Temporal vs. Eternal

     Do you ever wonder what God's dream is for you? Are you ever afraid that you are going to miss it? Maybe it is just me because I no longer question my salvation, my fear is that I am going to miss it. Miss God's path for me. And it will be my fault.
     I am afraid that I am going to spend my life on what is comfortable, easy, safe. I want to learn to abandon my life to a Greater Power and a Greater Purpose. I don't want to choose my own course. There are so many blessings if we allow God total control over our lives. God is showing me lately that I only give him part of me as a sacrifice.
Look at Romans 12:1, Therefore I urge you, brothers, in view of God's mercy, to offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God- this is your spiritual act of worship..
When we ask God what do you want? And he says, "I want your body." You see when he gets the body, he gets the contents. Paul gives us so much direction how to give it to him. "Present your body to him as a living sacrifice." 
 Why a living sacrifice? Paul was basically contrasting it with the old Testament sacrifices, which animals were first killed, cut into pieces and placed on the altar. Paul was saying, "Don't kill your body and place it on the altar. Place a living body on the altar."
When a sacrifice was placed on the altar it no longer belonged to the person who offered it, it belonged to God. God is saying, "Place your body on My altar as a living sacrifice. From now on you don't own it. I own it. You don't make decisions as to what will happen to your body- I make them. I take full responsibility for it. I decide what you will eat, wear, and where you go. 
 There are major benefits to this kind of commitment. God has a different attitude toward the property that is merely leased to Him as opposed to the property that is His. He accepts full responsibility for what he owns.
     God has made it clear that offering our bodies as living sacrifices is OBEDIENCE that comes from our heart.  Daily laying aside our own desires to follow him. Putting all our energy, resources at His disposal and TRUSTING him.
Surrendering your life to God is the most wonderful and hardest thing you will ever have to do.

To cling to your life, you will lose it; but if you give it up for me, you will find it. (Matthew 10:39).

Looking at the world through a TEMPORAL value system will cause us to pursue happiness through:  earthly treasures: money, power, popularity.
Driven only to accomplish to impress!

Prosperity knits a man to the World. He feels that is “finding his place in it,” while really it is finding its place in him.
C.S. Lewis

The eternal valve system is going to require FAITH......it will also require us to guard our hearts and our minds.
What we love is what we will give our hearts too...........and what we give our hearts to is what we pass down to our children.

"Our priorities will shape our practices!"

What have our desires made us?
AW Tozer

At the end of my life when I stand at the throne of God, I long to hear those powerful words "Well Done My Good and Faithful Servant."

all of grace,
Robbie

My Journey

Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and do not lean on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge him, and he will make straight your paths. Proverbs 3: 5-6

What a precious promise! What does that promise mean? Why do we complicate the simple? God says, in this verse, that he WILL correct our path and set a new and better course for our lives- if we.....Trust in the Lord with ALL of our heart!

God designed us, his creation, to have complete dependency upon him. Even in the everyday, ordinary decisions of a day- he wants us to seek him for counsel. When we come to him- he promises to communicate with us.

We must be faithful- to read God's word, study it, meditate on it, and obey it. God will guide us when we have decisions to make. The Holy Spirit teaches us and directs us when we pray and seek God's will for our lives. We walk by faith, not by sight.

It is our responsibility to place ourselves in the Lord's hands, through surrender, through study of his word, through fellowship with him in prayer, through uniting ourselves with others who believe.

Earnestly pray for his direction- look for his support-Trust God.

This past weekend at the "The Cove" in Asheville, NC.- I was able to spend quality time with my Lord. I am ashamed to say that, because it doesn't take- Going anywhere- to feel God. But I did feel him this weekend. I felt the warmth of the sun - shining through the trees, I felt the wind blow through my body- as if the Holy Spirit was filling my lungs with Holy Air.... I heard the trees sing praises to our Father. I saw rocks everywhere- we were on a mountain- which made me think- if I don't praise him, the rocks will.

