Shhh . . . Do You Hear Jesus Speaking To You In A New Way?

/ Lori Lawe / Leave a comment

Jesus, while He was walking the earth as a human, said a LOT without speaking.

Consider the following example:

Mary Magdalene came to the tomb and saw that the stone was moved away from the entrance. She ran at once to Simon Peter and the other disciple, the one Jesus loved, gasping for breath. . . Peter and the other disciple left immediately for the tomb. . . Simon Peter . . .entered the tomb, observed the linen cloths lying there, and the kerchief used to cover his head not lying with the linen cloths but separate, neatly folded by itself. The Message

We scratch our heads. Our ears are lying on the floor. We can’t hear Jesus speaking through the bolded words above! You must be making stuff up!

We read the newspaper instead and remain locked in fear. We call this freedom.

Jesus stands next to us, holding out a shovel. Are we willing to dig for some gold? Our freedom is at stake. His words are purposed to help us soar.

And so we rub our eyes from our sleepy state, reluctantly receive the shovel He holds out to us, and try with one hand to hold up one ear to our head so it won’t fall off again. “What exactly are You trying to say?”, we ask, yawning, digging awkwardly with the other hand.

In Jewish culture in the time of Jesus, folding up a napkin (translated above as “kerchief”) after a meal was a way of saying “I am finished.”

We hold onto our ear, about to fall off again. “Uh-huh,” we murmur. Yes, it was finished at the resurrection. We know this.

HANG ON before your ears drop to the floor again and you go back to sleep.

Jesus said “It is finished” to His confused followers because they hadn’t seen the end of The Jesus Film yet. They didn’t know how things would pan out.

But He speaks to US through the folded napkin too, as we apply what He said many years ago to our lives today.

Don’t drop your ear yet!

He says:

I speak in ways that you don’t expect, without words, sometimes. Do you want to hear me? If so, get out your shovel, hold up one of your ears to your head, and dig, friend, dig.

I offer freedom.

Do you want My gifts?

Jesus, may we hold both ears up to our head, eventually, as we learn to listen and to dig into Your words. May you answer our every question. May we come to another with our questions, and may they help us to dig, or may they offer the gold they have already found from studying Your life.

May many, many more of us learn that we have wings.

As you listen to this song, consider holding one of your ears up to your head and asking Jesus to touch your heart with His love. May you receive exactly what you need to fully satisfy your soul, whether He speaks with or without words to you today. May your heart be filled with His love for you, we pray.

A way Jesus recently spoke without using words will be discussed in future posts.

Are Ordinary Homeschooled Kids Reading Books Hope For Our Society?

/ Lori Lawe / 5 Comments

It started off as an ordinary day.

We were visiting the largest city in our region and decided to stop in at the library to borrow some books for our youngest daughter’s summer reading cache.

We walked in awe, looking up in wonder at the size of the magnificent building. So many books inside!

I headed to the children’s section to seek some advice on finding excellent books.

My daughter perused the shelves as I asked the librarian for classic books that my daughter hadn’t read yet.

He jumped up, taking us on a tour through several sections and a couple of different floors of the library in our quest for books.

“These are the most popular books for her age group,” he began. My daughter scowled. Trashy and scary novels without much depth weren’t her cup of tea.

“No, I’m looking for classic books,” I said again.

He was visibly excited.

“This is such a joy,” he said, his voice quaking. “I don’t meet many kids who actually like to read.”

“Huh? What?” I thought? I was distracted by another book he placed in my hands.

“I’ve read that,” my daughter stated absently, going back to a nearby shelf.

Together the librarian and I found ten classic books. My daughter had read five of them, which we returned.

“Wow!” He was still excited. He was venting at me now, in a state of catharsis.

“You know, usually I only get requests to print things for kids when they are on computers. I don’t get to actually look for BOOKS.”

“WHAT now!?” I thought, again distracted as he showed me another book.

I shook my head, looking at my daughter’s reaction to yet another trashy, popular vampire page-turner.

“Could I ask,” he began hesitantly, “why you and your daughters prefer classic books?”

