White as snow ...

Part of me longs for the crisp fall to linger... The colors that grace the trees high, the air that is fresh now that the farmers have finished filling it with the dust of their living, the bright morning skies that arrive just a little later so I can thoroughly enjoy them rather than dream of them...

All the while, deep down, I know there is nothing like the beautifully clean blanket that covers this hard, dirty, smelly land like the first real snow of the season.

Bradley and I love to drive... I have become good at my "drive by shootings". But isn't that just the paradigm... we drive to find a little bit of solace from the craziness of our lives and yet the highways loan themselves to be sped along.  

This time of year in particular, with the ice covered roads, we are forced to slow. And I am grateful for that. I don't absorb things quickly and easily as some others might. I have to look and feel and think things through from all angles before I am ready to move to the next image. This is not simply when I am looking through a lens but I tend to be this way in the way I work and carry out relationships and live my day to day life. Sometimes it drives my husband crazy. He is very goal orientated and so he knows where the finish line is and tends to bulldozes straight for it.  

We are learning... to take time to appreciate the beauty of each others differences. The simplicity that comes with one step at a time and maybe moving slightly faster or slower than we are comfortable with.

This season, I am thankful for. The reminder that no matter how hard things have been. No matter how much filth floats in the air from our own sins and the lies that surround my beloved and I. No matter how much pain  caused from the death that surrounds as life gets ready to surrender to the cold of this next season... 

There is beauty in this season. 

There is a sense of purity that comes with it. 

He washes white as snow and I am so grateful for this reminder. 

That He who loves us, loves us with an everlasting love. He does not hold us in a state of purgatory here on earth when we give over to addiction, pride and hurtful ways. He has given us the Holy Spirit to move and convict when need, Jesus Christ to cover us so we might be forgiven, and He chooses to extend grace and love us more than hate because of the sin we commit so that we can be in right relationship.

Yes, I love the fall... But there is nothing quite like the reminder of His pure love for us than the covering of the first snowfall. 

Psalm 51: 5 - 12

Surely I was sinful at birth,

    sinful from the time my mother conceived me.

 

Yet you desired faithfulness even in the womb;

    you taught me wisdom in that secret place.

Cleanse me with hyssop, and I will be clean;

    wash me, and I will be whiter than snow.

 

Let me hear joy and gladness;

    let the bones you have crushed rejoice.

 

Hide your face from my sins

    and blot out all my iniquity.

Create in me a pure heart, O God,

    and renew a steadfast spirit within me.

 

Do not cast me from your presence

    or take your Holy Spirit from me.

 

Restore to me the joy of your salvation

    and grant me a willing spirit, to sustain me.

My dear friend Tessa...

There are few people on this journey through life that you can pick up after not having opportunity to see or even speak to one another for lengthy periods of time. Friends that are really friends, who love you for who you are, trust you because they know you and love those you love because they know that legalistic worldviews are not overly becoming on anyone especially those who are attempting to follow's those ways of the One who gave it all for us! 

Tessa ( aimedattheheart.com , www.facebook.com/FaithfuloneDesigns ) is one of those beautiful friends who truly is that, a friend... Freshman year of college we were "linked up" during WOW week and it has been a journey since. We've talked all the boy talk, struggled with things of our faith, persevered together through family difficulties, attended one another's weddings, been there just as soon as I could after babies were born and I know that will some day be returned. We've chosen to love through differences and become more rounded people because of it, embraced each others loved ones and I know that even if months go by between coffee dates - it will continue to be as if no time has gone by at all. 

Love you Tessa... Thank you for challenging me and inspiring me to be a healthier, more God fearing, attentive, forgiving and loving person. I thank God for you! 

Here are a few photo's of that last time on your family farm before the move down south! 

Sorry, some of them are sideways - For the life of me I don't understand why they won't upload the correct way... 

Foggy Fall Morning...

On an eerily beautiful foggy fall morning I was so glad to have remembered "Rebel". The electronic device that is so perfectly named with the grief it has caused us from time to time... Isn't that just how life goes however? The same thing that can cause such heart ache points us to a deeper beauty that we normally would pass by... 

