Monday, November 26, 2007

Potted Plants

Just a random thought God has been speaking to me about lately. I have several friends who are at Master's Commission this year, and a few others that are planning on going to Portland Bible College next year. For some reason God keeps sending me out into the world, like right now at PCC or next year at PSU, even though I would love nothing more than to go to one of those good Christian places. I was tossing it around in my mind when God brought an analogy to me.

We are like potted shrubs.

When we are out in the world, exposed to the elements we grow slowly and steadily, bit by bit through each experience. Our bark gets thicker, our roots dig deeper, and we learn to depend completely on our Gracious Gardener.

Sometimes, He knows that we need shelter or recovery or fast growth and so He'll remove us from the world and its harsh environment and place us inside a greenhouse. These greenhouses are places were we are continually fed a steady diet of Bible, basking in the warmth of the Holy Spirit at all times, and can grow much faster. In the greenhouses, our branches and our dreams grow higher, our wounds heal, and we start becoming what our Gardener intended us to look like.

However, the greenhouse is not a permanent place of residence. A greenhouse is there for a period of growth, then we must be acclimated to the harsh world again. If a healthy plant is kept in a greenhouse too long, it can't grow higher, or dig its roots deeper. Disease begins to spread from the stagnant air, and eventually a place of life can become a place of death if change doesn't occur.

But if we do get removed from the greenhouse, and endure the conditions of the world, we can then thrive like we would never have been able to in the greenhouse. We reach higher pressing in closer to God. Our roots dig deeper as we cement ourselves deeper in his Word. And we move from being a small shrub to a mammoth tree. We start doing the job God made us to do, changing the atmosphere of the world.

Thursday, November 15, 2007

BIG BIG BIG NEWS!!!!!!!!!!!!

So for all my friends who don't know, I just received my Work Authorization Card in the mail. It means I can now legaly work in the US!!!! Its almost like a Greencard, except that it doesn't give me permenant residency and it only lasts for a year, but by then I'll have my Greencard so praise God!!! Seriousely not to sound cliche but it's really thanks to God. We have been in the system to get our Greencards for 8 years now. When we finally entered the last step, we were told just 6 months left, but then the whole system backed up and we were basically sitting dead in the water for 8 months. At that point I almost fell into depression, but God brought along a really good friend to teach me about patience, persistence, and perserverance. I pressed through and started interceeding again for the Greencard. My friend also started interceeding, and unbeknownst to us, several other people were also praying hard this last week for the Greencard. Last night at GC, I laid it on the alter before God and gave it into His hands. And when I got home, there it(my WAC, not my Greencard) was.

Now, for me this is miraculous. I have been in a place the last year or so where everything has been an uphill battle. Prayer, worship, Bible study, church, counceling, everything just seemed to be flowing against me, no matter how hard I pressed in. I had resigned myself to the fact that the rest of my Christian walk would be like this and had decided to grit my teeth and endure life, but now it seems that after all this uphill pressing, I have finally made it to the Mountain Top. I am reminded that "the Lord taketh away" but that He also "giveth". So many times it feels to me like life is sucking the Holy Spirit out of my faster than God is filling me, and that God just closes doors but doesn's open any new ones. But the Bible says that God has given us "life and life more abundantly" and that "rivers of living water" will flow up from within us, and that "he who drinks of this water will never again be thirsty". We are here on earth not to survive but to thrive, because greater is He who is in us than he who is in the world. I thought I'd wrap up with one of my favorite quotes:

"When God is all you desire, you will never be disappointed."
-Donna Lasit

Wednesday, November 14, 2007

Some Bus Poetry

This morning on the bus, I noticed their poetry in motion signs that have small excerpts of poems on the bus walls. I decided to write a poem based on what I heard on the bus. I came up with several first lines that rhymed with 'sound', and then realised I could put them together and make a whole poem. So here it is in its unedited rough draft:

The noise is endless, never a moment can be found
Without the ceaseless cacophony, ringing all around
The air is thin and harsh, as many voices rebound
And join the choruses of cars, that threaten to surround
The faintest hint of silence, that's so easily bound
By the growing orchestra, of ringing cellphones and barking hounds,
As flashing sirens pass, with perception dawns the profound,
And in the face of eternity, there is no sound.

Think about it....