Shadows hide me from the light that calls my name

In stained - glass windows, I often heard the song's reprise.
Reality resounding somewhere in the brokenness and despair
beyond the veiled crowds and the peacekeeping sounds.

My roots force their way
through the pavement
And the saints lay on their backs,
screaming to the endless sky
"where are you"

And the searchlights in the tall darkness
shine in their reply.

- caitlyn spence.

A few weeks ago, some of my sessionmates and I were discussing our 4 favourite biblical scenes. Mine were as follows:
Elijah and prophets of Baal on Mt. Carmel. (1kings18)
The Circumcision at Gilgal (josh5)
Jesus sitting alone at the Jordan (john10)
Nehemiah exhorting the Israelites and the early construction of Jerusalem's wall. (nehemiah 4)

It was pointed out that all of my favorite scenes have to do with repentance and holiness, and I think it;s true that these are some of the most important and recurring themes in my life. Actually, I think they are the most important things in life in general.
Repentance; the turning of hearts. Without repentance, there is only death. There is only hearts set on seeking what is seen, what passes away. It is the rolling away of reproach from our former ways. If we do not cut our old ways from ourselves, how will we then go on to live as new creations, unbound by our broken chains.
If we are consecrated to Him, He will do amazing things among us.

An important reminder from a friend

Yesterday, while I babysitting the 4 children of Aaron and Cherie White, Noah (who is 3) was watching a show called George Shrinks on my laptop. In this particular episode, George was frightened by what he believed to be a ghost. Noah's response to this was taking the laptop by it's screen and proclaiming loudly:
"Jesus is WITH you! He has the POWER to destroy that ghost!"

Amen.

Learning the language of a story told to farmers.

I am sorry for my slowness to write, but sometimes I open up the window and I stare at the text box and get completly overewhelmed by the size of it. How on earth do I fit my entire jam-packed life into a box barely a third the size of my laptop moniter? I'll start out with the small stuff, because that's usually the most important, anyway, right?
This morning was one of my favorite mornings I've had in a long time. It consisted of waking up early to spend time in a garden in an empty lot with the lovely Olivia Munn, discussing the resurrection. My bare, pale hands enshrouded in dark earth, surrounded by the potential of life blossoming just beneith me. As I established the home of what will eventually (hopefully!) be a cloud of roses and thorns in the middle of our vegitable garden, I contemplated the resurrection of Christ, and the signifigance of His appearance to Mary. I'm not the type to associate myself with an idea just because of what the surface literature provides, therefore I've never believed that Jesus was raised in anything but His original Earthly body. Although the text reads that three or so people didn't recognise Him right off, I don't see any proper proof to believe that Jesus had a new body - as I was taught in my Jehovah's Witness childhood. On this particular morning, however, as my heart was hoping for the beauty of roses to spring up from where I had embedded their beginnings and the weight of the moment when Mary first sees the resurrected Christ absorbed my thoughts. Mary was pretty emotional when she saw Jesus' body was missing, she probably wouldn't have recognised her own reflection. Her Risen Lord speaks to her and she assumes it's the gardener. And she assumes it because it's true. Because Christ IS the gardener. It was in a garden that we were given life. We were exiled from that Garden because cursed death was placed on us. And so it was that in a garden, our Lord was arrested and sent to His own death. And it was from this garden tomb that the new promise of life erupted forth. That morning, a woman was crying about an empty tomb, not realizing that that tomb was full; the walls were salvation. The garden she wept in was the completly redeemed life. The curse given in the first garden was taken away on the cross, and the effects of it were completly destroyed when a man walked from a tomb into another garden. Mary was completly right with her first assumption of who the man standing behind he was. This was the gardener. All things around her were created by him. This new, redeemed life she had stumbled into, this garden, it was His. He had made it and it was beautiful. He had spent the winter waiting for the rebirth of the spring and watched it unfold in the eyes of a young, innocent woman.
In summation, the garden is life. We were created for it, and were escorted out by the hands of death. But just as Death escorted Lord Jesus from Gethsemane to the cross, Jesus carried from his own grave the seed of redeemed life. The original blessings of the original garden and covenant made available to transgressors by way of the Gardener himself.
Behold, the old has passed away and He makes all things new.

The old, tired ground has passed away.
Wake up, O bride. Rise from your tomb and come into the garden.
Your groom awaits, and he has made all things new.

grace.
caitlyn.