Little Me.Big God

People who have known me for a while will testify to the fact that I have long term contentment issues. Even worse is that some people who have known me for a while wouldn’t. I’m very good at hiding them. I’m a master at turning my discontentment into someone elses sin or negligence (in my mind anyway). While im less prone to do that in current times the feeling of loosing out or longing for more than I have is still there, despite God’s abundant provision.

While we were away we visited someone I’ve known for a really long time. She has trained in science at university, she has a great whit and a quick mind. She is a fountain of knowledge, both biblically and worldly. She is a mother of two children and a Godly wife. She also has MS. Over the last two years MS has taken over most of her body, she can no longer walk, feed herself or talk clearly. She needs help moving and needs constant rest. She finds it hard to control her emotions and muscles and is loosing parts of her memory. By worldly standards, in her early 40’s, she has lost much of her identity. In spite of this, every time we see each other I am amazed at her Joy in Christ. She is always surrounded by books and feeding on Gods word. She is quick to praise her King in conversation and lean on him in her every day need. Above all her contentment is delightful, she is the last to complain or act as though she has not been given her fair share of blessings. The less there is of her to offer the more room there is for God to show his glory and provision.

In all of my discontentment, what is it that I actually want?

I want the faith and joy of my friend. I want to be faithful to the word and to the people I love (and don’t) in prayer. I want to be able to offer myself as a living sacrifice (Romans 12) and live zealously in the body (Ephesians 4).

I have every reason to be content. God has been kind and merciful in giving me his spirit. May there be little of me and more of Christ, may I long for his bigness, rather than mine.

Car Wisdom

Long trips generally result in thoughts. Some good, others pointless, some distracting. Here's one.

We are scared to age because we spend our lives building ourselves up, to know more, be skilled at more things, to look a certain way and to not rely on anyone (except maybe the one we choose). Age makes us un-able, our bodies decay and we have less control over them. We are less able to develop new skills, and our old skills are sometimes outside of our ability range. We forget the things we knew and sometimes become untrained in the self controlled and charismatic tongue that made us likable in the past.

If we look at how God has designed the body of Christ to be, it is clear that we don’t grow too old for his church.

“You, however, must teach what is appropriate to sound doctrine. Teach the older men to be temperate, worthy of respect, self-controlled, and sound in faith, in love and in endurance.

Likewise, teach the older women to be reverent in the way they live, not to be slanderers or addicted to much wine, but to teach what is good. Then they can urge the younger women to love their husbands and children, to be self-controlled and pure, to be busy at home, to be kind, and to be subject to their husbands, so that no one will malign the word of God.” (Titus 2:1-5)

There is a place and plan for us as we age. We spend a lifetime trying to be wiser, healthier, humbler, more elite, skilled…but if we take Gods image of the body seriously we will see that it is not these things that make us eligible.

“There is one body and one Spirit, just as you were called to one hope when you were called; one Lord, one faith, one baptism; one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all.” (Ephesians 4:4-6)

We are made eligible by the spirit, the same spirit we had when we are first brought into the kingdom, that one God is the God of our young and able bodies, just as he is God over our ageing, helpless ones. If there is a place for us in the kingdom, despite the decay of our charismatic and virtuous abilities, then it must not be these things that are worth putting our hope in.

Melbourne.

2800 kms.

8 days

51 hours of driving.

Recently my Mum, Sister and i took a trip to Melbourne. The primary reason for going was so i could get enough hours u on my L-plates to took my P's. The secondary, yet probably just as important, reason for going were to spend some time together before I get married in February. While i'm really looking forward to starting a new family, submitting to, helping and prioritising Josh above all others, the family i have been part of for the last 19 years is spectacularly unique and a treasure to be cherished. Here are a few happy snaps from the trip.

Bronte playing with the shutter on the roof top

Great Ocean Road

Below is the chapel street Bizzare. It was impossible to capture it in photo's but it was a store of rooms and rooms of antiques. I found some vintage lace for my bridesmaid dresses in the gloves-lace-tie room...

Dinner on Lygon street