Day 212

It's Day 212 of  The Red Shoe Project.  I just kicked off my Ruby Reds, took a long hot shower and washed away all the product from my hair, makeup from my face, and sweat off my back.  What a day it was!  Overwhelming to say the least, but a good day, all the same!  Don't you love a hot shower after a day like that?  Sometimes, just going out into the world, and experiencing all it has to offer, can leave me feeling like I have a thick coat of  "YUK" all over me.  Did things attached themselves to me when I wasn't looking?

The toil of life has it's residue:    Doom -- Gloom --  Negativity --  Restlessness --  Deceit --  Lies --  Gossip --  Heaviness --  Doubt --  Trouble --  Stress --  Aches -- and Pains.

Sometimes I just have to shake that stuff off me.  Other times I have to shower it off.  And when none of that works... I have to pray it off, in Jesus' Name!  That does the trick every time!

Today was just the opposite though.  As a Christian, searching for God, outside the comforts of my home, can be overwhelming... in a good way.  How can I explain that?  As you know, I've been seeking more and more the heart of God.  Today, I experienced a couple things in which God decided to reveal His heart to me.  He did that by flooding my heart with His emotions.  That kind of sharing in partnership can be divinely explosive!  Whooosh!  Watch out!  His feelings are not like mine.  They are intensely powerful!  It can leave a girl thinking...

"That's it, I'm done! 

God's gonna kill me right here and now!"  

I won't say,  "Stop! It's too much!"  I refuse to say that!  I'll take all that God wants to share... and if I die, I die.  I want to see what He sees!  I want to feel what He feels!  I want to know His thoughts on things!

It sounds so awesome...  and I guess it is awesome, but it has its challenges.  The picture that pops in my mind is King Kong at the top of the Empire State Building with that beautiful girl in his hand as he swats the airplanes attacking him.  If her grips her too tightly, he'll crush every bone in her body.  Of course, I realize that's just a movie and a human perspective of things.  I know that God is very aware of His strength, not to mention my frailty...  but His power can be somewhat intimidating.

It started at The Bonfire Bible study.  Three women were asked to give a short presentation on "The Intimacy of Christ."  They all had good things to share.  My friend, Zeva, was the last to go.  Instead of speaking, she decided to portray God's intimacy through dance.  First, she humbly shared -- so intimately -- about her personal relationship with God.  Then she concluded with a jewish marriage dance which she performed unto the Lord.  I was so overwhelmed with emotion.  I had to do everything in my strength to not fall to the floor and cry like a baby.  I was awestruck!

"awestruck" =  struck with wonder,  amazed,  at a loss for words, reverential,  terrified,  afraid,  fearful.

What was it I was feeling?  Had God poured His applause for her actions into my heart?  WOW!  Even now, as I reminisce and write it out for you, I am brought to tears.  It was glorious!  Thank You for sharing your thoughts with me, Oh Lord! 

If that weren't amazing enough, I had a meeting with my Giving Circle later in the day.  Today our group was hearing presentations from three non-profit organizations in the community.  We will determine in the upcoming month which of the three will receive the donation that we've been gathering up these last six months.

All three of the presentations were outstanding.  All of them are doing great work in the community.  All three are meeting critically vital needs of people.  How does one choose, which one?  When all the presenters left, and a few of us women still remained, I thought I was about to lose my composure completely.  

I asked the ladies if anyone would like to join me in prayer.  Six or seven of us gathered in a circle and joined hands.  Several of us lifted our voices to God.  We weren't looking for God to specifically decide which one was to be the recipient.  All of them are worthy of it.  My prayer was that God would somehow provide financial gifts to those who don't receive ours.  Another prayer was that God would use us in our community to give abundantly to those making a difference.  Still another prayed that God would show us the bigger picture... how we might impact others to give generously to such causes.  The whole time it felt as if electricity was flowing through my body.  

I wept.

Right there... 

in the middle of this group 

of businesswomen, 

I wept.  

I could feel the tears rolling down my face.  I could hear them  hitting the carpet below me.  Who cares!  I was lost in the grief that filled my heart over the atrocities of man. 

These two meetings today... they had to be two of the most moving moments of my life!  Sensing the love of God and the grief of God, all in one day.  I'm amazed that I'm still alive to tell of it.  All I can say is...

Our God is an Awesome God!

Thank you Jesus for Today.

In RED shoes, 

Gail

Day 211

It's the 211th Day of  The Red Shoe Project.  Adorned in my RED sneakers, I set off on another prayer walk.  I know I'm prayer walking almost every day.  That's just what God is doing right now, so I'm there!

Today I had an interesting conversation with Him.  Seven months into The Red Shoe Project and I'm still seeking answers to some questions I have.  Lately, I feel like I'm being unwound...  kind of like a spool of thread.  I, myself,  have unwound thread from its spool, many times,  but it's always been while I was sewing something.  I think that God is just discarding all my thread.  In fact, as I sit here writing this, He's confirming to me...

 "I am discarding it -- all of it!  

It's binding you up and it's keeping you from experiencing the fullness I have for you."  

Okay... I wasn't quite expecting Him to answer me on the spot like that, but  THANK YOU,  Lord  for clarifying!

