span></div>
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<span style="font-style: italic;"><br /></span></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
The further in to the chapter one gets, the more it becomes apparent that faith *doesn't* guarantee all we hope for and dream about...the final verses of the chapter talk about their successes and victories, yes, but just as quickly we read about mocking, flogging, imprisonment, torture...</div>
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What I need to be reminded is that hope should lift our eyes off of ourselves and what is right in front of us and cause us to realize that what, or really, <i>Who </i>we are hoping and longing for is Jesus. What pushed all of these men and women listed in the 11th chapter of Hebrews to remain faithful to God? <br />
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It was the promise of Christ.</div>
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My heart that loves my children fiercely is slowly learning to see their hardship and struggle in a different light. </div>
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Learning that when my heart breaks over their pain, that this is a tender mercy as well. That here, when everything feels like it is falling apart around them, that Jesus is showing Himself to be all that they need. That He is greater than this moment, this temporal pain...and He is even greater than the joy that threatens to overwhelm.</div>
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So, for the ones who made me a Mama,</div>
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May you know how deeply you are loved, despite my daily failings and fumblings.</div>
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May we enter into these days together firstly and fully recognizing that <i>this is the day that the Lord has made, let us rejoice and be glad in it!</i></div>
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<i><br /></i></div>
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May you be bold and courageous when others are mean and unkind <em>and</em> when you hear gun shots across the street, because sweet ones, <i>the Lord your God is with you wherever you go.</i></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<i><br /></i></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
May you face the future with hope and joy regardless of what the outside circumstances are, because in Christ, <i>God always leads us in triumph.</i></div>
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<i><br /></i></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
The four of you are the joy of my heart, even on the days when I feel so overwhelmed...over and over you point me back to the feet of Jesus and make me see my deep need for Him and feel such deep love for each one of you.</div>
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As we press into each other learning from and growing through the good and bad, may we be found pressing into Christ together, <i>for He is our refuge and our strength.</i></div>
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<i><br /></i></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
With all of my love, always,</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
Mama<br />
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kimberleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12804672126005078796noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-363178727668036801.post-58247336538030347672016-04-03T23:48:00.000-07:002016-04-03T23:48:20.633-07:00For When it All Breaks OutwardThe list of names is growing in the back of my Bible.<br />
<br />
Even though our rooms are overflowing and it seems at times there are more kids than any of us as staff can handle together, there are faces that you come to expect each day - smiles and voices that you suddenly realize haven't been seen or heard by anyone for a few days.<br />
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When a couple of weeks pass, I pull out my pen and slowly write each name under the one above it.<br />
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There is a mama and her family here in town who loves strong...who is strong. I know the secret of her strength, because I know Him too, and she opens her heart and her home to kids who need somewhere safe and there have been some kids that we have known who have ended up under her roof and her care - who have been enveloped in peace and the love of Jesus the moment they have walked through her door.<br />
<br />
She has a list too.<br />
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I've seen the growing expanse of it when I pick up my kids from their Friday mornings with her, their names painted up on the walls of her home - I've seen the names I recognize and I know that they have been loved deeply here and I am grateful for all the ways God crosses paths. Grateful for the ones in this community who have said "yes" to the uncomfortable and the awkward. "Yes" to the hard and the heartbreaking. "Yes" to the loving and the praying and the entrusting, not only of these children they don't know, but the entrusting of their own children into the Hands and ways of a good God Who asks us to love like He does.<br />
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The last couple of weeks have been difficult - I think I can write that down here.<br />
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Feeling as though I'm fraying on the edges, I've only wanted to hide out in my home. We've been sick, off and on, and I've been thankful. Thankful for the moments that meant I could curl up with my littlest and let her sleep on me on the couch. Thankful for vomit and sore throats and fevers and all of the extra snuggling that meant. Thankful for the volunteers who took one look at me after a bout of food poisoning and sent *me* home, telling me they had everything under control.<br />
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When the edges are raw, I want to retreat, and for about a week I could.<br />
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But the next week pressed in harder and by the time this past Friday finally came, I thought we were all going to collapse.<br />
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Spring bursts onto the scene, but so does violence in this place we find ourselves. A double murder happens just down the road a ways, police presence is thick. We hear yelling and screaming and gun shots and I see the color red everywhere - caps, shirts, shoes, shorts - and I find myself double checking our own attire before we head out for the day; the red bag I take with me to work gets replaced by a gifted brown backpack.<br />
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The overthinking everything rounds my shoulders in weariness.<br />
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<br />
