Signs of the times

Signs that children live in the house:

1. Plugs and/or caps on all the electrical outlets.
2. Plastic hooks on the inside of every cabinet.
3. Plastic/rubber safety catches on the outside of every cabinet.
3. Fragile, unsafe, or inedible items all stored 3' or higher. Soon to be stored 4' or higher. Especially when children tote around stools.
4. No presents under the Christmas Tree, due to the certainty of pre-Christmas unwrapping. Forcefully.
5. Re-rolled toilet paper, slightly damp, in bathroom.
6. Mann's Broccolini box resting by kids' table. It IS the racecar.
7. Caps on all the doorknobs. Slightly confounding to non-parental adults as well as children.


Signs that educated, technologically advanced parents live in the house:

1. Computer screen being converted into a tv and the PS3 used as DVD/hard drive so that child can watch "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer".
2. Subsequent social commentary on "Rudolph" movie. Deemed neo-fascist and "yelly".
3. Laptops in front of every adult. At least one computer with Linux installed on it.
4. An entire shelf dedicated to Catan and Carcassonne, with every expansion that has been made.
5. Child knows sign language, as well as by the age of 18 months can point out 25 different pieces of anatomy, understands and can answer simple sentences, and can make the sounds of 15 different animals when asked. (My personal favorites are, "What does a kitty say?" "MAAOW!"; and, "What does a lion say?" "RAAAAAAHR!") Also knows within 3 minutes the name of any new adult. Also can say at least 20 words. Especially "no." "Nononononono!!!"
6. Theories on why people have sites on the internet called "sproutpeople.org" such as, "Brussel sprouts are so awful that people who life them have to band together so that they don't get kicked off the internet." Also, "You know why sprouts are so awful? It's cuz they're pure, concentrated boring."

Current Status:

This is what I feel like doing:

Taking my inside, folding it up, putting it in a box, and kicking it under my bed. Buh-bye! O wait, I kinda already did that. Too late.

Another analogy: shutting myself off. A big, fat, heavy light switch - turn it off with a loud, satisfying clunk. Or loud, echoing clunk. Take your pick.

And yet. Someone gave me a word a few weeks ago, which was, "It's time to unpack your runaway bag." I thought I did that. [Didn't feel like it had lasting fruit....but that's not for me to decide.] Guess I have to do it again.

I guess I have a chronic problem with packing up everything (in boxes, in runaway bags)....it's a theme. Gonna have to deal with that. I just don't like to see the insides of those boxes/bags/me. Hurts too much, especially when I try to sort it out and it doesn't sort the way I think it should. I guess I should let God do the sorting.

The Paradox

'Jesus said to him, “No one who puts his hand to the plow and looks back is fit for the kingdom of God.”' Luke 9:62

I have to struggle to identify what is "giving up" and what is "giving to Him." He asks me to give Him things, but in my mind that's equal to giving it up. I don't think that's true; I think giving it to Him is being willing to give it up. At least in the case of this particular thing He's asked me to give to Him.

This particular thing that He's asked me to give up has been such a large part of my life. It's been with me ever since I can remember. I discovered tonight, as I was reminded that it's no longer mine, that I have entire trains of thought and habitual thinking patterns revolving around this thing. I based my entire life - consciously or unconsciously - around this thing.

Last night I was sitting, praying and preparing to give this all to Him, and I came to the realization that I had put my entire life on hold for this. I was waiting. Not making any decisions, not making any plans, in case it affected this thing. I wasn't living. Jesus said that He came to bring life, and life abundantly. I have hardly been living, let alone abundantly! And this thing is such a part of me - but it's been holding me back. And it's funny, because I felt like this thing was going to fulfill me.

I feel like it's such a paradox. Because God wants all of me, all of my life and He wants me to die to self - yet He wants me to live the life He's given me. It's mine. Not anyone else's. I felt him say that so clearly to me. Yet I die to myself and give Him everything. All so that He can give me life to the full.

