Prayer for John

Graphic from UI Here

I've been praying and reading the word to determine what to pray for John.

This is what I came up with:

Father I thank You that You are the giver of good things.  I thank You for marriage.  You’ve created that divine mystery of how a man charms a woman and the two make love and become one.  It is truly magnificent and is Your creation.  Marriage mirrors Your love for the church, your people throughout the earth and throughout time.   I praise You as the creative engineer, maker of good things, all powerful and holy one.

Father, I’m sorry for the ways John and I have failed in marriage.  Failed to make the other person more important than ourselves. All powerful, all mighty God, please change me. Help me to be a more generous, giving, wife.

Father I pray that You would unveil within John the unlimited riches of Your glory and favor until supernatural strength floods his innermost being with Your divine might and explosive power. Oh Holy Spirit empower John to constantly use his faith so that the life of Christ will be released deep inside him, and the resting place of Christ’s love will become the very source and root of John’s life.  Empower John to discover the astonishing love of Christ in all its dimensions. May John experience Your extravagant love pouring into him until he is filled to overflowing with Your fullness.

Father give John listening ears so that he can hear both the words and heart behind the words of those around him.  Increase his already compassionate heart to see ways he can give help, gifts, and encouragement to those around him. May Your love in John produce a generous spirit. Let giving to those around him spring up freely from the joy of giving.  May the measure John uses to give be extravagant and may You bless him in that same measure. Oh Father enrich John in every way as he gives generously on every occasion.  

Father, help John and I to live together in perfect unity by loving, honoring and respecting one another and serving each other for Your glory, honor and praise! 

Order, Disorder and Re-order

Photo from Box City

This morning I was listening to a super interesting dialog between Richard Rohr and Rob Bell on the Alternate Orthodoxy.  There was just so much there that has got me thinking......I'm going to just pick one thing that I want to ponder on and write my way through right now.  Not that I'll totally grasp and apply the concepts in one sitting, but I just want to think on them some more.

 In life we're working our way through 3 "boxes". The 1st one is order, the 2nd one is disorder, the 3rd one is re-order.  Conservatives get stuck in the first box;  their need for order is high.  They use good, right order that's founded in reality and helpful for life and child rearing.  But then they also construct artificial order that isn't true, but they stick to it at all costs due to their extreme need for order. Liberals, progressives and academics get stuck in the second box of disorder. They just keep deconstructing everything.  This has caused so many problems for the children who are teens today because they grew up in this constant deconstructing; it's a difficult way to grow up. There's no rules or reality and nothing to hang on to. Richard Rohr emphasized that there's no "non stop flight from the first box to the third box".  People want that; they want to just get there.  He emphasized how it's only when we face disorder in ourselves, our culture, our church and experience; when we go through the falling apart of what Thomas Merton called "our salvation project",  that we can work through the process of re-order.

I'm in the process of going into that third box.  I've been a life time in getting there.


I started out in the order box.  I grew up in a fundamentalist, evangelical home. Yet I can  remember as young as 10 or 11 knowing in the depth of my heart, that some things weren't right.  The 1st thing I remember was knowing that this giving your heart to Jesus at one specific time, and being saved, wasn't really like that.  In my church you walked down the isle, gave your heart to Jesus, and became saved.  Later on when I was involved in a high school campus ministry I even learned to give a 3 minute testimony about the before and after of this experience.  The problem was, I knew at 11 - I'd never disbelieved.  As much as I knew and understood, I always loved God and Jesus and reached out for him.  I distinctly remember walking down that isle when I was in the 5th grade to make my church happy - I knew that I wasn't "unsaved" before. I'd had the extreme blessing of growing up in a house that went to church and so I got to learn about God, the Bible, and Jesus from the time I was born.  I'm extremely grateful for that.  There was so much truth there.  But there was also what Rohr refers to as a culture that needed order and attached to orderly ideas that don't have Biblical or really even experiential reality to back them up - that don't make sense. This idea that "salvation" is a one point in time event just doesn't add up for me; it never has.

I can also remember that growing up in this fundamentalist group there is a sense of those who are "in" and "out". For example, Catholics aren't considered really "saved".  I mean God forbid that you'd meet and marry one - then you'd be "yoked to an unbeliever"!  I can remember several times in high school and onward where that felt all wrong. I can specifically remember once, I think I was in high school at the time, wishing something along the lines of I wish Catholics were saved too - I really like those Catholics and want to be together with them too. I think that my heart knew what my head didn't yet; I'd experienced the love of God.  When I was in middle school and living through that angst that is specially known to the adolescent, going time and time again tot he book of Psalms.  I'd found a paraphrase of the Bible called "The Living Bible" that I could actually understand.  The intensity and heightened emotion within many Psalms drew me in and the Holy Spirit ministered love to me when I needed it most. The result of love is to want everyone to get to be part of it.

Another result of that In and Out group thinking is that I always felt apart from the people around me.  As a Christian I never felt like I was one of the kids at my school or out in the community.  I was only one of the church people.  That made there always be a touch of sadness inside me. 

When I was pregnant with my first son (who BTW is now 31 years old) I read a book that opened up a whole new world for me: Celebration of Discipline by Richard J. Foster.  Through that I began an acquaintance with Christian writers through the ages.  I realized that there was a big world out there of real Christians who'd come before and who didn't think identically to my church.  I caught a glimpse of the wide stream of orthodox Christianity. Writers like Thomas a Kempis, Brother Lawrence, Meister Eckhart, and many others.  I was drawn to the Christian Mystics.  I found it amusing that so many of these authors were Catholic.

