Checking in, new blog...

Yes, I'm still alive. I know, I've been strangely missing in action but I'm sure I'll be back to my old self if I ever get my computer back again! We think our house is sold by the way, as long as everything goes well. Settlement is set for October 19th I believe.

In other news I went to a wedding today and there was a long sermon in the middle of it that left me with a headache it was so darn legalistically depressing/enraging. It was 'evangelistic' vomit--a mish mash of regurgitated illustrations, quotes, and cliches. The man seemed to enjoy preaching death and condemnation of unbelievers and barely tacked on some 'good news' in the last 2 minutes. I was also questioning the purpose of marriage vows. Do you think we start out with a legalistic mindset in marriage vowing to do all kinds of things perfectly even though we know it'll never happen that way? Should we be making promises of perfection to the one who will know our faults and shortcomings better than anyone else on earth?

And in still other news, a good friend of mine who has been receiving great revelations of God's love and grace lately has just started a blog. It's great to read what God's been doing in her life and I highly recommend checking it out. Her name is Lydia and her blog's name is 'a joy to be me'.

And one more thing...sorry I haven't called you yet Katie! And thanks to all of you who've been feeding Aaron too.

Now That I KNOW the Gospel!!!

I have to say that one of the most exciting things about this amazing ongoing revelation of pure grace that Aaron and I have been living in for the past few months is that we are 'getting' the gospel for the first time. I mean, we've understood parts of it at different times, and we had a mostly true cerebral understanding of what the gospel was, but now we are really really KNOWING it. It's changing our lives completely, almost as if (ahem) it had some kind of power over us and in us!

The glorious thing about it is that is seems the more revelation we receive the more it just keeps on coming. It started out slowly but now it's as if we receive fresh revelation every day and it's incredibly exciting to have all that Bible knowledge that once puffed us up come to life in the Spirit (or be put to death by the Spirit if it was a wrong understanding). When I was home in Canada recently, I began to be excited just thinking about preaching this message of pure grace to the people there. I have an ever-growing confidence that this is the best and most powerful way to change the whole world, and that as we are committed to immersing ourselves in pure grace we'll take the wonderful glorious presence of Jesus with us everywhere we go. I'm no longer worried about have powerful gifts of healing or miracles because I believe they will naturally and effortlessly flow when we boldly live in pure grace (yes Rob, we are really getting it!). Evangelism will literally be a breeze, or perhaps more like a hurricane!

And to all those who are skeptical that grace is really that powerful and we really need a little bit of law or guidelines or suggestions to keep us going in the right direction:

I just have to thank God for many answers to prayer, answers that are being realized for the first time and all since we have begun to come more and more into true grace. I was watching my husband last night singing worship songs and taking an opportunity to preach grace a bit (at a birthday party no less) and I can tell you he's a different man than he was even a month ago. I almost don't even know him. There is a boldness and fiery passion rising up in him that is (I think) apostolic. Increasingly he won't stand for even a hint of law and will graciously but fiercely fight for grace in people's lives. This from a guy who was so bound up in legalism and fear of man that I used to wonder if he cared about anything much, he lacked passion so badly. He lived in constant defeat and condemnation. Basically, I'm watching him pass from the ministry of death into the ministry of life. And it's happening to me too.

I realize that using phrases like 'pure grace' and 'true gospel' aren't very helpful. I mean lots of people steeped in law use these kinds of words too. They just don't know what they're talking about! I think I'll have to put together something just telling the gospel as I see it in Scripture to give an idea of what I actually mean. I want to see it myself, as I think I'll be surprised what comes out of me...

Compassion, Loving Our Enemies, and Fighting Our REAL Enemy

I just looked at an article by a well respected Christian leader (fundamental, non-charismatic) and felt saddened by how much effort we put into attacking people in the world. It doesn't matter who it was or what it was about, it's easy to find books, articles, sermons, etc...that people have poured endless hours of time and energy into to combat the church's perceived enemies. I suppose included in that list would be pornographers, Hollywood, abortionist rights people, liberal political adherents, feminists, the homosexual community, people in other religions, atheists/humanists, other believers with different theological bents, and the list goes on and on. We often view anyone who passionately fights for beliefs different than our own as our enemies, people who are trying to destroy us and everything we stand for (and sometimes they really are).


