The Light Shines Through

#wherethelightshinesthrough

As I sat there listening to the song “Where the light shines through” by Switchfoot, God gave me a view I had never expected…

There he was in my minds eye. A man. His head was bowed and his shoulders slumped, as if the weight of the entire world was sitting on him. As I watched this man, I saw him raise his arms and cry out. With the cry, the man lifted his hands as if in surrender and release of everything he was carrying.

It didn’t take a second. I saw the Holy Spirit jump like being released from a tight hold. The battle was epic, immediate and heavy. It was over almost as soon as it had begun. The damage left behind should have been more then crippling.

Yet…

I saw the man breath deeply and lift his arms. As he lifted his arm a strange mysterious light was shining out of him. In surprise he looked down at his body.  There was light shining out of him in several different places.  It was as if every area in his life that had been attacked by the evil lies was now shining with a strange, but declarative truth.

The battle had done it’s job and done it well.  The lies, the fears, the anger, the bitter pain, all of this gone as the Holy Spirit beamed truth, life, joy, faith, freedom out of this man.

No longer was he a slave to anything of this world, he knew beyond anything else that he had a freedom living inside him. 

His wounds is where the light shines though!

perfectly imperfect

I spend hours staring at my artwork. Flipping it over and over and over. I critic it with a critical eye and study every flaw and misplaced line.  I get frustrated and throw it on the floor.

Three or four days later I pick up that piece of paper and look with fresh eyes at the lines I had scribbled on the paper.

I take a step back and I stare at it with new perspective. The mistakes have not changed, it hasn’t improved over time.

But My HEART has.

For me, everything I start to draw or sketch starts in my heart. It starts with a idea placed inside me by the Holy Spirit. A vision that I cannot see with my eyes, but can feel inside my soul.  

 

As this idea works its way to my brain, things start to take shape and I start to put my own personal human twist into the vision.

I start to sketch things out and nothing seems quite perfect or quite right. Nothing ever seems quite like I wanted it to in my mind. By the time I’m done with the first sketch things are sometimes quite out of perspective of the “idea” I had.  Thus the throwing it all on the floor and walking away.

Little do I ever understand with God is doing inside me. The healing, the growing, the deepening, the searching, the surrender, the molding, the shaping, the strengthening.  Rarely do I recognize the deep knife surgery that is happening inside my soul as my fingers fly over the surface of the paper.

When I pick up that piece of paper a few days later and study it, it is not with my eyes that I see it, but with the heart that God was changing as I worked. It is a piece of who I am. A struggle of my soul, and Sharpening of my heart. 

It is my heart that beats in time to the Holy Spirit. It is me pouring out the love the Father has given me. It’s me seeing with the eyes the of my Father. It’s seeing the flaws and knowing their part in the whole picture. It’s surrendering the messed up parts of me to be seen through the eyes that make all things beautiful.

My artwork isn’t perfect or without flaw. It’s not meant to be. It’s meant to reflect with unfinished work of the Holy Spirit in my life. If I were perfect, my art would probably be perfect too. But there are days when all I can achieve is a beautiful disaster.  That’s ok. Jesus love’s the disaster. He loves the broken pieces. He loves us, His messed up, dirt covered, bloodied kneed, tear stained, giggling, crazy little children.

Thank you Jesus, for loving the imperfect messed up me.

Watching Time. tick-tock...

Time….hours, minutes, seconds, years, months, decades, moments, eras, age, period, young, old, midlife crisis, prime, birthdays, anniversary, goal, stages, grades, paycheck, job, season, series, ….we have so many different ways to describe time.

Time fly’s by, time stands still. Do we value time?

Do we expect life to happen to us in this life of time? Or do we happen to this time in our lives?

I was sitting here thinking about life. How we don’t have a clue how long we are going to live in this world. How long or short our lives are going to be.

We often look at the death of people under a certain age and say or think something like… “they where taken before their time.” Or “they never got a chance to live out their lives.”

Maybe our perspective is way off! I mean if you can live your full calling in this world by the age of 4, why wouldn’t you not want to go start your eternity with Christ?

I’ve watched the pain of passing life and often thought about the sadness it brings into peoples worlds. I think we misunderstand death. The focus is the idea and focus of the negative and hurt of separation. 

But inside the love of Jesus there is so much beauty on the other side of death.

To be dead to self, is to be alive in Jesus.  Do be dead to this world is to be alive in the arms of Christ.

There have been times when I wonder at the reason for a miscarried child or even the older generation that struggles to hold on even when they seem to be internally gone.  Like, did you fulfill your purpose in life before you entered the world? Or what is it that you still need to do on this earth before you can go home?

Time is what we want most, but what we use worst. –William Penn.

YOU- right now, what is the meaning of time in your life? Does it mark off the hours till your done with work? Does it even impact your brain at all? Do you think about the passing days? Do you wonder if you are created for more then the thing you are doing?

Do you ever get up in the morning and think, if this is my last day on earth, what do I want to leave behind?

Do you ever think that, and then think, I will start tomorrow…kid, what part of your LAST day on this earth did you miss?

Do you think you have a choice as to what you do with this life? Or do you see yourself as stuck in what you are doing?

Do you love what you do? Or do you struggle to make sense of the everyday mundane happenings?

If You Don’t Make The Time To Work On Creating The Life You Want,

You're eventually going to be forced to spend a lot of time dealing with a life you don't want. – Kevin Ngo

I feel like there’s a lot of questions in this whole thing, but seriously I would encourage you to think about it. Don’t just let this life live around you, live a life that is alive! You can!

You where never meant to just survive. You where created to thrive!

Where does my help come from?

Psalm 121

¹ I lift up my eyes to the mountains—
    where does my help come from?
² My help comes from the Lord,
    the Maker of heaven and earth.

³ He will not let your foot slip—
    he who watches over you will not slumber;
⁴ indeed, he who watches over Israel
    will neither slumber nor sleep.

⁵ The Lord watches over you—
    the Lord is your shade at your right hand;
⁶ the sun will not harm you by day,
    nor the moon by night.

⁷ The Lord will keep you from all harm—
    he will watch over your life;
⁸ the Lord will watch over your coming and going
    both now and forevermore.

Walking through the daily questions I look around with confusion aired on my face.

My heart was questioning everything, every decision, every action, every word that came out of my mouth as well as every word that came back to my ears.

What was going on? 

Something was happening here. Something outside my realm of earthly perspective. 

Things where lining up in a strange, yet obvious course of events that I was struggling to make any sense of.

The battle was over the top and my strength was on the edge of gone.

With an anxious, exhausted breath. I gave it up. I let it all slid from my own hands to the hands that where reaching out to me. 

I felt the weight of everything lift off of me, and I felt myself starting to slid. I was sliding downward, but not in a freaky, murky bleakness. I was sliding deep into solid peace. I was sliding into a quiet peaceful rest, so full of glory. 

Strength started to return to my heart and soul. A strength so far outside of me that I knew without a doubt that it was the strength of my Lord. 

He was reaching out taking everything that was holding me back and baring down on me. He was lifting me up out of the crazy and setting me in a place of rest. 

He removed all fear and replaced confusion with confidence. He settled my mind and filled it with His plans and glory. He changed the doubt to laughter. 

He is the author of my life. No other. He has plans for my life that might not make sense in the view of this world. But His glory goes beyond this world.