The Book of Beginnings – Part 1 – The Betrayal

In a kingdom long ago, there lived a great king. Kind and powerful, he ruled his kingdom with fairness and grace, showering his people with gifts and prosperity. But among his court walked the Betrayer. Cloaked with a fake smile and a stone heart, he desired control of the glorious kingdom and plotted out the king’s downfall. How would he do it?
To make his great wound, The Betrayer knew he could not reach the commoners. They had no power.
The servants were no better, nor the other advisers – for the King was too wise to heed false words.
No, he would have to go to those closest to the king’s heart. His children. Foundlings he’d brought up as his own.
Two children the King plucked from the poor alleys of the village as they were left for dead.
A son and daughter to join the King’s own Elder Son.
Yes. The vulnerable children, weak from inexperience and thick with craving, would be the tools the Betrayer would wield to usurp the King’s authority.

The King had told his children to remain within the safe haven of the castle walls until they were older. Sheltered by his care and guidance, he would teach them how to understand the world beyond the walls and use weapons of protection, but a secret mirror hid within the castle walls. A mirror the children discovered which led beyond their protected world. A mirror the King warned the children to avoid.
A mirror which the Betrayer would use to obtain his goal.

And – as time carved a pattern of doubts from the Betrayer’s mouth to the children’s hearts, curiosity clouded their father’s love. Pride burned a deeper path to their hearts than obedience.

And with one step – they walked through the mirror and it shattered into a million pieces.

Talkin to the Unseen

On one of those less brilliant days, when we decided to take our family of seven tent camping, I was walking with my two youngest to the bathhouse located a distance from our tent-site. It was a cloudy night, without shadows because everything was draped in a blanket of night. I held the flashlight in one hand, my 2 year old with the other hand, and my four year old held the hand of his little sister. Suddenly, he stumbled down a little embankment. I shone the light toward him but didn’t quite find him at first.

He cried out. “Mama, are you there?”
“I’m here, buddy.”
“But I can’t see you.”
“I’m still here, sweetheart. I’ll find you – just keep talking to me.”

A full five seconds later, he was back on the trail and we merrily made our way to the toilet, or as merrily as we could in the dark…and eventually torrential downpour .

Prayer is a weird thing if you really think about it. It doesn’t make sense unless you have the inside secret. From a perfectly “objective” and non-believing perspective, when we pray we are talking to the air…someone we CAN’T see. But that is one of the main points of prayer. Faith. It’s a beautiful example to God of our faith in Him.

Like the centurion in Matthew 8 who told Jesus, “Lord, I am unworthy to have you come under my roof, but only say the word, and my servant will be healed.” The centurion didn’t need to ‘see’ Jesus heal, he believed without seeing.

So three basic purposes of prayer are:
1. It shows our Faith in God. We are talking to the ‘unseen’ that’s why God wants us to pray. It is one step toward expressing our faith. “Being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we cannot see” as Hebrews 11:1 states.
2. It requires humility. When we pray, in effect we are saying “I don’t have all the answers. I need you.”
3. It reminds us who has the power. We pray in the name of Jesus for he is our Savior and Mediator to our Father God. Like in #2, we realize our inabilities and call on the one who is able…who is faithful.

I can’t always see God in the darkness of this life, but through His Word – I can hear his voice calling me to Him. When I can’t find Him, I can call out – and He will find me.

For those who don’t have eyes to see the wonder of a Heavenly Father, it may sound pretty preposterous, but for those of us who know the warm embrace and assurance of His love, it is hope and peace.

Romancing the Wicked Witch of the West – The Gospel

Oh come on, isn’t she lovely? With skin the color of sweet peas, a voice to scrape paint off the walls, and a nose with enough hook to catch a fish. She’s sweet too. Oh so sweet. Really. Who cares about a girl and her little dog too?

The Wicked Witch of the West is a fantastic heroine, right? Definite romance novel material.

Oh – and what about Senator Palpatine (aka The Emperor) off of Star Wars, especially after his electrifying facial. Mmmhmmm…can we say beautiful. Skin the texture of old leather, eyes the color of dried blood, and what teeth he does have hold a pale yellow candescence. Hunky!

I’ve got it! The Joker. What a great sense of humor, right? Sure, it gets a little out of hand, but that chalky white complexion and pasted grin can sure make my heart flip. And the eye makeup, or the redness around his mouth. Sooo complimentary.  And the laugh? Or the clothes? What’s not to love.

Would it sound very weird if I said – we are all villains?

Yep. Just as beautiful…probably worse, than the three I’ve just discussed. Even at our best, we’re pretty atrocious. We don’t want to admit it about ourselves. We want to believe (or make other people believe) we’re pretty good people – but at the core of who we are, we are irrecovably broken, flawed,…’our righteousness is as filthy rags”.

And yet – we are loved by the most beautiful being in all eternity.

God sees us as we are, in all our disgust, and romances us. Who would EVER read a book like that? Really? When there is nothing loveable AT ALL. What hero would seek out a woman like The Wicked Witch of the West? None in the books I read…unless, the books are trying to point to the greatest HERO of all.

John 3:16 should SHOCK us to our souls. “God so loved the world that he gave his only Son that whosoever believes on Him should not perish but have eternal life.”

God! Loved us THAT much. Loved US. US – those villains with breath to wilt apples, or enough evil to slay people’s thoughts with a glance. US.

God came down from Heaven and romanced the villains. And we weren’t even LOOKING for a love.

