Friday, May 10, 2013

Comfort: Contented Well-Being


You got me when I was an unformed youth,
God, and taught me everything I know.
Now I’m telling the world your wonders;
I’ll keep at it until I’m old and gray.


God, don’t walk off and leave me
until I get out the news
Of your strong right arm to this world,
news of your power to the world yet to come,
Your famous and righteous
ways, O God.
God, you’ve done it all!

    Who is quite like you?
You, who made me stare trouble in the face,
Turn me around;
Now let me look life in the face.

    I’ve been to the bottom;
Bring me up, streaming with honors;
turn to me, be tender to me,
And I’ll take up the lute [or fiddle] 
and thank you
to the tune of your faithfulness, God.


(Psalm 71: 17-22 The Message)




Comfort comes in the company of good people. Like today, my friend Kelly and I gathered on her screened porch with collage supplies. She invited me. I accepted her invitation. We made room for our magazines, glue and dreams.

Early in the week, she told me about the Facebook study hosted by the Winsome Woman. We are reading through and discussing You're Made For a God-Sized Dream by Holley Gerth. In the book, we were invited to make a vision board that visualizes our dream. (By the way, this is an open invitaion, click here to join the study.)




From the comfort of our chairs, with warm conversation and comfortable silences, we thumbed through magazines, ripped out images. One of us would say, "Look at this!" or "I think this fits your dream." Each of us looking out contentedly for the other's well-being. Wanting deeply to make sure we don't lose sight of God or his dreams.

We lingered all morning into lunch (Black bean and sweet potato burritos, apple slices and cornbread slathered with peach preserves--comfort food.)



Kel's Dream



Kelly's Dream


With visions of our dream before us, we poured over the images and words, asking each other what they meant. And the comfort of knowing we were together made the difference today. Gave us the courage to take one more step toward God's dream for each of us and for both of us.









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19 comments:

  1. Wow! You really captured the comfort of the day! And you worked in the fiddle!!!! Thank you friend for always being His comfort to me and for me. I love you!
    Hugs,
    Kelly
    PS Love our dream boards. Can't wait to see what more he has in store for us!

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    1. Kelly- You're the best! I know... I couldn't resist adding the fiddle...can't wait for some fun and fiddling around the campfire! God is for us, who can be against us, right? Love ya-Kel...thanks again for a wonderful day!

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  2. Makes me want to make a collage! Friends are such a blessing! FMF

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    1. I know collage is such a fun outlet and interesting way to discover things about yourself and even God. I love FMF! Thanks for stopping by...

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  3. How awesome! Wonderful boards!

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  4. Thanks, Cindi! It's great to meet another lover of words...I love your blog title "Let the Words Escape"

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  5. I AM SO JEALOUS!!! And happy for you both and your day, discoveries, and friendship! How far away is Missouri from Virginia? I want to join your campfire :D

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    1. Kim-I'm sure were a long days drove apart...may your weekend be filled with joy! Thx for inviting us to keep the sparks of our dreams alive

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  6. Hi Kel,
    Your bright icon on the Five-Minute Friday link up caught my eye and I'm glad it did. Your poem is a great anthem. Your words encourage me to rave and sing of God's goodness, His faithfulness and mystery.

    Lute, fiddle: anything, or anyone tuned to God's faithfulness is good music anyday.

    Almost squealed when I saw those magazine and collages. One of my favorite things! Spending time with Holley G. and magazines, piecing dreams together and sharing what's emerging with a good friend—beautiful.

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    1. Mari- so glad you dropped by... Dreaming, collage and friendships in The Lord ... Nothing sweeter :) btw I have to give credit where credit is due... The poem is Eugene Petersen's translation of psalm 71 in the message... I added fiddle bkz my friend Kelly dreams of learning how to play the fiddle one of these days and soon I hope :)