Several years later I read The Ragamuffin Gospel by Brennan Manning.  That book helped me see, and experience, the grace of God as I'd never done before.  It helped open doors in my mind that made me able to see things in a different way.  It was interesting because I have a wonderful Christian friend, a true woman of God, that I know from my local, fundamentalist church.  I'd talked about how wonderful that book was and given her a copy as a gift.  She and I both adore reading and studying alone and in groups. When she finished reading the book she said something to me about where was the accountability, the recognition of sin?  She missed it!  She missed that God's love and grace are so great, and the more we experience it, the less we want sin any more.  It's right there in Romans 2:4 that it's the love of God that brings us to repentance.  True repentance is turning away from our sin.  It's love that draws us there, not condemnation or fear of hell.

A couple of years after that I remember being at the library and seeing a book title: "What if everyone gets saved?"  I will never forget what happened in that instant - something leaped for joy within my spirit! I checked out the book and it ended up not being what I'd wanted; it took away from what Jesus had done and that hurt more than even thinking some people might not be saved.  But that experience, that connection to the idea of everyone being saved, stuck with me.

Then about 5 years ago I read Rob Bell's famous book Love Wins.  My heart exploded and I've never been the same again.  All around me everyone called it heresy.  But for me, I'd finally found the path where I could experience resonance. There was finally a thought process on which I could embark that allowed me to love everyone like my soul desired.  There didn't have to be outsiders and insiders anymore - Paul's words from Galatians 3:28 about there no longer being Jews, Gentile, slave, free, male, female - us all being one in Christ - they made sense now!

I am still a sojourner in the life of faith-still trying to figure it out while accepting and embracing that there truly is a mystery of faith.  But through these past few years I've been able to connect with "unbelievers" in ways I never could previously.  I've held more genuine conversations about God, His love, and the impact it can have on the individual than I ever had before. It seems like I'm having more of a positive impact than before.  I feel more comfortable with myself and other people - I can allow them to be whomever they are.  I'm more open about my own faith.

Church is more about being in right relationships than about believing the right thing

Photo from GraceChurch 

This morning I was listening to a super interesting dialog between Richard Rohr and Rob Bell on the Alternate Orthodoxy.  There was so much there that has got me thinking......I'm going to pick
one thing that I want to ponder on and write my way through right now.  Not that I'll totally grasp and apply the concepts in one sitting, but I just want to think on them some more.

The idea that got me to thinking was this concept that we've got it wrong that church is all about believing the right things.  It's so much more about being in the right relationships within the local body.

We need each other; 1 Corinthians 12:21 talks about how various parts of our physical body can't say they don't need one another to function and so it is with the spiritual body. This brings up a few things for me. I've felt a bit daunted that I couldn't find a church that believed just like I do.  I'd decided that as long as the main, big stuff, was the same I'd just go with it. Listening to this dialogue today affirmed that decision.

Because of my current, unique, life style/situation it's a bit difficult.  I live in a small resort town of around 6,000 people - that is where John and I own a home together.  This is my real home.  I work in a suburb of Los Angels that is a 55 minute drive from my home if there weren't traffic issues.  On week days that drive would be between 1.5 to 3 hours.  I can't live that way, doing that kind of commute.  John owns a home that is 9.1 miles from my work and it a 20 - 30 minute commute.  John's adult daughter and her boyfriend and his divorced oldest son live in that house; the oldest son gets his children to be with him in this home every Wednesday and every other weekend.  I have one room that I use in that house during the week and am home on weekends.  I've found a church that I really enjoy the pastors and so much of what they do near that house - but I'm not there on weekends.  Our town is so small that there are very limited choices.  There's a church I was part of for years; but at one point several years back a new pastor came.  I don't have anything against the guy it's just that there's not passion; it doesn't feel like he has a vital, growing relationship with God from which he's producing his sermons.  His sermons are pretty much a difficulty to sit through - not because they are "wrong", it's just there's so very little there.  When I was living in our town full time I solved this problem by participating in a small group with women from the church - I loved that group.  They were really my local body of Christ.  One friend had a gift of playing the guitar and leading simple, sweet, worship and she does that each week.  Another friend has a gift of administration and she'd organize everything and make sure we kept to a schedule, did ice breakers at the beginning of new Bible studies, had some ground rules, etc.  My gift was facilitating discussion, just helping others to be able to speak out and share together and pray. Only now I'm not around during the week.

My career skills are very specific and I'm grateful to have my current job.  I make a good living, do something for which I've studied to obtain my Master's, get to utilize leadership and creativity, am challenged to the hilt, and help other people.  It's also extremely stressful and unpredictable. Some days it will work out so that I have to work long hours because things come up.  I'm on call 24/7 and sometimes nothing happens, but sometimes a lot happens and I have to respond quickly both in terms of decision making and reports to the CA department of public health. I'm trying to get into mid-week groups with that local church but it keeps not really working for a myriad of reasons.  This church tends to have various, time limited groups that revolve around a specific book they're studying together.  I've completed two during the past year where I was able to attend and participate just about every single meeting.  Those were great experiences, but not enough to form real relationships and intimacy.  The current one I'm trying to participate in only meets every other week so you'd think I'd easily make it; but it's been just the opposite - work keeps coming up on the week of group.  I'd also had some issues since I'd participated in this group previously and have some difficulty fitting in.

All of this is to say that I want desperately to come together in meaningful, routine meetings with other Believers - to do "church" but can't seem to work it out.  All I know to do is to continue to try.

