Several years ago I penned and illustrated a little story in rhyme that I named, “Saving Christmas.” It’s the story of a young girl, Natalie, who had the worldly notion that Christmas was all about her. Then it tells how her heart was opened and softened by a brilliant star that shone into her bedroom window, whilst she lay across her bed, feeling so sorry for her pitiful, self-centred selfie-pooh. I called the story, “Saving Christmas” because Natalie’s change of heart gave Christmas true meaning to her, which, in turn blessed her family who had become fed up with her selfish ways. (I’ll try to put it somewhere on this blog…if I can figure out how to do it.)

But these days when I hear the words, “Saving Christmas,” echoing over and over in my spirit, they have new meaning, as more and more innovative effort is being put into trying to remove Christ from Christmas.These gymnastics would be laughable were they not such a sad commentary!But unforeseen? Not at all.

Those who are sustained by the fruit of “the tree of the knowledge of good and evil” will forever be trying to get rid of that Baby who defied, in every way, the earthly odds of His day, and grew up into the manifestation of Love that has changed and will continue to change everything for everyone who receives it. That things will be getting more and more perverse, before they get better, here on earth, is prophesied in Scripture. So we who read it really shouldn’t be surprised. But I, for one, will continue to share the true meaning of Christmas, not only during “the holidays,” but all year round.

Had that Baby not been born in a manger way back then, I know that I, personally, would be an entirely different person now. Maybe I wouldn’t even still be here…you never know. I did some crazy-stupid stuff in my “invincible” years. I was reckless, selfish, insecure, and unpredictable. But, deep down,I had a heart for God, He knew it, and that is why He met me where I was and rescued me, by revealing His Love for me through His dear Son. It happened by surprise…Remind me to tell you about it sometime.

Some of my subsequent changes were forthcoming. But I can honestly say that others are still happening and remain yet TO happen. I’m in His hands though, and it’s a position I can highly recommend. Why? Because He IS the Real Life that God created humans to live in the first place. The Real Thing. He IS “the Tree of Life,” itself. And that Life and Love simply changes everything. Everything! Is HE safe? Not at all! Can we trust Him with all we are and all we have? Absolutely!

To be loved unconditionally is what everyone on the planet desires, whether they realize it or not. Is it not totally amazing that we actually ARE loved unconditionally…by the One who created us and everything else that has life? Think of it! (Did you have a think?) Now think of this:That we are unconditionally loved by God is true, whether we choose to believe it or not. Many facts that we may not choose to believe actually ARE true, regardless of our opinions which do not change their reality one iota. This is one of those things. And it’s the most important one of all! Why? Because there really is no substitute for experiencing this unconditional love of the Father who gave is His beloved Son so that we actually COULD know this Love. There’s nothing even close to a substitute,though we try everything to fill the void…that God-shaped hole in the heart that begs to be filled with the comfort, peace, and whole love that God alone can provide. Why is it that only God can provide it? Because God actually IS that love, comfort, peace, joy, strength and wholeness. God is All in All. That’s what and who God IS!

And this is why the war against Christmas: because misery loves company, and we have an adversary who is most miserable! This enemy of our souls has been busily deceiving mankind from the get-go. Perish the thought that a man, woman or child could actually see clearly and have deep love, joy and peace everlasting! Quelle horreur! The anti-Light master of distractions is a subtle, insidious force that works behind the scenes in the battleground of the mind. This self-glorifying delusion would have Christ deleted entirely…were it possible. But it is most assuredly not possible! Jesus lived, He lives, and He shall live forever more, as Jeshua the Messiah, the human third of the Trinity. And He lives in the hearts of the centuries and centuries of people who have come to know Him as their Saviour: the Real and Eternal Life within them…(where the enemy of their souls has been deleted.)

So…while I may not be able to race around the world “saving Christmas,” I can surely proclaim the good news that Christmas has saved me. And all the trees and trimmings, stockings, surprises, candles, cookies and carols…all the feasts, fireplaces, plum pudding, and pies are pretty memory makers, but ultimately lacking in luster, substance, and dimension… without the rosy blush of the Love of the Christ Child.

May you know His Love more and more fully with every rising sun.
And may you share with your loved ones a truly joyous Christmas!

Clover and the FamiLea

Every morning I write my morning pages. At least I try to. I’ll put up a poem I wrote about these morning pages,once I’ve finished writing this.

