When my husband and I lived in Germany for a year, we participated in the local church choir. During a practice of a christmas carol, a guy leaned over to my husband and asked 'What is 'Schimmelchen' in english?' My husband asked 'What does it mean?' The man said 'Little white horse' to which my husband replied 'You say it 'little white horse'. It's a bit of a crazy story about language and how some languages have words that are richer in their explanation of things. The funny thing is people who believe in Jesus have words like this all over the place. One such word is 'Santification'. I didn't really know what it meant or even what it explained until a short while ago. For anyone out there my boat, it means the act or process of acquiring sanctity, of being made or becoming holy. It's a big part of being a believer because God takes us as we are and over time changes us through his love and the gentle whispers of instruction to our hearts. It's a piece of the puzzle that often gets confusing because people assume that before you believe you have to be and act perfect or they expect perfect behavior out of those who already believe. This process lets imperfection and sin into the picture as we travel the road of faith. It allows us to give each other a measure of grace as we understand how God works in our lives. Image credit (and purchase): tangeloststudioAdditional reading: Stepping Heavenward by Elizabeth Prentiss and Ellyn SannaThe Fitting Room by Kelly Minter
The funny thing about blogging is that you put yourself out there with your written word, exposing it to judgement, logged forever in the archives of history. Blog posts usually come to me at odd moments where I try to capture them as they flit through my brain, usually shortly after a quick prayer of "What should I write about this week?". (Disclaimer…they are not overanalyzed or verified or even proof read usually so please judge lightly.) Tim Keller, during a sermon said 'the things we say today will sound funny in the future'. Since people are saying more things to more people now than ever before, we definitely up our chances of being viewed as odd through the lense of history. Case in point, an excerpt from Laura Ingalls Wilder's book 'The Long Winter', a classic example of things sounding strange a hundred years later. "I can help, Pa. I know I can." "Well," Pa said, "maybe you can. We'll try it. If you can, by George, we'll get this haying done all by ourselves." Laura could see that the thought was a load off Pa's mind and she hurried to the shanty to tell Ma. "Why, I guess you can," Ma said doubtfully. She did not like to see women working in the fields. Only foreigners did that. Ma and her girls were Americans, above doing men's work. But Laura's helping with the hay would solve the problem. She decided, "Yes, Laura, you may." Here's a current day example of that same 'weirdness' in front of our very eyes: "Let's take it as read that Rick Santorum is weird. After all, he believes in the sanctity of life, the primacy of the family, the traditional socio-religious understanding of transcendent purpose to human existence. Once upon a time, back in the midst of, ohh, the mid-20th century, all these things were, if not entirely universal, sufficiently mainstream as to be barely worthy of discussion. Now they're not. Isn't the fact that conventional morality is now 'weird' itself deeply weird? The instant weirdification of ideas taken for granted for millennia is surely mega-weird - unless you think that our generation is possessed of wisdom unique to human history. In which case, why are we broke?" Mark Steyn Things are always changing. But it's interesting how some things hold up to the test of time. The Bible, for example. Though many believe it to be untrue, there is truth as far as principles to what it says. For those who believe it as true, our comfort is in knowing it will stand forever, despite the current thought of the day. God says of himself he is the same, yesterday, today and forever (Hebrews 13:8). And the historical consistency in comfort previous generations have drawn from Him and his word, is promised to ring true forever.
As a designer my standard tends to be a 10. Most marketers, digital consultants, business owners, however, don't see the same things I do. I see the nuance of a poorly chosen font, or how a specific shade of green communicates to potential customers, or how the choice of photography communicates messages that maybe negative.
When I see business owners, approve of marketing materials that fall short of my standard, I cringe not only because it looks unpleasant to my eyes, but because I can see the ramifications and hindrance this will have throughout what they are trying to accomplish - usually growing their business. But their untrained eyes don't see it.
