It's a Wonderful Life

       I was driving home from a depressing day at work, feeling low, when God flooded my mind with flashes of beautiful memories- vibrant FL sky, theme song texts from Dams, the crisp smell of winter trees, Jason dances, Ukraine, my Dad's voice, Tennyson, "Miss Abi, I'm gonna ask Santa to bring you Diamonds," Wesley-made apple and cheese omlettes with blueberries, Robin's ears, yellow, twinkle lights, despereauxing, Southern fam, Jesus..... I cried in my car for the joy of it all.  I have Jesus, and all this as well?  Our God is overwhelmingly generous.  
       I've realized this year has been especially wonderful.  It started with Passion, where God began to unravel my bound heart and allowed it to begin trusting Him truly.  Then my bosom friend got engaged... engaged!  She's getting married!  She's my shield, and I've learned more from her example in this season than I can express.  I loved most of my classes and got As both semesters.  I started working at the Bookstore, surrounded by beautiful words and women who invest in me and love me.  I spent two glorious months in Ukraine that has and will shape my life forever.  I started writing poetry again.  I met and grew closer to beautiful people.  I've seen the sun rise and set over the sea from two different coasts on the same day.  My Savior has revealed Himself ever more beautiful and good and just and loving.  He's set me aflame and given me purpose, specific purpose unraveling before my very eyes!  I know who I am now on a far deeper plane than ever before- what I'm good at, what I'm not, what I hate, where I'm weak.  Something else about this year, it was the first year I could say I'm truly content to be single.  I've been single my whole life either from pure conviction or even fear, but this year I've loved it.  I've seen how God has protected my heart and used singleness to cultivate good.  I don't worry about the future anymore, it's in God's hands.
       I don't say all this to boast, well, not in myself at least.  God has changed my life, is changing my life, my pathetic life!  He works all things together for good, and I am thankful for the ways He is working it in my own life.  Life isn't perfect; I am so far from perfect.  But.  this realization doesn't cause me to despair anymore.  Yes, I am a wretched sinner who has spent her whole life fighting against the proof that she can't make herself worthy.  But Jesus saves...

The LORD saw it, and it displeased him

that there was no justice.

He saw that there was no man,

and wondered that there was no one to intercede;

then his own arm brought him salvation,

and his righteousness upheld him.

He put on righteousness as a breastplate,

and a helmet of salvation on his head;

he put on garments of vengeance for clothing,

and wrapped himself in zeal as a cloak...And a Redeemer will come to Zion,

to those in Jacob who turn from transgression,” declares the LORD.

(Isaiah 59)

Our Business

     "Oh! captive, bound and double-ironed," cried the phantom, "not to know that ages of incessant labor, by immortal creatures, for this earth, must pass into eternity before the good of which it is susceptible is all developed!  Not to know that any Christian spirit working kindly in its little sphere, whatever it may be, will find its mortal life too short for its vast means of usefulness!  Not to know that no space of regret can make amends for one life's opportunities misused!  Yet such was I!  Oh!  Such was I!"
     "But you were always a good man of business, Jacob," faltered Scrooge, who now began to apply this to himself.
     "Business!" cried the Ghost, wringing his hands again.  "Mankind was my business.  The common welfare was my business; charity, mercy, forbearance, and benevolence were all my business.  The dealings of my trade were but a drop of water in the comprehensive ocean of my business!"

Romans 7:14-25

For we know that the law is spiritual; but I am made out of flesh, sold into sin's power. For I do not understand what I am doing, because I do not practice what I want to do, but I do what I hate. And if I do what I do not want to do, I agree with the law that it is good. So now I am no longer the one doing it, but it is sin living in me. For I know that nothing good lives in me, that is, in my flesh. For the desire to do what is good is with me, but there is no ability to do it. For I do not do the good that I want to do, but I practice the evil that I do not want to do. Now if I do what I do not want, I am no longer the one doing it, but it is the sin that lives in me. So I discover this principle: when I want to do good, evil is with me. For in my inner self I joyfully agree with God's law. But I see a different law in the parts of my body, waging war against the law of my mind and taking me prisoner to the law of sin in the parts of my body. What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death?...

...I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord!