Well, today I started a brand new book. Each book lasts anywhere from 1 to 3 months, depending on how much I write. Anyway, I’m always inspired when I start a brand new, little, blue world of clean, lined pages! So here’s my first entry in the new book:

“A new book is always a refreshment! I shall start out writing in it ever so neatly, and then it will devolve into hurriedly scribbled notes over these pages. But, Lord, they are merely a record of my relationship with You, as You influence, either more or less…(the choice is mine…) my everyday life. More and more You ARE my daily , my momently, life. And I find myself simply astounded, lately, that anyone can live without this intimate relationship with You! Yet most of the world’s people do. Please help me to share You with others in a manner and with a life that pleases You and is effective in producing, by Your power, Your desired results for all the folks You love so dearly. I’m fully aware that anything good that happens via me is solely because of You IN me. How grateful I am for You!

I think I lose my general balance when dealing with the stuff within me that I assume are Your giftings – the arts, the writing, the music, etc…If they are from you, then I should think/hope they would put me and others IN rather than OFF balance! So whassup wi dis, God?

Prying deeper I see that it’s when I strive to juggle/balance the creative stuff with the household, garden, business duties, etc… that I struggle so, and lose balance. I’ve been doing this juggle struggle for donkey years.” (Island folks call a very long time “donkey years” because donkey ears are so long! 😉 “It’s time for me to stop the carousel and hop off! I was going to call it a merry-go-round, but it’s NOT merry. It’s a struggle! And here’s the Thing, God…the rub: I have this inner guilt that doing the creative stuff is selfish. So if I’m wrong, You need to convince me better than you have in the past. I’d love to banish that skull and crossbones forever!

Now…If there IS some truth to it, as I suspect there is, then please help me to keep it in YOUR perspective, which will allow productivity in all areas without guilt. It is said that the enemy of our souls sprinkles a little dusting of truth into his deceptions so that we’ll buy them. I think that is the case with this. Surely there have been and are plenty of prima donas who DO live largely self-centred lives…all about “my art, my songs, my books, my plays,etc…” My, my my!”

(That’s why I’d like to change the headings on this blog that my darling daughter-in-love thoughtfully created when she made this for me. But I don’t know how to change em yet! Un-techy me.)

But back to the self centred thing: “What these folks mostly talk about is themselves, whom they apparently deem to be extra fascinating. So I know there really IS this danger.”

(Even in my writing this to share with others, I think to myself, “Who do I think I am to believe anyone would be even mildly interested in reading what I have to say?!? Li’l ole everyday lady, me. How egotistical!” But the thing is, I have a nagging suspicion that there’s a remote possibility that it might somehow be useful to someone. So I’m doing it.)

“For me, personally, there is also the danger of becoming reclusive, which I already am, according to some. Yet I greedily love my time with You, Lord, and in the garden, and with my famiLea and upstairs creating! And… I detest housework! Okay, thank You, You are already answering my question!” (This, My Friends, is why I write these morning pages, as they are essentially pages of prayer. And prayer is a 2-way conversation with God. As God answers me in my heart, I write it down. Then I have an ongoing record of His faithfulness! So here’s what God revealed to me:)

“The REAL truth is that when I am consciously WITH You, I actually love whatEVER I’m doing and whomEVER I’m with! It all flows by YOUR Spirit. It’s when I allow my thoughts (the passing traffic of things to be done or things that didn’t or aren’t going the way I think they should go) to over-ride the flow of your leading Spirit that the balance is lost. It’s like two different worlds or languages of thinking and being. And when the balance is lost, I am (trust me) no fun to be around! I return to being just an aging person with a lot of stuff to do that I don’t feel like doing. Lord, please deliver me from THAT version of myself! That exasperated, tired, discouraged, water-treading, futility-bound selfy self. Get her outta here, please. Continue to fill and refill me with Your joy which You have promised me is my true strength! THANK You for your faithfulness in always speaking to me and leading me with Your still, small voice. Help me to hear you more clearly, more frequently and more obediently. In Your name I pray. Amen”

See how GOOD God is? He urges us to ask and we will receive. He says that we don’t HAVE because we don’t ask, or we ask with skewed intention. He says to ASK Him so that our joy will be FULL to overflowing. For me, the value of the morning pages is exactly what happened today. If you don’t journal, I highly recommend it, but with one caution. I would suggest that it not become a venting venue, but a praying one. Write out your thoughts. Clear the air in your head and heart. But as you do so, keep yourself open for God to comfort and counsel you with His peace and wisdom and love. And record what you experience as He reveals it to your heart. Otherwise, your pages will be all about you..whom you know all about anyway!

Love,

Clover

Morning, Glories!

