Category Archives: Dreams & Visions

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Battle Lamp Needed, Inquire Within

I had the oddest dream this morning. I dreamt that there was a Civil War re-enactment of the Battle of Nashville going on, and it was happening all around my house. I was too busy getting ready for work to realize it at first, but when I finally figured out why there was all this louding booming and banging going on outside, I went outside to watch. By then, however, the most exciting parts were over and it was just little skirmishes here and there — and "dead" bodies lying everywhere. Still, it was fun to be a "part" of it all and I couldn’t wait to tell my friends that my house stood in the middle of an old Civil War battlefield.

During the heaviest part of the battle, some soldiers came in needing to borrow a floor lamp and walked out with one of my favorites. I found it later and brought it back, glad it wasn’t too worse for wear, but still…

What was that about?!?!

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The Cost of Freedom

Flag_draped_coffins_on_the_beach_1

No matter what your personal opinion of the Iraq war, you gotta realize that this is the price we pay for the freedoms we enjoy; even the ones that let us vehemently disagree with our leaders and our military.

The amazing thing to me is that no matter what we say, even if we rail against what they are doing, our military will still fight, and die, so we will remain free. That is truly something to lauded.

Photo by the amazing Kat Bonson. All her memorial pictures can be found here.  The organization that puts on these memorials in Santa Monica is called Arlington West.

NOTE: I do not put this up to rail against the war, or to make a statement for it.  I am personally conflicted about it, and do not see a clear solution or easy answers anywhere.

Rather, I put this up as a salute to all the brave men and women who fought and died for the freedoms I enjoy. Whether it was in Iraq, Afghanistan, Vietnam, Korea, World War II, World War I, The Civil War, or the American Revolution, many, many people have given their lives so that I can live free. Free to pursue my particular dreams, to worship the God I want the way I want, to speak my mind on any matter I desire, to travel when and where I want…. I am blessed. We are blessed. Because they were/are willing to stand against tyranny and say, "not on my watch."

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I Bring Myself

Today Jesus met me in a way I haven’t had in a long time. Today I sat at His feet and wept and worshiped. Today I had needs met in me so deep and so long unmet I’d forgotten what it was like to have them satisfied. Today I felt known; more over, I felt people wanted to know me. Today I found a place that values all that I value; that holds dear what I hold dear; a place where conviction meets real life and both walk hand-in-hand. A place that is as close to Mosaic as I think a place can get without being it, and yet is different.

Now that its over, fear is threatening to take over my heart. Fear that the whole thing was just a marvelous dream, or at best a one-time thing that won’t be repeated; fear that what I found is just too rare to be mine. Is that not the most insane thing you ever heard? But there it is. The reality in my heart. I’m so afraid I will come back empty-handed next time.

Two months ago I wrote about my dilemma. I’d been struggling for months with not having community at the church I was serving. I had prayed, reached out, gone to events and small groups, even had one in my home, but I could not seem to really connect with anyone. It was as if I was a foreigner to them, and they to me. We were interesting to each other but ultimately we spoke different languages, and I felt Lost in Translation. They want comfort, stability, safety, sameness, perhaps even God-in-a-box. I don’t. Here’s what I wrote; Here’s what I want.

I want to be known more than I fear it. I want
community more than I fear intimacy. I want to be challenged more than
I want to be "fed". I want to follow Jesus no matter the cost more than
I fear where He might take me. And I want a community of people to
journey with in life here in Nashville that shares my passion for Jesus
and my longings for community and challenge. I want that more than I want to shuffle
alongside people who still think Church is a fortress from the "world",
rather than the shelter and refuge FOR the world’s most broken, twisted
and shattered that it is and was always meant to be. I want a community
who desires to pursue Jesus with full-out passion. I want it so bad it
hurts. I haven’t had it since I left LA.

Today I think I found that place. Not only that, but I joined that place; for the first time since leaving LA I became a member of a church.

I didn’t mean to. I didn’t intend to. I intended to go to this event ("class") and just find out about this community, investigate it. I was going to keep my options open this time, and guard my heart well, in case they weren’t what my friend who’d told me about them said they were.  What have I done?

