Simple Woman's Daybook

Outside my window...it has been a cloudy morning in the valley-of-the-sun! But now the sun is poking through! Nooo!!!

I am thinking...that I need to starting reading the next chapter for a philosophy meeting.

I am thankful for...the joy of the Lord!

I am wearing...an elegant dark blue blouse and brown dress pants.

I am remembering...how the Lord has always been faithful to me.

I am going...shopping with my family in downtown Phx and then visiting my grandparents.

I am currently reading...The Scottish Chiefs by Jane Porter, Finally Alive by John Piper, and my friend's awesome novel.

I am hoping...the first week of the semester goes smoothly and that I am able to sign up for private voice/guitar instruction.

On my mind...Haiti, friends of mine who desperately need Christ, and how much I long to see the Lord victorious!!

Noticing that...my brother is really cranky when he cleans the kitchen! haha!

Pondering these words..."Every verse in the Bible is meant to have a good effect. Don't throw any away because at first it doesn't. The problem is us." - John Piper

From the kitchen...my dad is taking his vitamins and my mom is eating breakfast.

Around the house...my brother and sister getting ready to leave, Washed by the Water by Need to Breathe playing from the school room.

One of my favorite things~ simple days!

From my picture journal...

Thanks to the Simple Woman!

Year of Unshadowed Joy

The Mighty One, God the Lord, speaks and summons the earth from the rising of the sun to its setting. Out of Zion, the perfection of beauty, God shines forth. ~ Psalm 50:1-2

"May this year be one of unshadowed joy. There need never be a shadow. All shadows are from beneath, from self, from the I in us which so often wants us to listen to what it says, instead of to the voice of our Lord. Let us refuse this self voice, always, and live in the unclouded light of selfless joy and love. This is what I want to do ever more and more.
I have a lovely word for you: Luke 4:30. ‘Jesus passing through the midst of them went His way.’ We are meant to pass through the midst of whatever comes and not get upset or even inwardly ruffled.
A day or two ago I was thinking rather sadly of the past - so many sins and failures and lapses of every kind. I was reading Isaiah 43, and in verse 24 I saw myself: ‘Thou hast wearied me with thine iniquities.’ And then for the first time I noticed that there is no space between v.24 and v.25, ‘I, even I, am He that blotted out thy transgressions for Mine own sake; and I will not remember thy sins.’
Who but our Father would forgive like that?"
- Amy Carmichael

A memory that will forever remain with me from 2009 is standing, shaking and broken, in a church in Bayfield, CO during a worship service that my uncle was leading. The several weeks leading up to that day had been filled with desperation, panic, anxiety, and fear. The world of my dreams had been stripped violently from me. In my desperation, I had spent those week clinging to pieces of that dream. My heart, heated by my mad frenzy, could not be still. Everything I had desired and hoped for and clung to was being pulled from me. The tornado was raging and ravaging.
So there I was on that Saturday morning...utterly broken. Sin had already made its fateful climax and I stood there completely helpless. No one could comfort me. No one could descend to that lonely pit in which I had fallen. A pit which I had dug for myself in my own folly. I was wholly undone - brought to the lowest, most shameful, most unloved place I have ever been.

And yet there came to me a song, whose melody and words drifted to that darkened place where a torrent of wild emotions, memories, and thoughts were mercilessly washing over me. It was a song I had sung many times. A song so dear to me. And yet, in that moment those words were mine.

No more will I run from You

I will be wise accepting Your shelter

No more will I have to fear

I will be here in Your arms

Your Name, is above all powers above all kings

Your Name, You are the blessed Prince of Peace

No one else will ever let me live

This life I live in You

And no one else will ever take the place

That I have made for You

And no one else could ever fit the mold

That You have cast for me

You are my God I will bow down before You

You are my God I will lift up Your Name

Shimcha, Anu Ohavim Otcha (Your Name, We love You)

- Your Name, by Zemer Levav

And peace did come. It came to me as I stood there singing, shaking, and crying. The tears were painful to release. My sight was blurred by them and I held inside of myself a great cry of agony. If I could have escaped the crowd of people and found solitude for myself I would have collapsed in a frightful heap of tortorous grief, crying for someone to rescue me from myself.
I could not see as clearly then as I see now, but the awful helplessness of my entire being at that moment was beautiful in that it was a living picture of these verses:

For this is what the high and lofty One says—
he who lives forever, whose name is holy:
"I live in a high and holy place,
but also with him who is contrite and lowly in spirit,
to revive the spirit of the lowly
and to revive the heart of the contrite.
(Psalm 57:15)

The LORD is close to the brokenhearted
and saves those who are crushed in spirit.
(Psalm 34:18)

His grace came upon me ever so gently, little by little, until it held me and stilled my shaking body. He poured into me steel-like strength and enabled me to stand to resolve the matter of sin that day. And then He sent me home and put me to sleep. My heart, quieted. My soul, humbled.
What followed those days were trying. The grief, the consequences of sin, the hurt, and the shame were not done away with all at once. I had to learn the lesson of the weaned child. I had to learn to do without. I had to be still and quieted daily. I had to be led into repentance. I had to learn the discipline of the Lord. I had to learn obedience. I had to learn true love. I had to learn His will be done, not mine. And still I am learning these things.
My dear Lord and Saviour set me on a path that painful day. A set-apart path in which I have come to known the depths of His grace as I ever known before. I can never return to that life I once lived. He has set me to move forward, to surrender all of myself and to suffer the loss of all things so that I might gain Him. Yeshua is my very life. "He must increase, but I must decrease." (John 3:30). May this new year be a continuing of His eternal work.

