Write! That's All He Said...Five Minute Friday

Oh how I have missed my Five Minute Friday's. I've been traveling and busy working on two different book launch teams and have neglected this activity that has become a discipline...the catalyst to get my fingers to the keyboard and spill words out onto the page from the depths of my heart. All based on one word...just one word from Lisa-Jo and hundreds of bloggers all over the country and beyond get their creative thinking caps on and type for five minutes(or longer...as is usually the case with me), whatever comes to mind based on that one word.

I've been so overwhelmingly busy with...well...LIFE, that I thought I might not do another FMF post until late October or maybe even November. Then I happened onto Lisa-Jo's post for today, and the word prompt was WRITE.  This word has a very special meaning to me so I could not ignore it this week and WRITE I must!

So here goes...
 Write

Go...

As I have shared in a previous post, God gave me a word in 2008. Yes...I heard one, single, solitary word. Over and over and over...in as close to being a real hear-it-out-loud voice as I have ever heard. I knew that this was God's voice telling me to write. I just had no idea what it was He wanted me to write. Here is the entry in my journal around the time I was hearing this from God...

February 3, 2008
Write. Write…Write! This one word has been playing over and over to me for weeks now, maybe even months. Almost audibly. I hear the word. I believe god is telling me to write. I have shared this with Rod, Lyndsay, and my ladies bible study. Now I feel accountable, but I still don't know WHAT I am supposed to write. 

 And here is a little of what was going on in my mind at this time…

Ok God...I get it! I'm supposed to write, but could you clue me in on exactly what I'm supposed to write about.? Oh yeah...and I'm not exactly a writer ...sooooo, I'm gonna need a little help here. I'm scared. What if I write the wrong thing or worse yet, what if it stinks?  What if I write something and nobody reads it? Or they read it and hate it?  Is this supposed to be a book or a project?  My testimony? I'm not ready to share all of my life with the world.  Our son Brad had just experienced his second traumatic brain incident and we were in the process of going with him through all of the speech, occupational and physical therapies. Was I supposed to write about that?  It was all still too real and raw to share with the world at large. No...not that...not yet.  

So...I began to journal, somewhat sporadically. I figured if God wanted me to write I needed to walk in obedience to His voice and write...something...anything, until He gave me something a little more concrete with which to work. Then in October of that year I began this blog. It was a very slow process as I had no idea what I was doing. I am a sporadic blogger...not good in the blogging world.  You don't build a better blog unless you actually...blog. 

God has brought me a long way from that day in February of 2008. Sometimes God gives us a 'word' or a vision but it might be years before it is ready to be set into place...to see it come to fruition.(Click to tweet)  Look how long it took Joseph to step into his calling! You can read about all he had to go through to be ready to be the instrument God used to save his nation and the lives of his own brothers who had left him for dead so many years before (1 Samuel 17:51). 

God uses all those things in our lives...the good, the bad and the ugly to work out His good and perfect will in our lives when we are walking in the path He has set before us. Even when we have no idea where that path might lead or even what it will look like.  When He says go...go. When He says do...do! When He says WRITE...I'm going to write!

Since hearing that word from God...WRITE...I have had the privilege of being a contributing writer in two books. The first one you can find on my sidebar...Bloom Where You're Planted by Anne Milam. The second book's working title is, God Must Think I'm Superwoman: The High Calling of Parenting Your Child with Special Needs, Westbow Publishing. That book is at the editor's as I write this...and the chapter that I wrote for that book is what I believe God called me to write so many years ago.  I believe that, because the enemy has been working hard to deter the process of it's publishing. 

 I continue to write because I believe God has called me to this thing. I will probably never be  a well known writer but I'm okay with that because I believe God will use the words that He has given me to further the work of His kingdom here on earth. I believe He has and will continue to use me to encourage, enlighten and engage my readers in seeing every part of the culture and world in which we live through the lens and filter of God's Word. And that is enough for me! 

And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love Him, who have been called according to His purpose. 

                                                                                       Romans 8:28

Now it's your turn...

1. Write for 5 minutes flat - no editing, no over thinking, no backtracking.

2. Link back here and invite others to join in.
3. And then absolutely, no ifs, ands or buts about it, you need to visit the person who linked up before you & encourage them in their comments. 

