Inspiration for Friday

This is pretty neato.

But this might be even cooler:

http://www.sorry-im-late.com/makingof.html



Also, potentially not as well made but maybe even more impressive, here's this:

Broken Fingaz -Graffiti Stop Motion on Vimeo.

Your turn!

What does this make you think?

Write it out, I dare you.

Saturday thoughts

I'm not sure why no one ever told me this before, if they knew, then it was out of selfishness...so out of respect I'm letting you know:

that this union is a noteworthy combination. An Oreo may be milks favorite cookie, but coffee is definitely an Oreo's favorite beverage.
[also, the coffee melts the cream just enough for it to disperse to all your taste-buds and the coffee is just the kick the chocolate needs to enhance all it's delectable qualities it has when in cookie form.]

Some classes just give me questions...

IEP (Individualized Education Program)

IFSP (Individualized Family Service Plan)

IDEA (Individuals with Disabilities Education Act)

ADHD (Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder)

TA (Task Analysis)

EBD (Emotional and Behavioral Disorders)

LD (Learning Disability)

TD (Typically Developing)

OHI (Other Health Impairment)

NCLB (No Child Left Behind)

FAS (Fetal Alcohol Syndrom)

PBIS (Positive Behavioral Interventions and Supports)

FBA (Functional Behavioral Assessment)

ASD (Autism Spectrum Disorder)

PDD-NOS (Pervasive Development Disorder-Not Otherwise Specified)

PECS (Picture Exchange Communication System)

PRT (Pivotal Response Teaching)

ADOS (Autism Diagnostic Observation Scale)

ADI-R (Autism Diagnostic Interview - Revised)

CRF (Community Residential Facilities)

This is just a short list of abbreviations that I have collected in my brain from trying to understand the educational system we have in the US (in particular Special Education).

When we belittle people and their disorders, disabilities or needs to a list of letters that are incomprehensible to people who haven't been taught the code, there is something wrong with our "love" and we're (at best) in danger of forgetting the people we're trying to serve. 

I don't have an answer, but I'm not willing to say this is just "part of the job".

About Books & People

What if we had the same wonder and consideration for a room full of people that we do for a room full of books?

(And how much more do people hold? Both questions and answers.) 

Speakin' to myself here.

On Sitting and Not Doing

I am sitting, and not doing.

As I sit I'm taking in the world, and am finding a strange growing fondness. Not like the one I express or discuss. 

This comes from watching. 

The world turning. 

Sitting and wondering.

It fills me with questions and a desire to ask people them.

I watched a lady walk across the parking lot, and thought about how long it took her. I wonder more things about her life (therefore does she have more patience? Or do others have to have more with her? Was she teaching a class or taking one? Is she married? What stories does she have to tell?).

I watched a shadow fade all the way across-and-gone the huge satellite dish. 

I watched as someone went into a building. Looking at her almost a little too long.

It is strange how the look people give me makes me feel like what I am doing is not valid. I fight this inside and the wind aids me in my debate.

I thought about history as an African American and a white elderly lady professor strolled the same sidewalk.

Oh, I already saw him pass.

My arms have become cool from the breeze and shade. They feel nice against my warm hands, but I don't want to spoil it and make them warm so I wont touch them.

I notice that a sign reading "science" is a part of science at this moment, shrinking with the setting of the sun, even ever so slightly. There must also be things moving around and growing on it.

Even though everyone has muscles, they look so different on different people.

As time of doing too quickly returns I stand and ready to leave. Extending my arms I stretch out my skin, made new and freshened by the gaining of awe and wonder.

I've sat and not done long enough for others to start wondering.

"I write, not for children, but for the child-like, whether they be of five, of fifty, or seventy-five."

George MacDonald

Oh, Grace!

A poem that overflowed into my journal while reading A Praying Life by Paul E. Miller in the context of my life, in light of Jesus' life, and the weight of impact of the gospel.

Oh, Grace!

Vortex of peace,

limitless capacity

to consume my trespasses.

How well you know my captivity.

You were not given to the free but given for freedom!

My back breaking efforts to earn you has gotten me

No closer to success but rather created a deficiency 

Even more in need of you.

Mind boggling paradox,

Such simplicity.

I need grace to dwell on the fact that 

If I try out of my own strength

I am neglecting the gift itself

but if I sit in awareness

Of my brokenness and accept such love consideration

I am more intune with reality!

What joy! 

What freedom (!) from the very entanglements

I am acknowledging.
Haha!

I do not laugh at the depths of this provision

But because of the liberation it has caused.

Oh to dance! To engage!

To pour out and ask to be poured into,

Without fear of fault, as fault is inevitable,

But ransomed, redeemed already.

Oh sing all of you 

Whose hearts have been renewed to childishness, sing!!

Humility and Grace in the wake of Disoriented Striving

I sit here humbled, by my own photographs. Not ones I have taken recently, but ones I took 4 years ago. They are filled with wonder and excitement! For things that have been around since the world was created, but some how still fresh and full of life.

It is a little humbling to even admit that. There is an innocence in an artist undiscovered. Having never been compared to anything, you can fly away with your wonder of the world, capture things that you might otherwise second guess or think might be odd.

There is a balance to be found here. There is a danger, but also a discipline in being labeled "photographer" or "artist". If we have an understanding for these words then there is a model in your mind of what they should be.  Because people see me as a capable photographer I have been asked to take on the job and preform a task they wouldn't ask a butcher, a plumber, or a nanny to do. In turn that has driven me to keep up and grow in a hobby that otherwise may have fallen away or grown stagnant.

