Pauseforamoment

I made a decision to enjoy this term, and, so far, so good.

I met my class for the first time yesterday. It seems that the teacher they had was a little laissez faire. Translation: they came in climbing the walls. Eating in class, moving desks around, doing their own thing. By the end of the day, I think they were wishing they had their old teacher back. It’ll probably take a week to whip (not literally; we don’t allow whipping in public schools) them into shape, but I know that I’ll be happier, they’ll be happier and we’ll all learn a lot more.

One sweet thing happened. I have in my class one of my old students from the beginners’ class. She was delighted to see me, and said, “Now we can live again!”

“What?”, I said.

“We were dead before, now we can live again!”

I didn’t actually realise that I am the Messiah, but you learn something new every day. Let me know if you need any miracles. Raising from the dead appears to be my speciality.

I’m sure all the exciting people are out and about doing exciting things on this Spring-Saturday evening, but we are at home, both with laptops poised on our laps and the tv going in the background. My husband set up wireless internet today, and it is nice being in here playing online together. We’re kind of watching Cars, and waiting for The Bill tonight (a leftover love from my time in London). Each of us has a bowl of vanilla rice pudding (this great Donna Hay recipe – about a thousand calories a bite, but oh-so-good).

You know what?

We love this kind of thing. Chilling, enjoying each other, some nice food and the quiet and peace of home. This is one of our favourite places to be. There is a delightful sense of peace, too, in the fact that this is a long weekend, and we have three days off together. Nice.

This morning we drove up into the hills with my mother, and hiked along the Bibu1m@n Track for three or four hours, so I’m sure the effects of the pudding have been negated. The flowers were blooming like crazy, as they are wont to do in the springtime, and the air was fresh and clean. I feel pleasantly weary. We capped off the day with a BBQ by the river, with mum and my nephews in tow.

It occurs to me that these sweet, uncomplicated days are the best. Taking time to enjoy the beauty of the natural world, some good, hard exercise, a lot of sunshine, good food and quiet activities to end the evening. Finding joy in simplicity makes happiness less complicated.

Another bowl of that that pudding won’t go astray, either.

Just a minor vent.

I turned on the tv while I was having lunch, and flicked over to see what Oprah was saying today. She had on some lady who has written some New Age book on how to have a successful life.”You can create a new future blah blah blah…. speak out only positves blah blah…the universe is always listening to you so it is very important not to speak out negatives about yourself or your life blah… you are sowing seeds into your future blah-de-blah blah.” (Minus the blah part. I put that in myself.)

You know what bugs me?

All this talk is a complete rip-off from the bible. They’ve copied it. What she is saying is actually true, but not totally Truth.

The bible says things like, “There’s life and death in the power of the tongue”.

This is exactly the kind of thing she is talking about, except it is twisted slightly and includes that ‘universe’ crap. If we speak out negatives, we are speaking out death which of course will affect us. If we speak out positives, that is what we will reap. Think about it.

“I’m getting a cold.”

“I haven’t been sick for a while. I think I might be coming down with something.”

“That always happens to me.”

“I’m so unlucky”.

These words are not life giving. They are negatives. We are told that life and death resides in the power of the tongue. What are we speaking out? What does our mind dwell on and think about? The truth of God’s word? Or something else?

We are also told, “Let the words of my mouth and the meditations of my heart be pleasing to you, oh Lord. ” I’m sure it is not pleasing to the Father if we dwell and meditate on sickness and negative things. The bible totally coins meditation. It is mentioned several times. We are told to let the Word dwell in our hearts and minds, let it be a life-giving, transforming force. What happens?

The New Agers take meditation and make it into something slightly different. As a result, most christians think meditation is of the devil. We are scared of it. We wonder if we are turning to the other side. What is a beautiful, holy, spiritual thing created by God to allow us to be transformed by the Word has been snatched away and distorted and they think they invented it.

