Just when I decide to mind my own business and stop paying attention to what this crazy world is doing, I happen across a new bill that has been passed which directly affects my unborn child.
As of April 24, 2008, President Bush signed a new bill into law for the purpose of establishing a national DNA database. This bill (S.1858 "The Newborn Screening Saves Lives Act of 2007") authorizes the federal government to screen the DNA of all newborn babies in the U.S. within six months and warehouse it. This stored DNA can then be used for genetic experiments and tests without parental consent. Are you friggin' kidding me?
This is just one more thing I will have to decline with a signature because it goes against my "religious beliefs". I'm glad good 'ole religion is still a viable plea; but for how long? ...and if they're doing it without parental knowledge, who is to say that the little pku test they draw blood for isn't being used for DNA screening as well? Giving birth at home is sounding reeeeaaaaal good right about now.
Monday, July 14
Friday, July 11
Death - the last enemy to be defeated
Many people have been asking about fundraising since reading one of my previous posts. I have been researching and will definitely get back to that; but for right now, death is my target.
Yesterday was Kevin Cromer's funeral. My family was in attendance and my husband was asked to speak. The situation of his untimely death, combined with my own poor job of guarding the gates to my soul, has made me very death conscious. I lay in bed fully aware of my heartbeat and how fragile everything in my body is.
During the altar call, the preacher said that death comes a-knockin' and can come at anytime. He said we weren't even guaranteed to get home safe after leaving there. Life could all stop without my will or consent. Is that the truth? Not according to scripture.
Death is an enemy of Yah. The scriptures do not say the wages of life is death; it says the wages of sin is death. Even when Adam sinned, it took 930 years for that sin to work its way to death. Yet today death is manifesting so fast we just assume it is out of our control. However, I seem to remember Yeshua saying that He Himself had to give up his life in order to die. I absolutely remember him raising the dead a few times with just a touch or a word. I even remember Paul making a conscious decision to stay on earth because it would be more beneficial to those around him.
I read something in a book this week about innocence. It gave one of the definitions as, "having no consciousness of mortality or morality." I thought that was wrong at first, until I thought of my son. He is 1.5, he has no awareness of death and no awareness of morals. He just is. He lives in the moment, he trusts, he plays, he laughs, he gets frustrated when things don't seem right to him. He is innocent. Adam and Eve were innocent in this same regard.
Innocence is what the enemy fights so hard to steal from us. Innocence is what brings power to heal the sick and raise the dead. The scriptures teach that if we are not childlike, we will not enter the Kingdom of Heaven. We have become so desensitized to death and sickness that we are not moved with compassion to eradicate it - we accept it as a way of life in ourselves and others.
It has to stop. At the end of my Kevin Cromer post I asked what it is that we are not getting. I got my answer - we have lost our innocence. Life is more powerful than death, but we have a lot more death in us than we even realize. The life we receive from hearing and reading scriptures has to contend with the death we receive from television, movies, advertisements and conversations. So many things we allow to pass through our gates (eyes, ears, etc) on a daily basis are in direct opposition to the scriptures.
In that same book about innocence, the author speaks of his 3 year old son receiving a McDonald's toy in his happy meal of the Hunchback of Notre Dame. He started to cry. When his father asked why, he said, "This man needs healing." That is the compassion, sensitivity and innocence that I yearn for. It is more important to me than anything I can ever entertain myself with.
It's not too big of a goal to be pure and innocent enough in my thinking in order to take the scriptures at face value and raise the dead. It's not too much to ask to be able to spend enough time with my Abba that His power manifests in me and sets people free. My soul is crying out for consecration.
Yesterday was Kevin Cromer's funeral. My family was in attendance and my husband was asked to speak. The situation of his untimely death, combined with my own poor job of guarding the gates to my soul, has made me very death conscious. I lay in bed fully aware of my heartbeat and how fragile everything in my body is.
During the altar call, the preacher said that death comes a-knockin' and can come at anytime. He said we weren't even guaranteed to get home safe after leaving there. Life could all stop without my will or consent. Is that the truth? Not according to scripture.
Death is an enemy of Yah. The scriptures do not say the wages of life is death; it says the wages of sin is death. Even when Adam sinned, it took 930 years for that sin to work its way to death. Yet today death is manifesting so fast we just assume it is out of our control. However, I seem to remember Yeshua saying that He Himself had to give up his life in order to die. I absolutely remember him raising the dead a few times with just a touch or a word. I even remember Paul making a conscious decision to stay on earth because it would be more beneficial to those around him.
I read something in a book this week about innocence. It gave one of the definitions as, "having no consciousness of mortality or morality." I thought that was wrong at first, until I thought of my son. He is 1.5, he has no awareness of death and no awareness of morals. He just is. He lives in the moment, he trusts, he plays, he laughs, he gets frustrated when things don't seem right to him. He is innocent. Adam and Eve were innocent in this same regard.