(Talk about interactive blogging!)

I just now looked up the definition of "unwind."  Here's what I found:

Unwind - Undo - Unwrap - Unbind

to repeatedly untwist and uncoil something from it's core.

Undo - Untie - Unknot

to take apart.

Unwrap - Uncover  

to bring out in the open.

Unbind - Loosen 

to release what's holding it all together.

 

Wow! It's not all that hard to conceive that LIFE has somehow wrapped itself around me in a way that's so binding that I'm unable to move for God in the way He desires.  But it seems God has a plan.  He's at work... in me!   He's unwinding my life, loosing me of things that I don't even realize are a hinderance to what He wants to do in and through me in the future.  

I'm all for it --  FREEDOM!

Okay... so back to my day.  During my prayer walk, I cut across the desolate land where the garden is.  What can I say?  I wanted to take a picture of it.  As I was leaving,  I sensed the presence of God, so I took a moment to ask Him...

"What's going on?" 

Why all the unwinding?  Am I really still all wrapped up?  

Even after 211 Days?

With that said, He responded in the quietest whisper that penetrated into the depths of my soul...

"I'm doing a DEEP work in you."

After showering and cleaning myself up, I finally sat down at my computer screen.  What kind of deep work?  God doesn't always go into great detail with me.  But I had to wonder, "Is that all you got for me, Lord?"  Oh well, I didn't have time to pursue it any further right now.  I had some research to do.  

Tomorrow's Bonfire is on "Intimacy with Christ."  Three of our ladies will be sharing their thoughts on the subject.  I'll be introducing them so, to prepare my heart,  I thought I'd Google the theme and see what came up.  I could never have anticipated what was about to happen.

Once again... He read my mail!   God answered me before I even asked out loud.  I wasn't on Google but a minute and something caught my eye.  It was an interview between two well known ministers.  Wondering what these two men of the cloth had to say on  "Intimacy with God",  I clicked.  Long story short, they began to describe in detail what I was personally experiencing -- the whole "unwinding"  thing.  Then they began discussing what it meant in detail.  I can't squeeze into this blog all that was said, but I will leave you with this paraphrased golden nugget:

"God gets us alone... strips everything from us... until there's nothing left -- but Him.  It's a deeper experience than anything you could ever imagine.  It takes total surrender... total death to the flesh.  You'll be relying on Him -- not ever day -- but every second of every day.  Ultimately He wants to fill you to the brim with His Holy Spirit...  all the way to the top so that just  ONE MORE DROP of Him will produce an overflow that will reach others on His behalf.  Your ministry is  THE OVERFLOW!"

As I look back on today and all that God has done, I'm  thinking that all this "unwinding" is a good thing,  a great thing!  That doesn't mean it's easy.  It's more of that "dying to self"   stuff.  But at least I have a clue to what He's doing.    

By faith, as I say goodnight to Him,  I'm lifting my arms upward,  in the shape of a cup, and shouting...

"Pour into me, Oh God!"

"Don't stop until I'm 

overflowing!"

Going deeper...

in RED shoes, 

Gail

Day 210

It's Day 210 of  The Red Shoe Project.  I've had on my RED shoes all day, looking and listening for God, but I've been distracted.  I've been swatting at all the birds that keep trying to nest in my hair!

They are everywhere.  They were waiting for me when I took Pauly outside for his morning walk.  They attacked again while I was trying to worship in church.  When I got in my car to drive home "bang, bang, bang"  they smashed  against the windsheild of my car.



 I thought that was it, but as I sat eating a quiet lunch at home, they reappeared again, outside my window.  Finally, I left the house for my prayer walk, and even as I sang and talked with God, they watched and waited at a distance, looking for an opportunity to swoop down on me.




Just what are these birds that I'm talking about?

They are the crazy thoughts, pictures, lies and temptations that the enemy catapults at me, in his relentless attempt to distract, discourage and disconnect me from God.  

I'm starting to feel like I'm in my own personal remake of Alfred Hitchcock's THE BIRDS!



There's a saying...

You can't keep the birds 
from flying over your head, 

but you can keep them from 
building a nest in your hair. 

Just yesterday, as I was praying up a storm in the garden, God spoke to me about my walk with Him.  As I continued to cry out... "More of You, Lord!  Draw me closer!  I surrender all!"  He warned me that the enemy would attack.  He told me that I'd have to put on  my spiritual armor every day.  He reminded me that I'd have to fight off "the birds!"   I know I can never let them rest in my hair or my heart.

What does that mean?  
It  means that I can't give room to those thoughts, pictures, lies and temptations.  I can't dwell on them.  I can't spend time thinking about them.  I can't let them land in my head or they will do their best to "nest" there.  They will want to make my mind their home!  And boy... once they've nested... it is ever so difficult to get them out of there.
Fighting them off is easy in comparison.


The Bible says...

"...do not give the devil an opportunity to work."

