Gifts

I'm drinking my coffee on the couch this morning still thanking God for a relaxing, much needed long holiday weekend with my husband where we could just be quiet and do nothing. I remember over the last few years many times praying for days like that because they always seemed to be rushing by so very quickly. I loved it and am missing it greatly of course, but am also expressly aware I need to relish this specific gift of right now - the blessing of some lunches and coffee with friends, reading, thinking, relaxing, getting some house cleaning done, being present in the moment, and getting through the storm damage/coming changes with our home with my sanity intact!
Isaiah 65:24 - I will answer them before they even call to me. While they are still talking about their needs, I will go ahead and answer their prayers!
I am simply reminded today that answered prayers dont look familiar, but they are answered none the less by a familiar friend and Savior who knows us better than we know ourselves :)

Marisa

Chick Chat with Marisa

Seeking What Isn't Hidden

In listening to two different people speak in two days I heard a common phrase and thought by both... "seek the face of God, not just His hand".
Now when I have things like this happen, I try my best to really pay attention. What are the similarities if any in the people? In the context or situations? Was there a common third party around both times? You know, any questions I can ask that will reveal the lesson, the message, or the heeding whether intended for me or for someone else. To see what exactly God might be saying.
Earlier tonight I looked up a couple of verses God seemed to be leading me to.
Psalm 105:4 says Seek the LORD, and his strength: seek his face evermore.
'Paniym' is the Hebrew word in this verse for face. That word means "face, or faces", the "person", or "presence". (I love the plural use of faces here, as in the Holy Trinity, the three complete persons of the God Head!)
And 1 Chronicles 16:11 which is Seek the LORD and his strength, seek his face continually.
This verse also uses, in the original Hebrew, the word 'Paniym'. Further research revealed this word also means "before and behind", and "from beforetime"
WOW! What a magnificent and humble reminder as I ran my finger along the lines on the page - His person, His presence, has been since before time.... always His presence has been. That's a lot of person, a lot of presence.
And as long as He has been and will be, ever before and for ever more, to seek THAT Holy presence and person of God... WOW!!!! That's huge. That's an ever evolving, never ending journey. Thats a story with unlimited chapters and words and phrases to drink in. It's to become more familiar with who God is. What His eyes are delighted by. What they see. To understand what makes the laugh lines appear at the corners. What His ears are tickled by. What they long to hear. What God's very lips delivers in so many ways. Where His kisses of blessings are. What His word says. How He speaks in ever thing that exists. The very features and facets of His face if you will :)
I am overwhelmed!!!
Two definitions for the Hebrew word 'Darash' (Seek) are "to frequent", and "look for with care"... there's an urgency in that to me!
This is what I feel Him whispering to my very soul to remind me tonight - to earnestly seek His very face and presence, to want and allow Him to be both truly before me and behind me - my provision and my Jehovah Jireh, to know Him even more intimately, to allow His very presence to be so deeply embedded in my every moment, to remember that when I allow the ultimate romance that is ours and ours alone blossom it's then that I will see His hand truly moving in my life the way He desires it to and wants to show me!
Oh Father, I do want more of you, to not be distracted by what are very good things so that I miss the very great things you have for me... there is so much to love about you - I want to know it all! Help me focus, and seek your face both in my waking moments, and even as I dream and am at rest in the night. Continually reveal more of your self to me - it can never be enough!

Marisa

Chick Chat with Marisa

The Farmers Markets Return!

If you're like me and LOVE getting the freshest veggies, fruit, pastries, cheeses, and more that are made right here in East TN and stimulate our own local economy then here is a list of East TN Farmers Markets now open!
They are great places to discover local artists too offering crafts, jewelry, clothes, purses and more.

My First Love?

I was reading today's devotional page from "Jesus Calling" by Sarah Young as I sipped my coffee and it hit home in a powerful way as it always does.
It reflected my immediate thoughts and reaction in the first moments after the storms that ruined my roof, my attic, my ceilings, my things. Hmmmmm... see a pattern emerging here? When our power and daylight returned and as I looked around my first thoughts were so anxiety ridden and focused on ME and what I lost... how would I replace this and that, what will I do, how will MY things be salvaged?
REALLY??? Sheesh. I'm still breathing when so many aren't, when so many lost everything, some even lost loved ones. What I see around me are things. But first and foremost EVERYTHING has come from HIM - EVERYTHING is HIS. If HE allows them to go then so be it. A choice to praise His name, right?

