Tag: hope

I Waited and Waited for God

On By Charis PsalloIn Mountains, Music, Photography2 Comments

mountain shadows 2 ch

I waited

and waited

and waited some more;

patiently,
knowing that God would come through for me.

Then, at last, he bent down and listened to my cry.
He stooped down to lift me out of danger,
from the desolate pit I was in,
out of the muddy waters I had fallen into.

Now he’s lifted me up into a firm, secure place,
and steadied me while I walk along his ascending path.

A new song for a new day rises up in me
every time I think about how he breaks through for me!
Ecstatic praise pours out of my mouth until
everyone hears how God has set me free.
Many will see his miracles; they’ll stand in awe of God,
and fall in love with him!

(Psalm 40:1-3 The Passion Translation)

 

 

It was no one’s fault. Doctors get sick, equipment breaks, the critical displaces the urgent. It just happened to take a long time between symptoms showing up and getting the results of a biopsy. Months actually. The first time I was told I might have cancer I was sick with worry and too distracted to concentrate on work a lot of the time. This time I was more patient. I’ve had the experience of seeing the Lord come through for me. We went for walks together and talked about something else.

Today I finally got the report. Benign.

I still need healing for an underlying problem that, although I have tried and tried, I can’t fix myself. So even though it has been the source a lot of rejection in my life, I continue to come to God, just as I am. My only plea is that Jesus’ blood was shed for me.

He’s good with that.

Waking Up

On By Charis PsalloIn Flowers, Photography, spring2 Comments

crocus cluster IMG_1015

“There is a forerunner spirit that comes out of Heaven and seems to wander the Earth looking for people who want to be ahead of their time; who are willing to pay a price to be in the full front of a move of God so that they themselves become a visual aid to the Earth about what is coming next. There is a price you pay for that, but there is also a glory attached to that because God is glorious.”

-Graham Cooke from Why Wounded & Betrayed Believers Are So Useful To God

 

The crocus is one of the first wild flowers to bloom in the mountains. My file of crocus photos overflows because I go snap crazy. The fuzzy purple flower is a forerunner that speaks to me.

“More to come!” it says.

There are people like that -forerunners. They seem out of place when they pop up in places of dormant expectations. Sometimes they are like the voices of children who wake too early – adorable, but annoying. When we can no longer ignore their cheerful and sometimes naive enthusiasm for a new day we reluctantly get up, go to the bathroom, put the kettle on and stare at the cereal bowls in the cupboard, trying to remember what it was we were looking for.

Sometimes forerunners are like cheerful signs of affection. A kiss to build a day on. An early morning crack of light sneaking around drawn curtains. They invade our acceptance of a cold dark season with hope. They have seen the future and they want to live in it now while the rest of us are still feeling sluggish.

I saw some of these lovely forerunners this week. They were singing, “This new season is going to be so good!”

Time to put the kettle on.

Leaning

On By Charis PsalloIn Art, Black and white, Uncategorized4 Comments

pencil Jesus John ch IMG_1093

The nurse reminded me to keep my head above my heart when she handed me the page of post-surgical instructions. I chuckled. People have been trying unsuccessfully to convince me to do that for years.

“I’m serious. You could hit the floor if you bend over to pick fluff off the carpet. It takes a while for the anaesthesia to wear off. Take it easy for a couple of days.”

So, armed with the excuse to avoid work I put my feet up and watched a live-streamed event from Los Angeles all day on Saturday. What I saw caused my heart to rise well above my head.

I can’t explain it. When I saw a delegation from Korea pour out their hearts in prayer for America, I wept. When I saw First Nations people forgive white men for horrors brought upon them and join with Jewish people to drum and blow shofars I was undone.

Yes! Yes! There is something about honouring roots that will heal this land. I don’t know how I know, I just do. My spirit leaps at the sight of Aboriginal people dancing in praise to the Creator – perhaps because the Algonquin people rescued my great grandmother when she was a child. They raised her and taught her how to live off the land while loving and respecting it. I am so grateful. My heart also wants to stand up and honour people who have survived hundreds of years persecution by misled religious people to discover the real Messiah.