Ephesians 4:27  (ISV)

Being caught in a deluge of tempting thoughts has it's challenges.
Here's some of the things I do to keep them off me:

When I was out walking Pauly, I simply dismissed the thoughts as they popped into my mind.  "That's crazy!"  I thought,  and I started talking to God about the day ahead.  For me... it's not sufficient to just not think about it.  I have to fill that space in my mind with something else.  I can't just leave it empty, or the enemy will keep trying to fill it.  Prayer is perfect!

Later, while I was trying to worship at church, I found that I had to open my eyes.  (Usually it's the opposite.  I close my eyes to focus.)  This time, I found it helpful to focus on the song lyrics that were displayed on the screen.  As my eyes focused on the words and I sang along boldly,  it pushed out and replaced the picture Satan had tried to deposit in my head.

While in my car... solid Christian music that I could sing along with did the trick!

And during my prayer walk... I sang songs of victory almost the entire time.  That kept the birds at a distance!

Eventually, I resorted to my most effective tactic.  It works every time!  I stop whatever I'm doing,  sit down,  close my eyes  and pray up a storm, in Jesus' Name.  It's not my usual prayer.  It's an Ephesians 6 prayer.  It's a battle prayer that reminds me who I am in Christ and that... "I am more than a conqueror through Him who loves me." (Romans 8:37)

"Submit yourselves, then, to God.

Resist the devil, 
and he will flee from you."

James 4:7

The day is quickly coming to an end.  THANK GOD!  Truly, it has been a "Work Day!"  But there will always be days like this.  Days that I have to work hard to defend my faith, my family, my mind, my call.  All things that are dear to my heart.

It's funny because I know better than anyone that I can defend nothing on my own.  Sure, it just looks like  "Little ole me"... in my RED shoes...  but truth be told,  I'm surrounded by the the Army of God... His Heavenly Host.  I'm protected by the prayers of my "Rubies,"  family and friends.  I'm filled with the power and presence of The Holy Ghost.  And I'm wielding the Sword of the Spirit:  God's Mighty Word.

That's the life of a Soldier in God's army!
And I'm one of them.
Thank you fellow soldiers for your prayerful support.

Gail

Day 209

Day 209 of  The Red Shoe Project may consist of twenty-four hours, but almost an hour of that time went missing during my prayer walk today  in RED sneakers. 

With two thirds of my walk completed,  I turned the corner and came upon the property with the big pink house.  The house was recently picked up off it's foundation and moved  way over to the back corner of the property where it now rests on stilts. The land around it has been completely leveled.  The beautiful garden that I used to sit in to pray is a total, abandoned mess.  The brick pathway that ran through it has been torn out.  The greenery and flowers are overgrown, dried out, plucked out, and stepped on.  

There used to be a pump in the middle of the garden that took  away any excess water during heavy rain storms.  It's gone now.  A few weeks ago I stopped by to take a look and the whole garden was like a big mud puddle.  Today, the puddle was gone, it's all dried up and the earth is like hardened clay. 

No matter!  This garden is where the Spirit of God dwells.  To me, that means it is an altar to God.  There have been no demolition crews or workers here for months now and there's no fence around the property.  Sorry!  I couldn't resist.  God only knows how much longer I'll be able to do this.  I side-tracked from my walk and headed down the stone driveway to what remains of the garden.  


It was early afternoon and the sun was beating down on that desolate property. Fortunately the forsaken garden was still home to a tree that provided me a little shade.  I stood in the middle and did a full circle.  What a mess -- the dried up garden... the plowed up property... the overgrown grass, the house held up on stilts.


I just wanted to cry!  It reminded me of the story of Elijah at the Brook Cherith. That was the place where the ravens fed him during the drought.  But one day... the brook dried up!
(1 Kings 17:7)

What was I doing here?  "Speak to me Lord!  One more time in this place, I ask that you speak to me!"  



I closed my eyes and shut out the scenic mess all around me.  A cool breeze blew through the garden as I felt His Spirit rumble inside me.  At first all sorts of random things were popping in my mind.  "What if someone saw me on the property? - especially praying  -- what would they think?"  I could be mistaken for a crazy person.  LOL.  Then I thought,  "Come on!  Who cares!"  

I kept pushing through the ideas and pictures popping into my mind.  "Okay Gail... Focus!" 
As I attempted to push aside the collage of craziness in my head, I asked the Holy Spirit to tell me who to pray for.  At first I had nothing, so I waited.  I continued to focus.  "Lord, show me who you want me to pray for."  Then a picture of someone popped into my mind.  I went to prayer on their behalf.  Another face followed and another and another.  One by one I lifted each person up before the Lord.  I asked God to give favor, to bless, to have His way, to heal and to meet specific needs.

The names and faces in God's prayer line flowed continuously for some time and then suddenly... they just stopped.  My prayer feeder was empty.   Just like that!  Nothing.  All done.  I opened my eyes.  Yikes!  There I was sitting on a stone chair at the edge of the old garden.  My hands were lifted up and the Peace of God rested upon me.  How glorious!  I just love that.  Oh.... it looks crazy!  But I love it all the same.  I thanked the Lord, and moved along.  The prayer party was over -- at least for now.

I smiled and sang a happy tune to myself as I walked that last mile home.  It was a good day... a RED shoe day,
and it had just begun.

Gail