Our Easter Celebration

I meant to post sooner but for some unknown reason (ok, I mean that with my tongue in my cheek and a sparkle in my eye) I am exhausted!!!!!!  I mean soaked to the bone, completely uncaring about whether I get dressed before noon exhausted, any more exhausted and I wouldn't care whether I had makeup or my bangs curled!!!! seriously!!!

We had such a wonderful Easter week! It, I will admit, is part of the reason I am so worn out...only part. It was an amazing time of fellowship, unity, love, and utter joy.  Thursday night we started our "celebration" with a gathering of about 70 of us, we worshiped to some GREAT songs, had a short teaching by Michael S. and then split up into groups and prayed. The Lord really touched my heart that night as I sat and quietly prayed about things.  Friday our son Ryan showed up, bright and early and we rallied the troops to BYOB, Bring Your Own Bible, and we sat around and didn't eat together as all of us were undergoing our own versions of a fast. It was a wonderful time of fellowship, talking about the Word, sharing our favorite scriptures or what we had learned. At one point I yelled out, OK IM HUNGRY, LETS PRAY!!!!!  and we did.  It was a great day.  We broke up the party a few hours before the worship night at church and all rested a bit, then met again for an amazing night of worship before the Lord.

Let me set the stage:  The room is darkened, very dimly lit, with one bright lit landing on a rough hewn, handmade cross that is laced together with ropes. It sits in the corner of the sanctuary, off the side of the stage area, and waits.  What a beautiful, horrible, thing it is.  Our buddy, Mike stands up and talks to us about the cross and what the "plan" is for it.  At the base sits a box of old square nails and a couple of hammers.  As we begin to worship, people start coming forward, putting nails in the cross.  They were nailing their pain, their addictions, their sins, and in my case, the lies they believe about themselves, up on that cross.  Imagine singing the song "Nails in Your Hands" to the sound of nails being pounded into the cross. A very profound experience, that is for sure.  so many people weeping, laying down their stuff, kneeling at the cross, standing before it, one woman knelt there with her hand by where Jesus' feet would be and just rocked back and forth as she prayed and then put in her nail. I wish you could have been there, it was amazing and beautiful all at the same time.

Saturday morning about 25 of us showed up at the Literacy Center to help serve a brunch to the less fortunate in the community. We ended up serving about 120 people a meal. It was a lot of fun as John and I served a table together and laughed, joked and made friends with our table of people.  One table over this very elderly lady sat, I recognized her from my childhood but wasn't sure she would recognize me, she's 94. She reached out and grabbed John, who knelt down at her chair and asked if he was one of the twins...yes, my husband and his brother were quite the talk of the town as twins were pretty rare, they visited for a second and then she asked to talk to me. I went over and she knew exactly who I was, asking me to tell my mom hello for her.  Years ago, Connie, the lady we were talking to, was an Avon Lady, (sidenote:I thought she was OLD, turns out, she was the age I am now!!!!)  she used to come to see my mom and have coffee and sell Avon and as she did I would sit at her feet and look through her Avon kit, I was about 10, yes folks, 40 years ago.  My sister, step brother and I would also go to her house every Sunday night to watch The Wonderful World Of Disney on television, since we didn't have that channel or have a color tv back then. We spent many an evening at their house watching tv and enjoying Connie's company.

Later on Saturday John, myself, Ryan and my sister Connie all met at the church to start setting up for the "breaking the fast" meal we were going to take.  I had a few other helpers like mama bear, Jamie, Kales, Sandy Lund, Lexy and Penny and Kenny show up to help out and get things ready.  We ended up with about 100 people to break their fasts!!!!  Butch Grady led us in taking communion first, and my oh my, communion never ever tasted so sweet.  Then we just enjoyed the evening of fun, celebration and fellowship. It was a smashing success and I had so so SO much help pulling it off. We ended up with about 12 different kinds of soup and salad and homemade bread. It was all very nutritious and wholesome and healthy! What a blessing. I loved every minute of it.

Sunday was a trip! A joy and a blast. Just worshiping the Lord with friends and family.  WOW!!!!! and double WOW!!!!!

I learned a few things.  One, as I stood there Friday night, thinking about my life and what I might want to nail on that cross, I could think of about three things. Three things that I seem to keep recycling in my life over and over, going around and around the mountain....I stood there, fingering the paper that those three things were written on and I knew there was more.  I didn't know what though.  I also stood there, fingering that paper and looking at those three words and, sadly enough, wondering and asking myself (or maybe the Lord was asking me?) "do I really want to put these up there? because if I do, I can't take them down"  yeah, I was wrestling with wanting to put the lies on that cross.  I stood there for a very long time when one more word hit me.

Abandoned.....

ok, now I am weeping as time after time began to float through my head of when I believed the lie of being abandoned.  We left my dad, he didn't leave us, but I felt abandoned and years later, when he passed on to be with Jesus, I felt abandoned.  My sisters, all my sisters, have loved and protected me my whole life (not always a good thing girlies) so when they got married...abandoned.  My mom and step dad moved to the valley when I was 17, I could have gone too but I chose to stay, still, I felt abandoned.  My husbands addictions and resulting sin in the middle of those addictions...abandoned...My children moving away to start their own lives or at least find their own identities...abandoned.  My friends moving away to start new jobs and follow God, abandoned.   the list goes on and on.   I stood there, now I REALLY was wrestling with whether I could actually and authentically nail that list to the cross.  As I stood there the Lord spoke gently into my heart. "Lucy, though the heavens pass away, though it all leave you, I will never leave you, I will never forsake you, I will be here through it all" WEEPING NOW!!!!!   I knew, as I took that piece of paper, holding it, treasuring those lies for one last second (I never claimed to have a corner on the market of mental health here folks) that once I left those things there, I would never be the same...NEVER.  I couldn't be. So, I took a nail, I made holes in the paper, I unfolded it one last time and read my list...and I refolded it, sliding the nail through that hole, and I pounded that nail, with those lies, those awful lies which have formed the grid through which I see myself, I hear the voices of others, and I identified myself, onto the cross of Christ, never to be picked up again.  There was no magical feeling of freedom, no big sparkly lights blinking in my eyes or some wild and crazy sense of, oh, I don't know, wahoo-ness, just a quiet sense of calm, of the knowing that when the battle for those lies hits my mind, I can win it, that when I am hearing something through the lie of  "unloved" or "unworthy" that I can know that on that day, on Friday April 6th 2012, I nailed them to the cross of Jesus and I left them there. The fact of the matter is, and maybe this a blog for another time, they were on the cross when Jesus died, 2000 plus years ago, when He said, "It is Finished!" it was a done deal!!!!  Hmmmmmm.......makes me look a little deeper, how about you!?

I pray your Easter was an amazing day of blessing, joy and a wonderful reminder of His glorious victory!!!