Day 1 of our Journey West - Gateway Arch

 This trip was a dream, a plan, and now became an action.  After much planning and details by our Leader, the day has now come...

To the West.

Tuesday, June 13, 2023 marked our departure for 4 weeks.

We start in Ohio, of course, ➡️ passing through Indiana, ➡️ Illinois, and ➡️ into Missouri, where we end for a our first night.  We gain an hour this day as we cross into another time zone, the first of three by the time we reach the west coast.

We stopped at the Gateway Arch in St. Louis - Gateway to the West! Our first touring stop.

Leaving - dark and early 🥱😊

all ready to go west, bleary-eyed and all

It ended up being 4:57 till we actually pulled out of our driveway. 

day is dawning

skylines - have a beauty all their own

leaving our home state for our

journey westward

- stopping for lunch -
I packed a cooler with lunch meat 

for sandwiches
and other lunch goodies

Gateway Arch in the distance
This is our first stop - Gateway to the West!

stopping for a photo op 

as we walk to the arch

(much to the boys' dismay)

I warned them is only the beginning 😜

Lewis and Clark and the exploration

westward

Influential Chief shirt etc.

This is our car number for the 

ride to the top

our 'capsule' ride to the top

Ride back down

 looking at the mechanisms as

we descend

Our first place to setup our 'home'

grilling steak

enjoying a campfire when we have

the chance

these carvings were scattered

throughout the campground and

were very neat

evening sunset while on a stroll

and then.... the bathrooms...

what fun details!! 

We are grateful for safety as we had one really close call.  And a nice place for our first night away.  It was a good beginning.

Because Jesus Is

 

Jesus is.

Light. Truth. the Way. Life, abundant life. All sufficient. All powerful. He is Rest. And invites us to stay with Him. He cares. He IS the Good Shepherd. The door. Sustaining bread. Life-giving Water. The Vine, our Source. He is Counsellor. Redeemer. Saviour. Friend. Healer. Grace, manna grace. He is Strength in my weakness. Restorer of life that's been taken. And so MUCH more. 

He is.

He doesn't change. His character remains. He loves not because we're good or we get it right. No, He loves because He IS love and will never deny or go against His character. 

If and when He changes His mind, it is only because it matches His character. 

Jesus simply is.

And nothing will separate, get in between that for you and me.

Someday, the curse that was given in a garden will be removed forever in a garden, it's sting was fought for in a garden and conquered on a cross so we could be given power for a choice. (Revelation 22:1-5)

He is the Tree of Life. Here, on this side of heaven, we can choose to partake from the tree of life by choosing Him. 

Eve chose what she thought was best that one day so many years ago. She listened to Satan's enticing words of how it would be so good to be like God, knowing good and evil.

Now we wish we wouldn't know so much. 

Today, we still have a choice to make.  We can reach for Jesus and His words of Truth and Life or we can keep reaching for what we think is best. 

Jesus won't demand us to choose Him, but He will always be standing right near... holding out His nail-pierced hands, inviting us to choose Him. 

What love!

He is. And I stay.

On a Friday, when hopes are nailed to a cross. When all seems lost to me. When darkness seems to have won. Hope vanishes in the bitter dark. 

On a Saturday, when all is silent to me. His workings are unknown and behind the scenes. 

On a Sunday, when hope has become clear, stones rolled away and Jesus is visible. 

He is and I stay, choosing Him, who IS the Way, the Truth, and the Life.

Grief's Anguished Cry

 

Life is filled with daily miracles, joys that thrill our hearts and gifts to look for and to be grateful.  But the reality is that there are also those moments that forever change our course, happenings that blindside us and send us reeling. There is sickness, it's-not-supposed-to-be-this way scenarios, rejections, etc.  These moments leave us with a cry, a deep, heart-rending cry that ascends upward and into our Father's presence.

Jesus knows all about this.  He too, uttered a heart-rending cry that ascended up, up to His Father.

These cries come from deep within our souls and leave us gasping for air and searching for a footing, a place to ground our flailing emotions and land.  Sometimes it seems these cries go no further than the ceiling and other times they seem to connect with our Father.

Jesus knows such a moment.   A moment of 'where are you,God?'. A moment of silence, alone in grief, carrying a load all alone. 

He cried, "My God, my God, why did You forsake me?"