I am not a slave to sin. but sometimes it feels that way.

Tomorrow, Jesus, kindred spirits, the sea.

I saw red and yellow flowers outside 

The brightest sunrise than i seen in a long time. 

And through it all, 

I stood and stumbled, waded through my thoughts and heart 

Yeah through it all, 

I fooled and fumbled, lost to the poet's frown. 

I fought the wolves of patience just to let it lie down. 

See these waters they'll pull you up, 

Oh if you're bolder than the darkness. 

That these songs be an instrument to cut 

Spaces between the happiness and the hardness. 

Out the door, 

The touch of morning, the burning of the frost 

Out the door 

Strong hands to hold; good friends that i never lost. 

And what we found 

Down these coves of limestone and cockle shells, 

What we found 

Down these roads that wander as lost as the heart 

Is a chance to breathe again, a chance for a fresh start. 

See these waters they'll pull you up, 

Oh if you're bolder than the darkness. 

That these songs be an instrument to cut 

Spaces between the happiness and the hardness. 

Oh, spaces between the happiness and the hardness. 

Ben Howard, "These Waters"

His blessings just keep coming!

I just received a $500 check for my Ukraine trip from a completely unexpected source!! Ack!  Does God deliver, or does He deliver?!

*a day after posting the above, someone gave me a check for $1500!! 

I think it might be possible that God wants me to go to Ukraine.... :)

For Comrade.

Thanks for "freeze crackled." [^^^]

Waking up brittle

 

Oh sleepy body, up!

Out of comforter, and be sheetless.

Freeze crackled body grabs a sweater.

It is 78 degrees.

The sweater is an attempt to shelter the thinness of body skin

thinned like an egg shell in vinegar.

Thinness smells sharp like vinegar,

but really

feels dry like a socket where a tooth once thick and hardy

now evaporated to shell and sensitive nerves shivers,

but really

sounds like air slicing hollow branches which are

dead and no longer thirsty.

"If we are faithLESS He remains faithFUL."

no. joke.
I'm almost to embarrassed to share this, but God is proving His faithfulness in my life and it's so overwhelming that I want to write it down and never let myself forget!  I have been freaking out about my life (note 2 posts ago): devastated that I won't be able to see the children I love in Ukraine next month, confused and scared because I hadn't raised enough money for the trip and there is no way I could pay for it, doubting God's blessing in giving me the opportunity to go, tangled in problems with the scarves I'm making/selling for Ukraine, stressed to the max about my college classes, directionless in my future....
     Sunday night, I was ready to explode with the weight of it all.  I wanted to scream at God "why aren't You coming through for me!?"
          Well....
Monday morning I find out the issues with the scarves are completely resolved and I didn't have to lift a finger.
Monday afternoon I'm given an extension on the due date for the money for the trip.
Tuesday morning I'm told it is possible to have the Vovka kids leave their orphanage and visit us in Kyiv and, if they come, we'll throw a Christmas party for them!
Also Tuesday morning, I find out there are long term mission positions with Hope for Orphans I could get involved in.
Tuesday mid-morning one of my professors gives the class an extension on the due date for our final paper (this has never happened to me in my 5 years at Rollins!)
Tuesday afternoon my poetry prof. encourages me to pursue a MFA degree in creative writing.
Tuesday night I get a call from a friend who found out I need funds for my trip and wants to help me out.
     I mean, how insane is this!!  God did all this for me even when I didn't have the faith to hope for it.  He is too good to me.  I don't deserve Him one iota and yet He delights in flooding me with His blessing! 
Hallelujah!

"When I'm weary and overwrought with so many battles left unfought..."

"...I think of Paul and Silas in the prison yard
 I hear their song of freedom rising to the stars...
I see the slave awakening to the value of her soul
I see the young missionary and the angry spear 
I see his family returning with no trace of fear
I see the long hard shadows of Calcutta nights
I see the young girl huddled on the brothel floor
I see the man with a passion come kicking down that door
I see the man of sorrow and his long troubled road
I see the world on his shoulders and my easy load" 
 (from Sarah Groves' "When the Saints," definitely my victory song. thanks Dams.)