Why do I struggle on this journey? It is plain... It is clear..... He said to me over and over... all down the mountain.....I made sure Robbie remembered it, cause I didn't have a pen handy as I rolled my pumpkin like self down the mountain. We nicknamed ourselves the pumpkin and the pear- cause it wasn't pretty seeing us, or even hearing us gasp for breath as we climbed this mountain. But what I heard so clearly, so plain.

"In all things, In all ways- acknowledge me"!!!

In the good times- In the bad times- In all times- In all ways

I have trouble with the letting go

Walk in the spirit, not the flesh

But how?

Mediate and Pray

Trust and believe

Mercy and Grace

 I remember, on the mountain, during my alone time with our Father- thinking loudly...... " What do you want from me?"...... What?

As the wind started to blow- I opened my mouth and inhaled the sweet air. I felt the Holy Spirit run through me!

All I want from you is for you to Acknowledge me.... Trust me......... Spend time with me.

Father help me hear what you are saying to me. Help me to be obedient.

Amy

Resurrection

Amy and I had front row seats in the middle of a forest............we wait in silence! We hear streams bubbling as water flows down the mountain.

In my silence I ask myself do I really want to die? Die to self..........and be resurrected with the king?

Maybe I don't really BELIEVE in the resurrection of Christ?

Romans 6:4;

We were therefore buried with him through baptism into death in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life.

We watch the sun flicker through the trees like glittering gold. We wait before streams in a desert.

There is a wood-pecker up above, and an owl hooting to another. And I wonder is it normal to think about life's pain as if it is the end to all things?

It's me who denies the resurrection when I look at death as the final!

Generations come and generations go..............but what  is it that I am seeking in the now?

Is it the temporary valve system?

or

The Eternal?

Feeling small in this spinning, falling world........meditating on John 15 has split me wide open!

Sitting beneath the trees my body quakes...........something inside of me yearns for more in this life. I tell Amy I don't know why the sunlight makes me start to cry. Is it my guilt ridden sin?  Maybe it's my selfishness, in my me-ism little world.

Maybe I weep because for so long I lived by the temporal valve system. Even enjoying it! And wanting more of it.

Aren't the deniers of the resurrection of Christ the ones who don't see His grace that is everywhere?

 His grace and mercy rein even in the darkness!

Isn't freedom found in Christ?

I open my hands and reach them up to the sky....................and quietly mumble......."I surrender all."

The sun warms my face.........and I ask myself, "what if I lived my life like the tomb was empty?"

The same power that raised Christ from the dead is LIVING in you and me............it is time to start living like it!

all of grace,

Robbie

gratitude that keeps on coming:

-having homemade turkey and dressing in the mountains

solitude with God

coming home to my bed

clean sheets

husband who missed me

learning to wait on God

long walks

a pastor who drove the long to give us Communion in the mountains

prayer

life changes

testimonies

fellowship

fresh air to breath

coolness of fall

leaves turning and falling

candles flickering into the night

A God who is unchanging peace and rest

renouncing self

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Weekends are made for kneeling at prayer altars

ISAIAH 56:7 (NIV)
⁷ these I will bring to my holy mountain
and give them joy in my house of prayer.
Their burnt offerings and sacrifices
will be accepted on my altar;
for my house will be called
a house of prayer for all nations.”

PSALM 43:4-5
⁴ Then I will go to the altar of God,
To God ^[c]my exceeding joy;
And upon the lyre I shall praise You, O God, my God.
 O send out Your light and Your truth, let them lead me;
Let them bring me to Your holy hill
And to Your dwelling places.



      Amy and I are at Cove in Asheville NC. We are on a prayer retreat! For the last month we have been meditating on John 15.  During our free time today we hiked down to the prayer altar in the woods.....the light was just beginning to lower itself through the tallest trees I have ever seen.
We bend...........and open ourselves up to the king...............we laugh and we cry......praying to be the broken.
And in the warming sunlight flowing down into the trees we find passage..................and our hearts yearn for more of him.
We hang on to the words that cry out WORTHY is the Lord..................we soak in verses from Isaiah..........and Psalms as the light flickers through the trees.
We stay bowed as the earth moves in it's own "spiritual rhythm." The trees seem to dance in the sunlight as if they were praising the King themselves.
We stand at the veil where it is torn............WAITING on our Lord.

