his name is phil.

my pastor from college rocks.

i mean, really. he packs a punch. every message. every week. so much so that i still listen to his messages even though i'm at a church in maryland and he's moved to a church way down in florida.

today (while driving across the great state of . . . illinois, i think) i listened to a solid message on phillipians 3:9.
check it out on www.pinewoodpca.org
the message from march 19th.

do yourself a favor and listen. be encouraged.

But whatever things were gain to me, those things I have counted as loss for the sake of Christ. More than that, I count all things to be loss in view of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them but rubbish so that I may gain Christ, and may be found in Him, not having a righteousness of my own derived from the Law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which comes from God on the basis of faith, that I may know Him and the power of His resurrection and the fellowship of His sufferings, being conformed to His death; in order that I may attain to the resurrection from the dead.
phillipians 3

drove 574 miles today.

thru 4 states.

(can you guess which ones?)

yeah. that's what i'm talkin about.

rock on meadows family.

CURRENTLY:
columbia, mo (right in the middle of the state)

here's our route across the states:

CURRENTLY:

right across the west virginia/kentucky line,

between huntington, wv and grayson, ky.

partial lyrics from a song i was listening to on the drive tonight.

really hit home with me.

any control I thought I had just slips right through my hands

while my ever-present conscience shakes its head and reprimands me

reprimands me

then and thereI confess

I'll blame all this on my selfishness

yet you love me

and that consumes me

and I'll stand up again

and do so willingly

You give me hope, and hope it gives me life

you touch my heavy heart, and when you do you make it light

as I exhale I hear your voice

and I answer you, though I heardly make a noise

and from my lips the words I choose to say

seem pathetic, but it's fallen man's praise

because I love you

oh God, I love you

and life is now worth living

if only because of you

when i go down, relient k

all of my family's belongings fit into a 53-foot long space.

i know this because at midnight last night i watched a moving van of that size pull away from our house in virginia. with all of our stuff.

---------------------------
mom and i sat on the porch and watched them finish packing the van. she held my hand, still comforting me from the mini-breakdown that i had after walking thru and feeling (not just seeing) the emptiness of each room. it's interesting how even without furniture there i could still picture the rooms just as they should be. last night was the first set of tears.

----------------------------
this morning i woke up in our empty living room floor. mom, dad and i spent the night there last night instead of getting a hotel room. it certainly wasn't the best night's sleep i've gotten, but i wouldn't have wanted it any other way. it was the last night i had to be in that house.

----------------------------
in some ways today has seemed somewhat normal. dad was awake first and busy doing things when mom and i got up. we sat around the breakfast table with carla and marisa (our neighbors of 13 years) talking about typical life stuff and listening to marisa play her recital peice on the piano. i sat out on the back deck for awhile with the cat. i swept the floor.

but doing a few "normal" things doesn't make the day itself normal. such was the case today.

----------------------------
i am currently sitting in a hotel right across the kentucky state line. my family (including the cat) has spent all day packing up the last remains of our home in virginia and setting out for the west . . . golden, colorado to be exact.

i have decided i will use this lovely little internet creation that we call a blog to keep everyone updated on the events of our trip. as those of you know who read my blog, i rarely post daily events, but rather ideas, musings, mad squirrel disease thoughts. the next week and a half will be a mixture of the two. take it for what you will.

i leave you tonight with a verse that i thought of as we were driving thru the beautiful mountains of virginia and west virginia today:

You will go out in joy
and be led forth in peace;
the mountains and hills
will burst into song before you,
and all the trees of the field
will clap their hands.
isaiah 55
(read the whole chapter for even greater encouragement)

from the pulpit.

"a loss of silence is as serious as a loss of memory . . .
and just as disorienting."

--john render, quoting someone else

(sorry, i didn't catch the reference)

\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\

///////////////////////////////////////////////////////

\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\

"be still"

surrender

drop your hands to your side

cease striving

"and know that i am God."

psalm 46:10

more on light . . .

i want you to get a mental picture. or even maybe do this. that's right, try it out.

turn off all the lights in your bedroom, walk out of it and close the door behind you. turn on a light in whatever hallway you are in. ok, you're set. you are standing in the lighted hallway. now, open the door to your room.

yeah, so that's the whole game. but what i want you to watch as you do it is the light. not the actual lightbulb, but the light itself. how it moves. what happens with the light when you open your bedroom door?