"This last year has been a year of battle, but thank God of victory too, and we are nearer the Crowning Day this morning than ever we were before. ‘And having done all to stand.’ God keep us standing. ‘When I said, My foot slippeth, Thy mercy, O Lord, held me up.’ And now as we look forward we see great stones and many of them. ‘Who shall roll away the stone?’ More and more I delight in the word that says, ‘The angel of the Lord descended from heaven and came and rolled back the stone and sat upon it.’ We shall see the angel of the Lord sitting upon many a stone during the coming year. And think of it, we may see the Lord Himself, Christ risen, Christ crowned, this year.
Oh what will it be to see Him?
To be for ever with Him, holy for ever, strong for ever, never, never to grieve Him again."

"Our God does satisfy. I think sometimes He has to draw us into strange experiences in order that we shall prove Him to the uttermost, for some purpose out of sight. For what is He preparing us? It is all hidden, we have only hints in the Gospels and in Revelation. ‘His servants shall serve Him’ - where? How? But this we do know; never a pang of disappointment or loneliness or pain (there are many different kinds of pangs) but may be turned to minister towards a perfecting power to serve - first here on earth, then Otherwhere. God bless you and utterly satisfy your heart with Himself.

- Amy Carmichael, Candles in the Dark & Gold by Moonlight

Love: Dying to "our own"

"Love...does not insist on its own way" - 1 Corinthians 13:5

Now here is a hard lesson set before us.

Charity is an utter enemy to selfishness: Seeketh not its own, does not inordinately desire nor seek its own praise, or honour, or profit, or pleasure. Indeed self-love, in some degree, is natural to all men, enters into their very constitution. And a reasonable love of self is by our Saviour made the measure of our love to others, that charity which is here described, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. The apostle does not mean that charity destroys all regard to self; he does not mean that the charitable man should never challenge what is his own, but utterly neglect himself and all his interests. Charity must then root up that principle which is wrought into our nature. But charity never seeks its own to the hurt of others, or with the neglect of others. It often neglects its own for the sake of others; prefers their welfare, and satisfaction, and advantage, to its own; and it ever prefers the weal of the public, of the community, whether civil or ecclesiastical, to its private advantage. It would not advance, nor aggrandize, nor enrich, nor gratify itself, at the cost and damage of the public.
- Matthew Henry

Take notice that he says such love "is an utter enemy to selfishness." It detests the slightest sign of it in the inward places of the soul. Oh, but how often do we live our lives allowing this disease of selfishness to spread in our souls, which are vessels meant to house God's glory? We, in our proud ignorance, think we know what loves means and dare to presume that we know how to live it out. We inwardly demand and covet those things and people that meet our desires. We dress up our fleshly pursuits with lofty words and actions so as to make them appear they come from Love itself. We even fool ourselves into thinking we are basking in Love's glory, that we have obtained its blessing. But how very, very little we know! Love that is true comes from having first been brought low, humbled, and stripped of self that seeks its way above obedience to Lord and the good of others, the "I" and "me" and "myself" that is in us all.

"Take the key phrase in verse 5: "Love does not seek its own." I don't think this means that it is wrong to want to be happy. Because in verse 3 Paul argues that if you don't love, it profits you nothing. So it's not wrong to want the right kind of profit. What he's saying is that love does not seek its own personal, private preference without reference to what may be good for other people. Love seeks its joy and its profit in the good of others, not just in private gratification.
When Paul says, "Love seeks not its own," he is not saying that you shouldn't stand up for your own convictions—he died for his convictions. He is saying that you must be sure that the strength of your conviction is in proportion to the conviction being God's not just yours. To the degree that your preference is yours and not compellingly found in God's Word, to that degree should you be slow to seek it, and slow to get angry when others don't share it. "Love seeks not its own." It seeks the good of the many, not just the comfort of self.
So if we are going to love, we are going to have to die to "our own." Love seeks not its own. What does it do? It dies to its own. "Unless a grain of wheat fall into the ground and die it remains alone, but if it dies [to its own] it bears much fruit.""
- John Piper

Any other love than that is merely a fake and a counterfeit.

Again, I shall leave the last word to Amy Carmichael, who reminds us what love does not do and what it does not look like.

If I hold on to choices of any kind, just because they are my choice; if I give any room to my private likes and dislikes, then I know nothing of Calvary love.

If I put my own happiness before the well-being of the work entrusted to me; if, though I have this ministry and have received much mercy, I faint, then I know nothing of Calvary love.

If, the moment I am conscious of the shadow of self crossing my threshold, I do not shut the door, and in the power of Him who works in us to will and to do, keep that door shut, then I know nothing of Calvary love.

If there be any reserve in my giving to Him who so loved that He gave His Dearest for me; if there be a secret “but” in my prayer, “anything but that, Lord,” then I know nothing of Calvary love.

If I become entangled in any “inordinate affection”; if things or places or people hold me back from obedience to my Lord, then I know nothing of Calvary love.