I wasn’t sure where to begin. He works in the children’s section of one of the largest libraries in our Province. (“Province” is the Canadian word for the American term “State”, Google Translate told me). Shouldn’t HE be trying to convince ME to choose books with more depth for my child?

I shrugged off the WHY of the question and spoke for a few minutes about mentors as the main characters of books, helping us to learn how best to navigate through life’s challenges.

He wasn’t convinced. “Well, I don’t know about THAT,” he countered.

The pieces of the puzzle of what he had been saying all morning came together into one unfinished whole. I was seeing a bigger picture, though I had to guess as some of the puzzle pieces were still not available.

But definitely, this ordinary day for us at the library was NOT an ordinary day for the librarians.

My homeschooled kids, who actually LIKE to read, were neon flashing lights in that place, screaming NOT ORDINARY! NOT ORDINARY!

Do we look in wonder at my kids?

No. Classically homeschooled kids consume challenging literature like fires consume water from fire hoses. They all read a lot.

We look in wonder at our culture, seen afresh through the contrast of our kids.

They’re missing out on all this?

Is this another way that homeschooling kids are hope for our society?

Ways that children reading classic books offer hope for our culture will be discussed in a future post.

Does Your Life Inspire Others To Soar?

/ Lori Lawe / 3 Comments

Here’s a picture taken just after I completed a triathlon.

I’m the one in the hat. You can also tell which one is me because I’m the one that is “fit looking”. Just sayin’. Well, at least I should say that I’m the one that looks “fitter than I was”. Whatever.

Yes! We are wearing matching shirts! I completed this triathlon as a memorial for my dad, who passed away not long ago, and who inspired us all in physical strength by completing many triathlons.

Leaders inspire others by their examples.

. . . lead them by your own good example says the ancient text

How will our lives inspire others who are watching us, even though we don’t see them looking our way? By our example. Are you awake to who God is calling you to become?

In the last post, we talked about how God often wants to wake us up to His vision for our lives, if our ears are screwed on tight enough to hear Him.

God may be blowing open your expectations of what He can do through your life if you sense any of the following:

1) God is whispering about something you know you could never accomplish on your own strength.

2) God seems to envelop you in love, even for just a moment, or to touch your heart with His invisible love. With Him as the wind, holding up your wings, He can move mountains.

3) God is trying to wake you. He stands next to your bedside, gently nudging you. He picked up your ears off the floor. Will you put them on?

What does He see when He looks at you? Ask Him! If you don’t hear His gentle whisper, continue reading The Message. Every word read helps put a bit more glue on our ears, ever ready to fall off.

How may God be calling you to set an example for others of a life well lived?

Abba, continue to speak in ways that we can finally grasp the truth that You have much, much bigger plans for our lives than we do, with You at the helm, guiding us for Your kingdom purposes. Help us to be able to hear You more clearly, we pray. Keep our ears screwed on tight.

God Encourages Us To Complete The Triathlon?

/ Lori Lawe / 4 Comments

While my back still felt like an old lady’s, when I had to yell up at people so they could hear me as I spoke to their waist, hunched over, I announced I would do a triathlon.

“Well . . . if I can walk, I will do a triathlon,” I clarified.

This annoying back problem has GOT to get better someday, right?

And it did get better, praise be to God.

It didn’t help that the little kid I was playing with at the family dinner jumped on my back in a fit of fun.

My community gathered around me that same night and cared for me, lifting me to God in prayer.

My back felt better after that night than it had in a long, long time.

So, yup, time to do a triathlon.

I didn’t have as much time to train as I had intended, but I thought the bike part was about 10 km?

I was shocked as I picked up my bib the day before the race to learn that the bike part was 20 km. Could my back even handle being on a bike that long?

My husband coached me, like a parent coaching a small child. I needed some direction. “Now remember,” he said slowly, “You have your goals in the wrong order.” He coached me by holding up a finger for each goal. “The most important goal is not to get hurt,” he said. I had relegated that goal to Goal #3. He was right.

But in the pool, I felt God nudging me to swim faster (!). What does God care about an obscure triathlon where a bunch of fairly fit middle-aged people do their exercises?