Seriously. That is, like, the rule. And the fun. And the heart of this community...

Tears...Breaking the Dam of Hardened Hearts

Broken...

 She reached down into the depths of her heart stirring up the tears that had lain dormant far too long. As the hardness began to break in to pieces, the tears ran in streams down her cheeks. The floodgates burst open, releasing the pain and hurt of the deception she had been carrying. 

The very thing that had caused the hardening of her heart, the wall of her emotions to hold fast, was now gone. Washed away...flowing away with the turbulent river of tears of a repentant heart.   

            Broken.

                                                At last, she was free!

The previous paragraphs? An excerpt from a book that is yet to be written.  I won't expound on the story at this time because it is really just a seed that God planted in my heart...it will take much prayer, research, and the hard work of getting it on the page before it will come to fruition. It sort of just burst forth from my fingertips after contemplating something I had read in my devotional time one morning last week. It was most definitely one of those God whispering moments...and my heart...and fingers responded.  

What I had read was from Elmer Towns book, How To Pray: When You Don't Know What to Say. If you are looking for a good book on how to pray or just ways to refresh and reinvigorate your prayer life I highly recommend this book.  However, since this post is not a 'book review', I will leave it for you to check it out and discover the treasures therein. 

As I read the chapter in Towns' book on repentance and deliverance, I was reminded of the importance of tears in our prayer life...more specifically, my prayer life. Towns writes: "to be an effective intercessor, we must have a 'weeping heart' before God. If our eyes are always dry, it means that our soul is also probably dry. And a dry heart eventually becomes a hardened heart." He goes on to tell us that tears and brokenness is the avenue to a softened heart before God. Tears and brokenness can push aside the pride long enough to expose our hearts for what they have become, hard and dry. Those very tears are a good sign that we are broken and ready to deal with our sin. We are ready to repent. 

This has me asking myself...how soft is my heart before God? How many times have I cried over the sins I, myself, have committed. How many times have I wept over the very things that break the heart of God?  And surely our personal sins, among many other things, break His heart. 

How many times have I cried for other's, whose hearts are hardened by the harsh realities of the sin-soaked society in which we live...cried for those who have chosen to walk in defiance to the plan God has for their life. Do I cry over those who cannot even see that they are spiritually sick and have the cure to their sickness within their grasp, yet fail to latch on? Like a man in a swiftly swirling whirlpool getting weaker and weaker as he fights against the current, yet he refuses the lifeline that has been thrown to him.  

I pray that God will soften my heart so that I may weep for those who don't even realize there is a reason to weep.  To weep for those who are living broken lives and don't know how to fix what is broken.  May the tears break down the wall of pride in my own heart so that I can see ever clearer the sins that are present in my life, so that I may repent and walk in obedience to the Word of God. I pray that the Lord will soften my own heart so that He can use me to reach out to others with open arms and open heart. May they see the love of Christ in my words, in my actions, and within my heart.

Lord help us to weep tears of repentance...to accept your forgiveness...so that times of refreshing may come.

I could use a bit of refreshing...

                                                 How about you?

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Run to Him...

My dog, Clair, loves to chew on things.  If she doesn't have enough toys she will start looking in my office trash can for empty water bottles.  The water bottles happen to be one of her favorite things to chew and I might add one of the most annoying because of the  crinkly noise the plastic makes as she mauls it...annoying to me and anyone else who happens to be in the same room when she is attacking a plastic water bottle...but I think the noise is, for her, a reward for a bottle well chewed! 

Every once in awhile Clair will find something, as do most young dogs not quite out of the puppy stage, that she should not be chewing on.  Usually, when she has something in her mouth, I will tell her to show it to me.  At that point she will hunch down over the object as she drops it between her two front paws, ready to snatch it up quickly in case I attempt to take it from her.  Interestingly enough she rarely runs at this point and I am able to retrieve whatever it is she has chosen to turn into a chew toy.  

