The Fairy Tale Ends

Revelation 21:1-7

1Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth,

for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more.

2And I saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God,

prepared as a bride adorned for her husband.

3And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying,

"Behold, the dwelling place of God is with man. He will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them as their God.

4 He will wipe away every tear from their eyes,

and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away."
5And he who was seated on the throne said,

"Behold, I am making all things new."

Also he said, "Write this down, for these words are trustworthy and true."

6And he said to me,

"It is done! I am the Alpha and the Omega,

the beginning and the end. To the thirsty

(whoever wishes)

I will give from the spring of the water of life without payment. "

As little girls we all wish for our knight in shining armor to come to rescue us from the danger that is in this big, scary world.

Some where along the way, we realize that the knight is never coming, and the danger is ever present.

In an earlier generation, there was a saying, "if wishes were horses, beggars would ride." If our little girl wishes would only come true then we would ride off into the sunset into the land of contentment, constant love, and no more pain or tears.

Our Knight has come.

He has conquered all for us, but we continue to dwell in the land of wishes.

In one of the older translations, of Revelation 21, it adds the phrase (whoever wishes) may come and drink from the water that is free, to us.

Right now, we live in the land of wishes, unkept promises, unfulfilled dreams and longings that are never met. They cause us pain, and tears that fall, and keep our hearts wishing for something different. It is not the same for everyone. We all carry burdens that can never be resolved, or lifted.

Wishing we were someone other than who we are, wishing we had different parents, different backgrounds, gifts, money or looks. Wishing we had not said what we said, did what we did, or not have done what we could have.

Those particular hard places that hurt every time they are thought of,

are particularly at risk.

This places us down the path of deception and denial.

We begin lieing about ourselves, and to ourselves, our situations, and others. Making ourselves, our situations and others smaller or larger than they should be.

Being completely honest about our lives is the hardest thing we do. The tighter hold that pride has on our lives, the harder it is to see reality.

Our heavenly Knight keeps the longing alive in His bride. The longing for unconditional love, (have you heard that phrase tossed around?) We can have unconditional love if we only.......But we constantly get it wrong.

The longing for a peaceful life, children who follow the Lord, husbands that are unselfish. We chase after His earthly gifts in order to find Him. He then has to increase our thirst, our longing, our desires, and our stages of discontent.

He only wants us to have eyes for Him. Not because He is a meglamanic, but,

"He has made us for Himself, and we are restless until we find our peace in Him."

Augustine, Confessions

As the branch cannot bear fruit without the vine, so we cannot do anything apart from Him. How come I stay in the land of wishes most of the time? When abundant life is waiting, and the fulfillment of that life, life eternal is mine as well.

dreams cont...

The Bible speaks of the intimate relationship between a man and his wife as knowledge. When God chose those words for this particular kind of union it was not by accident.

We all dream of love that even though there is knowledge there is also acceptance. It is written deep within our souls, that longing to be known and yet...loved anyway. We would give up all the riches, the treasures, the luxuries that this world can offer, just to be totally loved. On the human side of things we are very fortunate indeed to be able to share that type of vulnerable love even once in a life time. Some souls never find it. There is always hope though. For even though we do find it, it lets us down time and time again. It disappoints us, it saddens us, it does not satisfy. It can even leave us feeling more empty than we were before. We give our hearts, minds, souls, bodies to another, and we are left feeling betrayed. Pouring our life into another comes with great hazards. Mothers can give themselves completely to their children, and find that at the end of a lifetime they are tossed aside like an old shoe. Wives can pour themselves into their husbands, and find that somewhere down the line their mate finds hobbies, mistresses, solace much more interesting. This is where the word knowledge once again comes to play. As we give ourselves to another soul, we need knowledge of the one that made them. He alone can satisfy. He alone can transform the love that seeks itself to a love that seeks the others best. If you find yourself doing for others and resenting the doing, then your doing is really not for them, it is for you. It is selfish, and self centered. Without being satisfied with the love of the eternal beloved, we will never incarnate His love to others.

Pray for the ones that hurt you. Pray for their success.

Dreams by Rhonda Gunn

She wanted to travel to far away places but couldn't get past the brick wall

She wanted to soar with gentle graces but her wings were crushed by a fall

She longed to sing a love song but her heart had forgotten the tune

poor little thing,

now what was she to do

He came traveling with a shining vision in search of his heart's only love

Driven by passion of her in white linen

she's all that he's ever dreamed of

though he found her all broken & ragged

it mattered not 'cause you see,

Her rags could not hide all that he knew she could be -

now she dances in royal spendor

& her heart has a new song to sing

& I'm here to tell you Dreams still do come true

when you are the bride of the King

oh, I'm here to tell you Dreams still do come true

'cause that wishful dreamer was me

As little girls we dream of our knight in shining armor coming someday to sweep us off our feet. We long to be pursued and loved. We desire for someone, somewhere to look at us with the piercing eyes that look deep into our very souls. With that glance comes not just total acceptance, but knowledge that the gaze is and always will be genuine, steadfast, and single. The knowledge grounds the stare in reality. Without it, it would be hollow, shallow, passive, and double minded. No one in all the world; nor any job, any hobby, any ego building activity can ever lesson the intensity. With that glance comes all the military might of the strongest army, the most zealous of fighting men who are willing to lay down their lives at a moments notice for the cause. Nothing could stop them from defending the honor of the one that they fight for. Nothing could stop the instantaneous way that this warrior will claim sole rights over the soul of his beloved.