I’m not having a go at New Agers. Sometimes (ducking, here) they are more in touch with spiritual things than christians. They just have a distorted version of the truth. When you leave God out of it, it becomes a New Age practice. The devil has just manipulated something that was originally designed for christians and made it seem like the original is evil and wrong as well. We are missing out on so much because these wiles.

So many people who don’t know the Lord are hungry to feed their spirits, hungry for some kind of truth in their lives. They’ve been sucked into a semi-truth (one that is making a lot of people very rich), and distorted the original, great truths in the Word, which were designed to draw us closer to God and help us be changed from glory to glory. Makes me cross.

My heart is so full at the moment with all the Lord has been doing in us. It goes without saying that we had an amazing time on so many levels. I feel so honoured that God has allowed us to be a part of these people’s lives. Like nothing else they have caused me to look beyond my Western materialism* and Western Christianity to see a bigger picture about the nature of God’s love and Who He is. I am in awe of this Father that we serve.

I know that I have been evasive about what we have gone through over the last few years, and I still don’t feel right about sharing it all. I’m sure some have figured it out and that is ok. I just know that out of deep pain comes deep deliverance and seeing the Father work out a high and painful calling. It is often through suffering that we learn obedience and trust, and it is all worth it if we allow the work to mould us into His image. I know that all things work together for good for those who are called according to His purpose. It is a special thing if these words move from just being words to becoming manifest in our hearts and lives. It is a process becoming the Word not just proclaiming the word.

On some deep level the Lord has worked a healing in me. I know I still have a long way to go, but something started last week as I reached out and ministered to others, and I want to allow Him to finish this work. I had to step out, once again, into preaching and teaching and He met me where I was. I know that He imparted something through me into the Cambodians – not through my strength but all His. With obedience comes great fulfillment.

Though they are just normal people like you and I, with the usual struggles and hopes and dreams and desires, the Cambodians bring something special to my heart. I love that they live a life of prayer, not in a religious way, but in a natural, heartfelt way, out of the overflow of gratitude and honour to their Father. They will pray anywhere and at any time.

Their worship is just beautiful. Even the children light up with joy as the music starts, and it doesn’t take much to get everyone dancing and singing. They worship with abandonment, not caring about sound so much but about throwing out praise from every pore to a Father who has rescued them. There are no conditions to their worship.

They have smiles that light up the world. Every time we came to the church (where a number of families live, too) they would smile until I thought their faces would split. All the children come running and they greet you with such enthusiasm. One feels like the most important person on earth. When we left, they stood by the airport window (only travellers allowed inside) and moved along as we went through the check-in process (lots of different stations), smiling and waving each time we caught their eyes, and finally, waved until we were upstairs, just out of sight. Everyone who could came to wave goodbye, on a motorbike or a tuk-tuk or on a bike. They ooze love.

They are generous – with time, with love, with kindness, with food. They are incredibly grateful for anything we give.

We were quite busy and I believed we achieved some good things in terms of growing the church and its believers. Once I found my groove, I absolutely loved bringing the word to them. We shared the teaching load and covered all kinds of areas, including sonship, authority, team work, building the house of God, serving and so on. We had the opportunity to pray for several sick people, and I can’t think of one person who wasn’t healed. My God is awesome.

One very special blessing was being able to spend nine days with my husband. We became best friends, again, and such a deep, deep bond was formed. I cherish these precious memories we share. We had so much fun in Singapore, too. He laid down his loathing for shopping and spent hours with me in this activity. He is my hero! I miss him terribly today as he is back at work.

I know there will still be some processing of our time away over the next few days. I can feel the pressure to allow a sense of ‘let-down’ to dominate right now, as we ease back into our normal lives, and I am guarding my heart against this. I am praying that the Father will bring this work to completion, and that it will all be to His glory.

He is good and very good.

* I do hold the opinion that we are not more holy the less we have. I see nothing wrong with having nice things and a nice home, but I do see something wrong with these things holding more value for us than God and people.

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Today we have been married for three years. I can scarcely remember the time we were not married; my life is so full and rich and complete with him and I am so thankful to have him by my side.