God used this very basic "natural order of things" picture to teach me something about himself (and consequently, about myself) a couple of years ago. it was as simple as me walking into a room and thinking, "interesting . . . the light always spills over into the darkness. the dark room always gets lighter, not vice versa."

have you ever thought about that? if nature were different, darkness could spill over into light. but it doesn't. the light is stronger than the dark. more potent, if you will. the light always beats out the dark. always.

that should give us an amazing strength of spirit in considering the following truth:

"you are the light of the world."

when light is introduced, darkness disappears.

there is power in light. there is power in the Light.

darkness is cold.

i was thinking tonight about the verses in Scripture that talk to us about being lights. about how we are to shine in the darkness.

and i guess when i read that, i always think about the light part. how it shine like stars. how it engulfs the darkness. how it provides the ability to see things clearly. how it offers warmth.

but then there's the darkness. the thing that surrounds the light. the thing that makes a need for the light. it's around us all the time.

i know this about darkness.
but tonight i felt the darkness. and it was cold. and heavy.

there is a weight to the darkness of this world. to the Lord, i suppose that weightiness is ever present. it is a constant stabbing in his heart. but for me, i don't always feel it's bite. i suppose because i live surrounded by it so much that after awhile it just seems "normal". like i get so used to being in it that it no longer seems like it's in such opposition to me.

but it is.

and tonight i felt the difference between light and darkness. the war that they fight. the stark difference in how they move. how they feel.

sometimes the darkness around me is so heavy that it makes my light feel like nothing more than a flicker.

but at least there is a flicker. all glory to Him.

"But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people belonging to God, that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light." --1 peter 2:9

reflections from am

i read the following this weekend. it's quoted in a book called story by steven james; the original source is soren kierkegaard's provocations:

"The difference between an admirer and a follower still remains, no matter where you are. The admirer never makes any true sacrifices. He always plays it safe. Though in words, phrases, songs, he is inexhaustible about how highly he prizes Christ, he renounces nothing, gives up nothing, will not reconstruct his life, will not be what he admires, and will not let his life express what it is he supposedly admires."

what powerful words. i wanted to write something about this . . . about how it convicts my soul. but then i remembered an email that my friend annmarie ("am") sent me regarding this same quote (she read the book a month ago). her words are honest and right on. and are much of what i felt when i sat and thought about this. so instead of me, you get to hear from her today:

"Wow...will i allow my heart to be convicted by such frank words. I sit here and think of all the talking i do about this life i want to live, these sacrifices i want to make, the places i want to be, the Christ i want to share with the world...yet here i stand in the same boat, holding the same net, contemplating what i should do next...throw the net again and try to keep this same old life working the best i can, or jump out of the boat, swim my way to shore and take hold of the hand that promises to lead me to a life of more blessing than i can imagine! Seems like it would be such an easy decision to make, yet I feel like so many times I have have heard the words of the Lord saying “Follow me” and as I have hesitated to reply he keeps moving on to invite some others.

I have been reading this verse in 1John 3:18-20 “Let us not love with words or tongue but with actions and in truth. This then is how we set our hearts at rest in his presence, whenever our hearts condemn us. For God is greater than our hearts, and he knows everything.” He knows my struggles, he knows of my hesitation related to my fears, my pride, my self absorption, he knows that I condemn myself as a result of those things… yet he says there is only one thing that is going to lay all of that to rest and bring me into his merciful presence and that is to drop our nets and pick up our cross to follow him. “In the same way, any of you who does not give up everything he has cannot be my disciple.” Luke 14:33 . . .

Steven James envisions Jesus asking the question, “So what do you say? Will you follow me, or just keep admiring me?” But I truly don’t think that we can even begin to admire this sweet Savior unless we can look into his precious face…and yet if we don’t walk with him at his invitation, all we will see as we stay there in the boat will be the back of his head as he turns and walks away! Let us not admire from afar, but let us get close enough to touch and marvel at the face of Christ…he will be there in all that we do in the power of his name!"

--april 12, 2006

admirer or follower . . . which will i be? which will you be?

for marie

"are you ready for heaven?" i asked softly.

(it was an awkward question . . . or maybe just an awkward moment . . . looking at someone who is near death and talking with them about what will likely soon be.)

she slowly, but deliberatley, nodded yes.

(it was the first answer to a question that i had gotten all morning.)

i smiled. and happy tears welled up in my eyes. i don't think that she noticed. i don't think any actually spilled out onto my cheek . . . they just sat there in my eyes, blurring my vision of this beautiful woman that lay before me.

i sat there a bit longer, at times talking with her, at times talking to her, at times just looking at her, moistening her lips with vasoline, wetting her mouth that was so dry from lack of fluids, stroking her hair, holding her hand.