This is no new revelation at all but it just hit me in a different way this morning:

You know how the salvation of the spirit is immediate when we ask Christ in, but the sanctification of the soul is progressive as we renew our minds by washing them with the water of His Word and Truth. So we’re born into this fallen world system with essentially fallen selves until we receive New Life in Him, right? Right. Then we “work out our salvation” through the course of our lives, some more effectively than others, dependent upon a host of factors…no judgement made either now or in the hereafter. So… we have a grasp on spirit and on soul (mind, will, emotions,) but what of the body? Call me dense, but it occurred to me in a fresh way this morning (just now) that as our souls are thoroughly exposed to the deceits of this world system (under the governance of the sleeze,) we obviously must take the authority that LIVES within our spirits by the Holy Spirit to override the carnal, death-bound input. (Body and soul both = “Flesh” …until renewed, or when not actively in a state of being able to respond from a renewed position****.)

So what of the body? Well, Baby, as I look (remember: we walk by faith and not by sight!) at mine, best I can figure is that it’s in a sure nuff fallen state, subject to the physical laws that operate here and vulnerable to every little this and that that floats by…UNLESS/UNTIL I take authority over it with my renewed SOUL, which is being momently, (subject to my choice,) renewed by the Spirit within me. So, darling, fellow headstrong ones, here is where our strength of will can play a positive part spiritually! IF we REALLY line up our minds, wills, and emotions with the Truth of His Word and Spirit (who is the “Spirit of Truth,”) then we can APPLY that REAL and eternal Truth to these obviously fallen (in more ways than one ) bodies.

So I’m hobbling out to the garage this morning…not having jumped or stretched, not really having started the day out the way I’d like, and I get this intense snap! like an old-fashioned camera flashbulb flash that here I am walking around in a fallen body that doesn’t HAVE to be fallen. It’s like…what the hell (exactly!) is wrong with this picture? (This all goes with the herenow, not hereafter healing/resurrection idea I’ve been talking about…and that the glorified body maybe NOT being something completely saved up for the othah side of the big rivah. It goes with the walking through the wall thread too.) It all goes together with God’s Word. But the ridiculousness of the dichotomy of the Spirit of God dwelling in a fallen (essentially dying) body on an ongoing basis hit me like an uncovering of a huge deception. (“Pay no attention to that man behind the screen!”) A pulling open of the drapes. Okay, if we are reckoned dead with Christ, to be alive with Him, then are we? IF it is not I but HE who lives within me, then MY way needs to be dead and gone so HIS way has freedom to move in and through my life. My life. What is my life? Is my body included in my life? Of course! And it is, to one degree or another, being glorified even now if I choose to actively, consciously include it in the sanctification process….not just a hereafter thing.

So the main point, I guess, is that when we are hobbling along, mustering up our strength and stamina, bolstering our own willpower to forge forward, we might also be heeding the wrong truths. If so, we’re heeling to the wrong master! The Right Master not only wants us HEALED, but has made absolutely every provision for us to BE healed! It is way more than mind over matter. It is the synergy of our wills infused with His omnipotent Spirit of Truth over physical matter. But we have to take up the authority He’s given us and USE it. That’s where the walking through the wall happens. And you know, one day very soon that wall WILL be behind us and we won’t even know how we got on the other side! (It can happen many times in a day, but then we forget!)

I don’t think I carried this idea well (without spilling some) or said it the right way, but maybe there’s a nugget in there for you somehow.

Love,

me

The following was written a few months ago. So much catching up to do! I’ll get the hang of blogging one of these days…Anyway, here’s what I wrote way back in February:

“…I shall write an update soon. It’s our busy time of year here. We have nine guests and lots going on! Here’s a short story about today:

We went up to feed the hens this morning, and there, eating with them, shoulder to shoulder, was a small, pink PIGGY! Dunno how she got in there, but we called our neighbor, Kelvin, who has pigs, thinking perhaps she had escaped He came up to have a look. Upon first glance, he informed us that she was a “water carrier,” pronounced locally, “Watah Carriah.” It’s the local word for a runty pig, like dear Wilbur of “Charlotte’s Web”….like Babe of “Babe.” Awe…..how SWEET! Noah, who is 17 and has Down Syndrome asked if she could “please sleep over tonight in the guest room. It is our new guest!” I said I didn’t THINK so.

David decided we didn’t need another pet right now. (We just got two lawn mowing sheep and a small fluffy dog who needed a home, and we have with us a girlfriend for our parrot. So that would make: 2 doges, 2 cats, 2 birds, 2 sheep, 13 hens, and no partridge in the pear tree.) My heart wanted the little pig..she wouldn’t eat so much or be much trouble… but Kelvin agreed to take her and not harm her. Noah was okay with having to bid the pig farewell…after he had introduced her to his nephews (3 and 4 years old,) who happened to arrive during Kelvin’s visit.

