christmas

its been a crazy fun blessed family filled christmas day spent with my parents and 5 siblings. i learned a lot. i learned my 11 year old sister is crazy funny and spits out one-liners like its her job. i learned it is entirely possible to put together a 1000 some piece castle thats 2 feet tall in under two hours, my 16 year old sister should be an engineer shes so darn good and designing stuff. and i also just learned that my little 14 year old sister likes screamo-type music. shes amazing. shes so hardcore. i basically want to be her when i grow up. yeah. the end.

oh, and merry christmas.

thoughts on christmas eve

a few weeks back it was 75 degrees in kentucky.

i had a little outing with myself, photographing.

the small river that had been a dry bed all summer was now full

and overflowing its banks because of all the rain we've had.

i was pondering the verse: Isaiah 11:1 (and those following)

"a shoot will come up from the stump of Jesse; from his roots a Branch will bear fruit"

i forget now why i was contemplating this verse, but when i looked closely to the ground

i saw this. it was most beautiful.

here is that river bed that was completely dry all summer long.

and this is what i saw when i looked up.

that shoot came up from the stump of jesse...his name was Jesus.

A shoot will come up from the stump of Jesse; from his roots a Branch will bear fruit.
The Spirit of the LORD will rest on him, the Spirit of wisdom and of understanding, the Spirit of counsel and of power, the Spirit of knowledge and of the fear of the LORD and he will delight in the fear of the LORD. He will not judge by what he sees with his eyes, or decide by what he hears with his ears; but with righteousness he will judge the needy, with justice he will give decisions for the poor of the earth. He will strike the earth with the rod of his mouth; with the breath of his lips he will slay the wicked. Righteousness will be his belt and faithfulness the sash around his waist. Isaiah 11:1-5

read the rest of this chapter. its good.

love.

your love captures my heart. your jealousy amazes me.

it leaves me breathless, yearning for more.

your love is patient.

your love is kind. it ruins me every time.

what can i say to you?

what can i say to you, the one my heart loves?

how do i chase after you. how can i stop chasing after you? you place a crown of pure gold upon my head then you command your loving kindness to chase me down

so i am holding on to love that i cannot see,

but i believe.

its real love. and its somehow got a hold of me.

i don't know what to do with myself. i cannot stop thinking about you.

you somehow got a hold of me.

im ruined. im ruined because of you.

fear

perfect love casts out all fear.

a lot of us are afraid because we don't know the love of our father.

we're afraid of man, because we haven't been gripped

with the reality that man can do nothing to us.

because we haven't been gripped with the reality of

God's perfect love for us.

because we haven't been gripped with reality.

grip us God, with reality.

with the reality of who you are.

of who we are.

in you.

twelve.seventeen.seven.

when i walked by my kitchen a few minutes ago,

i saw a canvas i am working on leaning against the wall where some flowers sit.

the colours are something like this. i am pretty much a fan of these colours.

these are the flowers i am talking about.

they are sitting on my counter right now. except they're
dying a little bit. i think they're more wonderful crumpled and falling
apart now then when i first got them.

twelve.fifteen.seven.

this is an image i had in my photography show recently.

it is a digital image of the photograph so its a pretty bad representation of the original.

i like it though. i think i like it so much because i almost didn't take it.

i often look at things and consider photographing them, but don't.

sometimes when i am quiet and my heart is silenced within me i think upon the lord and inquire of him.

often in these moments the still small voice speaks from within me and shows me something.

sometimes its something related to photography, mostly its not.

i've been learning to listen to this voice, because when i do that sweet life

that only the spirit can give is swept over me, and i am renewed and refreshed.

when that voice speaks to me about photography, it is a beautiful thing indeed.

the majority of my photographs are ones that i woud not have taken,

yet that sweet spirit spoke to me concerning them and i obeyed.

and now they have become visual manifestations of the invisible spirit that dwells within.

i took this when i was out photographying with my dad in leesburg, nj.

i named it paths.

twelve.thirteen.seven.

sometimes there just isn't anything to say.

crannied wall

"O my dove, in the clefts of the rock, in the crannies of the cliff,

let me see your face,
let me hear your voice, for your voice is sweet,

and your face is lovely." Song of Songs 2:14

flower in a crannied wall, i pluck you out of the crannies

i hold you here, root and all, in my hand

little flower but if i could understand

what you are, root and all, and all in all,

i would know what God and man is. -Alfred Lord Tennyson

fire

it seems a lot of homes in tennessee and southern kentucky have large white propane tanks sitting in their front yards. i thought, while driving back from tennesssee this morning, that just about every great action movie includes someone shooting a propane tank, and what an interesting sight it would be to watch one explode. i think i just like fire. good thing im a nice christian girl who keeps her zeal for fire restricted to candles and reading about it in the bible.

what do i want?

what do i want?

i want to find a quiet place in the wilderness, and i want to sit there, seeking out the face of the holy one until he comes and i know his fullness. and then when that happens i will never leave his presence. so basically God its a win win situation. you have me now, you have me later. you have me forever. my attention is yours. my heart and mind are yours. i give them to no other.

