Family

Family photo shoot pictures

Wings

No, they're not mine... but they're awesome:-)The thing about flying is you have to jump off the ledge. In order to glide upwards on the currents and eddies you must hurl yourself headlong into the abyss and believe that underneath are the everlasting arms. A mother eagle does not teach her chicks to fly bit by bit. She simply kicks them out of the nest. Often God is more gentle with us, but often He wants us to do our bit of the growing too. I often wish that God would simply place in me all of the attributes He wants me to have so that I won't have to learn them the hard way. But, it turns out, the only way to develop patience is to be faced with many oppurtunities to be patient. The only way I am ever gonna learn to fly is to get out of the nest. But if I won't get out, God may well give me a shove. He knows I need it. Instead of resenting God's nudging or overspiritually rebuking the enemy when in fact it is only my circumstance which are out of place- I need to recognise the purpose and the lesson in the shove. What attribute am i learning here? How are these circumstances giving me oppurtunity to grow up?
Ranting and raving about unfairness, i've discovered, is kind of pointless. Are we actually genuinely demanding what is due to us? Let's think about that for a second. That might be dangerous... I deserve eternal judgement and fury for what I've done. But God in His incredible and reckless grace has chosen to be a father to me, whether that requires taking me by the hand as I take my first steps, picking me up and reassuring me when I fall, or sometimes saying, "Matt, you're old enough to do this now- just do it. Don't make me shove you. You have to grow or you'll stagnate and I'm not willing for you to be lost. So even if it means me shoving you out of this nest, You're gonna grow and become who I want you to be, and fulfill all that I have planned for you. I love you too much to let you stay how you are. Now get out of this nest and get on with the flying."

Spelling

So its been a while since i posted, i know. That doesn't mean nothing ahs been going on :-) loads has happened and is still happening that makes the normal things of a previous life less and less comfortable. Maybe thats what I need in order to accept growth. I heard recently that you spell growth C-H-A-N-G-E and also that faith is spelled R-I-S-K. Well that's all very well until you have to do it.
Circumstances are changing in my life which will mean i have to adapt and change, grow and progress, in order to deal with it. But the working out of what to do next is anything but clear. I need the wisdom to see the next step and the faith to take the R-I-S-K.

What hurts the most

Wow. i got just a little bit emotional watching this- thought i'd share it.

Egkentrizo

Graft (egkentrizo; the Revised Version (British and American) "graft"; the King James Version, "graff"):

The word occurs 6 times in Rom 11. Paul assumed that those living about Rome were familiar with the process of grafting olive trees, for olive culture had been adopted by the Greeks and Romans in Paul's time. The wild olive trees (Arabic colloquial, zeitun berri) are cut back, slits made on the freshly sawed branch ends, and two or three grafts from a cultivated olive (Arabic colloquial, zeitun jouwi) are inserted in such a way that the bark of the scion and of the branch coincide. The exposed ends are smeared with mud made from clay, and then bound with cloth or date straw, which is held by thongs made from the bark of young mulberry branches. The fruit thus obtained is good. Wild olives cannot be made cultivated olives by engrafting, as Paul implies (Rom 11:24), but a wild olive branch thus grafted would thrive. So Gentiles would flourish spiritually when grafted into the fullness of God's mercy, first revealed to the world through Israel.
James A. Patch

http://www.wildolive.co.uk/

This website i've found really helpful in understanding my place in relation to the people of the promise, Gods chosen Israel. I think its interesting that grafting can't happen without wounding. The process of joining, of uniting, is a painful one and requires wounds.

Just something to ponder...

New Name

Did you know that the disciple Matthew was also called Levi? I just found that out. pretty cool. so i looked into the name- always nice to have a cool biblical alternative name eh? Levi means "joined" or "attached" from the Hebrew word yilaveh.
Levi as well as being a disciple/tax collector in the new testament, was the third son of Jacob and Leah. When she gave birth, Leah is supposed to have said, "maybe now my husband will be joined to me because I have borne him three sons". Wow. unpack that one why don't you?

We tend to look at Rachel, Jacobs second wife, as the significant one, the more loved one, the one who bore Joseph. How often do we look from Leah's side of the fence? I find this really interesting to look at because i have often struggled with feeling like an outsider, despite feeling like i have every reason to be accepted. Leah was the older sister, had given Jacob more children, but was unloved. We see in the name she gives her son, the longing to be finally joined with her husband- not legally, that was already taken care of; but in his heart. She wanted to be one with him.

