Ella-Bella

I can be so cynical. I really can.
For the most part I tend to be an optimist. But when it comes to my predictions about the future and the direction humanity is heading...it seems a little dark. The media, politics, relational standards, and the big push for "tolerance" only appears to be pushing the human race farther and farther away from the way God desires for us to live.

Still, there is HOPE. And hope does not disappoint. Ella Stepan is 4 1/2 years old and brighter than a thousand roman candles exploding across the sky. She has a "heart of gold", a heart that I truly believe Jesus Christ resides in. She is creatively and intellectually brilliant, she has plenty of spunk and passion to go around, and she loves others with such power.

I babysat her the other night and she sang me all the songs that she has been learning at church. "I like to sing Jesus songs the most, they are just the best!" she explains to me. When I grabbed her dad's guitar and started playing a worship song she asked me to wait and ran upstairs to get her guitar to. She couldn't play a chord, but the kid could strum in perfect rhythm and no joke, she could stay in key. We played and sang together and I have to admit, I got a little teary eyed. It was as if the Lord way saying to me "Chin up kiddo, this is the future I am building. I still have things under control."

The Last Leaf

And if I should live to be
The last leaf upon the tree
In the spring,
Let them smile, as I do now,
At the old forsaken bough
Where I cling.

The Last Leaf
Oliver Wendell Holmes


This poem reminded me of a song that I love from Brooke Fraser:

when the world has fallen out from under me
I'll be found in you, still standing
when the sky rolls up and mountains fall on their knees
when time and space are through
I'll be found in you



I want to be found clinging to the tree. I want to be found standing firm at the end of the day, and every day until Christ returns.

Agony?

A fifteen year old girl at a local school committed suicide a few weeks ago.

I mean, what in the world? So young! She had so much life to live! My youngest sister is sixteen and I cannot (and I mean literally, I start to sob at the thought alone) imagine what it would be like if her life was just over.

Moreover, this girl was a student of a dear friend of mine. And when that friend shared the news with me, she could barely speak between loud, heavy, sobs and gasping for air. As I held my friend I tried desperately to search for words to say, I realized that, that was just it. The situation was desperate. My friend was in deep agony. Agony that a soothing word or warm embrace will never cure. Agony that sits deep in the belly and threatens to burst a lung at any moment.

I just can't seem to get a few thoughts out of my head. They are haunting me. And so, I venture to share them with you and hope that you will at least ponder with me for a moment.

1. Do I even pay attention to how much I could be impacting someone? Or am I just lazy and "typical" in my relationships?
2. What am I doing to speak truth into younger girl's lives?
3. When was the last time that I was truly in agony over something? Was it righteous or petty?
4. Why don't I hurt more for situations like this? A fifteen year old just taking her life into her own hands? Have I become numb?
5. How can I have the heart of God for each person that I come in contact with?

Oh Lord my God! I need you so much!

Call me Crazy

I have been thinking a lot about technology and how it really has so many pros and cons. I realized the other day that I have my phone with me, well, pretty much ALWAYS! When I sleep, it charges by my head, when I am in church it is on vibrate, when I go into to pay for gas I carry it in my hand, when I go to the bathroom...well...you get the picture. My Blackberry and I are "attatched at the hip".
On my phone I have the internet, e-mail, Google chat so I could talk to Em when she was in the Czech, ICQ, the Bible, a Calorie Counter, Twitter, and all sort of other applications. I am fully available to people ALL OVER THE WORLD all the time! Crazy! And I don't think I need to be that available. I really think that it has been an idol in my life. I freak out when I do not have my phone. How lame is that?

So...I am going to go on "phone fasts" pretty regularly. I will take days to just spend with the Lord and with the people arounds me, without my phone. If there is an emergency, you can call my husband or just call me like 6 times and if I check it every now and then to make sure there is not a problem.