It seems the common way of dealing with these 'enemies' is to fight back. Now as good Christians we normally fight back with lots of words and little else, but our attitude towards our enemies is certainly often less than compassionate and loving.
Jesus said:

"You have heard that it was said, 'You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.' But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those that persecute you, so that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven." (Mat. 5:43-44)

I suspect that there's a good reason behind why Jesus told us to love our enemies. First of all, these enemies are souls he loves and wants to save, kind of like he saved us while we were still his enemies. Second of all, when our attention is focused on flesh and blood enemies, we forget about our real enemy who is not flesh and blood. I think the word 'pray' is a little tip-off that those who persecute us need prayer. They are prisoners and slaves of Satan and need to be set free! In fact, all humans, whether believers or not, have a common enemy. Satan is trying to destroy and devour all of us, hating us because we bear the image of God. When you see this, it's becomes normal for us to view unbelievers with love and compassion. I mean, they are in the unfortunate position of being caught between two enemies--God who must pour out his wrath on sinners, and Satan who hates, lies, steals, accuses, and destroys anything God made. There is only one hope for them: Jesus Christ.

Let's not forget Ephesians 6:

"Finally, be strong in the Lord and in the strength of his might. Put on the whole armor of God, that you may be able to stand against the schemes of the devil. For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against rulers, against the authorities, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places."

You see, fighting against people is a waste of our time. It will not bear the fruit we were meant to bear and quite frankly, it's beneath us! We have been empowered and commissioned with the authority of Jesus to stand against the schemes of the devil and wrestle against every demonic power this world has. And as we do that, we release the captive souls and set prisoners free to worship our Father in heaven. We take back this world for our King, the only Eternal Glorious King of Kings.


So I think the right response to people who persecute us is not to persecute them back with our hard words, but love them and pray them into the Kingdom of Heaven. I think that is a tactic our 'enemies' will find difficult to stand against!

Mother's Day

I'm a day late but yesterday was Mother's Day here in the Americas (yes, that means Canada too). I'll start off by saying Happy Mother's Day to a couple of friends, first of all Katie because it's her first and also Coralie because I'm so happy for her in her pregnancy and loving all the details.

I got time alone for my gift! I headed out to enjoy nature with my guitar, songs, hymnbook, and Bible. I stopped at a park and went for a walk, then moved on to a different park to worship and enjoy the peace and quiet with God. It was a beautiful day and just to prove it I took lots of pictures of the second park. It's rather shocking how beautiful northern Delaware can be.


I was reminded more than once of Dan's prophetic picture about the dandelions, especially since it was a windy day and I was sitting surrounded by fuzzy floating flying seeds .


I really love the wind. I love the unpredictability of what it will do --which way it will blow or will it stop dead for a moment then rush and tear wildly around the next. It has always made me feel that God is right there with me and all around me doing whatever he wants. I love that about God. He's everywhere always doing what he wants and we'll see him more and more clearly as the church ushers in his kingdom of heaven on earth. The whole world will see his goodness, kindness, love, and compassion. And they will no longer be able to deny his unchangeable unstoppable power. They won't even want to.

Then a family with 4 children came walking down the hill to go for a walk, I suppose in part because it was Mother's Day. The kids were running full speed down the hill reminding me of how exhilarating it was to run as a child in a big open space. Well, one of the girls, around 11 I suppose, fell and hurt her ankle. After much yelling and carrying on , the father finally went back up to see why she wasn't coming down. This resulted in the whole family eventually abandoning their plans for a walk and the mother was quite obviously disgusted with her daughter. No one would help the poor girl get back up the hill so she hobbled quite dejectedly until she finally landed at a picnic table. I was getting ready to leave and was passing right by her and I felt such compassion for her. I could see how miserable she was, her mother still angry and her ankle hurting. I said did you hurt your leg and she nodded. Then her mother came over and starting trying to look at her foot and I said this may be strange but would you mind if I prayed for her? And I was not prepared for the response. I think I would have been ready for a yes or a no or fear or well, just about anything except what I got. She completely ignored me (the mother) and pretended I wasn't even there. Didn't look at me or answer...nothing. So there I was standing like a fool not knowing what to do! I asked if there was anything else I could do and she acknowledged my existence saying they were fine so I left. But I felt strangely successful. I had compassion and I took a step of faith; God is definitely doing something with me.

So I went home and Aaron and I went out together for a while. Movie, dinner, good conversation, and some wandering around. All in all, a great day. Hope all you mothers out there can say the same.