Sources:
Matthew Henry Commentary on 1 Cor 13
Dying as a Means of Loving, Part 2 - John Piper sermon
If - Amy Carmichael

Love: Selflessness

"Love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant or rude." - 1 Cor 13:4-5

This is a heavy verse. There's quite a lot to chew and reflect on in it. One of the things that leaves me in awe of the Love described to us in 1 Cor. 13 is that it is inexhaustible, not only in its description, but in its real-life application. Such Love searches our hearts and minds - a depth that we cannot reach (being unable to save and purify ourselves) - and sets us into a Higher Love - a fullness that we can never use up and are always growing deeper into (the wonder of having an Eternal God).
Matthew Henry and John Piper do well to point out the evils of the human heart (and what we often try to pass around as "love" in our lives) in contrast to the selfless Love of Christ.

III. Charity suppresses envy: It envieth not; it is not grieved at the good of others; neither at their gifts nor at their good qualities, their honours not their estates. If we love our neighbour we shall be so far from envying his welfare, or being displeased with it, that we shall share in it and rejoice at it. His bliss and sanctification will be an addition to ours, instead of impairing or lessening it. This is the proper effect of kindness and benevolence: envy is the effect of ill-will. The prosperity of those to whom we wish well can never grieve us; and the mind which is bent on doing good to all can never with ill to any.

IV. Charity subdues pride and vain-glory; It vaunteth not itself, is not puffed up, is not bloated with self-conceit, does not swell upon its acquisitions, nor arrogate to itself that honour, or power, or respect, which does not belong to it. It is not insolent, apt to despise others, or trample on them, or treat them with contempt and scorn. Those who are animated with a principle of true brotherly love will in honour prefer one another, Rom. xii. 10. They will do nothing out of a spirit of contention or vain-glory, but in lowliness of mind will esteem others better than themselves, Phil. ii. 3. True love will give us an esteem of our brethren, and raise our value for them; and this will limit our esteem of ourselves, and prevent the tumours of self-conceit and arrogance. These ill qualities can never grow out of tender affection for the brethren, nor a diffusive benevolence. The word rendered in our translation vaunteth itself bears other significations; nor is the proper meaning, as I can find, settled; but in every sense and meaning true charity stands in opposition to it. The Syriac renders it, non tumultuatur--does not raise tumults and disturbances. Charity calms the angry passions, instead of raising them. Others render it, Non perperàm et perversè agit--It does not act insidiously with any, seek to ensnare them, nor tease them with needless importunities and addresses. It is not forward, nor stubborn and untractable, nor apt to be cross and contradictory. Some understand it of dissembling and flattery, when a fair face is put on, and fine words are said, without any regard to truth, or intention of good. Charity abhors such falsehood and flattery. Nothing is commonly more pernicious, nor more apt to cross the purposes of true love and good will.

V. Charity is careful not to pass the bounds of decency; ouk aschemonei--it behaveth not unseemly; it does nothing indecorous, nothing that in the common account of men is base or vile. It does nothing out of place or time; but behaves towards all men as becomes their rank and ours, with reverence and respect to superiors, with kindness and condescension to inferiors, with courtesy and good-will towards all men. It is not for breaking order, confounding ranks bringing all men on a level; but for keeping up the distinction God has made between men, and acting decently in its own station, and minding its own business, without taking upon it to mend, or censure, or despise, the conduct of others. Charity will do nothing that misbecomes it.
- Matthew Henry

"...we have developed strategies for minimizing our failures and maximizing our successes. We tend to draw attention to the one and cover over the other. There are crude ways of doing this like overt bragging and boasting and developing a certain cocky swagger or talking with a kind of devil-may-care conceit or an in-your-face kind of arrogance.

In fact, in America we have turned the vice of bragging into a virtue of entertainment.

But there are also more subtle, refined, acceptable ways of expressing our pride—like bringing the conversation back again and again to ourselves and what we've done, or even more subtly by constantly talking about our woundedness or our sadness, and about how badly things have gone for us. Self-pity and boasting are both forms of pride: one is pride in the heart of the weak, and the other is pride in the heart of the strong.

Now Paul says, "Love does not brag and is not arrogant." That is, it does not speak much about itself and is not puffed up with its achievements or too concerned about its hurts.

Love is other-directed, not self-consumed.
Which means that a massive craving in our hearts must die, if we are going to love. We're not puffed up because we decide to be. We are puffed up by fallen sinful human nature. This comes from deep within who we are as corrupt human beings. If love is humble and other-directed, love is death.
The glory-loving, self-exalting, attention-seeking, whining, pouting, self-pitying me has to die.

This is why Jesus said, "Unless a grain of wheat falls into the ground and die it remains alone"—alone in its self-absorbed, self-asserting, self-enhancing prison—"but if it dies, it bears much fruit"—the fruit of love and all the people that will see Christ in that love."
- John Piper

I will leave the last words to Amy Carmichael....

If I myself dominate myself, if my thoughts revolve round myself, if I am so occupied with myself I rarely have “a heart at leisure from itself,” then I know nothing of Calvary love.