God too has a really high standard for how he wants us to be. His standard is perfection, yet there is no way we can reach it. He looks at us and cringes at the awful colors of our hearts, at the words we use to communicate, because he cares and he see how these things impact our lives. Jesus, though, has the heart of a designer, he longs to beautify our lives and actions with his love and tenderness. He whispers his messages to our hearts (replace the purple of anger with the red of love). He makes us new so that God receives us and that life will go well for us. The catch...we have to trust he knows better than us and then let him make changes.
A friend posted a text message from her husband on her blog. It said 'Your life is colliding with God's story and His glory.' What a happy collision. Glory seems to be something we are made to experience. There is a glory present when kids run around in capes, for example. The funny thing about glory though is that it's illusive. Sure there are glorious moments, but they fall short of the richness that is God's glory. God gives us glimpses of His glory in the expanse of the skies or the majesty of the mountains. His glory is revealed in the way he works in the lives of people. A person beyond hope is restored. A broken heart is mended. A physical healing. We as regular people, he calls to share in his glory. The hope and peace he gives we spread as if we twirl our invisible capes among those we live. Our movements and actions point to his glory and the wonder of it is that in this way he shares his glory with us. "He called you to salvation when we told you the Good News; now you can share in the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ." (2 Thessalonians 2:14 New Living Translation ©2007)So I couldn't resist adding some songs to this post. One is an oldie but goodie by Rich Mullins...'There is such a thing as glory'. The second is ' Your glory' from All Sons & Daughters. Enjoy. Image credit: Celebrate a simple life
When I was getting married my mom said to me, " It just seems [my dear husband] holds the keys to your heart." And it was true, he did. The only problem was those keys were never meant to be held by a human. Accidental hurts and deceit compounded with childhood wounds slipped that key and heart into a locked position. At the time I didn't know there was actually such a thing as a locked heart. It took concerted effort and seeking to find and know the One who could really unlock this heart of mine. There are many of us whose hearts get locked by the trails and hurts we experience in life, but the good news is there is a key that can unlock hearts. The key is Jesus and the keyhole is prayer. It's easy to see prayer as a request service, but there is power in prayer as it brings us to a place of connectedness with God. He sees our wounds and can heal them. If you too feel like you have a locked heart John Regier lists out the different types. You can see more on his work at Caring for the Heart ministries. For information on healing prayer and how it works George Hartwell (ironic name), lists out it's history as well as how it's done. And last but not least, Dannah Gresh has a great article on how to facilitate healing prayer, removing soul ties and the lies that can bind up our hearts.
Recently my son was questioning the need for state assessments (standardized testing). I explained to him that the teacher knows him and sees that he is a good student. She knows this not only by his grades but also by unmeasurable characteristics like his character, respect and trustworthiness (qualitative measures). The state, however, sees him as a number and the only way they can know if he is a good student is by his test scores (quantitative measures). In the web design world analytics, search engine rankings, a users time on a site, sales figures are measured to assess whether the site is performing well. Sometimes the qualitative measure is left out…how is the layout effecting the experience, how is the tone of the copy engaging customers. Since there is little numerical evidence to prove the impact of these, an expert (just like the teacher in the previous example) assesses these with user testing and against best practices to capture qualitative feedback for improvements. In life, we like to measure ourselves against a checklist of things we do. Religion is in part a quantitative approach to seeing how well we are doing in our performance for God. I fed the poor, check, I gave X amount, check. God, however, is mostly qualitative. He looks at the heart. He doesn't have a check list like you might expect. And though he looks at our performance to some degree, his primary requirement or measure is relationship, which is difficult to measure quantitatively.
I was telling a fellow user experience designer about a recent online banking redesign project. We had proposed an initial process flow and wireframes, but the client hesitated to implement it. Instead they brought in their own domain experts to design a different approach. But after rounds of revisions they arrived at the same result we had initially proposed. My friend said the same thing happens in her team. This scenario repeated itself in the last few weeks with a couple of initial concepts that when reviewed moved to a different direction only to return to the original idea. It made me wonder about this aspect of our hearts that desires to go our own way and not trust the creator. I find myself doing this with God. He is a creator at heart, one who established the 'best practices' for us humans. He even gave us a 'style guide' (the Bible) that if followed allows us to live at our best and yet so often we (I) decide we know the best way forward…but in reality it's He that does. He after all made us. He knows what could go awry and what we can handle. It's unfortunate that sometimes we resist and take the long route to his way. Credit: The above quote is from the song Come thou Fount of every blessing, written by Robert Robinson.
