Coming Forth

A 2013 blessing to you:

May your coming forth be FORTH COMING-full of beauty, Light, answered prayer, destiny, praise, and giftings stirred with the beautiful Grace of God on High abounding.

May you COME FORTH in awesome ways in 2013!

Outburst

Outburst means to have a sudden release of strong emotion. It can also mean an outbreak of a particular activity as in "a wild outburst of applause."

Psalm 19:14 says to let the words of your mouth and the meditation of your heart be acceptable in the sight of the Lord; your Rock and your Redeemer.

In the past I have had outbursts of strong emotion; negative outbursts when my flesh acted up and out. I have also had outbursts of strong emotion when my Rock and Redeemer Lord caused everything within me to give a shout of praise while applauding Him wildly.

This picture has a fiery look to it; it looks explosive. What are your outbursts like?

Do they bring the burn of hurt and woundedness to another? Do they curse? Are they filled with hot anger from careless lips of a prideful unteachable heart?

Or do your outbursts bring blessing and hope, joy and strength? Do your outbursts INSIST on believing with a stubborn faith that God is absolutely in control, has you in the palm of His hand and will PROSPER you in the midst of testing and trial?  THAT kind of explosive outburst is an inner wildfire that cannot be contained and it WILL spread.

From out of the HEART the MOUTH speaks. 

May your outbursts be because of the One who BURNS within you.

NEW Day

Felt impressed to name this particular painting NEW Day (emphasis on new). It reminded me of a pretty sunny spring day where the "hidden lovelies" were popping up after a harsh winter.

Some of you may feel like you have been caught in the "dead" of winter for a long long time wondering if life was EVER going to show you blossoms of promise where you have planted seeds of faith, hope and love.

The answer is YES.

Almighty God is indeed the Maker of heaven, earth, and the NEW day.
May He show you on this day the lovelies that have been hidden and may your eyes feast upon the exceedingly abundantly extravagant beauty of them because of the One Who is altogether lovely.

Cracks

Ever experience those days where you feel like you don't have a crack in your armor, but maybe in your soul? Black cracks that run deep and all you can do is focus on them and groan.

I am so thankful that God understands my GROAN. I am also thankful that He knows where the cracks came from in the first place.

As I sat in His healing presence, He and I talked about these painful cracks. One of the intriguing things my Creator pointed out to me is that they bring out DEPTH.

So whether it is in a painting or in my life, these cracks CONTRIBUTE to the overall picture; the art doesn't look quite as flat and I am somehow not as shallow.

But Deliver Us From Evil

I had the Aurora families in mind when I composed this photograph tonight.

It is simply a shot of my hands with one small flashlight as the lighting source. A camera mounted on a tripod with a timed release took the shot while I held my hands under the lens. Nothing remarkable about all that, but it DID give the effect I was looking for  to comfort those who mourn:

I cannot debate the "higher ways of the Lord" when my humanness simply does not understand and I cannot accuse my Savior of being evil Himself for giving man a free will to do despicable things of ALL kinds, and I don't know what was going on in the minds of those who were experiencing the horror of this attack, but I DO know that the Lord is well able to save when His Name is called upon. I DO believe in death bed conversions and I am absolutely certain that the old saying, "there are no atheists in fox holes" rings true when murderous EVIL comes charging to steal, kill, and destroy.

For those who are sorely tempted to "curse God and die" as Job's wife bitterly told HIM to do, I pray that the God of ALL COMFORT will pour Himself upon you.

I don't know if those who lost their lives that night had their hands clasped in prayer or in the hand of another loved one or even a stranger, but I pray this picture helps you SEE the following:

The Lord is a VERY PRESENT help in time of trouble. The Lord was holding the hands of those who knew Him as Savior until the very end and some grabbed His hand for the very first time that night.
For THEM, their future looks extremely bright. THEY have been delivered from evil for all eternity.

I pray that as you look at this picture that you will see the Hand of the Deliverer gripping the hand of one crying out in the darkness and I hope that you will see that the hands also represent the MANY intercessors who are praying for you, your children, your spouse, your siblings, your friends, your loved ones; those who survived the attack and those who did not.

May the Lord DELIVER you from evil that would make your heart sick. May the Lord DELIVER you from evil that would accuse Him of being deaf, blind, and uncaring. May the Lord DELIVER you from evil that causes nightmares. May the Lord DELIVER you from evil that says God is dead and that the "dark knight of hell" is in control. May the Lord DELIVER you from evil that shouts to you to NEVER EVER FORGIVE OR FORGET. May the Lord DELIVER you from evil by overwhelming you with His loving kindness, compassion, provision and healing power He not only CAN do, but that He WILL do.

Blessed are those who mourn for they SHALL BE comforted.