However, it also makes me aware of the fact that I'm striving for something. [I'd like to clarify that growing in excellence in something is not a fault. No one would have hired a 5 year old to paint the sistine chapel. I am referring to striving for the sake of satisfying human desires and pleasing man instead of being a good steward of your gift and practicing your passion. Distinct difference in the heart.]

I find this same distinction in my heart so often with Christ. What a blessing and leap of faith it is to be called into leadership positions and be given responsibility in the church! But how dangerous it can be when we start pouring our own thoughts and understandings into our spheres of influence and responsibility. Probably even more dangerous and more common in my life, is to say what I think someone needs to hear because I feel I need to composite something (because, I mean...I'm the leader/more experienced believer/more gifted in whatever, right? That's why I'm here, yeah? [Not necessarily--and that's not how Jesus thinks of us]), rather than what the Holy Spirit has composited in my heart to share with them.

We should not do for the sake of doing, pleasing, or displaying our worth, but because we have been gifted, because we are passionate, because we have been provided discipline and opportunity. 

How do we achieve that? Praise Jesus, because He cares so deeply about our hearts! About our thoughts! He wants us to maintain a raw existence before Him. But like Psalm 103 says: "for He Himself knows our frame, He is mindful that we are but dust", and has given provision for when we do not maintain a vulnerable heart before Him. His Son has crested us with a perfect character before the Lord, which credits us complete grace in this growth.

My prayer for myself of late is that I would be given and called to shoes too big for my mind to imagine I could fill. Because then I hope I will not even be able to attempt to fill them on my own.
The human imagination has great capacity, who am I to think I can satisfy a desire conjured up by that? We can't satisfy each other, but be used to nudge towards the One who can.

And ultimately if we do not call out for Jesus (but rather for other things, or each other) with our every breath, we need Him more than we are aware.
If all we do is not means for drawing closer and knowing Him better, than it is all in vain.

A trip for toilet paper, a reminder of God's faithfulness

Leaving my evening activities my heart was somewhat heavy tonight--just realizing there are people here to help me, and take care of me when I'm in need. However, there is no one in my life who is physically and tangibly a provider currently in my life.

[note: this is not the fault of anyone in my life, it is just a season where no one is called to fulfill that role in my life in the way I hope someone, someday, will be called.] I then had to go to the store (which, when alone, especially at night, is a despised chore). HEB was closed, so I had to go to CVS--something I do about every leap year. 

There I met "Mr. R". He's from here, his family lives down the street…but he's been to countries I've never been to! He hinted at tales that intrigued this well traveled heart. He had tidbits from his Easter to share that spoke into the role of parenting. He genuinely cared and was unintimidated by my history as a missionary kid who spent the majority of her life in a country he wasn't 100% sure where was located. And spoke fondly of the influence diverse cultures bring to a person's mind.

It was a very unexpected little conversation and I share my surprise in it in relation to my heavy heart to prove this point: God is faithful, by all means, to elaborately illustrate that His love abounds for you.

I'm not saying there was something deeply spiritual about my random interaction with a CVS worker, but then again…am I?

I'm saying it was deeply significant for me because I had been feeling overly independent and not desiring that and like the depth of my soul was a bit too far away for anyone to truly care about. But then boom! A random conversation about things that I can't often talk about in College Station. Demonstrating that God FULLY understands my needs--more than I do. And can meet them--BETTER than I can imagine.

Our imagination likes to deceive us into thinking we have to hold on or all will fail. In reality our grip can and often is a hinderance and our security is frequently immobilizes growth and faith. Like a child held by the Father, we are better off relaxing in trust and peace then arching our back in self-made expectation.

Psalm 36:7 & 8

How precious is Your steadfast love, O God! 

The children of men take refuge and put their trust under the shadow of Your wings.

They relish and feast on the abundance of Your house; 

and You cause them to drink of the stream of Your pleasures.

Purify my heart

Let me be as gold and precious silver

Purify my heart

Let me be as gold, pure gold

Refiner's fire

My heart's one desire

Is to be holy

Set apart for You, Lord

I choose to be holy

Set apart for You, my Master

Ready to do Your will

Purify my heart

Cleanse me from within

And make me holy

Purify my heart

Cleanse me from my sin

Deep within

A Starlit Dance

My joy is on a growth spurt,

About to rip through the clothing
That is my chest cavity

Driving to the sounds of Beirut's East Harlem

They tempt to burst my ear drums

This Texas night's story is told by its smells

Soil, horse manure, skunk and spring

The quality of my driving is equal to that of a drunkards

Dizzied, simply by existence

Awed by the grand functioning of life

Straining to be heard

By myself

Over my own music 

I realize

The frogs would be better at 

Harmony than I

Slowing, 

So the trumpets and accordions
Bring this moment to a close

(Rather than my arrival at destination)

I smile at passers by,

If only they could share this moment

By hearing a glimpse of my ruckus

But how does one share the joy in their heart?

Upon return the duffle bag of laundry

Is left forgotten in the back seat

It had once been the purpose in flight

Now replaced

As if the trip were all for the sake of

Coloring my cheeks

Giggling, I return for the bag

Because…was it not? 

I disguise my childish delights 

With the face of responsibility