The word 'tastemaker' is bandied about on the internet worlds frequently these days. It implies leadership in defining what is tasteful (up-to-date, trendy, beautiful) or "a person or thing that establishes or strongly influences what is considered to be stylish, acceptable, or worthwhile in a given sphere of interest, as the arts." Bloggers like Swiss Miss or the top pinners on Pinterest all help define the 'taste' of the day. Many people aspire to it. I for one do, but by not inspiring trends or objects of beauty because becoming a person of influence can be done in many different spheres. Women are usually the tastemakers in their families, for example. I aspire, instead, to influence in the area of faith because what God says turns taste making on it's head: "Taste and see that the LORD is good; blessed is the one who takes refuge in him." Psalm 34:8 For those who have traveled the road of life with all it's ups and downs, trials and despair with Jesus, we have tasted the peace, the love and the healing he gives. All the beauty and styles they delight our senses, but there is a certain emptiness of the heart that longs to be filled by something more satisfying and sustaining. Trends are here but so quickly slip out of our grasp. Meanwhile God says try me, I am unchanging and good. There is a sweetness to a life of walking with Jesus. Some have yet to try a taste and some of us provide the sample taste test for others…they are the real tastemakers.
Today was one of those days where writing a blog post was the furthest thing from my mind. Well the first day of March break and already we've had the loss of a borrowed toy, the bike that is still in the shop, and this domestically challenged mom fully exposed. (How do you get those girl scout badges to stay on anyway? Before you answer I've already tried sewing by hand -needle through finger and yes I was using a thimble, sewing by machine, hot glue, fabric glue and ironing.) Kids at home while trying to work means wearing lots of hats and changing them frequently. I suspect other mom's have issues with this as well. The perfect blog post would tell you the 10 things you can do to entertain your kids for the week, but truth be told I don't have any advice except try to survive. But what started off with a heart full of resistance and dread at the anticipated demands of the day, were softened by a listening Father who gave assurance of his peace and hand in everything. And so the day unfolded with my little miss sleeping in very late (got some work in), a wonderful picnic with Dad at work, and a little friend who came over to play with the miss while my son finished raking the front lawn. Then tonight encouragement in the form of this poem, read while tucking my dear daughter in…enjoy! The Sculptor Boy Chisel in hand stood a sculptor boy, With his marble block before him; And his face lit up with a smile of joy As an angel dream passed o'er him. He carved that dream on the yielding stone With many a sharp incision. In Heaven's own light the sculptor shone,– He had caught that angel vision. Sculptors of life are we, as we stand With our lives uncarved before us, Waiting the hour, when, at God's command, Our life-dream passes o'er us. Let us carve it, then, on the yielding stone, With many a sharp incision:– Its heavenly beauty shall be our own,– Our lives, that angel vision. "The Sculptor Boy" was written by George Washington Doane (1799-1859), American writer and Episcopal bishop.
A couple of weeks ago we sat down to watch the movie "Horton hears a who". In it Horton the elephant discovers a speck with the tiny residents of Whoville living on it. He goes to great lengths to protect the flower (which held the speck) from those who didn't believe anyone was there. But he had heard the residents of Whoville, and finally they were able to make enough noise so that everyone else could hear them too. Sometimes I feel like we are all the inhabitants of Whoville here on earth, and the cacophony of our hustling and bustling, worship and talking reaches into the heavens with a quiet 'We are here". God like Horton delights in it. Louie Giglio, in this video, demonstrates how the stars also speak. They add to our heartbeats and uttering along with the songs of the whales, and birds. Maybe in actuality what we are all saying is 'You are there' to the one who made us and keeps us.
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