So here lies another part of my struggle. Because this was such a huge part of me, I feel grief at the loss. Truly. But Jesus says not to look back from the plough. In my grief, am I looking back from the plough, or am I going through the process of giving it to Him? I hope the latter. God has challenged me to truly desire Him more than anything, and to give Him all of me so that there is nothing left. And I want Him more than anything else. When the rubber meets the road, I make the conscious decision to say, "Lord, I want you more than this. I want YOU more than this. I want YOU more than this!!!" I still feel pain though.

Again though, it comes back to living life abundantly through Christ. When I was praying this through, I felt joy at the understanding that God wanted to give me abundant life. There's no more bondage to those things. If I am dead to myself, then I have no more fear about my reputation, no more inhibitions, no more worries about my life - and at the very same time, my life now comes from Christ, and He only gives the best and the most. Fulfillment in Christ.

"And he said to all, “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me. For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will save it. For what does it profit a man if he gains the whole world and loses or forfeits himself?" Luke 9:23-25

"The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. I came that they may have life and have it abundantly." John 10:10

Boxes

Several people have had words for me in the last few months that I have dreams, all in boxes, and they're shoved away and shelved. There is one box, one large box, in particular, that is kind of the central box. And God is wanting me to take them off the shelves, and start to unpack them.

I have difficulties with this, for a number of reasons. First, I don't even know what some of these boxes hold anymore. It's like I've shoved them away and they've gotten enveloped into my heart and hidden, and I can't remember what they were. I've forgotten those dreams. So, how can I unpack it if I have no idea what it is?

Secondly, the only one that I really know what it is - the big box - that's not something that I have control over. Only God does. So how can I unpack it if I CAN'T unpack it?

Third, looking at and trying to unpack this big box - which seems to be the key to all these other boxes - it hurts. It's too painful to look at because it reminds me of what is out of my reach. Why would I open up this box - live with this huge dream that's yet unfulfilled and completely out of my control - only to live in constant pain? It is far easier to shove it under the bed so I don't even see it, let alone have it on a shelf where I can glance at it. I know that eventually this dream - and all of these dreams - will be fulfilled; I've already trusted God with it. But for right now, I don't want that constant reminder. What else can I do but shelve it and focus on something else?

However. God has said for me to unpack them, not shelve them. I guess part of the "how" of unpacking them comes through a) praying to find out what are in these boxes that I've forgotten about; b) praying to find out how I am supposed to unpack them...and I think that there are unconventional methods...instead of taking a direct road, more like preparing for the fulfilling of the dreams. Still hurts, but I need to walk in trust that God will do what he says and that he knows what he's doing.

God Healed My Back!

I want to start by saying that a few years ago, God gave me a vision. He showed me a door frame with a curtain hanging from it. I was standing at the edge of this doorway. The curtain fluttered in the wind, and I saw almost like a starry night behind it. I knew that behind that curtain was so much more to/in God than I could imagine, and I knew that it would look different once I stepped through it than what it looked like from this side of the doorway. I wanted to go through that doorway, but I didn't know how.

After I got off the phone with Pastor George last year in regards to taking the youth pastor position here, I had a decision to make. I knew that if I stayed in the Lower Mainland, I could get a good job, have a great youth group and ministry, but I'd never go through that doorway. I knew that if I went to Port Hardy, God would take me through the door.

Well I have to tell you, God has taken me through that doorway. As I've told many of those who know me, my entire paradigm of how I thought God worked or didn't work got turned upside down this past year. It started with a question of "why couldn't he work like that?" and evolved to "God does work like that. In fact, he works any way he likes and I have no idea what he's going to do next."

On Tuesday, the 12th, God healed my back. You all know how much time and money I've spent on Chiropractors - my mom can attest to that. For any of you who don't know, when I was 20 I injured my back though a weekend of intense physical activity - a lot of heavy lifting, chopping wood, and a four-hour horse ride. Since then I've gone to the chiropractor in Maple Ridge, and then when I couldn't afford to keep going, stopped. I put out my back in 2008 when I was in White Rock, and again shortly after I moved to Port Hardy.

We've been having a 9-day conference focusing on healing, miracles, God's power and stuff. I have seen a deaf guy get healed, I've seen a guy walk in on two canes and at the end of the night run and dance out, without the canes, I've seen a baby's stomach get healed, I've seen people get touched with the love of Christ and the power of the Holy Spirit. My youth have been touched by God, and are now praying for people with boldness. And I myself have had some crazy encounters with God that I can't even begin to describe. One of them, like I said, was when God healed my back.