He loves me completely; I am in awe of how much. We have grown together past the fluff and bubble of the first romantic flush, delicious though that feeling is. Our love is deeper, richer, stronger and I believe we have found deep places in each other and have bound our hearts together more tightly.

We believe in one another; he brings out the best in me not just through his love but through his probing of my heart, his leadership and the strength that God has put in him.

I know that my love and humour and ability to find laughter through the pain has brought healing and strength in him. I have never been one to keep my mouth shut, although I am learning wisdom in this, and I believe it has done good things in him. Neither of us are content with being average. We know that destiny comes through perseverance and persistance, and we will not let the other give in to character weaknesses. I value that. This is a love that transcends emotion and is growing into something deep and strong.

I love that although we are celebrating our anniversary with a Japanese meal, our focus at present is far more on our ministry in Cambodia next week. He has to work late, and will probably be tired tonight, but that is ok. We are romantic, but focussed, and have learnt that true romance is always tempered with reality. Romance comes not through the celebration, but through those moments of giving, loving, serving one another, putting the other first.

I am so happy to be with him.

Last night hubs and I went here for dinner. We had to book quite a while back, and needed to use a voucher we were given early this year, and the evening coincidently falls close to our anniversary, next week. We will go out then, too, but not as fancypants as Jackson’s.

I wanted to write about it because it turned out to be such a funny evening. I, of course, took photos of all the food, because I am addicted to interesting food. Unfortunately it was a bit too dark for the pictures to work with my phone camera. After the glass of Veuve, I started with green pea soup, with crispy egg and Iberica ham. It was delicious, and amazing looking, as always.

For the main course, we both wanted to try the pigeon breast, and had a minor scuffle over who would get to order it (we like to get different dishes so we can taste each other’s food). The other option we both liked was the duck. I won, the pigeon came to me. I’ve never tried pigeon before.

Well, the plate arrived and there was this bird. It was sectioned, but the two little legs were sticking up on either side of the plate, with the claw-like feet still attached.

But wait, there’s more.

Above the feet and breast was the head, with the beak and the little eyes closed. I’m not sure what my face did, but I knew immediately I could not eat this dish. I have this weird thing where I can actually think myself sick, and the strangest things can set it off, like a smell that no-one else finds unusual. I could feel myself starting to shudder, and my lovely husband immediately swapped plates with me, even though the duck dish looked completely delectable.

It was.

It was bathed in a delicious orange sauce (Cointreau) and tiny bright green broad beans scattered on the plate. It was amazing, as Jackson’s food always is. The pigeon dish, however, was unusual. We both love to experiment with new flavours, but despite the truffles, the flavour was – strange. I don’t think we will repeat this menu choice.

After a while, we started making jokes that probably only we will find funny. Even today, when we saw a bird, we would both crakc up as we thought of those little legs pointing skywards and that head!

Dessert was amazing – truffle icecream with raspberry and dark chocolate-filled spring rolls. Another Jackson’s winner.

We declined coffee, stuffed to the gills and came home to recline on the sofa, watching some of the opening ceremony.

Tonight I am cooking for our Mus1im friends. We’re having lamb shanks cooked in white wine with a hint of orange and cinnamon for five hours, roasted smash potatoes, green beans, and baked chocolate fondants for pudding.

Not quite pigeon (with legs and head) but I think it should be nice.

Google search which brought up my blog:

undies undies undies bathers budgie smug

Weird.

I’m pausing in my guilty rush of chores to provide some commentary on the sad state of real estate in this part of the world. We would like to buy a house sometime in the (near) future, but things are pretty grim around here. Although the market is falling, it is still pretty much unattainable for first home buyers, unless you have a massive outlay of funds to begin with. I spend some time every day perusing the market and seeing what the prices are around the place.

We did some sums last night. (Say that seven times, quickly.) If we were to purchase a $400 000 house right now (ha ha! Good luck finding a house at this price. The median house price in Perth is $450 000, and that is a very, very average home in an average suburb.) at 10% interest, we would be paying off $40 000 a year in interest payments. That’s $800 per week, and we haven’t even touched the principal yet. If prices stay the same, that means we lose $40 000 per year. Someone was telling me that renting was dead money – but while we fork out $350 a week for our little shoebox, it is a lot less than $800 out of which we gain nothing. We’re going to stay in this position until the market starts to shift. It makes good financial sense.

