Are not the scars part of the beauty?

September 12, 2018 / jill autrey dorman / Leave a comment

The ocean’s wind catches each regret, each sin, and sorrow throwing it into the eternity of a perfect God to be forever forgotten. In the light of the moon a young woman, who thought the stars would stop shining above her found the Maker of the stars and the freedom and love and the lullaby He sang washing over her in waves. So now I am drifting, sailing free in the light of summer love and I know that I am saved. I know that I was lost and you came to find me.

On that day when the sun tipped over the edge of the earth and spilled colors like buckets of orange, pink, and violet as a reminder of the power of Holy light. The young woman once ravaged and scarred by guilt and shame found joy in the warmth of The Son. Lifted from the darkness you came for me . I was lost and you lifted me in your arms and by your own wounds, scars, and stripes you healed me.

It is always worth mending that which is broken. This is the heartbeat of God’s love. The fractures, wounds, and scars are remarkably purified like gold after the pain of repentance has done its work making every broken piece precious in His sight transforming those that are broken into the Holy wholeness of the Holy One whose image we bear.

In the end are not the scars part of the beauty? Oh yes! I think Jesus, when we meet him will show us his perfectly mended scars in his human-ness even though He is now glorified. He is always perfect. I think he will say “yes, these scars represent each of you and they are beautiful.”

No Darkness at All…

September 9, 2018 / jill autrey dorman / Leave a comment

Photo by George Becker

If you have lived any part of your life without receiving the love of Christ then you have known the dark places that lie at the heart of what may or may not appear to be light. Like many Christians before me I am compelled and pushed toward this light driven somewhat to the point of desire for perfect love, which cast out all fear. In the book of first John he states, “this is the message, in Him there is no darkness

I hope in these words daily. What an astounding profound statement and fact. I want this person, Jesus, who is the Light. I want to bathe in it, live in it, and roam the halls of eternity in His warming light.

This marvelous, scandalous love of the God/man Jesus intrigues me so.
Although love has the component of something sweet that makes me “feel” good most of that time it is only a fraction of the Wholeness in Him.
REAL LOVE it dawns on me is dangerous, not safe. Love is risky. It will get hold of you from the inside out and its grip is so tight that if we could stand the squeeze we find ourselves willing to do anything for its sake. In the words of the warrior-child Lucy in C.S. Lewis’s Chronicle of Narnia I am reminded over and over of the fact that God is absolutely GOOD but He is not safe.
He is the one who says, “I’ll risk myself and come down to you because I choose you and so you may find me and be amazed at my pure light of love and glory. It will do you Good for Good is who I am.”

the subject of suffering is a hot bed of emotions in the human realm.

September 4, 2018 / jill autrey dorman / 2 Comments

selective focus photography of tree leaves

Photo by Egor Kamelev

I have been “leaning into” the book called The Gospel According to Job or about three years…the subject of suffering is a hot bed of emotions in the human realm. The one million light bulbs that go off in my head like some crazy paparazzi event when I contemplate truly suffering usually sends me into an endorphin crisis. Some have said to me “well, if you had more faith…blah blah blah…” ( God is the one who gives faith and I Love that. He will measure out to me the Faith and Grace and Mercy I need from his very own hand he gives it to me).
I am seeing more clearly what is the heart of Job. He has become a friend to me. He is what is called a “type” of Jesus (foretold in the Ancient Testament). Job had unmerited suffering put upon him. It was allowed by God. (This right here will upset many of you but I believe God can allow whatever he sees best to befall anyone. I believe this because I know that God is more Good and more wild and transcendent and more terrifyingly wonderful than I have ever even begun to know!!!) Job was a man who pleased God yet lost all his family and home. All of his children in one day…cannot even go there!
Anyway I am saying all of that to say the story of Job is not about suffering in the way I always use to think, even though suffering is well displayed in its pages. The story of Job is that for him the worst thing that could ever happen was that he might lose his Peace with God…think about that.

