Picture Potluck

Nothing really going on to write about...So I thought I'd throw out some random pictures...

This is a chalk drawing of a classic painting. Denny did this at the recent Sayler Park Harvest Festival.

I took this picture at Kings Island this past summer. I liked how the flag looked translucent in the mist from the fountain.

Me and my beautiful Mommy!

I'm not sure if maybe this was a costume party? I have a vague recollection of this day. :) Just kidding...Those are my two bestest friends, Lori on the left and Gina on the right. I have known Lori since high school (and she still loves me!) and Gina since the 2nd grade!!! She is like my sister. I barely remember life without her!

These politically incorrect salt shakers were at the "Nostalgia Store" in Missouri. I didn't know whether to laugh or be offended.

Bentley...A ball of cuteness.

Old School...

In obedience to my blog mentor, Reverb, I offer some stuff from my old days...

My favorite movies from the 80s...Starting with 2 Brat Pack classics:

OK, this next one isn't from the 80s - it was released in 1973. But I didn't see it until I was 12...The thing I always say about this movie is that the point of it is so often missed...Everyone gets wrapped up in the demon-possession of the little girl. But the story is really about a priest who has lost his faith...And in the end gives his life for the girl, living out the very faith he was questioning...Deep stuff!

My best friend Gina and I used to get together yearly to watch these 3 films - the 80s musical movie festival. Boo for the poor sexual values that they all embraced, but yay for the themes of pursuing your dreams!

Speaking of dream pursuing...This book kept me from ditching my dreams in senior year when I almost walked away from my ambitions to be an actress/writer/director. The last line in this autobiography is "Never give up your dreams"...And if anyone makes fun of Barry I'll punch 'em in da mewf!

Can you spot my junior picture? Don't ask what was up with my hair..It's like a really effed up mullet...

Senior year was a bit better:

Here are a bunch of old handritten pages of the story that I started writing in 1987:

That story became the feature length script I finally completed this summer:

It is in revisions and will be produced as my executive Producer, Lord Yeshua opens the doors... :) This week I talked with an old friend from college who is looking for a project to shoot...

So, there is...A trip down memory lane of Helen Luther Betz.

Who's next??!

Treasure Hunting

Inspired by this book:
I went with a group of friends tonight on a treasure hunt that was unlike any other...It was one led by God! It was not a mission to get people to come to church or to preach at anyone or to talk theology. No info cards or mention of church was allowed. It was simply about finding people that God wanted to bless.

Ingredients for successful Treasure Hunting:

A creative, fun-loving God...

A group of people willing to risk looking foolish (Being a bit off-kilter helps, too!)

A list of clues provided by God (he is always talking to us!):

And a destination:

Before going out we met at the House of Horgan where Kevin put on his thinking cap...

(Oh, wait...That was a different night...)

Back to tonight...

We took 10 minutes to quiet ourselves and listen for God's voice to tell us, individually, clues that could lead to someone He had prepared for an encounter with Him. Taking longer than a few minutes gives you too much time to overthink things. The object is to write down what you get without editing. Clues generally fall into one of 5 categories: Location, a person's name, a person's appearance, what they may need prayer for and The Unusual.

Next we broke into teams of 3-4 and drove to our chosen destination. Tonight it was a small plaza nearby.

My team was Denise, Kevin and Carol and myself.

Clues that appeared on our respective treasure maps included things like:

Cassandra
Jennifer
Blue shoes
Pencil in hair
White sweater
Pink baby hat
baby carriage
Purple
forlorn
catastrophe
dentist
Cocoa puffs
Poptarts
Minestrone soup
Clipboard
Intersection
Stop light
wheelchair

These are general clues and are meant to be used as general directions. The point isn't to match clues exactly (though that will blow you away!) but to find who God is looking to bless...One of our friends who has done this before had 'cracker' on her list and it turned out that the person who was the treasure called everyone 'cracker' :)