These are a few un-edited shots of that morning, beautifully painted as only the Master Artist could... 

Drive by shooting... 

Drive by shooting...

Drive by shooting...

"Be Still"

"The eye of the beholder"

One thing I have asked from the Lord, that I shall seek:
That I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, To behold the beauty of the Lord
And to meditate in His temple.

Psalm 27:4

With a greatful heart...

*** Oops, forgot to publish this post :) 

This weekend people all over this country I call home celebrated "Thanks Giving Day". Many spent hours in a kitchen basting turkeys and hams, peeling piles of potatoes, seasoning the perfect pies...

Deep dish pumpkin pie... 

I am included in this percentage of citizens. I love spending my days in the kitchen, music invading the small space of our home.  Puttering around kneading and chopping,  stirring and baking, dropping stuff and putting those things clean away... Mostly, I know how the 10 hours put in will make satisfied those hungry tummies and this opportunity to create a space for fellowship is needed for those beautiful guests who came.

Bradley's favourite... My first time making real homemade scalloped potatoes... mmmmm!

 

In this season that we celebrate the bounty of provision that our good Lord has bestowed on us I am weary and strained and sick with a cold to top it off. My head says I should feel guilty about admitting this but it's just the honest truth.

Truth... now that is something I am thankful for. Truth is not always easy but in it we find much freedom.

The truth about ones self is rarely something we enjoy acknowledging because the truth is, we are naturally pretty horrible beings. When we were created, He said we were "Very Good"... we weren't created to live a life filled with sin but rather we must endure it and learn to work through it because of a decision to succumb to it in that first generation so very long ago.

This day, after a day of celebrating friendships, family, provisions, and ultimately our Provider, I long to be grateful. I am grateful.

Grateful to know Him who is the Truth personally. Grateful to know that that "this too shall pass", this season of drought which has formed deep crevices in my spirit. I am grateful to know that the Source of living water does not run dry and continues to nourish my roots even though the levels are lower than my visible eye can see.

With a grateful heart, I do know that He cares and He chooses to bless in ways we may never know. So yes, on this Thanksgiving Day I do give thanks with a broken, tired and yet eternally grateful heart to the One who knows and loves us exactly where we are!

Give thanks to the Lord, for he is good;

    his love endures forever.  

Psalm 107:1

Psalm 2...

Psalm 2 (NASB)

 Why are the nations in an uproar
And the peoples devising a vain thing?
² The kings of the earth take their stand
And the rulers take counsel together
Against the Lord and against His Anointed, saying,
³ “Let us tear their fetters apart
And cast away their cords from us!”

⁴ He who sits in the heavens laughs,
The Lord scoffs at them.
⁵ Then He will speak to them in His anger
And terrify them in His fury, saying,
⁶ “But as for Me, I have installed My King
Upon Zion, My holy mountain.”

⁷ “I will surely tell of the decree of the Lord:
He said to Me, ‘You are My Son,
Today I have begotten You.
⁸ ‘Ask of Me, and I will surely give the nations as Your inheritance,
And the very ends of the earth as Your possession.
⁹ ‘You shall break them with a rod of iron,
You shall shatter them like earthenware.’”

¹⁰ Now therefore, O kings, show discernment;

Take warning, O judges of the earth.

¹¹ Worship the Lord with reverence

And rejoice with trembling.

¹² Do homage to the Son, that He not become angry, and you perish in the way,

For His wrath may soon be kindled.

How blessed are all who take refuge in Him!

Psalm 1...

Psalm 1 (NASB)

 

1 How blessed is the man who does

not walk in the counsel of the wicked,
Nor stand in the path of sinners,
Nor sit in the seat of scoffers!
² But his delight is in the law of the Lord,
And in His law he meditates day and night.
³ He will be like a tree firmly planted by streams of water,
Which yields its fruit in its season
And its leaf does not wither;
And in whatever he does, he prospers.

⁴ The wicked are not so,
But they are like chaff which the wind drives away.
⁵ Therefore the wicked will not stand in the judgment,
Nor sinners in the assembly of the righteous.
⁶ For the Lord knows the way of the righteous,
But the way of the wicked will perish.