the creative process

One of my favorite blogs to follow is Take Your Vitamin Z, generally a collection of other good posts to read, funny videos, and book reviews.

Today he posted a video about the creative process. Encouraging and challenging.



Ira Glass on Storytelling from David Shiyang Liu on Vimeo.

learning how to deal

For several months now I've been praying about how to "suffer" well throughout the year, and I have felt like "suffering" was an extreme word until this morning. As I was reading through a chapter in one of Tim Keller's most recent books, the Lord began to shed light on the balance I have been wrestling with. I want to embrace the sadness/frustration/pain of separation as the current reality that they are, but I want my hope to be set so fully on Christ that it is not the overarching theme of my life. It seems to be a tension between being real and giving church answers, facing difficulty and being ok with it, living for eternity and ignoring the present altogether.

I would like to quote several portions of this chapter entitled "The Cup" from King's Cross. Keller is explaining the agony of what Jesus felt the night before He died as He asked the Father to remove the cup of wrath from Him. Jesus has just experienced the first taste of the anguish our redemption will cost him, and Keller explains His agony in the Garden of Gethsemane.

Suffering happens, we might say, when there's a gap between the desires of your heart and the circumstances of your life, and the bigger the gap, the greater the suffering. 

Often what seem to be our deepest desires are really just our loudest desires. 

Yet not what I will, but what you will.Jesus is subordinating his loudest desires to his deepest desires by putting them in the Father's hands. As if to say, "If the circumstances of life do not satisfy the present desires of my heart, I'm not going to suppress those desires, but I'm not going to surrender to them, either. I know that they will only be satisfied, eventually, in the Father. I will trust and obey him, put myself in his hands, and go forward." 

Jesus doesn't deny his emotions, and he doesn't avoid the suffering. He loves into the suffering. In the midst of his suffering, he obeys for the love of the Father--and for the love of us.And when you see that, instead of perpetually denying your desires or changing your circumstances, you'll be able to trust the Father in your suffering. You will be able to trust that because Jesus took the cup, your deepest desires and your actual circumstances are going to keep converging until they unite forever on the day of the eternal feast. 

That love--whose obedience is wide and long high and deep enough to dissolve a mountain of rightful wrath--is the love you've been looking for all your life. No family love, no friend love, no mother love, no spousal love, no romantic love--nothing could possibly satisfy you like that. All those other kinds of loves will let you down; this one never will.

Praying to remember, reflect on, and digest this love as much as possible in the days, weeks, months to come. Grateful for the reminder and the revelation. I would highly recommend King's Cross, or any other by Tim Keller.

the big day

Today was the big day, and I feel there is at once so much to say and yet no words for all that I am thinking and feeling. The Lord blessed it on so many levels on the homefront, and I can only pray He does the same for Stephen as he is away. After the send-off ceremony and the departure of the buses, my family and Stephen's parents took me to brunch at the Cheesecake Factory where Marisa Acree and Katie Phillips joined by surprise. I had the privilege of spending the remainder of the day with them and Kimberly Johnson in a very successful attempt to postpone my own solo homecoming. 

Just a few of the random things going on in my mind:

Grateful that the day I have dreaded for nearly six months is over.

Grateful to start the countdown to next October.

Grateful for all your prayers and encouragement.

Praying for Stephen who has truly been led out into solitude with the Lord.

And while I wish I had more meaningful words or insights of my own, the Lord's grace overwhelms me at every turn. I had previously purposed to read through the "Streams in the Desert" devotional over the year that Stephen is away and was reminded of it by a conversation with our moms this morning. Unfortunately I cannot take any credit for the poem that accompanied today's short reading, but I'll be darned if God does not somehow bless these sorts of books so that October 2nd was exactly what I needed it to be. I think He must shuffle them around among the pages so that the right one pops up whenever I open it. So of course as I climbed into bed alone tonight, He met me here:

Come with me by yourselves and rest awhile,

I know you're weary of the stress and throng, 

Wipe from your brow the sweat and dust of toil,

And in My quiet strength again be strong.