If I do not get back to you right away, it's not because I don't love you...it's because I do love you and I want to be more attentive to you when we are together and not constantly on my phone.

xoxo

New Soul

I'm a new soul
Came into this strange world
Hoping I could learn a bit 'bout how to give and take
But since I can here, felt the joy and the fear
Finding myself making every possible mistake.
-Yael Naim

Do you ever feel like that? I mean...don't get me wrong, I am SO overwhelmingly thankful to be a new creation in Christ. I read Colossians 3 and get near giddy over the fact that I no longer have to be what I once was. And I now have this lovely skin that I can crawl into and make my own. Christ has made me His own.

I have had my ups and downs, just read this blog and you will see that, but I also know that I am contunially growing as I see more of God and work and as He speaks truth into my life. Still, there seem to be some re-occuring speed bumps that I would love to just pave over. And man, oh man, I hate learning NEW (and annoying) things about myself through the way that I react to OLD hindrances.

For example, while I am resiliant, I am so darn sensitive. I really am. Lenka sings this song about being over-sensitive and how it it "dangerous and sweet". It is true. If you cut me, I will bleed. Words carry great weight with me and can literally be weapons that penetrate my seemingly "tough skin". And I have only been realizing this by standing back and observng my reactions to things. It is so comforting isn't it? I often think to myself "Oh lovely, a new issue for the Lord and I to work on...how delightful." And while I am being slightly sarcastic, the truth is, I know that it really is delighful and magnificent to be santified by a holy God.

So, even if I do constantly feel like a new soul, fresh out of the gates and wobbly...I am truly thankful. And I will enbrace whatever it is that God is bringing to my attention.

Still

I am sitting here in the late afternoon listening to the warm whispers of The Reminder by Fiest. The weather outside is mild and inviting, almost as if it is waving a white flag in an offering of peace after the violent heat that is "not appropriate" for early summer. I am reminded, though, that this is California. A recent road trip up north to Davis revealed that this state is as much desert as it is rolling hills and ocean views. Life is like that isn't it?

I appreciate the stillness of the present moment. And the clarity of hindsight. So, reflecting on the last few months and allowing the outside weather to influence me, I have decided to call a "truce" with my wavering emotions. I have sat in the desert for days and cried. But my tears did not flow enough to create a river that saturated and changed the land. I felt them on my cheeks...and then the dried up. Being a newlywed, I have also gazed upon hills of endless beauty and the dazzling seaside and known that even if I daily add a bucket of water to the ocean, it will not make a differnce. My joy will not cause something so vast to oveflow.

The passing of my dear friend and grandmother has been such deep sorrow. And yet the wonder of my new marriage and the building of our life together has almost "balanced out" the woes. And so, I sit with a stable heart rate and body temperature, in the late afternoon, with my music and my Savior...and I am still.

Moving

Dr. Keith Phillips spoke at a church we were visiting on Sunday. The man is a gifted (and might I add crafty) speaker. He has this way of making sacrificial life appealing. Really, he makes us want to pack up and move to Watts and start a street ministry. He does not butter it up...he presents a life of challenge, hard work, and living with a missional disposition. And yet the way the Lord speaks through Keith and allows the words to flow together just seems to get me every time.

I am not sure that we are supposed to move to LA right now. I am not sure that we are supposed to move to Africa either. Actually, I am not sure we are supposed to "move" at all. In the literal sense of course. But I am SURE that the Lord is "daring us to MOVE". There are things that we CAN do. We can be faithful with what the Lord has placed before us right now in Simi Valley. We CAN diligently pray for missionaries and visit them or send notes of encouragement. And we certainly CAN be willing and ready to pick up and move when God asks us to.

We all have skills and talents the Lord has given to us. We all have people in our lives that we directly impact. We may not all move to the inner city or across the globe with the good news of our Savior. But are we doing all that we CAN do?

Will you pray for us and with us? And will you commit to praying and asking the Lord to reveal what you CAN do?