Thoughts while Traveling

There are little parades everywhere. In the East Village, on 7th Ave. in the Slope, etc., etc. Children and adults alike traipsing around in costumes and giggling. Why is it I have to keep reminding myself it is Halloween?

My eye will not stop twitching. The right one. It has been convulsing for 5 hours straight now, with only seconds here and there of relief. Google led me to an explanation of stress and anxiety. Now there is a revelation. Ha.

I wish I could make it stop, because it is making me so tired and irritated.

Two more days of my current job. Another promising interview tomorrow. I am sure that VICTORY is around the corner. My faith has been really tested this past week. I ask God to reveal the scary corners of my heart and he does it. Ever faithful He is.

It is quite an amazing thing, the discipline of storing His Word in my heart each morning before walking out the door. Everything looks different. People look at me different. Funny thing about that is I don't see myself. I only see them. So why do THEY look at ME different? I must look different. I must look kinder and gentler and more loving and accepting. Fruits of the spirit, you know? I was talking to Todd about that in the elevator today. How we have much more control of how people respond to us than we think we do. Why do we face the same issues from job to job, city to city, house to house? Perhaps because the common denominator is people. And ourselves. And the thick walls that we can build in an instant. We ask for it. Perhaps we should start giving more than receiving. (I sound "cryptic" I am sure, as my old buddy Phil says)

Just think about it. So many times I see pictures rather than words and have a hard time translating them.

I heard a sermon this morning that is sticking with me. A highlight for me? She said, "When you have the Spirit of the Lord living and breathing in you, God MAKES people like you!" I love that. Because it has nothing to do with me but everything to do with WHO is living in me.

This statement was in the context of coming to the Father BOLDLY with our requests, and when we do so only IN THE NAME OF JESUS and only FOR THE GLORY OF JESUS, things that we request (such as God's favor in job interviews, in my case) WILL be done. The secret is the motivation. In recent years I have struggled with this BOLDNESS in my faith. I think because I have a deep understanding of my flesh and my unworthiness. I carry around old sins and baggage I have already been forgiven for. So... I beg God for scraps. "Just" get me by. That is in direct contradiction to what the Word of God says. Don't get me wrong, I do not prescribe whatsoever to the "prosperity" theology and preaching we see so much of these days. However, God is ready to bless us with more. More opportunities, more spiritual insight, more responsibility...

Makes the battle way more intense. But I know for me, for whatever time I have left on this earth, I would rather be fighting an intense battle than chilling out and bored in the trenches.

The eye is still twitching. I need to close it for a while. Heading home to turn off the lights and pretend I am not there, because I don't have any candy to hand out.
Hey, no judgment...the rent had to be paid today and there is nothing left for candy. Dog food?

No, incognito is my costume for the evening.

Vincent Van Gogh has always been one of my favorite artists. I learned once that he was a "tempermental" artist and "tortured soul". I have never taken the time to find out why. More. I read something this morning that stirred not simply curiosity in me, but a deep longing to research and dig into the lives and faith of artists.

I believe God just whispered in my ear. After a while in the desert, I am thirsty.

A quick paraphrase of what I read on the train this morning that captured my heart: At the age of 25, he wanted to preach. He believed he was called to be an evangelist. He had a burning passion for people. He went to the coal mines of southern Belgium. Disaster insued in a mine, and out of that he found himself ministering to an overflowing church of hungry for a message of love. A superior in the church came to visit him and was appauled at his lifestyle and his appearance. He was clothed in rags, lived in a hut, and gave his salary to the people. He was dismissed from the ministry as pitiful and unfit to teach, as he looked worse than the people that he was called to love. He was devastated. He lingered for a while in the village and began to sketch a solitary face.

There is so much more I want to know. I read a few of his letters to his brother, Theo this morning when I got to my destination. This one brought tears to my eyes as I connected on a spritual level with his words. I think you can help me see more clearly, Vincent, through the whispering of the Holy Spirit. I have always been inspired by his colors, his insight, his gift. Now, his words. A traveller that has gone before.

Letter from Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh Amsterdam, 30 May 1877

Dear Theo,

Thanks for your letter that arrived today, I am very busy and write in a hurry. I gave your letter to Uncle Jan, he sends you his greetings and thanks for it. There was a sentence in your letter that struck me, “I wish I were far away from everything, I am the cause of all, and bring only sorrow to everybody, I alone have brought all this misery on myself and others.” These words struck me because that same feeling, just the same, not more nor less, is also on my conscience.