I don't remember ever reading anywhere how lonely ministry can be. Surrounded by many, pressed in on all sides by children desperate to be seen, but it can still be so lonely.<br />
<br />
I see it in my own children when we venture out past the inner city - their struggle to find where they fit.<br />
<br />
They see and hear things that are much different here. My oldest daughter leans against me one evening last week, sobbing because of the horrors that her friends right here experience and bravely share with her tender heart...how do you voice that <i>outside</i> of the inner city to your peers? I watch my children flail at times, trying to get their footing...and it breaks my heart. I <i>know</i> that God is using this, <b><a href="https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Ephesians+2%3A8-10&version=NIV" target="_blank">that this is part of His plan for their lives for the good works He has planned for them,</a></b> but I don't know how to help them through these moments where they feel like misfits - like the odd one out.<br />
<br />
But isn't this a feeling common to everyone?<br />
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It's just worn differently, depending on who and where you are.<br />
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Sure, it's easy to see in a Red or Blue shirt, in the woman strung out on drugs, on that man who walks by our house, desperate to get rid of his demons by trying to drown them in the alcohol in that bottle he carries around.<br />
<br />
<br />
I wear my glasses.<br />
<br />
Now, there are times I wear them because I genuinely need to - contacts aren't as comfortable anymore, no matter how many brands I try,<br />
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but there are days when I put my glasses on to put a wall up between me and the world outside. As though that one small barrier will make my smile stronger.<br />
<br />
<br />
Because things are easier to carry around, to wear. Being bold and vulnerable and saying to the person across from you that you are a mess is just...well...<br />
<br />
messy.<br />
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<br />
And who has time to be bothered anymore?<br />
<br />
<br />
Everyone is running around like the world is on fire, because it feels as though it actually is.<br />
<br />
<br />
And our alone-ness feels as though it is going to consume us and it's so much easier to just play one more round of the newest game on the newest app on your phone.<br />
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But the hiding it just hardens us...<br />
<br />
at least, it hardens me.<br />
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The kids all went fishing this past weekend at a local Kid Fish event put on a by a number of people who go to our church. Madison House packed over 40 kids into a couple of vans and they reeled in a good number of trout.<br />
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I opened the door to a little boy who proudly carried the fish my girls caught in Ziploc bags right up into my home. Marched across the threshold and through the school room and up to the kitchen counter and <i>plopped</i> them down on the counter.<br />
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Plopped them so hard the bag burst open and fish...juice...went everywhere.<br />
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I sighed.<br />
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Loudly.<br />
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And I watched his face fall.<br />
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I still want to cry over it all - not the spilled and watery fish liquid, but over how I reacted. I love this kid like he is part of our family. I love how brave he was and how comfortable he is just to walk right in my door...but in the trying to hold it all together, I became brittle and it took absolutely nothing at all to break me into shards.<br />
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Our shards always break outward, hurting those closest to us.<br />
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It doesn't seem to matter how deeply I know this, I always seem to forget when I am most weary.<br />
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There's a portion of verses in Exodus, when the Hebrew slaves are groaning over their burdens in the heat of Egypt, that always jumps out at me - seems to come to my mind most when I feel most alone, and it's simply this:<br />
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<span class="text Exod-2-24" id="en-ESV-1579" style="-webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased; background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Verdana, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 24px;">And <span class="crossreference" data-cr="#cen-ESV-1579A" data-link="(<a href="#cen-ESV-1579A" title="See cross-reference A">A</a>)" style="box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 0.625em; line-height: 22px; position: relative; top: 0px; vertical-align: top;"></span>God heard their groaning, and God <span class="crossreference" data-cr="#cen-ESV-1579B" data-link="(<a href="#cen-ESV-1579B" title="See cross-reference B">B</a>)" style="box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 0.625em; line-height: 22px; position: relative; top: 0px; vertical-align: top;"></span>remembered his covenant with <span class="crossreference" data-cr="#cen-ESV-1579C" data-link="(<a href="#cen-ESV-1579C" title="See cross-reference C">C</a>)" style="box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 0.625em; line-height: 22px; position: relative; top: 0px; vertical-align: top;"></span>Abraham, with Isaac, and with Jacob. </span><span class="text Exod-2-25" id="en-ESV-1580" style="-webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased; background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Verdana, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 24px;">God <span class="crossreference" data-cr="#cen-ESV-1580D" data-link="(<a href="#cen-ESV-1580D" title="See cross-reference D">D</a>)" style="box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 0.625em; line-height: 22px; position: relative; top: 0px; vertical-align: top;"></span>saw the people of Israel—and God <span class="crossreference" data-cr="#cen-ESV-1580E" data-link="(<a href="#cen-ESV-1580E" title="See cross-reference E">E</a>)" style="box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 0.625em; line-height: 22px; position: relative; top: 0px; vertical-align: top;"></span>knew. </span></div>
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<span class="text Exod-2-25" style="-webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased; background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Verdana, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 24px;">Exodus 2:24-25</span></div>