We decided since there were obvious grocery items that we would go into Kroger (we also had a Walmart and Petsmart to choose from). I actually needed some groceries so we had a 'cover' to blend in as we walked around the store looking for God's treasure. :) Almost immediately we spotted a family who had a baby in a pumpkin seat (baby carriage). Denise stopped to coo at the baby and saw that she had on a pink jacket with a pink hood (pink baby hat). She came back to us and we were sure this was one of the treaures. After freaking out for a moment and stopping to gather our composure we tracked down this family again. Kevin and I approached and explained what we were doing and showed them our treasure map. They said "sure...you can bless us if you want". So we did. :)

Next we went to the cereal aisle because of the cereal aisle clues. Just after we entered the aisle, so did a woman wearing a pink bandana, pushing a young girl who was wearing a purple jacket. She walked past us at the Poptarts and then stopped just beyond the cocoa puffs to look at the other cereals. We were amazed! We got talking to her. And asked if any of the other clues on our map applied to her in any way. It turned out that her daughter had just been to the dentist and had her two front teeth pulled. We prayed blessings for them too. And the lady teared up a little bit as we prayed and thanked us for stopping to talk to her.

Moving right along, we saw a lady in a light colored sweater riding on one of those motorized grocery carts (wheelchair). She was down at the other end of the aisle at the intersection of two aisles. We were planning to get to her but on our way we saw a Kroger employee who had a pen tucked behind his ear (pencil in hair). He was also carrying an electronic device that stores information which we stretched to say was our "clipboard" clue (lol!). He wanted prayer for his friend who had just been laid off.

While I ran out to the car to get money for my groceries, Carol asked at the front desk if there was anyone who worked there named Jennifer because that name was really heavy on her heart. There was a Jennifer but she was not working tonight. But the manager said Jennifer would be very excited to know there was a prayer team looking for her and promised to tell her about it. She also asked us to check out in aisle 2 where the cashier needed prayer. Her name was Nicole. Her co-worker came over while we were talking to her. And her name was Saundra. I asked if her first name was Cassandra but it wasn't. Close enough though!

Ranchwhile, back at the mean, the other half of our group had less clues actually match up but they had an opportunity to pray for a woman who had an injured leg. They also spoke with a couple of people who had matching clues (white hat, pencil in hair and orange shirt/bright colored/blue shoes) but those folks didn't think that the clues really meant them. But they appreciated the thought. :)

All in all it was an awesome night! And we all want to do it again now that we feel more comfortable and encouraged.

Who else is up for a Treasure Hunt??!

Renaissance Fest 2008

Today we played hookey from church and went to the Ohio Ren Fest. It was a great day for it - after it warmed up! I was glad I had the cloak that my mommy made for me...Here are some photos and video from the day. For more check out Steve's Blog!

Carol was attracted to the shiny things. Here she admired some hand made crystal ornaments.

I wanted to get a set of the elf ears that the girl has on the right. But they were a bit pricey. And I figure my own ears are pretty elfin on their own and don't need much help.

Steve and I were forced into a dual using what were called "Safer Swords". It was fun! But somehow Steve sustained an injury on his finger. So maybe they aren't as safe as they say!

Falsely accused. That's all I have to say...


MUD SHOW!

The guy who owns this hand has been doing mud shows at the Ohio Ren Fest for 19 years.

This guy was a riot! He made a bologna sandwhich with his feet and here he is juggling swords while standing on a hobby horse.

But that was only a warm up for what he did with Denny - who bravely volunteered without knowing what he was getting into...

On our way back to the highway we stopped at an Amish shop and bought good food, including this whoopie pie which has about 1,000 calories in it!



The shop next door was a flea market run by none other than Chad Vader!



Good Times!

When was your last adventure with friends and family?

Little souls

I work with some great kids. Many of whom struggle everyday in a world of spiritual attack they know nothing about. And it's heart-breaking. There's the 4 year old girl who is so anxiety-ridden that she talks rapidly incessant when in a stressful situation. She will also avoid being comforted when she is hurt or scared because if she lets her guard down she will disintegrate into a mess of tears. Last year her parents split and now she is caught in the middle of a horrible custody arrangement. One day while I was helping her change her wet clothes she broke down and started wailing that she didn't like her family. Just the other day she told Katie that she didn't love her mommy anymore because she loved her daddy. Somehow in her mind if she loves one she can't love the other.

