The Incredible Power That Comes with Feeling Small

This morning as I'm listening to Christmas hymns and trying to understand why the Creator of this universe I see outside my window would humble himself to be wrapped in flesh in the form of a teeny, tiny baby, it makes me feel so small but yet so significant. A love like that can't make you feel insignificant no matter how small you actually are compared to Him. A Casting Crowns song began playing in my head, and this is how it goes (oldie but goodie)...

Who am I, that the Lord of all the earth
Would care to know my name
Would care to feel my hurt?
Who am I, that the Bright and Morning Star
Would choose to light the way
For my ever wandering heart?

Not because of who I am
But because of what You've done
Not because of what I've done
But because of who You are

I am a flower quickly fading
Here today and gone tomorrow
A wave tossed in the ocean
Vapor in the wind.
Still You hear me when I'm calling
Lord, You catch me when I'm falling
And You've told me who I am
I am Yours, I am Yours.

Who am I, that the eyes that see my sin
Would look on me with love and watch me rise again?
Who am I, that the voice that calmed the sea
Would call out through the rain
And calm the storm in me?

Not because of who I am
But because of what You've done
Not because of what I've done
But because of who You are

I am a flower quickly fading
Here today and gone tomorrow
A wave tossed in the ocean
Vapor in the wind.
Still You hear me when I'm calling
Lord, You catch me when I'm falling
And You've told me who I am
I am Yours.

Not because of who I am
But because of what You've done
Not because of what I've done
But because of who You are

I am a flower quickly fading
Here today and gone tomorrow
A wave tossed in the ocean
Vapor in the wind.
Still You hear me when I'm calling
Lord, You catch me when I'm falling
And You've told me who I am
I am Yours.

I am Yours.
Whom shall I fear?
Whom shall I fear?
'Cause I am Yours
I am Yours.

White as Snow

Friday there was a buzz around town that we'd get some snow flurries on Saturday. Saturday morning I ran a few errands, hit the treadmill (I'm up to jogging 2.25 miles!), and sat down to check the forecast. I turned around a few seconds later, and saw the first few flurries floating to the ground. Within the hour, the ground was covered with a fresh blanket of snow, and the flakes got bigger and bigger. All in all, we got about 3 inches.

I've mentioned this before, but something about snow just warms my heart (ironic, right?). It's just so magical, and the more I think about it, it really is a beautiful picture of salvation. Snow blankets the ground, making it clean, fresh, pure, and spotless. It covers the mud and muck and dead grass underneath so that all you see is white, and it's the whitest of all possible whites too. That's exactly what the blood of Jesus is for us. His sacrifice covered us in a beautiful, pure blanket of snow to cover all our filthy sins so that all the Father sees when He looks at us is His purity. In fact, Scripture even says in Psalms and Isaiah that we'll be whiter than snow: "Cleanse me with hyssop, and I will be clean; wash me and I will be whiter than snow" (Psalm 51:7). "Though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be white as snow; though they are red as crimson, they shall be like wool" (Isaiah 1:18). So the next time you witness the breathtaking beauty of a snowfall, take a moment to say thank you to the One who covered your sins with His blood.

A New Chapter

Hello again, gentle reader. I've taken quite the hiatus from blogging lately, and I think it's because I've been feeling for a long time that it needed a fresh start. Thus, I've given it a snazzy new look and renamed it "Pen Strokes of the Author," and it will focus on glimpses I see of God in literature, music, and the beauties of day-to-day life that we so often overlook. Hopefully it will end up being a celebration of the little things in life and art that can point in big ways to the character of God, the love He has for us, and the hope we have for life beyond this one. God always seems to speak to me through the simplicities of life, and I pray that the ones I record here will encourage you and bring glory to Him. I hope that it inspires you to listen for whispers of God in your own life. In the words of C.S. Lewis, let us look "further up and further in" to see the divine in the everyday...snapshots of wait awaits us.

"But for them it was only the beginning of the real story. All their life in this world and all their adventures in Narnia had only been the cover and the title page: now at last they were beginning Chapter One of the Great Story which no one on earth has read, which goes on for ever, in which every chapter is better than the one before." - C.S. Lewis, final lines of The Chronicles of Narnia: The Last Battle

What Love Really Means by JJ Heller

He cries in the corner where nobody sees
He’s the kid with the story no one would believe
He prays every night, “Dear God won’t you please
Could you send someone here who will love me?”

Who will love me for me
Not for what I have done or what I will become
Who will love me for me
‘Cause nobody has shown me what love
What love really means

Her office is shrinking a little each day
She’s the woman whose husband has run away
She’ll go to the gym after working today
Maybe if she was thinner
Then he would’ve stayed
And she says…

Who will love me for me?
Not for what I have done or what I will become
Who will love me for me?
‘Cause nobody has shown me what love, what love really means

He’s waiting to die as he sits all alone
He’s a man in a cell who regrets what he’s done
He utters a cry from the depths of his soul
“Oh Lord, forgive me, I want to go home”

Then he heard a voice somewhere deep inside
And it said
“I know you’ve murdered and I know you’ve lied
I have watched you suffer all of your life
And now that you’ll listen, I’ll tell you that I...”

I will love you for you
Not for what you have done or what you will become
I will love you for you
I will give you the love
The love that you never knew

Time zone fail

I kept watching College Game Day and the clock in anticipation of the Lee Corso mascot reveal at 11:00am. "Why aren't they doing picks by now?" I wondered. Then I remembered I live in the Eastern Time Zone. Time zone fail.

"Beautiful Beautiful" - Francesca Battistelli

Don’t know how it is You looked at me
And saw the person that I could be
Awakening my heart
Breaking through the dark
Suddenly Your grace

(Chorus)
Like sunlight burning at midnight
Making my life something so
Beautiful, beautiful
Mercy reaching to save me
All that I need
You are so
Beautiful, beautiful

Now there’s a joy inside I can’t contain
But even perfect days can end in rain
And though it’s pouring down
I see You through the clouds
Shining on my face

(Chorus)

I have come undone
But I have just begun
Changing by Your grace

(Chorus)

"For the Moments I Feel Faint" - Relient K

Am I at the point of no improvement?
What of the death I still dwell in?
I try to excel, but I feel no movement.
Can I be free of this unreleasable sin?

Never underestimate my Jesus.
You're telling me that there's no hope.
I'm telling you, you're wrong.
Never underestimate my Jesus.
When the world around you crumbles,
he will be strong.
He will be strong.

I throw up my hands.
" Oh, the impossibilities."
Frustrated and tired,
where do I go from here?
Now I'm searching for the confidence I've lost so willingly.
Overcoming these obstacles is overcoming my fears.
I think I can't, I think I can't.
But, I think You can, I think You can.
I think I can't, I think I can't.
But, I think You can, I think You can.
Gather my insufficiencies and place them in Your hands.
Place them in Your hands.
Place them in Your hands.

Never underestimate my Jesus.
You're telling me that there's no hope.
I'm telling you, you're wrong.
Never underestimate my Jesus.
When the world around you crumbles,
he will be strong.
He will be strong.