Psalm 16:11 You have made known to me the path of life; you will fill me with joy in your presence, with eternal pleasures at your right hand.
What if the eternal pleasure His hand desires means we lose some things to acomplish it? Is our path in life not placing our hope and trust in Him?


Today's page for May 3 says this... "You cannot serve two masters. If I am truly your Master, you will desire to please Me above all others. If pleasing people is your goal, you will be enslaved to them. People can be harsh taskmasters when you give them this power over you.
If I am the Master of your life, I will also be your First Love. Your serving is rooted and grounded in My vast, unconditional Love for you. The lower you bow down before Me, the higher I lift you up into intimate relationship with Me. The Joy of living in My Presence outshines all other pleasures. I want you to reflect My joyous Light by living in increasing intimacy with Me."

Here's the thing - I can be a harsh task master to myself - the harshest even - because what I consider a priority can enslave me more easily than anything else.

This may be cliche to some, but oh friends - may we all lean in to an intimacy with Jesus so overwhelming that in any situation, in every aspect of our day, and at every crossroad whatever HE is looking for from us becomes our first choice, that He is our next thought, and that desiring His presence is what overides all else. Praise His Name this day that He loves us with an unfailing love and is the only one who gives and takes away!

Marisa

Chick Chat with Marisa

Artistry Waiting To Happen

Going with my friends Amanda and Erin to a local painting class called Sips and Strokes here in Knoxville during my two week Birthday Extravaganza was something I had looked forward to for several weeks but actually started with an unexpected profound moment for me.
We met up at S&S eager to have a new experience together and were very excited. We each had picked out a different picture we wanted to replicate, and as the instructor handed us each our own blank canvas I was reminded of a statement I had heard for so many years that says basically "our lives are the canvas God paints His pictures on".
He does paint the stories of our lives on a canvas I think - blank material stretched and ready to receive, awaiting brushes strokes that create the chapters in HIS big story.
But what struck me this day was the blank card I was also handed. The rectangle that was blank and white. A sturdy piece of stock material intended to hold the colors we would use. Our instructor, Will, took us over to the colors in large pump bottles where he would apply to the card whatever colors we were to use, depending on what picture we wanted to create.
I then started thinking that maybe the canvas isn't us. That it actually encompasses so much more. That it mirrors us, those around us, the people and things that impact us, the ones we impact, even nature itself and how we impact it - everything! It all becomes the picture on the canvas. Its the world around us that we touch in some way.
So what I was now suddenly considering was this: that we're actually the colors that make up that picture.
The colors that get stroked, poured, flicked, rolled, and sponged on the canvas. Material that absorbs me. Colors I provide God to dip His brush in.
Because I have free choice maybe I choose the color on even given day, in any given moment by my intent, my actions, my reactions, and my motive of heart.
I can be a vibrant exciting red and orange, soothing green, calming blue, cheery yellow - or I can be a big old blob of dreary gray, an envious or jealous shade of green, a dirty brown, or icky black that gets applied.
We are all vessels that are being used, so now the question creeps in my mind: at any given time who am I allowing to help me be what color?
Its not hard to imagine that my choice and action could mirror itself in color - but am I allowing God to influence me or am I allowing the enemy to "color my decision"?

This weekend at the Extraordinary Women's Conference in Johnson City, speaker Lysa Terkhurst said that the first four letters of the name "Messiah" reminded her that God takes our "mess" and touches it with healing and uses it to make us beautiful.
I am a walking breathing testimony that that is indeed truth :)

2 Corinthians 12:9
But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me.

I'm praying today that I allow myself to be a lovely color for God's brush to rest on as He paints, but thanking Him that He uses all the colors I can be, irregardless, to accomplish His masterpiece and that He loves me anyway

Marisa

Chick Chat with Marisa

Having the Right Posture

Head high, shoulders back, back straight, eyes ahead... flash back to the charm school/etiquette classes my mom took me kicking and screaming to in 6th grade, or how I am to praise God in a trial?
BOTH!
The Jonah study I am in the middle of now just nailed me between the eyes.