The Parable of the Laborer; A Portrait of a Woman Caught Between Two Worlds by Lynn Cross

The Parable of the Laborer
A Portrait of a Woman Caught Between Two Worlds

`The next thing I perceived was a woman, if you want to call her that; gnarled, broken and bent, with wrinkles spread over her face like a spider’s web. She was explaining to the Spirit that she needed to fix the lands in this place so that the ghosts would have no problem walking on the hard grass. She wanted to be given tools to make the rough places smooth and the way made easier. The spirit stopped her and told her that by doing it herself that way would not make the rough places smooth. The way had already been made for her if she would just trust. The way wasn’t rough to those whom God had let do the smoothing. She said she really wanted the tools; that her hands, which when I looked at them were course, her knuckles were bulging from many years of work and labor. She insisted that her hands were meant for much labor and she wanted to begin right away. The spirit told her to be still, to know He was God. She began a tirade of trying to explain to the spirit that she knew that, but she had worked all her life and she wasn’t about to stop now. Didn’t the spirit know that she had raised children, worked to make sure they were happy all moments? She did all their laundry; cooking, cleaning, education-when had spent umpteen hours driving them about wherever they needed to go so they could better themselves. And, not one time had she thought of herself, but they were ungrateful in the end…telling her they didn’t need her anymore. She again began saying that she didn’t have time to be “still”; she had the church to attend to, too. Didn’t the spirit know how many people had passed through her doors, how many people she had fed, clothed and they never seemed to be satisfied. She could not be still. She had been completely busy all her life and she wasn’t going to stop now. She had asked God to help her, but there were always voices that told her something else had to be done. Always one more seminar to attend, one more study to prepare, one more “super curriculum” that would surely fix her children! And if only her husband had listened to that famous preacher from New York-he would be changed as well. Couldn’t he see that with all she had to do she could not be still? She said one more time if only she could make the rough places smooth, the ghosts would be able to walk to heaven on their own. She kept begging him till her back was bowed, her fingers more gnarled, and the burden on her back was the size of an elephant.
I protested to my guide, “Don’t you see how unfair this is? Can’t stop this? This woman worked all her life, never stopped living for others’ happiness and not her own. Can’t you stop this?” My guide replied, “Oh, but that is where you have it all wrong. She has become all she is because she thought to work to please was the aim of it all; it was a twisted, selfish love. Duty was her master. She did not look to the Master of all duty, and simply love and be still. In the end, she was living only for herself, and is still trying to be Him who ultimately makes the rough places smooth. To be still would have caused her to face her insufficiency at doing any of it. He says, “Come unto me all you who labor and are heavy laden I will give you rest, take my yoke upon you and learn from me.”
The last I saw of the woman, she was down on all fours scraping with her own hands the grass in that place. Her hands were bleeding, her knees torn to pieces, but she kept right on muttering under breath, “If I don’t do it no one will, over and over again, as she was escorted back to hell.

Hummingbirds Tome by Lynn Cross

Hummingbirds show your glory to a lost and dying world.
Hovering over your creation their tiny wings, beating unfurled
As flags wave out a message of whom they belong,
These tiny fields of green and red beat out your constant song,
A message of grandeur, that takes place around your throne.
Open eyes, open hearts to see the Hummingbird’s Tome.

Silently

Silently
By Lynn Cross



Silently, I sit and ponder on the wonder that You are,
Silently, I wish that you were something not so far,
Silently, You whisper to my lonely heart,
that if only I would trust,
you would shout through fear and pain,
but only wonder would remain.

Lady Wisdom by Lynn Cross

Lady wisdom is illusive, like fog in the morning.

Trying to grasp her, she fades away and escapes, teasing, ever before me, not with me.

Come back, I cry, be my companion. She is gone like a wisp of smoke causing great mourning. Running towards the specter I stumble, I fall to the ground once again.

Wiping the dirt from my knees and taking the grass from my hair, I find a gem on the broken ground which lays shining among the pebbles and the stones.

Picking it up. I look at it closely, examing it’s many facets gleaming bright, I hold it close. Wisdom’s gift comes at great cost.
Rising once again I cry out to my illusive friend, where are you taking me?

She turns and lovingly smiles. as once again she fades telling me only to follow .

Endings and Beginnings

Life certainly is about beginnings and endings. There are times when you feel like you are caught in the middle, but right now my life is just that: beginnings and endings. My oldest daughter got married Saturday to a wonderful godly man. They want to be on the mission field in a few years, and I couldn't be more thrilled. Ending was the relationship that I had grown very fond of, kind of like sitting in your favorite chair where the pillows and fluff are molded to your body. Then somebody decided that you needed a new chair. They threw out the pillows, and the cusions, put new fabric on it, and even moved it to a different spot in the room. It is still the same chair, I just have to get used to the new rough edges, the new pillows that have not been smushed to the contours of me. In fact, the chair will never be the same. The new chair will eventually feel soft again, but it will never be the same. To some, the old chair will become a faint and distant memory, except to the original owner.

My dear, sweet, daughter has started on the same journey that I did 25 years ago. I barely remember what it was like to be that person, that sister, that daughter. My mother remembers, though. She remembers when I ran away to the neighbors house, she remembers when I played in the mud in the back yard right before church, she remembers old boyfriends, old playmates, old memories that have virtually been wiped away from my heart. They are written on her heart. They will never go away, they will never be obliterated, or snuffed out. When she lays dying she will, if she can, still remind me of the time when.......The endings and the beginnings are happening virtually at the same time.

With God they are always simultaneous. When we begin our walk with Him we are beginning, but is He? He thought of us before the foundation of the world. He held me and my daughter in His hands. We begin, but He had already began. When I lay dying, I will be ending, and beginning. I will also remember the pitter pat of little feet on the stairs and the precious laughter of long ago. Beginnings and Endings......

How do you view the world? Do you have rose colored glasses, or glasses that cast shadows over all? Look to the heavens, God is on the wind, He moves His wonders to perform. Put on the lens of Scripture and joy will come to those who see Him.