"Saying goodbye to those we love so dearly here on earth is so very difficult, whether we lose them to death itself, a betrayal, a divorce, or a broken mind or body.

How anyone goes through these without the presence of God,

I simply do not know.

It feels like you just fall apart.

You just walk around with pieces rattling around inside you.

You feel fragmented, undone.

It takes a long time to address the journey,

and longer still, to get through the bruises

of the heart, and cuttings of the soul.

You have to embrace that you will be walking with these beautiful unrestored pieces of vintage warfares, with their stories rich and deep. 

 You will come to know the insatiable wonder

of the realities that death is part of the living, 

just as sure as dying is a rebirthing for them and you.

Your mind will play tricks on you.

Your emotions will bully you.

Your faith will need to be fierce.

You’re going to feel at best, strange in this old world, 

and devastated in the worst.

Just when you think the weeping has run its course, 

the nether springs deep in your hardest pieces will start to leak and overflow.

Best not be trying for that perfection of a life without the pieces. You’ll walk all over them and straight through them, 

circle around and do it again.

I’ve walked around in pieces for a

very long time now.

But I can tell you, I’d rather be in a million pieces at His feet, 

than be a million miles from His Presence.

My Savior knows what to do with my pieces.

He knows He can pull off one of those pieces and use it to meet the needs of another. 

I’ve seen Him take pieces and make songs,

restore families, 

build amazing homes, 

rejuvenate the untuned heart, 

place the truth in all its beauty, 

straight down in the midst of enemies.

Oh the miraculous goodness, the exquisite healing of Jesus, 

the power of pain in His hands.

Let it be.

Teach me to always come to Your Presence."

Ann Stewart Porter.

 

 

“I can tell you love it,

because that’s what my face looks like

when I love something.”

She said these words with eyes red and puffy after a good moment of crying in the prayerful embrace of a loving team member from our church.

These are sacred moments when the truth of Jesus’ words are like arms to fall into, exhausted from the weight of life’s troubles, the ache of our hearts and the reviving taste of living water. She was alive in the moment, awakened by the Spirit, open and welcoming to the presence of Christ in the basement chapel.

But this is just an encounter, hopefully a seed was planted in the words prayed, the confessions made, the turning to Jesus that happened in the rushing tide of His incoming.

But time will tell, it’s His work to bring new life within someone. We just pray, wait and watch, looking for signs of a seed breaking open and something growing. Carefully tending possibilities with small but meaningful intentions. Praying.

Giving her a Bible and next steps material to help her understand what has happened and what to do next.

Picking her up for Church.

Loving her kids.

Encouraging her in the hard work of her moment in crisis.

Holding her in thought and intention.

Such a plan seems so fragile and vulnerable, like a newborn baby in the arms of a new parent. This is how life arrives because love is wild and dangerous.

I hope that all our moments of outreach are upheld with loving faces that bear the testimony that Jesus is good and He satisfies the soul. I pray that every worker we bring with us will shine with God’s glory, the glory that comes from a relationship that is deeply nourishing and real. I pray that each hand laid in prayer, each word said in encouragement, every song sung will be a witness to “taste and see” that the Lord is good.

When I helped her get out of the van at the shelter, I could see the look on her face that knows she’s back to mom duty and that’s no easy task with three young boys. I touched her shoulder and tried to encourage her to keep pressing forward little by little.

Inside I am praying the power of God will hold her, the love of God will pour out upon her and that new life will be stronger than any distraction, deception or challenge ahead.

Please join me.

Pastor Eric, Jacob's Well Spokane Wa. 

 

By: This Blew Up My Mind

“When pregnant, the cells of the baby migrate into the mothers bloodstream and then circle back into the baby, it’s called “fetal-maternal microchimerism”.⁠

For 41 weeks, the cells circulate and merge backwards and forwards, and after the baby is born, many of these cells stay in the mother’s body, leaving a permanent imprint in the mothers tissues, bones, brain, and skin, and often stay there for decades.

Every single child a mother has afterwards will leave a similar imprint on her body, too.

Even if a pregnancy doesn't go to full term or if you have an abortion, these cells still migrate into your bloodstream.

Research has shown that if a mother's heart is injured, fetal cells will rush to the site of the injury and change into different types of cells that specialize in mending the heart.

The baby helps repair the mother, while the mother builds the baby.

How cool is that?