-------------------------------------

i sat down by the lake for a long while, reading Scripture and contemplating the fate of my friend. the air was crisp from the breeze that came now and then, but the sun made it warm enough that you knew it was springtime. all the flowers were out, the dogwoods white with bloom. there were geese near the water's edge and every once in awhile i'd here the scurry of a squirrel in the grass behind me. i sat there for a long time. in the middle of spring happening all around me. in the midst of life. in the midst of new life.

-------------------------------------

there was a long set of windows in her room. everyday when i would visit, i walked over to the windows and looked out into a lovely little courtyard . . . and past the courtyard to the lake on which the hospital is situated. the lake where i sat a few days earlier. it struck me one day how that wall of windows seemed to be a very distinctive divider between that room of death and a world of life.

-------------------------------------

i have spent a good deal of time thinking, contemplating, questioning, reading . . . for many days i had a deep uneasiness, and a great sadness about my friend. i cried sad tears over the impending loss of her. but then one day it hit me . . .

i was focusing too much on the external. was it ok to be grieving her loss? absolutely. but what does Jesus tell us he looks at? what does he tell us matters? not the external, but the internal. not the body, but the soul.

i was looking at my sweet friend's body deteriorate, day by day, little by little. i was watching her eyes get dimmer, her breathing get heavier, her responsiveness grow less. but all of that was simply her body. what was going on with her soul?

i don't claim to know what happens to a person's soul as they are dying . . . at least in the days that lead up to death. but i know the end result for my friend. and i'd like to think that in those final days her soul was inching closer and closer to the gates. closer and closer to Him. that while her responsiveness to this world was growing less and less, her soul's responsiveness to heaven was growing greater and greater . . . that she was continually feeling more peace, more warmth, more excitement, more rest about where she was going.

i was seeing the death; but at the same time she was drawing nearer to Life.

------------------------------------

today was her day of arrival. today was the day of homecoming. she had told me a week ago that she was ready. and today she got to go.

"And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, "Now the dwelling of God is with men, and he will live with them. They will be his people, and God himself will be with them and be their God. He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away."

He who was seated on the throne said, "I am making everything new!"

from my reading today:

For you were called to freedom, brothers. Only do not use your freedom as an opportunity for the flesh, but through love serve one another.

For the whole law is fulfilled in one word:

"You shall love your neighbor as yourself."

galatians 5:13-14

an addition to 'whys and hows' . . .

i was thinking more about the why and how questions. and i came up with another question:

why do we question things so much?

and then it hit me. a long time ago, way back in the beginning, i suppose humans (adam and eve, really) didn't question things. things simply were. the relationship that they had with the Creator was such that there was no reason for them to question anything for everything that they needed was provided . . . they had NO NEED - physically or spiritually. their perfect relationship with God and the perfect world in which they lived left nothing to be questioned. i suppose the questions only came when sin came. when the relationship was wrecked, when the balance was disrupted.

in a way, sin, at least for a lot of the big "adult" why questions, is both the cause for them and the answer to them:

why does sickness and death strike people that we love so strongly and suddenly?
why do we humans hurt each other so much?
why is it that God seems so far off sometimes?

does this make any sense?

it seems to me that
the reason that we question is because we were created to understand.

does this seem way off? i'm really just thinking out loud on this one . . .

whys and hows

it's the "why" questions that are the hardest.

i must have learned this at an early age. we all do, i suppose. seems that all kids go thru that phase where they ask a question, they get an answer and then the immediate next thought is "but why?" and then the answer to that question is followed with, "but why?" and so forth and so on until the answerer is exhausted and out of answers.

why do lightning bugs light up?
why can't i hit my brother if he hits me first?
why do i have to go to school?
why was that girl mean to me?

seems our hearts, even when we are little, long to know the "why" of things.

only when we get older, or why questions become a little deeper . . . a little more involved . . .

why does sickness and death strike people that we love so strongly and suddenly?
why do we humans hurt each other so much?
why is it that God seems so far off sometimes?
why am i the way i am?
why is it that people have such a hard time agreeing on things?

and somehow, even if the more involved "why" questions are answered, often times they only lead into the more complicated "how" questions . . .

how are we to deal with grief and pain?
how do we find peace and forgiveness and love for people that have hurt us?
how do we have a relationship with God?
how do we become the people we were intended to be?
how do we know which "truths" and really the Truth?

in these questioning moments (which life is overwhelmingly full of) it seems my belief in God - in Yawheh, the only true God - is clutch.

