Breaking Pride's Protective Shell

          I've been in bad shape. Don't really know why. I've found a measure of healing laying here in the woods and crying. Reading back in my journal and asking You to show me what it was I wasn't getting, has helped.

                   --  I notice you don't ask Me to speak into your mind.  --

          I guess I haven't.  I seem to want to feel blank in my brain, yet I get this queasy feeling like I should ask if You have anything to say to me like last Sunday.

So, please clear my mind.  Protect me from anything myself and any other input that is not of You, in Jesus name...  I place myself before You, and I am willing and desirous to hear You.

--  My child  - I love you.

Do not let your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid -

for I am with you.

I am with your friend. 

I know you are worried about her, but she is in My hands, for I love her as I love you.  --

(I see a "picture" of You holding her face in Your hands and kissing the top of her head, and Your love just "running down" all over her.)

--  Keep that picture before you

and know that I love her

and know that I love you.

You do "count" with Me.

You do matter to Me.  --

(Lord?  The tears start to choke me.)

(--  Keep writing, child.  --)

--  You do matter to Me and I love you.  --

(Lord? the next thing I hear seems like just a memory from Anne's prophecy over me at Haymarket, but I feel blocked if I don't write it... and I don't want to write it because I can't believe it is from You. It sounds too preposterous.)

--  I cannot "live" without you: you mean that much to Me.

Come.  Lay your heart in My hands and know that I love you. 

Know that I do want you for My own,

My very own.  --

(please, Lord:  conflicting loves and loyalties?)

--  I'll resolve them, for you cannot resolve them in and of yourself. 

And this is how I will do it:

I will love you until you can love no more,

and then I will love through you.

There is much love I have to offer a dying world, and I offer/long to love through you --

but your love will not suffice.

Under its severity, you would "crack".

You cannot take it: the pain is too great.

But I can take it.

Let Me love through you.

Let Me care through you.

Let Me tend through you.

But to do this, you first must let Me do all three for you.  You do count with Me. 

You must know this beyond a shadow of a doubt.

You think all growth must come through suffering but, you think wrongly.

Much growth doesn't.

Rather it comes through love,

through the experience of being loved.

This is what changes you

This is what brings growth

This is what brings true humility:

the knowledge of being loved, being deeply loved,

will break the hardest shell of pride.

Yes, I know -- you have read that knowledge of being deeply loved brings humility. 

I can and do draw on that which you have read. 

But notice:  I take it beyond and tell you that humility means

the hard shell of pride has been broken.

Don't you see what this means? 

Pride is used by all as a shell to protect the heart. 

You have long wanted Me to deal with your pride,

but I need to deal with the hurt that underlies it.  --

Manna-shoulds

--  Drop the shoulds.  –

but then how do I know how to act?

          --  Live close to Me.  Ask Me for the day and I will tell you.  –

one days worth?

--  Manna.  Manna for a day.  One day at a time.  Each day.  For the whole day.  Ask Me to supply your need in this.  Forget the "should’s".  "Edwards" was right, here.  All of the "should’s" Christians and "non" level at My people would drown them.  Law doesn't work.  If it did, I would have left it at that.  How simple that would be!

          And how complicated.

          And how boring.  Boring for you.  Boring for Me!  I like to live close to My people, to dwell with them!  I love them.  Passionately.  With a passion that doesn't quit.

          So if life is too complicated for them to really figure out --

                             so be it!

          I have a purpose in this and the purpose is to drive them, pull them, draw them to Myself!

          You know this!  It's in scripture.  All through it.  The main theme if you will.

 I want a people

         and will go to

                and have gone to

                    will continue to go to

                      any length it takes just to have them! 

Even if it takes letting them drives themselves "nuts".  --

(aw oh.)

          --  Yes that means you, too.

          Maybe...  especially you.  –

(I think I know what that means...)

          --  Yes you do, little "no-stop-brain".  –

(but Lord.  I don't really know how to shut that part down, the figure-figure-figure it out part.)

--  I know.  But you do know, really. 

Put your mind in My hands.  Actually picture it.

          And then  trust Me!

          Trust Me with My people, little silliness!  --

I do feel like I'm always on guard.

          --  You don't make a very good sentry you know. 

You are far too scattered. 

