the twinkling of an eye

Grace Enough

2011-07-01T18:44:00.000-07:00

Stupid words. Even before I say them, I know I'll regret them, but I speak nonetheless, breathing contempt recklessly through the scalding steam of my coffee. My friend in the chair across from me is taken aback and I cringe inside, cowering from the echoes already jangling through me. Why on earth would I say something like that? I didn't even mean it! I want nothing more than to turn back time.

Fear descends on the awkward silence that follows. What if the person I just spoke against is sitting right here? I glance around the coffeeshop and breathe easier, seeing no familiar face, but paranoia quickly invades my thoughts again. What if that woman sitting beside us knows him? What if she's his aunt and she's going to phone him up about this as soon as I get home? What if that barista knows him? Heck, what if my friend is secretly recording this conversation and streaming it live as we speak? It's a case of the robber thinking that everyone else is a robber too—when you betray someone's trust, your own trust takes a blow.

And when you wound someone with your speech, you feel the wounds tenfold. For days, I gingerly roll those words around in my heart, feel them leave fresh scars every time I replay them. By the time the week winds down to Saturday night, church night, I'm in a state of perpetual distraction. The worship songs start and I mouth along to the words, but my mind keeps circling back to that coffeeshop date, to those careless words, to the person whom I hurt without him even knowing it.

I want nothing more than to turn back time.

So I do. I think back to one cloudy recess in first grade, when I was standing in queue at the top of the play structure and waiting for my turn down the slide. As I watched one boy make his way to the bottom of the slide and walk below me back to the ladder, I picked up some of the sand that had piled up on the wooden platform. Then, for reasons I'll probably never understand, I discreetly but with great precision threw the sand down onto his head. He climbed up with a miserable look on his face, angrily brushing his hands through his hair and demanding to know who had thrown the sand. Feigning innocence, I hastily made my escape down the slide.

I'd bet anything that this boy, now in his twenties, doesn't remember this episode, but I remember it well enough for the both of us. I remember the intense guilt that my six-year-old self carried for weeks, and I remember accidentally bumping into him at the grocery store a few months later. Although he still had no idea that I was the culprit (and had probably forgotten the incident anyway), I was so ashamed that I literally couldn't bring myself to look him in the eyes. I said hello while staring at my sneakers.

It all seems so familiar. Today, just like then, I still find myself doing stupid things and spending weeks awash in remorse. How little has changed—I throw words like I threw sand.

But I come before before a God who didn't throw a stone. And that changes everything.

So I teach myself a new refrain. Each time I feel the guilt crawl through my thoughts, I answer, there is grace enough. There is grace enough for stupid words and loveless acts and bad examples. No, I have no right to slander someone over a coffee at Starbucks, but my only remedy is grace. My only escape from the mistakes lies in God, in his spirit, in his indwelling. And yet, just as that shame kept me from coming to him in worship, when I'm racked with guilt, I can't enter his presence—guilt bars me from reaching for the very thing I need.

And it reminds me.

Of a time years ago when I was so clothed in shame that I couldn't bear to look at God, when my guilt made a divide between us that stretched as far as heaven is from hell. But there was grace enough for all my mistakes, grace dressed in scars and crowned with thorns and nailed to a tree for my freedom's sake. And I will walk the path I've walked before, retrace the route from repentance to liberation, rediscover the power of his forgiveness.

How little has changed. Each day, I need the gospel just as much as I needed it the last.

And each day, like manna, the promise falls softly to the ground: there is grace enough still.

The Sound of Silence

2011-06-23T19:13:00.000-07:00

The girl in the picture is my friend J (I'll call her Jen). Last week, Jen and I met up for a conversation and mini photoshoot. Incidentally, the photoshoot ended with me stepping in some goose, uh, byproduct, with my bare foot—I'm still slightly traumatized, but even that couldn't overshadow the wonderfulness of the time we spent together. Between Jen's out-of-town university studies and ministry work, we don't get to see each other very often, but when I do meet up with her, I come away from our conversation challenged and inspired... she's one of the humblest, kindest, and most honest people I know.

During out latest meeting, we spent a lot of time talking about silence. We talked about how nice it is to have friends with whom we can share non-awkward pauses. How much better it is to let somebody's words sink in, to slowly turn them over in your mind and ponder them, instead of shooting off the obligatory, thoughtless response. And we spent some time in silence, sorting through our thoughts and savouring all of the little sounds that it amplified... the soft click of a librarian's keyboard, the footsteps brushing across the carpet, the quiet conversations of other visitors.

—

I'm not a confident talker.

During the first 17 years of my life, for various reasons, I had nearly no face-to-face or phone contact with my friends outside of school. Basically, my only chance to talk with people my age was during recess (which ended in grade 6), before and after classes, during lunches (many of which I spent at home anyway), and during class (but I was a good kid and didn't do that as often as I should have).

Nevertheless, I still found people who were willing to listen to me, share secrets with me, and encourage me, even if I couldn't see them beyond school grounds. Jen was one of those people—during her senior year, she spent almost every lunch hour and 8-minute between-class break with me, offering all of her free time to walk with me through everything that I was facing at the time (and, to top it off, she wrote me nice long emails every few weeks). So between the Internet, friends like Jen, and the loads of time that I spent with my parents, I can't say I lacked social contact when I was younger... sure, I missed out on the sleepovers and late-night phonecalls, but I had some of the best relationships anyone could dream of. Still, that aspect of my life affected me in one big way: it made me extremely insecure about speaking.

Over the past two years, a few changes in my life situation have given me many more opportunities to see people face-to-face. And while it's been wonderful to share secrets over coffee or sit together in the sun, it's also taken me a while to fight down the feeling of panic over not knowing what to say, or not being able to say what I want. To stop rewinding conversations in my head for days and beating myself up over a bad joke or lame remark. To make small talk with strangers (I'm so glad I've gotten better at that. The other day, I had a great chat with a man on the bus who was undergoing radiation for cancer. I can never get over what a priviledge it is when a complete stranger chooses to share his heart with me).

Last year, I had a pretty hard time learning to wade in the deeper end of the social world. It was kind of like playing badminton in high school. I was a total mess at badminton—I'd blindly swing around the racket, without any aim or strategy, in hopes that it would eventually hit the ball. And that's kind of how I talked to people last year: as soon as the conversation came barreling my way, I'd desperately shoot off a reply. Sometimes it came out mangled, sometimes exaggerated, sometimes flattering, sometimes curt; occasionally, it hit the mark of sincerity and honesty. But either way, all I really focused on was myself and what I needed to say.

With practice, I learned to be more diligent, more vulnerable, more caring in the way I spoke. But I still can't shake one big insecurity of mine: I still don't like being silent with someone. Being able to say something—anything, no matter how artless—still gives me confidence, a sense of power. I hate admitting that I don't know what to say. I hate 'wasting' someone else's time as I rummage through my thoughts. I hate not having the answers.

—

In Judaism, there's a custom called sitting shiva. When someone dies, friends visit the grieving family and spend a few hours sitting together in silence. Unless the mourner says something, no words are exchanged; even "hello" goes unspoken. The mourner and comforter sit together, reflecting, waiting, listening.

I remember once, during a really rough week in high school, I got up at lunch and declared to my locker bay, "Who wants to come with me and sit in front of a window and think?" I was half-joking and half-desperate. I needed space; I needed time to grieve the 'old normal' that had been replaced with a bewildering new reality. I needed to enjoy the company of another without feeling that I had to entertain or impress or explain anything to them. So a friend of mine came along and we sat in front of a big window in the hallway for half an hour, staring into the sky.

As much as I feel threatened, sometimes, by silence, I have to admit that it can also be incredibly comforting. Sometimes, presence speaks louder than words, and silence is the most sincere response you can give. It can be nice to know that you have space to wonder and dream in someone's presence. It can be nice to walk together through a sunset in quiet awe. It can be nice to listen.

Do you feel comfortable being silent around others?

Another video that looks into the spiritual side of silence.

Dropping In

2011-06-07T10:39:00.000-07:00

I'm not going to post much for the next week because that's how long I have to read half a textbook and study for my last exam. After that, I have some plans for this blog that I'm pretty excited about. Until then, though, here are a few things I want to share with you...

Photoblogging

If you follow me on Twitter or like my photography page on Facebook, this is going to be a bit redundant for you, but I have a new post waiting over at my photoblog. Here's a sampling...

I've got lots of photoshoots planned this summer, so you should see more posts there if all goes as planned.

Summer reading list

I've finally put together my book list for this summer. I'm probably only going to read 8 since I'll only have two months to get through them, but here's what I'm thinking of...

Miracles, C.S. Lewis
Blue Like Jazz, Don Miller
Little Heathens, Mildred Kalish
The Heart is a Lonely Hunter, Carson McCullers
All of Grace, Charles Spurgeon
Same Kind of Different As Me, Ron Hall & Denver Moore
The Pilgrim's Regress, C.S. Lewis
Emma, Jane Austen

Have you read any of these?

Pinterest

I've been absolutely enamored with Pinterest lately. I have almost 5,000 faves on Flickr, over 1,000 on Tumblr, and over 500 starred items on Google Reader. With Pinterest, I can sort the best of those beautiful, inspiring things into visual pinboards by topic, subject matter, and so on. The slightly-OCD part of me is thanking me (the part of me that's trying to study is not). Here's my account; if you want an invite, give me a shout!

My favourite song of the moment

Introduced to me by the lovely and talented Jocelyn.

Askbox

If you want to drop a word or two in my askbox, I'm all ears. See you in a week! :)

Salt of the Earth (The Story Series: #1)

2011-06-02T11:02:00.000-07:00

A long time ago, I said that I'd begin a blog series on the topic of story. Finally making good on that promise. This won't become a regular or frequent thing, but I'll be writing posts for this series now and then, whenever inspiration hits. Here's the first...

Yesterday, I watched a bit of Dan Cruickshank's "Around the World in Eighty Treasures" series on TV.

(As a side note, I would love to have Dan come along with me to Doors Open Ottawa this weekend. He gets so enthralled by everything around him... at one point in the special, he spent a good five minutes gushing over a chair as if it were, I don't know, a rocketship or the last surviving dodo bird. I wish my own wonder and curiosity were captured that easily).

In this particular film, he made a stop in Poland to visit one of the most fascinating places I've ever seen. It's called the Wieliczka Salt Mine, and it produced salt from the 13th century all the way up till 2007, making it one of the world's oldest operating salt mines. That alone is pretty significant, but the most astonishing thing about the mine is this:

...and this...

...and this.

Those are sculptures that were carved out of the salt by the miners who worked there. The whole mine is filled with these. Many of them are religious in nature—some are reproductions of Christian iconography, others, carvings of revered saints. The skill and effort that was put into these is mindblowing.