     It's so easy to look at the world and despair over its atrocious state.  It's easy to doubt God's goodness.  It's easy for me to doubt.  But I have to remember, God is on the move.  He is restoring His people, and He calls me not to despair, but to "fill up what is still lacking in Christ's affliction" (Col. 1:24).  Not that Christ's suffering lacks something to complete salvation, but it does lack a messenger, and He has called us to be that messenger!  Is it a task too big for us?  Yes.  Can we save the world? No.  But God's message is far beyond us.  "It [God's Word] shall not return to me empty, but it shall accomplish that which I purpose, and shall succeed in the thing for which I sent it" (Isaiah 55:10-11).  As Isaiah says earlier in chap. 55, God's vision is far higher than ours.  What looks like inevitable defeat to us, He has planned for ultimate victory.

     The fam and I have been watching The Lord of the Rings over the past few nights- phenomenal movies!  The story resonates so strongly with THE story, the one we are all living.  But I have to say, great as the movies are, the books are still better.  I love the moment when Sam realizes his and Frodo's impossible journey goes beyond their current circumstances.  He catches the vision of a greater perspective.

"We shouldn’t be here at all if we’d known more about it before we started. But I suppose it’s often that way. The brave things in the old tales and songs, Mr. Frodo: adventures, as I used to call them. I used to think that they were things the wonderful folk of the stories went out and looked for, because they wanted them, because they were exciting and life was a bit dull, a kind of sport, as you might say. But that’s not the way of it with the tales that really mattered, or the ones that stay in the mind. Folk seem to have been just landed in them, usually—their paths were laid that way, as you put it. But I expect they had lots of chances, like us, of turning back, only they didn’t. And if they had, we shouldn’t know, because they’d have been forgotten. We hear about those as just went on—and not all to a good end, mind you; at least not to what folk inside a story and not outside it call a good end."
     When I stay focused in the story, I'm overwrought, but God is outside the story, and He promises me the story's worth fighting for.  It's just so hard for me to remember.  One of the worst aspects of my personality is the way I totter between apathy and ambition, rarely do I balance in between.  In ambition I strive to be and do and think in my own strength, and I burn out (like that quote from Ever After- "I used to think if I cared about anything, I'd have to care about everything, and I'd go stock-raving mad!") then I flip to the opposite end and decide not to care at all- what can I do about it anyway?  Nothing in my own strength.  My Lord remembers that I am dust and gives me His strength to accomplish His purposes.  I'm preaching to myself because, though I know this is true, I don't live like I know it.
     I want to change.  to fight the long defeat.  I want to say, as Paul Farmer said, “I have fought the long defeat and brought other people on to fight the long defeat, and I’m not going to stop because we keep losing.  I don’t dislike victory... we’re used to being on a victory team.  We want to be on the winning team, but at the risk of turning our backs on the losers, no, it’s not worth it. So you fight the long defeat.”  There are suffering people in to world without a glimmer of hope.  I want to fight ferociously for those people.
     I'm realizing, we can't fight the long defeat (with hints of future glory) until we catch the vision, until we truly know what we are fighting for WILL come, and will be of far surpassing worth.  This may be a silly example, but bear with me.  Yesterday morning Dad and I were talking about scuba diving.  We got so excited that we actually started dream planning a dive/fishing trip to Roatan, Honduras.  (We're both slightly obsessed with the ocean).

As we looked at pictures of stunning reefs, read about sea creatures and ship wrecks, and talked about diving shear wall drops into 10,000 ft deep blue brilliance, I realized that, as much as I longed for these things (and let me tell you, I want them bad!) they are only a reflection of the glories of Heaven, of eternity with Jesus.  He is all surpassing worth, worth fighting for, living for, dying for, even "losing" for.
    
     Please pray for me, that I would fight, and remember how worthy of fighting for He is.

Psalm 13

amen.