If, when I am able to discover something which has baffled others, I forget Him who revealeth the deep and secret things, and knoweth what is in the darkness and showeth it to us; if I forget that it was He who granted that ray of light to His most unworthy servant, then I know nothing of Calvary love.

If I want to be known as the doer of something that has proved the right thing, or as the one who suggested that it should be done, then I know nothing of Calvary love.

If the praise of man elates me and his blame depresses me; if I cannot rest under misunderstanding without defending myself; if I love to be loved more than to love, to be served more than to serve, then I know nothing of Calvary love.

Oh Father, save us from empty, self-filled loving. Fill us with Your Divine Love that rises above and beyond us.

Sources:
Matthew Henry's Commentary on 1 Corinthians 13

Dying as a Means of Loving, Part 2 - John Piper

If - Amy Carmichael

Crushing Grief

I shall return to my study on Love soon enough. I am preparing my next post, but, in the meantime, I have only this to offer...a little bit of my heart....

Does anything hurt or grieve a heart more than to know that a dearly loved one has returned to Egypt, following after the lusts of their own flesh, and unwilling to receive correction and wisdom? But greater is the grief in one's self for causing that dear one to stumble in such a way.
One recalls that much-awaited day when, after many agonizing prayers, a dear friend received the life of Christ. All was joy. All was joy. New life and hope burst forth!
But the shadow of self came and disrupted the growth of that new life. Through the indulging of self-interests and desires, the one who had prayed (one who had supposedly been further along in growth of wisdom), turned the other from continuing its reach to the Son. Like one, who after much waiting and watering over a seed, becomes impatient after seeing the flower in its first stage of budding and selfishly plucks it before it had the chance to truly blossom.
One is burdened to think that nothing could redeem this sin of turning a brother away from the Lord, which in turn led the brother to sin horribly, cruelly betraying the trust of many, and thrusting a dagger into the very heart of the one who had, in the past, watered it and loved it so.

Such grief is crushing to the human heart.

It is a weight that refuses to be lifted until it can be known that the lost soul will not utterly forsake the Lord, that the lost soul will be redeemed for the sake of His holy name.


In truth, I would give anything to return to a time when that soul was in my life...before sin separated us from each other...when that soul was listening to my words, regarding them with great interest. What I would give to have only spoken of the grace found walking daily in repentance and the life of Christ. What I would give to have only spoken truths of the Gospel to that soul. What I would give to have only spoken Biblical truths about dying to self and living to Christ. What I would give to have continued watering that soul with Scripture and gracious words filled with our Father's wisdom. What I would give to have never turned that soul from God to look upon me as their Greatest Good.
If I could have seen then as I see now...if I could have known then as I know now...I would have never dared to entertain that soul with such fleshly things...I would never have been so selfish. That bud was not for me. It was not mine. How could I have ever tread upon the glory of the Lord?

"...there are some among us who heart-break is that they have no sure and certain hope about their dearest, who have passed beyond reach of human love and influence. May I offer this which comes to me in the form of a question: Does to be out of reach of our love and influence mean to be out of reach of His who said, "I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto Me?" ?"
- Amy Carmichael

Here I am, resting in the hope that He who began a good work in that soul will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ (Phil 1:6).

Forgive me, Father.

Love: Long-Suffering

Love is patient and kind… – 1 Cor 13:4

I. It is long suffering--makrothymei. It can endure evil, injury, and provocation, without being filled with resentment, indignation, or revenge. It makes the mind firm, gives it power over the angry passions, and furnishes it with a persevering patience, that shall rather wait and wish for the reformation of a brother than fly out in resentment of his conduct. It will put up with many slights and neglects from the person it loves, and wait long to see the kindly effects of such patience on him.

II. It is kind--chresteuetai. It is benign, bountiful; it is courteous and obliging. The law of kindness is in her lips; her heart is large, and her hand open. She is ready to show favours and to do good. She seeks to be useful; and not only seizes on opportunities of doing good, but searches for them. This is her general character. She is patient under injuries, and apt and inclined to do all the good offices in her power. And under these two generals all the particulars of the character may be reduced.

Those paragraphs are taken from Matthew Henry's commentary.
There is a great deal of weight in these words; they hang heavily upon my heart. How many times in the day are we given the opportunity to love like that? I mean, to truly love like that with all our heart, mind, and soul? There are days that come with such opportunities - moment by moment. We call them "bad days." We call them "stressful." We call them "exhausting," "taxing," "awful," and the list goes on. Oh that we would bless the struggles, the annoyances, the frustrations, and those difficult souls that prick our hearts, reminding us that we must bear! If there is one thing I have most been learning in these past few months it is this:

"It makes the mind firm, gives it power over the angry passions, and furnishes it with a persevering patience, that shall rather wait and wish for the reformation of a brother than fly out in resentment of his conduct."

All my days seems marked with this reminder from Love. It presses me to repentance. My heart would ache from the hurt of past lovers and, in that pain, become weak and listless. But the Spirit of Him who is in me is greater than the one in the world (1 John 4:4) - it pushes me forward, it silences my flesh and urges me forward to gird my soul with His kind of stronger love for my fellow brethren, to pray in earnest over their souls!

Lord, let such love permeate all that I am!