To me, this is one of the most heart wrenching moments when such a deep cry is left loose and goes up, upwards toward the Father. 

Scripture doesn't tell us God turned His face  away. It doesn't say He deserted His Son, but Jesus felt it, His cry echoes and our sometimes matches it. And sometimes it's as if our cry is only to be met with what feels like God turning His face away. 

Alone. Alone.

Why??  

As I sat with that, wrestling with a moment in my fifth grade year at school, wondering where was God in that moment, a moment that left its mark deeply embedded in my soul and I thought of the moment Jesus had on the cross.

I have often heard that this moment of being forsaken, a seemingly turning from His Son, Jesus, as He hung on the cross, was because of sin.

I wrestle with that and questioned it's validity as I thought of my day in school.  If God turned His face away, forsaking Jesus because He couldn't tolerate sin, would He have not done that me and to the many sacrifices that the children of Israel offered over the years?  Would He still not turn away from my sin and yours?

As I thought of Jesus seeing me that day, watching what was happening and knowing what it would do to my soul and what I would do with it for many years following, my question was/is, "How could He stand and watch it?"  "Why doesn't He intervene?"

There were a couple of thoughts that came to me... One is that hard, heartbreak, and sin is the natural consequence of choosing the tree of knowledge of good and evil.  Two, Jesus wants to redeem all things and sometimes the hardest situations are where we find Him the deepest and experience the deepest redemption.  But He can't stand to watch it happen, so it's as if He turns His face away. He doesn't intervene, but He doesn't leave. He stays because He knows and sees all things and desperatelylongs for vus to find Him in deeply redemptive ways. 

Jesus, hanging on the cross, in deep physical pain, had prayed hours before that this cup would pass from Him, this walking out a deeply hard path.  His heart-rending cry was left unanswered but it's result would be the last sacrifice needed for eternal redemption. It was a needed hard for an ultimate good, but it was also so hard for God to not intervene and I can only imagine, not to rescue Jesus. To rescue Jesus would have left us deserted.

Sometimes the best and good can only be by walking the path of hard hard.

I don't have many words for this or able to explain it, but I do know that out of my deep, deep unanswered cries and wondering where God was, I have found Him very deeply and personally, that I can see it all as a gift.  And I really wonder if that is why God sometimes seems to turn His face away and to us it seems like He doesn't care, when really, He cares oh so deeply.  It's a risk He takes because we may choose to allow it to turn our hearts away from Him instead of toward Him for redemption.

This Easter season, this remembering of His sacrifice, remember it is for our own redemption, initally when we choose to believe Him and accept His salvation, but also on-going, redeeming our hearts through each and every hard we experience and walk through.

Nothing happens that He can't redeem.  He wants our hearts.  Just like it was before the reaching and eating off the one tree Adam and Eve were told not too. Before the bite they walked with God.

God wants us to walk with Him and discover Him to be sufficient strength. To find Him as the Way, the Truth, and the Life. To let His love go deep in our souls, redeeming all things. 

God promised a Saviour the moment they took and ate the fruit. Jesus fulfilled that promise and I am deeply grateful for His redemption in so many ways. 

Jesus is our Advocate, our Immanuel, and He gets our deep heart rending cries that ascend up, up and up. Stay with Him, trusting and believing that He sees and hears. The Holy Spirit interprets our groaning cries. 

Jesus, our Redeemer, our Saviour, our Friend. 

Let This Mind Be in You

 

A few verses in Philippans chapter 2 often come to my mind.

The first eight verses have given me pause and pondering moments as I think of one phrase in particular... Let this mind (or attitude) be in you which was in Christ Jesus. 

Paul is writing and encouraging the people in the Philippian church to think of others, with humility.

Humility feels a bit elusive. I wonder if it's a little like happiness... the more you pursue it the further it gets away from you?

Is it something we pursue or is it a by product of something deeper??

Verse 5 is the verse that so often pops into my mind, "Have this attitude in yourselves which was also in Christ Jesus." (NAS)  The following several verses continue to expound a bit about the attitude Jesus had.

v. 6 - Though Jesus existed in the form of God, He did not regard His equality with God a thing to be grasped.

v.7 - He emptied Himself (laying aside His privileges), taking the form of a bond-servant, being made in the likeness of man. 

Whew, man who chose to not listen?!  Man, whom He created, chose to take matters in their own hands?! He lays aside living in heaven and becomes a man, one of us! 

v.8 - He humbled Himself by becoming obedient.