All I could think of after I saw that (and forgive the slightly lame allegory I'm about to draw here) was that those miners had carved out a legacy in a place where we'd least expect to see one. The tools they were given became more than tools for earning money; they became tools for telling stories, tools for exploring faith, tools for worshipping their maker. And to these men, the mine was not a dark, frigid prison cell a thousand feet below the surface of the earth, but a sanctuary. They didn't need to see stained-glass windows or hear birdsong or watch sunsets to remember God's glory... and because of that, out of what looked like a tomb, a cathedral emerged.

I'm not sure I approach my life with the same kind of attitude. I depend too much on things like journals and blogs to send a message, to record my story. And since I've never been much of a journaler or a particularly disciplined blogger, I often beat myself up for not trying harder to leave a tangible legacy that future generations can look back on. But I've been coming to realize that scribbles and keystrokes and pages and posts are only a fraction of the tools that a can storyteller use.

See, I'm pretty snobby when it comes to my environment: I feel oppressed in an office cubicle or in a windowless, fluorescent-lit classroom. If I could have any job I wanted, I'd become a freelance writer and graphic designer who'd spend her days dreaming up images and weaving stories at the park or in the warm glow of a Starbucks. But I know that the reality probably won't be that pretty. Like those miners, I won't always be in a workplace (or community, or life situation, or family, or relationship) that appeals to me.

Am I going to let that snuff out my desire to tell of God? Am I going to retreat to my Moleskines and blogs to 'make a difference'? Will I be so narrow in my definition of an 'artist' that I'll miss out on the most important canvas, the greatest blank page, that lies open before me?

Or will I begin to carve out a message of glory—right where I am?

How fitting that those mining for salt many centuries ago left us with such a marvelous metaphor for what being "the salt of the earth" means. It means, in part, telling God's story right where you are with what you have. Some salt gets sprinkled on the king's dinner plate, some gets set aside for cattle to lick. Some people paint frescoes in cathedrals, others engrave them in cold, dim mines. But we wherever we are, we are to be the flavor of forgiveness, the seasoning of the Spirit. There is no place where grace cannot be proclaimed; there is no better page upon which we can write our legacy than right here.

As Charles Spurgeon said...

You are expected, therefore, to influence others for good. You are an employer; let your influence be felt by your servants. You are a child at home; let influence be felt around the social hearth. [...] Your influence must act quietly and unostentatiously, like the influence of salt, which is not noisy but yet potent. You cannot get through this world rightly by saying, "If I do no good, at least, I do no hurt;" that might the plea of a stone or a brick, but it cannot be an apology for savourless salt; for if when the salt is rubbed into the meat it does not season and preserve it, it is bad salt, and has not performed its work, but has caused loss to the owner, and left the meat to become putrid. And if you in this world, according to your capacity and means, do not affect other people for good, you have convicted yourself of being useless, worthless, a cumberer of the ground.

(Image credits: Margy's Musings; Destination Europe; Wikipedia. There are some great images here too).

Royal Wedding Inspired

2011-05-22T00:21:00.000-07:00

It's old news, but that won't stop me from blogging about it. ;)

I know this is going to lose me coolness points among some people, but I watched the royal wedding... twice. (Didn't stay up late for it, though... I'd had enough of that during exams). I do agree that way too much fuss had been made about it in advance, but it was a lovely, very classy ceremony. So to mark the nearing one-month anniversary (and because I can't think of anything else to write about at the moment), I want to share a few of the things that I particularly liked about it.

1. The dress and decor.

I was really struck by how wonderfully understated Kate's dress was for the occasion and setting. And as I watched the wedding, I noticed that this kind of juxtaposition was a recurring trend—the simple, elegant gown against a regal, ornate carriage; the trees inside a grandiose cathedral; the royals driving off on a balloon-and-ribbon-decorated car; the intricate but very subtle, near-monochrome cake. By the end of the service, I fell in love with this pattern... those little details were breaths of fresh air against the overall background of pomp and pageantry.

As I mentioned a bit earlier, I want to start using this blog to collect and share visual inspiration, and this seems like a good place to start... I found that aspect of the wedding really inspiring. Ever since, I've been keeping an eye out for art and photos that explore that blend of aristocracy, regality and/or majesty with simplicity and subtlety. I think these capture it quite nicely (click each thumbnail to see the full piece on the artist's website)...

Left: Leanne Ellis for Santoro. Right: Arthur Rackham.
See what I'm getting at? Simple but regal.

L & R: Kate Alizadeh. Love the contrast between the
majesty of nature and the wee little celebrating people.

L: Julianna Swaney. R: Renee Nault. Don't you love
that juxtaposition between the aristocratic reader and
the elements of wilderness in Julianna's? As for
Renee's piece, ditto what I said above about Kate's.

L: Amy Sol. R: Jeremy Cowart. Amy Sol's piece is regal but
beautifully understated, and Jeremy nails the theme
in this shot taken in my home country, the Ukraine.

I've already started playing around with this theme in my sketchbook... lots of potential here. I love it when inspiration springs up in the most unexpected places.

2. Bishop Chartres' speech.

I loved this guy's address—full of grace and truth and hope, but also simple, humble, and utterly non-preachy. I don't think there was anyone in the audience, regardless of their beliefs and background, who couldn't relate to at least something he said... what a great way to establish common ground with a diverse audience. Here are a few of my favourite parts:

The spiritual life grows as love finds its centre beyond ourselves. Faithful and committed relationships offer a door into the mystery of spiritual life in which we discover this: the more we give of self, the richer we become in soul; the more we go beyond ourselves in love, the more we become our true selves and our spiritual beauty is more fully revealed. In marriage we are seeking to bring one another into fuller life.

I was really struck by the parallel between this and C.S. Lewis's idea that we become more ourselves when we serve God: "The more we let God take us over, the more truly ourselves we become—because he made us. He invented all the different people you and I intended to be. … It is when I turn to Christ, when I give up myself to His personality, that I first begin to have a real personality of my own." Isn't it wonderful to think of marriage doing the same thing? The more we serve the other, the more we become the people that God meant us to be.

You have both made your decision today – “I will” – and by making this new relationship, you have aligned yourselves with what we believe is the way in which life is spiritually evolving, and which will lead to a creative future for the human race.

It's true. God created the world in such a way that progress and love increase together—the more love, unity, and compassion we have, the more meaningful things we produce and the more we can move forward... and upward, toward God.

As the reality of God has faded from so many lives in the West, there has been a corresponding inflation of expectations that personal relations alone will supply meaning and happiness in life. This is to load our partner with too great a burden. We are all incomplete: we all need the love which is secure, rather than oppressive. We need mutual forgiveness in order to thrive.
As we move towards our partner in love, following the example of Jesus Christ, the Holy Spirit is quickened within us and can increasingly fill our lives with light. This leads on to a family life which offers the best conditions in which the next generation can receive and exchange those gifts which can overcome fear and division and incubate the coming world of the Spirit, whose fruits are love and joy and peace.

"Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven." We can never experience the perfection of heaven here on earth, but we can start to approach it by aligning ourselves with God's ways. Expecting that perfection from people is burdensome and leads to disappointment, while journeying together to find it in God leaves a legacy that inspires future generations.

3. The cheering.

Whether it's the sound of Vancouver after the Canucks win (and I don't even care for hockey) or the sound of Britain after the heir to the throne gets married, something about cheering crowds always gets me. I think we humans are hard-wired to enjoy the sound of many voices joining together in rejoicing ...well, most of us, anyway. But, seriously, it's like a little glimpse of what heaven is going to sound like when we stand face to face with God.

4. The music.

Need I say more?

5. Princess Felizia.

I hate to make this post so girly, but I can't hold myself back from saying one more thing about fashion: didn't the Princess of Spain have the loveliest outfits for the wedding and pre-wedding dinner? I mean, half the time, I don't even notice peoples' gowns, but these are just works of art. :)

(Image credits: Will and Kate photo found here; left Princess Letizia photo by Bauer Griffin, don't know who took the one on the right. The art included in this post is copyright its respective authors, and meant solely to promote their work and to inspire. :)

A few lines of gratitude

2011-05-19T19:41:00.001-07:00

You've probably seen this clip already, but in case you've not, take a look. It's wonderful (even though it's one of those sneaky videos that turns out to be a commercial in the end).

This encapsulates everything I love about writing. I get a strange satisfaction from putting just the right words into just the right places, from trying on a hundred ways of saying something before finding a phrase that fits just right, from turning a simple sentiment into something powerful, haunting, lingering. And it nicely sums up what I love about blogging, too: thousands of people getting together to write about the same things—life, religion, world news, relationships, struggles—using different words... words that challenge, inspire, and spur into action. Writing's been making me really happy lately.

And while we're on the subject of happiness, here's a list of other things that have brought me joy recently (sorry; as much as I love writing, I'm a bit too lazy to write a proper blog post at this moment). Right now, I'm grateful for...

• The baby girl who laughed the whole bus ride downtown the other day. Put me in the best possible mood for my midterm.

• Watching Charlie Chaplin's 'City Lights' with my fam this weekend. Who doesn't love a silent movie night?

• Going to a movie theatre for the first time to see 'Jane Eyre,' a book I've reread at least five times, come to life with stunning cinematography.

• IKEA frozen pancakes.

• That feeling of wanting to burst into song during long bus rides.

• Filling out volunteer applications, and the challenge of putting into words what kind of difference I want to make in my city.

• A semester that started off feeling like my worst semester ever and ended up being my best semester yet.

• A city-wide "open doors" day happening soon. My camera and I are going on an outing!

• Half a dozen half-written blog posts waiting to come alive.

• The suddenness of a late spring rainstorm.

• Church, fellowship, and worship; every day becoming more and more knit into the body of Christ.

What's made you happy today?

Why School Matters

2011-05-13T10:05:00.000-07:00

A few months ago, Pete Wilson posted an excellent question on his blog. He asked, "Are you honestly able to make a connect between what you do for a living and God’s Kingdom?" I started typing up a response but never posted it because I couldn't quite put into words what I wanted to say and, well, because I was ashamed of having such a bad attitude about school. Nevertheless, I saved a copy of it, and I want to share it now because I've realized a thing or two since then.

Such a good question and convicting post. I've been thinking about this nonstop. I don't have a job yet, but as a university student, I'd honestly have to answer "no." I find it really hard to make a connection between the Kingdom and my role as a student (that is, as someone who listens to lectures, does homework, studies for exams...) unless I'm in a religion/philosophy class or something of that kind. It's relevant to my future career, but not at this point directly relevant to the kingdom.
It's different when it comes to my role as a friend. It's easy to connect my social time on campus with the kingdom (I attend a Christian club and Bible studies, help out with outreach efforts, have lots of great conversation with friends, etc.), but that's only one side of the coin. I still can't really find the relevance of the other side—the strictly academic part that involves writing essays and reading textbooks. Maybe I shouldn't be making this distinction between my social and academic time, but it's frustrating.

Yup, that's precisely the attitude with which I trudged through my first two years of university. And just knowing that it was a bad attitude didn't help—changing it took prayer. If I could, I'd say a couple of things to my slightly-younger self that would have saved me some stress and depression last semester.