We find ourselves in much the same position as Leah oftentimes, even when it comes to God. God chose his people, Israel first. As Gentiles, we are not part of the covenant he made with Abram, (later Abraham). We are outsiders. Over there are the people of the covenant, those with whom God shares a testament. But we are over here ignorant of His ways, chasing after gods of our imaginings and bowing down to any hint of significance or greatness we can create.

And yet God, in His indescribable mercy chose to include us in His covenant. The problem with the old, and its dependance on the actions of men, chosen men yes, but fallen men nonetheless, has been wiped away with the new covenant, which depends only on Himself. God swears a covenant by Himself. Not dependant on us. And inclusive of us. Romans 11:17 calls us Gentiles "wild olive branches" that have been grafted into the root. This "grafting in" is kind of similar to the "joining" in the Leah story, i think. But the inclusion in the amazing heritage and promise God made for his chosen people is an incredible honour. Its easy to forget our place. We did not start this. God in His grace simply chose to graft us in.

"Levi/Levy, Standard Levy לוי Tiberian Lēwî ; "joining"
"The text of the Torah argues that the name of Levi refers to Leah's hope for Jacob to join with her, implying a derivation from yilaveh, meaning he will join."

Redemption

Two years on.
Renee.

Everlasting Doors 2

"You're back in the way again- I thought i told you last time- Get out of the way, my Dad is coming through."

To write Love on her arms

This story is the foundation of "To write Love on her arms", and i've found it challenging and moving. The group it inspired, http://www.twloha.com/ , is worth looking at. I won't apologise for the language, sometimes it's necessary to understand.

TO WRITE LOVE ON HER ARMS by Jamie Tworkowski

Pedro the Lion is loud in the speakers, and the city waits just outside our open windows. She sits and sings, legs crossed in the passenger seat, her pretty voice hiding in the volume. Music is a safe place and Pedro is her favorite. It hits me that she won't see this skyline for several weeks, and we will be without her. I lean forward, knowing this will be written, and I ask what she'd say if her story had an audience. She smiles. "Tell them to look up. Tell them to remember the stars."