I truly don't have it all figured out but I know that I need other people.  I want to love God and love people in ways that are real.  I want to grow in my faith and relationship with both God and people.

Prayer for Devon

Photo graphic from Christ Church

Devon is my oldest son.  It's hard to believe it but he's already 31 years old - how did that happen?!  He's got so many wonderful things about it and I'm  grateful for the wonderful man he is.  Grateful for his heart of integrity.  He has his wounds too, because of my sin and failures when he was growing up.

I'm reading the Bible and other books as I seek to learn to pray.  This is the prayer I felt led to craft and am praying over Devon currently:

Father God, I praise You that You are the all knowing all powerful God!  I praise You that You have good plans for me and my children.  Thank You that You knew who I would be, the good and the bad, and that You chose to bless me with Devon as a son.  I praise You because I know that You love Devon more than I do.  Thank that you still chose me to be his mother; that amidst all my failings, I am the one you wanted to impact my son.  I praise You that You who began a good work in Devon will be faithful to complete it.

I ask forgiveness for the ways I’ve failed Devon.  For way his father and I’s messed-up-ness created holes in Devon’s heart.  I ask forgiveness for that unhealthy marriage that I participated in with Dale and all the pain and damage it inflicted upon Devon.  Please restore and heal his broken heart. I ask forgiveness for the fact that I wasn’t always present for Devon; that sometimes I failed to deal with the pain of life and chose to slip into food, daydreams, relationships and other things to numb out pain.   I’m sorry God, I was wrong.  I thank You for Your forgiveness.  Please dear God heal the parts of Devon that are broken because of mine, his father’s, and Dale’s failures.

Oh Father I pray that Devon would be a man who delights in You, whose pleasure and passion are remaining true to You. Father may Devon be a man who hides Your words deep in his heart and thinks on them throughout his days and nights.  Oh Holy Spirit empower Devon to experience You endless love beyond measure that transcends his understanding; may he be overflowing with Your love. May he be intelligent and discerning in knowing You personally. May Devon be firm like a tree deeply rooted by the brooks of bliss and bear fruit in every season of his life.  May Devon never be dry, never fainting, but experience your endless energy and boundless strength. May Devon refrain from pride and sarcasm, instead, make him a lover of people.  May Devon take up residence in a life of love.  Help him to daily make it as clear as he can to all he meets that he’s on their side, working with them and not against them.

Oh Holy Spirit please rise up big within Devon and give him what it takes to be a Husband and Father. May he demonstrate Your love toward Rachel.  May he be self sacrificing in that relationship.  Teach Devon how to be a father to his children dear God; bring resources into he and Rachel’s lives to help them continue to grow as parents.  Help Devon practice loving discipline with his children.  Open his eyes to who each of his children are as individuals and grant him insight into how to help each of them grow in the individual gifts You’ve bestowed upon them.

Father You are not a respecter of persons so I ask for you to bless Devon just as you did Joseph and David of old. Please put Your favor on Devon just as You did Joseph; so that everywhere Devon works both his superiors and those he supervises will be drawn to him and give him respect and authority.  May Devon be a leader like David; may he lead with skill and integrity of heart. May he care for the hearts of his wife, children, and the people he leads at work and in his community. Father please grant Devon the open hearts of those whom he leads so that he may speak truth into their lives.   .

Prayer for Lincoln

Graphic from Greater Kashmir

My heart aches for my grandson Lincoln.  My son Dylan, Lincoln's father, has been clean and sober for 3 years and I'm so grateful!  Lincoln is 5.  Lincoln's mother (who is now not with his father) is still in that old, unhealthy, lifestyle.  Dylan and his ex share custody of Lincoln.  I can see how broken little Lincoln is; he engages in a lot of acting out and lashing out at others.  You know that old saying about how hurting and broken people hurt others?  Well, Lincoln's mom hurts him a lot; from what we're told she slaps, pinches, uses curse words at him and demeans him. Today when Dylan and I were talking, God opened up my heart to be able to share some advice with Dylan to get Lincoln into therapy and Dylan was open, receptive and appreciative.

I spent time in the word and developed this prayer for Lincoln:

Father God, I praise You that You are the all knowing all powerful God!  I praise You that You have good plans for my children and my grandchildren.  Thank You that You knew who Dylan would be, the good and the bad, and that You chose to bless him with Lincoln as a son.  I praise You because I know that You love Dylan and Lincoln more than I do.  Thank that you still chose Dylan to be Lincoln’s father; that amidst all the things that you know would grow wrong with Dylan and Kelsie, You still choose to bring Lincoln into their lives.  I affirm that I know that Dylan is the one You want to impact his son.  I praise You that You who began a good work in both Dylan and Lincoln will be faithful to complete it.

I ask forgiveness for the ways Lincoln has been failed.  For all the pain his parent’s failed marriage inflicted upon him and for all the pain his father’s human frailties have had upon him.  Father I intercede and ask forgiveness for the sins of Kelsie against Lincoln.  Oh Father God, may your love pierce her heart and cause her to repent of the evil she’s inflicting on Lincoln.  Dear Lord, please do what it takes to bring her into right actions toward her son.  Father, may you put your mighty warrior angels around Lincoln to protect him in the midst of what is happening to him. Oh Lord, I ask for a miracle, that Lincoln would come to know You in a personal and intimate way even at such a young age, so that he would know in the deepest part of his heart that he’s never alone.