But people at the event were so friendly, so open, so willing to be known, and to know others. Conversation was easy, and for the first time in over two years I felt I belonged, really belonged. Like I wasn’t a foreigner speaking a strange language, or a stranger trying to force my way in. It felt very good.

Anyone who knows me knows I love people, but that they also exhaust me. I’m such an introvert! Crowds, big or small, scare me and I have to take a deep breath before I plunge in. Yet I felt no fear with this group. I felt no… discomfort at all. And the time went by far too fast. I wasn’t at all ready for it to be over when it was.

God spoke to me as I stared at the community’s commitment/covenant at the end of our time. He spoke of putting down roots and how I’ve been avoiding it since the church-plant fell apart. I invested so much of myself, invested my whole heart and soul in that group. To have it disintegrate before my eyes broke not just my heart, but my spirit, I think.  It’s like losing a baby that never got to be birthed.

But here He was, Jesus, talking to me softly about putting down roots, reminding me that it is a rare thing, and this was the first place I’d found it in Nashville. He was soft, but insistent, yet never demanding. So, I took a deep breath, signed the covenant and nervously handed it to someone on staff.

What have I done?

This morning was my last morning on the sound team at the other church, and it was filled with sweet fellowship with the team leader and with my ministry partner/producer. It was as if they were dangling carrots to keep me there and involved. It nearly worked; part of me really wondered if I really ought to be leaving and whether a year was long enough a chance to give a community.

But then I walked into the other community– my new community now — and Jesus sat down beside me. Wrapping up the sound in the chapel after 1st service of my old church had caused me to miss the worship at my new home. When I came in the pastor was already into his sermon. I sat down on some steps nearby, the nearest "seat" I could find, and Jesus made His presence immediately known.

I have this "language" with Him that I cannot explain, it just is. Its a visual language; one where He shows me things–shows me Himself–in my mind, or what I call my "mind’s eye". I get flashes of images, Him sitting somewhere or standing or in some position, always near or next to me. Sometimes we dance, sometimes He holds me, sometimes He’s drenching me like a rainstorm, sometimes He’s at my feet. No, often He’s at my feet. At first I fought that idea; that’s not where He belongs, He belongs above me and I at His feet. But He’s been insistent that His position is at my feet. He came to serve me, came to love me. He adores me. And He kneels in front of me, and stares intently into my eyes, my face, because He wants me to know Him, not just as "Lord" or "Almighty God" but as Lover and Counselor and Servant-Leader and Friend.

I realize some will call me a heretic for this. I cannot help that. This is who God reveals Himself to be, to me. And I know, to the core of my being, that it is Truth. He has proved it over and over. Its a position I don’t fully understand, I just know that it is. And I live by it.  Since He calls me to follow Him — His position toward me says to me that my position is kneeling at the feet of others, serving them, looking intently into their faces, letting them know me as friend, counselor, servant.

So often I’ve longed to kneel at His feet. So often I have, only to have Him get down on the floor beside me, so He can look intently into my face, and I into His. I try to tell Him this defeats my purpose in being on my face, only to have Him retort that His purposes are higher than mine, and His purposes are the ones that will last. There’s no point fighting with God. He decides He’s going to do something a certain way, that’s what will happen, regardless of what I try — and believe me I have tried it all.

Today Jesus let me sit at His feet. I don’t know why. But today, as the Pastor brought us into a time of quietness before God and the worship team led us to the throne, Jesus let me place myself at His feet. And instead of getting down on the floor with me, eye-to-eye, He stood tall, His hands on my head, as if to say to anyone, everyone in the universe, "this one is Mine. This one I love. This one I am–" dare I say it?? –"I am proud to call My own."

I clung to His feet, knowing beyond doubt how blessed I am to be known by Him, how unworthy I am to be loved by Him, and how grateful I am to belong to Him. I did not want to get up from that place, did not want to leave that position. It became holy, sacred ground in that moment, though the rest of the world would see them only as stairs at a movie theater.