But I, with shouts of grateful praise,
will sacrifice to you.
What I have vowed I will make good.
I will say, ‘Salvation comes from the LORD.’”
And the LORD commanded the fish, and it vomited Jonah onto dry land.
Jonah 2:9-10

Sacrificial praise? Jonah is praying IN deliverance not FOR deliverance? Wait a minute - that means I fully and whole heartily thank God for the storm. That means I praise Him that He is delivering me within that storm. That the hard place indeed IS my provision, not just the consequence I really deserve.

Wow, I remember with no trouble at all the outcome of those charm school classes. I went with a determined posture of unbending resentment. The result? Utter failure.

God help me take on a posture today of sacrificial praise... In my prayers, with my head high above the waves and my eyes looking straight to where my help comes from. And in my verbal gratitude of a God who is saving me, inside and outside the storm... alway returning me safely to land!

Marisa

Chick Chat with Marisa

Bold Transparency

I have never been more keenly aware as I am right now of just how important we are to one another when we are as real as we can be about the "us" most never see.

Last night after spending time with a particular gathering of women and sharing stories of how we all saw transparency begin to breed freedom as we served at the last Esther Experience, I awoke with the same urgency in my spirit...
And then He brought me conversations even this morning with women whose hearts are breaking over those they dearly love that are being held captive - and my heart is literally pounding with that urgency.

Oh Father God, that we would begin to understand how timely are the ways we serve one another with our testimonies! If we could only see how much we free one another when we reveal darkness exposed to your light - it is here where the healing is!

As I read Galatians 6:2 this morning that says "Share each other's burdens, and in this way obey the law of Christ" I had to return to Galatians 5:14 "The entire law is summed up in a single command: "Love your neighbor as yourself."
Keywords - "share" and "love"...
Oh God, to be a conduit that you use to release the grip of what holds those around me by sharing what You are and have brought me through is the most powerful way I can ever love!
Ever prayed 'God please use me'?
He will in the simplest but the most profound way possible if you will move through your daily life ready to share with others the stories behind why you can now say "Look -look at my God! See how magnificent He is and how much He loves me and is saving me, and is healing and restoring me! Look at how I cannot live without Him! Look at who and what I was and how He loves me anyway! Look at Him and what He is using for beauty and strength! DO YOU SEE MY GOD?!"

Ephesians 3:8-12 says "Though I am the least deserving of all God’s people, he graciously gave me the privilege of telling all people about the endless treasures available to them in Christ. I am chosen to explain to everyone this mysterious plan that God, the Creator of all things, had kept secret from the beginning. God’s purpose in all this was to use us to display his wisdom in its rich variety to all the unseen rulers and authorities in the heavenly places. This was his eternal plan, which he carried out through Christ Jesus our Lord. Because of Christ and our faith in him we can now come boldly and confidently into God’s presence."

To keep what He has and is doing to myself does not love those He loves and is something I can't do... COME BOLDLY AND WITH CONFIDENCE AND REVEAL WHAT HE HAS COVERED WITH HIS BLOOD!!!!

Marisa

Chick Chat with Marisa

Looking for Joy and other Clues

Joy. Having it, finding it, knowing it, wanting it. It can be so elusive sometimes - we can get so far from it. Life presents many obstacles to it, right? Hurts, anger, complacency, guilt, and even busyness - thats always a favorite tool of the enemy for a lot of things.

I think its no mistake that I picked up the little book 'Joy for a Woman's Soul:Promises to Refresh Your Spirit' with excerpts from the Women of Faith ladies a week ago and have been thumbing through it just a couple days before having lunch with my friend Leslie Vogel. Because one of the things that came up over our quiche, stuffed pears, chicken salad, and raspberry tea at LuLu's Tea Room was joy.

I was in Lifeway Christian Store the other day, just perusing through the gift books, journals and such, and I remember saying in my mind and my heart - "God, I would really like to have something in addition to the bible study I am working through right now that would allow you to say some things I may just need to hear, if not for me then for someone else... something I can keep handy, keep close, and that will be that extra connection"


Then I had lunch with Leslie. Then I got home, picked up that book, and suddenly remembered another conversation from the day before... my friend Pat Wade and I were at her house talking about a lot of things, but they all seemed to lead to the fact that there are so many women right now being tripped up by things that keep them from living the life God desires for them - keeping them from living a life of 'JOY'...