Innocence is what the enemy fights so hard to steal from us. Innocence is what brings power to heal the sick and raise the dead. The scriptures teach that if we are not childlike, we will not enter the Kingdom of Heaven. We have become so desensitized to death and sickness that we are not moved with compassion to eradicate it - we accept it as a way of life in ourselves and others.
It has to stop. At the end of my Kevin Cromer post I asked what it is that we are not getting. I got my answer - we have lost our innocence. Life is more powerful than death, but we have a lot more death in us than we even realize. The life we receive from hearing and reading scriptures has to contend with the death we receive from television, movies, advertisements and conversations. So many things we allow to pass through our gates (eyes, ears, etc) on a daily basis are in direct opposition to the scriptures.
In that same book about innocence, the author speaks of his 3 year old son receiving a McDonald's toy in his happy meal of the Hunchback of Notre Dame. He started to cry. When his father asked why, he said, "This man needs healing." That is the compassion, sensitivity and innocence that I yearn for. It is more important to me than anything I can ever entertain myself with.
It's not too big of a goal to be pure and innocent enough in my thinking in order to take the scriptures at face value and raise the dead. It's not too much to ask to be able to spend enough time with my Abba that His power manifests in me and sets people free. My soul is crying out for consecration.
Thursday, July 10
Today
I have so many important things to write about - truly - but I just want to take this moment to document that today, July 10th 2008...the day Joshua has officially turned a year and a half...he saw fit to take dry erase markers and scribble all over the hardwood floors in not one but two places. Foolishness is indeed in the heart of a child.
Friday, July 4
Kevin Cromer
I was going through some old blog entries, reliving past revelations and laughing at my own journey - when the news I heard yesterday evening hit me in the gut again. Kevin Cromer has passed. That's how my husband put it when he got the phone call from Stephen (at church). Kevin Cromer has passed.
Kevin Cromer (or Triple A, as I would call him - the anointed, ambulating apostle) was born with spina bifida and was wheelchair bound his entire life. He was hilarious, loving, and very intelligent. He was my friend.
I cried when I heard the news. I'm tearing up writing this. Oh I know where he is now, and I know he has his glorified body and that he is happier right now than he has ever been in this life. I understand and fully believe that. That knowledge is what keeps us believers from the grief that overtakes many when they lose a friend or relative.
What deeply saddens me is what his "death" represents. It embodies all of the unfulfilled promises, the unreceived end to our expectations, the hope that seemingly bore no fruit. It signifies the prayers without answer, the pure and consistent belief for healing in this lifetime that seemed to fall to the ground.
Pierre says it is always something on our end that went wrong, never on Yah's end. But over and over again? What about the young stranger I prayed for in my early days of salvation with every ounce of faith I had; when I looked into his mother's face and said everything was going to be ok as he laid there comatose in the hospital - only to get a phone call a few days later that he had died? What about all of those that have "passed" recently, leaving behind those same unfulfilled promises?
What is it that we're not getting?
Kevin Cromer (or Triple A, as I would call him - the anointed, ambulating apostle) was born with spina bifida and was wheelchair bound his entire life. He was hilarious, loving, and very intelligent. He was my friend.
I cried when I heard the news. I'm tearing up writing this. Oh I know where he is now, and I know he has his glorified body and that he is happier right now than he has ever been in this life. I understand and fully believe that. That knowledge is what keeps us believers from the grief that overtakes many when they lose a friend or relative.
What deeply saddens me is what his "death" represents. It embodies all of the unfulfilled promises, the unreceived end to our expectations, the hope that seemingly bore no fruit. It signifies the prayers without answer, the pure and consistent belief for healing in this lifetime that seemed to fall to the ground.
Pierre says it is always something on our end that went wrong, never on Yah's end. But over and over again? What about the young stranger I prayed for in my early days of salvation with every ounce of faith I had; when I looked into his mother's face and said everything was going to be ok as he laid there comatose in the hospital - only to get a phone call a few days later that he had died? What about all of those that have "passed" recently, leaving behind those same unfulfilled promises?
What is it that we're not getting?
Thursday, July 3
Time to raise some funds
I woke up this morning having dreamt something that stirred me to the very core. Our church is currently awaiting half a million dollars that was promised from some mystery man and hasn't shown up. We want to use that money to lease church space for a year or so downtown Manhattan. When we thought we had the moneys in hand, our pastor's wife gave a strong reproof to the congregation that basically went something like this, "Don't rejoice, you lazy people! Someone else is getting the credit for what you should have done yourselves!" Of course, she was a little nicer about it, but that was the gist. Shortly after that, the moneys evaporated into thin air.
