Footsteps on the ceiling

There are moments that cling to the edge of consciousness. Moments that brush against your mind like the tender wisps of a feather, teasing you to grab ahold of them, and laughing softly when you miss. Sometimes when I sit at my computer and try to write I get lost in moments like that. Moments when I don't even feel like I am grounded in my own body. Instead I hover just outside of myself and I pulse with each breath I take.
When that happens I usually realize that I have become so calm that I can look at myself as though I am someone else. What I see, well, what do any of us see when we look at ourselves that way? Like looking in a mirror, I see things that I am proud of and things that I am very much ashamed of. But I think the point is that I see them. Our generation is often described as being selfish, or self-centered, and I am not denying that, or even saying that it is a good thing. But I think that when people become self-centered they forget to be self-aware, and being self-aware is a good thing. Seeing yourself like someone else would see you is being self-aware. Taking a deep breath and really evaluating the parts of your character that you are proud of alongside the choices and character flows you wish you could hide in the deepest darkest depths of an ocean, that is a good thing, because out of that can come the change. Change into becoming the person you really want to be, and staying there; but not only staying there, but growing there.
One of my favorite authors you all will soon see, is J.R.R. Tolkien. His character of Treebeard in the Lord of the Rings is a character that is kind of half human, half tree. I like this character for a lot of reasons, one of which is that I think humans grow a lot like trees. We grow slowly, and we are shaped by what we grow towards. Trees always grow towards the light, and sometimes that can result in beautiful trees that shoot straight up, tapering into tall graceful elms and pines. Other time the trees have to fight and slowly twist around and around in order to get at the sunlight. This forms them into crazy, convoluted shapes. The thing is, they grew so slowly that if trees had a conscience, they probably wouldn't have noticed that they were growing into such a crazy shape, they were just following the light.
A Christians, we have the responsibility to look at ourselves and notice the kind of shapes we are growing into. Have to look at the kind of light we are aiming towards, and what it is turning us into. The good thing about slow change is that it can be guided.
Da pacem domine in diebus nostris. Qui a non est allius, qui pugnet pronobis. Nisi tu Deus noster.

13/365

Days go by quickly, don't they?
When I started this blog, it was in response to a sermon I had heard on the text, "So teach us to number our days, that we may gain a heart of wisdom." Psalm 90:12 and I am realizing today that keeping track of the days and everything that you do in them does give you a good sense of perspective on what you do with your life. For me, this realization has been rather humbling.
I have realized that the things I tend to do with my time are things that do not contain any kind of spiritual gain. This realization drove me to reevaluate what I spend my time on, and how I structure my days. I realized that I had been depending on outside forces to structure my days for me when I should have been taking the bull by the horns and doing it myself.
Sorry to cut this short, but some of those outside forces I was just talking about interfered. I will talk to you guys tomorrow!

12/365

Speechless in the presence of God.

I kneel before you,
Helpless to reach for Your hand,
Needing to bow,
Before the sovereign throne.

Lost in a vacuum of wishes,
Prayers are all the words I have,
My hands are reaching for You,
And only end up digging through the earth.

Draw me close,
Reach for me,
Desperate for You,
I'm reaching in all the wrong directions.

10/365

This is beginning to be more of a journey than I thought it was going to be, but instead of holding forth in prose today, I am going to follow the example of a very good friend of mine who is also writing a blog this summer and write down some of the emotions I am feeling in the form of a poem.

A Moment in the Presence

Peace and goodwill,
Your gift to me.
Gentle melody and song
In a world full of green.

Shadows rend and distort,
And vision is splintered.
Keep me, Your child
Close by Your side.

Something to fight for,
Here on my knees.
Tell me Your story
Of assured victory.

9/365

Communication has got to be the hardest part of any relationship. There is so much that can go wrong, and misunderstandings are often the foundation of many a fight between friends, lovers, siblings, husbands and wives.

I hate fighting with people. Though I probably would be described by friends and family as having a fairly quick temper, I have struggled through my whole life trying to master it. The worst feeling that I have every felt in my life is the feeling of having driven dear friends, or family members away, or to feel that I didn't love them because of careless words that I had spoken in the heat of selfish anger.

As a Christian, I am beginning to realize that something that is very threatening to the evil forces in this world is the idea of the Body of Christ. There is great power in a group of believers coming together and worshipping together. As a body of believers we can uphold and encourage one another to great heights beyond anything any other group of people. And yet, in the context of the world it seems as though Christians have not accomplished much except the division of a unified church into multiples factions visibly at odds with each other. The reason? Satan is almost exclusively focused on breaking up the Body of Christ. Satan, in my mind rubs his hands with glee every time a group of Christians divide over a disagreement of theology or practice.