This morning as I was sitting in my office reading, I noticed that I had not heard any noise from her in awhile so I decided to go find her and see what she was up to...you know the rule...if they are too quiet, they must be into something;  same rule that we think of with children.  I know...dogs are definitely not children but, strangely enough, there are times when I think Clair has striking similarities to a toddler.  Anyway, as I went to check it out I found her on my bed with something in her mouth.  I asked her to show me what she had and she did her usual quick drop between her paws, but then immediately grabbed it back up and ran with it in her mouth, as she leapt off the bed, out the door, and into the other room as fast as she could go.  

It was a Halls cough drop.  She must have loved what she had and decided that this time she was going to get what she wanted and the best way to do that was to leave my presence. 

Suddenly, a thought hit me!  Isn’t this what I do…what we all do...at times?  When we know we are coveting something we shouldn’t have…when we are craving after things that are not in God’s will for us...we run from God.  We get far away from His presence so that we can feel good about this new thing, or selfish choice, and not feel His displeasure. 

Jonah did this too.  Remember him, the guy who spent three days in the belly of a big fish because he chose to run from God instead of doing what He knew God wanted of Him? 

I remember doing an in depth study, an inductive study, on the book of Jonah and even though I had read that story many times before...new truths just jumped out at me.   Not only did Jonah run, but he ran in the opposite direction from where God had wanted him to go.  He was willfully disobeying God.   I had written in my notes, "I can't imagine running from God...but I guess not doing what He clearly tells me to do in His word is the same as running from God."  

When Jonah was still on the ship and trouble came, he knew the trouble had come to them because he was running away from God yet he didn't choose at that point to run back to God.  Instead, he chose to be thrown overboard.  At which time the great big fish swallowed him.  WOW! Talk about stubbornly going your own way!  

Now I would think at this point he would have immediately called out to God saying, "I will go and do whatever you say" ...but no, he stayed in the belly of that fish for three days, and three nights!!!  Yuck and gross!!  Can you imagine? Yet, how many times do we choose to wallow in our own self-pity because of the circumstances that our own selfish choices have brought about in our lives. How long before we repent and turn back to God? 

The most amazing thing about Jonah's story is that when he finally cried out to God...as he was entrenched in bile,  seaweed wrapped around his head, growing faint almost to the point of death...he looked  toward the LORD's Temple and acknowledged that salvation comes from the LORD...God heard him!  

God heard his prayers and rescued Jonah from the pit of despair!!  Not only did God hear him but He still allowed Jonah to be His instrument, His prophet. When Jonah ran from God's presence, he was willfully disobeying God; obedience moved him back into God's presence. 

Time and time again through the Bible, we see God's people turn away from Him as they choose to go their own way, leading them away from the presence of God; first in the Garden of Eden, then through the sacrifices, the Tabernacle, and the Temple.  

Finally,  God sends prophets to instruct and warn His people,  that even though the Temple will be destroyed,  there is  One who is coming ,who will set all things right...the Messiah.  One of the first names given to this Messiah was Emmanuel, God with us!!  Jesus came, God in the flesh, to dwell among us and to offer Himself as the only perfect and acceptable sacrifice for our sins.  His death, burial and resurrection give us  a hope and a future and provide  a way for us back into relationship with God, the Father.  

When he ascended to Heaven He didn't leave us to continue on in this harsh, sin ridden world alone.  We now have the Holy Spirit...His presence in our lives!  Time and time again, we see God establishing His presence among His people. 

His love never fails...even when we do!  

The book of Jonah and all of God's Word teaches us that compassion and grace and His active presence in our lives are not given based on  what we deserve, but they are based on our responsive steps in the right direction.  I am amazed and in awe of how loving and forgiving God is to us all!!

Aren't you glad that we have the stories of the lives of those who have gone before us written in the Word of God that show us how much God loves us and to what great lengths He will go to make sure we are in a right relationship with Him!!  

 So... as the saying goes, "if you don't feel close to God...guess who moved." 

 I, for one, want so very much to be moving in the right direction...in obedience towards my heavenly Father!! 

I am so thankful that He gives me these glimpses from time to time, these sacred echoes, as reminders of God's desire for me and my desire for God.  Sometimes the glimpses come from a deeper reading of His Word...and sometimes...well sometimes they come in the form of a chocolate brown lab, named Clair.