God had started something on my back on Oct 11th, Monday night, but it wasn't finished, so I went up for prayer on Tuesday night. My pastor's wife prayed for me; I went down on the floor with the power of God, and from that point on, for next hour and a half I felt like I was at a "cosmic chiropractor". My hips, which had been twisted and my left higher than my right, from my spine being out of alignment, all of a sudden moved where my right came up and my left came down. From there, God worked up my back, twisting me and arching my back, and doing what felt like to me deep chiropractic adjustments. Like I said, this went on for an hour and a half. And then he sat me up a couple times and started stretching me and rotating my back. Then he moved me into ballet stretches and warm-ups. Now, I have not taken ballet. The only dance training I've had is one year of mixed dance in grade 10, and only one unit was beginning ballet. So the girl that was filming me has taken dance for most of her life; she recognized that I was going through ballet warm-ups. Then God danced me. And I am serious when I say God danced me - I had no control over my limbs. It was like being led in a dance, only not from the outside but from the inside. I was fully aware of what was going on, just not in control. (Though I tried to control it at first, which resulted in some funny collisions with chairs and stuff. After that I yielded, and God led me in dance). I danced to music that was in the background at church, and did moves that I've never done, with a grace I have never had before. Michelle (the one trained in dance) told me later that part of the reason she knew it was God and not me was all the technical stuff, like posture and my feet/hands positions, that I couldn't possibly have known. Then, after 15 minutes of dancing, with no elevated heartrate, no sweating, no breathing hard - God did cool-down stretches and movements with me. Michelle and Caleb (who has also taken dance) said that I was doing a bar routine. At the very end, God had me pray over Michelle, and then Caleb - again, Him moving me - and Michelle told me later that I had been on point when I was praying over Caleb. Point is the most advanced position a ballerina can do - it's dancing on the very tip-toes - which I have never done. And I was in bare feet.

There's more to the story, but in a nutshell, God healed my back. And I have a video that was taken of the tail end of the healing and almost the entire dance. I've uploaded it to Youtube in two parts, both of which I am linking onto this email. I am totally amazed, still am, that God healed my back, and then danced me. It was the most incredible experience I have ever had.

This is what's on my mind.

So I recently came into acquisition pictures of myself taken 6 or 7 years ago. Complete with braces, glasses, and bushman eyebrows, I was the picture of a cute, insecure girl who had forayed into the realms of neither confidence nor style. Not that I have any great style now. I still wear hand-me-downs and clothes that I don't realize don't suit my body until a year down the road. But I'm getting better. At least I have sweet accessories.

The pictures having been taken pre-college, I was at that point 20 lbs lighter. God how I hate to say that. Here's why: like any cute, insecure girl with no style, no confidence, and bushman eyebrows, I thought I was fat.

GAH!

Ok. So I was not stick-thin like my Asian buddies. But I was no means obese, or even overweight. All of the adults around me told me, "You're not fat. When you get older, you're going to look back on pictures of yourself and think, 'Jeez I was skinny!'" I was in size 7 pants, for crying out loud!

But the point of this blog post is not to whine about how much weight I've gained since then. I mean, I'm still only in size 9 pants now. It's more to make an observation of myself and how I see myself. See, I'd look in the mirror and think about how fat I was, or how ugly I was - or at least how unpretty I was. I couldn't laugh at myself the way I can now - like how when I had braces, my lips were caught in a permanent smile due to the effort it took to close them over my protruding braces. Hahaha. My esteem wasn't helped by my @$$ of an ex-boyfriend, who gently and sweetly put his arm around me and told me he'd never have to worry about cheating on him, because I wasn't pretty enough to get someone better than him. &^%$!!!! No, all you readers out there, I didn't dump him on the spot. I didn't even kick him in the 'nads. I just took it tearfully, wondering how someone could say that, and if he said what I actually heard him say.

If I had a bf that said that to me now, I'd laugh in his face and tell him to get outta my life before the multitudes of male relatives and friends in my life beat him to death, and on his way out I'd recommend a good counselor.