Then there's a boy so starved for physical affection that he misbehaves just to have human touch. In his home it's probably the only time anyone lays a hand on him. There have been a number of times that he has refused to cooperate until you come over and guide him by the shoulders or take his hand. Then he is more than happy to comply. My spirit shed tears the day when he refused to come pick up something he had dropped in the hallway as we headed back to class. We were having a stand off and I said "Your friends are waiting at the art center. Come pick this up so you can join them." He stood there refusing. Then put his hand out and said "hold my hand"....He wanted me to come and take him by the hand and bring him over to the paper he had dropped. Simply so he could hold a hand. How could I refuse? We walked together to the paper which he gladly picked up and then we walked hand in hand to the classroom where we sat at the art center together and colored. I wanted to just wrap him up in a big old hug and pour out the love of God right from my spirit to his so that he'd never feel alone.

I could tell so many other stories of the precious lives that have impacted mine. I have the privilege of working with these kids...Yet sometimes it can be so hard knowing that I hold in me the key to unlock the shackles that bind them and their families. It's hard because I do not have permission to exercise that at school in a direct way or without parental permission...Even God respects the spiritual authority of a parent. Still, I can pray blessings over them, and ask Jesus to protect their eyes and ears from the evil that they endure daily. Ask him to soften the physical blows that come their way. I can be His hands and feet and His love for them in general ways...And that is something. Human love is wonderful. But the love of God is infinitely deeper and wider. It is eternal. Maybe in years to come a blessing prayed for a lonely, anxious 4 year old will became a life line to Father God, the ever flowing source of abundant life.

From the blog of Joe Boyd

Apology

This is from the blog of Joe Boyd, one of the pastors at Vineyard Community Church. It is a courageous piece and one that should be shared with the world.

It confesses the sins of those of us who call ourselves followers of Christ (We are "The Church" - it is not any particular denomination or physical place).

But it also speaks the truth about what the Church SHOULD be, has been and can be when God is at the helm and not humans in their own "wisdom."

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I've had lots of requests to post the "apology" that I read this weekend at church. It's from a page in my prayer journal over ten years ago, dated 9-2-98:

I feel the need to ask for forgiveness, whether it is forgiveness from God, or from or from the millions of people who have been offended by the church I am unsure:

I need to ask forgiveness for the ongoing corruption of the church at large since the early days of the church, for I believe that it is a sin to use the church for personal or political gain.

I need to ask forgiveness for every boring church event, church service, or sermon since the creation of the church, for I believe that it is a sin to bore people with the good news of Jesus Christ.

I need to ask forgiveness for the silence of the European church during the Jewish holocaust, and of the American church during the years of slavery, for I believe that it is a sin for the church of God to sheepishly stand by while innocent people die.

I need to ask forgiveness for the subtle, unspoken belief that we created God in our own image as opposed to embracing our own created-ness, for I believe that it is a sin to deny the power, mystery, and miracle that is God.

I need to ask forgiveness for the weight of rules and legalism that has shackled the church, making it oppressively boring and guilt-centered, for I believe that it is a sin to deny people their freedom in Christ.

I need to ask forgiveness for every right wing political zealot who has ever advocated violence against innocent people in the name of Christ, for I believe that it is a sin to judge in the place of God.

I need to ask forgiveness for every sidewalk and soap-box preacher who has so much as cracked upon a Bible with anger or pride in his heart, for I believe that it is a sin to misrepresent the character of a loving God.

I need to ask forgiveness for every cult leader and extremist group leader who has ever led people astray in the name of Christ, for I believe that it is a sin to desire the position of Jesus as the head of the church.

I need to ask forgiveness for every preacher who has thought with his zipper, or his wallet, or his ego, for I believe that it is a sin to lead the church while consumed with unconfessed sin.

I need to ask forgiveness for the millions of men in the church who have somehow stretched the Word of God to validate their own sexist views, for I believe that it is a sin to dishonor a woman.

I need to ask forgiveness for the thousands of church splits and denominational factions that have ripped the body of Christ in every direction except heavenward, for I believe that it is a sin to bring disunity to the body of Christ.