I wept with the representatives of African American people from troubled cities who offered forgiveness and I travailed with Black women who cried out for their children. I was amazed at the sight of Armenians and Turks with their long history of hatred making efforts to reconcile. I saw steps toward unity when Roman Catholics and Protestants embraced each other and the shards of many splinter groups recognized one Lord, one faith, one baptism.

What impressed me the most was tens of thousands of people under the age of thirty who stood in line at 4 a.m. and then stood in the rain for fifteen hours, and stood shoe-less with footwear held in the air as a demonstration of their dedication to go to the streets to demonstrate the goodness of God beyond the walls of the church. They have a desperate need to turn away from division and strife and powerless Christianity with mere theoretical grace and toward love and hope and demonstrations of the real thing. So do I.

 

As I sometimes do when I am watching a video or listening to a podcast, I doodled. I planned to try painting in watercolours since I haven’t done that for a while. I started a simple sketch as a basis for a painting, but I kept adding to it. I didn’t have a theme in mind, and I have never drawn a depiction of Jesus – mostly because I don’t like relying on any artist’s interpretation, so why should I add mine, but that’s the way the drawing went. In the end I decided to leave it as a pencil drawing.

I guess I was thinking about John the disciple, who referred to himself as one who Jesus loved, leaning on his Master at the last supper, because there he was in the drawing. In my mind he was just a young man with a wannabe beard. He had no idea what lay ahead. None of them did. All John knew was that Jesus loved him, and he was safe.

That’s all he needed to know.

I watched the crowds of young adults at the Los Angeles Coliseum respond to worship and make commitments with nothing more to go on than the knowledge that Jesus loves them. But that’s all they need to know. Secure in that knowledge they can move mountains.

Like John and the ten remaining disciples and the other people who were transformed when the Holy Spirit came in power, I do believe this generation will change the world.

My head may try to stay above my heart, but it can’t. My heart tells my head to get into alignment with God’s purposes because the drums are beating, the shofar is sounding, the wind is blowing and the fire is falling. The world will know that Jesus didn’t come to condemn them, but rather through him they can be saved. God loved us enough to send his only son so that whoever believes in him will have life -eternal life, abundant life. We can lean on him and be safe.

An old song just came to mind:

What a fellowship, what a joy divine,
Leaning on the everlasting arms;
What a blessedness, what a peace is mine,
Leaning on the everlasting arms.
.
What have I to dread, what have I to fear,
Leaning on the everlasting arms?
I have blessed peace with my Lord so near,
Leaning on the everlasting arms.

Leaning, leaning,
Safe and secure from all alarms;
Leaning, leaning,
Leaning on the everlasting arms

Evidence of Transformation

On By Charis PsalloIn Art, faith, Flowers, Photography, Uncategorized13 Comments

daffy impasto edge ch

I love those time-lapse videos of plants tossing over bits of soil as they shoot up and flowers unfurling like proud flags on the top of their stems. Beautiful! But as I stare at a skinny daffodil stem in my garden I realize that is not my earth-bound time reality. Even if I observe, with utmost patience, the tiny yellow tip on the end I still can’t see any change. If I go away for a few days and re-visit it when I come home I can see progress, but it’s way too slow to see without enhancement.

A course I am taking suggests keeping a journal with a special section for “evidences of transformation.” Why? Because sometimes the process of personal transformation is like watching the unfolding of springtime in the Rockies – in slow motion. It’s not easy to see  change. It can be discouraging. Old habits die hard.

