I've moved over to Larksong! New Year...New Look...

I've moved most of my old posts over there too!

Hope you will join me.

Consider Jesus.
Know Jesus.
Learn what kind of Person it is you say you trust and love and worship.
Soak in the shadow of Jesus. Saturate your soul with the ways of Jesus.
Watch Him.
Listen to Him.
Stand in awe of Him.
Let Him overwhelm you with the way He is.      
John Piper

Today marks 35 years of marriage with my very best friend. It's been a wild ride of unspeakable joy! Oh, how I love this man! I wake up to him; I close the day with him and wish that every moment in between could be spent with the one that makes me a little better each day. Each step is a little sweeter, my beloved.

I know...I know...it's been awhile, but the mission trips, summer camps, visiting family have captured the hours. I've been busy pounding the keys, just not here. Hopefully in a couple of weeks I'll get to reveal the epic writing assignment that has taken me away from blogging.

But for me, the good news is.....I'm back!

Exposed

Laid wide open like a butterfly pinned to board.

Shame blushes...Every dirty pore, every weak fiber, even the sacred places...

Exposed

Fears, dreams, words

Placed on the auction block.

Exposed

No place to cower, no chance for retrieval.

I grasp for cover and Jesus tenderly offers...

'Let Me blanket your failure, your vulnerability. Let Me cloak your rejection, your shame.

I covered Eve in the Garden; I covered David on the battlefield.

Cover is My love offering.'

Exposed

Arms lay wide open, pinned to a crossbeam.

'Cover is My love offering.'

A grandmother's love... scroll up a bit to turn off background music



Courtesy of her wonderful mommy!
Happy Valentine's Day...

Posting over at larksong today....http://robin-larksong.blogspot.com/2011_01_01_archive.html

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Sign up athttp://www.incourage.me/category/bloom.

Tuesdays with Beth... Charges fed and delivered to the "animal" rooms...women folk embrace and smile love into each other's eyes...Holy words fill the air. Tuesday has arrived and Jesus is our host! Study with Beth knits the generations tightly together; each sharing its unique blend... wrapping His fold with encouragement. Tears tumble freely as we expose the dark hours and welcoming laughter lightens the load. Beth unwraps the Hope and we hide it in the deep places. God graces us with His arrival. Tuesdays cradle our questions and the absent days gird our prayers.
God continues to carve a tender Bride in our gathering place, etching His image on our hearts.

Rule Number One: Don't dare break one of them. Fear keeps a faithful walk on the straight and narrow, but what if that fear to stray prevents the commitment to thrive. I alone carve the sacred commandment to obey others' expectations. Self-inflicted imprisonment. So afraid to disappoint or incur judgement. Abandon the image others paint of me? An intriguing possibility. Go ahead, self...break one!

Four years of survival. That's all. Treading water...Counting hours...Girding myself for the next assault. The onslaught of losses taking its toll. As the year bids its final farewell, I find myself ready to leave the wasteland. No more just surviving, ready for a season with a pulse. Ready to thrive!

That's going to require putting off some old things: guilt, beating myself up, others' perceptions. Time to breathe...Time to risk...Time to move...

Farewell 2010

Leaving Kansas once again...

Ludwig

G-time with Sam

San Diego Zoo Trip

April Sip and See

Playtime with Uncle Bobby

Alex and Stephanie's Peru Mission Trip

Alex's first Marathon takes place in Oregon

Sychar places #1

Babysitting trip to Austin

Shanna and Alan's August Wedding

Sad return to Kansas City

September Farewell to Dad

Sam's first BU homecoming!

Bring on 2011!

Dear Santa,
All I want for Christmas this year is my family!
I want to cradle my granddaughter, read to her from my holiday stack, look into the eyes of my adult children and see Christmases past.
Distance is my enemy. Miles empty my soul.

Sometimes we just groan. Sometimes words cannot be found. The heaviness of this broken world renders us speechless. Is evil, illness, injustice swallowing us?
Sometimes we just groan.
Our Advocate groans as well. He divinely sighs, rescuing the broken one who has no hope of escaping his condition.
He yearns for our likeness to the Son. He intercedes for our eternal security.
He groans on our behalf, offering our silent weight to the Heavens.
Sometimes we just groan.

The probate petition arrives in the mail. It might as well be stamped: Final.
God, I don't think I have the energy to travel this road of rememberance again.
Grief sucks the life out of me. Yet, You remind me that You go before me and that You hold all things together. So the journey begins with one trusting step after another while You lead.
Each painful memory of being a second thought will be soothed with a sweet reminder that You loved me first!

Samantha is One!

Happy Birthday Samantha!!!

You are the love of our life...
xoxo Granddaddy and Gigi xoxo

I launch the dvd and I melt.
The heart, so guarded, yields to memories.
I struggle to seize the sweet ones, but I know they simmer deep in my being.
Little girl hugging daddy's neck...once upon a time, there must have been affection.
Lasting images collapse the reserve and the dam breaks.
I gasp and choke with pain and regret for recent photos scream his numbered days.
Did this weathered man's heart yearn for the sweet ones as well?

"I still love you."
Words on a birthday card; words that sear my soul.
A phone call, girded with prayer and hope for reconciliation, fails to connect.
Again, disappointment bruises my heart.
Dial once again? Or simply let hope find its way on parchment wings?
Time runs out...wavering misses the deadline.
Guilt punches me again and again. Did his heart cry regret and yearn for one last conversation?
Betrayal fades slowly...forgiveness often comes too late.
Can affection reach the heavens?

Words refuse to flow tonight; only toss and tumble from my pain.
I stand before my God small and fragile. My friend says it's the little girl in me; Joyce Landorf describes it as the little bird who has lost her song.
Broken, hurt, empty is all I can muster.
A frail charge who desperately yearns to be loved, but finds the prize beyond her reach.
Love can't even slip through outstretched fingers when love has never cradled them.
Stark reality leaves me orphaned and lost.
Fatherly love should swallow us, but sometimes the fathers can't find such gifting within them.
My hope crushed now that the flame no longer flickers.
Tonight I struggle to feel Heaven's parental embrace.
I know it abounds, but grief blurs the senses.

One brief meeting...hope was shared.

Our eyes told it all...cancer was mounting its final assault.

Hours spent storming the gates of Heaven...His plan was Heaven bound.

I knew you, Tina, because you knew the Holy One.

I heard your stories until my sides ached from laughter.

I suspect you laughed with joy right into His arms.

No more prayers for you...only your own.

Til we meet again, may Hope resound.