a one shoe mystery

you never know what is going to show up in the we will go clothes closet. we take in donations almost daily. people calling wanting to bring old clothes, new clothes, but we never know what we will find when we open one of the large black garbage bags. on tuesday this week we had a mystery bag. it was full of really nice, almost brand new, shoes. only the mystery was that there was only one of each and it was a left shoe. who in the world would donate a bag full of only one shoe?

my first thought, other than that one i just said, was....well maybe someone with only one leg donated them thinking that we might have a neighbor that only has one leg. and what do you know, we DO! his name is Terry and he lives on cohea st. he lost one of his legs years ago in a shoot out. a life full of things you can't even imagine, terry has lived. years in prison. years of drug use. years of drug selling. gangs. violence. you name it, terry has lived it.

the amazing God that we have, terry is learning to walk in freedom from ALL of that. wow, i can't even tell you how jesus is working in this mans heart. it is like revelation, hard to understand and comprehend.

back to the shoe mystery. as we thought of other possible explanations to the bag of only one shoe, in walks chris. chris is terry's cousin, who is also serving jesus now. we ask chris what size shoe terry wears because someone brought a whole bag of really nice shoes, only one and terry might could wear them. um. TERRY donated the bag of shoes! never crossed our simple little minds. what an amazing moment we had over these shoes.

jesus is working through terry in even the smallest of ways. so now we have these shoes. and the mystery was solved. and we are praying and believing a new neighbor with one leg, opposite of terry's, same size, will come here. and when they do, it won't be crazy to us.

here is terry

only takes one drop

and being in anguish, he prayed more earnestly, and his sweat was like drops of blood falling to the ground. luke 22:44

in him we have redemption through his blood. ephesians 1:7

without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness. hebrews 9:22

but with the precious blood of christ, a lamb without blemish or defect. 1 peter 1:19

and the blood of jesus purifies us from all sin. 1 john 1:7

to him who loves us and has freed us from our sins by his blood. revelation 1:9

they overcame him by the blood of the lamb and the word of their testimony. revelation 12:11

he is dressed in a robe dipped in blood and his name is the word of god. revelation 19:13

he gives us his blood freely and we have freedom in that. but what i realized recently was this......while he was the lamb slain and offered as our sacrifice to pour his blood down on us from the cross, it really only takes one small drop of his blood. one drop. yet he poured every single drop in him out on us. that fountain never stops flowing either. one drop = freedom. gives his blood freely = jesus.

integrity brings us into his presence

in my integrity you uphold me and set me in your presence forever - psalm 41:12

Integrity is a concept of consistency of actions, values, methods, measures, principles, expectations, and outcomes. In ethics, integrity is regarded as the honesty and truthfulness or accuracy of one's actions. Integrity can be regarded as the opposite of hypocrisy, in that it regards internal consistency as a virtue. - wikipedia, not me.

to know that i can be in the presence of God forever, meaning never being rejected by Him, ever, kinda intimidates me alittle. woah. but only in my integrity does he promise that. even more woah.

there is no place i'd rather be than in his love.

consistency. i have been very inconsistent over the last few years. up and down. good and bad. high and low. in all that inconsistency i never got to see things from His perspective. oh how i missed out on so much. when i was on the upside i tried to do it without him. when i was on the downside i didn't even know how to reach up to him for help. it's like a car alignment. when the right side it out of line, the left side is too. when you get it all lined up, it goes right where it is supposed to go. i was way out of alignment. thank goodness for those alignments.

jesus molding my integrity and shaping my consistency, i get to be in his presence forever! woah. He picks us up and puts in his presence, to see from his perspective. to give us his mind. the mind of christ.

you know me inside and out, you hold me together, you never fail to stand me tall in your presence so i can look you in the eye. - psalm 41:12 message

if you don't have the united pursuit album - live at the banks house, i suggest you go get it right this minute. here is a glimpse....

mario. being made into something beautiful

the first night i met mario was a thursday night bible study at we will go. he snuck in the door and sat on the back row, right by me. he was dirty, had on old dirt clothes and didn't smell very good. i was instantly curious about him. i asked a few of the other missionaries about him and was just told "he is a hard one." so i instantly became even more curious about him. that sunday at church he was there and i went up to him on the street and we had very small casual conversation. i started praying small for him but believing big. over the next few weeks when he would come by, we would have more small talk and then one day i got him. see, with those people that are hard to reach, you just have to find one thing that brings connection to them and when you get that, you get them. so my way of getting mario was - dominos. yes, all those domino games played at my grandparents growing up paid off. mario is the domino dominator. so we played dominos on the peace house porch. and i won, but really, mario let me win.

