Tag: Children

Beyond Metaphors

~ Elizabeth W. Marshall ~ 8 Comments

Today is 5 Minute Friday where we just write freely for five minutes on a one word prompt. Today’s word is Beyond.. Let’s see…. beyond. Go.

Like launching a rocket into another galaxy or launching a stone from a sling shot.

Like gently tossing a stone on a pond to ripple and skip along its way.

Like sending a carrier pigeon on its way with messages for the world, holding hope on one’s breathe that he arrives, delivers, and returns.

And like a feathered mother on her nest with her owl babies, oh my favorite book, oh the memories of that book and my children in my lap, they and she and me and my trioed tribe.

And its beyond words and metaphors. Its past containment of bounds of language.

Its a language unto itself, a leaving language, a language of beyond the familiar, beyond this home.

Its launching your first born from your nest into the wild, into the blue, into the great beyond this place called home. Into that place called other.

And though you knew it was coming its beyond mother-human comprehension how it would ever feel, when he has a life, a church, a home, a refrigerator filled with 25 cent yogurt, and he is way beyond your four walls.

And he is standing upright.

And somehow the world still spins on its axis and the sun still rises and sets.

And you know there is nothing out there that can catch up, equal or surpass a mother’s love.

Stop.

(disclaimer- grace required a minute or so over as a mother’s heart gushed past 5 minutes. Thanks for the grace, friends.)

Linking up today for 5 Minute Friday’s with Lisa Jo Baker dot com.

Art Bus Project {Roll With It Baby}

~ Elizabeth W. Marshall ~ 7 Comments

What will it look like to look out from the inside, out past the self, into the eyes of the others, and open the heart to love with Jesus’ love through art?

And creativity. And joy. And with new paradigms for spreading the gospel?

Or newer for this writer. But isn’t He a God of new each time.  Doesn’t he create, and re-create, and make all things. new.

The tools are willing hearts, a big bus, a little bus, bubbles, a grill, and art supplies.  I imagine. I don’t  know all the details. There are ways in which the trip, which starts  (or continues) for me tomorrow, is still evolving. But I need only know He loves and lovingly provides. Resting in His provision with each turn of a plane wheel, or bus tire, its all we really need.

The adventure is in the stepping out, and into, and onto, and with, and beside. It’s following. With the spirit  leading the way. Trust bending the head in gentle agreement, yes we are on board. Yes, we hear this call.  Yes, we know He has a plan. And it is good.  It always is.  It always was.  

It’s  in imagining how The Creator will and does lovingly use creativity to reach and speak and draw in with love. Everytime there is love.

So here for the next six days I will share everything I can about this studio with a mission.

This art bus. The one that we are rolling with.

The one we are riding on. Weaving our way from Brooklyn to Charleston.

We know a little, we don’t know a lot.

But we know and love the One that does know. Oh, He knows the plans, His plans for a colorful, joyful, creative ministry. And when we step out and trust and watch as He reveals, we will be blessed observers and participants in His kindgom plans for a string of souls, the ones that He will love and who will love us along the way.

Isn’t the story still being written.  Mine is.

Doesn’t He ask us to be willing vessels. We know that no one will be more blessed than those going to serve.  Those intending to be used by God to bless, will in fact receive the blessings. With humility. Honored to have any role at all.  That he would trust and entrust with anything of even small importance to Him.  Loving and reaching His children.

We hope not to waste any chance along the way, on the ride. To stay alert and awake and sensitive to His whispers of how and when and where to go. When to speak and when to listen.

If you are following here for the next six days, thank you for your interest and your prayers. And if you have friends who want to ride along on these pages here, invite.(And follow along here too.)

And we will watch with expectant hearts to see colorful joy spread in a stroke of His love down the eastern seaboard.

Oh the privilege of being a part. Oh the joy in being in a community on a bus with a mission, along for the ride, as The Creator creates a story of art displayed in love for Him.

May all the Glory and Honor be His.

Counting Gifts with Ann, at A Holy Experience.

*Attending my niece’s graduation with my daughter…. oh the family time. Oh the bread , doesn’t it always accompany a celebration.  The joy surrounding this milestone was oozing out for days.  So grateful to be a part and to have a wellspring of memories of laughing and remembering.

*A long, very long visit with a childhood friend whom I hadn’t seen, really seen and talked with at length, for over 24 years. For laughter in the restaurant that drew stares and remarks. The remarks of one bystander caused me to realize anew how valuable and even priceless this friendship is.

*Sitting with wisdom and hearing new insight into a parent struggle. Regaining and reclaiming hope to shift somethings. Replenished reserves of hope leading to optimism and new beginnings for leading and encouraging differently.

*Time with my daughter on a recent trip, the getting reaquainted time after a very long school year which kept her so busy.

*Getting on a plane tomorrow with her to walk out in Faith this art bus project

*Going to Brooklyn with her to shop, have lunch, explore before we begin the true ministry portion of the trip.

*Plans for lots of time as a family in our beloved moutains at the old family home.  Memories to be made and savored and secured under the roof with three generations.  A huge gift.

Linking up with these fine ladies today, Michelle, Ann, and Laura

Eyes To See Like He Sees

~ Elizabeth W. Marshall ~ 10 Comments

{Today I am linking up over at Lisa Jo’s for some fun on Friday. Today we are writing for five minutes on the word prompt see. No editing, no over thinking, just writing for five minutes. Come see what the fun is all about at The Gypsy Mama’s blog. Ready, go, write}

I see him there.  Yes right there working through this preparation to go off to camp, no its not off to war.  We had dinner with a friend this week, he’d just gotten that call.  You know the dreaded one, his nephew had just been shot in Afghanistan.  No its not that.

The eyes of my head see the mess, the struggle, the confusion, the ADHD still there tangling up the processes of life.

Messy messes and turmoil.  No organization.  Upheaval.  The eyes of my heart know that it is this.

I have seen this for years now, how it challenges and entangles and strangles.

Today he leaves for camp and I will see through blurry eyes a child soon to be a man, in months now, walking out the door to be a counselor, to help others.

And I know that when he walks back in the door I will see transformation and change. I will see maturity and new talents and experiences that have jumped on his back for the trip back home.

But more than anything while he is gone, I want to learn to see him through the eyes of God.  To see past and through and deeply down into his inner places of hurt and pain, the way God sees.

Kingdom eyes please give me the eyes to see like You.

STOP

The Rich Soil of Childhood

~ Elizabeth W. Marshall ~ 2 Comments

…think of prayer as the breath in our lungs and the blood from our hearts. Our blood flows and our breathing continues ‘without ceasing’; we are not even conscious of it, but it never stops.– Oswald Chambers

I step out to the raised garden to check on the tomato plants.

I measure the growth, the progress.

The Patient One planted a beautiful herb and vegetable garden here in raised beds for us, for summer goodness and nutrient rich deliciousness for our home, our plates, our sustenance.

But I can’t see past the tears.

All I see are the big bulging  stalks and stems like veins. And the babies, the green ones.

They are my children. They are my pink babies.

I see the green fuzzy veins pulsing with blood and nutrients.

And wonder on the past nutrients in their soil.

Was it rich in its provision? Was everything they needed to grow and thrive in their soil?
For their growth.

Is all that runs through their fuzzy veins, from the soil where they are planted rich and good?

And I come into the house to pray, for my three and others.

And look for ways to fertilize them with love this day.

wynnegraceappears