{following the Piper again}

Joshua 'n Anna

A little over a year ago, the Courter asked the Penney if she would be courted. She said she would.

They're still changing together, and thought that pictures would be a good idea. So we did a shoot, and here are a few photos.

9.10.11

{because there's a purpose}

I was sitting there, replaying a scene; the conversation clear, sight vivid. I wished I would have acted more. Pretended that things didn't hurt, that there wasn't pain in the rejection. Life seems easier with unpenatrable walls. Steel armor to block out wounds. So I responded wrongly, in anger, to hide the truth. I failed to love.

I struggle with the pain, the knowledge that I'm vulnerable.

With worsening wounds. With wondering why.

With burning scars.

Then, a Voice, clear and True, spoke its way into my thoughts.

I have scars too.

The Perfect One, the One who loves, has scars. Scars that we've given Him.

I aruged back. I know You have scars. But Yours have purpose, and a meaning for us. My scars are deep, purposeless...they have names, stories, and their own power of torture.

Love spoke truth again. My Scars are deeper than you can imagine. Each scar has a name...one of them has your name. But I loved you anyways. I loved you when you hated Me, when you ran from Me. When you wounded Me.
My Child, I'm giving you the gift of scars. You can allow them to torture you, or they can be a reminder...a reminder to love.

These scars. Everyone has them. Some are large, tell tale of a painful injury or accident. Others are small, barely visible, but deep. Those are often the ones that remain the longest.

I often wondered what the purpose was of scars. It seemed for a long time that scars were just a reminder of something I wanted to forget. But I think now I know.

The purpose of the scars is reminder...reminder to love.

The word scar was derived from the Greek word schara, meaning place of fire. The scars we bear remind of times of fires, fires that everyone experiences.  According to the American Academy of Dermatology, no scar can be completely removed.

Not ever.

They're there as reminders to love. But a gift?

Have you not asked for Me to make you more like Myself? Will you reject the journey I'm bringing you on because it's painful? Will you accept the gift of being more like Me?

I want desperately to remember. To love. To accept scars as gifts. To be more like Him.

Show me your hands. Do they have scars from giving? Show me your feet. Are they wounded in service? Show me your heart. Have you left a place for divine love? 
~F. J. Sheen

{on walking into the kitchen before I fully awoke}

"How did the unwashed dishes multiply since 10am last night?"

If I wasn't going to work, I would go back to bed. The good thing is, I'm not driving our carpool to work today. That small fact will most likely save the lives of at least four other people. Somehow.

I'm think I'm running late...or early...

Reflections of sorts

{my thoughts exactly}

"Never imagine yourself not to be otherwise than what it might appear to others that what you were or might have been was not otherwise than what you had been would have appreared to them to be otherwise."

~the Duchess

C. H. Spurgeon; Evening, August 24

"If fire break out, and catch in thorns, so that the stacks of corn, or the standing corn, or the field, be consumed therewith; he that kindled the fire shall surely make restitution."—Exodus 22:6.

But what restitution can he make who casts abroad the fire-brands of error, or the coals of lasciviousness, and sets men's souls on a blaze with the fire of hell? The guilt is beyond estimate, and the result is irretrievable. If such an offender be forgiven, what grief it will cause him in the retrospect, since he cannot undo the mischief which he has done! An ill example may kindle a flame which years of amended character cannot quench. To burn the food of man is bad enough, but how much worse to destroy the soul! It may be useful to us to reflect how far we may have been guilty in the past, and to enquire whether, even in the present, there may not be evil in us which has a tendency to bring damage to the souls of our relatives, friends, or neighbours.

The fire of strife is a terrible evil when it breaks out in a Christian church. Where converts were multiplied, and God was glorified, jealousy and envy do the devil's work most effectually. Where the golden grain was being housed, to reward the toil of the great Boaz, the fire of enmity comes in and leaves little else but smoke and a heap of blackness. Woe unto those by whom offences come. May they never come through us, for although we cannot make restitution, we shall certainly be the chief sufferers if we are the chief offenders. Those who feed the fire deserve just censure, but he who first kindles it is most to blame. Discord usually takes first hold upon the thorns; it is nurtured among the hypocrites and base professors in the church, and away it goes among the righteous, blown by the winds of hell, and no one knows where it may end. O Thou Lord and giver of peace, make us peacemakers, and never let us aid and abet the men of strife, or even unintentionally cause the least division among Thy people.

From Spurgeon's Morning and Evening