I need to ask forgiveness for the thousands of churches who are set up as extravagant social clubs, for I believe that it is a sin to ignore the poor and hurting among you.

I need to ask forgiveness for every misspent dime that was ever placed in an offering basket, for I believe that it is a sin to waste an old lady’s tithe.

I need to ask forgiveness for the prostituting of the American church and the American minister to the American dream, for I believe that it is a sin for the church or her leaders to love money more than God.

I need to ask forgiveness for every self-centered, self-proclaimed “miracle worker” who has sold people counterfeit hope and light and fluffy theology for $19.95 plus shipping and handling, for I believe that it is a sin to spit in the face of God.

I need to ask forgiveness for every pastor or teacher who has ever stepped in front of their congregation without preparing or praying or confessing their sin, for I believe that the sin of the leader somehow mysteriously thwarts the growth of the local church.

I need to ask forgiveness for every sin of every priest, pastor, minister, reverend, teacher, elder, deacon, pope, nun, monk, missionary, Sunday school teacher, worship leader, apostle, prophet, and church member from the inception of the church until this very second, for I believe that sin is the problem with the church.

And lastly for me: For my sin - my pride, my anger, my laziness, my lack of faith, my lack of mercy, my over-analysis of life, my immaturity, my depraved heart that is bent to evil. Forgive me, if you can, for I am a sinner. Blame me and others like me for a messed up church that has done more than its share of evil deeds. Blame me if you have to, but don’t blame the church whom I love. The church is perfect in theory, perfect in origin and, sometimes, even perfect in practice. Our sin corrupts her, but she never folds. Our pride limits her growth, but she never dies. For, she is the Bride of Christ - perfect before him. She is the Body of Christ-his hands, his feet, and his tears. And she is the voice of hope in a hopeless world.

Good soil, Justice and The Princess Bride

Every Monday a group of us gets together to dig into the things that Jesus has given us authority to do as His followers. Things like healing and deliverance. It's cool because it's a safe place where we can dig into Scripture and really take an honest look at it; searching out things that we are bothered by, blessed by and unsure about. We don't have to worry about offending anyone or feeling like our questions are dumb. Often we discover that we're not alone in our questions.

A couple of weeks ago we dug into something that seemed on the surface to throw a monkey wrench into a truth we hold dear - that God's will is ALWAYS to heal. And that he does not make us sick or use illness to teach us lessons. This is the foundation that we minister from. Jesus was and is the perfect revelation of Who God is and what He desires for us. And he brought healing and deliverance. For God to use sickness to teach a lesson would be child abuse.

Yet, there are places in scripture where it states plainly that God brought sickness onto various people(s) as a measure of judgment. Rather than try to excuse this or interpret it to say what we wanted, we dug into it. The answer that seemed obvious as we searched was that there IS a difference between the Old Testament (an earlier covenant that God made with His people) and the New Testament (a better, complete, fulfilled covenant). To get there, we had to go back to the begining like Vicini told Fezzik and Inigo in The Princess Bride.

This is kind of a long journey. It's a good one. We learned a lot. I hope you'll stick with us!

God is the same always. Though his HOW might change, his WHO does not. To quote my friend Don, there is a dividing line in how God deals with people now and how he dealt with people then....And it is shaped like this:


It's an overused cliche...That the cross saved us. Churchy McChurcherites (to quote my other friend Ryan) use it all the time. But it's worth really getting what that means.

God is first and foremost love...Complete, unadulterated love. He is also patient, kind, slow to anger and everything else that is listed 1 Corinthians 13:1-13. If you don't truly believe this, if you have any doubt that God loves YOU with an everlasting love then trying to understand some of the uglier things in Scripture is difficult. That is because God is also just. Love and Justice go hand in hand. The dictionary says that justice is: The quality of being just; righteousness, equitableness, or moral rightness.