As I am getting married in 5 months, I have been thinking a lot about communication in the marriage relationship, and the marriage relationship in general. In Paul's writings, the marriage relationship is a great mystery that mirrors, and is supposed to be an image of the relationship between God and man. If a godly marriage relationship holds that much power, it stands to reason that Satan would attack this relationship with a special venom.

So I am resolved to commit the matter of the communication between me and my fiancee even now to much prayer, and I urge you all, my readers, to commit the matter of the communication of every marriage relationship you know to much prayer and care.

8/365

Sometimes I am fascinated by the ability of my sinful self to twist any which circumstance to a viewpoint in which I am victimized, or somehow made out to be the only party in the right. I'm sure everyone has had a moment like this, you find yourself thinking about a conflict you have had with a close friend or your boyfriend or girlfriend and you look at yourself and you wonder how you could have been so blind to their needs and wants and callous to everything but your own desires. My only response sometimes is to thank God that He opens my eyes to these moments so that I may learn from them!

7/365

My fiancee had the idea of writing about waiting for things. Patience is not my strong point,but lately God has been teaching me patience, and so I can share some of my own journey with you all.

I do not do well with waiting for things to happen. I am a person who likes to take action, and normally I will decide on a course of action as soon as I may, and then I will do as much as I can to make that happen. Sometimes it happens, though, that God makes you wait a while for Him to make clear the path that you are to take. This happened in my own life recently. I had to face the reality that I did not know how or if I would be able to return to school to finish my senior year of college. I spent half of a summer desperately working to earn the money I needed in order to return to school.

I spent four weeks that summer working as a tree planter in Northern Ontario. A tough job, I did not have the mental strength to handle it. Several times I was unable to work because I would hyperventilate over the stress of having to do more than I could manage in order to go back to school. One day I was in the hospital, afraid and stressed to the breaking point. I had brought with me my Bible with me and turned to Psalm 121

I will lift up my eyes unto the hills, from where comes my help. My help comes from the Lord, which made heaven and earth. He will not suffer your foot to be moved: he that keeps you will not slumber. Behold, he that keeps Israel shall neither slumber nor sleep. The Lord is your keeper: the Lord is you shade upon your right hand. The sun shall not smite you by day, nor the moon by night. The Lord shall preserve you from all evil: He shall preserve your soul. The Lord shall preserve your going out and your coming in from this time forth, and even for evermore.


This passage comforted me, and gave me something to focus on, even as I realized that in that moment there was nothing I could actively do to make anything happen. Even as I focused on the Lord as my Help and did not expect myself to be able to make my own way to school, God made a way for me to return to my studies.

Waiting is still not easy for me, but I know now that no matter what, God makes a way if we but trust in Him and the wisdom of His ways above our own.

5/365

Hello to all, and I am sorry I missed yesterday! I got a very strange strain of the stomach flu. I am feeling better today, thankfully, so I will attempt to a post today!

I think that it is really easy to get caught up in the doom and gloom of Christianity. We get bogged down by the reality and seriousness of sin. While those are important things to remember, all to quickly we are walking around with long faces and the people around us think that there could be no worse fate in life than to become a Christian.

How sad! If I could be in my right  mind all the time and keep perspective, I would strive to make Christianity the most joyful of all religions and life choices. There is so much beauty and joy to be had in participating in the Life of the Body of Christ. Our joy may be a deeper, and more solemn joy than the typical capering of the world, but I think Christians could afford to caper a little more when the fit takes them.

Throughout the Psalms God commands His people to sing Him a new song. In my experience this can be done with almost any song (as long as it does not support anything contrary to God's word). My most recent experience with this truth was on choir tour with my college concert choir this past spring. We travelled into the southwestern states during our Spring Break. 14 days on a bus together, and the atmosphere was still caring, joyful and loving. Each night we all as a choir did our absolute best work to ensure that the audience for that night could experience the total breadth, hight, and depth that each one of us individual singers found in the music. What an explosion of creativity, colour, sound, musicality and beauty there was on the stage each night. Singing beside the same people over and over again allowed you to trust that the people on either side of you would know and own each one of their notes, enabling you to sink into the harmonies and enjoy the texture of each piece. When I think of what it might be like to sing in heaven, I think of that experience and then wonder how it could get better. In my mind it could not, but I know God's idea of what is true and good goes far beyond mine, and I am glad for that.

I know not everyone reading this is a musician, but I hope this account inspires you to think of the best, most selfless, amazing experience you have ever had, and then wonder how that could last for an eternity, and exist even better than it was! Praise God for His beauty!

3/365

As I sit here in front of my computer, I am struck by how much of my life is consumed with selfish desires and ambitions. In Israel, during the reign of Darius, Haggai the prophet lectured the people against looking to their own houses at the expense of God's house. The more they tried to gain satisfaction through selfish means the more unhappiness they garnished. God told them that they would not find happiness until they rebuilt the temple.

