I had a dream that I was walking on the beach and about twenty yards away I looked and there stood Jesus wading in the water. i ran to him with all my might and we embraced, as we walked along the shore we spoke of many things that he knew were in my heart and like a beautiful string of pearls I gave them all to him.
as we walked the sea began to dance and sing and dolphins began to dance as if they too enjoyed worshipping him!
After our walk Jesus came into the place he prepared for me and we sat for what seemed hours, days, years but there is no time with him.
“The fact is that sin is a bigger disaster than we think it is and grace is more amazing than we seem to be able to grasp that it is. No one who really understands what Scripture has to say about the comprehensive, every-aspect-of-your-personhood altering nature of sin would ever think that anyone could muster enough motivation and strength to rise to God’s standard of perfection. The thought that any fallen human being would be able to perform his or her way into acceptance with God has to be the most insane of all delusions. Yet we all tend to think that we are more righteous than we are, and when we think this, we have taken the first step to embracing the delusion that maybe we’re not so bad in God’s eyes after all.” Paul Tripp
You better pray everyday
You better read your Bible every day.
You better join the choir, teach Sunday school, be a missionary, or do some kind of ministry.
You better tithe.
You better be at Church every time the door was open. (This one was easy because my Dad was a Pastor.)
So, if you are out there trying to earn your way into relationship with God it is a burden that you need not carry and when you realize this Truth it is actually a relief. Then you can start to actually do and say the things that please God by letting His Spirit live in you.
It can be a rough ride and not a pretty sight, but Jesus did not come and die for us because it was comfortable or pretty. He did it because he understood and still understands that it is HE who brings life from sin and death, and it is Jesus in you that will produce “good works and fruit.”
Your behavior will change because Jesus transforms our hearts and out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks, the hands serve, and the love overflows. I know, because I spent years trying to be good enough and failed and then as I lay all of that down I began to change.
Jesus said to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. John 14:6
It is dusk in winter casting the sky and world into Winter blue. I squint my eyes and can see that little girl. That one, see her over there? She is quite the believer! She knows this color blue was made just for her and she looks forward to it every year. She gazes at the stars and sees the gateway to Heaven open wide and welcoming. Every season it occurs. Her crooked little smile and deep set navy-gray eyes are shining with the hope of Christmas. She loves getting toys of course but her love for feeling safe and cozy on a winter night means more than toys. There are decorations, and a tree with a favorite ornament hanging there and the warmth of family gathered. She knows her family loves her but she also knows that they whisper that she is a dreamer when they speak of her and they wonder if she will be all right . Dreams are not rebellion you know? As the years flow on Winter Blue comes again and again, however for me, the little girl’s safe existence and lingering dreams would have slipped through the looking glass had I not kept my promises to never lose her or our rendevue with Winter blue.
I am always astounded when a renewed sense of the “Realm of Grace.” is gifted to me by the Holy. My dear mentor Dr. Hud McWilliams puts it this way, “Grace erodes all of our human ability to be gods. Grace removes ALL of our ability to PRETEND we are in control.”
I clearly see This Realm of Grace cannot be diminished, Grace cannot be penetrated by darkness, Grace cannot be stopped by disease nor death, and best of all it cannot be bought or earned! The birthing place of Grace is Mercy. The person of Grace is Jesus our Lord who died and gave us his grace because our Heavenly Father is merciful. This refreshing and renewing gift from Grace is that Grace annihilated Shame! And I bear it no more!
He said I felt like a sledgehammer in his chest He said my steel magnolia eyes are the place he found rest He said he never met a girl life me before or since He said life without me made no sense And the music played and the song was sung.
A remote beach calls me with a symphony of crystal sea sound. Swimming free under a Copper Moon shining atop the waves Fears are banished into the midnight phosphorus of indigo blue My heart is so full and I know that I am homeward bound.
I surrender my soul to the wonders of The Holy One I weep for joy as the tentacles of humanity gently slip away The Copper Moon escorts me through the peace I have found Holy baptism fuels me yet again and I know that I am homeward bound.
Evening has fallen and I find myself sitting in a place of yearning, like being home sick. I am completely at peace. All is safe and warm yet I have a longing. I want to savor this life I have been given.
Every once in a while a moment will cling to me longer than others and it catches my breath because I want to stay there for a while before it becomes a memory. In those moments I might smell fresh cut grass or feel thunder shake the earth or laugh until my stomach muscles ache or taste the sweetness from the honeysuckle vine. Like an old reel to reel movie I see all of them. All of the memories. All of the generations of my family and I want to go home. What joy to know the God who loves us in a place where there’s no death or time. It is wonderful.