First off, if we can eat pizza and drink tea for the glory of God, then there's got to be a way to read textbooks and write exams for his glory too. Maybe that means smiling at the prof as I pass by or not stressing out when I don't know an answer. Maybe that means getting excited about the opportunity to discover dozens of different perspectives on an issue (even if doing so entails reading a couple hundred pages). Maybe that just means being diligent and paying attention to what I'm doing. It's hard to know in advance what that looks like, but that's what makes this so exciting: I can ask God at any moment to show me exactly what about my attitude or behaviour I can change to glorify him better as I highlight that book or sharpen my pencil for that exam. By looking for God's purpose in things that seem totally unrelated to him, I'll discover just how vast and, for lack of a more powerful word, pertinent he is.

Second, my experience as a student enriches my social interactions. I understand exactly what others going through... I know the stress, the pressure, the isolation (yup, even in a university of 30,000—I didn't meet anyone from my program until 2nd year). I think it's a bit like missionary work... I'm sure that the most effective missionaries are those who spend their nights in the slums instead of sleeping in a luxury hotel (and for the record, I don't mean this judgmentally; just an illustration). The more fully I embrace and invest in student life, the better I can serve within it. I shouldn't separate the academic and social realms, just like I shouldn't separate cleaning my house form entertaining friends at my house—I can't do the latter without doing the rather-unglamorous former... at least, not as effectively.

Finally, in the words of C.S. Lewis... (which I found, incidentally, while researching for a paper. It's a tad long, but there's a lot of truth in it, and if I were you, I'd read the whole speech—it's called "Learning in War-Time.").

There is no essential quarrel between the spiritual life and the human activities as such. Thus the omnipresence of obedience to God in a Christian's life is, in a way, analogous to the omnipresence of God in space. God does not fill space as a body fills it, in the sense that parts of Him are in different parts of space, excluding other object from them. Yet He is everywhere—totally present at every point of space—according to good theologians. [...]
The intellectual life is not the only road to God, nor the safest, but we find it to be a road, and it may be the appointed road for us. Of course, it will be so only so long as we keep the impulse pure and disinterested. That is the great difficulty. As the author of the Theologia Germanicai says, we may come to love knowledge—our knowing—more than the thing known: to delight not in the exercise of our talents but in the fact that they are ours, or even in the reputation they bring us. Every success in the scholar's life increases this danger. If it becomes irresistible, he must give up his scholarly work. The time for plucking our the right eye has arrived. [...]
The learned life then is, for some, a duty. At the moment it looks as if it were your duty. I am well aware that there may seem to be an almost comic discrepancy between the high issues we have been considering and the immediate task you may be set down to, such as Anglo-Saxon sound laws or chemical formulae. But there is a similar shock awaiting us in every vocation—a young priest finds himself involved in choir treats and a young subaltern in accounting for pots of jam. It is well that it should be so. It weeds out the vain, windy people and keeps in those who are both humble and tough.

The Sandpaper Sofa #1

2011-05-10T12:02:00.000-07:00

A while ago, I read a tweet from @xianity that quipped, "Desiring God introduces the 'Don't Waste Your Life' sandpaper recliner."

Seriously, where can I buy one?

I've been reclining too much, physically and spiritually. I've burrowed so deep into my comfort zone that I've lost sight of the opportunities that lie just beyond it. So I'm going to start taking note of the things that inspire me, stretch me, or call my ways of thinking and acting into question, and I'll share them here once a month. To paraphrase from @xianity, this is going to be my sandpaper sofa: a collection of things that force me away from the comforts of complacency and familiarity. Feel free to comment with your own challenging things, or grab the banner and join in on your blog; if this gathers some steam, I'll turn it into a blog carnival (let me know if you'd be interested in that!). Here goes...

1. Robertson McQuilkin's inspiring speech of resignation from his presidency over Columbia Bible College in order to care full-time for his wife, an Alzheimer's sufferer. (Via Justin Taylor)

What a beautiful example of devotion. The word spent comes to mind... I want my life to be spent like this. Offered entirely to God, poured out fully for his children.

2. Jon Acuff's blog post on grace spots.

It made me realize that there are some moments in life where people aren’t getting any grace. There are some places where people aren’t being shown any kindness, ever. There are some times in the day where people aren’t getting any love. And although I might like to think I am graceful in those situations, I’m not.
But what if showing grace to someone was like anything else in life, you had to be deliberate? What if I could consciously pick ahead of time “Grace Spots” where no matter what, I was going to do my best to throw out wild amounts of grace? Would that change somebody’s day? Would that show someone Christ in a really unexpected way? [...]
When I was in the ninth grade my mom made me write an apology note to the dentist. He swore he’d never see me again as a patient because I was such a jerk to him. So when we moved to Nashville, I determined I’d pick the dentist’s office as a grace spot. After a few visits of showering everyone in that office with grace, a new hygienist handled my appointment. She said, “I was so excited to finally meet you today. Everyone was talking this morning about how much they enjoy when you come in for a visit and I hadn’t met you yet.” Then a few days later she sent me the first hand written thank you note I’ve ever received from a dentist’s office.

This is a tremendous idea, being intentional in showing grace to people who tend to get disregarded... or, worse, disrespected. There are definitely some people I see each day who don't get much grace from others. Bus drivers. Professors. Custodians. Baristas. Telemarketers. And, yup, dentists. I'd be lying if I said I intentionally showed grace at a dentist's office. Honestly, most of the time, I cry at dentists' offices (they're a life-long phobia of mine; don't laugh :)... but I've got to wonder whether turning the dentist's office into a grace spot wouldn't be a win-win situation. I could brighten up the dentists', hygienists', and office workers' days, and at the same time, by turning my attention outward, I'd feel less stressed out and anxious. Guess it's just my luck that I have an appointment today, so I can try it out and see how it works. ;)

3. The story of Nayanaran Krishnan, who gave up his day job as a doctor to serve India's "untouchables." (Via Jamie)

Love in action. This guy isn't waiting for social change to open up an opportunity for him... he's pushing through the stigma and barreling through the norms on his own, and his actions, while they may be relatively small and aimed at individual recipients, are making massive waves in his community—and, now, in the attitudes of the whole world.

Pretty inspiring, no?

What's challenging you today?

Blogging

2011-05-06T19:13:00.000-07:00

I'm determined to make this blogging thing work. I created my first blog when I was 12 and that fell through a few months later; I tried it a few more times over the years but couldn't keep it up past a year or so. (And I'm glad, because I just found an old blog of mine through the Wayback Machine and was thoroughly embarrassed... I don't think I could stand still having that stuff in my archives. But I'm grateful for the indulgent comments of my five or so regular readers... their encouragement kept me writing even though they must have cringed at what I wrote).

So now I'm on to my fifth blog, and have a long, free (read: jobless) summer before me—seems like a perfect time to take this up again. I think the reason I've gotten so intimidated by blogging in the past is that I've generally aimed to write deep, thoughtful posts on profound topics. But since there's only so much profundity I can tackle at a time, it's always gotten too hard to keep up the trend. So for this summer, I don't want to concentrate on writing 'deep' things... I want to make a discipline of writing, full stop. Short or long, trivial or deep, flowery prose or unrefined ramble—I just want to share, and not let my perfectionism or past posts hold me back from saying exactly what's on my heart at any given moment. Because as often as I quit, blogging keeps calling me back... I just can't ignore or take lightly this opportunity to connect and dialogue with people all over the world. And speaking of dialogue, I invite you to send me questions, thoughts, and ideas that I can eventually respond to on this blog.

I also want to make these posts a bit more art-driven. I've been really getting into graphic design lately, and I would love to devote some more space on this blog to gathering together visual inspiration. And, I mean, I currently subscribe to 96 blogs... I can appreciate how much more appealing image-based posts are over long-winded text posts.

Lastly, I want to practice honesty. Blogs have produced some of the most powerful, inspiring, and healing perspective shifts that I've ever had, all because the writers were transparent about their struggles. I've become pretty tired of image maintenance, so this blog seems like a nice place to become more real, especially now that I've finally shared the URL with some of my 'real-life' friends.

So to sum all of that up, I want to give this another shot. I'm going to aim for about one or two posts per week to start with. Right now, I'm working on a post about drawing Jesus' crucifixion... still looking for the right words to describe that experience, because it was pretty powerful. And I'll also probably end up writing a gushy thing or two about the royal wedding, as much as I'd like to prevent myself. We'll see if good sense prevails. Stay tuned. :)

(And in case you need more encouragment, contact me contact me contact me).

Some thoughts on trials

2011-05-05T08:55:00.000-07:00

Finals ended last week. I'm already having the usual recurring post-exam nightmares about failing or forgetting to come; those usually last until September. Not fun. But I guess it's nice to have something to keep me on my toes over the summer, right?

I haven't gotten many of my marks back yet, but considering what was going on in my life during that month, I think I did pretty well. It was a pretty crazy time for me... if you follow my tweets, you'll know that my family went through a crisis of sorts at the start of April. It didn't involve me per se, but watching the situation unfold truly felt like the whole world was crashing down around me. I didn't stop crying for days. And even after things got better, I didn't really recover from the experience for a few weeks... I stayed inside my self-pity, withdrew from my family, and recoiled from any sign of returning normalcy. How could things ever be normal again? I think, sometimes, it's harder to accept that a trial has passed than it is to go through the trial itself. Receiving blessings after your world turns upside down takes trust and humility.

Nevertheless, right now, I'm grateful I went through that because, as clichéd as it sounds, I learned some important lessons along the way. Last weekend, someone at church shared a story he'd read on an email forward. Now I'm not generally a fan of forwards, but hearing this story gave me goosebumps. I know it's not completely accurate, but it's still a beautiful parable...

Malachi 3:3 says: 'He will sit as a refiner and purifier of silver.' This verse puzzled some women in a Bible study, and one of them decided to call up a silversmith and make an appointment to watch him at work. She didn't mention anything about the reason for her interest beyond her curiosity about the process of refining silver. As she watched the silversmith, he held a piece of silver over the fire and let it heat up. He explained that in refining silver, one needed to hold the silver in the middle of the fire where the flames were hottest in order to burn away all the impurities.
The woman thought about God holding us in such a hot spot; then she thought again about the verse that says: 'He sits as a refiner and purifier of silver.' She asked the silversmith if it was true that he had to sit there in front of the fire the whole time. The man answered that yes, he not only had to sit there holding the silver, but he had to keep his eyes on the silver the entire time it was in the fire. If the silver was left a moment too long in the flames, it would be destroyed.
The woman was silent for a moment. Then she asked the silversmith, 'How do you know when the silver is fully refined?' He smiled at her and answered, 'Oh, that's easy—when I see my image in it.'