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I think to that page in the back of my Bible, of the wall of my friend - both marked by the names of the faces who have touched out hearts, no matter how briefly we have known them. We write them down because they have worth - these children matter, their souls bear the very image of the God Who created them.<br />
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Their names are written down, because they are seen and known - not just by me...not just by her - they are known by Jesus and should I ever be given the opportunity to sit down with one of these children who came by everyday and then just didn't - I want to be able to pull out my Bible and show them this - show them that they have never been forgotten; they have been prayed over and loved still, no matter how much time has passed.<br />
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The One Who is Most High and Almighty, He sees you and me. He sees each one that feels most alone and forgotten - the one who feels like the misfit and outside of everything. But He doesn't just see - He <i>knows</i> - and in the knowing, He came near...He<i> is</i> near.<br />
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Monday is less than an hour away and a new week will begin. Madison House will be open and who knows how many children will press in close and yell and push to be seen.<br />
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My edges, they still feel a tad raw, a bit frayed. I'll admit here that I feel a bit of a mess.<br />
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But it's the raw and frayed edges that open my eyes to the beauty of Jesus. In Him I'm not alone and when I press into that, I can point the other raw and frayed ones to His love that took on our grief and our sorrows, our pain and our sickness. <b><a href="https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Isaiah+49%3A13-23&version=NIV" target="_blank">The One Who wears our names in the scars on His Hands.</a></b><br />
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There isn't a pen in the world that can beat that.<br />
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<br />kimberleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12804672126005078796noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-363178727668036801.post-19058313067177621452016-03-20T20:43:00.001-07:002016-03-20T20:43:45.537-07:00For When it isn't Enough {A post by Tony}<span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;">People often ask me what the worst part of this job is. </span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;"><br /></span>
<span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;">Contrary to popular belief it's not gunfire at all hours of the day and night, physical violence, constant lies, all our things that have gone missing, lice, broken promises, mice or a myriad of other things to choose from.</span><br />
<br style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;">Jesus said (Mathew 10:22) that we would be hated for His namesake; that sending us out would be no easy task. </span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;">Great, I know all that, I know what I signed on for. I told the committee during my interview four years ago that I would never work in an office again. </span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;">I did that job; where I answered to only the president of the college and had 12 departments under me. </span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;">Boring. </span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;"> 60k a year, nice car, top level corner office, cheap college housing and good health care, boring, boring, and boring. </span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;">I'm never going back.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;"><br /></span>
<span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;"><br /></span>
<br style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;">So what is the worst part of this job? What did I miss when I signed up? </span><br />
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<br style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;">She's only ten years old, maybe 11. She's dragging her family behind her. A brother,6 and a sister, 4 - about the age of my three oldest children. They heard about the Madison House at school and came to check it out. After a couple of weeks they decide they like it and stay. </span><br />
<br style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;">She's a nice girl, really shy but she's tough too, and funny. Being the oldest she is responsible for little brother and sister and she does a good job. </span><br />
<br style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;">She loves to play pool and every day she asks me to play a game with her. We talk and I learn that she doesn't have a mother, there's a father but he seems in and out of the picture. <i> </i></span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;">"He's gone," she says.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;"> We are playing pool and I look up from my shot, "Who's gone?" </span><br />
<br style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;">"My dad." </span><br />
<br style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;">"Where did he go?" I ask. </span><br />
<br style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;">"I don't know. He said he was going to the store and he never came back." </span><br />
<br style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;">"Ok...how long has he been gone?"</span><br />
<br style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;">"He left on Friday." It's Tuesday. </span><br />
<br style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;">"Well who's taking care of you?" </span><br />
<br style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;">"Grandma." </span><br />
<br style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;">"Oh, ok,"</span><br />
<br style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;">I ask more questions about gangs or drugs, trying to find out details but she adroitly dodges all my questions from that point on. She's said all she's going to. </span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;"><br /></span>
<br style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;">A week goes by, we are playing pool again. </span><br />
<br style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;">"He came back." </span><br />
<br style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;">"Oh good, when?"</span><br />
<br style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;">She shrugs, "a couple of days ago."</span><br />
<br style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;">"Great," I say, "right?"</span><br />