This is often why certain illnesses vanish while pregnant.

It’s incredible how mothers bodies protect the baby at all costs, and the baby protects & rebuilds the mother back - so that the baby can develop safely and survive.

Think about crazy cravings for a moment. What was the mother deficient in that the baby made them crave?

Studies have also shown cells from a fetus in a mothers brain 18 years after she gave birth. How amazing is that?”

If you’re a mom you know how you can intuitively feel your child even when they are not there….Well, now there is scientific proof that moms carry them for years and years even after they have given birth to them.

I find this to be so very beautiful.

 

"Had someone charge me again with "creating a God in my own image" by my insistence that God is like Jesus, a God who loves his enemies and is non-violent. A God who has the fruit of the Spirit. 

Since when is loving enemies and non-violence in humanity’s own image? (Wouldn't it be nice if everyone was just naturally a follower of Jesus.)

Retribution is in our own image. Wrath and violence is in our own image. 

A non-violent God is a God whose ways are higher than humans violent ways, and therefore a God who sets the example to call us to the same. 

If you want a God in your own image, a non-violent God is not the way to go. Humans are violent, Jesus is not. Jesus loves his enemies. Jesus has a justice that restores, not just vindictively injures and destroys. 

I am actually arguing against the god of our own image. I am arguing for a God whose ways are higher than humans.

I am arguing for a God who challenges our dark ways of dehumanization and violence, not participates in them, and whose example calls us to be peacemakers and lovers of enemies. 

A God who is like Jesus.

Jacob M. Wright. 

 

  "Dr. Frank Mayfield was touring Tewksbury Institute when, on his way out, he accidentally collided with an elderly floor maid. 

To cover the awkward moment Dr. Mayfield started asking questions.

"How long have you worked here?"

"I've worked here almost since the place opened," the maid replied.

"What can you tell me about the history of this place?" he asked.

"I don't think I can tell you anything, but I could show you something."

With that, she led him down to the basement under the oldest section of the building. 

She pointed to one of, what looked like small prison cells, their iron bars rusted with age, and said, 

"That's the cage where they used to keep Annie Sullivan."

"Who's Annie?" the doctor asked.

Annie was a young girl who was brought in here because she was incorrigible—nobody could do anything with her. 

She'd bite and scream and throw her food at people. 

The doctors and nurses couldn't even examine her or anything.

 I'd see them trying with her spitting and scratching at them.

"I was only a few years younger than her myself and I used to think, 'I sure would hate to be locked up in a cage like that.' 

I wanted to help her, but I didn't have any idea what I could do. 

I mean, if the doctors and nurses couldn't help her, what could someone like me do?

"I didn't know what else to do, so I just baked her some brownies one night after work. The next day I brought them in. 

I walked carefully to her cage and said, 'Annie, I baked these brownies just for you. I'll put them right here on the floor and you can come and get them if you want.'

"Then I got out of there just as fast as I could because I was afraid she might throw them at me. But she didn't. 

She actually took the brownies and ate them.

 After that, she was just a little bit nicer to me when I was around. 

And sometimes I'd talk to her. 

Once, I even got her laughing.

One of the nurses noticed this and told the doctor. 

They asked me if I'd help them with Annie. 

I said I would if I could. So that's how it came about that 

Every time they wanted to see Annie or examine her, 

I went into the cage first, explained and calmed her down and held her hand.

This is how they discovered that Annie was almost blind."

After they'd been working with her for about a year—and it was tough sledding with Annie—the Perkins institute for the Blind opened its doors. 

They were able to help her and she went on to study and she became a teacher herself.

Annie came back to the Tewksbury Institute to visit, and to see what she could do to help out. 

At first, the Director didn't say anything and then he thought about 

a letter he'd just received. 

A man had written to him about his daughter. 

She was absolutely unruly—

almost like an animal. 

She was blind and deaf as well as 'deranged.'

He was at his wit's end, but he didn't want to put her in an asylum. 

So he wrote the Institute to ask if they knew of anyone who would come to his house and work with his daughter.

And that is how Annie Sullivan became the lifelong companion of Helen Keller.

When Helen Keller received the Nobel Prize, she was asked who had the greatest impact on her life and she said, "Annie Sullivan."

But Annie said, 

"No Helen. The woman who had the greatest influence on both our lives was a floor maid at the Tewksbury Institute."

 

Shared to me by ~Ann Stewart Porter