because as much as i search the history books or the 6 o' clock news or the internet, the answers are not there. not even science or common sense or philsophers or my parents can give me all the answers to all the "why" questions. and none of those give me effective answers to the "how" questions either.

but then i search the Scriptures. and i see Him. God shows up and speaks of our condition as humans, of my particular struggles and of Himself. and He gives answers. not always the answers that i thought i wanted, or to the fullness i wanted, or in a way that i completely understand, but answers nonetheless. sometimes the answer can simply be, "I have brought this about. and it is good. because I am Good. so trust it. trust Me."

and if i don't always get it . . . if i don't always like the answer, i am forced to remember that i am not God. and that i'm not always going to get it. His understanding if so far superior to mine that it is astounding. and He may not ever tell me the answer fully or so that i can grasp the reasoning.

but i read - and so believe - that He is Creator, Life-Giver, Sustainer. that He is Love and Truth and Justice. and i look further into the story to see all of that lived out in a man named Jesus. and i get trust-evoking answers to the why questions. and effective, life-changing answers to the how questions.

He is enough to handle all of the questions. all of the whys and the hows.

"i think there is a reason bedtime stories always end with 'happily ever after.' once everything is happy and there's no struggle, then there's no more story to tell. we don't want to hear about happiness and peace unless the story also includes freedom and discovery. without discovery all you have is monotony. without freedom, utopia isn't paradise after all.

it's just hell in a fancy prom dress."

-steven james, story

courage

talked to my mom tonight. she was in a hotel room in denver. waiting for my dad to get out of his business meeting.

my dad travels out to denver frequently. they have a big office out there. he's the boss-man so he has to go out there. but this time my mom went.

they are house-hunting. after years of fighting it, my mom has finally agreed to go. so my parents are moving. to denver. all the way across the u.s. i can hardly believe it.

as i talked to her tonight and was thinking about it later, i realized something. another "realization of emotion" similar to my "happiness" epiphany today . . .

i am proud of my parents.

"strange," i thought. "isn't it supposed to be the parents being proud of their kids?"

but i am indeed proud of my parents.

for thirteen years they have lived in the same house. they have lived next to the same neighbors (on both sides, i might add) for 13 years. they have seen their three kids thru middle school, high school and college in that house. they have gone from a full house to an empty nest there. they have re-modeled every room in the house at least once. my dad has driven 1-95 up and back to d.c. every day. they have watched our town change from lots of green fields to lots of strip malls and restaurants and wal-marts. they have developed close friendships over the years.

they are established. and now they are leaving.

and i am proud of my parents because they are courageous. it takes courage to look at a house that you have spent years making into your home and give it away to someone else. it takes courage to take on the daunting task of packing up, throwing out or giving away what the nooks and crannies of a house have accumulated over 13 years. it takes courage to leave everything that you know, everyone you know (even your three kids) and move across the country. it takes courage to step out of the comfortable and known into newness that can be intimidating and lonely.

i admire this courage in them. probably because i want so much for me to be that way too. to be courageous.

i am both proud of my parents and so excited for them. i found myself smiling as my mom (who is NOT a city person) told me how she's spent her day running around downtown denver, learning how to use the public transit system, offering up a bagel and jelly to a homeless woman who was nursing a cup of coffee in the diner where she had breakfast, looking at homes that are only 5 mins away from where my dad will work so he will no longer have a 1-3 hour commute each way every day, wishing that i were there with her because "sarah, you would fit so well here."

my parents are moving to denver. exciting.

sitting and happiness

do you ever just sit? not sit and read. not sit and listen to music. not sit and watch t.v.

just sit.

i accidently went to volleyball an hour early tonight. so i had an hour to kill. and i found myself just sitting. in the dugout of an empty baseball field. on the cold metal bench. watching the sunset.

and as i was sitting, i had this thought some over me. "i am happy."

so i sat a little longer just kinda mulling that over in my head. it's kind of a funny realization to come to, you know. the realization of such a basic emotion. it's almost as if i had been standing out in the rain for 10 minutes and all of a sudden realized, "hey, i'm getting wet." like i should have noticed it a long time ago.

so then i thought, "well, why am i happy?" and a million things started flooding my mind. and i started listing them. here's part of the list.