And becoming one of us, was to give His life so we could see our way back to God. It cost Him His very breath!

What does humbling ourselves look like?  Is it beating ourselves down?

Sometimes it's helpful to look at the opposite and a proud person is a bit easier to define and one we all resist. 

A proud person is full of themselves, thinking they have got the answer. Pride puffs up and lifting one's self to be something. A person who grasps for something is not a restful or pleasant person to be with, for they often step on someone to reach for what they want.

So what is emptying ourselves look like? Do we badger ourselves and put ourselves in the dirt, lowering ourselves? Is this humility?? This is the opposite extreme of lifting up one's self and grasping for something. 

No, I don't think that's the answer either.  Both of these responses are focused on me, myself.  Neither one is a proper view of how and why God made us. God made all things good and as man we are to glorify Him, pleasing Him with our faith. 

Jesus chose to become man because His love is so deep for us that He was willing to give us and show us the way to His Father. 

All the great men and women in Scripture who made a positive impact kept and kept coming back to Jesus and they were ones who knew who they were in Christ and knew that each person they met was also valued by God.

Humility comes, not by doing something correctly, but adjusting our view of God and one's self and others. It's grasping a little bit more of the bigness of God instead of grasping for what?? More of what I think and or even have experienced?? I don't know, except I do know we humans are pretty quickly drawn to power.  And just like, wanting to be like God, was Lucifer's downfall; so we have the bent to be our own god.

It's a remembering that God is the kingpin, He has got it and not me!

We keep coming back to Jesus and the Father, realigning our focus on Who holds the answer. 

Humility flows as a result or an awareness, not a doing.  It's being with God and letting Him take care of any situation. 

Now, I'm not saying we sit back and do nothing.  No, I believe a proper awareness of who God is and who I am, will inspire me to be involved.  After all, we are His hands and feet. 

But I believe it will affect HOW we get involved and it will affect our response when our involvement and even our beliefs are met with resistance.

Saul was convinced that he was doing the right thing by spending much effort and time persecuting and killing Christians. He went in hot pursuit of them. 

Destruction. Fear. Rampage. 

When he met Jesus on the Damascus Road, that energy took a shift. He became a man of passion but you never see him demanding others to believe. 

Power. Boldness. But never demanding.

Saul was utterly convinced he was right in his persecution. 

He experienced a dramatic and obvious shift that not many of us experience to that degree.

He became just as convinced and passionate for Jesus as he had been against Him. There were many other men who were passionate and yet they didn't demand others to follow.

Jesus Himself, is the Way, Truth, and Life and even He, doesn't demand us to believe His words.

I see a thread... passion, boldness, power, strength; but never demanding or pushing. 

Pride demands, humility invites.

Pride pushes away, humility draws in. 

Pride says it's up to me, I've got to... humility says it's God, come and let's do this together. 

Time spent with Jesus will affect our everyday living. 

I don't know what you're thinking by now and I'm not even sure if I'm saying it correctly, but one thing I have sensed the Holy Spirit whispering in my heart, is, you aren't truth, Jesus is. 

And if Jesus allows choice, when He is Life and is the Way, and is Truth; then why do I get bent out of shape when someone isn't listening to me?

Humility. Emptying. Letting go because of God.

When we remember that Jesus is the Way, Truth, and Life, and not me, it brings a perspective that I have found vital as I walk in community and with a passion for truth. It shifts HOW I bring and present my beliefs, actions, concerns, etc.

*I can rest knowing that God has got it. He has promised to complete a good work and yes, that means He will as we look to Him. God won't let us be deceived if we truly want to know Him. 

*It's not up to me to make someone believe what I think is true. Yes, I said, I think, because the reality is I may have God's truth skewed a bit, no matter how much I believe God revealed this _______ to me. The lens through which I am understanding just may be cloudy. And I can hold what I believe to be true, with gentleness.

*When I remember and grasp a bit more, how much God loves me; then I understand it's the same for any other person and I can see beyond the difference, the pain, the hurt, a little bit more and find Jesus. 

One who sees Jesus, will see others as valuable and royal. When we remember that it is not we who hold the answers, it's Jesus, we can hold even the Truth that set us free with more grace and gentleness. Compassion. 