The pastor had asked earlier, what do we bring to God this Christmas season? We spend so much time and energy telling people what we want for Christmas, making our lists for our parents, friends, family — perhaps even for God — of what we want this Christmas. But what do we bring to Him? He is, after all, the one who came; the one who’s birth we celebrate. Sadly, for all my talk of mission and passion, I had not really thought about that question, until the pastor asked it. Sadder still, I didn’t have an answer.

So, today I brought myself. Today I brought all of me to His throne, to His feet, for whatever I am worth and whatever He can do with me, and I worshiped. And I wept. While He stood tall and proclaimed me His own, His beloved.

And when He later whispered that I had too long resisted putting down roots, I brought myself to Him again. Perhaps what I have done is to bring myself to the community He has brought to me. Is it real? Will it last? I don’t know. But perhaps its time to step into the fear, instead of running from it, and find out.

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Heart of the Matter

There is a stage in the grief process when anger finally pushes to the surface and fills the soul for a time with hot coals of raw emotion, of rage. Sometimes that rage doesn’t make a bit of sense. Sometimes it shoots blindly at whomever or whatever is closest. But sometimes it is laser-focused on a particular thing, or person.

I got the call today, I didn’t wanna hear
But I knew that it would come
An old true friend of ours was talkin’ on the phone
She said you found someone
And I thought of all the bad luck,
And all the struggles we went through
How I lost me and you lost you
What are these voices outside love’s open door
Make us throw off our contentment
And beg for something more?

We don’t just grieve when someone dies. We grieve when dreams die, when relationships don’t work out, when jobs aren’t what we thought they would be, when careers are not what the college recruiter promised.

We also grieve as we grow in our discovery of ourselves.

I’ve been learning to live without you now
But I miss you sometimes
The more I know, the less I understand
All the things I thought I knew, I’m learning them again
I’ve been tryin’ to get down to the Heart of the Matter
But my will gets weak
And my thoughts seem to scatter
But I think it’s about forgiveness
Forgiveness
Even if, even if you don’t love me anymore

When you discover that much of the view of you, of yourself, that you built your life around is actually a lie from the enemy of your soul; when you finally connect the dots of your life and see how the arrows of childhood hurts have shaped your behavior, your willingness to be treated in unkind, abusive ways and your choices in relationships; how those lies fed an insecurity that kept you clinging to whatever measure of power or control, or both, you could grasp, there is a firestorm that sweeps over you, an anger that must find a release.

You can try to stem the tide. You can try to stuff the emotion. You can try. But whatever ever method you choose, it will ultimately fail. Like the little boy with his finger in the dike, it is too little, too late. The dam is broken and its just a matter of time before the anger spills forth and floods every valley of your life.

These times are so uncertain
There’s a yearning undefined
And people filled with rage
We all need a little tenderness
How can love survive in such a graceless age
And the trust and self-assurance that lead to happiness
They’re the very things we kill, I guess
Pride and competition cannot fill these empty arms
And the work they put between us,
You know it doesn’t keep us warm 

There is a slow burning fire growing within me. Embers of anger fanning into raging flames as I begin to realize the lies I believed and the person I allowed those lies to shape me into. I feel it rising inside me, filling up all my insides and spilling over my spirit and into the world. It comes out in inappropriate ways — cussing out the drivers in front of me who drive too slowly, muttering curses at my computer and my office’s Internet slowness when neither move as fast as I declare they should. I know there are better ways, more productive ways to release this anger, but I have yet to have success in using them.

In truth, I’m afraid. I’m afraid of the fire inside. I haven’t touched the fullness of it yet, but I know it burns hot. And it will rage out of control soon.

Yet even in the midst of all this discovery and fire, there is a Truth that shines brightly even in the daylight. Truth that brings release, like buckets of cool rain. I am free.

