Loosing

There comes a time in every game where you have to decide how you are going to end.  I remember those games.  You can look at the moves you have yet to make and you can see that you have run out of options.  You now simply have to decide how you are going to end.  I can remember when an acquaintance of mine was at that point.  There were no more relatives to run to.  There were no more cities to welcome.  The boyfriends left.  The children grew up.  The public aid checks got smaller and her health was spent.  She changed.  She became calmer and more accepting.  She stopped panicking and started packing her life up in paper bags.  She planned the end the way she wanted to end.  This she had to do because the end was coming and instead of fighting it, she welcomed it.  We always plan to win, but no one teaches us the art of loosing.  No one says that you don't have to go out kicking and screaming.  You don't have to transition that way.  You don't have to always throw a fit.  A good friend of mine said, "I'll always have to fight, but I don't always have to cry".  I may always have to face loneliness, but I don't have to cry  about it.  I may have to be broke for a while, but I don't always have to cry about it.  I may be sick longer than I supposed, but I don't always have to cry about it.  You go out of here with your head held high even if some things in your life are just going to be that way.  Be to ornery to wither and die.  Play your last piece as if it was your first and live life................................to the end.
Ecclesiastes 7:8-14King James Version (KJV)
⁸ Better is the end of a thing than the beginning thereof:

Free

My mind falls on a day in the fall when my mother filled out the paperwork for school and gave it to me to return.  In all my days, I never thought to open the envelope and read what she wrote, but one day I did.  It was the standard free lunch and free textbook form.  I had a short walk from our home on thirteenth street to Dr. Andy Hall School, but once I got there, I had an epiphany.  The form entitled my mother to free lunch and textbooks if she did not make over a certain amount of money.  As a matter of fact, I understood that the moment she wanted to better herself, she would have to assume the responsibility of paying for the lunches.  If she wanted the help, she had to remain poor.  My mother signed up for a program to pay the utility bills after the winter.  Once again, you had to remain poor to receive it.  We moved across the street from the community center where they gave out free cheese and butter and once again, we had to identify with poverty in order to qualify.  My mother made sure we always qualified, but it hit a sour note with me.  It dawned on me that she was selling her identity to receive what she thought was free.  As a matter of fact, what got her out of the bed on certain days was getting something for free.  I examined this in my mind as a child.  You have to stay poor to get the oldest cheese in the universe.  You have to stay poor to get glasses made by inmates.  You have to stay poor to have the worse doctors in the profession.  You have to stay poor to shop and get the worse grocery stores.  Qualifying was producing a way of life that I did not want to live.  I did not want a free life.  I would rather pay and get good glasses.  I would rather pay and shop at the good grocery stores.  I would rather pay and eat the good cheese.  Even if I did not have the money, I will never identify with poverty.  Everything that is free is not..................free.

Buy the field

Matthew 13:44-46

The Parables of the Hidden Treasure and the Pearl

⁴⁴ “The kingdom of heaven is like treasure hidden in a field. When a man found it, he hid it again, and then in his joy went and sold all he had and bought that field.
⁴⁵ “Again, the kingdom of heaven is like a merchant looking for fine pearls. ⁴⁶ When he found one of great value, he went away and sold everything he had and bought it.


I love the way this parable reads.  When I think of some of the shady people I have in my life, I know that their first thought is to take the treasure from the field without purchasing the field.  Many would not have even considered it stealing.  Charlatans and thieves are always looking for a way to nickel and dime.  A person, who is honest, understands that you cannot take the pearl without the field.  You have to take all of it.  You cannot see someone as a resource and not consider the whole person.  You cannot take the good and somehow leave the bad.  You cannot cherry pick blessings and separate them from the blessor.  One day we ill understand that.