When we grasp a little bit more God's deep, simple, unconditional love for ourselves, then, that must spill over into our physical relationships, to all men. 

God, man. One is connected to the other. Loving God means, our convictions and beliefs should never be something that steps on another person, even if we are called on a different path. Jesus never used His Truth as a weapon or threat. He simply lived it and allowed people to choose.

The mind of Jesus is learned as we learn of Him, staying with Him who holds all things in His hand, and seeing how He emptied Himself for us. He is the One who holds the answers. The One who embodies truth. The One who IS the answer, the Way back to God. If He can empty Himself and doesn't demand us to know, believe, and follow Him, why should I think I can get the job done for others to believe Him??

Let this mind be in you which was in Christ Jesus and walk in gentle boldness for Him. 

Go in the confidence of His love for you and smile to the world around you. God holds us all.

In The Darkness, Light Pierces

 

Dark. Night. 

Not many of us are comfortable in the dark. In fact, from little up we fight the dark, being scared, having night lights, etc.  

Children are naturally scared of the dark. That seems to be a phase all children go through or at least mine did.

I remember one of my sons 'seeing' the shadows as terrifying animals out to get him, that he wouldn't even get up at night to go the bathroom, in the safety of his home. Night after night. 

Most adults aren't comfortable with dark. I am more than I used to be, but I still have times when I wonder what's lurking in the shadows waiting to take me down. Waiting to pounce on me as I walk past. Images appear and in the dark they become distorted. We're not in control because we can't see very far into the distance. 

In the same way, in our minds, the darkness of pain, loneliness, fears can overtake us. We walk through our days wondering when they'll pounce on us, and even feeling like they've overtaken us. We can't 'see' far into the future, not even around the next bend.  Images appear, those thoughts taking shape in our minds. 

Darkness.

The night Jesus came, 400 years of silence preceded. Silence. 

Ongoing quiet. No word from God through prophets to the people. 

Quiet. Silence. Hard Roman rule. 

Longings. Wanting someone bigger to overtake the Roman rule. Deliverance. 

The night Jesus was born, light pierced the physical darkness. 

Shepherds were tending their flocks on a hillside at night, when an angel appeared, piercing the dark night with the glory of the Lord, and the shepherds were afraid. 

The angel told them to not fear because I have good news, a Saviour is born!

The angel gave them more details on where to find this Saviour and then suddenly! There was a multitude of angels, praising God with these words, "Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, God will toward men."

Peace. Goodwill. Light. Really?? After the years of silence and crushing Roman rule??

The shepherds looked at one another and said, "Let us go... and see...."

They went with haste. 

Light always brings hope. Light brings anticipation. Light reveals. Light reveals what is really true. 

But Light doesn't always look like we think it should. 

In a stable.

To shepherds on a hillside in the dark of night. 

After 400 years of silence. 

The promise of a Saviour. 

Miracles.

Where were you,  Jesus?

Healings.

But Jesus ...

Death on a cross, seeming death to all they thought would happen and what saving them looked like in their minds. 

The living and walking out of that hope and promise was often disappointing and led to disillusionment. 

Many turned away, walked away. And in the end, not even His disciples stayed with Him.

Why? I think if we look deep into our hearts, we can answer that. 

How many times has there been silence in our stories? The darkness overwhelmed us and we felt all alone on our hillside, waiting another night for Light to penetrate. 

And we turn away.

Darkness leaves us vulnerable. We can't see far ahead. We panic because we can't control very much around us. Darkness asks us to trust, to take steps in faith. 

It's easier to walk away, to turn our backs on Jesus, and turn to what we can see or our own methods of what we think is best. 

I am so glad we have the stories after the resurrection. The disciples and many didn't stay away from God. Jesus appeared to all of the disciples as they huddled in a room.

Sometimes we're huddling, trying to grasp or understand what is or has happened, and waiting for Jesus to appear and speak to us. It's the staying, the waiting, that is brutal at times. It's the believing and hanging on to faith when darkness screams many false beliefs and our mind wrestles to believe the words of Jesus when all is quiet, that is crushing at times. But it's in the room of waiting and staying, on the hillside, that light comes. The angel of the Lord, announcing good news to us, Jesus has come. He is here!

Yes, He is here. 

Darkness is when light is most visible. Jesus pierced the darkness 2000+ years and that is still His mission, to pierce the dark parts of our stories. He wants to set us free from what imprisons us, our fears, our pain, the rejections, etc. 