Wasn't that a brilliant way of putting it? I mean, I knew that suffering conforms us to the character of Jesus, but somehow this story made that truth come to life, and cut straight through my self-pity. I'm not called to try and make things better in a situation over which I have no control; I am called to reflect God. And this trial wasn't a matter of him forsaking me; it was proof that he had a plan for me and needed to clear away the dross obstructing that plan. It was a painful but vital prelude to discovering more of his nature in me. It was an opportunity to yield to his reflection—to identify with him, suffering and all.

And it was a reflection of his goodness. That's something I've had to grapple with over the past few weeks, the idea that God is good when bad things happen. I mean, I know it. But it's only recently that I've begun to really know it. Jamie said it much better than I can...

...Thanks to a financial gift from our home church, and a few more from [readers], the cost of the trip, engine, and labor was covered to within a few dollars of our actual expenses. Pretty cool, huh?
This is the part where I'm supposed to say, "God is good".
Which He is. But. He was also good when our the car died on the side of the road under the blazing Nicaraguan sun. He is good when the house burns to the ground, and He is good when the accident is terrible, even if it happens to me. He is good when the report says "cancer". God's goodness simply can't be measured by what my stupid, human heart deems satisfactory. So I guess what I'm getting at is that we got our car back and we can still afford to eat [...] and, of course, that God is good. Just like always.

A-men. And the post couldn't have come at a better time. The next day, I went to church, heard that silversmith story, admitted my need, had a few people pray for me and for the situation (let me tell you, that is one of the most powerful things ever), and I was finally ready to move past the pain of the fire and to enjoy the greater fullness of God that had resulted from it. Right now, for instance, I'm exploring one lesson I learned from the experience, best encapsulated in this tweet that I wrote in the midst of the situation...

It's not often that I felt so much grief over a situation that I just wanted to keel over from the emotional pain... that tweet was written on one of the few days I ever experienced that kind of pain. And it was hard. Yet that's just a fragment of the grief Jesus willingly entered into as he took the punishment for us. It's just a shadow of Gethsemane. It's just a small part of what the Perfect One felt while walking this broken, unbelieving earth.

So I've been learning to feel God's kind of sorrow for the world—and I don't mean 'sorrow' in the despairing sense. I'm talking about becoming burdened with, rather than calloused towards, the needs and concerns of others, and in the process, to see them a bit more like God sees them. To 'have a heart for' the world; to invest in their situations and empathize with their suffering. I guess, in a way, my own pain made me more sensitive to the pain of others. It's been a huge perspective shift and I'm still adjusting to it... but I can see that it sure made the time in the fire worth it.

Have you gone through a trial recently? What have you learned from it? How can I pray for you?

(And while I'm at it, I want to throw out a huge thank you to everyone who put up with my angsty tweets and prayed for that situation to get better. Love you guys).

Where Arms Are Raised

2011-04-16T20:05:00.000-07:00

This is a repost/rewrite of something I posted a while ago as I was reading through the OT... I felt it would be fitting for Good Friday. I'll take up blogging again in May. Hope everyone has a wonderful Easter!

Moses lifting his hands on the hilltop.

There's something about that scene that gets me every time. I can see it even as I type—the powerful, electrifying strength with which he first raised his arms over the raging battle—the pain that gripped them as they grew unrelentingly heavy and fell to his sides—the weight of his body slumping down upon the rock—the weak, numb arms falling into the hands of Aaron and Hur—the arrows gleaming through the blazing atmosphere—the victory proclaimed by sunset.

It's so awe-inspiring, how a stuttering, awkward man was chosen to stumble down from a mountain engulfed in the presence of the Holiest One and proclaim the law of God before his people. That the same elderly man—overcome by weakness, desperately yoking his tired arms about the shoulders of his descendants—was entrusted with the power to lead his nation to victory. That the man who cried, from the depths of his fears and insecurities, "Send someone else!" would hear the creator of the universe say, "Go."

I stand in wonder of the God who pours his might into our weakness, who does not despise our messy, blundering offerings, who makes victorious those who lack the strength to hold up their own hands.

And I see glimmerings of Moses everywhere: in the young man lifting his arms during worship, overcome with waves of doubt and condemnation; in the young woman raising her hands in prayer, crying as she looks back on the life that's brought her to her knees; in the mother raising her newborn above her head and feeling a piercing pain as she remembers the father he will never meet; in the husband lifting his wife over the threshold of their new home, struggling to fight away the memories of his parents' relentless quarrels.

Where arms are raised, a battle is raging. And where arms are falling, crumbling under the weight of a broken world, they find support—held, embraced, rising, linked, outstretched, interwoven, unrestrained—as two or more gather in His name. For wherever the day is dying, hope is fading, and sunlight is languishing, the God of light waits to lavish victory upon his people.

I think of Jesus. His arms straining, the weight of his body pulling his hands above his head, his shoulders buckling, his head bowing. As the sun slipped silently from view, the world saw two arms raised in helpless defeat.

But they weren't. They had been raised in petition, stretched out in forgiveness, lifted with reckless abandon in passionate worship.

And now, supported on either side by two dark, gleaming nails, they were raised in victory.

The battle was won.

Images: 'Victory O Lord' by John Everett Millais; 'Jesús crucificado expirante' by Francisco de Zurbarán

Promise

2011-02-18T09:46:00.000-08:00

Word made seed: a germination
dances quiet in its shell;
and by the wayside starts the blossoming
of a thousand little heads
inclining already toward sunrise.

Summer winds will tangle them
and winters lull to sleep
until the blush, the break, the beckoning
of faithful springs,

and the turning seasons will be to them a promise --

wavering ones: take root,
take rest and restoration.
I will make you innumerable,
yet count your every fibre.

The contours of your branches
will be outlines of my image
for the despised ones, the meek and contemned,
to adorn,
and your leaves will be a shelter to the fragile;
you will catch a thousand falling ones and never break.

And the promise gives life:
seed springs up sudden, blooms relentless,
word takes root and pollinates the earth
while seasons blow by on the wind;

then,
in the glow of a blazing harvest
heaven's readiness grows ripe,
the call descends and the free take flight,
a mist of tiny seeds
in one last migration, in one final sunset,

to be planted in a new world.

.:.

Freedom Song

2011-01-14T09:55:00.000-08:00

{I haven't written in so long... I miss this. Nice to feel the words pouring out, even if this prose is about as unrefined as it gets. This is about a new development that's been happening in my life recently... will talk about it more soon, but just want to share these vague tidbits for now...}

Perhaps it's better this way. To wait on His hand for daily water, to wait on His fields for daily bread. It's a far-off door, but it gives light enough for the sabbath, that I may learn what rest is. They are waiting too, I remind myself: the imprisoned messenger, the secret baptist, the persecuted teacher, the veiled disciple. Adopted orphans, widow brides — my kin, hoping for the heavenly things. I think of them as I wait on the miracle to inch its way to half past four.

"Go."

Oh how little my faith, that I trust the setting sun but doubt the Saviour's rising. Come as you are, and I answer back with blue jeans, sweater on shirt, bundled up and suede-booted, with fears and weaknesses and joys to lay into my Father's arms.

The sun is swaying low; the air makes visible my breath, and it is fitting, for I come to be made visible. I come for smiles and tears, for glances and greetings, for embrace and prayer-touch, for vivid Spirit, manifest grace, conspicuous faith.

A destination is a secret, and I keep mine in my ribcage and in my purse — the former, a heart-cry; the latter, heaven's correspondence, sent to me leather-bound with a return address called "Love." The living book breathes, prepares the heart to know the swell and surge of love.

Dizzying. Storm-tossed. Salty. Anchored. Still. This ship has no parlours, no first-class dining, no iron hull. She is really just a lifeboat, but I am drowning and if my pride prevents me from reaching, the sea will pull me apart. So I grow humble and find myself caught up to safety, with blankets and greetings and prayers, with shepherds and strangers and friends, with coffee and cookies and juice.

And it is all love, though it may not look like much — the stop, the walk through snow, the clattering staircase, the dingy and plain; this extraordinary and uncontainable home.

"Go."

And I steady myself for the song.

.

The Story Series

2010-08-14T15:08:00.000-07:00

Hello bloggy-friends,

I know I sound like a broken record; I've written 2 consecutive posts about how I'll start blogging soon, and I've broken that promise each time. Today, though, I got nostalgic and decided to take another dive into blog-land. Free-floating thoughts drive me crazy, and I've got many of those at the moment, so I need a place to pin them down and organize them and store them for safekeeping. I'm still struggling to find my normal, casual writing style—hopefully it's still lurking somewhere under all the pages academic essays that I had to do this year—so if my first few posts sound unbearably formal, try to bear with me anyway... I'm working on it.

I think I'm going to resurrect this blog by beginning a series about stories. Now that I think of it, I'm not quite sure how to define stories: I guess you could say that they're the processes by which different people, events, and situations get woven together and imbued with meaning. Don Miller does a much better job of defining story in his book A Million Miles in a Thousand Years—that's what first got me thinking about the concept. In the book, he describes how “editing” his life into a movie memoir stirred him to start looking for ways to “live a better story”—to accept conflicts and struggles as opportunities, to interact more closely with other people, to fashion memorable, meaningful moments out of his circumstances... in short, to make his life interesting and worthwhile.

Though I wouldn't say the book was groundbreaking, it kicked me into the habit of looking at my own life as a story. This mindset has proven to be both freeing and constraining. It's freeing because it helps me look past the pain of my struggles and see how beneficial they are in the grand scheme of things; it's constraining because it constantly forces me to ask, “What kind of message am I sending here? Is this choice going to develop my character in the right direction? What kind of ending might I miss out on if I turn back?” Seeing life as a story has made me more and more sensitive to “the big picture”—God's grand plan for humanity—and it's prompted me to think about how I'll the most of my little niche in that big picture.

So in this series, which I'll probably intersperse among more “normal” blog posts, I'll share a few glimpses of the stories and story elements I've been finding in my life and in the rest of the world. We, as a society, are enamored with stories... and I think there is some good in that, if put to good use. I'm going to explore that idea in the coming weeks. Hope you stay along for the ride... posts coming soon. :)

I know...

2010-05-04T09:38:00.000-07:00

... It's been ages. I'm not sure I can call my blog break a "hiatus" -- it was a full-out, AWOL desertion. But I'm going to do my best to come back this summer and fill you in on some of the stuff that's floating around in my head. Stay tuned for posts! It's going to be really hard to churn them out after writing only academic essays all year, but I've learned a lot about discipline this year, and I miss writing-for-pleasure terribly, so it seems like I've got the perfect recipe for a bloggy summer. :)

How has everyone been lately?