(There were actually some young and very fit people there who definitely upped the cool factor of the race. Just sayin’. I’m sure I would have beaten John in the race to Jesus’ tomb too. Just sayin’. Not that that matters OF COURSE, but for those who are interested, I thought you should know).

Then I realized that God was speaking to me during this triathlon because God cares about everything we do. We can’t relegate Jesus to an hour on Sunday. Everything is an opportunity to grow closer to Him, if we can find our ears and screw them on.

Maybe there was a lesson here too, while completing this triathlon, that He wanted to nail through my thick skull, a lesson that wouldn’t sink into my brain any other way, perhaps.

And I went further and faster than I thought I could.

. . . THAN I THOUGHT I COULD.

How else are we limiting ourselves with what God wants to do through us?

What race is God asking you to enter that is too far for you to go, or that you are too slow to finish?

Are your ears lying on the floor, too?

Samuel took his flask of oil and anointed [David, the shepherd boy, as king], with his brothers standing around, watching. The Spirit of God entered David like a rush of wind, God vitally empowering him for the rest of his life. The Message

Ways that God may be trying to wake us, trying to translate His words into a language we can understand, trying to encourage us to pick up our ears, screw them on, and listen to His vision for our lives will be discussed in the next post.

Is Holy Spirit Attempting to Waken You?

/ Lori Lawe / 4 Comments

Yeah, so I might have had a small touch of fear now and then over my lifetime.

OK, let’s admit it. Fear is paralyzing me, my constant friend.

Jesus walks over to me, crouches in the corner next to me, and offers me His arm. It is time to stand. I rise on quaking legs.

He is asking me to run. He hangs back, crouching down low to whisper in my ear as I hide in the fetal position. Time to run, His eyes bid. He gazes in the direction He wants me to travel.

I pull the covers over my head. I am trying to go back to sleep.

Wake, wake, dear one. He whispers. He is shaking me, gently. Wake up.

And so the decision rests in my heart. Will I get up, rub my half-seeing eyes and stand into the new thing that God is calling me to?

Or will I put in earplugs to distance myself from the sound of Jesus’ voice and go back to sleep?

The choice is mine. The choice is yours. What is your heart’s reply?

One day He asked me to run into a cooking adventure. The result freed my daughter from expectations around various diagnoses that tried to pin her down.

One day He threw me into the deep end of the spiritual swimming pool. I awoke more fully with the splash of water and have been swimming more deeply, in a spiritual sense, since that day.

One day He asked me to homeschool, again, another year. This was many years after I thought I would change my apron for a real job, one that actually pays money in exchange for work. A job that is recognized culturally as actually “doing” something worthwhile.

I left my career identity by the side of the road and followed Jesus down a narrower path to homeschool longer, my inexperienced feet aching from the journey of following Him.

I had wanted to go back to sleep then, too. To rest in the comforting mold of what regular people do. Go to work. Put their kids in school.

And yet, maybe He is using our unappreciated homeschooling journeys to bring hope to society.

He woke me again this morning, early. Write, my dear one, write, He whispered.

Are you the one that I am writing for?

Are you, like me, also beginning to wake up?

In your drowsy state, do you sense He is trying to waken you, too?

Are you being awakened to pour more of your life into your children, to grow, grow, grow in hearing His voice, to a creative endeavour, too?

To something else?

If so, welcome to the adventure of a lifetime of following Jesus!

He walks ahead of you, bidding you to follow.

Will you trust Him enough to join Him on His journey for your life?

If we can leave our fear behind, the journey is exhilarating.

This is what God says . . . “Forget about what’s happened; don’t keep going over old history. Be alert, be present. I’m about to do something brand-new. It’s bursting out! Don’t you see it? The Message

Holy Spirit, help us to be able to hear You when You call us to a new thing. May we be brave enough to follow You. After a few moments of quietly listening for the voice of God as the song below plays, ask Jesus, “What direction do you want me to travel in this next season? What needs to be left behind?”

The Way To Fight Climate Change is To Eat Beef (Seriously)

/ Lori Lawe / 1 Comment

I was looking around me, trying to figure out how to save the world.