The natural realm always reflects the spiritual realm. So the analogy of courts of law is an easy one to use. There are consequences for breaking laws that have been set forth to protect people. Take a story like Sodom and Gomorrah. People who continually went against the ways of God were subject to the judgment of God (just as a repeat criminal is subject to a judge in an earthly court of law). Knowing that love is slow to anger and long-suffering, we can know that God didn't bring wrath flippantly, in a knee-jerk fashion and especially NOT with pleasure. These folks were not dealt with without pre-warning.

Ok, so bad people get punished. Great! Problem is, many people walked around believing that since their wrong-doings weren't THAT bad, then God would be OK with them...After all, "I might have lied, but at least I didn't KILL!". In order to show people that any level of wrongdoing was still wrongdoing, God instituted the law...Read the books of Leviticus and Deuteronomy for a taste of exactly what one must do to not be under the wrath of God. No one can do it.

God knew this. He knew it at the beginning when he created us with free will. He also knew that as our perfect Father he would have to rescue us.

So He did. He came to Earth as a human to be the ultimate debt payer for all of human kind. Anyone can take that pass and walk out of an inevitable prison for free. At that crossroad was where the "rules" changed. Again, God's character did not change, He is still love and He is still just. But the payment for the injustice that we do has been taken care of. God no longer has need to punish for sins. He took it onto himself and along with that, He took upon himself, sickness. By his wounds, we ARE healed (Isaiah 53:5). It is already done.

Why people, even followers of Christ, still get sick is a whole 'nother can of worms involving choice, spiritual battles and faith. But if we don't internalize and live in the reality of what has already been done for us, we will not have the foundation from which to grow into living as God intended.

So, when Scripture says that God brought sickness upon a nation as punishment, he did. There is no sugar coating that. But that was never God's ideal...It is not God's best. But once you cross that bridge into the wake of Jesus - who shows us what God DESIRES for us - we find that there is healing...For body, soul and spirit. That is where I want to plant myself. That is where I want to grow...In the soil of God's provision. Even though I don't fully understand it. Even though it means battling an enemy I cannot see. When I place myself into the truth of God's love for me and accept that I can do what Jesus did and more, I find life like I never imagined.

Mousecapades

Our church meets at a movie theatre on Sundays. It's a pretty decent little place. At least it's a roof over our heads. But we do have interesting things that happen sometimes because of our environment.

Today we had a little visitor...He looked something like this:


Trying to catch a mouse is quite a fiasco...This one kept teasing us. He would run out when no one was behind the candy counter (where we serve coffee from), then disappear behind the popcorn maker...And I do mean, he disappeared...


He ran under here, but was nowhere to be seen. 5 minutes later he appeared behind us, and started to crawl up a power cord. He was quite an acrobatic little guy!

Finally, Jonah and I had him cornered.

...And Jonah had a plan...

Score!

Here he is!



Since we're a kinder, gentler church, we released our little friend.

Did I tell you he was quite an acrobat?

We do wish our friend well. We asked him not to come back to the theatre because not everyone is as nice as we are. Next time he might not have a second chance at life. We think he understood. He found some nice berries on the tree he climbed so we left him to find his way.

And that is a day in the life of Vineyard Westside!

I'm sold...

The debate isn't even over yet...But I am even more convinced!

SARAH PALIN FOR PRESIDENT!

Annnd - we're back!

After flirting with Word Press I decided that the two sites are similar enough that it's not worth the rigmarole of switching...I do like the layout and dashboard navigation at WP but the templates weren't that great and I don't know enough HTML to design my own. As I like to say, if it's not broke, don't fix it! Aside from the annoying photo embedding issue on here* I am quite happy!

So, I'm home again here at Blogger!

I missed you!

In celebration of returning, here are 2 pictures of a cool sunset that I saw on Delhi Pike last Friday night!






*The photo embedding issue:

When you input a picture, instead of being placed in the body of the entry where it should go, it gets placed at the top and you have to click and drag it to the right spot...argh! If anyone knows if this is fixable lemme know!

Trying something new...

I am trying out a new Blog...Just for kicks and giggles...I love Blogger and will keep my other blogs here...But for my main one, I think Word Press might be easier, especially in working with photos...Trial period of a week or so!

www.lightbygrace.com

will take you to my new site as soon as the update takes effect.

This blog remains at

www.gracewalking.blogspot.com