Thirsty

2009-04-06T14:57:00.000-07:00

breeze clingingly swings
from the tips of the stray
strands in her braids; unkempt.
she entertains little
shipwrecked ghosts of thoughts
as minutes fly on the drafts between
the windows open in her mind.

sky: grey and gold,
clouds collide in the pulse of the wind
meeting, passing, melting into
a directionless sea;
an expanse
that feels almost like stillness
and almost like infinity...

and not a mollecule of it has forgotten
the dust it was drawn from
on that creation morning.
there they will all return.
and while she wanders here, forgetting,
the very stones cry out...

harvest overflows onto her feet
as she passes by, but her hands
remain empty.
yet something must have stirred,
for, tentative, a prayer emerges --
silently she speaks,

lift up my face;

her eyes turn to follow the wind's transparent tracks;

break the storm like bread over me
let the wine pour --
drench me in your sacrifice, my salvation,
overwhelm me --
wash the very shadows out from under my feet
and teach me

to remember where the soul belongs,
so thirsty

is she,
for the golden-gilded pages
she reads each morning,
for the red letters, and all those numbers,

and the spirit that inhabits all the lives
that You've whispered in between its lines.

.

7:27

2009-03-28T16:41:00.000-07:00

It begins with a bird on a branch in my backyard.

I open my drawer and pull out my camera. Several soft clicks, and the screen clears; focused, meditative. Snap. Snap. The sound is startling in the day's-end cool silence, but it catches in the glass of the windowpane, and leaves the bird unfazed. She turns her head several times, searching for something. I relax my posture, lean on my elbows and wait for the perfect picture of flight. Stillness. The light fades in little increments, like someone is removing the sun, strand by strand, from the sky. I wait. Minutes yield nothing and my arms start to grow tired. There will be other birds, I tell myself. My feet shift, preparing to leave. But something in the air reaches out to pause me. It's as if God is telling me to linger.

Compelled, I allow my thoughts to slow; I melt into the pace of the approaching dusk. Particles and worries dissolve into the evening's stillness, leaving me grateful and pensive. The camera still aimed, my eyes drift elsewhere.

Unexpectedly, the bird takes off. My senses do not react for a few moments, and when my finger springs to the shutter release, it's too late; the branches are empty. Strangely, it doesn't bother me much; as I place the camera on my bed and return to the window, I am keenly aware of something greater than me unfolding. I know I am alone in this: surely, no one else is standing like me at their window, peering out from behind the fog of their breath into this mudane darkening, into this thickening night descending upon the city. No, nobody but me is watching this moment, and I feel as though I'm sharing a precious secret with God; witnessing something that no one sees but us two. I pick up a notebook and a pencil. The quiet grows quieter.

I draw my notebook near my chin and rest it against the windowpane to write. The words are growing dimmer, I strain harder and harder to discern the graphite from the page. This is not some magical, pink-tinged dusk. It is progressive colourlessness; a dim grey drinking up light and hue. Yet there is a certain iridescence to this dullness -- a tinge of comfort in this twilight's milky diffusion.

I watch the slow crawl of headlights as they light up the road in small, shifting patches. I listen to the coldness, and to the stillness, and feel the almost-touch of the light that emerges from the doorway of a farther room. The cold white frame of the building across the street. The flickering lamp on a neighbor's lawn. Earth covered in dead leaves, winter's debris. Candlelight through a curtained window.

This is real beauty; tangible, yet untouchable; this is the stream of poetry that runs between the paragraphs I write. These words are only a distraction, but they are all I can produce: scribbled sentences, breaths that catch upon the scratches on the surface of the sky.

The Shower of Doom

2009-03-23T18:26:00.000-07:00

I have the most aggravating shower. Whenever I turn it on, the water is scalding. I freak out for a few moments, trying to remember which way is left and which way is right, and chanting "Lefty loosey, righty tighty" (because I can never remember how to turn taps on and off), before I finally gather my wits enough to twist the left handle a wee bit to the right. Just a few millimetres does the trick.

Aaah... Refreshing, cool water comes pouring down to soothe my just-been-boiled-alive self, and I begin humming the overture to a show-tune. Yes, showering is nice.

But not for long.

Two seconds later, I find myself in freezing water: it's so cold that it literally knocks the breath out of me. I scramble for the tap handle and twist it frantically. How could one millimetre have done this? I barely even turned the tap, and the shower went all Arctic on me! It's quite the drama, and it repeats itself every single day. On -- scream --twist -- ahh -- scream -- twist... over and over it occurs, creating a viscious cycle that I battle daily.

But why exactly am I sharing this profoundly edifying and enlightening experience with you? Well, there's more to this story than meets the eye. I've realised, over time, that it's a bit of an illustration of my life and the way I sin.

I fool myself every single day. I tell God, "This is it. I will not commit this wrong ever again. I will not make any excuses for it. There is nothing in the world that can justify it, so I repent of it for life." And for the first few minutes, I do. I'm fired-up, living the "hot" life, enjoying the resolve that I feel as I return to the quiet, peaceful narrow path that leads to my Lord. And then something catches my eye. It's about as important as an atom compared to the God I serve, but somehow, it grabs my attention and I become absolutely overwhelmed with desire for it.

One tentative step to the right. One millimetre. It can't do any harm. And the next thing I know, I am absolutely cold.

I might be wrong about this, as I don't know the Bible by heart, but I don't think that God ever talks of Christians regressing -- in his eyes, we either walk forward or fall away. There's no such thing as a millimeter when it comes to sin -- the tinest veering off of the path turns the soul to ice. We think, it's no big deal, this is only a fraction of a sin, but, when it comes to evil, an inch quickly turns into a mile.

Sometimes, I can't stand the heat of living for Christ 100%, and I decide to tone it down just a little -- just be one puny percent more like the rest of the world. Surely it won't change the temperature much. So I wake up in the morning and think, I'll read my Bible a little later, after I do my hair. Not reading the Bible is out of the question, but, in the mad rush that ensues when I realise I'm late for school, my first thought quickly morphs into, Okay, I'll read it after school. After school, when I'm starving and have tons of homework, it's suddenly not that big of a stretch to think, Not tonight. I'll read my Bible tomorrow. Ouch! Do you see how that happened? In the early morning, I would have been shocked at the thought of not reading my Bible all day, but, millimeter by millimeter, that thought becomes acceptable to me, and before I know it, I am left cold.

Let's look at it another way. I've never skydived before, and even the thought of jumping from a diving board at the pool scares me. But if I leap a few times from my kitchen counter, I'm suddenly no longer so afraid of jumping from the top of the play-structure. And when I take that risk, a diving board isn't so scary anymore. After jumping from the highest diving-board in the pool, will I still be as afraid of sky-diving as I used to be? All it takes is that first jump from the kitchen counter, and a bunch of possibilities are opened. With many things in life, that's a good thing. With sin, it's not.

My daily shower-gone-insane experience is a good reminder to enjoy the fiery life that God wants me to live, and to never cave into the idea that a little millimeter won't change anything. Even the smallest steps have big consequences.

In the words of Casting Crowns,

It's a slow fade when you give yourself away

It's a slow fade when black and white have turned to gray

Thoughts invade, choices are made, a price will be paid

When you give yourself away

People never crumble in a day

The journey from your mind to your hands

Is shorter than you're thinking

Be careful if you think you stand

You just might be sinking...

Image from JupiterImages.

SPACE

2009-03-02T17:18:00.000-08:00

SPACE

strands of the future float
among the ancient stars
grains of this perfect universe lost
in its own pocket

lonely dreaming circle
rolling through space
emptiness
where the weight of the world
finds a shoulder

moonlit planets race through the open sea
of faceless galaxies reaching for the light

darkness drinks up the void
tumbles breathlessly between
miles of mute wonder

earth still spinning
in awe of creation

To live again

2009-03-01T17:23:00.001-08:00

The week is almost over, and I still haven't fulfilled my post-per-week challenge, so I'm sitting here and wondering what I should write about as the end of the day draws near.

I feel like I've been really wasting my life lately. I haven't been reaching out to God; I've become so content with my desert-like state that I've forgotten how to cry out to him... I've drunk so little of the Water of Life that tears no longer come. I'm too numb to feel the pain of my loneliness; I've hardened my heart until my conscience barely pricks me. It hurts me that I've forsaken the love of my life and forgotten how to yearn. I'm reading Hosea, but I'm not convicted; I see myself in every line, but I don't repent.

At various points in my life, I've found myself consumed by things. For instance, I can remember hearing some songs from Les Miserables for the first time and being unable to pull them from, not only my mind, but my whole being for days afterward. I was so deeply affected by the music that I lost touch with the outside world, living within the songs and watching reality race around me, distant and detached.

I also remember being consumed by a desire for money once. I sat down, and, without letting God refine and referee my thoughts, considered my future and how I could make enough money to sustain myself. My thoughts began racing through imaginary store ailes, pointing out all of the necessities for which I'd have to work as an adult; my brain began calculating how much I'd make, how much I'd save, and how much I'd have to spend, and I found myself completely lost in a world of competition and despair -- all thoughts of helping the less-fortunate thrown aside as I focused on how to make the most for myself.

I've been consumed by sin, schoolwork, the Internet, sorrow, flippancy, romance, despair...

But by God? I can remember a few instances... right after I was saved, for instance, or in times of tribulation. I can remember a few times when I felt like a child in the womb: utterly helpless, utterly protected, and sustained solely by the nourishment of God. I can remember a few times when I felt like there was nothing else in my life but God, and I wanted to keep it that way.

A few times.

I realise, tonight, that I've created an idol for myself: a god who is content with taking the passenger seat, who feels no jealousy for the soul he bought and who has no burning passion to destroy the distance between us. That's not the God of the Bible -- not the God I accepted five years ago -- but he's become the god I serve; the warped image of God that I've created to suit my life and the sin that I can't seem to let go of.

I want to cast away the idol and turn to the real God; the one who loved me so much that he died for me, and who yearns to see me return that love. I want to serve the God who knows more of me than anyone in the world has ever cared to know, and who expects more of me than anyone in the world has ever bothered to expect. I want to be consumed again. I want to be intertwined with, melted into, and joined to the universe's blessed Creator.

Whatever it takes. Please pray for me. Pray "dangerous" prayers -- prayers that will challenge me to give up all the things I think I need and reach out to the real Source whatever the cost. I want lukewarm to end tonight. I know He does, too.

Lord, teach me to live again.

Yeah, that day of the year.

2009-02-13T07:34:00.000-08:00

Valentine's day.

It's funny how, a few years ago, it was all about getting two-cent Magic Schoolbus cards from (female) friends and little bags of cinnamon-flavored hearts that stung your tongue when you ate them. I'd skip home with my backpack full of pink Valentines and my tummy full of chocolate, and scream a shrill "Eeew!" every time I saw a kiss on TV (which would, inevitably, happen very often that particular day). How much things have changed since then.

It all started when I was about thirteen and began realizing that love wasn't all icky as I had previously thought. One by one, I began to revoke my childhood vows to never date, kiss, or marry. Then, I guess I read Little Women and Les Miserables several times too many, and they pushed me to the brink: I became a hopeless romantic.

