'Empire's End' by Jerry B. Jenkins

The apostle Paul is one my favorite characters in the New Testament, so I was curious to read a fictionalized take (well, partially fictionalized) on his life.  I've always been attracted to his feisty personality, and how the Lord used the same passion he exhibited with his attacks on Christians in his leading of new believers after the Lord saved him.  Jerry B. Jenkins has portrayed him beautifully.  He follows Scripture telling the story of Paul's hatred and persecution of new Christians, his Damascus Road experience, and his later writing of many letters of the New Testament.  He does add a side story, including what could have been a possible romance on Paul's part, tying in the story of Paul's involvement in the stoning of Stephen, the first martyr.  While some readers will be more hard-line, saying a Biblical writer doesn't need to speculate, but really, it isn't a problem, at least not for me.  

I appreciated the parts of the story where the Holy Spirit spoke to Paul.  It was powerful to realize that this same Holy Spirit who spoke to Paul's heart, is the same One who speaks to me.  It brought me to tears at times, and that's always a good sign.

Jenkins tells a wonderful story, and even though he takes artistic license in adding the romance line, it's a sweet telling of a true man of God.

(i received this book free to review from worthy publishing)

Refreshment

There must be some sort of subliminal messaging going on in our house.  Gary brought home 18" carpet squares from the church the other day, leftovers from some renovation work we'd had done there.  They save EVERYTHING.  Good for us.  We now have a beautiful carpet in our bedroom, which has totally transformed it, and some in the dining room as well.  We've cleaned up things that have been long overdue,  I'm thinking we're cleaning our lives of muck in person, sort of getting stuff out of our heads as well.

At least I am.  The freedom I'm feeling with the backside of things being dusted and washed is incredible.  Very freeing.

Making room for the Holy Spirit to continue a good work in our lives.  

A mother's re-focus

The verse for now is, "My Grace is sufficient for you."  

I know too much.  More than my husband about our sons.  Moms tend to, you know.  Stuff is worse than I could ever imagine (speaking of son and his girlfriend's business), and quite honestly, my imagination isn't very active.  I can go a certain distance and then say to myself, "Oh surely not. Please no, he can't be doing that."  I'm pretty much, a what-you-see-is-what-you-get person.  And I take folks at face value.  I end up being gullible when I should be shrewd.  But, here's the thing---the Lord has given me two spiritual gifts, ones I was made aware of ages ago.  One is the gift of healing, which I used to take to mean the laying on of hands.  In reality, it's the herbs, and I do have a God-given knack with them.  Makes me laugh.  The other gift is discernment, but only with those outside the family.  I can see through a fake instantly, almost like mind reading, as long as they're not blood.  My kids can fool me all day long.  So, when they tell me something, whether it's believable or not, I accept it.  A stranger or a friend, not for a second.

The Lord says to walk away from our boys, as I mentioned in my last post.  Pray, and don't engage on purpose.  Let them make the moves toward me, but don't initiate.  That's hard.  I tend to want to at least text when I've not heard in a few days.  The thing is---I want them more than they need me.  Yeah, I get it.  I don't yearn for too much involvement with my own mother either.

He asks me to trust Him.  Don't help except to pray.  No letters, no nothing.  I hate to see my boys entrenched in lifestyles that are so full of darkness.  But they're okay with that.  And when oldest son was here the other day---he'd not been by since he began his new job and had out-of-town training---he had a different look on his face.  He looked happy, which is no big deal, really.  He always looks happy, but there was a frenzied look about him.  Glittery.  My neighbor had the same look on her face last week when I visited her.  She's sort of too into mystical things, and had a story about this New Age/witchcraft-like herb store she went to, but it was hard to believe, at least to me.  Another story for another day.

Demons.

I just shake my head.

Now, to not give too much air-time to the prince of the air, our son who's in California is doing very, very well.  That Christian retreat where he's working is concerned for the spiritual and physical welfare of their employees as much as wanting them to be good workers.  They were taken as a group to a large non-denominational church over the state line in Oregon yesterday.  After five years in the restaurant business, and the worldly atmosphere there, he's being refreshed with other believers.  He's exactly where the Lord would have him be, and that gives me great peace.  Even though I miss him crazy-like.  Definitely a Praise the Lord situation. :)

I'll stop now.  Have more to say, but need to quit.  Y'all take care.

A quiet Saturday

Mornings are my favorite times of day, only seconded by evenings in bed after my bath.  Quiet, window open, all is well.  I adore the hour in bed with my tea.  Usually I read the Psalter reading for the day in my Book of Common Prayer and the Office in The Divine Hours*.  Then I feel ready to get into my study of Stephanie Bennett Vogt's book Your Spacious Self.  Healing, that's what her book is to me.  I've gradually been cleaning out things, weighty sometimes.  Finding old photos of my children, hurting over the journeys some of them are taking, but remembering the Covenant we made with the Lord.  Reformed Presbyterians (my old church/my husband's heart is still there) have a beautiful service for infant baptism.  Always loved that.

The carpet is down in the dining room.  Gary opened the old trunk we have in there, usually burdened closed with two Lawyer's Bookshelves that sit on top of it.  Pictures and more.  My grandparents' old pictures, aunts and uncles long gone, and a couple of my old high school annuals.  The girls have laughed today over those.  