This has been the kind of week that used to hit all my anxiety triggers.
– I just drove eighteen hours return trip (passing several serious accidents on the way) to help someone who passionately hates me no matter what I do, and yet needs me.
– Ambient noises in the hotel (none of which were the fault of management) startled me awake every fifteen to thirty minutes or so for two nights in a row.
– Dear people I looked forward to visiting while I was in that city were all desperately sick with the flu. I felt it was not wise to expose myself to the virus since I am booked for surgery tomorrow.
– My last surgery date was cancelled when two doctors fell ill themselves. Since it involves a biopsy, having to wait another month until they could be replaced and another OR time booked has been a little hard on the nerves. Then there’s the increasing pain issue.
– We encountered legal complications this week because the actions of a person who (sadly) is mentally ill and not able to make wise decisions right now.
– On Tuesday one of our precious grandchildren was diagnosed with the same rare condition her father has – one that greatly challenged him and our entire family when he was growing up and still makes his life difficult.
– Then my husband and I got into a major argument because we had different memories of the outcome of an important discussion that took place months ago. Work I did on that basis may have to be thrown out.
– We are both dealing with unwelcome signs of aging in the other one – like less acute hearing for both of us.
– Family and friends I love are also facing major stressful events in their lives – life and death issues, some of them – and I do care.
– Worst of all, my fat pants are too tight.

But I’m not overwhelmed -and that is a miracle right there.

I’m grateful for the advice to make note of evidence of change in the way I think. It’s time to evaluate by looking at my life in a kind of time-lapse photography manner. Maybe I need one photographic exposure every few months to see change.

It’s still stressful and my upset tummy tells me I am not yet completely at peace, but five years ago I would have been in a flipping panic and ten years ago I would have needed medication. Old posts are showing up on my Facebook of memories of this day in an eight year history. This is good for me. They remind me of very stressful times in our lives and tremendously exciting times of answered prayer and periods of accelerated growth. I can look at a memory frame that comes up and see how God took care of us and the strength he built in us through situations custom-designed to stretch us in faith.

So my journal entry is about thanking God that I can thank God, that his peace is growing in my heart, that I am learning to trust him not only with my problems, but with the problems of those I love. The joy of the Lord that is my strength is not dependent on circumstances and even though it seems like my progress is excruciatingly slow and I should be much further along the path by now, Holy Spirit still walks with me and surrounds me with love and promises that he is not going to withdraw his grace any time soon – or ever.

He has taught me that hope is vision-led endurance, and maybe, just maybe, that lesson is starting to sink in.

Materializing

On By Charis PsalloIn Photography, Trees and forests, Uncategorized8 Comments

new leaves ch sq 2 IMG_0942

Dreams carried around in one’s heart for years, if they are dreams that have God’s approval, have a way of suddenly materializing.
-Catherine Marshall

Out of the Box

On By Charis PsalloIn Art, Photography, Uncategorized4 Comments

IMG_0934 blue box

He’s not quite twelve but our grandson is showing some talent as a magician. Our family gathering this past week was a marvelous opportunity for him to show off his newly acquired skills to his younger cousins who were amazed at his ability to find coins behind their ears and make them disappear again. The three-year old followed him around, enthralled by her big cousin from High River. The four year old wanted him to do it again. And again. The five-year old wants to be just like him when he grows up. The six year old was open-mouth amazed. The seven-year old hounded him to tell her his secrets.

Some of his tricks, especially the ones involving cards, are works in progress, but still he is very entertaining. He sat beside me on the couch and showed me clips of illusionists he admired on YouTube and told me about plans for scenarios of his own.

“Okay, Grandma, imagine this,” he said. “You are in a metal box. It is cube-shaped and barely high enough to stand up in. You can feel the seams where it has been welded shut. There is no opening above you, below you, or on any side. No one can hear you shouting or banging the walls. How are you going to get out?”

I made a few suggestions. He explained why they would not work. Now I’ve got a bit of claustrophobia and I began to feel like a Robertson Davies character who “felt the weight of the mountain on his chest” as he was stuck in a narrow downward sloping tunnel on his way to a hidden cavern. I gave up.

“Use your imagination,” he said.
“I’ve been trying, honey. I don’t have any more ideas.”
“No, Grandma. I mean use your imagination. I said ‘Imagine this,’” he laughed. “Your imagination put you in the box. It’s not real! Imagine something else and you’re out of the box.”

How incredibly simple!

Oh, I heard God’s voice in this as I drove home later. Sometimes I find my thoughts hemmed in all around. What will I do if this situation happens? I can see no solutions. This is a dilemma. I cry out for help but no one seems to hear me. I begin to panic. Then I hear the Lord gently chide me.