Thirty pieces of silver

I think one of the most trusted and valuable pieces of information on can receive is the revelation of the person in your midst who will betray you.  Jesus Christ performed miracles and Judas was there.  Jesus fed the five thousand and Judas was there.  Jesus raised Lazarus from the dead and..........  Then there came a time when Jesus was simply a resource to Judas.  When it came right down to it, Jesus was worth thirty pieces of silver.  In dollars it was about 3000 dollars.  In essence, it really was not that much money, but Jesus was reduced to that.  It revealed something about Judas and his character that he could no longer hide.  Only after he had ruined the relationship between he and Jesus, for Jesus would never be seen by him again, did he finally see that it was not worth it.  By that time, he was revealed to be a common charlatan and a whore for money.  Not even the priest would help him find redemption.  With all that he was laid out on the table, Judas finished the job by hanging himself.  I say this because that is the way of thieves and liars.  They are often caught up in their own games and lies.  They fall by their own hands.  They reveal what they always want hidden and the come to their own demise.  Allow God to reveal what people in your life will do for thirty pieces of silver.  The information will be priceless.

Rome

People always talk about traveling.  They want to see Paris and Rome.  I have never desired to have that in my life.  I really want to stay in one place.  As a child, we moved often.  That meant that there was never a time when you could sit back and chew the fat with a childhood friend from Kindergarten.  You didn't have that type of history.  I longed for the life where you saw each other grow up and you could reminisce about the good old days.  I wanted to walk down a street at twenty five, that I walked down when I was five.  I wanted a community so familiar that I could move on to other things.  I didn't have to learn roads and names and places.  I could simply set up camp and live.  You don't realize how strange a place is until you have lived there for ten years and you still get lost.  I don't have many places like this in my life.  Seems like I have always lived..................in Rome.

Walk Away

Mark 11:12-25New International Version (NIV)

Jesus Curses a Fig Tree and Clears the Temple Courts

¹² The next day as they were leaving Bethany, Jesus was hungry. ¹³ Seeing in the distance a fig tree in leaf, he went to find out if it had any fruit. When he reached it, he found nothing but leaves, because it was not the season for figs. ¹⁴ Then he said to the tree, “May no one ever eat fruit from you again.” And his disciples heard him say it.


Jesus was outside of Bethany when he cursed the fig tree.  Then Jesus walked two miles to Jerusalem to drive the charlatans out of the church.  Then the next day, he walked two miles back to Bethany and his disciples saw the fig tree that had been cursed the day before.  All Jesus did was drop the word and keep going.  I have a habit of wanting to stand around to make sure God's word works.  I have learned that I don't have to do that. You don't have to stand over his word to see if it works.  One of the hardest things to do is to simply leave the word and walk away. You pray for healing and then go about the rest of your life.  You quote the scripture and then leave the word to do the work.  Meanwhile, you keep on working.  You keep on praying.  You keep on keeping on and when you come back to the fig tree on your way to do something else...................it will be withered.

Your later will be Greater

The progression of most people is that they start out as a blank slate.  Life gets filled with the goings on of the day and it becomes more complicated.  Marriage and children and school and pta meetings fill your agenda until you are an empty nester.  Then life slows to a crawl and you die on a golden pond.  What if God wanted to do something different.  Let's say, backward.  You are born in oblivion and lived a meaningless existence laboring in other people vineyards but never drinking the wine.  Then one day when your bones are creaking and your hair is gray, you find love and legacy wrapped in the same box.  You find money hidden in the crevices of your life that you thought were lost forever.  You look up and you are living the life denied in your early years and you go down...................in a blaze of Glory.

Haggai 2:9 Context

⁶For thus saith the LORD of hosts; Yet once, it is a little while, and I will shake the heavens, and the earth, and the sea, and the dry land; ⁷And I will shake all nations, and the desire of all nations shall come: and I will fill this house with glory, saith the LORD of hosts. ⁸The silver is mine, and the gold is mine, saith the LORD of hosts. ⁹The glory of this latter house shall be greater than of the former, saith the LORD of hosts: and in this place will I give peace, saith the LORD of hosts.

Although the fig won't blossom

I am in the stage of life called transition.  Hormones that use to reign and dominate are fading away.  Sleep alludes me and pain comes without invitation.  My mind weighs heavy on the things of the past and the uncertainty of the future.  Transition is a funeral of sorts.  You say goodbye to what you will never be again and tremble at what you are becoming.  It is joyful and tearful at the same time.  I go from ecstatic to weeping within the same turn of the second hand.  Being a dark person, I like this time.  The stalls are empty, the figs won't blossom but I hope in God.  I know he is up to something truly wonderful in my life even though this has been one big battlefield.

