Todays MOPS email (Mothers of Preschoolers) was great reading.

“It’s Not Up To US:
Are you working hard and doing your best to produce the fruit of the Spirit in your life today? Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Who wouldn’t want such qualities in her life? But – whew! – they seem so beyond our grasp. Why? Perhaps because we think it’s all up to us to produce.

It’s not! It’s not our job to produce the fruit of the Spirit in our lives or in the lives of those around us. That’s God’s job: fruit production. The fruit of the Spirit grows when we let Him live these qualities in us and through us as we grow in a relationship with Him.

Living out the fruit of the Spirit requires honesty. We don’t have to dress it up to make it better. It admits, “I really can’t do any more today. I’m bushed. But I’d love to help out tomorrow.” It suggests, “A better time for me to commit would be in the early afternoon because then the kids are in preschool”. Naked fruit isn’t 24/7 availability to impossible expectations. But, drawing from a relationship with God, naked fruit does try – openly and sincerely.

Naked Fruit is about getting past the peeling of “nice” Christianity and getting down to the honest, simple truth: the fruit of the Spirit is about being like Jesus.

God makes it simple. We make it hard. We want to grow a life that matters and he wants to grow such a life in us. That’s fruit: minus the peeling. Naked fruit.

There’s more about this that I want to encourage you with, so I’ve taken an excerpt from my book Naked Fruit and made it a free download available at www.mops.org.”

Monday’s “Slice of Infinity” was beautiful.Betsy Childs with RZIM wrote “Canyons of the Spirit” and I’m excerping a bit because it was so delicious. Note to self… reread this Monica… let it live in you.

There is more than one way for a canyon to be formed. They can be carved quickly by the rapid erosion of a rushing river or a melting glacier. Or, they can take years to form, hewn by the steady trickle of a stream running through limestone.

No one can encounter power of Living Water and come away unscathed. Sometimes, the most dramatic canyons take a lifetime to carve.

++please continue to remap me Lord with Your Living Water. clear away the obstructions that hinder the rushing of Your life over my spirit. flow and flood the landscape of my heart. saturate me.++

This is a beautiful quote. God has been calling me to a deeper level in prayer, and this thought is so fragrant and rich.

“Prayer should be the breath of our breathing, the thought of our thinking, the soul of our feeling, and the life of our living, the sound of our hearing, the growth of our growing. Prayer in it’s magnitude is length without end, width without bounds, height without top, and depth without bottom. Illimitable in it’s breadth, exhaustless in height, fathomless in depths and infinite in extension.” Homer W. Hodge

Condensation of My blessings on the walls of your heart,
cascading down into pools
of translucent love,
beginning and ending with Me.

Elegant prisms gleaming a spectrum
of My love and grace
centered on you.

I AM TRUE.
High pitched noise
ultrasonic rhythms
covering you (in solace).

Flowing
beyond listening
sensing beyond knowledge
reverberations in harmony to One (sound?).

Unique knowing
scattered among noises
bursting the boundaries and limits
in time (timing) in quiet realms.

Cleansing anew.

I have a few thougts that I have recieved from the Spirit over the last while. I have found a path into His spacious place for me, and when my mind is clear from clutter, I can hear clearly His Spirit speak.

Innumerable desires
filing into thoughts traveling
through realities of My love and devotion for you.
Surrounding, floating on the wind
is My Spirit, in your heart,
delighting in your thoughts,
rustling through feelings
combining emotions into internal soliloquies.

The Preacher’s Story in 4 Parts in part 4 he writes: “People who doubt can have great faith because faith is something you do, not something you think. In fact, the greater your doubt the more heroic your faith.”

I think there are a lot of nooks and cranny’s in this blog that are beckoning me…

My Virtual Faith This was something I stumbled upon… wonderful message and description… especially James 1:12 at the end…

Are You A Pencil?
Contributed by: Mr. Nath

The Pencil Maker took the pencil aside, just before putting him into the box. “There are 5 things you need to know,” he told the pencil, “Before I send you out into the world. Always remember them and never forget, and you will become the best pencil you can be.”
#1 — You will be able to do many great things, but only if you allow yourself to be held in Someone’s hand.

#2 — You will experience a painful sharpening from time to time, but you’ll need it to become a better pencil.

#3 — You will be able to correct any mistakes you might make.

#4 — The most important part of you will always be what’s inside.

#5 — On every surface you are used on, you must leave your mark. No matter what the condition you must continue to write.

The pencil understood and promised to remember, and went into the box with purpose in his heart.

But now the pencil lay on the dark wood table, feeling insignificant and rather sad. Beside him on the desk was a colorful tin can, filled with every kind of beautiful pen to be had. There were silver fountain pens and a neon felt tip marker. There was also a classy ballpoint whom everyone called Parker.

“What a loser,” they said of the pencil, as they observed his wooden frame. “Don’t bother with him, he’s a nobody,” said Parker, “He doesn’t even have a name.”