I’ve been tryin’ to get down to the Heart of the Matter
But my will gets weak
And my heart is so shattered
But I think it’s about forgiveness
Forgiveness
Even if, even if you don’t love me anymore 

The chains of desperate need for power, for control, they no longer hold me captive. The need to make sure everyone believes as I do, that everyone follows the rules I deem most important, don’t exist anymore. I look at my life and I can see the legalism I lived under. I can see the legalism I enforced upon others. And I see if for the legalism it is, not the “concern” or “passion” I once believed it was.

When hurts come, when the arrows of Life pierce our hearts, our automatic reaction is to close ranks and protect ourselves. Legalism is the best protector of all. It creates a nearly impenetrable wall that none can scale. It sets the bar so high than no one can ever measure up. And if no one can measure up, no one can hurt us with unmet expectations or unexpected rejection. It gives an illusion of power and control over the undefeatable and uncontrollable.

All the people in your life who’ve come and gone
They let you down, you know they hurt your pride
Better put it all behind you; cause life goes on
You keep carrin’ that anger, it’ll eat you up inside

There are so many in the world right now who long to keep me trapped in legalism, especially in their own particular brand of legalism. They say I cannot do certain things, because I am a woman. They say that I cannot practice certain things, because they do not interpret the Bible that way, and they know these things better than I, they say. They say I cannot believe certain things, because God showed them my beliefs are in error.

For a moment I raged. Fire burned inside my spirit and smoke poured from my heart.

And then the chains fell to the floor. I saw the legalism for what it really was, a defense, to keep out the Grace of God.

I wanna be happily everafter
And my heart is so shattered
But I know it’s about forgiveness
Forgiveness
Even if, even if you don’t love me anymore 

Grace says it matters not who’s right. Grace says I don’t need to be in control. Grace says it doesn’t matter who appears to have the power. Grace says I am forgiven. Grace says I am redeemed. Grace says that God has the power; God has the control. Grace says God defines me; and God defines my ministry.

Grace even says that God is patient; agonizingly patient. He allows the power hungry, the control obsessed, the legalistic, the pharisees of our day to continue down our self-made paths of destruction because He loves us. He loves us enough to give us as much time as we need to, well, to get a clue that we’re in over our heads. He is slow to anger, and quick to forgive because He loves even the power-hungry souls, so much so He does not want them to suffer punishment at His hand.

I’ve been tryin’ to get down to the Heart of the Matter
Because the flesh will get weak
And the ashes will scatter
So I’m thinkin’ about forgiveness
Forgiveness
Even if you don’t love me anymore

Grace says I’m forgiven. When I accept God’s Grace, His forgiveness of my own desperate game of power and control washes over me and my chains of legalism fall powerless to the floor. Grace stands in opposition to the legalism I see all around. And Grace calls me, longs for me, begs me, to forgive. Forgive, as I have been forgiven. Others can try with all their might to bind me in their chains, but they will fail. For I am free. Grace has freed me. Freed me to give Grace. And I pray Grace will one day set them free.

There is much power in forgiveness. It is the power of Life.

“Heart of the Matter” by Don Henley, performed by India.Arie
Download it now from iTunes

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Does This Happen To You?

I’ve had several dreams over the last few days that continue to stick with me. Even as I sit here at work, combining edits and comments of the doc’s new book for the doc to read through, I keep having vivid flashbacks of my dreams.

More than that, there’s an undercurrent of emotions… I guess that’s the best way to describe what I’m feeling… there’s this undercurrent from the dreams that remains. Like a constant hum of a motor.

It’s an undercurrent of anticipation. Of expectation. Of pride (the kind you have for others), warmth, love and contentment…. even though the things in my dream were not "settled" or "finished".

I dreamed about enemies, of attempting to make alliances with an enemy chasing me in order to defeat an even greater enemy awaiting me.
I dreamed about roads, lots of roads, and traveling down many of them,
of desperately trying to avoid wrong-way drivers on a freeway full of them — I knew they were fleeing the enemy awaiting me.
of buildings blocking the way of the roads, and of me looking for a way around them,
of family members, of how proud I am of my niece and nephew,
of reconciliations,
and rain and flooding,
of disappointment because of  friends who never came to a celebration (perhaps because of the rain and flooding)…

There’s more, I know there is. I just can’t remember it all right now. I didn’t write them down, as I usually do when I have dreams I remember. Haven’t had the time. Nor have I had the time to go through and contemplate what they mean.