Screaming............"My house will be a house of prayer."
We are to pray EVERYWHERE without ceasing................May your weekend be one of finding your prayer altar.......bringing thanksgiving in everything you do.

all of grace,
Robbie

New Day

 He lives at our house.....not sure why?  He has been here for a while....the kids and I love to come home and see our green little friend greet us at the back door.

The days fly by again this week...........I inhale trying so hard to breath in his grace. I exhale slowly wanting so badly for time to stand still. So much to do not knowing which way to go first.....it is then that I decide to praise the most high!
I ask myself daily what would it be like to be a companion of Jesus today?
But it's me that continues to seek his hands instead of his face......am I simply blinded? By my own flesh.................not able to see his grace that is right in front of me. Maybe I am simply CHOOSING not to see!  Especially when there is people hurting it is me that questions the most High God........instead of  kneeling on my knees to praise the King.
   
     I so long to love him in a NEW way that pleases him! Learning that up is really down and down is really up when your seeking the most high?  Isn't the point to DIE the flesh DAILY? 
I walk weekly through the hospital seeing the pain and sometimes death of others. It is then that I question Him who died for us......the one who was fully human and fully God at the same time.......He who sweated BLOOD at the thought of what was ahead! I think about my wavering faith being tossed around in the sea. How unfaithful I have been.
     Sometimes I want to scream.........how do I turn it all around? And it is then that I wonder, "who am I to question the King?"
     Sometimes the nightmares haunt me of the new widow who had to say good-bye to her husband of 63 years.......the mom who loses her teen that was driving while intoxicated. The son who watched his 77 year old father fall from a 12 story roof......The young mama who is newly diagnosed with stage four cancer and the doctors tell her there is nothing else they can do for her............. the HIV patient who had a stroke and all family and friends have disappeared since the end is near.  And I wonder where is God?................... as I run as fast as I can to my car and speed home to take a shower and try SO hard to wash the pain and the smell from my body, mind and soul. Does He see?
     It is the me who has cried out in despair I don't want to do this anymore.........but I have been called to be the humble servant to the sick and the hurting.  But some days the hurt and pain of others is what  blurrs my vision. It is then that I forget...........that I could live every moment as HOLY. Maybe ripping my clothes and putting on sack-cloth would help me to see.

    It may be next week or even tomorrow I will forget again........because someone will come through that hospital that rips a hole right through my heart...........it is then I will revert back to choosing to see through the eyes of reason instead of seeing every moment as HOLY.
     But for now I am begging please...........more of your grace. And I will say it to you and to me...........God is a good God.....His ways are not our ways...........His thoughts are not our thoughts and for now I will bend the knees and praise the most high King!


all of grace,
Robbie

 Tomorrow Amy and I traveling to Asheville, NC for a prayer retreat.........we have made a commitment to seek......seek.....seek. Daily I have spent time praying for over 300 names of beautiful women who will be there seeking the face of God! Praying hard for us as a group to have our hearts peeled back so far that we are exposed.............the kind where the flesh shows...........wanting more of him in a way I have never known. Asking kindly for your prayers too.

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a river runs through

Why is it that I have been chosen to witness the dying? I can sometimes smell the stench...the stench of death......my 13 year old asked me tonight if I thought God was a little selfish?

I look at her the woman-child who has grown so beautiful and I think to myself:  "Have I failed you?"  "Where have I gone  wrong?" There were the days when I was living the tired all the time and I was short......the kind of short with the power of words.

Life is raw sometimes muddy sometimes dirty but it continues to flow until it reaches its destination..............flows until the clogged up part stops us like a road block stopping us- dead.............dead in our tracks.

"Living water,"............I keep going back to the well.....................the well of  "living.....living water."  

Genesis 21:19  

19 Then God opened her eyes and she saw a well of water. So she went and filled the skin with water and gave the boy a drink.

What am I giving to my girls to drink? Is it the living kind? The living water?

Doesn't the God who is omnipotent provide us with the water everywhere?

But how? how do I make myself and these teens drink? Drink from the well of living water?