Come now aside from all the world holds dear,

For fellowship the world has never known,

Alone with Me, and with My Father here,

With Me and with My Father, not alone. 

Come, tell Me all that you have said and done,

Your victories and failures, hopes and fears.

I know how hardened hearts are wooed and won; 

My choicest wreaths are always wet with tears.

Come now and rest; the journey is too great,

And you will faint beside the way and sink;

The bread of life is here for you to eat,

And here for you the wine of love to drink.

Then from fellowship with your Lord return,

And work till daylight softens into even:

Those brief hours are not lost in which you learn

More of your Master and His rest in Heaven.

soundtrack of my day

Wake up call: "it's a new day, oh it's a new time, and there's a new way I'm gonna live my life, because all the old has passed away and the new has come, thank God, it's a brand new day"

"what heights of love, what depths of peace, when fears are stilled and strivings cease"

"You are everything that I live for..."

"this is a song of surrender, for whom have I but You, and You are, You are better, forever so much better than the world, You are my Portion, my Reward, my never-ending, overflowing Lord, my Portion, Lord"

"the Lord has promised good to me, His Word my hope secures"

"overwhelmed and uninspired by this communication breakdown"

"You make me beautiful, You make me stand in awe, You step inside my heart and I am amazed"

"You are the source of life, I can't be left behind...this world has nothing for me, I will follow You...capture me with grace"

"My love is over, it's underneath, it's inside, it's inbetween"

"Lord, I really need to hear You speak, so remind me in the waiting that You are working all things out for the good of those who are called by You, for the good of those who are in love with You, that's why we sing"

"all You are is all I want always, draw me close in Your arms, o God, I want to be with You"

And I think I'll go to sleep to: "I want You, Lord, I want You more than what You give, I just want who You are, and I'm not asking for any answers, just Your face, I just want who You are, glory in the adoration of my heart, cause I want You more"

Thank You, Lord, for the gift of song.

wow

Quoted in this post on Maundy Thursday:

"Christ was all anguish that I might be all joy, cast off that I might be brought in, trodden down as an enemy that I might be welcomed as a friend, surrendered to hell’s worst that I might attain heaven’s best, stripped that I might be clothed, wounded that I might be healed, athirst that I might drink, tormented that I might be comforted, made a shame that I might inherit glory, entered darkness that I might have eternal life.My Saviour wept that all tears might be wiped from my eyes, groaned that I might have endless song, endured all pain that I might have unfading health, bore a thorned crown that I might have a glory-diadem, bowed his head that I might uplift mine, experienced reproach that I might receive welcome, closed his eyes in death that I might gaze on unclouded brightness, expired that I might for ever live." (The Valley of Vision, “Love Lustres at Calvary”)

Piper tweet

God never does only one thing. In everything he does he is doing thousands of things. Of these we know perhaps half a dozen.

timely? always.

i love this post on John Piper's blog, especially this summary at the end (emphasis mine):

The Holy Family's first few years were not tranquil. They were filled with grueling travel during the hardest part of pregnancy, a birth in worse than a barn, no steady income, an assassination attempt, two desert crossings on foot with an infant, living in a foreign country, waiting on God for guidance and provisions just in the nick of time. It was difficult, expensive, time-consuming, career-delaying and full of uncertainty.

And it was God's will.

The unplanned, inefficient detours of our lives are planned by God. They are common for disciples, and they commonly don't make sense in the moment. But God's ways are not our ways because our lives are about him, not about us. He is orchestrating far more than we know in every unexpected event and delay.

So when you find yourself suddenly moving in a direction you had not planned, take heart, hold tight, and trust God's navigation.

another piper tweet

We need God in ways we do not know. Don't limit your experience of God to what you can think to ask. Ask for the unknown joy.

piper's twitter quote today

Lord cut, Lord carve, Lord wound, Lord do anything that may perfect the Father's image in us.

Samuel Rutherford