Love

To Love at all is to be vulnerable. Love anything, and your heart will certainly be wrung and possibly broken. If you want to make sure of keeping it intact, you must give your heart to no one, not even to an animal. Wrap it careful round with hobbies and little luxuries; avoid all entanglements; lock it up safe in the casket or coffin of your selfishness. But in that casket-- safe, dark, motionless, airless-- it will change. It will not be broken; it will become unbreakable, impenetrable, irredeemable.......The only place outside Heaven where you can be perfectly safe from all the dangers ......of love is Hell.
--C.S. Lewis, The Four Loves

I Don't Know

I Don't know what to think and I Don't know what to say.
I Don't want to offend but I have to get it all out. I
went to a Catholic Church on Easter Saturday.

Apparently this is a very important day in the Catholic calendar. I went because two of my nieces were baptized into the Catholic Church. They are not infants but because they were not christened as babies they have to be baptized now. The reason for baptisms as I understand it is to rid them of original sin so that if they die they will not have to spend so much time in purgatory. That in itself was difficult for me to handle. The very idea that the God who made the world...The universe would need a child to be touched with water to be rid of original sin. As if what Christ did on Easter Friday was not quite enough. It makes my heart ache. During the Mass the congregation also prayed that all the saints and the apostles would intervene for them in Heaven. That they would put in a good word for them. At the end of the Mass was Communion. Which I and my children, who are seen as infidels, were not allowed to partake. It made my heart sick. There was no beauty in the service. There could have been but it all seemed like a performance. I Don't really know who the whole thing was for. Surely not God. I felt like it was all for the people. The woman behind me knew every response and on the realization that I and my children did not, seemed to say everything all the louder.

But in my arrogance I began to think about how I 'do' church. Do I make people feel unwelcome? Do I think if I know all the words to the songs I have achieved something? Is it all just a performance for me? If I see someone who does not know the words do I judge them? When a person who has been raised in the Catholic tradition comes into my worship service do they feel like an infidel. I hope not. I want to do all I can to help them feel God's Grace. To see His Love. To touch Him and be touched by Him. Like I said I Don't know what to say and I am so full of this feeling. I have to work it out a bit more I guess. Maybe you can help me with that?

Peace is not the absence of trouble.
Peace is the presence of God.

Unknown

HEY

I was reading over my posts from last month and I realized something.
I think there is some kinda power or something to writing stuff down.
I wrote about Pressing In and I am definitely being tried in this area.
In fact I am pretty sure I got somebody else's goo on me and now the trick
is getting it off me. I didn't realize that when we press together sometimes
it gets messy and people get gooey.
It is like to old joke about never praying for patience. Perhaps God was
preparing me for what was to come. He is so faithful. It isn't over by a
long shot. I am right in the middle of........I don't even know what to call
it but I know I am in the middle. He has been faithful all along and I will
trust that He will be faithful to the end.

KISS

I was kissed this week.
A gentle passionate kiss.
A soft touch to the forhead.
A gentle whisper of a touch.
A whisper of a Love.
The love of a Lover.
The Lover of my soul.
A moment of eternity.
A gift.
A kiss.

Processing

Sooooo I am processing STUFF and I think I am doing okay.
Sometimes it is difficult to be honest with myself.
But that is really what I want...honesty...well mostly.
In reality honesty can be scarry.
Do I really want everyone to be honest with me?
NO!!!!
That would suck.
I need to be honest with myself though because I think that if I am God is more powerful in my life. I think He lives and moves in Truth and that is what I want.
I realized a bit of humility this week and then I felt proud of myself for it.
Ha Ha.
Honesty is brutal.

SHEESH

I am tired today.
Been kicked around abit.
I have done the right thing and got the wrong response.
So here is the question.
When I am put under pressure what should squeeze out of me?
You know what I mean.
If you put stuff under pressure stuff squeezes out.
If you step on a bug the guts squirt out.
If you squish grapes you get wine (eventually).
But what do you get when you pressurize me?
I know what I want to come out but is that what really happens?
When I am under pressure I want Jesus to squirt out of me.....BUT.......
I fear that all that comes out of me is squishy rotten ME.
I am sad about that.