My soul is lifted High unto the Lord and He is restoring me.

Psalm 51:1-12,17
"Have Mercy on me, O God, according to your unfailing love; according to your great compassion blot out my transgressions. Wash away all my iniquity and cleanse me from my sin.For I know my transgressions, and my sin is always before me. Against you, only you, have I sinned and done what is evil in your sight, so that you are proved right when you speak and justified when you judge.Surely I was sinful at birth, sinful from the time my mother conceived me. Surely you desire truth in the inner parts; you teach me wisdom in the inmost place.Cleanse me with hyssop, and I will be clean; wash me, and i will be whiter than snow.Let me hear joy and gladness; let the bones you have crushed rejoice.Hide your face from my sins and blot out all my iniquity.
Create in me a pure heart, O God, and renew a steadfast spirit within me. Do not cast me from your presence or take you Holy Spirit from me. RESTORE TO ME THE JOY OF YOUR SALVATION, and grant me a willing spirit to sustain me.
The Sacrifices of God are a broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart, O God, you will not despise."

Recently God has been giving me this constant message: "Less of you, More of Me". Simple but so complicated. I am in a place of brokenness and God is slowly putting the peices back together. He has broken my life and the peices of me are being replaced with peices of Him. What a wonderful savior, compassionate Father.

I was looking through the Psalms for a verse or nugget of encouragement to send to a freind of mine is also in a difficult place in her life and i came accross the Psalm above. And it had an impact on me as well because when i read verse 12 "Restore to me the Joy of your salvation" it hit me. I have lost the initial Joy and bliss of knowing that my Father loves and has chosen me before the creation of time to spend forever in His presence and to dwell in His love. How amazing is that? It is beyond comprehension, and i had forgotten this. I had let it go by the wayside caught up my own skin. I should get that Tattooed on me somewhere, "RESTORE TO ME THE JOY OF YOUR SALVATION!!" It is beyond explination. The remainder of the Pslam is equally great, but that section in particular stood out to me. (thank you God for your small mercies and constant and subtle reminders) At church we have been going through Acts and we are talking about Devotion to God and this is a great step in that path of being devoted to God; leaving behind what is not of Him and being restored in His power and Mercy and taking on what is Him and what he wants us to be.

desperate prayer

God,

you see me, you know me, you love me, more than i deserve.

help.

i need so much help.

I have to let go of this control and this pride. I have to let you take control of my life. I know i need to do this but i'm afraid.

Afraid because i have been in control and caring for myself my whole life because no one else did. So i'm afraid that if i relinquish this everything will fall apart. i already have so little.

I want to be a priority for someone, i want to be loved, i want meaningful relationships. but i dont have these things, at least not as many as i would like.

I cant do this on my own. Life is to difficult and depressing and stressful to go at it alone. Being alone weighs heavily on my heart. I cant keep dealing with the issues and pain of others if i have to be alone.

I wont last, I will fail.

I need you're strength, you're abundant love, you're patience, you're heart. I need everything you can offer me. I'm weak, i'm nothing.

Come take control. Fill my life, bring your spirit and fill my heart. Renew my mind, i want to think about things that matter to you. I want to feel the things that matter to you. I want to feel sad about what makes you sad. i want to rejoice in the things that make you happy.

In this process we call life, guide my thoughts and my actions. That everything i do would be for your glory.

Thank you so much.

Ordinary People

"There are no ordinary people. You have never talked to a mere mortal. Nations, cultures, arts, civilizations - these are mortal, and their life is to ours as the life of a gnat. But it is immortals whom we joke with, work with, marry, snub, and exploit - immortal horrors or everlasting splendours." (pg 46)
- CS Lewis in The Weight of Glory

"If God is satisfied with the work, the work nay be satisfied with itself." (pg 38).

- CS Lewis in The Weight of Glory

love in the audible void

One does not realize the beauty of silence until their world becomes a cacaphony of pointless sound. This reality has struck me recently and sometimes I do crave a moment of peace with no sound. Silence allows me to calm down and destress. I can organize my thoughts better and be better able to make sense of what is going on.

In this book i'm reading I read this quote that correlates with this concept of slowing down and silence, because you pretty much have to slow yourself down to hear the silence.

"Americans are always living in the future and even when we can slow down and relax we don't shift out of high speed. He teaches the present is the present and that if you live in the moment there is no stress. We can't do it all the time, but we can time-shift into a more pace some of the time." Mary Pipher quoting Stephen Rechtshaffen

I agree in part with this statement, i hear it all the time that people who go on vacation come back more exhausted then when they left. they didn't relax on what was supposed to be a relaxing vacation. I hear all to often, "I need a vacation from my vacation." Why is it that we can't turn off or gear down when we need it the most? Why do we feel that we have to be so busy that we can't take some time and just do nothing? No one answer will suffice for these questions. Obviously some people have jobs that demand a lot of their time; others have children which require constant attention; the reasons are there but i think part of the reason is that we are scared of what we will think of. We are afraid what thoughts we will think of that we had been trying to hide or avoid. Whatever those may be will obviously vary per person. It might be the loss of a loved one whose memory is to painful to recall, or it may be a barrage of faults that come at us when we sit at home with a moment between busyness. It may be that still small voice convicting us, telling us what we already know but have been avoiding.