Maybe "hopeless" is the wrong word. I'm actually a very hopeful romantic -- I hope that, someday, I will fall in love, get married, have children, et cetera. In fact, I don't just hope: I'm certain that this must be what God has in store for me. Why would he deprive me of the experience that so many people get to go through? The magic of knowing somebody better than anybody else on earth knows them; the magic of opening your heart to them and finding that they understand better than anyone's ever understood; the magic of bringing new lives into being and and watching them go from 'love is icky' to marriage; but, above all, the magic of joining somebody else to become a single person who embodies God's will better than either could alone. Love -- no one can deny that it's an amazing gift to us humans. Surely it must be in God's plan for me. And if it isn't, I'll muse over honeymoon locations and doodle wedding dress designs until he changes his mind.

Yeah, that sounds really bad -- blasphemous almost. But I might as well be honest: it's precisely what goes through my mind, subconsciously, when I think of marriage. I don't stop to ask God what role he wants love to play in my life. I just assume that, since everyone else has one, there must be a special someone out there for me.

But what if there isn't? That's the question that gets me every time. That's my secret weakness: the ugly insecurity and point of faithlessness that lies behind my 'sweet Christian girl' mask.

I was once talking to someone who was going through some romantic troubles with her significant other. "Today's our anniversary," she told me. "If I were him, I would have bought some roses or a card or something to show me that he wants to start over. If I were him, I'd walk up to me and say, 'Look, I want to make things better. I'm sorry for what I did.' I just don't see why he doesn't. If I were him..."

I barely restrained myself from answering, "But you're not him! You've walked into this relationship with expectations on exactly how he's supposed to act, exactly what he's supposed to say, and exactly what he's supposed to do. You want him to do what you want him to do, but that's not what he's in your life for!"

Did those thoughts ever come barreling back at me! I've realized since that conversation that I am treating God exactly the same way. I've walked into our relationship with conditions: "God, thy will be done, but it had better include a nice Christian guy, a honeymoon in Italy, and a family of adorable children whom I'll name Caroline, Bethany, Sean, and Paul." I sit around daydreaming about how I want my future to look, which is exactly the same thing as deciding what I would do in my life if I were God; just, "daydream" is a prettier way to say it.

Today, I'm feeling like God isn't the only one who's tired of that kind of attitude: I'm tired of it too. I've been holding onto this for too long, and it's putting distance between me and the true Love of my life. I have to let go. I have to open my hands and give up my desires and fall... fall into the hands of the real Prince Charming -- the Prince of Peace. His arms are ready to catch me and keep me if I would only release my grip on this world.

So gallant. Just the man I've always dreamed of.

Letters

2009-02-07T11:17:00.000-08:00

a dusty letter-box lies open;
_____________love notes rest in twilight's gauzy gleam,

valentines, and dry, forgotten roses,
_____________all faintly fragrant of a bygone dream.

she lifts them, inhaling the aroma
_____________that lingers like a kiss upon the words,

as tears stray through her downcast lashes
_____________and wet the pages,

_______________________________unseen by her.

lost in the echoes of her stolen moment,
_____________she clasps the paper memories to her heart;

her fingers tenderly smooth out the creases,
_____________longing to mend what has been torn apart.

at last, she stands up, sets the pages falling,
_____________despairing, vows to put them from her mind --

her letters lie there, in the tarnished moonlight,
_____________unread by her,

_________________________________for she is blind.

___

Written when I was 15. As I wrote this, I hadn't tried to infuse any sort of deep meaning into it: I just sat down to write one evening, and this came out. However, re-reading it now, I feel as if it's an allegory for spiritual blindness and how easy it is to miss God's love-letters in the midst of this unseeing world. I've reworked a few lines to make it fit this theme better.

Moors

2009-02-01T17:50:00.000-08:00

Hey everyone! Okay, so I'm going to be jumping on board Abigail Kraft's Monthly Poetry Mondays. I won't always be posting recent work (the poem I'm posting today, for instance, was written when I was 15), but I'll try to participate as often as I can. :)

So, here goes...

MOORS

the moors lie, an open canvas
blown smooth by the wind --
barrenness, barrenness, barrenness that
gives birth to so much beauty.

the opening dawn brushes the heart
steals it away into the sweet, the familiar mundane
wavering chords of birdsong
weave through thick emptiness
fading, fading, fading
into the fog; straying,
waking in the rain.

lost hope is called back
and love wanders into the sun,
leaves its nest behind
to soar into heaven's sanctuary,

circling, circling, circling
over the gentle folds of the earth.

.

so much more

2009-01-26T12:31:00.000-08:00

there is
a time to speak,

and a time
to fall silent.

we were meant to be
so much more than
noise.

Pattern

2009-01-15T18:01:00.000-08:00

i've talked of heaven's gates in terms
of geometric patterns --
the golden bars, pearl-laden and parallel --
repeating, repeating, repeating
infinitely...
their endless panoramas raced through my mind while i sat
mastering the equation
and missing the entrance.

but you

you haven't learned arithmetic yet
and your faith makes me restless.

i believe
when i see your fingers reach for mine
the lines in the palms of your hands,
which you clutched so tightly
in the womb --

these
are your patterns.

lift them, child,
leave your imprints in the air;
our unseen fingerprints are
His to breathe in
His to remember...

and He will collect your patterns,
guard them tightly between the pages of His book
save the songs you spun in worship
eternally

forever and ever and ever and ever
and always.

it is a pattern, child

and it's dancing.

Inspired by Brooke Fraser's song "Seeds." Read its lyrics -- they're amazing.

and in the midst of the christmas frenzy

2008-12-30T12:28:00.000-08:00

... she crept out the door for a breath of silence.

steal away,
steal away,
steal away to Jesus...

steal away,
steal away home...

i ain't got long to stay here.

The Stable

2008-12-25T10:55:00.000-08:00

"There was no place for them at the inn." -Lk. 2:7

I used to be an inkeeper. My life was so filled with the temporary guests and transient visitors of this world that I had no space for Jesus. It wasn't that I cared about the people and things upon which I lavished so much time and care; it was simply that I could not afford to let them go. What a cost to my reputation it would be if I stopped swearing, stopped laughing at crude jokes, stopped dressing in the latest, revealing styles! Who would stop by my inn if I made room for Christ? No, I had an image to uphold: I was the keeper of an inn that invited all the latest trends, all the coolest people, all the riches of the world. A young wife gasping in labor and about to give birth to a child? A baby, still in the womb, lauded as the perfect Son of God?

Sorry, no space here.

"When Herod the king heard [the wise mens' news], he was troubled ... he sent and killed all the male children in Bethlehem." -Mt. 2:3, 16

I used to be a ruler. Herod was my name, and, although I didn't personally know this Jesus, I had heard enough about him to decide that he was my ultimate enemy. A King who would grow to be greater than me? Could anyone dare to even think of pushing me off my throne? No, I was the center of the universe. My needs came first, my glory was sought before anyone else's. Could a carpenter's son tell me otherwise? I would not stand for anyone trying to rule over me. To be my guide? To make me conform to a standard other than my own? The thought disgusted me, and I set out to destroy anything that even mildly smacked of this Son of God. Prayers and hymns were put out of my mind. The name of God I dragged through the dust, trying to empty it of its glory. I was certain that the Messiah had to exist somewhere -- in organized religion, maybe, or in stained-glass windows, in nativity sets, or perhaps in the syllables "Jee-zus." So I slayed those things, taking care that not even a fragment of them should remain near me.

I was an innkeeper and I was a ruler. I rejected my savior and persecuted my God. Salvation was for the weak; I sure didn't need it. I had all I wanted: I was rich, and powerful, and important.

Or, at least, I thought I was. But, in reality, I was a sad, sorry sight. A dirty stable, cold and worn to bits, with loose boards and a caving roof. I was smelly and full of waste. My walls were stained and my floor was a sea of wet, sticky mud. I was a foul, disorganized, broken mess.

And God chose to lay the Savior in me.

In my empty manger, God placed the Bread of Life. On my dark, shivering floor, God placed his warmth and light. Into my dirt, God placed the world's purest soul. And into my lonely silence, God placed the sacred cries of a child who would become my King.

It's then I realised that my famous inn and my great kingdom were but illusions. Suddenly, my riches seemed like dust in my hands, and I saw that all my past glory was nothing but a foolish mirage. That knowledge broke me; it hurt to feel my poverty and see my ugliness. But that night, as the star shone over me and as angels sang above my roof, I felt myself starting to become rich in a whole new way. I, the run-down stable, had become a dwelling place of God. My worthlessness was being transformed into purpose, and my affliction into peace.

The innkeeper in me vacated his rooms and the Herod I'd been stepped off of the throne, because now, the King of the galaxies was alive in me.

And, even if I'd had the whole universe laid out before me for the taking, I couldn't have asked for a better gift than that.

Merry Christmas.

Photo from JupiterImages. Verses from ESV.

Winter Warmth

2008-12-22T08:03:00.000-08:00

We could never guess

2008-12-20T11:52:00.000-08:00

tiny little bundle, you

your skin delicately pink
blanketing your warmth
eyes of awe

your beautiful lashes and tiny hands
little noises
the very veins in your eyelids

are melodic

small translucent ribcage

your breath
is bigger than you

and God pours life
between your fingertips

you hold your mother's skin

your purpose here
is bigger than our imagination
we could never guess

but maybe someday

when we dance
through the universe
perfected

we will know

.:.

Dedicated to little Kayleigh, whose story I've been following breathlessly over the past few days. She has already touched my life, and she's changed the world in ways that we might never even guess at until we see the God who sustains her face-to-face. He has plans for her that exceed our imagination. Kayleigh is truly a miracle; please keep her in your heart today.

http://kayleighannefreeman.blogspot.com/

Gary

2008-11-14T15:07:00.000-08:00

In my 3-and-a-quarter years of high school, I don't think I ever saw him talk to anyone.

I had him in a couple of my classes. Every day, without fail (excluding test days), he spent the entire period with his head laid down on the table. Sleeping. Or so it seemed -- I mean, it's not like anyone ever bothered to check. He wasn't on my mind a lot -- or ever. I only thought about him when a teacher would ask off-hand in the middle of a lesson, Is that Gary sleeping again? Had he been oblivious to the giggles and the laughter as jokes about him cracked over his head? I knew that he wasn't because, sometimes, he'd lift his head and look up long enough to show that he was not asleep. Yet that didn't stop me from laughing along.

When he looked at you, his eyes would flinch nervously -- or defiantly -- from yours. His expression was fierce. And utterly silent.

I never thought about him. No one ever did. Until Thursday, that is.

On Thursday, Gary brought a home-made bomb to school.

The police were called in. His locker raided, his belongings confiscated, his school records stamped with "Expelled."

It's probably the last I'll ever see of him.

However, it certainly hasn't been the last I've thought of him. My first thought, right when I heard the news, was probably the same one that's running through your mind right now: My gosh -- that could have killed someone! Was he crazy?! How could he?

My second thought was: Well, what did you expect?

