asante way.

Four summers ago, I flew in a plane over the familiar sight of Europe to an unfamiliar Africa.

Making tracks and change, leaving loved ones behind in Canada - to Him who is able: to hold all the tears no one man can hold, and use them to water dry lands.

I followed His voice, His word and direction - and it led me to Kibera, Kenya.
It still perplexes me why I should be given the honour to travel to such a place, to meet those who touched my heart and inspired the soul. Standing together, lifting voices in praise we were not different, but we were church. Here and there, we all need the Lord - we are all blessed in His gift.

I came home culture-changed. When I don't use a clock or watch, when I keep the lights out at night and burn flickering candles, when I treat myself for the lasting effects of typhoid et al., when I bake chapati on my electric stove, when I syncopate my clapping in Sunday services, I remember Kibera.
In the slum, I learned another means to be thankful for another means of richness: Thanking Him for the water that came once through the week, the intermittent electricity, but mostly for what we had in our lack of Canada, and full of Kenya- more of each other, of feeble Kiswahili attempts, of cultural-missteps and tears and laughter with kindest of friends.

The crushing contrast arriving back here at home haunts me still - my first glimpse at my home country, far more striking than my first gaze at the dusty, smelling vista of the the shanty-city-become-temporary-home. But, it wasn't all about that.

This morning, I felt a twinge of impending guilt as I awoke in my bed nestled in a soft and safe nest, with pillows and a fresh blanket. How many times have I internalized a speech that expostulated my responsibility for the material difference? How these platitudes motivate us in fear, and paralyze us from our responsibility to our brothers and sisters.
So, I made it to my knees to thank Him for much this morning. I gave Him my question why? and how? too.

Only out of the heart of thanks can He move to make well the poverty - our pity is uncharitable. From the posture of thanking we are moved into our daily of His work, and the truth shows up in His way. This is how we might love one another.

I pray for nests of Shalom in Kibera - though this is not the whole reality there now, there are those working diligently to envision and build them - carpenters like their Brother.
peace to you dear friends & His strength in your hands.
Asante.

somewhere along the way, I fell...

well it happened last night,
on a major street downtown - down to my knees
after a toe-dive into that pot-hole.
they are bruised today.
Rectified with a laugh and Friendship.

How often do I find mysef here?
How often have I questioned?
was that a misstep, or a normal one in uneven territory?
and here's the thing,
the bumps still happen and I still fall laughing-
in Love.


giving thanks to the One in all steps, jumps, flailings and landings.
its a great journey - thank You for letting me live it.

You sooner

sooner, rather than later. I need You.
help me where I ramble before running into Your arms,
and looking to Your face.

God of 'not choas'; of might, strength and compassion; of faithfulness and all true:
make us humble-low
lifters up of Your name.


Not usually a fan of pop, but! Lights brought this out in an acoustic version - so now I can listen to lyrics I like, with simple strums.
peace to you in your listen.




Thank you:

• that You forgive
• that grace is apparent if you show it up
• that my fears are fears, and not always true
• for finally giving into djembe... hallelujah! ;)
• sweet, sweet August
• burning flames

overcoming winning-over

John the Baptiser’s prayer is mine.
More of You,
Less of me.

So that Your love is my work.
So that Your love is my life.
So that I am me, and my actions.
So that I forgive - and know, myself.
So that I take up the mantle.
So that I don't withold a thing, as offering to you.

So that I don’t buckle under burden not my own,
But flourish in Yours.

Lord this day, I cast my cares,
For I am afraid of a torrent I can't control.

But I can take me, and give me to You.

Giving thanks for:

• organization :)
• food for the day.
• Nutmeg bouncing over for apples - so happy

believing just went out the door.

a gift given this weekend.
time off when I was ready to work.
what to do?! wah!
stand there on the unit like I did, in scrubs
shaking with excitement.
hardly able to believe.

in weirdest, greatest ways He comes down, lays down -
takes you up and leads you on.
'Who do you say I am?'

belief keeps growing,
as you walk down steps,
though the door,
run down the street
burst through another - and pack, and hurry, and not take too much time to think about whether to receive the gift given.

and realize that this is choosing to believe.
allowing receipt,
and gobbling it up like an excited pre-teen, growing boy.
no regret. just thanks.
hurtling down the highway toward what you are so grateful to have.

still believing, though traffic gets heavy and competitive;
though en route you realize you forgot some essentials;
and though the clouds lay a downpour too -
though you're bringing just a rumpled-up you to the party.
still believing because you haven't turned back.
He provides -
you just went out the door.


thanks from the road:

• good waves goodbye.
• CBC Radio 2 - I heart you and your folk songs.
• golden sunsets at your back.
• big, blue skys.
• dark, lightening-striken ones.
• patient rabbits in the back seat.
• ! the group 'canoeing' from the windows of their farm truck.
• laughing at them, and thus having them drive by thrice to show off sweet 'paddling' skills.

mama's B

to the woman who waited and waits for me
with faithful anticipation...

Happy Birthday!
it's my mom's birthday today.

I love her. She becomes dearer to me with every day.

Every phone chat.

Every tense moment of me moving from little-girl to big-one.

Every shopping excursion that ends in me listless and her frustrated with my shop apathy :)

Every way that we are the same, but "black-is-white".