In my dream, I was yelling at everyone. I was asking them why we, as able-bodied adults, were sitting around waiting for $500,000 to fall out of the sky. What ever happened to fund raising? What's wrong with bake sales, yard sales, mowing lawns, singing on the subway...whatever?! If everyone does a little, even if we can raise $100,000 - it's more than we have now. Since when did we become of those sort that sit around and wait for blessing to land on our laps?
I woke up realizing that we are really lazy. Why? Because we've sown seed? So now we feel entitled? Imagine farmers sowing seeds and then going and sitting on their couch, praying for watermelons to land on their laps; praying for someone to show up at their door with potatoes. That's ridiculous. Having sown seed, you have to then put your hand to the plow. You gotta go dig up your harvest. The work doesn't end. Does the miraculous happen where checks show up out of nowhere and Yah speaks to people to give you money? Of course. The Word does say that men will give unto your bossom. Yet that's one friggin' scripture. The rest of the scriptures speak of hard work and persecution. We bank so much on that one miraculous line in the bible that we are crippled from the satisfaction of accomplishing Yah's will on earth for ourselves.
It not only goes for Faith Exchange, my church. It goes for us as individuals. It is so easy to make money in this country, if you really think about it. People will pay for almost anything. Yet we get so grandiose in our thinking; we think we have to build multi-million dollar companies overnight in order to affect any sort of real change...meanwhile we are living in lack. We, healthy/able-bodied/intelligent/good looking/strong/talented/entrepreneurial GIANTS are in lack because we think so much on the huge things we will do one day that we forget the small things we can do today. What about collecting the loose change laying all around the house? What ever happened to the concept of bit by bit, little by little? Isn't it possible that as we are diligent to do the little things, Yah will supernaturally bless it and triple our efforts? Gosh.
Where do we get this stinkin' mentality from? Certainly not from our pastors, who have given more of their personal substance than I think I have ever earned in my lifetime thus far. They travel the country, and other countries, helping every one that needs it. My pastor is working on global water initiatives and speaking with Indian chiefs to bring aid to their communities. He's constantly bringing different vehicles into the church to help people make money. Yet as a congregation, we are so inward focused. Every space we have been able to have church in has been a supernatural blessing - yet what have we really done to help the communities we've been in? We sit in our four walls and wait for bigger and better things while our harvest rots...the harvest of moneys AND the harvest of souls.
I am convinced Yah is not pleased with us as a congregation (our pastors aside). I am also convinced that the smallest effort and change of heart would bring about such a huge bounty. I am now on a fund raising frenzy...personally, and for the church. This is not the last you will hear of this. Oh and if this is like anything else I have ever done, I'm dragging EVERYONE in with me. Onward to corporate blessing through individual best effort. Onward to debt eradication everywhere.
In my dream, I was yelling at everyone. I was asking them why we, as able-bodied adults, were sitting around waiting for $500,000 to fall out of the sky. What ever happened to fund raising? What's wrong with bake sales, yard sales, mowing lawns, singing on the subway...whatever?! If everyone does a little, even if we can raise $100,000 - it's more than we have now. Since when did we become of those sort that sit around and wait for blessing to land on our laps?
I woke up realizing that we are really lazy. Why? Because we've sown seed? So now we feel entitled? Imagine farmers sowing seeds and then going and sitting on their couch, praying for watermelons to land on their laps; praying for someone to show up at their door with potatoes. That's ridiculous. Having sown seed, you have to then put your hand to the plow. You gotta go dig up your harvest. The work doesn't end. Does the miraculous happen where checks show up out of nowhere and Yah speaks to people to give you money? Of course. The Word does say that men will give unto your bossom. Yet that's one friggin' scripture. The rest of the scriptures speak of hard work and persecution. We bank so much on that one miraculous line in the bible that we are crippled from the satisfaction of accomplishing Yah's will on earth for ourselves.
It not only goes for Faith Exchange, my church. It goes for us as individuals. It is so easy to make money in this country, if you really think about it. People will pay for almost anything. Yet we get so grandiose in our thinking; we think we have to build multi-million dollar companies overnight in order to affect any sort of real change...meanwhile we are living in lack. We, healthy/able-bodied/intelligent/good looking/strong/talented/entrepreneurial GIANTS are in lack because we think so much on the huge things we will do one day that we forget the small things we can do today. What about collecting the loose change laying all around the house? What ever happened to the concept of bit by bit, little by little? Isn't it possible that as we are diligent to do the little things, Yah will supernaturally bless it and triple our efforts? Gosh.