But the thing that keeps pulling at me are these undercurrents I spoke of. They continually swell up in me. I want so much to be able to put a finger on their "cause"… the real-life cause. But I can’t.

It’s so distracting at times! It’s hard to sit in anticipation and expectation when you don’t have any idea what you’re waiting for, what you’re expecting to happen. Yet I can’t get rid of it.

Nor do I think I want to. I like the feelings swirling in my soul right now. The expectation as well as the warmth, pride and contentment. I’ll take them any day over the dark cloud I lived under for so long last year! Even on this overcast, rainy winter day, life looks as bright and warm as spring….

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Oh What a Night

Man, did I pack a lot into tonight… and not on purpose.

First I went to Mosaic… that took a couple of hours — eating, talking to people, then listening to John talk and Lindsay sing.

Then shortly after I got home Nina called. We talked for nearly two hours (a "short" conversation for us). While talking to Nina, my oldest sister Paula called. I called her back after talking with Nina and talked her ear off for about an hour and a half. During all this talking and listening, I unloaded and reloaded the dishwasher, cleaned up the kitchen and straightened up my room (can I get a hearty "WooHoo! We love headsets!!")…. I would have cleaned the bathroom too, but that would’ve been too noisy to really hear either of my sisters.

The last half hour or so I’ve been contemplating a variety of issues ranging from should Scott Peterson get the death penalty — while I’m pro death-penalty, I’m also pro-life… how do I balance these two convictions??… and, in the end, which will ultimately be the harshest punishment to fit Peterson’s crime? I gotta tell ya, I’m very, very glad I’m not on that jury! — to states rights, which I recently found out is a real hot-button phrase here in the South….

I wanted to, and planned to, go to bed early tonight, because I need to be into work early tomorrow. But I can’t get my mind to quiet down. It’s very excited about all these things that got churned up over the last few hours and it wants to chew on them. I wish I could convince it they could be chewed on while I sleep. Of course, that might make for interesting dreams….

Speaking of dreams, I had quite a crazy one this morning just before waking. I had fuzzy memories of it just after waking, but later in the day something triggered a memory of the dream, and I ended up spending all afternoon writing it down, picking it apart and sorting out it’s meaning. Afterward, I checked out a couple of "dream dictionaries" online, just to see if I could get more clarification on it through a few "universal" meanings of elements in my dream. Pretty much everything I read confirmed or backed up what I sensed was the meaning. On occasion it clarified some things… but mostly I look at those dictionaries a more fun than fact… dreams, like people, are highly individualistic. While I believe there are some things we universally identify with subconsciously, I don’t believe in that sort of thing happening across the board.

I won’t go into the details of the dream, but I will tell you that by the time I was done "analyzing" it I felt pretty confident that yesterday’s post wasn’t just pie-in-the-sky I’m-ignoring-reality-and-living-in-my-own-fantasyland stuff. My dream, to me, confirmed that my subconscious even believes I have turned a corner, that I’m getting rid of negative feelings, old patterns and moving into new, more positive ones, that I am conquering obstacles in my life, that I’m going through an inner transformation and have an internal passion that is being fanned into flame.

It was a wild dream, and took me on quite a series of adventures. Even just after awakening, as just the fuzziness of it remained, I felt… refreshed, is the best way to put it… like inhaling deeply of fresh mountain air early in the morning. Refreshing and invigorating. Later, when the whole dream came back and I was typing furiously to get as much detail out before it faded again, I felt even more invigorated. A good chunk of the dream had to do with something that would sound gross if I were to describe it, yet it’s something so very common to all our lives. So it was quite odd to have such a positive feeling and affect from dreaming about it.