He wants us to turn to His light of truth and trust Him in the darkness. 

Trust. Faith. 

Without faith it's impossible to please God and I begin to see why. There is so many times that God's ways make so little sense to my human mind frame, that to stay with Him requires me to believe in spite of what I see.  To believe Him in spite of what my heart and feelings scream to be true. 

To believe Him as my Way, the Truth, and Life to me. And to TRUST.

Let's run with haste to see Him. 

With Us

 

In all the paths that wind and twist around in life and in the times the path is more straight and smooth, I want to know I'm not alone. 

Alone.

Alone is a word that can strike fear.  It can strike terror, panic, anxiety in our hearts if that's what we focus on.

Fear is very present in various forms for we humans as we journey and walk through life.  We fear the unknown.  We fear being left alone in a relationship.  We fear losing a child, a loved one. We fear we won't be enough or we'll be too much. We fear rejection.

It has been said that Fear Not appears 365 times in the Bible.  And with a number of those Fear Nots, Jesus, God our Father, promises to be WITH US.

Ahh. With Us.  Not alone.

Sorrows shared are divided, and joys that are shared are multiplied.

This Christmas season, I'm reminded again of IMMANUEL.  Immanuel is one of my favourite names for Jesus.  It's the name that brings comfort and one to anchor all my fears in.  Grounding the anxiety, panic, and unknowns in the capability of our Saviour who left the glories of heaven to be WITH US.

To show us a way back to Him.  To invite us to a way that is often so not like we think it should be. But one that is so life-giving and freeing. One of redemption. He gives a peace which passes understanding.  He forgave those who hurt Him and asks us to offer the same grace to each other.  He calls us to trust Him and that He has our good in mind.  He came to give His life so I may have everlasting life.

Isaiah 41:10 is one of the verses that speak the words, Do not fear anything, for I AM WITH YOU; do not be afraid for I AM your God.

It continues to say, Do not fear, I will help you.  And He even takes our hand or holds us in His hands.

Isaiah 43:2 tells us when we pass through the waters He will be WITH US.

Isaish 43:5 again says, Do not fear for I am with you.

Alone and yet not. Alone, can be the silence in which Jesus whispers life to our hearts. Alone is when we can hear His heartbeat if we're willing to bring our fears to Him and release them. Alone.

Jesus often went to the mountain alone. Alone to talk with His Father. Alone to hear His Father's words. I really would love to have a window into their conversation. What did Jesus say? Did He have any fears? Heartaches? Disappointments? Did He need to refocus on His mission and purpose?

Even the night He was taken, He went a stone's throw away from His disciples and was alone in agony with His Father. There we know He wrestled with what was laid in front of Him, wrestling to submit to His Father's plan. 

This season, let us let the with-ness of Jesus penetrate our heart and draw us to come. Come into His Presence with our fears, pain, our joys and thrills to worship and adore Him, the One who left all, to give all, so we could have all.

He left glorious perfection to be WITH US so we could be WITH HIM. And my heart rejoices. 

The Steps of One Moment

 

This is a day that begins the beginning of a new month.                                                                              

How do we get here, in this moment, the second to last month of a year?

Life gets full. Days are filled. Moments get overwhelming. 

I invite you to take a deeep, looonngg,, breath with me.

Breathe in, breathe out.

Inhale.... Exhale...

Exchanging our anxiety, worry, pain, fears, disappointments for His grace, love and receive His joy.

A day. A moment is what you have right now. 

The way up the stairs is one step at a time.  The way to climb a mountain, is one step at a time.  The way to the end consists of stepping one step at a time.

Each moment you choose to do the right thing, is one less wrong. Each time you resist whatever you know in your heart that is not healthy, is one more right moment. 

Each moment adds up and leads to many more good and right moments. 

The moments where you gave into a weakness or didn't make the right choice, is only one moment. It does not need to define the next moment. 

A day is made of moments.  That leads to a week. Then a month. And then a year. 

One day. At a time. Focus on Jesus, each and every moment.

Taking the next step with Jesus is to give wings to living with victory, healing, joy and abandonment. 

Each moment you choose to think differently, each moment you choose to search among the weeds and under rocks to see the gifts God gives, is to taste and see that HE IS GOOD. 

Remember, one day and one moment at time is what you have to take and to live.