Every tear and tearing hug as we part.

Every excited long one when we see each other again.

Every pen scratch on the page as she studies.

Every selfless moment in the kitchen where she doesn't really "love" to cook (but man, can she!)

Every moment where she is wisdom.

Every moment where she doesn't know something, and says it - where she feels, and shows it.

thanks mom.

you are you, fearfully and wonderfully you:

the first to point out to me the tenderness in your love of soft and little.

the one to teach me love of water and sand, and sound of tree frogs... or june bugs... or whatever.

the one who goes miles for being together :)

love ya much.

Him & sisters

Just looking back at what I've written down here the last few months is sort of interesting. What started with complete thoughts, and structured paragraphs has changed - into dips of sharing:
heart-hymn,
axiom,
fragment,
aphorism...
I'd like to thank You,
piecer of all things together; author and perfector of faith;
holder of me in the dark and light places.

I'd like to thank you.
Sisters, who wonder and wander and write together -
those who don't write at all.
I am humbled as I am shaped - and He has meant us to meet. to sharpen. to share.
your words are His beauty to me,
your struggles are often mine to as I learn to be
in God's Maker-hands,
and I am so blessed by your acquaintance.

more of His peace.
more of Him for us.

that amazing grace.

the anger slips like time
with every breath for thanks
and toddler/teenage angst against the hearing Father
subsides.

I have deep wonders -
I don't have answers
to questions shot forth
from the rumblings of distressed soul.


rather, I have more of Him
a map of His face, rather than the road ahead
and a heart knowing His gift giving behind.
amazing grace, sufficient

more of Him as I lost
and was found:
rest,
time,
deep laughter,
glimpses of sparkling eyes and souls



thanking Him for:

• Ann Voskamp
• FD
• fresh market fair
• warm smells of summer-end
• first IV, in! WOOP!!

thankyou.thankyou.thankyou.

passing under tire tread
slipping through breaths,
and meals,
and chats late into the night over bottles of draft
thank you. thank you. thank you.

it's where You started -
dark room, taking breath
so that was all that could come out
and wondering...

it's to see days like this,
and night's like last -
she and I sat in the kingdom
talking of all it's new shades
and how we're timid and unsure of how to be in this newness
of twenty-three and twenty-four

it's to thank as we've tried on
hats and dresses -
on teacher and nurse
until they seem familiar,
but not that familiar

it's to see shackles fall in our confession
she's broken
so am I
she, the one recognized from a word and a photo,
and we made friends in a stairway

It's to thank and love for the joy of finishing sentences -
laughter filling the booth with His triumph.
He is not content to leave or forsake us,
we pursue Him with what and all that we have.

Today, I am thankful for:

• Day 101 WOOP!!!

tea & books

Him in tea sips
and an afternoon read,
listening to life in the office
and the old dog's tail wag in her sleep

Christ comes.
Creator to keep creating.
Into tea time and a book.
Into this house.

Into laughter.
Into seriousness,
hammer blows,
and drizzly days
is Christ.

The new
sense
mind
heart
of those created.

99 days of giving Him thanks,
I will be thanking God when tomorrow comes...

growing. older.

near 100 days of thanking Him

learning to thank

seeing how unthankful I can be.



I am overwhelmed in the multitude,

like I was;

like we always are in His riches.



and He makes me appreciate and love them

rest and trust and wait in His all,

because on my flowery-own I cannot.



All things in Christ.



Peace on your weekend: I'm heading home for yep, more wedding!!!

be lifted high.

in cracks
of voice and holding back
we worship

we find ourselves
in melody together

messing up lines
in passion
because we are lost in Him

brought close together
by Him
as we draw near -
one, and one, and one after another
crying out to the High and Holy
finding that He is near
in brother and sister
sitting in the next chair
and on the pillow across the room.

Great is He who unites and bonds
who calls us to together
who makes the joints of this body work to His rhythm
and teaches each part of His tune

Praise Him. Be lifted high.

Today I give thanks:

• for liking peanut butter and honey, very much
• for Pearl
• for lights out in the neighbourhood
• for growling summer storms
• for getting soaked.

uncontrolled anticipation.

like a little kid,
spunky and enerved, ready to pounce on deep Holy-cultivated desire.
and I see how I have much room for more risk,
more hope,
more space to anticipate more of Him.

Perhaps, you like me, don't know right now where He will take you -
He's giving you glimmers that you couldn't hang a hat on, and He's calling you to lay your life down.
Oh my God.
That's just it -- my God.
The One and Only for shady doubters.

my hands are loosed in greater grip,
and soft feather-breaths of hope come to rest on Him:
the Strong and Kind, the Hallowed and Near One,
willing us up from amidst the desert's thousand grains of sand -
in His way of wooing us to fall soft in Him.

In talking about plans,
dreaming dreams,
and telling Him about them.
in praying for things to for things to come,
wanting "Thy will be done".

About learning new shades and signs,
choosing ways,
taking a path
to follow Him on.
Trust in His hands known gentle,
with holy lips speaking God-life into all of me.

Hope is boundless and palpable,
He perfects my hoping as it's used and I care less about all that's not Him.
We talk of where we are and about hoping for more,
for change and for future.
All satisfied in wanting of Him.

Today, I give thanks for:

• looking and finding.
• open doors.