Habakkuk 3:17-19
¹⁷ Although the fig tree shall not blossom, neither shall fruit be in the vines; the labour of the olive shall fail, and the fields shall yield no meat; the flock shall be cut off from the fold, and there shall be no herd in the stalls:
¹⁸ Yet I will rejoice in the Lord, I will joy in the God of my salvation.
¹⁹ The Lord God is my strength, and he will make my feet like hinds' feet, and he will make me to walk upon mine high places. To the chief singer on my stringed instruments.

He won't Suffer it..........

I am learning how strong God's word is in this season.  My doctor's looked for everything God said I would not have.  They were convinced but they did not move God's word.  It reminds me of concrete.  I did not know how strong and long lasting his word was until man tried to move it and could not.  Man tried to chisel it and could not.  I tried to bulldoze it and could not.  His word is unmovable.  His declarations are truest to the upmost.

Isaiah 46:10
Declaring the end from the beginning, and from ancient times the things that are not yet done, saying, My counsel shall stand, and I will do all my pleasure:

God knew, but man did not know and His word.................stood.

Smiling

I don't quite know how people live without faith.  I don't know what I would do if I did not have options.  The one thing I know about God is that he never runs out of options and because of that, I never run out of options.  Recently, I spent some time in the hospital faced with people who looked like they were at the end of their road.  I wanted to lean over and ask them if they had tried Jesus.  I don't know where I would be without Jesus.  The best part of salvation, in Him, is that the sun is always coming over the horizon.  Tomorrow can always be a better day.  The rain can always stop or the drought can always end.  I believe suicide happens because they can see no way out.  Even if God sat on his throne and did nothing, there is still that possibility and that is comforting.  At least in his killing, he can kill me softly.  Life still has that glimmer like the moonlight on a still pond.  In the midst of a warzone, you can smile and .....................I am smiling.

The New Me for the New Life

Recently, God is remaking me.  It began with weight loss to the tune of forty pounds.  I gave up growing hair and began to rock wigs.  I found a new freedom in the wigs.  I was able to come off of a lot of the medication.  My blood pressure was awesome.  I had to take a potassium supplement but it has not been to bad.  When God wanted to remake my mind, I bucked like a wild horse.  I didn't think I needed a pill.  I went into spiritual counseling which was wonderful, but I still needed something to deal with the physiological symptoms of anxiety.  I remade my makeup to include a face powder and a red lipstick and I don't stress about dishes anymore.  I didn't think I would enjoy this process, but I have to allow the Lord to have his way.  This......................is His way.

An Old Problem

When I was young I remember things that I would rather forget.  One of those things was a period of time when I began to pull out my hair.  My family had gone through significant trauma and most of the responsibility rest upon me.  I soldiered it like a soldier but it took it's toll.  I bit my nails down to the quick, and I began to pull out hair on the left side of my head.  I had a noticeable bald spot. I slept or went to bed as early as I could but laying awake I always relived my own victimization.  At the age of 15 I began to pack on the weight.  By the time I was out of High School, I weighed 200 pounds.  While in college, I ballooned to the weight of 275 and stayed there for most of my twenties and thirties.  Every evening at around 8:00pm, I went into a period of sadness.  I combatted these things with music and finding something to do but when I prayed I had to watch myself because my prayers in the evening were always negative.  I blamed God for where I was in my life.  I questioned God about why I had to live the life I had to live.  In the morning, it was alright.  Then as I moved into my forties, my night terrors moved into the day.  I began to be anxious about negative things all day long.  I began to be negative.  The only thing that helped was secular music.  Christian music only reminded me that I God had forsaken me.  One day, the perfect storm was hatched for me.  I experienced sickness that sparked me to grieve for my family again.  Then I became anxious like I was as a child, waiting to the next disaster to take place.  My doctor asked if I needed a pill and I rebuked him.  It took a month, but I started the pill.  It has been three days and there has been a difference.  For once in my life, I can stop forboding at least for now.