We’ve got some problems, right?

“Tick Season” and “Wildfire Season” are the terns that replace what we used to simply call “Spring” and “Summer”.

The warmer winters allow ticks to flourish, and weird weather events are seen all over the world with increased regularity.

So how do we solve these problems, I wanted to know, as I took another bite of my snack and continued to half-watch my favorite iPad distraction.

One list of ways to curb climate change helpfully included “Turn off lights” as a to-do item.

“Come on! The world is falling apart and you are harping about turning off lights?” I thought incredulously.

OK – what are the MOST important things that we can be doing to reverse climate change?

I don’t have a lot of time here. The commercial is almost over.

It turns out, that the best thing we can do is to eat beef.

Now, two caveats:

(1) I didn’t say that we should eat MORE beef.

(2) I didn’t specify what KIND of beef we should eat.

We should eat LESS beef. For sure. Your hearts and knees will thank you. We should cut up that beef into TINY strips and use it to add flavoring to our stir fries, for example. But we should EAT beef.

We should ONLY eat ONE kind of beef. The kind that costs more money. But if we do point number one, above, and eat LESS beef as well to give our overtaxed bodies a break, we still come out ahead, financially. And we can enjoy a side of ultra-cheap beans with every meal, which will make our bodies happy too.

Anyway, having extra money to buy more plastic items that will break next week is one of the idols of our culture, enslaving us. But that is a conversation for another day.

Now, I finally get to the point:

Eat only beef that has been regeneratively farmed.

Yes, a big word for the end of a short blog post.

Check out this movie for a summary of this movement or wait for a future post for a detailed explanation.

Kiss the Ground

What are your thoughts?

Cowering In Fear Or Ready To Fight?

/ Lori Lawe / 1 Comment

Yeah, I’ve been cowering in fear as mentioned here and here.

But we’re made to soar, our Heavenly Father, like the wind, buoying up our wings.

But I feel fearful again, this morning.

How do we keep Fear at bay, in its corner of the ring, instead of on top of me, rendering me immobile?

Learning about what we fear helps. I learned that alligators need water to survive and that annihilated my childhood fear of these animals living under my bed. (Don’t judge me). In the same way, in a future post, I will talk about how my raging Fear was soothed as I learned from scientists studying wildfire behavior.

Scientists have also learned* that if we exert some (even very minimal) level of control over stressful situations, our stress levels decrease dramatically. Translation: DOING something, even a very small thing about the stuff that bothers us makes us feel a WHOLE lot better. Fear stays on its own side of the wrestling ring for a while.

And so I got on my bike, put on my superwoman cape, delivered flyers, and our neighborhood became Firesmart.

But then as I watched the news one day, Fear grew and its shadow threatened to overwhelm me again.

No!

And so I act, again, I DO something to battle my Fear.

I write this post.

Talking about climate has been compared to having flatulence at a cocktail party.

And dwelling on Fear is only another way to drag more of us into the ring, with Fear immobilizing all of us.

NO!

What are you DOING to fight Fear?

Every action we take is food that we offer to our neighbors, strengthening them.

Let’s share our food together, feeding and encouraging one another.

What are you doing or is another doing that is food to strengthen you, to pick up your boxing gloves, and to meet with Fear head-on?

Let’s bandage each other’s wounds, offer each other a sip of water and a word of encouragement and then get back in the ring.

Because fighting is how we soar.

Here are a pair of boxing gloves.

Are you ready to put them on?

The counterintuitive, best things we can do to fight the weird weather that ramps up our fear will be discussed in future posts.

Blogpost Footnotes

*Lecture 14: How Your Brain Manages Stress by John J. Medina in Your Best Brain, from The Great Courses

Want To Be A Hero Too?

/ Lori Lawe / 1 Comment

I AM a NEIGHBORHOOD CHAMPION. I AM the COMMITTEE CHAIR. (For those who don’t know, the CHAIR is the TOP, MOST IMPORTANT position on the committee).

Of what, you say?