                                                  Fortunately.  --

oh.  that means You use my scattered-ness to keep me away from some of the things You don't want me near.  You use what people see as our "flaws" (not sins), those things they think we "shouldn't" have, to complete Your purposes in our lives.

This Ancient Heart

          I'm sick.  Ill at heart.  Another June, and another legal case where justice has not been served.  Yet another case where we did all we could, heart and soul, and nothing worked.

           I feel so hurt.  All I want to do is cry.  I kept wrestling with myself and my feelings from the past (that You didn't value me enough to let my mother live) last night.  I guess You'll have to get me through this again.  I partly know You will, but I feel shaky and lost.  I don't want to close my feelings off in the way I did as a child, yet I don't want to get into free fall anger like I did over (my friend's) case last June.  I feel caught between the two.  The first is how I try to overcome the second.

          Why are we called to try and bring justice and truth to bear if it doesn't work? 

And I hear:

                   --  Fallen world.  –

And I sense You say that this is a taste of how You feel. 

Yet?  How does that jive with Your sovereignty? 

To say it is all in Your hands is not to say it all goes the way You want?

                   --  Kingdom come.  Pray "Your will be done"

                             on earth...  –

Oh. I guess it isn't.

                   --  No.  No amount of "prayer" will "fix" it.  –

...in total.   only piece by piece.  It will take a cataclysmic act of Yours to fix it.

                   --  Yes.  –

but I'm so sick of it!

-- I   know.

So am I.. 

 It is repeated again and again the world over,

in far worse cases.  –

yet You've told me to put down my weapons, repeatedly.  I don't understand how this fits.

--  Weapons of hate.  –

oh.  how do I do that?  For hate is what I feel.

please help me.  I feel so ugly and stained. 

I had been trying so hard not to feel rebellious towards You over this because reacting the way I did the last time was horrible beyond words. 

As I started to question why Tom's case came out like this, I was walking down the frozen food section of Safeway. 

Suddenly, a song came on and hit me full in the face.  It was as if You motioned to me to listen.  I froze in my tracks in shock, thinking how could this ever apply to me, especially in the state I was in!

(I'm including the lyrics as best as I can remember them.  Somehow, I feel they may also be for you.  if not today, then tomorrow perhaps, or another day)

"Good night My angel, now it's time to go to sleep.

 Put your questions away for another day

and know that I love you.

I have told you I would never leave you

and I will always be here right by you side

as close as your heart beat

as near as your next breath.

And My hope is that someday you will come to see

the depth of the river of love that flows towards you

out from this ancient heart of Mine."

Sleep My Child and Peace Attend Thee

I've been falling apart the last 24 hours.  Came out here feeling frantic and overwhelmed.  Everything seemed too much.  I thought, "I need to go away for a few days and have someone take care of me."

--I will take care of you.—

and I lay my thoughts and fearings open to You.

--Trust.  You need to learn to trust Me;

with life, your life,

"your" people which are My people.

My goodness!

  You even worry over the forest creatures. 

Let them go.  I will tend them.

             And I will tend you.

          You need this: My care, My tender/silly one.

          Shhhhh, My Child.

  I am big.

So big.

So very, very big...--

      I look at the tree in front of me in awe --

- how could it just grow up from the ground with all its knots and twists and color variations.

  And I am lost in wonder.

Knots

I'm sitting out here, stewing!  (what else is new?)

          Ah Lord.  What are we to do? It is such a mess and we are all struggling so hard.

Oh. I guess I'm trying to be a "fix-it."

          --  Little Partner,  --  You laugh.

dear Lord, my Lord, I don't know where to begin.

              --  Pray...  --

uhhh... but that is where I don't know where to start.  A big ball of knots.  You know how poor I am at untangling threads.

                --  Ah.  But do you?  That is the question, isn't it?--

I do keep trying, don't I?

Trust

--  Trust.

  It all has to do with your trust in Me.

  In My desire to do "right" by you.

  Trust in My kindness and goodness towards you.

  Trust in My ability to take care of whatever is in you that is not pleasing to Me.

          I know you can't do it.  If you could have, you would have.  For Me.  For yourself.  For your family.  For the sake of those around you.

          But I know you can't!  I know you are tired.

    "Sin" is a helpless thing.  I could see that from the beginning.  That was why I had to do something.  Something rather drastic.  Yes, it was drastic as you have begun to understand.  It was tearingly drastic.  In some ways it tore the very fiber of My being.