The bomb he brought was no joke: no little sparkler or mini-firework. The bomb could have left people blind, disfigured, or worse. But what did I expect? The guy who was, to us, nothing more than some wierd kid who always slept and never talked -- did I expect him to see us as anything more than a homogenous group of jeering, uncaring teenagers? Could I really expect someone upon whom we had never bestowed any value to see our value? We had no regard for his life -- why were we so surprised to find that he had no regard for ours?

In no way am I condoning what he did, or planned to do. I'm merely saying that we'd been doing the same to him for many years, minus the explosives. And I did nothing to set myself apart and show him the love that God has for him.

Thursday evening, I put these thoughts aside for a while to surf some blogs. On one of them, Casting Crowns' "If We Are The Body" came on in the flash music player. I sang along, swaying my head and lifting my eyes at all the appropriate moments.

To God, that must have been one of the most ironic moments of history.

"But if we are the Body

Why aren't His arms reaching?

Why aren't His hands healing?

Why aren't His words teaching?

And if we are the Body

Why aren't His feet going?

Why is His love not showing them there is a way?

There is a way..."

In my 3-and-a-quarter years of high school, I don't think I ever saw him talk to anyone. Certainly not to myself.

Or maybe, I was the one. Who never stopped to speak. Never stopped to listen.

Name of student changed to protect his identity. Photo from JupiterImages.

Award

2008-11-14T08:19:00.000-08:00

I've been awarded a "Thank You Blog Award" by Kaysie of Alabaster Box. My first ever --thanks! :)

In turn, I'd like to award a couple of the bloggers who have helped me "break through" into the blogging world and have supported me by coming by to read and comment on my posts.

Phylicia: Her blog is filled with helpful, relatable, and relevant advice that I believe all girls need to hear. Thank you for taking the time to fill this world with the godly attitudes that it lacks so much, Phylicia! I know I'll be reading your blog for a long time to come!

Ruthie-Roo: She's an absolutely wonderful blogger who really knows how to strike a balance between the light-hearted and the serious when it comes to posting. Her blog is, in turns, heartwarming, smile-inducing, and soul-convicting -- and always God-glorifying.

Laura: She recently deactivated her blog, but I have greatly enjoyed her encouragement and friendship, and I think she deserves this award for everything she's done for me this year! :)

Carmen: Another frequent commenter with a very enjoyable, interesting blog; going through her posts always brings a smile to my face! Thanks Carmen!

Kaysie: Am I allowed to award someone "back"? Hopefully, because I certainly think that Kaysie deserves another one of these awards. She's truly a light in this world, and I'm glad I found her blog, because it has already done a lot in my life.

Have a great friday everyone!

Love,

Oksana

Wherever Arms are Raised, a Battle is Raging

2008-11-08T19:18:00.000-08:00

Moses lifting his hands on the hilltop. There's something about that scene that gets me every time. I can see it right now, even as I type -- the powerful, electrifying strength with which he raised his arms for the first time over the raging battle scene -- the pain that gripped them as they grew unrelentingly heavy and fell to his sides -- the weight of his body slumping down upon the rock -- the weak, numb arms falling into the hands of Aaron and Hur -- the gleaming arrows whipping through the blazing atmosphere -- the victory proclaimed by sunset.

It's so awe-inspiring: that the stuttering, awkward man was chosen to stumble down from the montain of billowing smoke and proclaim the law of God before his people. That the same old man -- overcome by weakness, desperately yoking his tired arms about the shoulders of his descendants -- led his nation to victory. That the man who cried, "Send someone else!" out of the depths of his fears and insecurities would be told, "I send you."

I stand in wonder of the God who pours his strength into our weakness; who does not despise our messy, blundering offerings; whose makes victorious those who have no strength to hold up their own hands.

I see glimmerings of Moses everywhere: in the young man lifting his arms during worship, overcome with waves of doubt and condemnation; in the young woman raising her hands in prayer, crying as she looks back on the life that's brought her to her knees; in the mother raising her newborn above her head and feeling a piercing pain as she remembers the father he will never meet.

Wherever arms are raised, a battle is raging.

Arms raised, falling, crumbling collapsing, descending, embracing, supporting, rising, linked, outstretched, interwoven, unrestrained...

Wherever the day is dying, hope is fading, and sunlight is languishing, the God of light waits to lavish victory upon his people.

I think of Jesus. His arms straining, his body heaving, his weight pulling his hands above his head; his head falling. As the sun began slipping silently towards the horizon, the world saw two arms raised in helpless defeat.

But they weren't. They had been raised in petition, stretched out in forgiveness, lifted with reckless abandon in passionate worship.

And now, supported on either side by two dark, gleaming nails, they were raised in victory.

The battle was won.

Images not mine; copyright goes to their respective owners.

Live and Let Live

2008-10-25T20:12:00.000-07:00

I saw that video a while ago, and was really moved by it. I watched it again, and again, and again, and soon enough, the bigger picture began to unfold. Why is it that we so often avoid things because of our limitations, incompetence, or inabilities? Why, when there are so many other people who can be our support and help us do the things that we alone cannot? Is it just because we want to steal the show? To be the only spotlit, center-of-attention performer -- or else not perform at all?

Seeing this video makes me wonder how much could we do if we could only let others be for us the things that we are not... and do for them what they cannot do. It seems as if we live our lives fruitlessly trying to perform an arabesque without a leg to lift, while our healthy arms dangle uselessly. We try to choose what we want to do, when God has already chosen other roles for us -- roles that might not be as glamorous or fun as those of others, but roles that are perfectly allotted by God to make the Christian body into one complete, unified being.

I mentioned a while ago about the hard (for me) decision to become a writer. I had been jumping from one thing to the next -- trying to teach myself piano, trying to master wheel pottery, trying to learn to sing, trying to learn Italian on my own -- and ended up leaving my gift for writing stagnant and under-nourished. I was like a gardener who planted a hundred different seeds, and spent so much time jumping around from one to the next that none of them ended up growing.

I'm all for trying new things, but there's a difference between a focused, concentrated effort on several key projects, and spreading yourself too thin. I think that, if -- figuratively speaking -- God gave me a "hand" so that I could be a hand to those who have no hand, I should focus on using that hand instead of bemoaning the foot that I don't have... there are others who "be" that foot for me. That's how we are made: there are no trials that have no way out, no deficiencies that cannot be filled in by others.

One of the central characterstics of a servant is to do your part to the best of your ability, and let others do their part. I mean, Jesus, who has absolutely no incompetencies, imperfections, or inabilities, still allows and encourages us to be his hands and feet. It's not that he needs us to do these things for him -- it's that he entrusts us to do his work here on earth. He lets us do it so that we can grow.

I guess we sometimes misinterpret messages such as "expand your horizons," or "do hard things," and turn them into instruments of selfishness. It becomes a race for quantity, not quality. You learn to sing, though you nave neither talent, nor desire, nor passion for it -- you just want to put your hundredth accomplishment on the list of "Things I Can Do." Your lackluster efforts are copied by other people who are looking for easy ways expand their lists. The standards of quality in the music world begin to fall. People who are passionate, anointed musicians get discouraged by the low standards invading the industry, and either fall to meet those standards, or choose a different path.

And all this time, your God-given talent for drawing is left neglected and forgotten by you.

Wouldn't it have been better for everyone if you'd fulfilled your role and let others fulfill theirs? You see, that's what Jesus does -- he lets us do his work so that we can grow from it. Sometimes, you've just got to give up the microphone to the people who were meant to sing -- who will actually grow by singing.

The young woman in the video didn't try to perform lifts using her one arm -- she let the man do that, and he ended up strengthening his arms. Likewise, he didn't try to do jumps and footwork that required two legs -- he left that job to the young lady's strong legs. Together, they reinforced their strengths and filled in each other's weaknesses.

And it was beautiful.

Me from my

2008-10-07T15:31:00.000-07:00

I've been studying Psalm 34 lately; going through it line-by-line to really savour the meaning of each word. As I was reading, several verses reallys truck me, and have been tumbling about in my head ever since like stones when they are being polished into gems. By now, a clear-enough message has emerged from the rough, but I'm still struggling to find just the words to explain what I mean. I'll try to do my best...

Here are three verses from Psalm 34, each following a distinct pattern:

4: "I sought the Lord and ... he delivered me from all my fears."
5: "The Lord hears and delivers them out of all their troubles."
19: Many are the afflictions of the righteous, but the LORD delivers him out of them all."

I've generally been in the habit of asking God to take my fears, afflictions, and troubles, from me. This Psalm opened my eyes to the fact that, if I want God to change something in my life, I'm the one who has to be moved. You see, God does not deliver your problems from you, he delivers you from your problems, by taking you to higher ground. If you want deliverance, you can't just open one small part of your life to God: you have to let him change everything that has been affected by your sin, and that means he's going to lift you out of your comfortable world and into a place where none of your past can enter.

To illustrate this better, take a moment to imagine a beautiful, comfortable, luxurious room. It's a room that's practically perfect in every way, except for one little thing. A skunk has decided to make one of its corners his residence.

You're left with two choices. The first is: take the skunk out of the room. Which -- as you'll know if you've ever had the good fortune of coming near a skunk -- certainly won't make the room smell any nicer! The second choice is to relocate yourself and move to a place where the skunk can't follow. You've not only left the source of the problem, but you're also leaving everything that has been affected by it, as well as sparing yourself any future trouble.

In a spiritual sense, it's the same thing. If you want to be delivered from a sin, you have to realize that your whole life, not just part of it, has been affected. Which means that you can expect a huge upheaval in everything that has been comfortable and familiar to you. God isn't going to weed out the sin and leave you in the same place as you were before, he's going to pluck you out of that situation completely and draw you to a place that may be completely different from anything you've ever known. A place that is closer to him. A place where not a single scrap of your past can survive.

This speaks to me right now, since I've had several problems with my approach to Multi Media Ministry, my e-zine: I feel I'm not glorifying Jesus through it as I should. And I spend so much time making lists of things I need to change and pointing out specific errors and whatnot, when God just wants me to leave behind all of my comfortable, familiar, preconcieved ideas about what this ministry should be, and let him take it to a place that I can't quite comprehend, control, or imagine yet. It's not the problems that need to be removed from my e-zine, it's that the e-zine needs to be moved closer to God.

The only thing I can do is let go.

Love, Oksana

Work in Progress (to be continued)

2008-09-11T18:14:00.000-07:00

Day 1... I sat down and began sketching a red book lying flat on the table ... the rest of the image just began to emerge.

Day 2... she has the beginnings of a face! Sorry about the colours... this photo was shot under indoor lighting.

And she has an eye. :) A left eye, no less. Which, of course, means that I have to painstakingly cover up the right side of the picture while I do the other half so I don't smudge it. I should have thought this out better!

I'm moving tomorrow... will be off the computer for at least a day or two.

Lesson Learned.

2008-09-06T11:03:00.000-07:00

As I was walking into my apartment building the other day, I saw a frail, elderly man walking up to the elevator. I noticed that he had deep blue eyes; they stood out against his pale skin and fine silvery hair, but they seemed a little unfocused -- uncertain. He clutched a newspaper with his plaid sleeves.