When I think of the past, - when I think of the future of almost invincible difficulties, of much and difficult work, which I do not like, which I, or rather my evil self, would like to shirk; when I think the eyes of so many are fixed on me, - who will know where the fault is, if I do not succeed, who will not make me trivial reproaches, but as they are well tried and trained in everything that is right and virtuous and fine gold, they will say, as it were by the expression of their faces: we have helped you and have been a light unto you, - we have done for you what we could, have you tried honestly? what is now our reward and the fruit of our labour?

See! when I think of all this, and of so many other things like it, too numerous to name them all, of all the difficulties and cares that do not grow less when we advance in life, of sorrow, of disappointment, of the fear of failure, of disgrace, - then I also have the longing - I wish I were far away from everything! And yet I go on, but prudently and hoping to have strength to resist those things, so that I shall know what to answer to those reproaches that threaten me, and believing that notwithstanding everything that seems against me, I yet shall reach the aim I am striving for, and if God wills it, shall find favour in the eyes of some I love and in the eyes of those that will come after me.

There is written: “Lift up the hands which hang down, and the feeble knees,” and when the disciples had worked all night and had not caught any fish, they were told “go out into the deep and cast your nets again into the sea.” My head is sometimes heavy and often it burns and my thoughts are confused - I don't see how I shall ever get that difficult and extensive study into it - to get used to and persevere in simple regular study after all those emotional years is not always easy. And yet I go on; if we are tired isn't it then because we have already walked a long way, and if it is true that man has his battle to fight on earth, is not then the feeling of weariness and the burning of the head a sign that we have been struggling? When we are working at a difficult task and strive after a good thing we fight a righteous battle, the direct reward of which is that we are kept from much evil. And God sees the trouble and the sorrow and He can help in spite of all. The faith in God is firm in me - it is no imagination, no idle faith - but it is so, it is true, there is a God Who is alive and He is with our parents and His eye is also upon us, and I am sure He plans our life and we do not quite belong to ourselves as it were - and this God is no other than Christ of Whom we read in our Bible and Whose word and history is also deep in our heart.

If I had only given all my strength to it before, yes, I should have been further now, - but even now He will be a strong support, and it is in His power to make our lives bearable, to keep us from evil, to let all things contribute towards a good end, to make our end peaceful. There is much evil in the world and in ourselves, terrible things, and one does not need to be far advanced in life, to be in fear of much and to feel the need of a firm faith in life hereafter, and to know that without faith in God one cannot live, one cannot bear it. But with that faith one can go on for a long time. When I found myself in front of the corpse of Aerssen the calmness and dignity and solemn silence of death contrasted with us, who still live, to such an extent, that we all felt the truth Of what his daughter said with such simplicity: “he is freed from the burden of life, which we have to go on bearing.”

And yet we are so much attached to the old life, because next to our despondent moods we have our happy moments when heart and soul rejoice, like the lark that cannot keep from singing in the morning, even though the soul sometimes sinks within us and is fearful. And the memories of all we have loved stay and come back to us in the evening of our life. They are not dead but sleep, and it is well to gather a treasure of them. A handshake and write soon to Your loving brother, Vincent

Things I have learned of the Big Apple since my emergence:

NY is the most environmentally conscious place I have ever lived.

One can exist in a city of millions... and be lonely.

Beware of most "street meat" except for Rafiqui's on Park & 57th.

The big and scary "NYC" gets smaller the more days I walk the streets.

Everything is later. People get to work later, stay later, and eat dinner late. Not working for me. I am putting on weight like a sumo wrestler, regardless of the 2 miles walking every day.

Having your groceries delivered is not lazy. Its just smart.

Relying solely on public transportation is teaching me patience.

I need to join an online book club. I can't feed my reading habit fast enough with the hour commute to work.

Although I can hold my own on Madison Ave., the breath I take when getting off the train in Brooklyn at the end of the day is...deep.

My husband has never seemed more alive. I love that.

"When religion has said its last word, there is little we need other than God Himself. The evil habit of seeking 'God-and' effectively prevents us from finding God in full revelation. And in the 'and' lies our great woe. If we omit the 'and' we shall soon find God, and in Him we shall find that for which we have all our lives been secretly longing. We need not fear that in seeking God only we may narrow our lives or restrict the motions of our expanding hearts. The opposite is true. We can well afford to make God our All, to concentrate, to sacrifice the many for the one."

AW Tozer