Yep - I think He's speaking, and I think I better be listening :)

Marisa

Chick Chat with Marisa

Getting Caught Red Handed

I'm 7 again. My face is flushed. My heart is racing. I'm embarrassed. I'm scared. And I am in trouble.

I am immediately back in the old Sears building on Central Avenue with my mom and dad. I can smell and even see the candy counter where I used to press my face up against the glass in excitement.

Back then I would enter the building and would be assaulted by the overwhelming smell of chocolate. My excitement was about more than I could stand because I knew that when we were finished shopping I would get to go with my parents to that huge glass cased counter in the center of that floor and watch as the gentleman behind it in his red and white stripped shirt and crisp white paper hat filled one white bag with chocolate covered raisins and one white bag with chocolate covered peanuts. I then would get to sit between my parents in that green country squire station wagon with the wood paneling on the way home, where on that front bench seat I would get to reach into both bags filling my cheeks full of delicious candy goodness!

But what I was remembering most right now as I listened to Priscella Shire in one of the Jonah bible study dvd sessions was one specific Saturday afternoon before I got to the candy counter. On this particular trip to Sears I got into trouble. Big trouble.

'Garanimals' were huge then. Tags hung from each item in a line of children's clothes that allowed us to pick out our own outfits without looking like little freaks! All we had to do was match up a lion tagged pair of shorts with a lion tagged skirt, or a zebra tagged pair of pants with a zebra tagged shirt and the colors and fabrics would automatically match! Parents could relax and let the independent streaks run free in children who wanted to dress themselves before school and church and know that other parents would not question their sanity.

I loved Garanimals because I got to finally be a big girl and pick out my own clothes! And on this particular Saturday I was pretending I was shopping alone. I was pretending that I had driven that station wagon to Sears, that I would get to go and tell the man behind the counter that today I would just have the chocolate covered peanuts and raisins mixed together in one huge bag. That I was out for a day on the town all by my big girl self.
In fact today I was feeling so grown up that I decided that, even though my mom had told me to stay in the two aisles of Garanimals racks, I was big enough to walk to the candy counter and look through all the glass cases by myself and pretend I was trying to decide what other exotic candies I may try on my next trip into the city. After all, if I was dressing myself I was big enough to maybe branch out and try other chocolate covered delicacies. I would only stay there a couple of minutes anyway.

This day is what I was remembering at this moment in bible study. The day when I decided to leave the two aisles I had been given permission to roam free in and venture out clear on the other side of the giant candy counter where I was envisioning the chocolate covered orange slices and caramel turtles being dropped into separate white bags. It was then, on that day that my mother and fathers voices interrupted my day dream as they yelled my name - loudly.
They had been looking frantically for me. I was busted. Caught red handed in defiance of what they had told me I was allowed to do and not do. They had told me the two aisles they gave me free reign was where I should stay. No where else was I to be. Right there and there alone. But in my new found independence I decided to stretch those limits. That was a bad move.
I was snatched up, spun around, my back pressed up against that candy counter, and was berated by my mom and dad as they preceded to LOUDLY machine gun fire questions at me... Did I not know I had just given every pervert within 5 miles a chance to kidnap me? Did I not know that little kids get taken all the time? Was I trying to give them a heart attack? Did I want to be killed by strangers? How could I have disobeyed? Did I not realize how much they loved me and what they would do if something had happened to me? Did I not know how scared they were when they stepped one aisle over from where I was to be and could not find me? Did I not know that what they told me to do and not do was for my own good?
My face flushed, my heart raced, I was SOOOOO embarrassed, and everyone was looking at me. Every adult, child, and Sears employee within ear shot had gathered around and was looking at me.
Oh my, I just wanted to die. And I had disappointed my mom and dad. I was caught red handed in disobedience. I felt swallowed up by what I had done, by my own guilt and unwanted attention it had brought me in this moment. And as the questions they fired at me began to sink in I was swallowed up by the realization and fear of what could have happened to me.