          And if I had to do it all over again,

          if I could do it all over again,

          if it would do any good to make it possible to salvage more.

                             I would.

                   You know that! 

                             You've begun to see that in Me.

          No, I don't want any to perish.

          And no, My will and desire are not always done,

                   - to the detriment of everyone.

That is why I said to pray to the Father, "Your will be done on earth as it is in Heaven."

          I don't, didn't waste My breath on bogus prayers that make no difference.  And neither do I ask My people to do so.

          And no, you must  leave (   ) to Me.  You do not do not know where you walk if you step out of line from where I tell you to go.  In the wrong time, the right information can bring damage instead of healing.  I will tell you "when" and "if" you may address this to him, My little warrior.

          You are so ready to fight.

          So ready to leap to My defense!

          Truly, I don't know whether to laugh or cry over you!

          Laugh, because Child, you are so little! 

And I am very, very big.  You just can't imagine.

          I want to laugh and put My arms around you pull you to My chest and "smother you with kisses".  It is so darling of you to come to My defense!

          But Child.  I have been absorbing this pain for eons and will continue to do so.  You can't do it, Little One.  It only hurts you.

          And that is why it makes Me "cry".  You try so hard.  You are so valiant.  Such a little fighter.  But no more.  Put down your weapons -

                lay them at My feet

                           and do not take them up again.

          I know you are conflicted because scripture says to fight so many of these things.

          But you also know and very well, that Satan uses "good" in your case to trap you.  Yes, it is a function of the "age" you live in.  I am very well aware of the blessings and havoc of "instant" telecommunications, and I have planned for them.  I know well how to work with them.  That is why you must listen for My voice!

          Yes, I will tell you how to test the "spirits".  --

(how, Lord?)

          --  Live close to Me and I will not allow you to be fooled nor deceived!

          Beggars.  Think. 

          If on an impulse you gave all you had to a "beggar" because that is what you thought scripture said...

          ...what would you do when your hands are empty and the person I had wanted you to bless, who needed My blessing of life through you came along

     and your hands are empty

     and you have nothing left to give?

          The time-frame you live in makes it essential that you walk by My Spirit rather than a set of rules at best improperly understood.   --

Earlier Conversations

Oh God. I hope that You are not an impersonal force.

- I'm not... -

You say, and You speak with such gentleness.

You are so patient. I feel You laugh... and You are soothing. I was thinking how I "hear" You in this wonderful wind out here. Then I started to think of Your largeness, and became afraid...

I cannot believe how wildly the oaks sway!

-See the tensile strength I have built into them? -

At first I thought, well, why write it down? It just seemed conversational, and would it even be of any interest later? Oh! You mean more than the trees, don't You?

You mean us. Me, my beleaguered friend, my family: whoever I'm fussed about.

-You will bend but you will not break.
The storms of life will come
for they must,
but you will not break.
I have said it. -

I don't want to make "stuff" up.

-You won't. -

but You sound so soft. How can it be louder?

-Live close to Me.-

please help me. I've been so distracted lately.

... I hear You in the wind!

It's like being taken and swirled around and enveloped by You!

-Just a little...-

This wind. It takes me back. Something about my childhood. The Heights. Virginia - but it is different from the soughing of the pine trees.

I try to go back. I remember loving the winter wind and somehow feeling held by it. But the thought of it without You seems too empty and pointless to bother.

-I was with you then. -

But I didn't know You, then.

-Yes, you did. In your little child's way. -

And I got a flash of myself as a blonde-haired toddler, bending over something, curious.

-I took great delight in you. -

Because of knowing what You had made?

-And what you would become. -

I'm so afraid of making things up.

-It comes easier because you are more relaxed.
Loosen up. I'll take care of you. -

It's funny. These are more of conversations.

-To each is given differently. -

And as I think back, I remember not wanting to go inside because the sound of the wind that day, filled me and enveloped me. At two and a half - maybe almost three, I could not have said what it was I felt, let alone why... but now I suddenly realize that it was You there, in the wind, that held me. I did not know Your name, then, and I don't think I could have even conceived of You with my mind -- but I knew Your touch. Even then I remember feeling like it was someone and that there was more love in that wind than I had ever known; and I felt more at home there than anywhere I had ever been. Even though I was so young that I remember little from that time, I can still feel how my heart felt like it was being torn out when my mother decided we had to go inside. I vaguely recall that she seemed puzzled by my reaction.