See! We really do have winter here!!! 1 degree!!! Frost!!!! Wheeeeeeee!

Thursday:

Precis:      Shower or two.                    
City:        Min 8      Max 20
Mandurah:    Min 9      Max 19

UV Alert:    Nil , UV Index predicted to reach 2 [Low] 
Fire Danger: Coastal Plain: NOT RATED
             Hills:         NOT RATED

Friday       Showers, thunderstorm easing.          Min 9      Max 17
Saturday     Showery, thunder, hail, windy.         Min 9      Max 15
Sunday       Early shower then fine.                Min 4      Max 15
Monday       Fine. Early frost.                     Min 1      Max 16
Tuesday      Fine. Early frost.                     Min 3      Max 17
Wednesday    Showers developing.                    Min 5      Max 19

We went to visit some friends last night (the curry night!) who have recently purchased their first home. They moved from a tiny little flat to this spacious, three-bedroom abode in a reasonable suburb. I was looking at the vast kitchen, spacious family area and meals area, that easily accomodated the 30+ people who were milling about. I was thinking how much I desire to have a more spacious home. I am really looking forward to owning our first home and having more than one tiny cupboard in the whole place. Our little rental only has one room that is light enough in winter to have no other light source than the window, and that is our bedroom. It is the only north-facing room in the whole house. I find myself gravitating to this room in the afternoons, to capture the northern light and drink tea and pray on my bed. I long, though, for a home where the main living areas are built to catch the winter sun and to have space to invite more than one or two couples.

I found myself dwelling, as I sometimes do, on what I don’t have rather than what I do. I found myself focusing on my desires for the future, rather than seeing the beauty in the here and now. I put a check to my thoughts, and pondered, instead, on the incredible gifts we do have. I saw myself sitting on the floor, legs crossed, and a pile of gifts on my lap, growing my the moment, poured out by a loving Father. I dwelt, in gratitude, on the fact that we have a roof over our head. I felt thankful for our sweet little home, which has so many nice features, despite the ones it lacks. I felt thankful for the quiet and serene neighbourhood we live in. I never feel unsafe. I thought of our lovely little backyard, soft and green in the late-autumn rain. I am thankful that we have money to supply all our needs, and many of our wants. I am beyond grateful for the many, many amazing friends the Father has given us, who give us so much love and so much support. They make our lives more beautiful. I am thankful that we always have enough food to eat, and I never have to worry about the next meal. I am blessed beyond measure.

In every day, I try to find beauty in the now. I try to delight in the sweetness of the moment; a rain-soaked rose, the smell of eucalyptus, the creamy richness of a home-made double-shot latte, the warmth of my husband’s hug, the joy of time together.

I’ve spent a lot of my life waiting and hoping for the next thing. I regret some of those moments. I think back to all those years of singleness, when I allowed my loneliness to crowd out the desire for Father to cultivate in me a deep, fierce, strong love for Him. I heard that ‘wait’ meant ‘no’. I mistrusted Him. I regret that. I know that some of the lessons He is teaching me now are ones that I probably should have learnt back then. He is hungry for our whole hearts. He is hungry for our trust in Him. He is hungry for us to seek first His kingdom and His righteousness rather than all the other things that crowd our lives.

My husband has felt the urgency for us to live in a different way from how we have been. It involves a bit more sacrifice, and possible a bit more waiting for the things I want. It involves the laying down of some of our goals and dreams. We both know, however, that we only get one shot as this life. We want it to be more about His kingdom than about having what we want when we want it. Letting go means trusing the He will be our sufficiency even in the midst of sacrifice. Don’t think that I am not being dragged to this kicking and screaming – I have definately had my moments of that. Sigh. I just know, in my heart, that grasping hold of some of these truths is going to result in  lives well-lived.