But I digress.

I look at myself now, and I can recognize that my self-discipline is not where it should be; I live a far more sedentary and calorie-filled life than is healthy. However, I have also come to realize that - and here's the kicker - MY APPEARANCE DOES NOT DETERMINE MY WORTH!!

(*Trumpets and fanfare burst out, multitudes sing, "Hail, the conquering hero!"*)

On the flip-side to this, like any post-college person with less than strict discipline, I have acquired some unhealthy eating habits (Ie., sitting at the computer until all hours of the night, snacking) and therefore have also acquired the afore-mentioned 20lbs. However! Seeing myself in my size 7 state, knowing that what I did then was only a little more disciplined than now, is actually a little encouraging. >That in itself is an improvement on self esteem, ps. Instead of looking at myself with no muffin-tops and being miserable, I'm actually encouraged.< I think part of it is, for the past few years the only thing I've been seeing is my muffin-toppy self, and thinking that it's the norm for my body. In essence, I think I forgot what my body looks like when it to looks like what it's supposed to look like. lol.

So! A few weeks back a friend and I started running together. We're following the program found in The Beginning Runner's Handbook by the Sports Medicine Council of BC. If any of you have not read this book, you need to read it. It covers nutrition (not just for healthy eating but also for athletes, or those venturing into the athletic world); proper running technique; injuries and such; and most importantly emphasizes that running is as much a mental discipline as it is physical. In any case, I, a die-hard life-long running hater - have now converted to a die-hard life-long running enthusiast.

I've done this program before. Last year I trained to be in the Vancouver Sun Run. I did it in a decent time for me, especially since I previously was not a runner and also since I had to take a bit of time off when my grandfather passed away. Last time I was also attending a weekly exercise group run by my army reserve friend; this time, I have to stir up the motivation to do strength training by myself.

I digress once again. Basically, seeing myself as a size 7 reminds me to keep on with my fitness and to keep making -good- changes to my eating habits. If I do that, well maybe I won't be size 7, but I'll be a lot healthier and happier.

Kayaking

I have to say, for a couple days I was a little unsatisfied that I lived in a town so far away from civilization. The last trip in to Vancouver, and then my trip in to Duncan and Nanaimo, actually made me think that I would like to live somewhere a little more populated. See for a while I couldn't stand living in Van. I got claustrophobic and ached for somewhere with hardly any people and open air and ocean. But my last couple trips made me realize that I could adapt to living in a town or even Vancouver fairly easily. Doesn't mean I'd like it. Just that I could do it with some measure of success.

But then I went kayaking this morning. I didn't want to get up, but when I finally dragged myself out of bed and when we finally got onto the water (at 9 am - I was up and kayaking by 9 am on a Saturday) I realized that I am very lucky to live here.

Being on the open water like that, just gliding along in the quiet of the morning, paddling between the islands and exploring beaches, watching the marine life - it was pretty breathtaking. I felt really connected to nature. I said to Drew, "I think I was born to live here." It helped that it was an incredible day (I actually got sunburned, it was that nice out) and that the water was calm and that I was with awesome people. But even just being that physically close to the water, breathing the salt air - it was fantastic. It fed my soul. It was so much nicer than just zooming along on a motorized boat. I actually got to take in my surroundings, work with the water, just think only about the islands and the water and the little fish swimming in great clouds below my kayak. And getting out to explore some of the islands, seeing the interesting shells and stopping at the tidal pools to watch crabs fight and shellfish feed - it just takes life to a whole other level. I got to lay on a sandy beach with blue ocean stretching out in front of me. I got to dig my feet into warm sand in the shallow water, chase tiny bullheads, and hop along boulders and driftwood bleached white from the sun. I got to find beautiful shells and stones and discover the tiny pearls that mussels make.

And then tonight, after having an afternoon nap, we went out and had a fire on the beach. And we got to see phosphorescence! That's the first time this year I've gotten to see it. So beautiful.

And I think what made it extra nice is that I got to do that with people I like and care about. And there was no agenda, no time frame, just taking life a little slower, having time to breathe and be us.