Okay, just so you don’t go wading into the deep end and drown wondering what in the world I was dreaming… the portion I’m referring to had to do with pooping. Here’s what the dream dictionary had to say about this:

To dream that you have  a bowel movement, signifies that you are successfully getting rid of your  old habits/ways and thinking patterns.

I also dreamed of fire,

"Depending on the  context of your dream, to see fire in your dream can symbolizes  destruction, passion, desire, illumination, transformation, enlightenment,  or anger. It may suggest that something old is passing and something new  is entering your life. Your thoughts and views are changing…. it is a  metaphor of your own internal fire and inner transformation. It also  represents your drive and motivation."

flying over and being in the mountains (specifically a mountain village),

If you are flying with ease and enjoying the scene and landscape below, then it suggests that you are on top of a situation. You have risen above something. It may also mean that you have gained a different perspective on things.
"To see mountains in your dream,  signifies many major obstacles and challenges that you have to overcome.  If you are on top of the mountain, then it signifies that you have  achieved and realized your goals. Alternatively, mountains denotes a higher realm of consciousness, knowledge, and spiritual truth."

…and George Clooney… don’t ask. 🙂

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Of Roots & Dreams

Larry and I have been having an interesting discussion in the comments of his Generosity-of-dreams post. Here’s his latest comment to me:

One of the first gifts God gave me when He brought me back to Himself was the idea that “the first bricks go on the bottom.” Churches and sermons are full of fire and zip, and the implication is that we’re supposed to be instant Christians. Just add Jesus.

I’ve held to that idea ever since. I’m not going to allow myself to be buffaloed into overextending myself, as I’ve done in the past. I’ll let the bandwagon just roll on by, and I’ll keep walking in the belief that Jesus is holding my hand and that we’ll catch up with the bandwagon if we need to.

I think there is a lot more to the life that God wants to give me. Us. All of us. We don’t, however, have the patience of the oak tree that spends its first few years making roots so that a four-inch tree has a six-foot root underneath.

I believe that God’s life needs that root. I believe that there is much more to the life He wants to give us, but we can’t live without the root.

In short, I think you’re doing fine. You’re making roots. Sometime, if you just simply keep following Jesus, you’ll find out what your heart desires and He will give it to you. Being enraptured by Jesus’ glorious face is, I believe, where we start.

We’re used to living in a desert. If God were to dump all of what He wants to onto us we’d choke. It’s like feeding someone who has been starving for years: you don’t put him before a table loaded with pizza and steak. You start with broth.

God is a most excellent builder. He will do for us what He has promised.

His comment brought such hope to me! And a spark of life. This is what I miss from LA. I miss my Life Group. I miss my friends like Wendy, Ron and Leticia. I miss the times we had of communing together; with our hearts and souls intermingling, so that we shared in each other’s struggles and pain. Not just a time where we shared “prayer requests” but where we shared our hearts. They were safe places I knew I could bear my soul without condemnation or judgment, where it was okay to be who and where I was right then, where I could get words of encouragement and hope that spread across my whole being like a healing balm…. I think Larry’s found that with Nate and Debbie, and I envy him. I envy Wendy and her close proximity to all our other friends…

Ah, but that is rabbit to chase another time… right now I want to go back to the idea of growing roots.
Larry said:
“I believe that God’s life needs that root. I believe that there is much more to the life He wants to give us, but we can’t live without the root. In short, I think you’re doing fine. You’re making roots..

As I began my reply to him, an image popped into my head. A dream I’d had in ’97. Yes, I know. It’s a bit freaky that I remember a dream from that far back in my life. Even more freaky is that I remember it with vivid clarity. I also remember God’s interpretation, which came the following morning, with the same vivid clarity.

Now before you get even more wigged out that I’m going all “charismatic” on ya 🙂 (my apologies to my charismatic friends), this is an unusual thing for me. I don’t normally have dreams interpreted by God. In Love with Jesus I am. But Daniel or Joseph I am not (however, I have suddenly developed a strange affinity for talking like Yoda… weird).