Your fearful imagination put you in this box. Now use your sanctified imagination to think something else. Imagine your way out of the box. Have another thought. Think wide, think high, think deep. Think My thoughts. In Me there are no limitations.

 

Rocky Mountains near Lundbreck IMG_0912

Expectation

On By Charis PsalloIn Animals, Black and white, Photography1 Comment

 

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Be still.

Be patient.

Expect the Eternal to arrive and set things right.

Don’t get upset when you see the worldly ones rising up the ladder.
Don’t be bothered by those who are anchored in wicked ways.

So turn from anger.

Don’t rage,
and don’t worry—these ways frame the doorway to evil.

Besides, those who act from evil motives will be cut off from the land; but those who wait, hoping in the Eternal, will enjoy its riches.

(Psalm 37:7-9 The Voice)

These patiently waiting dogs caught my attention. I didn’t catch theirs though. There was only one person they looked to -the Master.

I hear you

On By Charis PsalloIn Photography, Poetry, Sky4 Comments

IMG_4158 rain cloud at sunset

I decided to re-post a poem I wrote several years ago. The day I wrote it I was sitting outside writing a letter to God. I couldn’t quite talk to him yet, but I was daring to write down my feelings and mail them to the fireplace. My page was full of angry accusations. In places my pen tore right through the paper. While I was crying a sudden squall blew in. I was so utterly at the end of my rope I didn’t bother moving. It felt like the storm raging in me was now raging around me.

The sun broke through while it was still raining. When the shower stopped I picked up my strewn papers and my wet Bible. It fell open to Psalm 18 where David writes about God wrapping himself in storm clouds on his way to deliver justice to his child. “Wrapped and hidden in the thick-cloud darkness, his thunder-tabernacle surrounding him, he hid himself in mystery-darkness; the dense rain clouds were his garments. Suddenly the brilliance of his presence breaks through...” (The Passion translation) And verse 19 “His love broke open the way.”

I’m publishing this again because this week I’ve read several excellent blogs by people younger than I who ably describe their frustration with church experience that involved competition, consumerism, hypocrisy, political manipulation, performance-oriented faith with impossibly high standards, dogmatic theoretical faith without power, and lack of demonstrations of love.

Yes, I know the saying that you get out of church what you put in, but change means admitting there are things that are not working for everyone. Many people are happy where they are, but there are also a lot of hurting people out there who feel no one hears them. They are expressing their disappointment with their feet. To those young people who are walking away I want to say, I hear you.

I think the largest “mission field” in North America is among those who have known spiritual abuse, from mild coercion to dastardly deeds worthy of criminal charges. I define spiritual abuse as the act of exploiting a vulnerable person’s longing for connection with their Creator for the purposes of acquiring  personal power -usually by a person with some degree of authority or responsibility for nurturing them. It is far more prevalent than anyone wants to admit. Repentance means to change the way we think. And we do need to repent. All of us.

The first step toward healing involves admitting there is a problem. If you have been a victim, express your pain, but don’t park there. Keep searching for the God who loves you as you are. He is not disappointed in you because he understands human frailty. He sent his Son, Jesus Christ, to show you what he is really like. He never expected you to be good enough to earn his love. He is the One who heals our wounded hearts and showers our lives with loving kindness.

We are incapable of loving God until we know his love. When you know you are loved and forgiven you can afford to take your hands off the throats of those who owe you. That’s when the world will know we are Christians – by our love.

 

Mourning

I cry, Oh God! Oh Christ! Oh Jesus!

Where are you when the ones who say
they speak for you –those who squeeze us,
press in on every side, demand
that we respect authority,
obey their rules, come (cash in hand)
to hear their words, as only they
have got the regulations straight at last?
Where are you when the weak are hurt,
aggrieved and stumbled in your name?

Don’t you see what they have passed?