"...wherever there is love there is pain—love suffers long (makrothumei) . . . endures all things, bears all things.” This is realism and therefore comforting. If two people, or two thousand people, are in a relationship of love, all will be hurt. And all will need to “suffer long” and endure and bear. It struck us as amazing that this was so prominent in Paul’s treatment of love. So we prayed hard that we would be good lovers in this way (giving less and taking less offense)."

- John Piper

If I have not the patience of my Saviour with souls who grow slowly; if I know little of travail (a sharp and painful thing) till Christ be fully formed in them, then I know nothing of Calvary love.

If I have not compassion on my fellow servant even as my Lord had pity on me, then I know nothing of Calvary love.

If, in dealing with one who does not respond, I weary of the strain, and slip from under the burden, then I know nothing of Calvary love.

If my attitude be one of fear, not faith, about one who has disappointed me; if I say, “Just what I expected,” if a fall occurs, then I know nothing of Calvary love.

If I take offence easily, if I am content to continue in a cool unfriendliness, though friendship be possible, then I know nothing of Calvary love.

If a sudden jar can cause me to speak an impatient, unloving word, then I know nothing of Calvary love.

If I feel I injured when another lays to my charge things that I know not, forgetting that my Sinless Saviour trod this path to the end, then I know nothing of Calvary love.

If I say, “Yes, I forgive, but I cannot forget,” as though the God, who twice a day washes all the sands on all the shores of all the world, could not wash such memories from my mind, then I know nothing of Calvary love.

If monotony tries me, and I cannot stand drudgery; if stupid people fret me and the little ruffles set me on edge; if I make much of the trifles of life, then I know nothing of Calvary love.

If the love that “alone maketh light of every heavy thing, and beareth evenly every uneven thing” is not my heart’s desire, then I know nothing of Calvary love.
- Amy Carmichael

Sources:
Matthew Henry’s Commentary on the Whole Bible

What Love Does and Does Not Do - John Piper

If - Amy Carmichael

The Full Glory of Love

Love is not love
Which alters when it alteration finds,
Or bends with the remover to remove:
O no! it is an ever-fixed mark
That looks on tempests and is never shaken
- Shakespeare, Sonnet 116

Many are well-acquainted with these words. They fall over us in a splendid sigh that is filled with hopes for such a love to prove so true. Love: The great marvel of souls. It is either zealously sought after or vehemently rejected. Either way, all souls have, in some way, been affected and touched by the idea, desire, or feeling of Love. Time after time, we think we have grasped it. We convince ourselves that we finally know it, that we truly understand it. It is so beautiful that we believe that it can transcend all time. To the romantic, Love is the ultimate God - self-sufficient and eternal. And then somewhere along the ecstasy of such a journey, it dies. It always dies. Even for those whom it has proven true, through many years or many trials, there comes a moment when it ceases to be.

Recall the scene in the film, Sense & Sensibility, when Marianne staggers over the hill facing Allenham (the estate of her lover and betrayer, Sir Willoughby) and recites Sonnet 116 in remembrance of what she and Willoughby once shared in "true Love." The tears streaming from her eyes are mingled with the icy rain falling around her. She stands there, unfeeling of the harsh elements that she finds herself in. In the love that she knew, there only awaited death. To her, there was nothing of value, worth, or meaning outside of that love. She was ready to die for it; to die a death that simply amounted to nothing. Instead of becoming a conqueror through love, she became conquered by love.
So it is with many of us. Never are we victorious. We are merely victims of that which we faithfully follow and call love. And like fools being led to the slaughter, we would rather meet that same piercing defeat again and again than ever dare to consider that maybe that "Love" is not truly Love. That, perhaps, our understanding, vision, and ideas of love are distorted, artificial, and empty. That true Love is not meant for base fools such as ourselves, who fondle cheap trifles and fanciful ideals that fall short of eternal worth.
And then our gaze is drawn ever upward, held captive, and fixed upon one whom we despise to think of as the fulfillment of the purest, truest Love.

Calvary, the word pierces even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit.
It is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart. It searches our love for our beloved. It discovers the quality of that love.
An Indian refiner puts his glistening gold into a small earthen crucible.
He blows up the fire, the grey scum floats to the surface of the gold.
The grey scum of selfishness in our human love will float to the surface of our soul and be discovered by us, if we are willing to allow the Refiner to blow up His fire.
There is a rooted possessiveness about much of human affection. “My loved one for myself” - that is the underlying thought of much that looks so beautiful.
God’s thought was different.
The love that our Lord asks for us is different.
His Father’s love was a giving love.
- Amy Carmichael