Dear Lord I ask that You would direct Dylan’s way and help him to find a good therapist for little Lincoln; one who will accept his insurance and who specializes in working with children.  Oh dear Lord, please use this therapist to bring healing into Lincoln’s heart and life.  Father help this therapist to help Dylan and Liz to know how to work in the best way for with Lincoln.  Teach them how to specifically discipline Lincoln when he needs it.  For we know that discipline is an important part of lovingly parenting and teaching our children – but how are they to discipline a little boy who’s so broken?  Who’s acting out in hurtful ways because he is hurting so bad?  Oh Holy God, You alone are all wise and powerful.  Please provide Dylan and Liz the resources they need to be trained up and empowered to meet Lincoln’s special needs.  Use this therapist and whomever else You choose to help them learn the best way to love, discipline and parent Lincoln.

Father I know that you don’t play favorites; so I ask that you grant Lincoln favor with those around him just like you did Joseph through all those hard times he went through.  Please put your favor on Lincoln.  Help those in his life to be inexplicably drawn to him.  May his school teacher have the patience and persistence to truly care for him and try to help him.  Oh dear Lord, I ask that Lincoln would not be labeled as “bad”.  Oh God may Lincoln know at the deepest level of his personhood that he is good, valuable, and loved by You.

Lord I ask that You would do a deep and mighty work in Lincoln’s heart.  Give him the opportunity to learn about You and Your ways. Empower Lincoln oh Holy Spirit to have a handle on his anger and to learn not to lash out at others. As he grows dear Lord, teach Lincoln how to listen deeply and to think before he speaks.  Father bring him the resources he needs to enable him to enunciate and speak so that others can easily understand him. May he be a boy who delights in following after You.  Please keep him away from those who are wicked and who make fun of others.  Help Lincoln to be a person who takes pleasure and passion in You and Your Word.  Help him to think on You, Your love, Your ways and Your truth. May his life be like a firm tree that is deeply rooted by the brooks of bliss, and may his life be fruitful.  Please bless and prosper Lincoln.

Stepping through an uncomfortable door

Photo from Outrageous Happiness #16

So I started a group through a local church where I live during the work week.  I participated in this
same group last spring.  It's at a generous-to-open-her-home woman's house.  Last spring I appreciated this woman's love for, and enthusiasm for, God.  I'd noticed that I'm a bit different from the rest of the group of women but figure that we're all in the same body, despite our differences.  I am thinking that perhaps God uses our differences to make us better.

Everyone in this group, aside from me, is Mexican.  Mexican in the kind of way where they all speak Spanish sometimes and make trips to Mexico at least annually where they have friends and family.  In a way where they identify with liberal politics because of those immigration issues.

I'm a white conservative. I'm conservative because I actually believe in the values of smaller government, self determination, and I am absolutely pro life.  Recently I went to mass with my oldest son.  I noticed that in their affirmations of what they believe that they said they were against the death penalty.  I get it - all life is precious.  In the past I've been in favor of the death penalty because I felt like we couldn't afford to keep for sure, killed many people, types of folks in prison - it's very expensive.  But now I don't know.  Anyway, I'm definitely on the opposite side of things from most liberals.  Last spring a few things came up that were uncomfortable - times when they spoke well of Nancy Pelosi (she's the congress woman from our state - California.  I know she's valuable before God; but I abhor her politics).   Yet, when it's all said and done, I'm a follower of Christ way before I'm a conservative.  And the two are NOT the same.

The group had stopped for the summer and began again this past Thursday.

As I stepped through the door of this woman's house I wanted to hug her.  She's my sister in Christ.  She's precious in the way she loves Jesus.  But she definitely wasn't hugging me so I smiled and greeted her and sat down.  I noticed that she hugged the 2 women who came in after me.  Of course it could be something in my own demeanor that kept her from extending a warm hug toward me.  I know that I don't exactly exude hugginess.

The truth is - I'm a little bit uncomfortable.  I feel like maybe I'm not really a part of the group.  But, for now I'll just pray about it.  Maybe it's good for me to be out of my comfort zone.  It's possible it's good for them too - who knows?

The really ironic thing about it is that this group will be going through the book Uninvited: Living Loved when you  feel Less then, Left out, and Lonely by Lysa TerKeurst. Isn't that intersting?

Prayer for Daniel

Graphic from The Children's Activity Center

Seems like I'll be spending quite a bit of time on the chapter entitled "Your family: fortifying the lives of those you love" in Shirer's book Fervent.

Yesterday I prayed and spent time looking up Scriptures for my prayer for my youngest son Daniel. I've been praying about what I'm to specifically, strategically, pray for Daniel.  Then, as I began to write out the prayer words, something happened that sometimes happens for me.  I found myself writing words that weren't the ones I planned. It's as if God's directed my words to place where I hadn't planned on going.  If I were in a Pentecostal church, they'd probably say I was prophesying.  I don't know about all that, but I do know that sometimes God give me words for people.

Here's my prayer for Daniel:                                                                                                                 

Father God, I praise You that You are the all knowing all powerful God!  I praise You that You have good plans for me and my children.  Thank You that You knew who I would be, the good and the bad, and that You chose to bless me with Daniel as a son.  I praise You because I know that You love Daniel more than I do.  Thank that You still chose me to be his mother; that amidst all my failings, I am the one you wanted to impact my son.  I praise You that You who began a good work in Daniel will be faithful to complete it.

