.: worship

our hearts were made for worship.

i'm hoping, no, i'm actually pretty certain that in heaven my dreams of being a worship leader will come into play. i can't tell you how much despite the tiny little fact that i can't really sing, oh, the passion and heart is there.

maybe its because i love my little jesus worship jam sessions and get my hillsong on as if i really could do something with this voice coming out of my mouth like i know something.

in heaven, i'll get to be like kari jobe. worship to my hearts content AND have it sound good.

for now, my singing/worship leading/experiencing is confined to that behind closed doors, the eyes of any public including sometimes my husband, yet there's something deep within me that i can't deny in these times as i am overwhelmed with tonight as we speak as i haven't been able to stop listening to or playing "You Make Me Brave" by Bethel.

i'm so glad mere gave me this cd. yet another worship cd that has just hit the spot. been a godsend and an answer to prayer in ways she will never know in this life, the timing and the content, always so what only the lord knew i needed/would soon need.

all of this to say, regardless of our actually singing ability, what i love is we're all called and made to worship.

my soul is taken to an entirely new place where i can belt it out cause i'm singing to my King and nothing else matters.

a place our soul alone needs and can dwell, find peace, nourishment, and rest.

yes, we were made to worship.
our hearts were made to sing thy grace.

:: photo courtesy of the interwebs

.: father

 

Another song I ran into today from Hillsong United's "Aftermath" album, "Father." Another anthem of today.

.: take heart

 

Today was one of those days in which the grief was heavier than the joy. Heavier than in the last couple of days, yet what struck me the most is being so surprised by not only its appearance, its consistency, strength, and power.

"Crashing waves of grief." 

One of my dear friends and mentors coined this term during the beginning of her season of hardship with illness and its affects on her family, stating in a blog post those moments where this tidal wave of grief can catch you unaware, come crashing to the surface of your reality where there is nothing within you that can keep it at bay.

I remember hearing one of my old pastors say, grief has to be dealt with, we have to process the grief as it comes.

I didn't know how true those words would be, but I'm finding more and more the longer I am in this current season of hardship and grief, the importance of this call.

I'm an avoider. To a T. If I could keep grief and all its furry little friends at bay, my life would be much different now and the last several years.

But like the strength of the waves in the ocean, the ones and the times in which I am standing there with my feet seemingly firmly planted in the sand, in the water, at any moment, without so much of a moment's notice, those crashing waves can come. The kind that threaten to sweep over you, carry you completely away.

See I believe it is this precisely that we avoid pain, grief, dealing with the two at all costs. Or crying. I've felt and I've heard before an unwillingness to cry, for fears that if one starts, one may not be able to stop.

The same can be said of pain, grief. Oftentimes we don't want to go there, we don't want to deal with it because we're afraid if we begin to re-live and re-visit that pain, we will never be okay again.

Yet, what I've found is unlike with the ocean where you can see the waves and the tides coming, grief can come knocking on your doorstep, no grief doesn't knock, grief barges in without any announcement or warning, blowing through our homes and very existence and leaving in its wake that which we now know and recognize as life as we now know it.

Life in which the sacred dance of grief and joy is now our current reality, life amidst and within the tensions of joy and grief, peace and uncertainty, hope and despair, a life lived amidst the poles of sorrow, heartache, and rejoicing, life as we never knew nor imagined it before.

Grief doesn't knock, it crashes in.
Today, I was surprised by the length of its stay.

It arrived last night.
I was thinking it would be gone by morning.

Yet all day I couldn't shake the sadness nor the heaviness I felt.
Everything was feeling just a little too real.

The reality is while I've spent the last few weeks largely not living in the pain cycle of this current source of grief, it is as if the last two days all of those aspects of my current reality are now hitting me.

I was in this euphoria and place where it felt grief wouldn't affect me this time.
I plan/hope to write about this soon, but I've encountered God as I never have seen nor perceived nor known him before. And since then life has never been the same.

I was given a completely new mental image of who God is, how He feels about us, how He wants to relate with us, things like heaven, a new heaven, a new earth, the kingdom of God, so many of these things seemingly once known, I have come to see in a new light.

I pray, I pray, I pray I will be able to articulate them soon.
Right now, I'm just starting at the only place I know how.

Where I am right now.

A day in which grief is present; strong and mighty.
A day in which I wish that I'd wake up and this would all be over.
A day in which I can't wait to be Home with my Father in heaven, where I can't wait for all that awaits me in my true Home.

A day in which I lament and cry out, begin to feel the weight of all that has happened, all that will never be the same.

A day in which I long and I dream of a world with no heartache, sickness, separation or pain, a world, life as He also intended it, for as one of my mentors always says, "Our hearts were never meant to experience death," sickness, illness, separation, etc.

"Death, sickness, they were never a part of God's plan."

We must grieve. When the waves come.

No matter how much we fear or they will sweep over us, there is so much we miss, so much Him and who He is we miss when we don't allow Him to sit with us in our suffering, in our hardship and grief.

He does not fix, He does not scold. He does not criticize, He does not judge.

If there is anything the ups and downs and trials of he last several years and now looking back at years of hardship before then, I have come to find that as Matt Rogers says in "When Answers Aren't Enough,"

"Our God is a God who laughs when we laugh, and cries when we weep."

No other words describe this God I have encountered in the midst of some of my deepest pain, no other words describe the heart of a Father whose heart breaks when it sees the hearts of their children breaking.