Priscilla Shire shares in one particular session of the Jonah study that we often see the big fish that swallowed Jonah as part of the consequence of his disobedience to God in not going to Nineveh as the Lord has asked. I can see why we would think that. Imagine living in the dark, smelly, gross, wet, cold belly of a big old fish for three days. Bad, right? What fear in that moment Jonah must have first felt when he looked around and realized where he was.
But she reminded us that God's provision and saving grace can look very different than what we expect it to.
That sometimes what we first view as the consequences for our behavior is actually our provision - it's what saves us, preserves us, and allows us to live to see another day.

Jonah 1:17
Now the Lord had arranged for a great fish to swallow Jonah. And Jonah was inside the fish for three days and three nights.

God arranged that fish to be there in that very place Jonah was thrown overboard into the raging sea. As Jonah sank into the depths of the sea, seaweed wrapping around his head and legs, dragging him down to what would have been a sure death, God SENT the big fish. Jonah's big fish was God's provision. A provision that saved his life, that would forever be the reminder and turning point for him. Look how much God DID love him, even in his disobedience of not going to Nineveh like the Lord had asked him to.

In fact it didn't take long for Jonah to realize this:
Then Jonah prayed to the Lord his God from inside the fish. He said, “I cried out to the Lord in my great trouble, and he answered me. I called to You God from the land of the dead, and Lord, You heard me! Jonah 2:1-2

The consequences of our actions ARE our provision in themselves - they are our second chances!

I was totally upset, embarrassed, guilty, angry, mortified, and was on display in front of all those people in Sears that day. But getting caught red handed by my parents at that moment when I disobeying them, going outside the limits they had set (instead of being allowed to make my way back to the Garanimals aisles with my parents none the wiser as I intended) was my consequence, my lesson, my provision, and my second chance.

I have never forgotten it. It was what I remembered the first time my own son asked me if he could go two aisles over in the store and look at the toys by himself like a big boy.

I do remember all that I mentioned above about how I felt, but what I remember the most now is how much my parents loved me to worry like that, and to have set the boundaries to begin with. That it was for my own good. Ands it's what I see in Gods provision of that big fish. Oh how He loved Jonah to have arranged in advance for that fish to be there to swallow Jonah up and keep him safe as he learned his lesson.

Oh how He loves us ~ So much that our actions have reactions, that our consequences are our second chances as we learn our hard lessons :)

Marisa

Chick Chat With Marisa

Is Fear at the Root?

As I left a 3 hour lunch today with my friend Lisa, that followed a 2 and 1/2 hour morning coffee with my friend Pat this past Saturday morning, I was struck by something. A word that came up many times in both conversations.
I should have counted how many times I both heard and uttered the word 'fear' in those two days.
Not always in a bad way, sometimes it was in the context of "fearing the Lord". But it dawned on me how much we had talked about how we see fear running rampant in the Christian life, in particular in women's lives. Fear seems to be gripping so many around us. Fear that manifests itself in so many ways - in insecurities of all shapes and sizes, in jealousy, in depression, in anger, in an eating disorder, in cutting, in bad relationships, in choices to leave marriages, in numbness and complacency, and the list could go on. The roots of fear can run deep and lead to so much devastation. Fear.
What dawned on me as I drove home is how we talked about when those types of fears started for us, and for those we know who are even now paralyzed by them. As early as elementary and middle school. WOW! Realizing just how long we have been living with the fear and insecurities, believing the lies that fear allows to creep in, was astounding to us.
The lives that are now held captive by fears have been so in some cases for 20, 30, 40, and 50 years.
Lord, if I could go back and speak truth into 'younger me' I would try to make me understand that I will never find anyone who loves me like God designed me to be loved by Him. That I will never be like the girl standing next to me and that's actually a good thing because I want my blessings, my journey - not hers. That no matter what a boy does to me I am worthy. That no matter what choices I make I can be forgiven. That I don't have to worry about even making a bad choice if I never put what others want me to be ahead of what God wants me to be. And that to care that much about what others think only succeeds in handing them the kind of power over me that only God should have.
I want to always fearfully love my Lord, but never want again to fear who I am, what He wants, is doing, isn't doing, or what He wants to make from my life.
Psalm 139:13-14
13 For you created my inmost being;
you knit me together in my mother’s womb.
14 I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made;
your works are wonderful,
I know that full well.

Something so precious has nothing to fear

Romans 8:31
31 What, then, shall we say in response to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us?

Lord, God, may my fears never again overide my purpose in you!