How easily we forget in this life.......forget what God has done for us!   I am blinded but do I really want to see?  
 the tail spin of life..... the emptiness of it all................emptiness is what I feel when another looses their life? As I stand there in the door-way of  a hospital room to someone who is terminal and I feel the nothing......Is it the nothingness that I stay in because it's safe and I am protected from the caring.....because does it really matter anyway? Maybe I am wearing my nothingness to HIDE all my sadness............
Although the water is there...........you have to want it...........you have to want to drink of the living water.............you have to want to never thirst again...........God can and will show us the well.........but it is us who has to do the drinking.......in His generous grace..........He who is the living waters is offering........offering us a drink.......a taste of heaven.
Will we drink?

     Praying that I don't forget..... what God has done.......praying not to feel such emptiness - wanting to get rid of the emptiness ............even if it is all I know........and praying for me the wretched mama to stop trying to see through the eyes of reason..................I lay my hand on the woman-child and gently take her face into my hands and I remind her that God is a good God and his goodness is full of grace.................and that we are to cling to his goodness
and I gently whisper how can I help these girls that you have entrusted to me if I can't even see?
praying..............open the eyes of my heart Lord..........I want to see what you see!

all of grace,
Robbie



(a quiet repost, while Amy and I are in the ICU's today. Thank you for your grace)

Stillness

       A stillness before God.....................waking in the wee hours of the morning tired and worn out to the work that is never done. Is it just me who sometimes resents............resents my very own fleshing blood?     Grace I whisper............more please.............more of your grace............just to endure another day in this cycle of life that can seem so repetitive............ like "ground-hog," day.
     Where is it? I ask myself............the gratitude that I am supposed to feel in the mundane of the everyday life?

Me with my outstretched hand only for the taking... from the one who lived only for the dying for me.

      What does it feel like?  Simplicity?   As the earth keeps spinning.....and the people keep aching..........looking for the one true thing that could bring happiness. Am I simply missing it?  Missing the one true way to happiness-  which is simple- the old rugged cross.

      Who am I ? The woman with unclean lips..........praising the King with one lip and screaming at the kids with the other.   What must I do to please the Lord?
And in His word He so gently takes my hand and whispers............"follow me,"..............."abide in me."  Do I really want to be a disciple? To have to deny self daily? 
My heart is pumping...........palms sweating............I am a little girl again playing in the water hose at my grandmother's house..............under a tiny car-port that looked so big at the time.
Where did the time go?  Just as our days are the numbered...............so are the hairs on our head.
    Time is ticking...........and we are the waiting.........waiting to see the king.
No-one knows the hour nor the day but the seasons are upon us..............and what must we do? But SEEK............SEEK.......................SEEK with all of our hearts...........and God himself will show us!
He will show us what time it truly is!

Is is 5 minutes to midnight? And am I just sleepwalking?

     As fall is in the air have I lost it?........lost all sense of the seasons to come........life is bearing down on us now.........not letting up..........the aching is more and more with the changing of the seasons........I have lost the stillness in him.  Time is marching on........and I am no better than a nicely wound watch.  I just keep winding and moving forward in a time that the king of the universe is screaming.........stop, look and listen to me.
     Is the everything all around me just more important than him?     It is time for stillness.   Resting in him is the way.   All else is futile.  The one who rests in him is the one who will find their way........in a broken world.......simply by........slowing down........spending time with the "Great I AM."

     Sometimes stillness is when you will see His grace fall like the leaves on a fall day. The seasons are changing...........There is beauty from ashes........the vinedresser is pruning................. the branches need to bear much fruit.


And he shall be a sanctuary.
                                                   Isaiah 8:14


     Where is your place of stillness?............Your sanctuary?
Where in the turmoil of this life?  In the busy cares of our homes?  In the hurry and the confusion of our fast paced lives.......where shall our souls find the stillness........to simply pray?
   "He shall be a sanctuary,  closer to thee than breathing, nearer than hands or feet." At any moment during all the hurried day we can be hidden from all earth's eyes, and STILL from all the earth's craziness we call life! We only have to abide in him!

all is well,
Robbie
    




Slowing down a bit this season........less time in the era of technology. Need your prayers and grace please. thank you

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