My mind has been terrifyingly chaotic as of late with so many thoughts I've wanted to blog but couldn't catch and organize into logical slots.  Well, my mental state hasn't improved, but if I don't at least try to release something from my mind it will explode, implode, freeze, overheat, disintegrate... I don't know, but something awful.
So this will probably not make any sense.  I apologize in advance.
You know, I thought I had finally figured out in what direction God wanted me to move, finally.  But I gotta say, right now I'm pretty darn clueless, again.  I was going to become a writer.  Clearly God opened doors in that direction. And maybe I will become a writer, but honestly, I. hate. writing.   No really.  Poetry is difficult, but I love the challenge and the results so it's not too miserable, but anything else?  Hate it.  Creative writing?  I'll spend 6 hours writing 3 pages of nonsense presented in miserable, ungrammatical, simple sentences.  Analytical writing?  I'll spend days compiling copious research, become an expert on the topic, then stare at a blank Word document for hours, write one sentence, wipe the blood off my brow and write another sentence hours later.   Writing is certainly not my natural skill set.  I can't even spell.  I work hard, and I've learned much, but I'm not good at it. 
Ukraine.  I had this grand idea of going over there and teaching English after I graduate, but, uh, graduation is fast approaching and I still don't speak Russian.  Who in their right mind would move to a country and not know the language?  Denis called me out on that one yesterday while we were skyping.  "It's not a good example," he said.  and he's right.  How dare I try and teach people my language when I can't even speak theirs?  And then there's the orphans.  My soul aches for the kids I met this summer.  I desperately wanted to rescue them.  I prayed fervently that God would allow me to contact them again.  Then I was invited back to Ukraine in January, to one of the orphanages I went to this summer!  God had answered my prayers!  He was going to give me my heart's desire!  Yesterday I found out we are now going to a completely new orphanage, far away from the kids I love.  And.  we're not spending much of our time with the orphans because of other ministry we will do.  Not gonna lie, I felt a bit betrayed by God.  I mean, I was fine with not going back to Ukraine; I knew He loved the kids more than I and they were in His hands, but to allow me to hope and almost give me my dream only to dash it?  It seemed cruel.
Fortunately, He didn't let me stay in that place for long.  He met me tonight.  I don't have any idea how to accurately express how, but it was a moment more sweet and beautiful than any this world can offer.  I was driving home from my first Winter With the Writers intern meeting, stressing out hardcore.  This internship will be -to put it mildly- intense.  But in the middle of my stress, God spoke to me.  You've got it all wring love; let me reframe it for you.  This internship isn't about you being an amazing writer and the top of your class, this internship is an opportunity to love people, to show them how much I love them, to serve them like I serve you.  He painted a stunning, precious picture of life, true purposeful life!  My burdens melted under the beauty of Him.  Life isn't about me, hallelujah!!  Life is so much bigger than me!  The Lord, my Lord, LOVES me. me!  Even though I treat Him horribly, He loves me.  He wants me to play a part in His beautiful, meaningful plan for restoration of the whole world!  There is so much I don't know in this world, so much I will never measure up to, but I know this, more than it is possible for me to know anything else.  The beautiful creator of all that exists knows my name, and He loves me. AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!
We've been discussing narratives and frames in my classes this past week, and I realized something.  Humans are limited.  I'm limited (cue music: "I'm limited, just look at me.  I'm liiiiiiiiiiiiiimited"....).  No matter how much information I take in, I will never know everything, and therefore can never make a true assessment or judgement of anything, because I do not know it completely.  Not history, not science, not culture, nothing can truly be interpreted without being fully known.  We all see through a frame.  Granted, some people's frames are larger than others, but it's still a frame- limited vision.  The only way to remove a frame, is to be omniscient.  So ya know what most people do once they realize this?  They become extremely depressed and decide truth is relative, we all create our own truth based on our own limited perspectives.  Meaning is created.  It's what makes story different than event.  The events of our life happen, but as soon as we reflect on them, any time we tell our story, we're creating purpose and meaning, so life only means what we want it too, which is basically saying life doesn't really mean anything at all because meaning is not universal.  BUT, there is good news!  Yes, we are limited and can never fully understand anything, but we can know the person who does know all things!  The person who is not limited by any frames because He is the first and the last, He knows all that was, is, and is to come!  What's more than that, He's created a story!  A story that does have universal meaning and purpose, a story that He invites us into!  Isn't this glorious?!  For a girl who relies far to heavily on her own intellect, this is such freeing and wonderful news!  I don't have to figure everything out, I CAN'T even if I killed myself trying!  AND YET I can know truth!  I know Him intimately!  and He loves me!  Praise the Lord of all the earth!