I sit entangled with the chords
of bitterness around my feet.
A plant blows over on the boards
that fence me off from outside world.
The petals scatter on the grass
and now the gust of wind that swirled
their frail wings in electric air
becomes a greater blast of rage
that showers ashes in my hair.

Flash tears the sky –breath rent apart,
and splits the veil of one who mourns,
with lightning striking to the heart.
Deep groaning rolls across the vale
from craggy peak to worn down ridge
and rains pours down –beats down in hail.

The sun withdraws beneath a cloud.
and saplings hang their weeping heads
as thunder rails against the proud,
who dare to claim the earth their own,
–and in the woods from hill to hill
creation echoes back the moan.

My tears obscure the sky from view.
Oh God! I cry. God! Where are you?

My child, I hear.  I weep with you.

(written during the struggle)

The Ugly Season

On By Charis PsalloIn Fields, Flowers, Uncategorized8 Comments

pots in march ch fade IMG_0743

It’s not winter and it’s not spring and in the valley the fields are pretty ugly (oxymoron intended).

Signs of spring are few; some crabgrass is getting a head start on the gardeners, a few little crocus pop up close to the house, and tiny tiny yellow buttercups bloom in the meadow. I take my camera and go out looking for evidence of change, but to be honest, in this shoulder season, it’s very drab out there.

The deer like our garden in the winter. They come late at night and bed down under the bare plum tree. You can tell this is a favourite place because when the snow melts the brown grass harbours dozens of piles of deer poop. (I’ll spare you the photo.)

Brown rotten leaves that I never got around to raking, or that fell after the first snows made raking pointless, gather in the hollows. They lodge between grey branches and add to the dullness of barren bushes and empty flower beds.

Shrinking piles of snow in the corners of parking lots in town look like speckled black slag heaps from old movies about miserable coal miners. The accumulated garbage of a season once blanketed by pristine white snow emerges on the boulevard like guilty memories of  junk food binges after you realize your jeans are too tight.

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Don’t get me wrong. I see hope. There is nothing finer than the first afternoon  warm enough to sit in the sun and enjoy a good cup of coffee. But the reality of once hidden things that need to be dealt with is hard to ignore, especially the day the ground in the stockyards thaws out.

It’s an ugly season, but it too is a season of grace.

Sometimes God sends us a gift we are not sure that we want after a while. A revealing season is one of them. Sometimes he melts the blanket of lovely white snow that has been covering a lot of nastiness. He reveals what has been hiding under there all along. Transitions can be ugly.

Sometimes he sends people (and attached circumstances) who seem to promise great things. When they come into our lives we welcome them eagerly only to discover that the great things are not so great – at least not yet. Their purpose (of which they are probably totally unaware) may merely be to reveal debris and garbage and piles of poop in our lives that need to be cleaned up so they don’t distract from the great things when they do happen. They may just be part of the unwitting transition team.

My friend and I were praying for a ministry which was having an important meeting. We prayed that God would move mightily. He did. The meeting fell into shouting-match chaos when old resentments and bitterness were revealed like piles of poop that had been under the cover of cool politeness for years. It got ugly. They could not move on until things were cleared up. The board members, being thoroughly humbled, set about to do that.

dead leaves broken pail IMG_0746We don’t always appreciate that a promising new boss, who turns out to be more difficult to work with than the last one, or a new political leader, who seems to be more inept than the former office-holder, may actually be in our lives for a reason. Their whole purpose (of which they are probably totally unaware) may be to be the agent that reveals the garbage we need to deal with and the brokenness that God wants to heal next. They may also be a part of an unwitting transition team.

It can be an ugly season when unpleasant stuff is revealed, but we don’t need to lose hope. In time the valley will bloom again. Watch for the signs.

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The Hope

On By Charis PsalloIn Mountains, Photography2 Comments

Steeples from Mouse Creek mountains winter DSC_0101

 

You answer us with awesome and righteous deeds,
God our Saviour,
the hope of all the ends of the earth
and of the farthest seas,

who formed the mountains by your power,
having armed yourself with strength,

who stilled the roaring of the seas,
the roaring of their waves,
and the turmoil of the nations.

(Psalm 65:5-7)