I ask forgiveness for the ways I’ve failed Daniel.  For all the pain his father and I’s failed marriage inflicted upon him – I’m so sorry God.  Please restore and heal his broken heart. I ask forgiveness for the fact that I wasn’t always present for Daniel; that sometimes I failed to deal with the pain of life and chose to slip into food, daydreams, relationships and other things to numb out pain.   I’m sorry God, I was wrong.  I thank You for Your forgiveness.  Please dear God heal the parts of Daniel that are broken because of mine and his father’s failures.

Father I pray that Your Holy Spirit within Daniel would raise up in him the desire to delight himself in You.  Draw him to Yourself dear God. Holy Spirit teach my son how to delight in you. I thank You that You will make Daniel’s steps firm as he delights in You.

Father, please heal the holes in Daniel that are resulting in fractured relationships.  Oh Lord, make Daniel a lover of the people around him.  Teach him how to love.  Father teach Daniel to love in a way that never gives up.  Help him to grow to love others more than himself.  May Daniel not have a swelled head or seek himself first. Help him not keep score of the sins of others.  Help him trust You and trust people to You. Dear God please help Daniel’s love to grow and increase beyond measure, bringing him into the rich revelation of spiritual insight in all things. Dear God pour love on Daniel so that if fills his life and splashes over on everyone around him.  May his life be infused with strength and purity, filled with confidence in the presence of You. 

Father I pray for Daniel’s future wife.  Please keep her close to You.  Develop in her a tender humility and quiet patience.  Father may she be a person who demonstrates gentleness and a generous love toward others.  May she be a woman who speaks when she has something worthwhile to say.  May she be a person of kind words.  May she be a woman who seeks to cultivate inner beauty; make her a loyal, wise woman. Show her the work you have for her dear Lord and grant her confidence in Your calling on her life.  Please grant her the opportunities to develop her gifts and skills for the work to which You’ve called her.  Develop in her a heart of diligence.  Make her a person who can enjoy the good material things of life, but who doesn’t have to have the material stuff.  Raise within her a spirit of giving and a heart of simplicity.

Oh Father, bring Daniel and his future wife together in Your perfect timing.  Help them both wait on the other.  Please bless them with the kind of attraction and affinity where they’re totally taken with one another.  Help them both see, and build up the good in one another.  Enable and empower them to be responsive to one another.  Teach Daniel how to honor , delight in and be good to his wife.  Give him a heart that will seek to truly hear and know what is important to her and to value those things.  Empower him to be good to his wife.

May it be said of Daniel that he is a lover of You, his wife, his children and everyone around him.  May his life be marked by excellence in everything he does.  May he always have time, room, and hospitality for the people you’ve placed in his life.

Prayer to to be a better wife

Graphic from Kabbalah of Marriage

It's looking like I'm going to be in Shirer's fifth chapter about fortifying the lives of those you love for quite a while.  It opens up so many doors for me.  

Today I decided to focus on my own role as a wife.  After having spent time looking up Bible verses, meditating, and praying, here's my prayer regarding being a wife: 

Father I thank You that You are the giver of good things.  I thank You for marriage.  You’ve created that divine mystery of how a man charms a woman and the two make love and become one.  It is truly magnificent and is Your creation. Marriage mirrors Your love for the church, your people throughout the earth and throughout time.   I praise You as the creative engineer, maker of good things, all powerful and holy one.

Father I ask forgiveness for the ways I’ve failed in marriage:

Failed to make two prior attempts at marriage to work. 

Failed to keep myself pure outside of marriage.

Times when I’ve chosen to care more for myself than my husband.

Times when I’ve flown off the handle.

Times when I’ve focused on the flaws in my husband instead of looking for the best.

Times when I’ve spoken unkindly.

Times when I’ve been tired and lazy in my approach to our home and relationship.

Times when I’ve not been supportive of my husband, when I’ve been impatient and short with him.

Times when I’ve kept a score of what he’s done wrong.

Times when I’ve been more consumed with my needs then seeking to see, and care for, his needs.

Father I ask forgiveness for all these past failures of mine – thank You for Your forgiveness!

All powerful, all mighty God, please change me.

Grant me the focus, energy and ability to become a better person and a better wife.  By Your power in me Lord, help me be devoted to John.  Empower me to be supportive.  Open my eyes to recognize his needs and be responsive to them.  Help me seek his good over that of my own.  Oh Holy Spirit put a guard on my lips and let no hurtful words slip past them. Grant me the wisdom, insight, focus and energy to cultivate good between John and I.  Illuminate my mind to what cultivating good between us should like like, and how to do just that in every day life. May I be a woman who pursues peace everywhere I go and especially in our marriage. May I put up with those human failings that are specifically John’s and overflow in love toward him in spite of them.  May I never want what I don’t have but instead live in gratitude for the good that is mine.  May I engage in more than obligation, may I seek to be pleasing to him. May I trust You always and know that You’ve given me this man and this relationship.  Help me rejoice and celebrate all the good that is mine.

It's not her fault

Graphic from NPQ

Now that my mother is gone, we have nothing to hold us together my sisters and I.

I've recently forced myself to start visiting my oldest sister once a month.  It's easy to feel  overwhelmed by work demands and make excuses, let the time go way too long between visits.  Plus, if I'm honest, it's not really fun in any way to visit my oldest sister.  She's annoying and manipulative; but she's still my sister and she doesn't really have any friends. So I decided to just make a commitment to myself to ensure I see her once a month.  But I can't seem to even want to make myself go looking for my middle sister.  I haven't seen her since mom died. She's the sister who's a paranoid schizophrenic.