On the evening of His betrayal He did not desire for us the less costly lover, the natural love which shrinks from a hard way for a beloved one, and never contemplates anything approaching shame.
Human love with its loopholes of escape from the supreme demand was not in His mind, It was Divine love that He desired should be in us, the love wherewith He Himself was loved, Divine love with all its agonizing possibilities - but with great certainty of eternal joy.
We have lowered the standard. That which should be usual has become so unusual that we are surprised and stirred, and write books about these bright particular stars in our firmament who have shone mightily in loving. Such lives should be the rule, the others the exception. Have we in our refusal of the Crucifix refused also the Cross? We do refuse the Crucifix. The sign of our faith, as Westcott said long ago, is an empty Cross, an empty tomb; He is not here, He is risen. But it is strangely possible to decorate that empty Cross, to smother it in flowers, even (but surely this borders on blasphemy) to use the symbol as an ornament. And yet the great law stands: “Whosoever doth not bear his Cross, and come after Me, cannot be disciple.”
We who follow the Crucified are not here to make a pleasant thing of life; we are called to suffering for the sake of a suffering, sinful world. The Lord forgive us our shameful evasions and hesitations.
His brow was crowned with thorns; do we seek rose-buds for our crowning?
His hands were pierced with nails; are our hands ringed with jewels?
His feet were bare and bound; do our feet walk delicately?
What do we know of travail? Of tears that scald before we fall? of heart-break?
Of being scorned?
God forgive us our love of ease.
God forgive us that so often we turn our faces from a life that is even remotely like His.
Forgive us that we all but worship comfort, the delight of the presence of loved ones, possessions, treasure on earth.
Far, far from our prayers too often is any thought of prayer for a love which will lead us to give one whom we love to follow our Lord to Gethsemane, to Calvary - perhaps because we have never been there ourselves.
Lord, we kneel beside Thee now, with hands folded between Thy hands as a child’s are folded in its mother’s. We would follow the words of Thy prayer, dimly understanding their meaning, but wanting to understand….
"That the love wherewith Thou hast loved Me may be in them, and I in them.” (John 17:26)
- Amy Carmichael

The natural loves are not self-sufficient. Something else, at first vaguely described as "decency and common sense," but later revealed as goodness, and finally as the whole Christian life in one particular relation, must come to the help of the mere feeling if the feeling is to be kept sweet.
To say this is not to belittle the natural loves but to indicate where their real glory lies. It is no disparagement to a garden to say that it will not fence and weed itself, nor prune its own fruit trees, nor roll and cuts its owns lawns. A garden is a good thing but that is not the sort of goodness it has. It will remain a garden, as distinct from a wilderness, only if someone does all these things to it. Its real glory is of quite a different kind. The very fact that it needs constant weeding and pruning bears witness to that glory. It teems with life. It glows with colour and smells like heaven and puts forward at every hour of a summer day beauties which man could never have created and could not even, on his own resources, have imagined. If you want to see the difference between its contribution and the gardener's, put the commonest weed it grows side by side with his hoes, rakes, shears, and packet of weed killer; you have put beauty, energy and fecundity beside dead, sterile things. Just so, our "decency and common sense" show grey and deathlike beside the geniality of love. And when the garden is in its full glory the gardener's contributions to that glory will still have been in a sense paltry compared with those of nature. Without life springing from the earth, without rain, light and heat descending from the sky, he could do nothing. When he has done all, he has merely encouraged here and discouraged there, powers and beauties that have a different source. But his share, though small, is indispensable and laborious. When God planted a garden He set man over it and set the man under Himself. When He planted the garden of our nature and caused the flowering, fruiting loves to grow there, He set our will to "dress" them. Compared with them it is dry and cold. And unless His grace comes down, like the rain and the sunshine, we shall use this tool to little purpose. But its laborious - and largely negative - services are indispensable. If they were needed when the garden was still Paradisal, how much more now when the soil has gone sour and the worst weeds seem to thrive on it best? But heaven forbid we should work in the spirit of prigs and Stoics. While we hack and prune we know very well that what we are hacking and pruning is big with a splendour and vitality which our rational will could never of itself have supplied. To liberate that splendour, to let it become fully what it is trying to be, to have tall trees instead of scrubby tangles, and sweet apples instead of crabs, is part of our purpose.

The loves prove that they are unworthy to take the place of God by the fact that they cannot even remain themselves and do what they promise to do without God's help....Even for their own sakes the loves must submit to be second things if they are to remain the things they want to be. In this yoke lies their true freedom; they "are taller when they bow." For when God rules in a human heart, though He may sometimes have to remove certain of its native authorities altogether, He often continues others in their offices and, by subjecting their authority to His, gives it for the first time a firm basis.

To love at all is to be vulnerable. Love anything, and your heart will certainly be wrung and possibly broken. If you want to make sure of keeping it intact, you must give your heart to no one, not even to an animal. Wrap it carefully round with hobbies and little luxuries; avoid all entanglements; lock it up safe in the casket or coffin of your selfishness. But in that casket – safe, dark, motionless, airless – it will change. It will not be broken; it will become unbreakable, impenetrable, irredeemable. The alternative to tragedy, or at least to the risk of tragedy, is damnation. The only place outside Heaven where you can be perfectly safe from all the dangers and perturbations of love is Hell.
Christ did not teach and suffer that we might become, even in the natural loves, more careful of our own happiness. If a man is not uncalculating towards the earthly beloveds whom he has seen, he is none the more likely to be so towards God whom he has not. We shall draw nearer to God, not by trying to avoid the sufferings inherent in all loves, but by accepting them and offering them to Him; throwing away all defensive armour. If our hearts need to be broken, and if He chooses this as the way in which they should break, so be it.