John 3, as Nicodemus visits Jesus by night, talks about how the ‘world’ wasn’t even looking for Jesus. Didn’t even want to see him. Verse 19 says, “men loved darkness instead of light because their deeds were evil.”

Evil. Villains. The World. Us.

The people for whom Christ died.

And now for Him We LIVE, because a love like THAT transforms us.

No longer beasts, but because of love – beauty. His love changes our sin-cloaked hearts and shapes them into magnificent vessels overflowing with the possiblities of our Lover.

He inspires, even enables, us to become Heroes in this story he’s writing with our lives.

Oh what a Prince, Savior, Lover of our Souls.

Pretty floors and a touch of wonder?

I work at a university and if any of you have ever taken the time to study typical university flooring, it isn’t exceptional. Occassionally someone will decorate an entryway into the library or a conference room with some ornate design, but for the most part, university flooring is fairly…plain, or so I thought.

Once, I had to pick up my three oldest kids from school and take them to work with me for a few minutes near the end of the day. As I held my daughter’s hand and helped her up the stairs, she looked down at the gray, green, and white speckled floor and said, “This floor is so pretty.”

How many of you went back to read the colors I just described? Yes, I wrote light gray, pale green, and white….pretty? I’m praying she’s showing optimistic character traits.

It reminded me of a time when my son Aaron was five and we were driving past Charlotte, NC. He looked out the window and said, “Oh look the clouds are beautiful.

The skyscrapers are beautiful. The trees are beautiful. Oh look, Mama, that broken down car is beautiful.” At this point I was beginning to wonder if he knew the definition of ‘beautiful’, but Lydia and Aaron have taught me a good lesson.

It’s too often in life that we either don’t stop and notice the beauty around us, or get so bogged down with ‘big stuff’ in life, that the simple pleasures disappear into a gray-green-white speckled floor. We so quickly forget what Isaiah writes, “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty. The whole earth is full of His glory.”

Does this include university flooring and skyscrapers? Well, God created the people who made those things and put those thoughts into the magnificent creation of the human mind. So….in a way, yes he did.

In recent memory, how many times have you stopped to enjoy the fascinating color hues of a fading sunset, or the subtle and gentle illumination of millions of stars as day blackens into night, or the swirling array of a rainbow of fall leaves as the wind lifts them up into a miniature whirlwind.

How many times have you reveled in the laughter of your child or the fascination of your infant’s newest discovery? Gee, right now sometimes, I get amazed when I see the bottom of the laundry bin.

The next time we feel weighed down from the heaviness of the everyday, may we find glimpses of God’s beauty in the ordinary. May the knowledge that the same Creator God, who formed the stars, and sunset, and the fall leaves, formed you…..for His glory…..for His pleasure and may we in turn take pleasure in Him.

Undeniably Yours by Becky Wade

Let me just say that Bo Porter is pretty perfect. Rough, rugged and strong on the outside – gentle, tender, romantic, and pure gentleman on the inside. Reading HIM was every bit of the icing on the cake of sweetness in Becky Wade’s newest book, Undeniably Yours.

If you like sweet and sassy, with some tingle-worthy kisses on the side, you’ll definitely like Becky’s contemporary romance. She even tosses a bit of suspense in it at the end. The gentle dreaming, the light-hearted banter, and the persistent pursuit drives this story of one woman’s journey of healing through the power of unconditional love.

When Meg becomes the heir to her father’s massive dynasty, her first goal is to get rid of the family racehorse farm – but one very handsome man stands in her way: the manager of the farm, Bo Porter. Through a slow and careful build, their relationship shifts from antagonistic – to friendship – and finally to a beautiful romance. But Meg’s wounds from the past bring with them not only a cautious heart, but a flicker of something even more dangerous. Is the unconditional love Bo offers enough to fight against her greatest fears…and her most lethal enemy?

Follow the Heart by Kaye Dacus

With her usual careful descriptions and finely tuned detail, Kaye Dacus introduces us to her newest novel, Follow the Heart. Set in mid-1800s England, when new inventions and industrialization sparked a shift in the status quo, Kate and Christopher Dearing travel from Philadelphia to England in order to accept the kindness of their uncle to marry wealthy. But love and money do not always dine at the same table and when Kate falls for the gardener and Christopher for the governess, what will they be willing to sacrifice to obtain their dreams?

There is such a sweetness between Kate and Andrew. I enjoyed their mutual discovery of their love through their interests in architecture.

If you enjoy the tension between the classes and a world of wonder set in 1851, you’ll probably enjoy Kaye Dacus’ newest novel, Follow the Heart.

Catch a Falling Star by Beth K. Vogt

Casey Herringshaw was right! Beth K Vogt’s newest novel, Catch a Falling Star, is even better than her first novel, Wish You Were Here. (and I really liked WYWH).

In Catch a Falling Star we meet Dr. Kendall Haynes and air force pilot, Griffin Walker. Both have given up on daydreams and fairytales because of life’s hard knocks. Kendall is beginning to think she’s reached her expiration date and Griffin is sure he’s long over due.

But suprises…and near-death experiences, bring these two together – an unlikely pair who believed their wishes would never come true.

I love Kendall’s personality. Her tenacity and directness is a perfect fit of Griff’s introverted strength. So fun to read the banter between these two.

Also (thank you BETH) for a lovely hallway kissing scene. I love teasers

Find out more about Beth’s books (and the wonderful author herself at www.bethvogt.com