"Help me to love you"

Lately I've been feeling stuck in the muck of apathy. And when I say lately I mean for the last two or three years (that sounds really long!). It all started after I got home from 6 weeks of touring with bugirl and 4 weeks of speaking at summer camps back in 2006. That experience and the whole year previous to it was probably the most exciting spiritual high of my life. In that time I learned and grew at an exponetial rate and coming out of that was one of the toughest spiritual challenges of my life.
Don't get me wrong- the last two or three years were filled with wonderful events, people, experiences and even moments with God. However I've felt, in a lot of ways, like I'm walking through a spiritual dessert.
I'm happy to say that I think I'm on the verge of exiting the dessert and entering back into the lush green of a thriving relationship with Jesus! But it's a slow process as the heat of the dessert has exhausted my spiritual energies and left me moving slowly and sluggishly towards God.
There have been several events and conversations that have helped me get through this season, but something I read the other day in a book called "Crazy Love" by Francis Chan has given me that final push. It said this:
"The fact is, I need God to help me love God. And if I need His help to love Him, a perfect being, I definetely need His help to love other, fault-filled humans. Something mysterious, even supernatural must happen in order for genuine love for God to grow in our hearts. The Holy Spirit has to move inour lives."

I need God to help me love God.

I need God to help me want God.

My prayer has become this, "I want You God, and when I don't, help me to want You."

It lifts such a weight off my shoulders to know that I don't have to muster up the desire to love God. That God is love and because of that, He can give me love for Him and for others. This is the only way that I'll be able to take these final steps out of the burning sand and into the cool spring waiting - if He gives me the desire to run towards the One who is waiting for me in the river.

The Weeks Are Flying By

I can't beleive today is Thursday already. It feels like these last three weeks have slipped away without me realizing it. This week has been exam week so I've been supervising exams as well as marking. In the last two weeks I've read approx. 200 essays and I have 6 more to go.

With my summer break just around the corner I've been thinking about what I'd like to do with all that extra time. Here are a few things I'm planning:

1. Go to the cabin for at least two weeks and as many weekends as possible.

2. Visit Alisha in Vancouver for a weekend.

3. Weed my yard and garden on a regular basis.

4. Paint baseboards, trims and new doors in the basement.

5. Have a few cooking lessons with my Grandma's.

6. Take Bailey for a walk, run or rollerblade everyday.

7. Speak at Camp Arnes for a week.

8. Get ready for next year - my first year as a full time teacher.

9. Go camping with friends.

10. And maybe if there's time, relax and read a few good books.

Learning about Life from a Dog?

So lately I've been learning some life-lessons from our 4 month old puppy, Bailey. Here are some of the lessons that she's helping me learn:

1. Material possession like, carpet, couches, table legs, coffee tables, sweaters, jeans, shirts, underwear, socks, cables and drywall are really not what life's about. They are the treasures of earth that rust, and mould and get destroyed by puppies.

2. Patience proves itself true when one can actually stay calm as they are being bitten, head-butted, peed on, chased, chewed and barked at.

3. Dogs smell funny.

4. Life happens so fast and little turns into medium and then big before you know it. Enjoy each stage cuz you can't get em back.

5. I'm not ready to have kids.

Gardening

I love gardening. Or maybe what I really love is making things beautiful and the best they can be. I have a pretty nice little yard, but by flower beds were ugly when we first bought the house. They were various clumps of flowers all crowded in one area and then empty beds scattered througout the yard. So last year I combined a few of the beds and created a scalloped edge. This year I've taken every single plant out, divided it and relocated it so that they are all evenly dispersed and ready to bloom and look beautiful. And I've done it all pretty much for free! All of my plants have been given to me by my mom or my friend Adrienne's mom and I was even given a pitch fork from my friendly neighbour Philip.
There's something about going outside on a late Sunday afternoon and weeding the garden that is both calming and satisfying. Even when little Bailey is "helping" me dig up weeds and sometimes plopping herself down right on a patch of about-to-bloom Iris's, I still love it! I've also put in a veggie garden for the second year in a row and am anxiously awaiting some green (other than weeds) to sprout out of the black earth. Any day now I hope. There's nothing like fresh garden tomatoes on a piece of toasted multigrain bread covered in mayo. I can't wait.