Every so often, I leave my bed (my safe, healing place lately) and tidy up some. Get overtired, lie down and then get up and do some more.  It's not that I'm ill, but am giving myself room to get stronger.  I do feel so weak after little effort.  

The Lord spoke clearly to me this morning, telling me to let my boys alone this weekend---pray always for them, but leave their lives for Him to work on.  Tend to myself.  Enjoy the day.  Rest and recover.  Allow myself to be still. 

I'm even just going to gather flowers and greenery here for the church altar vases tomorrow.   No expense.  The paraments (altar cloths) are green for the summer, and I was thinking some orange day lilies and greens behind them would look pretty.  Easy and sweet.  Plus, there's plenty by the garage. :)

Must go tidy some more.  Remember to rest.

*Phyllis Tickle's books---btw, she's very ill now with cancer---found out through church friends who used to attend the same church as Phyllis---she lives just outside of Memphis, so is nearby.

My hope...

Joel 2:21-32King James Version (KJV)

21 Fear not, O land; be glad and rejoice: for the Lord will do great things.

22 Be not afraid, ye beasts of the field: for the pastures of the wilderness do spring, for the tree beareth her fruit, the fig tree and the vine do yield their strength.

23 Be glad then, ye children of Zion, and rejoice in the Lord your God: for he hath given you the former rain moderately, and he will cause to come down for you the rain, the former rain, and the latter rain in the first month.

24 And the floors shall be full of wheat, and the vats shall overflow with wine and oil.

25 And I will restore to you the years that the locust hath eaten, the cankerworm, and the caterpiller, and the palmerworm, my great army which I sent among you.

26 And ye shall eat in plenty, and be satisfied, and praise the name of the Lordyour God, that hath dealt wondrously with you: and my people shall never be ashamed.

27 And ye shall know that I am in the midst of Israel, and that I am the Lordyour God, and none else: and my people shall never be ashamed.

28 And it shall come to pass afterward, that I will pour out my spirit upon all flesh; and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, your old men shall dream dreams, your young men shall see visions:

29 And also upon the servants and upon the handmaids in those days will I pour out my spirit.

30 And I will shew wonders in the heavens and in the earth, blood, and fire, and pillars of smoke.

31 The sun shall be turned into darkness, and the moon into blood, before the great and terrible day of the Lord come.

32 And it shall come to pass, that whosoever shall call on the name of the Lord shall be delivered: for in mount Zion and in Jerusalem shall be deliverance, as the Lord hath said, and in the remnant whom the Lord shall call.

Exactly...

"The mild red road goes on beneath the slanting and peaceful afternoon, mounting a hill. 'Well, I can bear a hill,' he thinks.  'I can bear a hill, a man can.'  It is peaceful and still, familiar with seven years. 'It seems like a man can just about bear anything.  He can even bear what he never done.  He can even bear the thinking how some things is just more than he can bear.  He can even bear it that if he could just give down and cry, he wouldn't do it.  He can even bear it to not look back, even when he knows that looking back or not looking back wont do him any good."

~ ~ ~ 

"It was all coming down on her too fast.  There was too much reality that her hands and eyes could not deny, and too much that must be taken for granted that her hands and eyes could not prove; too much of the inexplicable that hands and eyes were asked too suddenly to accept and believe without proof.  After thirty years it must have been like a person in solitary blundering suddenly into a room full of strange people all talking at once, and she casting desperately about for anything that would hold sanity together by choosing some logical course of action which would be within her limitations, which she could have some assurance of being able to perform."~both quotes from Light in August by Wm Faulkner

* * * 

Lately I've thought that if a person who sat in front of me asked me how I was doing I'd collapse in front of them, tears flowing.  Likely I would.  We're so stoic.  Life sort of shatters without our permission, children wander off down the wide road, and we wring our hands.  Crushed.  Some days I feel as if I'm holding my breath.

Last night I asked Gary if when a person is involved in a decadent lifestyle they get full up with the weight of it.  He asked what I was driving at, and I said I was reaching for straws, wanting our boys to stop filling that God-shaped void with bad living.  My husband had his own issues as a young man, before I met him, so I knew he understood where I was going with it.  He said his own experience was that he knew when he'd reached a place where he had to make a change or suffer permanent consequences.  He added that he hoped our boys would feel the Spirit's absence before it was too late.

Amen.

'Daily Painting' by Carol Marine

What a happy book.  Carol Marine's book called Daily Painting, is a joy to read.  It's full of paintings you'd want to tear out and hang up (but I will resist).  She shares her story of difficulties in finding time to paint, even when there was nothing more she wanted to do, yet she lacked the zest to get going.  She poured our her heart to a portrait artist she admired and he suggested she do some sort of art everyday.  His three page response thrilled her, but she failed to follow it. The daily painting movement really launched her into doing small paintings everyday, and she's been at it ever since.

In the book she covers supplies (not being such a critical decision that it takes away the joy), colors of paint to purchase, surfaces to work on and more.  Included are paintings by other daily painters---advice from them, and on the whole this book is all a person would need to attempt to self-teach themselves.  She's covered the questions a beginning artist would likely come up with, and is just so very encouraging.  I heartily recommend it.

Also check out her website at http://www.dailypaintworks.com/artists/cmarine. 

(i received this book free to review from crown publishing)