Victory

I met her three times,

in Paris first,

reduced to torso and sheet-tangled legs,

her bellybutton exposed by sea breeze,

yet people call her Winged Victory.

I saw her again in push-ups and lace,

still wearing wings,

smelling like jasmine, body, and desire

from Victoria’s.

Last time I did not see her.

With clipped wings, she’s a true secret now.

“Oh Natasha, Natasha!  Natasha!” John sang in climax.

And she? another’s victory.

The Book Thief. Markus Zusak.

Part 1: DEATH AND CHOCOLATE 

"First the colors.

Then the humans. 

That's usually how I see things. 

Or at least, how I try. 

***HERE IS A SMALL FACT *** 

You are going to die. 

I am in all truthfulness attempting to be cheerful about this whole topic, though most people find themselves hindered in believing me, no matter my protestations. Please, trust me. I most definitely can be cheerful. I can be amiable. Agreeable. Affable. And that's only the A's. Just don't ask me to be nice. Nice has nothing to do with me. 

***Reaction to the *** 

AFOREMENTIONED fact 

Does this worry you? 

I urge you--don't be afraid.

I'm nothing if not fair.

--Of course, an introduction. 

A beginning. 

Where are my manners?

I could introduce myself properly, but it's not really necessary. You will know me well enough and soon enough, depending on a diverse range of variables. It suffices to say that at some point in time, I will be standing over you, as genially as possible. Your soul will be in my arms. A color will be perched on my shoulder. I will carry you gently away. 

At that moment, you will be lying there (I rarely find people standing up). You will be caked in your own body. There might be a discovery; a scream will dribble down the air. The only sound I'll hear after that will be my own breathing, and the sound of the smell, of my footsteps. 

The question is, what color will everything be at that moment when I come for you? What will the sky be saying? 

Personally, I like a chocolate-colored sky. Dark, dark chocolate. People say it suits me. I do, however, try to enjoy every color I see--the whole spectrum. A billion or so flavors, none of them quite the same, and a sky to slowly suck on. It takes the edge off the stress. It helps me relax. 

***A SMALL THEORY *** 

People observe the colors of a day only at its beginnings and ends, but to me it's quite clear that a day merges through a multitude of shades and intonations, with each passing moment. A single hour can consist of thousands of different colors. 

Waxy yellows, cloud-spat blues. Murky darknesses. In my line of work, I make it a point to notice them. 

As I've been alluding to, my one saving grace is distraction. It keeps me sane. It helps me cope, considering the length of time I've been performing this job. The trouble is, who could ever replace me? Who could step in while I take a break in your stock-standard resort-style vacation destination, whether it be tropical or of the ski trip variety? The answer, of course, is nobody, which has prompted me to make a conscious, deliberate decision--to make distraction my vacation. Needless to say, I vacation in increments. In colors. 

Still, it's possible that you might be asking, why does he even need a vacation? What does he need distraction from? 

Which brings me to my next point. 

It's the leftover humans. 

The survivors. 

They're the ones I can't stand to look at, although on many occasions I still fail. I deliberately seek out the colors to keep my mind off them, but now and then, I witness the ones who are left behind, crumbling among the jigsaw puzzle of realization, despair, and surprise. They have punctured hearts. They have beaten lungs.

Which in turn brings me to the subject I am telling you about tonight, or today, or whatever the hour and color. It's the story of one of those perpetual survivors--an expert at being left behind. 

It's just a small story really, about, among other things: 

* A girl 

* Some words 

* An accordionist 

* Some fanatical Germans 

* A Jewish fist fighter 

* And quite a lot of thievery 

I saw the book thief three times." 

I can't even begin to express my love for this book.

Days have theme songs...

...and though it's almost over, here's today's, compliments of Lacrae.