As I left the back porch to step over the thresh-hold, I knew a moment's panic that: oh - it would never be there again, not in that way. Then I felt the sides of my head being "held" and I suddenly knew that it would be.

Update on Friday, June 6, 2008 at 07:26PM by [Pat Kashtock]

 Dictionaries and 3-Legged Lambs - Conversation continued

I had to look up "tensile".

1) of, undergoing, or exerting tension; as "tensile strength"

2) capable of being extended or stretched

"tensile strength" = resistance to lengthwise stress, measured by the greatest load in weight per unit area pulling in the direction length that a given substance can bear with out tearing apart.

I was thinking of "personal prophecy" for people, or that given in public as I sit near Tackett's Mill pond before church -- and how the fear of speaking -- and speaking wrongly roils in my stomach.

If You want this from me: please take away the fear. Let there be fear only when it is not of You, but when it is of You -- please put the fear away for me and pour through me with boldness.

– So. You see the difference.—

Thinking of how You spoke to my friend last night, and "being in the Spirit" -- I guess I can't just do this any old time.

-Are you so sure?-

Lord? You don't mean that anytime I would desire a "word", I just have to ask?

-Try Me.-

That sounds too much under my control.

-Is it?-

I don't know... It doesn't matter what state I'm in?

-Like I said: Try Me.-

then I get all bungled up with things like "well, what if I don't really want this at the time and I'm just doing it?"

-Try Me!-

oh. wrong focus.

Lord: I'm scared.

- I know...-

is there anything You would say either to me or to anyone else? help me to listen. help me to hear. I am listening. please speak if You would like.

-So uncertain.-

yes.

Lord? What do I do?

-Just write...-

-If My people who are called by My name will listen, I will be in the midst of them.

I am their Warrior.

And I will conquer their foes.

They are My people and the sheep of My hand:

With tenderness I will lead them to conquer the land.

You think it strange that sheep will conquer?

I say to you: Do not doubt.

Your doubt is a shackle, a chain that keeps you bound.-

(What do I do?)

-Let it go.-

(how?)

-Let Me. Turn your wrists up and let Me unchain you.-

(but practically, Lord? I don't understand. Too mystical. Not practical enough.)

-Keep My "image" before you. Know that I go before you. Know that I am your Master and Savior, your Redeemer and King and I go before you.

I always go before you to prepare your way.

Do you remember the image of the three legged lamb who stood valiantly to save another?

What did that lamb do that was powerful?

Did she become ferocious?

Did she grow great fangs and unlimited strength?

No.

But notice: I said, "What?" and not "Did?"

What she did that was powerful

was to stand close to her Shepherd

and look at Him.

She gazed at Him with love and trust and never took her eyes off of Him.

This was how she fought.

She never took up a weapon,

she did not sharpen her teeth.

In adoration she gazed at the One

who holds all power in His mighty hands.

And I am mighty.

My hands are strong.

I am mighty to save

and I am powerful.

To you I have given My love.

My love is there for you, strong and mighty.

My love knows no depths, for it is beyond the comprehension of depth.

It is "fathomless."

My love knows no bounds

and you must know this.

Know this: That I loved you enough to die --

And I love you enough to live.

You have trouble seeing this in the singular,

but it is.

My love is always singular.-

(I'm unsure...)

-Do you want Me to go on?-

(Yes, but I'm tired. Something new perhaps, so I could know that I'm not just "re-filtering.")

-But you haven't yet incorporated the "old."-

(I know... but a new way of seeing it?

Lord. I am tired.)

-Then let Me strengthen you.-

(please. I feel so physically weak, and it is time to go over to church.)

-I will continue later.-

In church it hit further: the Shepherd became a lamb. I know this has meaning to the above, but I do not see it, yet.

I think one of the things You showed me in the above is that You are far more willing to speak to me than I am to listen, even though I thought it was the other way around.

And the other is one You have said before; that somehow, this type of interchange between us can be tiring for me. Oh -- I wish it wasn't so!

-It won't be someday. And that is a promise.

My promise to you.-