A weekend and a book

Hello friends. I was going to write yesterday but I got to do something I haven’t done in months. Something that most of us long for throughout the day. Something I’ve been thinking about nonstop for the past few weeks. Something I’ve been desperately wanting for the past few weeks as well. *drum roll please*…

I got to take a nap. 🙂 Did it add up to the hype? *grin*

Anyway…

This weekend I made my way up North near Sandusky or Mansfield, Ohio. 17 of us from my Youth Group were going on a Retreat with our Youth Pastor Phil and his lovely wife (my dear friend) Caroline. Britt and I were talking about it Thursday night. She told me that she wanted to stay home more then go on the retreat. I didn’t tell her this, but I agreed completely.

Friday evening I sat next to my dear friend Caroline as she was driving, as we were making our way a few hours to the Retreat with 6 girls in the backseat. Most of the time when her and I weren’t talking or engaging in conversation or laughter from the backseat, I found myself gazing out the window or leaning foward with my elbow on my knee and my chin in my hand, wondering why I wasn’t reacting the way I wish I was toward the retreat. While back home, after paying $40 and packing I had almost changed my mind completely in deciding not to go. Thank God that I didn’t…

I don’t know about you, but sometimes I truly need to get away. Sometimes I’m desperate for it. Sometimes I truly need to be surrounded by people who are desperate for Jesus and love Him as much as I do; people who are broken, poor, needy, joyful, loving, free, compassionate, saved, desperate, and who want pure devotion. Friends… it was amazing to soak in. 🙂

Praise God.

Before I get to the meat of this blog, I want to ask for prayer friends. We got a call from my 9 year old neice yesterday; sadly, while I was napping. She told us that her grandmother had just died of cancer a few hours before that. Today my family and I are making our way to the viewing – I knew this lovely woman alittle when I was younger. I just ask for your prayers – for my neice and nephew and their Mom. Just pray that we can comfort them; and just that they would allow this to be a time that they would seek out Jesus and allow Him to save and comfort them…

On happier note…
If you know me at all, even just a tad, you know that I’m one who loves to read. I gained a love for it sometime after I began following Jesus. When I began following Jesus alittle over 2 years ago, I wanted to soak in everything about the Christian faith. Besides the Bible I read books by C.S. Lewis, Mark Buchanan, Donald Miller and Brennan Manning. Thankfully, I still love it.

I’m not one who normally likes fiction. Infact if you’d ask me, I’d most likely tell you that I hate it… and hate is a strong word. In the past few weeks I’ve learned that I don’t necessarily hate fiction; but I only like well-written fiction. Why am I sharing this? Because… that should give you a glimpse at just how remarkable this book that I’m about to share truly is.

The Kite Runner…

I know the The author is Khaled Hosseini. He is from Kabul Afghanistan and I’m pretty sure he’s a Muslim. I could be like a lot of people are today and allow those things to make me flinch, and take a step back. But I try not to be like a lot of people. And that has led me to believe he has to be one of the most well-written men.

I normally devour books. This one I took my time with. It almost seemed like if I read it too fast and too soon, I wouldn’t get the full affect, that I’d be missing someting.

“There’s a way to be good again” is one of the phrases used multiple times throughout this book. I’ve started questioning it this week. I know that Hosseini’s words and my thoughts on this probably differ. I know that in the book the main man wants to be “good” again to experience forgiveness and not hold onto his regrets from the past. But, the one thought that comes to my mind is that the way to be made “good” doesn’t really exsist. I only think there is a Way to be made clean and forgiven – and that’s through God. I think even being made clean and forgiven won’t completely make me good – because I still sin.

This has to be one of the best books that I’ve read. It is a novel about 2 young boys living in Afghanistan who differ greatly socially. One is rich another his servant. These young boys are friends, but their relationship is an odd one… but maybe one that I think we may experience or witness more then we think. One boy betrays the other and things end up a mess. But, the story unfolds in redemption, in brokenness and forgiveness… a young man truly wanting to know if he has a way to be “good” again.

Hmm… leave it to a novel by a young man in Afghanistan – to bring forth the question, “can we really be “good?”‘ For me, that doesn’t need questioned… but obviously Hosseini questioned it, I bet others do as well…

Please share your thoughts friends…

Teresa

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Words of inspiration….

If you’ve read this blog for anytime then you most likely know that I’m a reader, a desperate lover of words – if you know me personally then I’m sure you’ve known that for quite some time now. *grin*I haven’t had much time to soak up reading this Summer like I’m used to… but I decided to borrow this book from a dear friend of mine. This is 1 of the 2 books that I’ve so far been able to read this Summer. I want to share with you a few quotes from this book… hopefully reading these quotes will lead you into reading this sometime very random, vunerable, God-seeking book. 🙂

“When God is found and we embrace it with abandon, we embrace the Giver of it.”

“I had fallen in love with my spirituality rathen then with the One whom I sought, and in the end it left me void and wanting.”

“This is disheartening in that we know our living could be deeper and we have settled.”

“It is no wonder we have trouble when trying to fit our “spirituality” into all the stuff of life because we’ve neglected to bring all the stuff of life into our “spirituality.”‘

“….Even in the middle of darkness and loss is the unexpected presence of God..”

“Sometimes praise comes face to the ground, unable to move because we are so aware that this holy, terrifying God has busied Himself bringing us back to Him.”

Be inspired…. READ IT!

Teresa

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Things Unseen

Monday or Tuesday afternoon I finished a book by one of my favorite authors. “Things Unseen: Living in Light of Forever” by Mark Buchanan. The book is basically about becoming heavenly-minded and not only or always thinking of things on this earth. I want to quickly share with you very few of the profound quotes that I’ve read in this book!

“Our deepest instinct is Heaven. Heaven is the ache in our bones, the splinter in our heart. Like the whisper of faraway waves we hear crashing in the whorls of a conch shell, the music of Heaven echoes, faint, elusive, haunting, beneath and within our daily rutines. There you are, standing at a window watching oak leaves flutter down from dark boughs, and without a warning your whole body fills with a longing for something you can’t name, something you’ve lost but never had, that you’re nostalgic for yet don’t remember. You sense a joy so huge it breaks you, a sorry so deep it cleanses.”(Buchanan quoting C.S. Lewis)
“If you read history, you will find that the Christians who did the most for the present world were just those who though most of the next. The apostles themselves, who set on foot the conversion of the Roman Empire, the great men who built up the Middle Ages, the English evangelicals who abolished the slave trade, all left their mark on earth, precisely because their minds were OCCUPIED WITH HEAVEN. It is since Christians have largely ceased to think of the other world that they have become so ineffective in this.”

“Take captive literally means to take prisoner. We take prisnor, he says, (referring to Paul) anything that tries to take us prisoner.”

“God is proud to be the God of the Heavenly-minded.”

The day I finished reading this book I talked to a friend of mine on the phone and we got to talking about this book and he said: “The book sounds good, but, does it only talk about being Heavenly-minded? Does it over emphasize being Heavenly-minded that it isn’t telling you how to be both? Does it tell you how to be earthly-minded and yet Heavenly-minded? Because if you’re only one then that’s not good either.”

That last quote that I shared with you made me think of a question and something I’ve been wondering since I’ve finished this book. This book mainly states how we become Heavenly-minded, which is the very first place to begin. But now my question is: how do we balance being Heavenly-minded and thinking upon things of this earth? Do they go hand-in-hand? If you have any thoughts please do share them with me. I’m not looking for a specific answer, only your thoughts.

Blessings….
Teresa

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