I would rather write her a song, because songs don't wait to resolve, and because songs mean so much to her. Stories wait for endings, but songs are brave things bold enough to sing when all they know is darkness. These words, like most words, will be written next to midnight, between hurricane and harbor, as both claim to save her. Renee is 19. When I meet her, cocaine is fresh in her system. She hasn't slept in 36 hours and she won't for another 24. It is a familiar blur of coke, pot, pills and alcohol. She has agreed to meet us, to listen and to let us pray. We ask Renee to come with us, to leave this broken night. She says she'll go to rehab tomorrow, but she isn't ready now. It is too great a change. We pray and say goodbye and it is hard to leave without her. She has known such great pain; haunted dreams as a child, the near-constant presence of evil ever since. She has felt the touch of awful naked men, battled depression and addiction, and attempted suicide. Her arms remember razor blades, fifty scars that speak of self-inflicted wounds. Six hours after I meet her, she is feeling trapped, two groups of "friends" offering opposite ideas. Everyone is asleep. The sun is rising. She drinks long from a bottle of liquor, takes a razor blade from the table and locks herself in the bathroom. She cuts herself, using the blade to write "FUCK UP" large across her left forearm.
The nurse at the treatment center finds the wound several hours later. The center has no detox, names her too great a risk, and does not accept her. For the next five days, she is ours to love. We become her hospital and the possibility of healing fills our living room with life. It is unspoken and there are only a few of us, but we will be her church, the body of Christ coming alive to meet her needs, to write love on her arms.
She is full of contrast, more alive and closer to death than anyone I've known, like a Johnny Cash song or some theatre star. She owns attitude and humor beyond her 19 years, and when she tells me her story, she is humble and quiet and kind, shaped by the pain of a hundred lifetimes. I sit privileged but breaking as she shares. Her life has been so dark yet there is some soft hope in her words, and on consecutive evenings, I watch the prettiest girls in the room tell her that she's beautiful. I think it's God reminding her. I've never walked this road, but I decide that if we're going to run a five-day rehab, it is going to be the coolest in the country. It is going to be rock and roll. We start with the basics; lots of fun, too much Starbucks and way too many cigarettes.
Thursday night she is in the balcony for Band Marino, Orlando's finest. They are indie-folk-fabulous, a movement disguised as a circus. She loves them and she smiles when I point out the A&R man from Atlantic Europe, in town from London just to catch this show. She is in good seats when the Magic beat the Sonics the next night, screaming like a lifelong fan with every Dwight Howard dunk. On the way home, we stop for more coffee and books, Blue Like Jazz and (Anne Lamott's) Travelling Mercies. On Saturday, the Taste of Chaos tour is in town and I'm not even sure we can get in, but doors do open and minutes after parking, we are on stage for Thrice, one of her favorite bands. She stands ten feet from the drummer, smiling constantly. It is a bright moment there in the music, as light and rain collide above the stage. It feels like healing. It is certainly hope.
Sunday night is church and many gather after the service to pray for Renee, this her last night before entering rehab. Some are strangers but all are friends tonight. The prayers move from broken to bold, all encouraging. We're talking to God but I think as much, we're talking to her, telling her she's loved, saying she does not go alone. One among us knows her best. Ryan sits in the corner strumming an acoustic guitar, singing songs she's inspired.
After church our house fills with friends, there for a few more moments before goodbye. Everyone has some gift for her, some note or hug or piece of encouragement. She pulls me aside and tells me she would like to give me something. I smile surprised, wondering what it could be. We walk through the crowded living room, to the garage and her stuff. She hands me her last razor blade, tells me it is the one she used to cut her arm and her last lines of cocaine five nights before. She's had it with her ever since, shares that tonight will be the hardest night and she shouldn't have it. I hold it carefully, thank her and know instantly that this moment, this gift, will stay with me. It hits me to wonder if this great feeling is what Christ knows when we surrender our broken hearts, when we trade death for life. As we arrive at the treatment center, she finishes: "The stars are always there but we miss them in the dirt and clouds. We miss them in the storms. Tell them to remember hope. We have hope."
I have watched life come back to her, and it has been a privilege. When our time with her began, someone suggested shifts but that is the language of business. Love is something better. I have been challenged and changed, reminded that love is that simple answer to so many of our hardest questions. Don Miller says we're called to hold our hands against the wounds of a broken world, to stop the bleeding. I agree so greatly. We often ask God to show up. We pray prayers of rescue. Perhaps God would ask us to be that rescue, to be His body, to move for things that matter. He is not invisible when we come alive. I might be simple but more and more, I believe God works in love, speaks in love, is revealed in our love. I have seen that this week and honestly, it has been simple: Take a broken girl, treat her like a famous princess, give her the best seats in the house. Buy her coffee and cigarettes for the coming down, books and bathroom things for the days ahead. Tell her something true when all she's known are lies. Tell her God loves her. Tell her about forgiveness, the possibility of freedom, tell her she was made to dance in white dresses. All these things are true. We are only asked to love, to offer hope to the many hopeless. We don't get to choose all the endings, but we are asked to play the rescuers. We won't solve all mysteries and our hearts will certainly break in such a vulnerable life, but it is the best way. We were made to be lovers bold in broken places, pouring ourselves out again and again until we're called home. I have learned so much in one week with one brave girl. She is alive now, in the patience and safety of rehab, covered in marks of madness but choosing to believe that God makes things new, that He meant hope and healing in the stars. She would ask you to remember.

A step at a time

"When you are going through hard times- you have to take it one day at a time"

-"actually, make that one second at a time"

In the middle of life in all of its chaos and numb stupor the only thing i can do is to keep walking- one step at a time. With my eyes fixed on the hope of which i have been assured and look forward to, I press on through the anger, through the distrust, through the empty loneliness towards a time when everything will be clearer. But the trust that prompts action- the decision to walk through the valley when i don't understand, the belief that Father cares enough to guide my steps even when i can't see Him- this is different to the cynical despondancy i tried before. Childlike faith along the empty road keeps my eyes on the throne and keeps me from despair. And it is in these times i learn to praise the God who gives and takes away.

"When you're going through hell, don't stop. Just keep walking."