In our building, we have one big elevator on the left, and a small one on the right. Between them is the call button. The man entered the lobby from the left, passing the large elevator, and pressed the button. He didn't turn to watch the elevator he had walked by, as if he only expected the other one to open. Instead, he turned his head towards the large panoramic window by the door, and commented, "It sure is windy out there." Behind him, I saw the large elevator open with a "ding!" and, after a few seconds, close. He didn't hear it: he was waiting for the other elevator, and watching the wind.

I felt like going up to him and giving him a big hug. I didn't, but that's what I wanted to do.

As I thought this over later, God spoke to me about my own approach to life. The sweet old man's situation seemed to be a reflection of my own:

I ask God for a blessing, but I've already decided in my mind what form I want that blessing to take. I'm so busy waiting for what I've determined is right for me, that I don't realize it when God opens bigger doors for me. That, or I'm too caught up in the winds and storms of the outside world that I forget to focus on what I can do in the safe arms of God.

I think there's a lot to be learned from the mundane little occurances around us. What have you learned today?

Love, Oksana

Pastels

2008-08-27T18:41:00.000-07:00

Today, I dwelved into the wonderful world of pastels. :)

I just love the way pastels let you 'interact' with your picture. It feels almost as if you're sculpting something, when you blend them beneath your fingers, pulling colours across the paper with your bare hands. Pastels have this very unrefined, 'raw' feel to them. Instead of drawing perfect, smooth, artificial lines, they crumble and smudge and fill the air with colourful, floury dust. It's so therapeutic to create art with this feeling of freedom -- this reckless abandon -- where you don't have to calculate your every move. I worked on two pieces today. The first one is complete... I made it for my mommy:

The second piece is still in progress. It's going to be a portrait of a girl who's leaning against a book with one hand, leaning her head on her other hand, daydreaming. I put a smiley face on the photo at the left to show you where the head's going to go (the sketching is kind of hard to see).

The spine on the green book is done all wrong, but I'm going to fix that when I do the background -- probably all-black. I'm also really bothered by the fact that I didn't give the poor girl an elbow... I'll see if I can add that without messing up too much of what I've done. But first, I'll finish her head, arm, and hand... it's going to be kind of hard to reach into those spots without smudging everything I've already done... Normally, I'd probably give up on this piece -- I don't usually work on art for more than one sitting; but, now that it's up here for the whole world to see, I feel like I have to finish it. I work well under pressure. :)

In other news, God has answered a prayer (thank you, Lord!) of mine that I've been praying for over 3 years. It means some huge changes in my life, so I'll be off the Web for a while... will probably return to regular posts in mid-September. I'll try to fill you in as much as I can in-between then!

Love, Oksana

The Preenses

2008-08-24T09:12:00.000-07:00

I discovered this 'gem' in an old workbook of mine from first grade. Most of the spelling and grammatic errors have been replicated in their entirety.

Onc's upoun a time there lived a beauty who had a green dres and black boots. She was looking like a St. Patrick preenses. But she wasen't marite. She was a grate beauty, oh wat a grate pursine. Rily she was looking like a preenses even if she didn't have a kroune. I want to look like her when I grow uq. One day she walk'd by her kastle. She walk'd and she saw a preense standing by. "I am yore frand," siad the preense. "I never had a frand," siad the beauty. So they marite together. They lived together happy as can be!

I can just hear the applause. ;) Brilliant, isn't it?

Firstly, a disclaimer: This was written about a year after I came to Canada, and about 5 months after I actively started to learn English... hence the horrible spelling. Yet, as frivolous and Disney-ed as this "story" is, there's more to it than meets the eye...

The reference to St. Patrick puzzled me when I first read it. St. Patrick princess -- wha? Then, I looked at some of my other stories... they were all about Valentines Day, Christmas, Halloween... I realized that I had been absolutely smitten with "Canadian" holidays like St. Patrick's Day, things that were not celebrated in the Ukraine. I don't know if it was so much that I enjoyed them, as the fact that I just wanted to belong. To belong to a world that was new and didn't understand me. I felt that if I reached into these holidays and celebrated them like everyone else did, I'd gain something that would make me the same as everyone else.

I guess that's what people mean when they say things like, "Christmas will bring us all together." At Christmas, everybody is longing to share -- share a feeling, an experience, a season. Christmas is that magical time when even the most simple people decorate their homes, even the most introverted people give strangers smiles, even the most stingy people buy gifts for others. Everybody is willing to step outside their comfort zone and into a place where they can belong... but then, like the snow, that fragile, crystalline Christmas spirit melts away as quickly as it came. How impermanent that magical, happy feeling is when it's based on material things!

Getting valentines and cutting out green shamrocks did nothing to make me feel like I belonged in first grade, in Canada, or in this world. Only love could do that. That fateful dialogue at the turning point of my story: "I am yore frand" -- "I never had a frand," speaks volumes about my own feelings back in first grade. I must have set the record for the loneliest five-year-old ever to grace the classroom... I cried in class every single day, to the point that I almost got kicked out of school for distrupting other students. I still don't know why I was like that, but I'll venture a guess: I just needed a friend. When I joined a different school for second grade, I found some wonderful people who were willing to share their recesses, snacks, and schoolyard secrets with me, and I barely shed a tear all year.

Perhaps I'm over-analyzing, but even the simplest, smallest, most mundane, most forgotten things in your life say something about you: the state your desk is in, the way you are sitting, your tone of voice when you told your mother you love her, the story you wrote back in first grade... it speaks about who you are. It's so much fun -- fun, and a little sad at the same time -- to look back and find all the little things that I now see in a totally different light. Some of these 'little things' are already in the trash, forgotten... by me, at least. But not by God.

He remembers and treasures up our every thought, want, and need, and gives us according to our needs in his perfect time. It took me several years to understand the real meaning of the holidays I celebrated. It took me several years to find some real friends who would stick with me through thick and thin. It may take me several years more to find my Prince Charming, if that's part of God's plan for me. But I think it's safe to say that, already, I'm living "happy as can be!"

Love, Oksana

Genesis

2008-07-28T19:53:00.000-07:00

I was reading Genesis today, about Noah and his ark, and the flood. Old stories that God is telling my to dig deeper into. As I read chapter 9, verse 16 -- "the rainbow shall be in the cloud, and I will look on it to remember the everlasting covenant between God and every living creature of all flesh that is on the earth" -- something hit me for the very first time. The rainbow, that little wonder of nature that has slipped into the commonplace and flits by, unnoticed, is God thinking of us. Not that God is ever not thinking of us, but isn't that a comforting thing to know? At that very moment the rainbow appears, God is thinking of us. Just something to remember. :)

Speaking of storms, I'm going to share something I wrote for Writer's Craft this year; a descriptive piece. I cut out the beginning and most of the middle; hope you enjoy.

At midday, the parched lips of the forest canopy part a little, inhaling the afternoon. The echo of a distant storm escapes from the sky and makes its way down to the roots of the cold earth; the trees shiver. Far away, thunder begins to roll towards the forest. Little rustlings from the ground show that animals have picked up the signal. A squeak here, a chirp there, and message of the brewing tempest has spread across the earth. Like a resurrected soul, the forest comes alive with movement. Tiny ears perk up and little eyes gleam as creatures rise from their stupor and begin to scurry. Filled with the rhythmic beat of their footsteps and the drum of the impending storm, the forest becomes a wild and pulsating entity beneath the sky.

Rapidly, and with great force, the storm approaches. Rain soon begins to fall upon the treetops; winds start to whistle through the branches and send them shuddering and waving against the sky. The sun falls, unheeded, into the horizon.

Suddenly, a crash of thunder tears through the forest, bending boughs with deafening force. Cold rain breaks from the sky in a violent torrent. The forest stumbles dazedly for a moment, then comes alive with electric energy. Glittering rain runs over the ground, filling every little footprint with water, until the earth is covered with tiny, quivering reflections of the moon overhead. Rain spills into the cupped birds’ nests, rain flows through the grooves of tree trunks, rain invades the narrow creek, rain trickles between pebbles and splashes onto the bitter ground.

Hours of thunder and lighting pass before the dark clouds gradually begin to draw apart. Slowly, slowly, the drops cease to fall; peace comes with the midnight, and every branch is silver-gilded beneath the stars. Somewhere, an owl calls, hoarse and hollow; the cricket with its rusty voice pours out a mournful serenade. Birds return to their nests and find themselves sitting in a pool of cold rainwater. They chatter angrily for a minute, then settle in with a resigned sigh. Hidden in the darkness, little mice scamper back into their holes, splashing through the puddles in the cold, wet earth. Then, the movement begins to slacken. The mist slowly rises back to its habitual position, the trees resume their silent storytelling. Flowers close drowsily, pressing their petals together for the night. As the sleep-holes of the forest creatures slowly fill, a dim and melancholy hum begins to emanate from the earth; the sound of their breathing rises up from under the frigid exterior of the soil. Other than this, all is silent once more.

Night steals down from the sky, silently coiling about the trees and gliding, snake-like, through the tall, wet grass. Deep within the whirling galaxies, stars dance in flickering constellations. Remote and distant on the eastern horizon, Mars begins to rise as a speck of smouldering crimson. And so the forest stands, beneath the hypnotic moonlight.

Love,
Oksy

Yeah!!

2008-04-02T15:21:00.000-07:00

Too busy to post much, but please visit Nate and Tricia at their blog "Confessions of a CF Husband," and lift Tricia up in prayer. She's getting a double-lung transplant tonight -- praise God! For her, it's a window into a new and better life. Please go over there and share this experience with them.

http://cfhusband.blogspot.com/

Oksana

BEFORE I SEE PEACE AGAIN

2008-02-24T09:22:00.000-08:00

… tear your curtains down
for sunlight is like gold.
and you better be you
and do what you can do
when you're walking on moon beams
staring out to sea…

- "Gold" by Interference

"I am very fond of sunsets. Come, let us go look at a sunset now."

"But we must wait," I said.

"Wait? For what?"

"For the sunset. We must wait until it is time."

At first you seemed to be very much surprised. And then you laughed to yourself. You said to me: "I am always thinking that I am at home!"

Just so. Everybody knows that when it is noon in the United States the sun is setting over France.

If you could fly to France in one minute, you could go straight into the sunset, right from noon. Unfortunately, France is too far away for that. But on your tiny planet, my little prince, all you need do is move your chair a few steps. You can see the day end and the twilight falling whenever you like . . .

"One day," you said to me, "I saw the sunset forty-four times!"

And a little later you added: "You know--one loves the sunset, when one is so sad . . ."

- from The Little Prince by Antoine de Saint Exupery

Yeah, sometimes I feel like the Little Prince, and I think I have to wait a long time before I see peace again ... then God reminds me that I only need to move forward a little - just a step at a time - to see the light once more. So I'll keep walking, keep walking, and God will keep the peace of twilight on this horizon...

Love, Oksana