Father God, I'm prayin' to you for somebody, who knows you Lord but just hasn't, hasn't been seein' you in the right view lately, Hear me out...
Father, I'm prayin' for a friend he and I are pretty close, and out of all my friends for this one I'm concerned the most. He say he readin' daily but he ain't really learnin'. He been in church but say that he ain't moved by any sermon. His faith's weak, he ain't prayed in a week, he wake up and just weeps with his face in the sink. Lord, you gotta help my man, I'm prayin' for him daily, he ain't sinned but it just seem as if he goin' crazy. He say he feelin' trapped... he's strugglin', even though he talk to me, I tell him what to do but he don't listen when he oughta' be. I'm scared for him coz there's people that look up to him, he got some younger siblings who been changed by what he's done for them but is it done for him? Lord don't let it be, if he don't wanna talk to you then Father hear from me...
  Yeah, I'm prayin' for you, I'm prayin' for you...
God, his condition is worsen since we were last conversed and I'm with him now and he ain't doin' well and this I'm certain. He say he tryna' trust you, doesn't wanna disgust you but he was in the mist of sinners and did not discuss you and just today his anxiety's got the best of him, he knows Christ but for hours refuse to rest in Him, he's not the best of men but Lord I know he really loves you and I can't understand why lately he's not thinkin' of you. People trust this dude, you could crush this dude, Father he needs more of you.  I pray you touch this dude.  What can I say to him? I'm determined to pray for him.  Father empty and break him.  I pray you'll just have your way with him, coz there's a change in him and the effects are strong.  I pray you open up his heart before the next song and when he gets home, I pray he'll open up the sixty-six book love letter you wrote and soak it up coz he ain't hearin' You and he ain't feelin' me and God I know it's killin' You because it's killin' me and matter of fact there's somethin' else he's concealin' see,
                                                    the person that I've been prayin' about is really me...

torrens voluptatis

I will see JESUS, really see Him, literally in His presence.
"At present, if we are reborn in Christ, the spirit in us lives directly on God; but the mind and, still more, the body receives life from Him at a thousand removes- through our ancestors, through our food, through the elements.  The faint, far-off results of those energies which God's creative rapture implanted in matter when He made the worlds are what we now call physical pleasures; and even thus filtered, they are too much for our present management.  What would it be to taste at the fountainhead that stream of which even these lower reaches prove so intoxicating?  Yet that, I believe, is what lies before us.  The whole man is to drink joy from the fountain of joy... In the light of our present specialized and depraved appetites, we cannot imagine this torrens voluptatis, and I warn everyone most seriously not to try.  But it must be mentioned, to drive out thoughts even more misleading- thoughts that what is saved is a mere ghost, or that the risen body lives in numb insensibility.  The body was made for the Lord, and these dismal fancies are wide of the mark.
     Meanwhile the cross comes before the crown and tomorrow is Monday morning..." ~C.S. Lewis, The Weight of Glory
But it is not this day; today is the cross.  To live is Christ and to die is gain.  No, it's not today, but it IS coming, and glorious anticipation gives us strength to continue.

Sometimes I wonder about the sanity (or lack thereof) of my mind...

So instead of hashing out cognitive thought, here's a cockney poem I wrote a couple years back.
As art, it's miserable- as an expression of my mind, it serves.
[and no, I'm not British, so yes, my cockney isn't legit, shopopalo]

Cockney

Here's lookin' at you kid

'Cause tonight you're gonna Charlie Brown

I'll be lookin' fer you kid

As the icy waves crash down

The first'll mess an' muck your brearf

The second, knock you cold

The third brings resurrecshun

This jig ney'er grows old!

Lor', luv a duck!

Cold blink in Jurrassic Park

Ya sure feel like a schmuck

Chomped by Noah's Ark

The George Michael's quite legendary

So unfortunately ordinary

"Logic! Why don't they teach logic at these schools?"

Forgive me as I climb onto a soap box...

     I've grown up with a sense of moral obligation to education.  Grades are only a reflection on that obligation, as words are to faith.  Thanks Mom- I think homeschooling helped form my mind that way.
     Most students know how to make the grade: take good notes, tell the prof what he wants to hear, study for the test... that's how most students "learn."  But they never activate their minds.  They don't think, and their teachers often don't require them to.
     I could go on and on about the failings of our educational system, but (I think) students realizing education is not a vehicle to a "good job" but rather an intrinsically valuable entity in itself is the first step to developing our minds.  And, as Ben Stuart points out, the formation of our minds matter because "what you think about is what you care about and what you care about is what you chase."
                                                                                          ...stepping down from box now.