12.05.07

hidden

(a photo i found on flickr)

if i know who i am,

i must know who you are,

i am hidden in you

when you say arise, i will rise

when you said wait, i will wait

i will trust your leadership,

your thoughts are perfect, your ways are right

i will cast down these idols, perceptions

from my heart

of who i think i am, you are

i will not be offended

i will embrace all that you have written,

have spoken since the beginning of time,

my heart says yes,

my heart is yours,

forever.

Glory

I once had this dream. I was standing next to this encredible building. It was multiple stories high, was brick and had a bell tower. When I looked at it more closely I realized that it had huge gashes in the brick, and was crumbling and torn. It looked like it had been riddled with bullets, and other explosives. When I looked at the building it was as if I was standing in a black and white movie. The building had no color, nothing that would set it a part from another building. The curtains hung torn and stained out of the windows. The glass was broken out. The building looked like it housed many people at one time, however no one lived in it because it didn't look sturdy. The beds that the people slept in were falling out of the building and everything that once might have been bright and beautiful was now being overtaken by the earth. Vines grew everywhere, and they smothered anything that once looked bright and brilliant. The bell tower was still intact, but the bell itself appeared to be missing. As I looked at this building someone spoke these words to me so powerfully that it awoke me instantly and resounded in my ears and heart, even after waking. "You are no longer an orphanage, I will make you a kingdom."

I had forgotten this dream until today. Can I just say this. As Christians we ARE deserving and worthy of Christ's love, of his grace, mercy, justice, peace, and of fullness. We ARE worthy because he has made us worthy. It's time that we stop living in this mindset that we're just a bunch of orphans adopted by a king who live in some old burned out, beat up building because we deserve no better. We aren't beggars at a table eating scraps off the floor of our King. Yeah, we need to be humble and contrite in spirit, but we needn't beat ourselves over the head with sin and shame that isn't ours to claim anymore. It says in Colossians that we were KILLED and BURRIED with Christ, and now, ours is to live and be raised with him. We are slaves to righteousness, hidden in Christ, the Holy of Holies, we are one with him. As soon as we start realizing that we are Kings and Queens of the Most Holy One the better. Demons tremble at our prayers. They shutter and groan in pain at the sound of our words. The enemy is torn down, the principalities of darkness are destroyed at our command. Do you know that we will judge the Angels? The Most High God himself delights in us and calls us sons and daughters. He rescues us, FOR HIS OWN SAKE, because he freaking likes us a heck of a lot. What is this crap about not being good enough? What is this about not being worthy? We are apostolic messengers and the world fears ones as these. In Jeremiah 2, refering to rebellious Israel, it states "they have exchanged their Glory for worthless idols, and have become worthless themselves." Its interesting to note that Glory is written with a capitol G. Glory, as in the Glory of the Most High God. Glory, not of a little slave boy or girl, but real Glory, the kind that is perfect, the kind that comes from righteousness. As far as I know, we have been made righteous by the blood of the lamb. Therefore we aren't worthless, but we are beings having the imprint of God himself. If we don't believe this, how are we to believe anything? How are we to believe that our prayers even profit? How are we to believe that we will be trusted by God if we do not believe that we are ones that God would even entrust anything to?

Come on. Lets raise up Glorious people of the Most High God. Lets claim this inheritance, lets stand as priests, lets claim this kingdom, lets take it by force.

its been awhile..

sometimes, when i listen to sigur ros i like to listen to the words

in icelandic or whatever it is

and try to replace it with english.

the last few sentences that i came up with are:

"oh tears, oh tears, oh lie,

oh its yous, oh yous, oh lie

you sigh, why?"

somehow i don't think thats what they're saying, i think i'll just let them sing in their language and i'll just listen.

i'm feeling pretty uninspired.

i think i'll go look at some art and then come back.