We are all receiving Charity. There is something in each of us that cannot be naturally loved. It is no one's fault if they do not so love it. Only the lovable can be naturally loved. You might as well ask people to like the taste of rotten bread or the sound of a mechanical drill. We can be forgiven, and pitied, and loved in spite of it, with Charity; no other way. All who have good parents, wives, husbands, or children, may be sure that at some times - and perhaps at all times in respect of some one particular trait or habit - they are receiving Charity, are loved not because they are lovable but because Love Himself is in those who love them.
Thus God, admitted to the human heart, transforms not only Gift-Love but Need-Love; not only our Need-love of Him, but our Need-love of one another. This is of course not the only thing that can happen. He may come on what seems to us a more dreadful mission and demand that a natural love be totally renounced. A high and terrible vocation, like Abraham's, may constrain a man to turn his back on his own people and his father's house. Eros, directed to a forbidden object, may have to be sacrifice. In such instances, the process, though hard to endure, is easy to understand. What we are more likely to overlook is the necessity for a transformation even when the natural love is allowed to continue.
In such a case the Divine Love does not substitute itself for the natural - as if we had to throw away our silver to make room for the gold. The natural loves are summoned to become modes of Charity while also remaining the natural loves they were.
One sees here at once a sort of echo rhyme or corollary to the Incarnation itself. And this need not surprise us, for the Author of both is the same. As Christ is Perfect God and perfect Man, the natural loves are called to become Charity and also perfect natural loves. As God becomes Man "Not by conversion of the Godhead into the flesh, but by taking of the Manhood into God." so here; Charity does not dwindle into merely natural love but natural love is taken up into, made the tuned and obedient instrument of, Love Himself.”

And yet, I believe, the necessity for the conversion is inexorable; at least, if our natural loves are to enter the heavenly life. That they can enter it most of us in fact believe. We may hope that the resurrection of the body means also the resurrection of what may be called our “greater body”; the general fabric of our earthly life with its affections and relationships. But only on a condition; not a condition arbitrarily laid down by God, but one necessarily inherent in the character of Heaven: nothing can enter there which cannot become heavenly. “Flesh and blood,” mere nature, cannot inherit that Kingdom. Man can ascend to Heaven only because the Christ, who died and ascended to Heaven, is “formed in him.” Must we not suppose that the same is true of a man’s loves? Only those into which Love Himself has entered will ascend to Love Himself. And these can be raised with Him only if they have, in some degree and fashion, shared His death; if the natural element in them has submitted – year after year, or in some sudden agony – to transmutation. The fashioned of this world passes away. The very name of nature implies the transitory. Natural loves can hope for eternity only in so far as they have allowed themselves to be taken into the eternity of Charity; have at least allowed the process to begin here on earth, before the night comes when no man can work. And the process will always involve a kind of death. There is no escape. In my love for wife or friend the only eternal element is the transforming presence of Love Himself. By that presence, if at all, the other elements may hope, as our physical bodies hope, to be raised from the dead. For this only is holy in them, this only is the Lord.
- C.S. Lewis, The Four Loves

Dearest Lord, transform our feeble hearts. Transform these lowly, natural loves.
That which you have justified, Lord, glorify!
Purify these loves and make them victorious through Thy Divine Love!
May our loves on earth be seated beneath Thee, reflections of Thy Glory!
Through Him, who loved us, we are more than conquerors in all things.

Simplicity, Names, Love

"There is nothing like staying at home for real comfort." - Jane Austen

I awoke this morning with a fresh resolve to bake something! It has been awhile since I have had a free day to myself, especially to bake a treat. I decided to try a delicious Dutch Apple Bread recipe (as seen in my photo above). Thanks to Mia for the wonderful recipe! It was so delicious!! I enjoyed it during afternoon tea with my sister whilst reading chapters 20 and 21 in Sense and Sensibility. I believe it's my third or fourth time reading S&S and I find myself more captivated by the story this time than ever before! Oh, it was glorious to be at home all day long! I am not ungrateful for my college studies, but it's just very exhausting to be at school six days a week. My heart longs for simple living. School just complicates everything.

I have been reflecting on my name recently. It's been frustrating to me that my parents meant to name me Erika with a K but never got around to changing it on my birth certificate so on official documents it is always Erica with a C. According to the state, I'm Erica, not Erika. You wouldn't think that one letter could make such a huge issue, but it surely does. I have always much preferred Erika for it's roughness in appearance. Does it not suggest a bold independence and romantic, warrior-like personality? Whereas, a C gives a softer appearance of a submissive, calm, and gentle soul. I usually prefer to sign my name as Erika wherever I go, but when it comes to signing documents I am forced to keep with the C. To most people, I am Erica - shy, sweet, quiet. To those who are my family and closest friends, I am Erika - much too passionate, excessively romantic, and terribly independent (not for my best, I assure you). If it has ever confused anyone as to why I go by both names, depending on the situation, now you all know why. Most of the time I am forced to with the C when I am signing for something. It gets me irritated every time; why couldn't my parents just have done it right from the beginning? haha! I could very well just change it now, but you know what a taxing process these supposedly simple tasks are. Having to change one letter in my name just doesn't seem worth the effort...but it would comfort me knowing that I can sign it as EriKa whenever and wherever I want. Nevertheless, I cannot help but think of there being a more divine purpose for this small mistake in my name. It has made me consider keeping the C and accept it as the way I was meant to be named (along with cultivating the type of personality it suggests - more submissive and gentle-hearted) and yet I cannot help but prefer Erika. Do you not see what a dilemma this has become?!
I realize I think too much on these little issues. Anyway, for the sake of fun, I placed a search on my name and came up with a bunch of fascinating results:
Erika is Old Norse for "ever powerful" or "ruler of the people."
It is of Old Norse origin, and its meaning is "forever or alone, ruler".
The Scandinavian form of the name means Ruler of All.
The English form of the name means Brave Ruler.
The Germanic origin means Honorable Ruler.
The Latin origin is known in English as the plant Heather.
Erika is also the name of a yellow German flower.
Erica has 28 variant forms of the name.