My middle sister's daughter told me that she's camping out in the orange groves over by where we grew up.  From before the time I was born in 1960, until the late 90s my parents owned 5 acres and a home out in what ended up being an area where people had orange groves.  They built their home with their own hands and added onto it as they could afford.  We grew up there and it was home.  But in the last few years of my father's life he became ill and wasn't able to keep it up, so that by the time he died, there was quite a bit of work to be done.  My mom sold it all (and then later squandered all the money). I don't think middle sister has come to terms with their death so it's as if she's trying to keep a piece of that life.  Plus it's quiet out there and. apparently, no one bothers her.  Maybe she has a PO box to get her social security disability checks and she'll rent a hotel for the too cold weeks.  Luckily the weather is rather pleasant all the time in southern California.  She was always really good at pioneer, camping type stuff.

I've noticed lately at work that the courts are letting people off conservatorship super easily.  On the one hand I understand that everyone should have the right to autonomy, on the other hand, people with extreme mental illness make such poor decisions that can cause harm to themselves and others. Middle sister never even got onto conservatorship.  She did end up with some acute hospital hospitalizations through her life.  When she was in her mid to late 40s she finally got onto social security for her mental illness.  It was a wonder she lasted so long.  She won't take meds and she has a lot of non reality based beliefs.  These beliefs are about things such as rays from TV/radio/cell phone infringing on her, or people being out to do her bad.  I don't think she sees things or hears voices, I'm not sure.  I don't think she would have ever told me if she did. As is typical for people who have schizophrenia, she has a difficult time pulling things together - she's unkept and so is any area where she lives.   She'll "clean" over and over sometimes, and things around her may even be damp from the cleaning, but it's always disorganized. 

My heart goes out to her.  I think perhaps I'm a bad person for not actively seeking her out and trying to help her in some ways.  She's just so resistive, and it hurts me so much when I hear her saying such delusional nonsense.  Why is it that I can work with mentally ill people but not even take the initiative to try to be there for my sister?  What's wrong with me?  So much of my life was burdened under the heaviness of her illness, I never felt any resentment, but it wasn't comfortable.  It was even painful.  It feels so hopeless.

Oh Father God, please protect Gail.  Please keep her safe and fed.  Bring her happiness.  If You want me to do something specific for her, please show me and give me the strength/ability to do it.  I don't think I'm a good sister but You are a good God.  Please bless her, she's so broken and it's not her fault.

A prayer to remember

Graphic from It's All about Yeshua

The 4th chapter in Shirer's book Fervent is a call to a prayer time to help you remember your identity in Christ.  After reading through her verses as well as some more that I found, this is my prayer:

Dear Father God, You truly are my hero!  You are the almighty God, yet You chose to love me.   You chose to start a covenant with Abraham and Sarah that led down through the generations to me. Even though all humanity, and especially me, was filled with sin, willfulness and rebellion, You chose the path of love toward us.  You chose to become one of us and identify with our human frailty and suffering; I can never thank You enough for that dear Jesus! Thank You Jesus for dying on the cross. I’m in the process of learning what Your death on the cross means; the more I learn the more grateful I become – praise and glory be to Your name for all You’ve done for me and the rest of humanity! Thank You so much that you don’t hold my sins against me! Thank You that I never need to fear not being good enough – You have made me Your beloved child, Thank You father that You’ve put Your Holy Spirit within me. I can barely comprehend Your great love toward me; You say that I’m so important to You that You’ve written my name on the backs on Your hands – oh my goodness, thank You so much!!!

Father I ask forgiveness; forgiveness for choosing too often to believe the enemy’s lies about who I am instead of Your truth. I ask forgiveness for not valuing myself – my mind, body and soul – as You do.  Oh Father please forgive me for eating food that doesn’t nourish this incredible body that You’ve given me.  Forgive me for filling this mind with less than lovely things that don’t bring those things that You have for me into my life.  Forgive me for self doubt and criticism. Forgive me for harboring unforgiveness, bitterness and self pity within my spirit.   For choosing to veer off Your path of service to others and choosing to just look out for myself instead. Thank You for Your forgiveness.  I repent of these ways and choose to start anew today.

Empower me oh Holy Spirit within me to change. Please put a guard on my lips that I not speak those words of self doubt and criticism that come into my mind from the enemy or the fallen world around me; instead, please call back to my mind who You say I am.  Help me to remember and speak aloud the fact that You have destined me from before the foundation of the world to experience the full inheritance of the kingdom realm. Grow me Lord in understanding Your kingdom and how to live a Kingdom lifestyle.  Please help me see people as You see them and serve them as You.  Instill deep within me the assurance that You will complete that which You started in me – that I will become better and better not because of my goodness, but because of who You are. Empower me dear Lord to live each day in the awareness that You have a destiny for me and, because of Your greatness, I will fulfill Your destiny for me.

Letter to Dylan on August 31, 2019

Photo from Postal Museum

I've recently noted how I'd been impressed to write hand-written-receive-in-the-mail-letters to important people in my life.  This is the letter I wrote to my middle son:

Dylan,

I want to make it official, let you see it in black and white, make it known in a way that I aspire for your heart to hear it in your innermost being:

I love you.

I am grateful that you are my son.

Daily I give thanks to God for all He’s done in your life and all you’re becoming. 

You’ve been clean and sober for three years – I couldn’t be more proud of you!  I pray daily that you will continue on this journey of sobriety and all the things it has, and will continue to, teach you.

