Well for the first time since I started writing this blog almost two years ago, I find myself nervous about it. I had some suggestions as to improvements that could be made, and I asked for them, and they are great ideas, but I have never tried to make this anything but the beginning of my sharing my learning through writing. So I really didn't have any idea how to take the advice and apply it. As I shared in a recent blog, I thought about making it more of a chronological account of my life with the intention to help others with similar experiences, but this is not going to work for me.

I have always loved the idea of sharing in the moment. Not sharing a slick, perfected idea or issue. But to share in the moment the struggles and successes of daily life. So I am going to stick with that because changing that made me not even want to write it.

Another thing I love is the way Carrie's character in Sex in the City writes. My style is the same idea, asking questions and then working through the answers as they come. Obviously I will not be as overtly sexual, but it may come up. Just a warning. :)

But I have made some changes in my approach to the way I think about this venue for my writing and I have come up with what I think will be a lot of fun, and work, for me, and at the same time make this a more widely read blog. Because if you don't know, all writers want to be read or why else write. Writers will say all day long that they write because they have this insatiable compulsion to do so, and they have to do it. This is not true of me. Don't get me wrong, I love it, but my truest pleasure is in teaching to faces the things that God does and is. But again, I want to reach as many people as possible, so as this grows and becomes more of what God has for it to be, I hope you will feel inspired to share it with others who need truth and grace and a word inspired from the source of all love, our grace-filled Creator.

I love you all. Keep the comments coming.

Look forward next week to many new topics and pictures.

Having learned that stories are the best way to communicate because our Creator created us as story formed people, I see the need to not only share stories, but to have these stories include a common thread. Being story formed means that we use stories to teach and share and interact. It is the most ancient form of communication becasue before we could write we could speak. Having a common thread means that in a series of stories there is an overarching theme that ties them all together, and for me makes it easier to understand.

Take for example; well let’s say… the bible. It is full of stories. And if you chose a theme, it could be redemption, relationship, forgiveness etc.; you can draw that out specifically from each story and get a clear view on God’s idea of and purpose for it. I am teaching in this style a small group of ladies at my house. We are stringing together the redemptive theme, which will climax with Jesus, and have been seeing so many stories of redemption which are building a theme of God's characteristics. Like how kind and caring and responsive He is no matter your sin. Examples here… Adam and Eve, Jacob, Moses, just to name a few, all of whom sinned greatly and were redeemed for purposes of great responsibility.

So, to start this series of writings I thought it would be helpful to know that we are on a redemptive arc with a freedom theme. My hope is that the stories I share will all be tied together with my steps toward freedom, pointing to the bigger picture of restoration and sanctification as part of redemption. The result of which, again I hope, is peace that passes understanding no matter the circumstances, a path to ease and light no matter the emotional digging going on, and the keys to self awareness which unlocks the prison of shame or fear or bitterness, and leaves you free to fully experience love and joy and truth.

But before you can be free you have to be able to see the walls of your prison. So next week I will show you the long ago places of darkness and just like any good bible story I hope you will not only see the intended theme, but also see it pointing to the ways I have been loved and protected and guided even when it does not seem that way. Because it’s those things that tell you of God’s character, and it is by knowing who He really is that will set you free.

I had no idea that when I baited you with the olfactory sensation of freedom that I would be smack dab in the thick of fighting for my own just a few days later.
I really have had such a great experience being set free. It seems like from the get I knew that there was something I had not seen but I knew was available. Yes I had heard it preached, but I also just had the sense that even though it was obviously elusive to the other followers I know, that there was more to be had. I do not speak of this in a way that means others are less than or even missing something. I am only speaking from my experience and when I look at the lives of others in comparison with mine, which you are never supposed to do, I felt like God was calling me to more.
I had no idea more what. My examples of what it means to be and looks like to be a Christian are normal people. Full of life and experiencing joy and pain just like everyone on the planet. I don’t know if I felt like I had more to deal with or felt called to a deeper relationship with God, but when I looked around me I didn’t see anyone who seemed to be doing the emotional digging I was.
My daily life was a moment by moment existence driven by my need of instruction and support. I felt very comfortable, so I thought, trusting God with all of me. It seemed natural and almost easy to just let go and let Him lead. I realize now that the past 9 years have apparently been a process of me letting go every day the parts of me that were being restored because they had been stolen from me.
So it turns out that until today I have not been in possession of enough of me to surrender fully to God in order to receive the freedom I have for so long been working. And the bugger of it is; the working part was my choice. It didn’t have to be such a burden. Again today in the midst of compiling my list of things to do to be set free I was reminded that there is nothing for me to do.
So how do we begin this journey? How do I share with you where I came from and how I got here in a way that helps you begin, or continue to move through, your own journey? And not only that but allows you to benefit from what God has taught me because that is the only reason I will ever write one more word. I used to write to say things I would never say out loud. Then I wrote because God had given me something to say and I thought that meant I was a worthwhile person. Then I tried to organize my writing so that I could find a reason to write which became the need to be published and have my voice heard, and pay the bills. And now, after all of this unnecessary work, I will write with you in mind. With the intent to benefit someone other than myself and, it will be easy. Because Jesus said so.
Again… how? Well my past is filled with stories of pain and abuse and insecurity, very much like most of the people in the world. So I’ll start there. Next week.

So the suspense is over! As you can see by the pictures I decided to go to the reunion. I took along a friend from church as an anchor in case I went blank and forgot who I was, and to keep me from reverting naturally back to that loud, insecure, silly girl.
The moment I walked in the door I realized I did not need a reminder of who I am. I have now been this person longer than I was that high school girl, and weight issue aside, I felt very comfortable as me.
We all talked an hugged and caught up on life. What I had not realized is that in a restaurant bar, with 75 people you are trying to talk to, the conversation does not get deep. So my answer to the question was... drum roll please... "My sister and I have our own wedding photography business." End of story. It was great. I did feel like I wanted to share more with a few people, but as happens with 80's teenagers we were drawn on to the dance floor with the baiting sounds of Guns and Roses and Prince.
Still though the idea of how I got here and what I am doing has grown much bigger than just trying to find an answer to a question or a justifiable list of reasons for my existence.
It has caused me to consider with perspective all that I have been through, all that God has seen me through, and what that means for you. You whom God has given me to. You who are the fulfillment of a promise He made to me saying that, "None of your pain will be wasted." This being said during my struggle to decide if life was worth living or not.
So, since my pain is not wasted and it has made me who I am, a teacher of the word and work of God, I am going to use this place to share how He and I got here.
And by the way, here is a place so very near absolute and total freedom that I can smell it. You want to know what freedom smells like???
Check back next week!