<br style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;">"I guess so." </span><br />
<br style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;">"Did he tell you were he went?"</span><br />
<br style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;">"No." </span><br />
<br style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;">Weeks go by and Christmas approaches; we've been doing all we can as a staff to help her family in particular.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;">No mother, no father most of the time. We give them extra food after dinner to take home, rides to church and tell them how much we care and are praying for them.</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;"> </span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;">It's a week before Christmas and there's a third day in a row of snowfall. All the kids badly need gloves and I've given out all I have. </span><br />
<br style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;">"Tony, do you have any gloves?"</span><br />
<br style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;">"No," I say "I'm all out." </span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;">We gave them all away, 100 pairs, maybe more. </span><br />
<br style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;">"Ok," she says, clearly sad and looking at her red chapped hands. </span><br />
<br style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;">She starts to walk away and I feel a pang of guilt. </span><br />
<br style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;">"Wait," I say calling her back, "take my gloves, they might be a little big but you can have them, I can always get more gloves." </span><br />
<br style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;">She yanks them on, runs off down the hall. </span><br />
<br style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;">That is the last time I see her, a smile on her face, headed outside with floppy, oversized gloves. </span><br />
<br style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;">She never shows up for the Madison House party, or the Chistmas Party. </span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;"> </span><br style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;">None of the kids she attends school with have any idea where she is or where she went, they just keep telling us, "one day she just didn't come to school." </span><br />
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<br style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;">We've driven her home enough times that I know where she lives so finally 2 weeks into January I drop by the house and knock on the door. </span><br />
<br style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;">A lady, mid twenties, answers the door. I've never seen her before and she's never seen me. She says she's a cousin but she has no idea where the three kids have gone and clearly and understandably doesn't trust me, a perfect stranger. </span><br />
<br style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;">"Oregon maybe?" She finally offers in an effort to get me off the porch. </span><br />
<br style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;">I climb back into my car and head to Madison House filled more with sorrow than frustration. Wherever she is at least she has warm gloves. </span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;"><br /></span>
<br style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;">It's late February and my 8 year old daughter is holding something dirty, heading toward me. </span><br />
<br style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;">"Hey dad," she yells as she gets closer, "isn't this your glove?" </span><br />
<br style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;">"We found it under the last snow pile outside, do you want it?"</span><br />
<br style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;">"No, just throw it in the garbage." </span><br />
<br style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;">This daughter is most like me and she immediately senses something is wrong and asks, "Are you proud of me for finding your glove dad?"</span><br />
<br style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;">"Oh yes," I put my hand on her shoulder realizing my tone and body language have given her the wrong impression. "You did a great job bringing it to me, but I bought another pair so I don't need the old ones anymore." </span><br />
<br style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;">She skips off happily to the garbage. </span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;">I will see her again. </span><br />
<br style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;">That's what drives me crazy. </span><br />
<br style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;">I know kids are sold into sex slavery, I know they move from house to house, town to town. I know they are used as look outs and drug runners. I know they are abused in every way imaginable. We call CPS about something and they tell us, "We've already been to that house 3 times in the last year, there's nothing more we can do." This is just one story where kids disappear and we never see them again. It kills me more each time.</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;"> </span><br style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;">People will tell you that whatever I wanted to do, I could always do it:</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;"> </span><br style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;">Played on my state football all star team in high school, worked three jobs and paid my way through college, always made it to management level of every job in less than a year, </span><br />
<br style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;">Started a band in Seattle, made top seller of the year in my region for Starbucks, Director of operations at a college.</span><br />
<br style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;">But I'm down here, living across the street from Madison House and I feel completely helpless. I open up the field and building on weekends, I give away my own money and things constantly. I have endless conversations about fundraising and volunteer work. </span><br />
<br style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;">There's nothing more I can do. </span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;"> It isn't enough. </span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19.5px;">I have perfect peace that God is in control but it doesn't take away the loss and pain. It hurts and sometimes it overwhelms me to the point that all I can do is weep. </span>kimberleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12804672126005078796noreply@blogger.com