Now the world was at war and their owner was a Soldier who was tasked to bring peace to the land.

“What we need is a map,” the Soldier had said, at the desk across from his Officer the other night. “If someone can fly me over the city unseen, I can draw a map from the sky. The map will tell you where to go and how to win, and soon we’ll put an end to this fight.”

The Officer had agreed and now the Soldier would fly, but first he discussed with his wife. “I’ll need something to draw with, something dependable . . . something that won’t fail me mid-flight.”

The Soldier looked at his dark wood desk, and observed all the pens in the can. He studied each one, their bodies all shimmering, and he weighed them all in his hand. “This one won’t work,” he said of a pen, “the ink might blot on the map. This one needs to be refilled every few hours, and this one will dry out without a cap.”

He looked at each one and always found something wrong, or anticipated problems if he used it in the sky. “I need something that would work whatever the conditions, and I need it soon my dear wife.” “Then take this pencil.” his wife finally said, handing him the frail and battered yellow thing. “It will write no matter what, it will write on a plane — it’s the best writing tool you can bring.”

The Soldier smiled, kept the pencil in his pocket, and took it with him on the plane. He finished the map and the map helped bring them peace … and the pencil has never been the same. “ The pencil was now nothing more than a stub; what was left of his lead was now broken. His eraser was gone, his wood frame had split, and some time ago his metal ring had been stolen.

Now he stood before the Pencil Maker, and waited for him to say those five words. “”Well done, my faithful pencil,” the Pencil Maker said, “You have written what you were meant to write in the world.”

“Blessed is the man who perseveres under trial, because when he has stood the test, he will receive the crown of life that God has promised to those who love Him.” – James 1:12

Author Unknown

This is a beautiful quote by Walter Wangerin Jr.
“The difference between shallow happiness and a deep, sustaining joy is sorrow. Happiness lives where sorrow is not. When sorrow arrives, happiness dies. It can’t stand pain. Joy, on the other hand, rises from sorrow and therefore can withstand all grief. Joy, by the grace of God, is the transfiguration of suffering into endurance, and of endurance into character, and of character into hope–and the hope that has become our joy does not (as happiness must for those who depend upon it) disappoint us.”

There is a song I love, just because it has ice cream and chocolate in it… so I sing it now and then, and when I do, I realize that I am singing it as praise to God… here’s my take on Sarah McLachlan’s song titled “Ice Cream”, here are the lyrics first:

Your love is better than ice cream,
better than anything else that I’ve tried.
You’re love is better than ice cream,
and everyone here knows how to cry.

It’s a long way down…
It’s a long way down…
It’s a long way down to the place where we started from…

Although Sara McLachlan probably didn’t write this song with a Christian angle, it’s praise music for me. Jesus Christ is like this for me… He’s sweeter than anything I’ve ever known, beyond the best chocolate, sweeter and more divine. And I am a chocolate hound… I mean, I feel unsteady if I know that there isn’t an ounce of it in the entire house, even if I don’t plan to eat it, just knowing that it’s in the cupboard if I want a little bite, it makes me giddy with excitement! This what God does to me… awakens me to excitement and eagerness in anticipation for what He is going to reveal to me next, through my physical enviornment, through His Word, and through His Spirit speaking to my heart.

So, back to the song… when it says “everyone here knows how to cry,” well, of course we do! We all have grief, uhnappiness, happiness and joy… and all those things are still ever more a sweet taste when you are filled with the love of Christ, as the pain isn’t so bad when you see it as loving discipline from Your Father, who is growing you (Heb 12:2-7).

When the song says “it’s a long way down to the place where we started from,” I see how far I’ve come through God’s ever present grace and love. It’s also a long way down to fall when I sin… knowing that He still paid for my unworthyness with His magnificent worth. Then when the song says “everyone here knows how to fight,” I see this as my own struggles with keeping Him at the center of my life, in every moment, in every situation… (when the kids are screaming and I turn into Momzilla, when I’m worrying or preoccupied, etc..) so many things distract me in my thoughts, that I lose the clarity of Him being in focus. When I lose the highlighted thought, to take every thought I have captive, to make it obedient to Him (2 Cor. 10:5), I am still reassured that He knows the deep desires of my heart… to try and step in tune with His love. Even though I sin and struggle at times,God’s love is STILL better than ice cream, chocolate or anything else that I’ve tried (past tense), and, will try in the future! Nothing will ever be sweeter than His love for me, nothing will be more delicious, scrumptions, and filling than being in His embrace….. just knowing that He is growing me… and allowing me to walk in His Word, and see Him all around me. The other awesome thing about Him… no calories, if anything, He has the power to make things weightless and leave your heart levetating inside your body.

Next time you eat a chocolate cookie, or a yummy morsel, remember that He is infinetly sweeter and more delectable…. Hunger for His love.
*hugs*