Where do we get this stinkin' mentality from? Certainly not from our pastors, who have given more of their personal substance than I think I have ever earned in my lifetime thus far. They travel the country, and other countries, helping every one that needs it. My pastor is working on global water initiatives and speaking with Indian chiefs to bring aid to their communities. He's constantly bringing different vehicles into the church to help people make money. Yet as a congregation, we are so inward focused. Every space we have been able to have church in has been a supernatural blessing - yet what have we really done to help the communities we've been in? We sit in our four walls and wait for bigger and better things while our harvest rots...the harvest of moneys AND the harvest of souls.
I am convinced Yah is not pleased with us as a congregation (our pastors aside). I am also convinced that the smallest effort and change of heart would bring about such a huge bounty. I am now on a fund raising frenzy...personally, and for the church. This is not the last you will hear of this. Oh and if this is like anything else I have ever done, I'm dragging EVERYONE in with me. Onward to corporate blessing through individual best effort. Onward to debt eradication everywhere.
Wednesday, July 2
Bye-Bye Fever
I want to start off by saying that my blog has not been neglected...I've just been enjoying putting entries in the photo blog. You can go there to see what I've been up to.
In other news, Joshua woke up Monday morning with a fever of 101.4. There were no other symptoms. Throughout the day he was eating and playing as normal, but after his afternoon nap the fever got even higher. Pierre wasn't home so I had no transportation to take him to the hospital...admittedly I would not have done that anyway. Pierre got home and we did everything in the natural (homeopathic) as well as in the spirit to take care of him. The fever persisted through the night and he started having convulsions (not seizures; tremors). He was in and out of sleep and it was a long night for all of us.
He woke up the next morning totally fine, only to get an even higher fever in the early evening. This time I gave in, gave him children's tylenol and made a doc appt for the next morning. That evening, Pierre and I took communion.
This morning he woke up fine and remained fine all day long. Praise Yah. We took him to the doc and she said she saw some sores on his throat, but didn't prescribe any antibiotics (praise Yah again because Pierre would've made him take them). He is totally healed. It was so nice to feel my baby's cool skin all day long. Aaahhhhhhhhh. Refreshing. There is nothing like a covenant with my Yah. We always know how the story ends.
In other news, Joshua woke up Monday morning with a fever of 101.4. There were no other symptoms. Throughout the day he was eating and playing as normal, but after his afternoon nap the fever got even higher. Pierre wasn't home so I had no transportation to take him to the hospital...admittedly I would not have done that anyway. Pierre got home and we did everything in the natural (homeopathic) as well as in the spirit to take care of him. The fever persisted through the night and he started having convulsions (not seizures; tremors). He was in and out of sleep and it was a long night for all of us.
He woke up the next morning totally fine, only to get an even higher fever in the early evening. This time I gave in, gave him children's tylenol and made a doc appt for the next morning. That evening, Pierre and I took communion.
This morning he woke up fine and remained fine all day long. Praise Yah. We took him to the doc and she said she saw some sores on his throat, but didn't prescribe any antibiotics (praise Yah again because Pierre would've made him take them). He is totally healed. It was so nice to feel my baby's cool skin all day long. Aaahhhhhhhhh. Refreshing. There is nothing like a covenant with my Yah. We always know how the story ends.
Friday, June 20
It's official; they're gone
My neighbors across the street sold their house and finished moving the rest of their things today. Yesterday I was outside playing with Joshua and the mom and 2 year old daughter were also outside. Her daughter yelled, "Baby!" across the cul-de-sac; to which Joshua responded with a wave. I've seen them outside while we were out there before, but never went over to say hello. Yesterday I mustered up the gumption (after the kids introduced themselves without help from us moms).
The Holy Spirit had been prompting me to befriend her ever since we moved into this house. I always found an excuse to stay in my hermit crab shell. I regret it. I went over and spoke with her yesterday and she's so cool. She was funny, smart, my age, and we have so much in common. She's also a stay at home mom, so while I was home all day long - so was she. I'm pretty sure they sold their house to an older couple with no kids.
Why didn't I ever take the initiative to go over there and make friends? I had way too many excuses. Basically, I didn't think we'd have anything to talk about. I was always too busy to make a new friend. Now they're gone and I face a missed opportunity. I hate those. Lesson learned.
The Holy Spirit had been prompting me to befriend her ever since we moved into this house. I always found an excuse to stay in my hermit crab shell. I regret it. I went over and spoke with her yesterday and she's so cool. She was funny, smart, my age, and we have so much in common. She's also a stay at home mom, so while I was home all day long - so was she. I'm pretty sure they sold their house to an older couple with no kids.
Why didn't I ever take the initiative to go over there and make friends? I had way too many excuses. Basically, I didn't think we'd have anything to talk about. I was always too busy to make a new friend. Now they're gone and I face a missed opportunity. I hate those. Lesson learned.
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