Why we think it is easier to withdraw into our own private little lives and ignore the seeking of God's kingdom, and the life of the community of His people, I am not sure. It has something to do with how we are selfish beings, how we would rather care for ourselves than for others.

It has come more and more to my attention that in many circles of Christians there is good attendance in the church, and the people in the church have excellent mental knowledge of theology and principles, BUT there is very little conversation about personal faith and personal experience with the will of God. Older members of the church are not involved in mentoring the younger believers, except as it involves teaching Sunday School and Catechism classes. Those are all good things, and yet there is an unspoken line that few people dare to cross. Instead of church being the open, honest, truthful place that it should be, church becomes a place where people hide behind visible righteousness, and refuse to appear vulnerable. We challenge each other, but do not offer comfort or healing.

I am not denouncing Catechism classes and Sunday school, those are good things, and it is always good for Christians to challenge each other. Yet it is not healthy for us to posture ourselves as free of sin. We are a sinful and fallen people, and God has given us a community to keep us accountable. A pastor I heard while I was at school said that secrecy is the breeding ground of sin. In the church this is especially true. When there exists the lie of closed doors and things that nobody needs to know about, sin will grow, and like a cancer, devour the church from within.

This has been true in my own life as well as in the lives of people I know. While I was in school it was easy for me to get hooked into watching television shows on my computer. I would think that I could escape the world, and that the escape would give me mental peace. Those shows I was watching filled my mind with lies about relationships, and about what good and evil are. That 70's Show may be funny, but it is full of lies about what a good marriage is, about the roles of men and women, and about what makes a good person and a good life. Even the jokes are a false idea of what is funny. I filled my mind constantly with these things. There was a time when I couldn't go a single day without retreating into that world. in moments when I would stop the cycle and delve into my Bible, pray and "consider my ways." (Haggai 1: 7) I realized that I was harming both myself and my relationships with my friends. Like most people, I find it very hard to admit defeat and willingly confess to another person that I sin. However, when I finally confessed this struggle to my fiancee, the light of honesty that shone in that moment burned away the shame and the attraction of the sin. There are still easily moments of temptations, but they are more easily vanquished, and become easier when I confess the moment of temptation itself.

It is a lie of Satan that we believe when we think that we will be haunted by shame if we confess our sins to other Christians. The opposite is true. When we confess our sinfulness to those we love and trust in the faith, we will find that we are bound together even closer to them, and that we are able to stand together stronger against sin than we ever were able to by ourselves. Satan is horribly afraid of the strength Christians would have if they were open and honest with one another. He would much rather have us splinter ourselves off and think that we must fight our sins on our own.

So let the church come and bow before Christ. Let all men come and confess their shadows to their friends, for in shining light into dark corners, the darkness is chased away. There is no more attractiveness to the monsters of the dark when the light reveals their true visage and purpose.

I encourage you, if you have a bosom sin that you are struggling with, find a friend that you can trust and tell them about it. Don't spend too long thinking about it, do it quickly, and watch the Holy Spirit work wonders in the lives of both of you.

2/365

What is your only comfort in life and death?
Life can be pretty comfortless. There are lots of things that cause us to doubt that any comfort exists. anxiety, fear, sorrow, these are all marks of man's sin in the world. It can be easy to see these things and stop there. I know I can easily get overwhelmed with the negatives in my life, and I don't think I am very different from anyone. Listen to how coworkers talk, often it is a strong of complaints about everything that has gone wrong in the past day, week or month. Often the one comfort people cling to is made evident in what they talk about. For a lot of people it includes, job security, a passionate relationship, enough money to live on, general happiness, the ability to pursue their own selfish desires without thought of any consequences.
Sometimes I look at myself in the mirror and I realize that if people were to listen to my comments, they probably wouldn't think that my only comfort in life and death was that I belong both body and soul to my Lord Jesus Christ. That's what I want it to be, that's what I confess it to be, but I don't talk about it. I do not live like that is my only comfort in front of people I think it might be offensive to.
Keeping the truth a secret is a tricky thing. If you live like something other than the truth is truth long enough the truth becomes a lie, and you begin to make true the lie.
Yet, I wonder if sometimes we do not have an incorrect idea of how God wants us to live out the truth of His presence in our lives. Matthew 5: 14-15 reads, "You are the light of the world. A city on a hill cannot be hidden. Neither do people light a lamp and put it under a bowl. Instead they put it on a lamp stand, and it gives light to everyone in the house." In my study bible there is a note below these verses that speaks about the nature of the oil lamps in ancient times. Apparently the light from these lamps was more like a gentle, steady glow than a flaming blaze. The lamps had to be placed carefully so that the light from them would illuminate the house adequately. This rings true in my own life. God, so far, has not placed me where I must blaze alone, trying to rid the world of darkness. He has pooled my light with my sister's, my fiancee's, my family's. God, in His perfect wisdom, gives me moments in which to mention Him, small moments that would nonetheless reveal that my mind is fully taken up with the beauty of His holiness. I pray that all my consciousness is overwhelmed with the beauty of the Lord. I pray that His light will seep through my very pores. I pray that every moment I gaze on Him, my face will reflect his own.