In 1Kings 19 it says "The LORD said, 'Go out and stand on the mountain in the presence of the LORD, for the LORD is about to pass by.' Then a great and powerful wind tore the mountains apart and shattered the rocks before the LORD, but the LORD was not in the wind. After the wind there was an earthquake, but the LORD was not in the earthquake. After the earthquake came a fire, but the LORD was not in the fire. And after the fire came a gentle whisper. When Elijah heard it, he pulled his cloak over his face and went out and stood at the mouth of the cave.'

Even through an earthquake, a fire, and a great wind; all really loud and distracting sounds and events, it was in the whisper that Elijah heard God's voice. So when our lives get to busy with work and with family and with any other activities that we put in our lives to keep us busy we often don't hear God trying to talk to us. I'm not saying family and work and activities are bad or should be done away with because they are good to have and family above the rest is a blessing from God. But it is important that we take time away from everything to listen for the still small voice. It may not be audible but it is there. God's ways are not predictable. It helps if we are being intentional in our listening and put aside time that is only for God. Its hard to do sometimes but it is can be done.

-RC

Photography

All my photography will now be posted at flickr.com. Go to http://www.flickr.com/photos/rcrundwell.

Passion

I had a tense few hours at work yesterday. We had gone on a nice house outing to Burney Falls so it was a easy hike but it was a pretty hot day and me like an idiot became dehydrated and so i had a nasty headache when we got back to the house. One of the girls had been having some issues with a peer of hers at school and she had gotten herself worked up about it and so she was threatening to kill her and to injure anyone who got in her way. So I was sitting at her door to make sure she didn't leave her room and to try and see what was bothering her and to try and calm her down. So here i am with a nasty headache try to be a good listener and trying to help this girl to start thinking straight. With the help of another staff we managed to get her to settle down some and to get her thinking about how she was behaving. The other staff went away and so i started talking to her. I'm not trying to pat myself on the back here but i just thank God for the ability he gave me at that time to level with this kid and help her to understand her behavior and the feelings she is feeling. i know a lot of people would have just given up on her which is the case with a lot of today's youth. People just don't seem to think that its worth the effort to try and push through the tough exterior to try and see the adolescent for who they are and really want to show. You just have to be found trustworthy enough for them to open up.

So after some talking back and forth about how she has responded in other situations and what kinds of things she can do better she started laughing about stuff. I like to mix a bit of humor into almost every situation, where appropriate of course, because its helps to lighten the mood and helps people to calm down. And after she decided that she wanted to start complying i sat back and reflected on the evening's events and all i could say is "Thank you God". Not that the situation descalated, although i was happy for that, but thanks that i had the opportunity to make a difference in this kids life. Thanks that i have this ability, that still needs work, to talk in such a way that both makes sense and is on a level where it doesn't sound like i'm trying to Lord over them but that i am telling them something important that they should choose to listen to. I am very glad for the attributes of my personality that God has given me such as mercy. I have a heart for the broken. Not that i want save the whole world, because i alone cannot do that, but i can affect a small piece of it and that makes a big difference.

So while working with beligerant and defiant kids does not garner a great deal of praise in the public eye it yields great rewards within yourself. I feel good, albeit tired, at the end ofthe day because i know that i played a part in restoring a person's health and spirit. That person may never change their ways but while they were with me and people like me, they experienced love and companionship that showed them that not everyone in their life will turn their backs on them.

Cowardly Christian?

I was listening to a song by Flyleaf called Cassie. I assume it was written based on what Cassie Bernal (spelling?) did at Columbine. She stood up for her Faith in the face of death and died for it. While our culture is not one that promotes overt persecution of those that follow Christ, the day may come where to say one is a Christ Follower means death.

I have thought about what i would do. It is easy to say, here and now, i would not reject God in the face of death. But then, i'm not standing before a gun and being asked that question. I think i'd be strong and no matter what was threatened i would remain steadfast and not deny my Savior. I've gone over various scenarios in my head and the implications of my answer are important.

I think this is an important question because not only does it pertain to what one would do in the face of death but it makes the individual think about how they view their relationship with God. Think about it, if you really loved God and were doing your best to live by His standards, you'd want to serve Him even if it meant death. But if your relationship consists of some prayer you prayed a while ago that doesn't really mean anything now and you are just kind of going through the motions, that person doesn't really have much incentive to maintain their integrity in this fashion. Now those are the extremes and i'm sure i could go into hundreds of situations that would all be equally difficult to deal with, but I'll leave that to you.

How important is God to you? Will you live for Him? Would you die for Him?