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  7. Oh Kel......wish I had been there. What joy! I think I told you all in one of my journaling classes how I shied away from collaging. Seemed New Age or something to me. And then there is this whole thing about "images" and Christianity. When I attended a journaling workshop in Denver when I was studying to receive my journaling facilitator credential, one of the assignments was collaging. My father had just passed away ten days before (I wrote about that here at your blog yesterday on Thrilling Thursday), and I can tell you that I was in such deep grief that collaging almost felt like sacrilege at worst and something really juvenile and Mickey-Mouse at best. But in a spirit of cooperation, I did the assignment. We were collaging covers for our journals. But rather than stay in the group, I went back to my room where I could just be alone with the Lord. I started flipping through magazines and letting images draw me, not even having any particular idea why something resonated. Then I ripped out pages. And ultimately either I tore or cut images from the pages and began gluing them down. I must have done this until 2:00 or 3:00 a.m. I cannot explain it, but this is one of the single-most healing experiences of my life. I've thought about it many times since, and I think God used is as a healing metaphor for my life. My life at Daddy's death was absolutely shattered. But piece by piece by piece, I was picking up my life and God was helping me to arrange the broken pieces into a beautiful mosaic--something beautiful and new was emerging. My life was being fitted back together by God's design. Naturally, this was only a tiny, tiny step, and I am still on that healing journey six years later. But at least seeing that a beautiful, meaningful design could materialize from the raw and rugged edges of my life gave me real hope. As well you know, I use collaging now in the journaling classes, and I call it "heart art." Images speak to us at a deep heart level, when sometimes words can't. And I certainly don't feel anymore that it is weird or that it contradicts the Bible. Our God is creative and artistic, and He has made us to be the same way. He loves color and shape and texture and design. And He speaks constantly in images in the Bible, images that we quite naturally visualize in our mind's eye, like doors, gates, pools, sheep, etc. What you and Kelly did this afternoon was use your sacred imagination, asking God's guidance and blessing. Basically He gave you a colorful blueprint design for your dream. How can you build what you can't see? I'm very excited for you and have several collages going myself. I like to collage inside journal covers too. Can't wait to see for myself, real-time, your dreams when they reach fruition! I love you two!
    Love
    Lynni
    PS. Kelly, you really need to show your readers your Warrior collage. I use it as a model in my classes. And oh yes, just so you know, I call myself the collage poster child with my journaling teacher. I'm sold on it! =]

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    1. Lynni - if we weren't so blasted disorganized, we would have had a collage party. I think we should plan a "heart art" party very soon. I love your beautiful way of describing how God began piecing your broken heart/life back together with that collage. That was a sacred moment for sure....nothing sacrilegious about that! And not so "mickey mouse" - huh? I think this is board #1, and there is so much more to come. I am going to post on my blog about the Warrior board. It was such a moment of discovery for me - life changing really! Of course it was the result of the work done in your six week journaling study which I want to do again asap! We must work on getting that scheduled!
      Love you too!
      Hugs,
      Kelly
      PS - isn't it cool that we know each other so well that we can tell whose work is whose before we even read their names? That's what God wants us to do - know each other intimately like he knows us!

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    2. Kelly, surprised to find your comment at Kel's, and what a delight! loved reading what you said, and I think it is so beautiful that we *get* this!!! Oh yes, we should have a collage collaboration (aka collage party) soon! Would love it. And wow, you told me you would like to take the Spiritual CPR class again, and I was so surprised. Would that be the 3rd time?! God is also placing another class on my heart (many other ideas, but this particular one first, which had not even been on the radar till several weeks ago). I love how the Lord is igniting dreams all over the place, and heart art is one! =] I loved your PS! That is so true. You are precious beyond belief!
      Love
      Lynni

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    3. Lynni and Kelly- Love the dialogue here! And love reading how God used collage in Lynni's grieving time...reminds me how important it is to process life through creativity and journaling...I would love to come to the collage party and can't wait to hear the new class God is putting on Lynn's heart...and yes, the Spiritual CPR class is definitely are repeatable experience, God is reviving us all the time in different ways and in different seasons! Love you both...happy day that God gave us to each other as friends!

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  8. BTW, thought you guys would like to know: Before I read your names under the collage boards, I guessed whose was whose!
    Kel, what did you do to make the white-lined grid?

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    1. Lynni- Sorry it took me so long to get back...I took a break this weekend from the email, web, etc...

      I used white packing string and tapped it to the back of the base (piece of cardboard covered with brown paper)

      It's fun to know that you could guess...

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  9. Oh I love this! I love that you guys are cheering each other on in your visions and dreams. Lifting each other up and connecting. It's so beautiful when God's women come together and unite especially over comfort food! ;)

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    1. Alia- So glad you stopped by..so thankful for the women God brings into my life! May God define your visions and dreams, too!

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  10. Love this and it sounds like a wonderful endeavor. I am happy with scissors and glue and journal anytime!

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