What is your only comfort in life and death?

That I am not my own, but belong, both body and soul, in life and death, to my faithful Saviour Jesus Christ, who, with His precious blood, has fully satisfied for all my sins, and delivered me from all the power of the devil and so preserves me that without the will of my heavenly Father not a hair can fall from my head, yea; that all things must be subservient to my salvation, and therefore, by His Holy Spirit, He also assures me of eternal life, and makes me sincerely willing and ready, henceforth to live unto Him.

1/365
Heavenly-Mindedness
Today in church the pastor was preaching on Psalm 90:12. "So teach us to number our days, that we may gain a heart of wisdom." He mentioned that one way to gain a heart of wisdom is to cultivate heavenly-mindedness. I really liked that term. Lately in my own life I have been feeling a need to cultivate some heavenly-mindedness and I felt that God was leading me to begin a blog that would be both an exercise and a testimony to God's work in my life.
So for the next 365 days I will take time to ponder the greatness of God, and post some of my thoughts on the matter here it is my hope and prayer both that this journal will create habit in my life of seeking the Lord and sharing His work in my life and will encourage you, my readers, to do the same.
I suppose I should give a word of introduction in case there are people reading these posts that do not know me. My name, or what I will go by on this site, is Rachel Kayelien. I am in my early 20's and will be getting married in November to both the love of my life and the man of my dreams. I count myself very blessed to find both those things in the one man God had set apart for me. I will refer to the people in my life simply by some kind of initial. My father is a law officer, and therefore I have to be mindful of things that I post on this wonderful thing called the internet. My mother is a teacher, and I am the oldest of four children. This means that I am a bit of an overachiever, and that I like to keep myself occupied with worthy projects. I have just graduated from a Christian college, and I am a writer and a musician, with my degree in Vocal Music Performance. Above all, I desire to find the presence of God in every moment of my life. At the risk of sounding trite I seek to live Coram Deo, or before the face of God.

I was reading through the rest of Psalm 90 today, as I was thinking over the sermon from this morning. Two verses that the minister had not mentioned caught my attention. Verse 14 reads, "O satisfy us early with thy mercy; that we may rejoice and be glad all our days." Something that I have struggled with for a few years is the idea that meeting God face to face is something that is best done in the early morning. Jesus set this example Himself with His habit of rising early to seek the face of His Father before He faced the rest of the day. I have noticed myself that the days I do devotions before I do anything else, I am much more joyful, thankful and grateful. I realize that this verse could also be interpreted as saying "Let us be satisfied with Thy mercy early (in our lives) that we may rejoice and be glad all (the rest of) our days." But I like the idea of making God the first thought of every day. I don't know that I will always be able to live up to that, but it is definitely a goal to make.
Verse 17 reads, "And let the beauty of the Lord our God be upon us: and establish thou the work of our hands upon us; yea, the work of our hands establish thou it." The first part of that verse was what struck me. Normally, I do not think of the beauty of God as being something that needs to be upon me. The more I ponder the idea, the more I think that being overcome with the beauty of the Lord would be a good thing. How differently would I live my life if the most powerful thought I had in my day was how beautiful the Lord my God is? That should be the most powerful thought of my day, and yet it isn't. That shames me. I count myself a Christian and yet I must confess that worldly things often eclipse the beauty of my God in my thoughts...That is not something I am proud of, at all.

There is a line in The Fellowship of the Ring by J.R.R. Tolkein that I have been rereading over the past few weeks that comes to mind right now. Gimli, the dwarf is leaving Lothlorien with the rest of the Company, and he is mourning the loss of the presence of the fair Lady Galadriel. He says as the boat he sits in slips out of that land, "Hence I shall call nothing fair, unless it be her gift to me." And through the rest of that saga, through two more thick volumes, Gimli calls nothing fair unless he calls it less fair than the Lady of the Wood. I know I am not so careful with my words, but I wonder what the outcome would be if we Christians held back words of absolute praise unless it was to praise God and His character and gifts? I think we would soon discover a love for His presence that may be lacking in our present lives. I challenge you, my readers to take special note of all the things you call fair or good this week and evaluate them before the Word of God. Keep a list if that makes it easier for you. Consider taking a day to call nothing good unless it is God or one of His rich gifts.

Praying for blessing on your journey to heaven.

Rachel Kayelien