Well, of this group I volunteer with, the Firesmart program. The goal is to educate people about the most common causes for houses to burn down due to wildfire, and then to focus on doing the most important interventions that decrease the risk of a house going up in flames.

We encourage each other to clean up the downed branches that are fire risks in our community. And of course, with tinder-dry forests where we live, in the BC interior of Canada, it seems the trees are shouting, “Please consume me with fire!”

Many of the cedars are already red, dried up, and sad, living in the arboreal never land between life and death.

But I digress.

The point I was trying to make is that, well, have you ever noticed how manipulation is overtly used in our culture? For example, the assumption is by the Firesmart program that Jane-Neighbor (aka me) would be more likely to spend another X number of hours volunteering if we raise her up a bit in her own eyes.

She is MORE important than others. SHE ALONE is the CHAIR, and my favorite, a CHAMPION. I rode around on my bike last summer delivering flyers with information about the Firesmart program. And now, I can wear a badge, and elevate myself to the lofty level of CHAMPION.

We are all so ridiculous, aren’t we? And by the way, when I throw away the title of Champion or Chair, what do we have left? “Regular Mom worried about her kid’s future”. Somehow that title isn’t as important, we feel. How wrong we are! The secret superpower, the cape under our regular clothes, regular moms, regular dads, is actually of course, concern for the wellbeing of our kids.

Learning what wildfire smoke does to kids’ brains* – that’s my superpower. I would wave my paper fan all day long in front of my kid’s faces . . . desperately . . . untiringly if that would decrease their potential cognitive impacts. I don’t even need the elevated title of CHAIR to do that!

Barring that, I ride on my bike distributing flyers. Maybe my kids and us won’t have to drive away in a car in a hurry this summer, flames licking at our tires. We read about others in Lytton, BC who endured that a few years ago. It would be nice not to do that, actually.

I’d rather just be a regular Mom, reading my book on the wharf at the lake while my kids play in the water.

Instead, I am a super mom, manipulated to feel important. The incredible truth is that “Mom Worried about Her Kids” is a force to be reckoned with. She is the true powerhouse.

Have you ever read about those moms who lifted a car off of their kids when they were in danger? The critical line in that article is that “. . . we humans are, quite simply, stronger than we think.”

Ready to lift the car of a sick culture off of our kids?

Come on, Moms, Dads. It’s time to reluctantly put away the novels, look at the future of our kids 20 years out, and work together to do some lifting. Our kids may be trapped between wildfire smoke and flames licking their tires unless we can find a way to turn this big ship, our culture, around. Time for some real heroes to show their stuff. On board?

For now, we can use our voice here, as one example of taking off our Clark Kent clothes and jumping into the battle. And let’s continue to talk about how to be a real hero in a future post, shall we?

Blogpost Footnotes

*Statement from this article: “A growing body of literature also suggests that exposure to particulate matter may have neuropsychological effects in children, including associations with ADHD, autism, school performance, and memory.”

Why Cleaning Eggs Off The Floor (Aka Homeschooling) Is Hope For Society

/ Lori Lawe / 3 Comments

We attended our city’s annual carnival event. “Get me out of here!”, my brain screamed after only a few minutes.

One of the rides closed after a variety of kids vomited on it. The fair was too hot, too loud, too much garbage overflowing from the cans, junk food at every corner.

If this is one of the highlights of the year for our local kids, as it is for many, no wonder there is so much despair among youth.

We could smell pot as the older kids drifted past us.

If this is as good as it gets for our teens, it’s not very good.

Thankfully one of my kids, and her friend felt the same way.

We drove to a nearby nature park to the “Critter Day” event, to learn about local plants and animals.

It was much quieter. The wind blew through the trees nearby. The sounds were of muffled conversation and some hammers pounding softly as local kids assembled birdhouses.

I was enthralled as a scientist described a local insect that lays its eggs into a host’s body, which the larvae then feed on until it is time to hatch. He showed us the bug’s rear body part that was perfectly designed for this one bizarre behavior.

I was a bit distracted, looking elsewhere, while my daughter and her friend asked questions of the entomologist. They moved on.