I respect how you’re willing to do the hard work of therapy.  That you value yourself, your family, and the interior life enough to do the hard work of paying for therapy.  That you’re actually doing the work of interior mining, habit change, facing your demons, and realizing the uncomfortable that come with therapy.   I can see the difference it’s making in you.  I find myself repeatedly thanking God for the wisdom you’re developing with regard to you and Liz’s relationship.  I can see you growing in the ability to give tenderness that is made real by sacrifice.

I’ve always adored how you have a sweet heart.  It makes me happy to see you letting that heart out in the choices you make about how your family spends it’s time and in romantic gestures for Liz.

I respect how you use your God given intellect to constantly increase in your ability to be smart with your money.  I admire how you have a plan for getting out of debt and how you don’t let it get you down.  I’m inspired by your great faith and vision in this area.

I’m in awe of how you keep your eyes on that which is positive in life.  You’ve plenty of challenges but I consistently see you choose to do what you can about these problems, and then live your life with your eyes on the blessings.  You are one of the most positive people I know.  Not in that obnoxious cheerleader way – but in a simple choice made way.

I’m delighted by your silly humor!

I’m glad to see the joy you receive from running and how you’re nourishing both your soul and body with the discipline of daily running that you’re developing.

I’m grateful to see your heart that reaches out for the spiritual.  How you are learning to make time in your life for daily time of reflection.

I respect how you seek to keep toxic people as much away from your life as is humanly possible.

I’m excited for your future.  I know that all the wrong choices you made in the past, and the hard times that have resulted, and the way you’ve handled these hard time – these life events are building in you.  I’m excited to see how God will use what He’s building in you to bless  you and your family, as well as to bless others.

I couldn’t love you more,

Mom

Prayer for fighting the real enemy

Photo from Wikipedia Armor of God

In Shirer's book Fervent, she has a chapter about prayer for fighting the real enemy.  As I read what
she had to say, and looked up the Bible references she provides as well as some others, I felt impressed to write this prayer:

Father I praise You because You are all powerful. You are the High King over all gods.  You are the majestic creator of all.  You hold deep caves and caverns in one hand and grasp the high mountains in the other.  You created the oceans, Your hands sculpted the earth – You own it all!  I praise You because You willingly came to this earth and became one of us.  You identified with the frailty and suffering of humanity, yet You didn’t sin.  You suffered and died in our place.   Salvation and glory and power to You!

I’m sorry that I’ve frequently pushed You and all that You’ve done for me almost out of my thinking.  I ask forgiveness that I’ve too often lived my life for myself instead of with you in the driver’s seat.  I repent from this habit I’ve too often fallen into of seeing only this material world and desiring the temporary pleasures.  I repent of too often becoming discouraged and thinking that the people who think differently than I do about political issues and weighty matters are my enemies.  I recognize the truth that there are principalities and authorities operating in rebellion under the heavenly realm.  That there are demon-gods and evil spirits that hold this dark world in bondage.  I praise You that You are more powerful than any of these little gods and evil spirits.  I repent of that forgetful, without purpose, selfish way of living. Thank You for Your forgiveness. Thank You for Holy Spirit that You live within me and empower me to change.

Father, may my mind become renewed so that I can live my life as You would have me to.  May Your holy spirit within me empower me to become alert, and to live with my guard up against the real enemy – not the people who’re being led astray by the real enemy.  Oh Father, help me keep a firm grip on my faith.  Give me the energy and stick-to-it-ness that I need in this life.  May I daily put on the protective gear that You’ve given me so that I can stand against the devil and his minions.  May I put on and wear Your Truth.  May Your Truth undergird my very being.  When lies and accusations are thrown at me by the enemy, may my mind be protected by Your Truth.  Holy Spirit, bring to mind Your words of Truth.  Empower me to not be led astray by lies about myself, Who I am to and through You, my purpose, and the value of others.  Enable me dear God to embrace the power of the salvation and deliverance that You’ve provided like a helmet to protect my mind from lies.  May I dig deep into You and Your word so that I can use Your word as a sword against the enemy.  Fill me with faith in Your word and Truth. Keep deep in my heart that truth that You have made me clean, that in You I am righteous.  May this truth protect my heart.  May Your righteousness be a breastplate over my heart so the enemy’s arrows won’t pierce me. Empower me oh Holy Lord to live righteously; to be set apart for You.  May I not be caught up in this world and entangled in fleshly pleasures.  Help me to enjoy all the good that You’ve given me but keep my deepest heart set apart for you – not for the good things You have, and continue to, give me.  Thank You for the peace You’ve given me.  May I live at peace with myself and peace with others.  May I be a peace maker, a peace bringer.  Father use me to bring peace to this fallen world.  Shod my feet in Your gospel of peace.

Letter to Devon on August 24, 2019

Photo from Zazzle

I'd posted the other day that I felt impressed to write & mail actual letters to some of the

important people in my life.  This is the one for my oldest son:

August 24, 2019

Devon,

I want to say how much I love you.

Sometimes in life I find that I think good things about people in my head, but fail to ever communicate those thoughts.  I want to make sure I explicitly let you know how much I respect and appreciate these specific things about you:

·       Your love and affinity for Rachel

·       Your diligence to do that which you believe is right even when it’s inconvenient

·       Your commitment to prayer

·       Your tenderness as a father

·       Your pursuit after learning how to be a good father and husband

·       Your allegiance to the principals/lifestyle of honor, duty and country

·       Your enjoyment of learning

·       Your commitment to being a great leader-to take ownership and to invest in those you lead

·       Your appreciation of music

·       Your whole hearted following after Christ as you know Him

I’m sure grateful to be your mother,

Prayer for Passion

Photo from Dr. Lauren Cielo

In her book, Fervent, Shirer starts with a call to praying for renewed passion for God.