Today God orchestrated some happenings that I needed. It was an affirming whisper from him…
Such an intimate and sweet “I love you” from my Lord. I say intimate because He and I are the only ones who know. I say sweet because I am his daughter and he understands me.
Snapshot of my dreams, 4… “painting broken pictures with wounded hands.”
It was not eight o’ clock in the morning. It was not two days before Christmas, and my phone did not just ring and awaken me from a fitful dream.
If I do not allow these things to exist then all is well. You are alive, therefore, my world is on its axis and breathing continues…
I did not hear my husband’s footsteps coming down the hall. I did not hear the groan of that spot on the wooden floor that is worn and squeak under his weight. I did not feel someone sit on the end of our bed. He waited…
He could not be sitting there waiting because if he were it means you are dead. It would mean he is going to tell me so. It would mean that a light went out in my heart and all has gone dark…
This tiny act of turning my face toward my waiting husband confirms that he is there and he is going to tell me you didn’t make it. He will remind me they said your heart was too diseased which made repair difficult at best.
If I close my eyes and try with all my might to make things not happen, to never have this wretched day exist I would do it. Yet as the minutes tick relentlessly on I finally turn my head and open my eyes and it has to be said…you are dead. I step into a quicksand. I am dazed, cloudy in my head. I must face immortality with Faith. I had to face that the one who loved me the most in all this world was gone. Now I am painting broken pictures with wounded hands.
I am five years old and it is Christmas. We live in Memphis and it has snowed on Christmas Eve. The snow in the dawn’s twilight looks powder blue blanketing our yard. I have my nose to the window because Santa is coming! You are as excited as I and my brothers. The next morning we were up at the crack of dawn and there in the snow were the biggest boot prints I had ever seen. You said Santa walked around our yard because we don’t have a chimney so he came through our back door. I marveled at this possibility. It was pure magic at Christmas with you. It is quite appropriate that you died in the season you enjoyed the most.
Now I am forty- five and there is no snow, there are no boot prints in my yard. There is no joyous Christmas music. Just the silent weight of grief. I speak to friends but I am on autopilot. I have never lost someone I loved so much. It isn’t a feeling of sadness because I know your Faith in Christ is real. It isn’t a feeling at all. It is an altered state, a new dimension.
The funeral is blurred. I do all the daughter type things for my Mom. I have stayed with her these last two nights as she stares into space or weeps. It is December twenty sixth and I marvel at the amount of people who are here even though it is Christmas and they could be somewhere else having fun. People offer condolences, love, and prayer. They are kind. I do my best to be attentive to their kindness but I fail. I can’t think straight. I cannot imagine a world where you aren’t. There is no one else who will knock on my door every school morning and awaken me with a silly song or stand at my door and do a pretty good impersonation of Elvis, or call me by a nickname you gave me. There will never be another church service where I sit and listen to you teach the Word of God. There will never be another Daddy who came when I got hurt and picked me up and took me home. Never another strong arm as yours will be held up in front of me like a gate as protection when I am standing beside you in the front seat as you drive…(no seatbelts in those days) but the thought never crossed my mind that it wasn’t safe because you were there. I will never have another super hero who catches me when I jump in the deep end of the pool and don’t swim well yet. There is no one left on this earth that will understand the anger I sometimes had with Mom as a teen or the despair I felt when I got sick. I remember you wept when you saw my swollen joints and that I could barely walk. I saw your frustration at not being able to fix it. I always felt you were on my side. I always knew nothing I did could stop your love for me and I was right. Nor mind for you.
The day after the funeral came and went. Then the next day and the next and the next. I am robotic much of the time. The grief beats down my body with a crushing weight. I keep remembering our last conversation, it blesses me still. You said, ” Jesus was always “Center” for you. That following him (Jesus) is the most important issue for a dying world. You said, ” don’t follow politics or religion! Just follow Jesus.” Then you called me the apple of your eye. These words of endearment comfort me and little did I know they would be a greater comfort in the twenty-two years that have come to pass. So much left unsaid in snapshots, don’t you think Dad?
The little seabird with twigs for legs hurries up and back about three feet. Waves rolls seaward and the Sandpipers skirmishes lighting fast to peck a little minnow and hurries back …the water never once touches her. It is comical, this dance of the Piper. Her spindle like legs never seems to tire…
This is the beauty that fills my mind. ” everything that is created was created by Jesus. By him all things made above the earth, below the earth, on land, and in the sea. Everything visible and invisible were made by him for his pleasure. Jesus hold all things together and in him all things live and move and have their being.
Jill Autrey Dorman 