The dream starts with me coming out of my parents church in Riverside (which, in the dream was my church… everyone at Magnolia Ave Bapt please stand and wave… thank you, you may sit down now…) As I approach my car, I realize all 4 tires have been slashed. Now what do I do? Suddenly, the church is no longer in Riverside, but in LA (for non-SoCal’s, they are about 50-60 miles apart) and I call my dad — in Riverside — and tell him what’s up. He says call AAA and have them get the tires okay enough to get out to him and we’ll go together to get new tires. I call AAA, they come and do their thing… but as the guy is leaving he tells me his is a very temporary and fragile fix. I cannot, repeat cannot go over 35mph, or my tires will explode and I will most likely cause a huge accident. The picture I got in my mind was of me killing myself and several others around me… Yikes!
I knew I needed to head straight out to dad’s, but I had so many errands I wanted to run! So, I ran them, all the while knowing my dad was waiting… patiently… for me to arrive so we could take care of the tires. I woke before arriving in Riverside, with this very uneasy feeling that lasted all morning… yet still feeling the warmth mixed with twinges of guilt of knowing my dad was patiently awaiting my arrival.

God interpreted the dream over a day later (Perhaps this was so there would be no mistaking both the dream and interpretation came from Him…). Driving home for Life Group God suddenly brought the dream back to mind my with stunning clarity. He pointed out that this was about my life; the tires represented “feet fitted with the readiness that comes from the gospel of peace.” Eph 6:15 — Erwin had been going through the armor of God in his talks on Sundays, this one had been the previous Sunday’s… and the key word this piece of armor was “discipline.” God said, as long as I continued the way I was, I would still be okay, but I wouldn’t get where I wanted to go very fast. I was left with this feeling that He was waiting, patiently (as my dad was in the dream) for me, so we could get the “tires” replaced so I could go-go-go.

This dream and God’s interpretation has come back to “haunt” me at various points in my life. Almost like a quiet, “God said this would happen…” sigh of my spirit. Or perhaps God’s spirit in me…. I never heeded God’s warning back in ’97 to “take care of my tires”… not really. I’ve made good stabs at it. Worked at being disciplined in time in the Word, time with Him, in living a godly life. But I lack consistency, so I don’t think I’ve ever achieved it… I certainly don’t see myself as disciplined now.

Perhaps the dream is not just about discipline… Perhaps that’s just the human definition I put on it because that was the one closest at hand at the moment to understand “feet fitted with the readiness that comes from the gospel of peace.” — which was very, very clearly stated by God (while the discipline wasn’t — I inferred it because of Erwin’s study)…. or perhaps part of growing roots is discipline… or part of discipline is growing roots…

The Amplified Bible puts verse 15 this way:
And having shod your feet in preparation [to face the enemy with the firm-footed stability, the promptness, and the readiness produced by the good news] of the Gospel of peace.

That would certainly imply discipline, at least in part. It doesn’t cover the whole of the verse… preparation is more than just discipline. It also involves practice, skill, alertness, a ready stance — like the feet spread that you get when you’re bracing yourself against a strong wind gust… just like a tree must have deep roots that will brace it, hold it steady, give it stability if it is to survive gale force or hurricane force winds…

“[Most] blessed is the man who believes in, trusts in, and relies on the Lord, and whose hope and confidence the Lord is. For he shall be like a tree planted by the waters that spreads out its roots by the river; and it shall not see and fear when heat comes; but its leaf shall be green. It shall not be anxious and full of care in the year of drought, nor shall it cease yielding fruit.” — Jer 17:7-8 Amp. Bible

I guess God is working on my feet, huh. I’m growing roots deep into the heart of God. That’s good. Because I just can’t seem to get enough of Him these days. So perhaps bigger, deeper, longer roots will help… I still need to work on the discipline thing… I need to become more consistent. I hope that part of God’s work on my feet will include helping me in this area too. ….Perhaps one day, someone will want to put this on my tombstone….

How beautiful upon the mountains were the feet of she who brought good tidings, who published peace, who brought good tidings of good, who published salvation, who said to Zion, Your God reigns! — Isa 52:7 Amp. Bible with Lu’s alterations