“Are your kids homeschooled?” the entomologist asked me. “Huh? Oh yes. That’s my daughter’s friend and she is homeschooled too. Why do you ask?”

“I can always tell who the homeschooled kids are.”

“How?” I asked, intrigued.

“They ask questions and engage at a level of someone who is 40 or 50 years old.

I travel all around and see it time and again,” he continued. “The public school kids say, “Oh, bugs,” and move on, staring into their phones.

The public school kids don’t engage.”

I felt sad. “It’s quite a feat, isn’t it, that the public school system can stamp the love of learning out of children.”*

It dawned on me that this man was a Ph.D. type, definitely overqualified for conversations with Grade 3 kids. He had driven several hours, as a volunteer, to be there.

I was curious about what motivated him, and he unburdened his heart as we spoke.

“I’m really worried about the future of our society,” he continued.

“What do you do with kids who aren’t even engaged? But wherever I go, I find hope in the homeschooled kids. They are the ones asking questions, interested.

I travel to fairs hoping that kids are engaged with their natural world so they will be motivated to find solutions to the immense challenges we are facing as a culture.”

My eyes welled up.

Yes, how do we encourage kids to engage with the wonder of creation, so they may be motivated to protect this incredible biodiversity as unprecedented challenges face our culture?

Perhaps providing hope for our culture is another reason to consider homeschooling.

You got this, Mom, Dad.

Keep being a world changer, Mom, Dad, in your own, hectic, cleaning-eggs-off-the-floor way.

Every homeschooling day you make it through lends a bit more hope to our society.

Blogpost Footnotes

*The public school system is undeniably broken. This TED talk, for example, is the most popular TED talk of all time.

Yes, I Was Mentored By A Random Internet Stranger!?

/ Lori Lawe / 1 Comment

An eagle showed up in my life.

She was drawing out the vile illness from my heart with her questions, green goo surfacing, and I was astonished at the sticky mess dripping off my clothes.

“Yuck! How do you clean up this stuff?” I asked, panicking.

“Why don’t I call you, and we can talk about this some time?” she offered.

My mind swirled.

She was a random internet connection.

Should I open my heart, and the great vulnerability within to a random internet stranger? What was I thinking???

Well, I’ll start with how it all began.

I had a recurring dream for a couple of years. The title of the book that was recommended to me by Amazon matched the title of the dream.

(I didn’t say that this story would be easy to swallow. I only promised the truth).

And no, I had never followed the random inner longings of a dream before.

I discovered Heidi Baker, a missionary in Mozambique through this book, and then was connected with a handful of people who met online weekly to pray about this common spiritual burning that it sensed God was putting on all of our hearts.

From within that group, one of those ladies started a Facebook group, which I joined regularly.

It was in one of those groups that I met Aja, who was now probing my heart with her questions. Goo from the depths that had not surfaced before was now spotting my clothes and I come back to my story – do I meet one-on-one with Aja, or not?

I met with my pastor, spouse, and a handful of trusted friends over iced coffees one sunny summer afternoon to ask their advice.

“I am heading down a spiritual rabbit trail that I don’t know if I will emerge from,” I began.

I shared what we spoke about, the journey that it seemed God was guiding with his large invisible palm, squishing me together with this new group, as so many lumps of clay, joined in the spirit.

I listened to both their wise cautions and their encouragement.

And I met with Aja.

Open your heart, I felt God whispering during that first call, as I spoke with her.

I was surprised.

You’re safe here, He continued to encourage.

And beyond the obvious safeguards that we use by engaging the big ol’ gray matter in the head, such as by asking if I am being encouraged to: (1) read my bible? (2) connect more deeply with my local community (?) (3) connect with the Lord?

Beyond those questions, which were answered with a yes . . .

. . . I was growing spiritually.

My plumage was starting to fill out.

She sat in the chair between Jesus and me and facilitated our conversation so my own quiet times could bear more fruit.

And I was just about ready to fly, by the grace of Jesus.

Is it time for you to choose a random internet, or in-person connection to soar with, too?

On a COMPLETELY UNRELATED topic, we are hosting a regular online listening prayer and connection time soon.

Details will be posted soon HERE.