He doesn't sit idly by. He doesn't push us away from that place, that place of vulnerability and pain, but deeper into it, knowing that journey and that journey alone will lead to our healing.

He enters in the midst of our grief, with a voice like no other, sits, weeps, laments, cries out and comforts and soothes the hearts of His beloved children by reminding and urging them to take heart; 

for He has defeated the night, He has overcome.

::

I don't know exactly why I decided to look up this song again today, a song I remember hearing when we were visiting a number of churches last fall.

But it's not an accident or coincidence this song was on my heart this morning and that I spent a number of time looking for just the right version that fit the song I kept hearing in my heart.

This song pierced my heart today. Was like/is like balm and water to my soul in ways I don't have to but wish I could explain.

So powerful, especially the bridge I'll share below. Words that ignited and planted seeds of hope within my broken and hurting heart.

All I know is He is with me.
He is with me, He is with us, and He is faithful.
He has overcome.

He is so much bigger, so much greater than all our suffering and hardship and crap and pain we have to deal with in this world.

I was given a glimpse into His heart and like I mentioned, have had a huge shift in how I see and view this God I already thought I knew and loved, these words could not resonate deeper nor be more representative of the truth of who He truly is.

I love how this part of the song is like a battlecry and anthem.
He has overcome.

::

All our troubles
And all our tears
God our hope
He has overcome

All our failure
And all our fear
God our love
He has overcome

All our heartache
And all our pain
God our healer
He has overcome

All our burdens
And all our shame
God our freedom
He has overcome

God our justice
God our grace
God our freedom
He has overcome

God our refuge
God our strength
God is with us
He has overcome 

::

I noticed this one of the million times listening to the song today, yet the majority of the times I was listening to it, I was working on other things on my computer so I was listening to, not also watching the video. But again, for whatever reason, I turned to the video at one particular moment and saw this verse and it was one that became one of several battlecries during the first couple years of my illness that I spent at home. To see it in the midst of this song, I have no words.

God, our Hope, He has overcome.

::

My salvation and honor depend on God

He is my mighty rock, my refuge,

Trust in him at all times, O people,

Pour out your hearts to him, 

For God is our refuge

:: psalm 62:7-8

{whiter than snow}

Purge me with hyssop, 

and I shall be clean;

wash me, and I shall be 

whiter than snow.

Let me hear with joy and gladness;
let the bones you have broken rejoice.

Hide your face from my sins,
and blot out all my iniquities.

Create in me a clean heart,
O God, and renew a right spirit within me.

Cast me not away from your presence,
and take not your Holy Spirit from me.

Restore me to the joy of your salvation,
and uphold me with a willing spirit.

Behold, you delight in truth in the inward being. 

{psalm 51:7-13, 6}

- photo courtesy of Pinterest -

let the bones you have broken

 let the bones you have broken rejoice

:: psalm 51:8

- photos courtesy of the interwebs -

new beginnings {behind the lens}

FOR AS LONG AS I CAN REMEMBER,  I've dreamed of having a camera. It wasn't really something I ever vocalized to anyone, I've just always wanted to save up enough money one day to buy one to capture moment and memories.

About a year and a half ago, this group of people gave me a gift that I could have never imagined receiving, one I use literally everyday, hardly go anywhere without, and something that has allowed me to discover that behind the lens is truly one of my favorite places to be. It was something I wanted to be able to buy someday, yet something I never would have asked for in this current season with my health.

Because of this, I was floored. I could not believe my eyes, Christmas Eve with my husband exchanging gifts between the two of us before joining our families, when I came to a camera box that I was sure could not have had a real, actual camera in there.

I found out my husband, knowing how much I loved taking pictures, at that point on a little point and shoot from the early 2000's and a non-smartphone, also knowing there was no way with all our medical bills we could afford to make a purchases like that, so he went to his family and they also knew of how much I loved taking pictures, so they all banded together to go in on one big gift for me that year, this camera.

I could never thank my husband for his heart and this idea, all his work behind the scenes, or the love and generosity of my family in even doing this. I've talked myself out of it a million times, but I'm finally doing this, even if just for me.

I'm posting all the pics I take and starting a new adventure called "behind the lens," it's basically just going to give me a place to put all my pictures and have them all in one place.

Part of why I love talking pictures so much is it forces me to stop and be fully in the movement. Ever since my life changed when I first got sick four years ago, my eyes have been opened to this world all around me I never knew existed. Taking photos reminds me that nothing is small, nothing is ordinary, and beauty is everywhere.

Thank you all for giving me something so much more than a gift, supporting and encouraging one of the ways in which I was made. I love you all. Today marks the beginning of a new journey, here are glimpses of life from my view behind the lens.

He is the Light

I feel the nations of the earth are shaking
There is no power that can match His grace
Lift up your head
Lift up your eyes to see

All of creation is waiting and longing
For sons and daughters to declare this truth
Lift up your head
Lift up your voice and sing



He is the light, shining in the darkness
He is the hope, Hope of all the nations
He is the light, He is the light
For all the world to see

I feel the faith across the earth is rising
We prophecy about his kingdom come
Just like heaven
All across the earth

Great,
Great is The Lord
Praise His name
Praise His name

:: Bryan and Katie Torwalt, "He Is The Light"
:: Stock photo courtesy of the interwebs ages ago, not an original photo at top of post