A brief analysis of the name (this made me laugh; this is me in a nutshell):
Your name of Erica makes you very idealistic and generous, with the strong desire to uplift humanity leading you into situations where you can express your desire to serve others.

You want to assume responsibilities and to look after people; however, you can become too involved in other people's problems and tend to worry.

Your name gives you a natural desire to express along artistic and musical lines.

You desire a settled home and family life, and are expressive and attentive to your loved ones.

Although the name Erica creates the urge to be reliable and responsible, we emphasize that it causes an emotional intensity that is hard to control.

This name, when combined with the last name, can frustrate happiness, contentment, and success, as well as cause health weaknesses in the nervous system, worry, and mental tension.
Emphasis on emotional intensity. haha...oh dear!

I have taken up a weighty topic in my Biblical studies as of late: Love. The vastness of it is gloriously humbling. I shall continue my discipleship posts with any noteworthy reflections or quotations that I come upon, but I find myself pulled to search out True Love - to know it, to live it, to give it. I was very stupid once to think I knew it. It took a sin, a betrayal, and then the power of the Cross to open my eyes to reality. I have only ever seen a distorted, self-seeking reflection of it. And I myself lived that way for a time. Only after my heart had been pierced and shattered did I realize my great ignorance. It was only then that I came to the Lord in desperation, "Father, make me a student of Thy Love. I need it! I must know it or I shall never truly live!" And ever since that day that I cried from a place of deep, unimaginable pain, by the grace of God, I have awoken everyday to the fresh resolve: Lord, teach me Your Love. I am, most humbly, a student of His Love.

But man's love for God, from the very nature of the case, must always be very largely, and must often be entirely, a Need-Love. This is obvious when we implore forgiveness for our sins or support in our tribulations. But in the long run it is perhaps even more apparent in our growing - for it ought to be growing - awareness that our whole being by its very nature is one vast need; incomplete, preparatory, empty yet cluttered, crying out for Him who can untie things that are now knotted together and tie up things that are still dangling loose.- C.S. Lewis

"There are times when something comes into our lives which is charged with love in such a way that it seems to open the Eternal to us for a moment, or at least some of the Eternal Things, and the greatest of these is love.
It may be a small and intimate touch upon us or our affairs, light as the touch of the dawn-wind on the leaves of the tree, something not to be captured and told to another in words. But we know that it is our Lord. And then perhaps the room where we are, with its furniture and books and flowers, seems less “present” than His Presence, and the heart is drawn into that sweetness of which the old hymn sings.

The love of Jesus, what it is
None but His loved ones know.

Or is it the dear human love about us that bathes us as in summer seas and rests us through and through. Can we ever cease to wonder at the love of our companions? And then suddenly we recognize our Lord in them. It is His love they lavish upon us. O Love of God made manifest in Thy lovers, we worship Thee.
Or (not often, perhaps, for dimness seems to be more wholesome for us here, but sometimes, because our Lord is very merciful) it is given to us to look up through the blue air and see the love of God. And yet, after all, how little we see! “That ye may be able to comprehend what is the breadth and length and depth and height and to know the love of Christ which passeth knowledge” – the words are too great for us. What do we comprehend, what do we know? Confounded and abased, we enter into the Rock and hide us in the dust before the glory of the Majesty of love – the love whose symbol is the Cross.
And a question pierces then: What do I know of Calvary love?"

Some of my sources for study:
Studying Love (part one)
Studying Love (part two)
The Greatest of These Is Love (A sermon series by John Piper)
If - Amy Carmichael
The Four Loves - C.S. Lewis

Simple Woman's Daybook

Outside my window...another sunny day, except this time it's nice and chilly out!
I am thinking...about a Bible school that I was recently accepted by for a 10-week course next summer (in Windsor, CO). I am overwhelmed with so many emotions - excitement for being accepted, joy for being able to meet some of the other participants online and getting to know them, and yet discouraged because money has proven to be a problem and I realize how much I need to have faith that God will provide for this path in my life.
I am thankful for...this wonderful past weekend that I had spent with friends.
I am wearing...a flowy, long white skirt and a dress-like top filled with ornate, flower designs.
I am creating...nothing at the moment. I have a list of things I would like to create, but I haven't the time at the present.
I am going...to school today: Choir, voice rehearsal with piano accompanist, and Digital Audio Workstation class.
I am reading…Deuteronomy and Morning & Evening by Charles Spurgeon.
I am hoping...that the Lord's power will be made perfect in my weaknesses.
I am hearing...monks singing Latin chants.
One of my favorite things...simple days.
A few plans for the rest of the week: Many of my plans are school-related. It's not very exciting to report.
Here is picture thought I am sharing...This is what I wish I could do all day today:


Thanks to the 'Simple Woman'