Coffee and antiseptic…I was young and new at loss…

August 29, 2018 / jill autrey dorman / Leave a comment

Photo by Erkan Utu

Coffee and antiseptic is the smell of the hospital to me. That smell is as familiar as coming home and while I know for many people this odd combination of fragrance carries a myriad of meanings and feelings.

What began as a life long journey for this twenty-two year old woman of such an innocence has in the last forty years become one of the most essential teachers of Wisdom on my road map of life.

Forty years ago I was young and new at Loss. Not a master of loss as I am now…

I learned that while “science/medicine/technology” gives a perception of control it simply cannot ultimately answer the deep questions of life. Science can achieve many wondrous feats but it is powerless in its outcome alone.

Once you see a patient’s eye shine with gratitude or you hold a total stranger in your arms as their life tumbles down around them one of two things will happen. Either your heart will break (which is okay and mine often has) or your blood will cringe and you will not be able to stay.

In the halls, rooms, and waiting rooms of this place that smells like coffee and antiseptic I have learned that as driven as we are to present our lives as if full and orderly the soul of a human and the meaning of life cannot be answered by mere science and knowledge.

The stuff life is made of goes on outside of these walls…Normal stuff…pushing your baby on a swing…normal stuff…listening to your clothes dryer hum all night long because you never get all the laundry done…on and on this list could go…normal stuff.

I write these things to you who believe in the name of the Son of God that you may know that you have eternal life. 1 John 5:13

Slow dancing home…

August 21, 2018August 21, 2018 / jill autrey dorman / Leave a comment

person in blue shirt on sunflower field photo shot

Photo by Rhiannon Stone

Sun flowers turn their face toward the sun everyday of summer…

The ocean is pulled and pushed by the tide without missing a beat…

With each succeeding step I take in this slow dance I see less brambles and thorns and more rich colored roses…

I see bright green leaves of trees and the glorious redness of an apple…

The high meadow mountain where the four rivers flow is getting closer and closer…

The lushness of Eden beckons and sings with the swaying pines…

The scent of jasmine and wisteria mingle through the air…

There is a warm wind that brings the warmth of summer yet I can see the harvest of fall and the daffodils and green of spring all at the same time…

The song of the rivers sing a Holy melody and I dance slowly on…

And oh such music, I can hear it so clearly in the laughter of children and the cries of the hurting…

Each step of this slow dance feels exactly right and I know I am dancing home…

Next Generation of The Church…

August 17, 2018 / jill autrey dorman / 3 Comments

I truly love my daughter’s generation (thirty somethings), well I don’t love all of their music (I can’t believe I am my parents)…I have enormous respect for their mantra…”I don’t have all the answers and neither do you.” I love how they can smell a “fake of any kind” within seconds! They live in a culture that isn’t buying into Christian consumerism, they are not for sale. They do not want to be entertained at Church (God knows there is enough entertainment in social media). They want to know God, experience His real presence and find worship in their own hearts that is not manufactured for one day a week on a stage. I just love that! I will say it absolutely terrifies me as well. The shift in our world to “postmodernism” makes me feel like I am floating in slow motion in water through a world I recognized but it is slipping away. Part of this exhilarates me and part of it so uncomfortable that my heart races, I am anxious, and will wake in the middle of the night and pray. I pray that they won’t throw the baby out with the bath water in some kind of reverse Dogma.
This tension is a must in the relationships of life. The relationship with the God who made us right down to the people who love us for better or worse. The thing is Jesus and “tension” go hand in hand. If we study his life we will see that His “absolutes” were few but man were they TENSE! So simple yet so “in your face”…”hear the word of the Father and do it and love others and forgive everyone else”…are you kidding me?
God intensely loves my children’s generation. No one wants more for our kids than God does! I believe that. For me it is evident in the women my girls have become in spite of me. Their grace and graciousness continue to astound me.
So when I feel alien in a postmodern world I look at them. At the Jesus in them and I take a deep breath and I know that Jesus made a way for every generation to find Him, to come to Him, and that through Him they will find the presence of God’s peace. So when I am not panicking or praying I am cheering them on with all my heart, my love, and my being to “press on” to love Jesus, love others and forgive all.