Now I’m feeling guilty. He won’t kill her. He promised. He says she’ll grow no bigger, so no plans for bacon from her now or later. He said he had a pig like her once who stayed very small, despite much feeding, and had eventually died of natural causes. I hope his other pigs are nice to her. Now I’m knowing I should have kept her. When Kelvin had arrived and I took him up to see her, she was all curled up in the hen house, looking like she felt quite at home. We clearly disturbed her pigsome peace.

Pigless in Paradise,

Clover

05/30/12 Sorrowful Update: I was RIGHT. I saw Kelvin in a shop about a week later and asked him how the piggy was. He shook his head and said, “Clover, I’m so sorry to say that she squeezed under the fence to get in with the big pigs and they KILLED her. I buried her.” Dreadful.

– Moral of the story: Always follow the little inside voice.

I was recently asked to post a “Noah story” on an internet group I’ve been involved with for over 12 years. It’s a really fabulous group for families with “late talking” children. I usually share funny stories about Noah, because he often comes up with such witty comments and observations that are always somehow surprising in their depth and content. The following is one that more typifies life with Noah
than any other, and it’s one of the most humbling ingredients of his life that makes ours so blessed:

When David or I, individually, travel away from home, Noah sometimes likes to come into our room at night and read and fall asleep in our big bed with whichever one of us is still at home. It’s a kingsize bed and very comfy, so there’s loads of room. A few months ago, David was the one who was away, and Noah and I had actually fallen asleep watching movie after a long day.

The thing that happened was not a new thing. It’s actually very common with Noah. He’s always done it. But it hit me with such impact this time…like a message from God. Somewhere in the middle of the night I stirred and bumped into him. He opened his eyes and whispered, “I love you.”

This is what he always does. If I go into his room, as I did the other night, to turn his fan down a notch and cover him with a sheet, he said the same thing…in a whisper. He doesn’t fully awaken…just enough to open his eyes and say it. And I thought,” Wow, this is the thought that is in his head when he opens his eyes…when he first stirs from sleep! This is what comes out of his mouth before any mental editing equipment kicks into gear.” And I thought to myself,”Gee…is that the first thought in MY head when I awaken?” I can’t say that any particularly unloving thought would be in my mind upon first awakening. But are those words the first to get bumped out of my slumber into a first waking moment? Probably not! This is how Noah lives. And this is really how God is, for in His myriad ways, from sunrises to sunsets and then through the spectacular brilliance of shining stars He is always telling us the very same thing. Do we hear? Do we reciprocate? There in the predawn moments of innocent 1/2 sleep, our son, Noah, reminded me, without a moment’s forethought, of all that matters.

Yesterday I had a chore to do. It was a chore that I’ve been putting off for…well, for too long. You see, last fall, we remodeled half (yes, half) of our kitchen. It used to be a verandah years ago, and when it made the switch into a kitchen, it was done somewhat hastily. At least it was not done perfectly. All the walls did not meet up with the ceiling just so, the way they should have done, and there were little places where I could see the outside shining in through the walls lower down….where the cupboards were to be built.

Clover

A couple of people I know have said that they think that all of us Leas are workaholics. Well, maybe we don’t quite definitively separate work and play, but you see, this has its upside! The trick is to include God, in everything. That is the mystery that lets us enjoy whatever we’re doing, work or play. Not that I do this all the time. God knows full well that I don’t! But He also knows that this is my objective…It’s where I’m headed. Some days I get closer than others. And…this blurry line between work and play can work the other way too: Play can become creative…with purpose. Purposeful play! I LOVE it!

Clover

While up in the garden, I realized that I’d left out a main point I had wanted to make in the last garden post. So I’ve re-edited that post to include the left out bit too.

Clo

How it has rained and rained this autumn and winter! Not usually all day…or even most of the day. In fact, often only at night… which is very thoughtful of it. And all the vegetation here in the tropics responds in a major way to rain! And I do mean, “major.” And I do mean “all” the vegetation. It grows and grows and sometimes I wonder how it can do it so fast: all of the flowers, fruit trees, shrubs, vegetables, herbs, and the weeds!

For me, time in the garden is welcome growing time…even when I’m working hard at weeding and pruning! Weeding and pruning is all about helping the good, fruit-bearing stuff to grow. And I must take stock on a regular basis to see what’s getting in the way of the Godstuff that I want to freely grow and increase in my life for those I love! So gardening can happen on many levels. Add to that the glorious green breeze on this magical hillside and a crimson sun setting over the turquoise sea, and I’ve got myself a delicious recipe for peace. Mmmmm…yum. Yes!