i'm happy to be sitting on a cold, metal bench watching the sunset.
i'm happy to know the God that created the sun and moves it across the sky every day.
i'm happy that no one in the world knows where i am right now except God.
i'm happy to have seen steph and faith tonight.
i'm happy for the 4 new c.d.s i got in the mail.
i'm happy that God has given certain people the ability to make words and music go well together; to express feeling and thoughts and ideas that i can't so poetically put words to.
i'm happy kyrie intoduced me to k.t. tunstall.
i'm happy the the book i ordered came in.
i'm happy that i had a relatively easy day at work.
i'm happy i got to take a walk with 2 of my co-workers at lunch.
i'm happy that God has blessed me with a mind capable of doing what i do.
i'm happy that i love what i do.
i'm happy for grace for the many times i think of myself rather than my God and others.
i'm happy to know the God who is Love - and to know that He changes me into a person of love.
i'm happy about getting to take pictures for my friends this saturday while they play volleyball.
i'm happy that God is too mysterious for me to fully understand.
i'm happy that He is also bigger than my doubts; that He can handle them.
i'm happy to have talked with my mom tonight.
i'm happy because the girls in my small group bless me more than i could ever bless them.
i'm happy because i've finally realized that it's the Holy Spirit's job to change a person's heart, not mine.
i'm happy that the word of God speaks for itself.
i'm happy that it's getting warm outside.
i'm happy that i accidently went to volleyball an hour early.


so, yeah . . . i realized tonight that i am happy. all because i took the time to sit.

great song . . .

it haunts me so
this gloomy weight
that comes and goes
without a trace
a thousand times my flesh embrace
a thousand more, but if for grace

to see the Lord, the promise land
wherein all sin's pearly gates look bland
and what was once a pearl, now sand
that blows away, that blows away
in light of Him

when battle lines become unclear
and the waging war is all I hear
Lord, sustain me with Your voice
and the choice to walk in truth

to see the Lord, the promised land
wherein all sin's pearly gates look bland
and what was once a pearl, now sand
that blows away, that blows away
in light of Him

that I might see this day
this waging war might go away
and be no more
that I might see His face
and hear Him say
son, welcome home
the war is over

to see the Lord, the promised land
wherein all sin's pearly gates look bland
and what was once a pearl, now sand
that blows away . . .
in light of HIM

waging war, clean ~shane and shane


"So I find this law at work: When I want to do good, evil is right there with me. For in my inner being I delight in God's law; but I see another law at work in the members of my body, waging war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin at work within my members.
What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death? Thanks be to God—through Jesus Christ our Lord!" romans 7:21-25

i've gotten hooked on a book again. i have so many books that sit on my shelf that are un-read. you'd think i'd read those before i go back to the ones i've already read. but, no . . . some are just too good and need to be re-read every once in awhile. i inadvertently got re-attached to this one. an excerpt:

"the real test of being in the presence of God is that you either forget yourself all together or see yourself as a small, dirty object. it is better to forget about yourself altogether."

~c.s. lewis, mere christianity

forgetting about myself. seeing Him. the latter produces the former. makes sense.

i love that God makes sense.

this entry is spurred from a movie i saw on friday night - "equilibrium". i will not try to explain the movie, as it is conceptually complicated, but i recommend it. it is worth watching for the simple fact that it makes you realize how much you "feel".

as i watched it, i thought of these words from c.s. lewis:

"God created things which had free will. That means creatures which can go either wrong or right. Some people think they can imagine a creature which was free but had no possibility of going wrong; I cannot. If a thing is free to be good, it is also gree to be bad. And free will is what has made evil possible.

Why, then, did God give them free will? Because free will, though it makes evil possible, is also the only thing that makes possible any love or goodness or joy worth having.

A world of automata - of creatures that worked like machines - would hardly be worth creating.

The happiness which God designs for his higher creatures is the happiness of being freely, voluntarily united to Him and to each other in an ecstasy of love and delight compared with which the most rapturous love between a man and a woman on this earth is mere milk and water.

And for that they must be free."

wise words. an all-wise God. i'll take the bad with the good for the sake of having freedom. for it allows me to know true Love.

last night i remember thinking as i lay in bed listening to the rain quietly falling outside my window, "maybe you'll wake up to snow in the a.m.". so when my alarm went off this a.m., in my half-awake stupor i reached over, pushed snooze and started to turn back over for 5 mins . . .

and then i remembered . . .

"maybe you'll wake up to snow in the a.m. . . ."

i shot striaght up in my bed, turned around on my knees and peeked over my headboard, thru the blinds of my window. thru a smile, i whispered, "yes . . ."

i felt like i was 5 years old again.

i like that God allows us to keep some of our childlike qualities . . . wonder is one of those . . .