This is my prayer:

Father God, I praise You because You are all powerful and nothing is too difficult for You. I praise You because You are holy.  I praise You because You are a faithful God.  Thank You that I can always count on You. Thank You that You love me.  Thank You that because of Your great love I’m not consumed.  Thank You that Your compassions for me are new every morning and that Your faithfulness is great.  Thank You that I’m precious to You. Thank You that You’ve given me the Holy Spirit; thank You Holy Spirit for living inside me. Thank You for all the times Your Holy Spirit has welled up hope, passion, purpose and joy within me.

Father I’m sorry for all the times I’ve sought after indulgences of the flesh and lived my life so that it was all about me.  Gone through my day thinking about me, me, me.  I’m so sorry.  Thank You for Your forgiveness.  Please give me the power to change.

Father, please make a fresh start in me.  Create a clean heart inside me that loves you with every passion of my heart, with all the energy of my being, all of my thoughts, and all of my strength. Oh Father, cut away the thick calluses on my heart so that I may be free to love you with my whole heart and soul and to really live. May You truly be my all in all.  Please restore to me Your strength and passion and the ability to do Your will. Restore to me a passion for You that consumes me.

The plan as I read Fervent

I'm reading the book Fervent by Priscilla Schirer.

Graphic from Worship House Media

My heart longs to be a woman of prayer, a warrior.  I want to pass on a legacy of prayer to my children and grandchildren.

I appreciate the acronym that she presents as a template for prayer: P-praise, R-repent, A-ask, Y-yes (agree with God and His Word).

I've felt impressed to read a chapter, then look up the Bible verses she provides as well as others on the same topic.  Read these verses in several translations and paraphrases.  Pick my favorite translations, or maybe use a few different ones, and type these verses on pages that I spend time reading.

The book is set up so that several of the chapters target specific prayers.  I've been impressed to spend a week, or maybe two or three, meditating on the verses prior to writing out my prayers.

A letter to my son's girlfriend

Last Sunday the Pastor's sermon was finishing the last part of the last chapter in 1 Thessalonians.  As I listened I was caught by that phrase in 1 Thessalonians 5:14; to "encourage the disheartened".  Gosh, the disheartened are everywhere I look: where I work and where I live.  I felt impressed to make that my mission each day.

Surprisingly, what I saw happen was how truly crabby I can be!

But I also got a specific impression to write an actual letter on paper to mail with a stamp to my

Photo from Zazzle

middle son's girlfriend.  She functions like a wife; they've lived together for 3 years and have been engaged for 2 years.   There are things about her that make her not the person I would have chosen for my son, yet, she has a lot of great qualities.  I also know from what my son and she have told me that her mother has made some positive changes in her life and is a good person today but was an over the top critical person when the girlfriend was growing up.  I think that because of this she has a hole her soul that craves affirmation.

So this is what I wrote in the letter to the girlfriend:

"I want you to know how much I appreciate you.

Sometimes in life I find that I think good things about people in my head, but fail to ever communicate those thoughts.  I want to make sure I explicitly let you know how much I appreciate these specific things about you:

• How you love my son Dylan
• How you sincerely love Lilly and Lincoln
• The way you inspired Dylan to get involved with Altig; the career he’s come to value
• Your creativity that expresses itself through * Doing all kinds of things that make every Birthday special,  * Coming up with so many fun ideas that make every holiday and special event wonderful and memorable, * Bringing joy into every day life
• The way you look at each child and see their gifts and leanings and seek to involve him/her in classes or events that nourish those parts of them
• The value you place on being a mother and wife
• The fact that you accept, (and model that acceptance for those around you), everyone for who they are and don’t require them to be who you want or think is “right”
• What a great home decorator you are
• Your sensitive heart that is moved by the pain of others
• Your willingness to run point on dealing with crazy (Dylan's ex's name was here; she's the biological mother of Lilly & Lincoln)
• All the extra work you do because of the split custody situation
• Your willingness to forgive others when they wrong you
• Your willingness to engage in self awareness efforts and your heart to want to constantly grow, change and improve
• Your desire for connection with the spiritual part of life
• Your appreciation of beauty

I love you (girlfriend's name) and just want you to know how grateful I am that you’re in all of our lives,"

May God use this letter to encourage her.

Thoughts of Mom

Photo from Hive miner

I'm one of those people who's great in an emergency.  I'm calm and competent. That ability to
suppress my feelings and do what needs to get done is useful.

In March 2017 my mom died.  It's only been these last couple of months that I've felt anything.  Prior to that I've basically been numb.  I naively thought that I just didn't feel anything because she'd gone down hill in the last few years and was 92; that none of us lives forever and it was just her time to go.  The truth was that I was just numb.

It hasn't been heart wrenching lately - it's just that I miss her.  I especially miss the person she was prior to the last few years; let's say the woman I knew my entire life until she was around age 89.  She wasn't perfect.  One of my life regrets is that I spent too much of my time focusing on her failings instead of enjoying all the good.  There was lots of good.

We weren't super close as some mothers and daughter are.  Yet, we had our moments....she was really something.  Keen intellect, opinionated, energetic, and loyal.  Every day she liked to "read the Bible a bit" - what a wonderful legacy that was that she gave me.

What I miss most is getting to go for walks with her and just talk.  She loved that and so did I.  Wish I would have done more of that.  Wish I would have spoiled her more near the end.

Glad that I have so many good memories.  Things she gave me such as a love for reading, always learning, and never being pretentious.