fast forward a few months and many more conversations, mario is in the hinds county detention center. for a while too. each person that lives here has a love for mario. even though years ago he tried to kill amy! he is part of our family and he is my friend. last week i had the honor to go visit him in jail. for the few days leading up to that i prayed a lot, trying to figure out what in the world do i say to someone that is in jail. how do i encourage them? the only thing the Lord said was "tell him about Paul." ummmm, ok, what do i tell him? "just tell him about Paul." ok, i don't know what to say but ok. when i walked into that tiny room and saw my friend i was soooooo happy! it was very hard to talk to him. you are separated by a very thick peice of plastic/glass with a small hole about the size of a soup can that has little holes in it (it is not like what you see on tv) and you can barely hear each other, then add in other people in there trying to talk to their friends too, it was very frustrating. so, we had our normal small talk and laughed and he asked about everyone here and even those on the street. then i shared with him about Paul. Paul spent most of his ministry in prison. mario - even though you are in jail you can still serve jesus and share him with others! that's all i knew to say. right there in front of me he spoke his conviction and his repentance and asked for forgivness. wow.

it doesn't matter why mario is in jail now. it doesn't matter that he was once in a gang and has done a lot of really bad things. it doesn't matter that his life has been one mistake after another. what matters is that jesus is meeting him right where he is - in jail. what matters is that jesus deems me worthy enough that i get to go see him in jail. what matters is that mario knows we love him and are not giving up on him. but what matters most is that he knows jesus loves him more and will never give up on him either.

when it was time for me to leave (we only got 30 minutes) mario said "i am really glad you came and i love you" then gave me a knuckles up against the glass. and that is a beautiful thing.

freedom

give me the beat boys and free my soul.

the isrealites were freed. slaves have been freed. animals were freed from the ark. countries have been freed. i have been freed.

freedom is a beautiful thing. when you are in bondage to something, anything, there is nothing sweeter than the feeling of freedom that comes when the chains are gone. money. time. relationship. addiction. satan can use any weakness we have to keep us chained down. but Jesus is so much stronger than that. He has the power to break those chains. and he does. if we let him.

jesus has been speaking freedom to me a lot lately. i felt it in my spirit and last week i felt it physically. i was standing in a van riding through the Masai Mara in the Rift Valley with nothing but incredible landscape painted during his creation with wild animals of every kind roaming around and the wind blowing right through me. i felt such freedom riding through that place i can't even describe it. but more than actually feeling that on the outside, i felt it on the inside.

jesus has freed me from my chains. he has freed my heart from hurt. he has given me freedom, so i can have the freedom to experience what i did in Kenya. he has freed me so i can live downtown jackson and love my neighbors. he has freed me so i can disciple middle school girls. he has freed me so i have the freedom and be available to go where he sends me next.

my chains are gone, i've been set free.

where the spirit of the lord is, there is freedom.

every face has a name

what a glorious morning outside! after leaving the gym i wanted some coffee, but not any that i make cuz i don't make good coffee. i went to the coffee shop at the king edward hotel, they make good coffee. when i left i was driving up captiol street and saw lots of friends. lots of friends leaving the church downtown that serves breakfast. it was like an outpouring of friends walking towards me. richard. carlos. mike. third eye. anthony. cole. lots of others.

when i left king edward i thought to myself, i love living downtown. i love everything about it.

but when i passed all my friends i thought to myself, i love living downtown because i know all these beautiful people!

the lord wrecked me about a year ago. he created each person on this planet - he says so in Genesis. even though some people choose a different life, we are all created in his image. all. in my former blindness i would have looked at "those people" and felt sorry for them, but now i look at them as who they are, who God made them to be. i know them by their name - and the cooler part is, they know ME by my name. that makes me happy.

each face i see has a name. each name has a story. each story has a God on the end of it that loves them, just like he loves me, and you. it blows my mind that i even get the honor to drive down captiol street and see my friends and wave to them and see them wave and smile back to me.

effort. sacrifice. payoff.

as i bent down to shave my right leg this morning in the shower i had an amazing thing happen. i felt and saw my calf muscle for the first time! i have been running and spinning, a lot, lately. i teach spin classes every week, was teaching 4times a week this summer, and i am training for my second 1/2 marathon in december. so, i am working extra hard, not missing a day, hurting when i run, sometimes crying, all that bad stuff that comes along with it. BUT. today was one of those glimpses of how all my effort and sacrifice is paying off. i physically saw the return on my investment. it hit me, it is worth it. i still have a long way to go, but it fires me up even more now, especially after my kartwheel in the shower.

made me think. it is no different than fulfulling the great commission. jesus calls us to this, we are his disciples, no different than the 12.

Matthew 28:18-20. Jesus came to them and said, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”

i can imagine that the disciples thought to themselves "do what? does he realize how hard this is going to be? how long this will take? is he crazy?" i say the same thing to Joey Poole when we are running sometimes too.

but the beauty is that Jesus GAVE us authority to do this. he didn't ask us if we wanted to, or if we would pray about it, or that we had an option. read this again....

Jesus came to them and said, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”

Jesus came. Jesus said. Jesus gave. Jesus commanded. Jesus was with.

i mean, as surely as i saw the results of all the hard work i have been putting into my running this morning, even more so do i see the results of all the effort and sacrifice i put into the command given to us. i see it. i know it. it is worth it. every single bit of it.