This is my heart

I haven't felt this alive in a long time.

I just painted a representative of what my heart looks like.

It was amazing. I can't even begin to describe how fulfilling and deeply worshipful it felt to do that.

I wouldn't really consider myself an artist, but I love to paint. And sometimes, I think God is the one painting through me.

This was one of those times. As I painted, I began to see unfolding before my eyes exactly what God wanted me to see.

This is my heart, one side oozing and dripping with the black sludge of sin, and the other side exploding with the effortless radiance of God's glory and love. The black side is shrunk and eaten away, weighted down by its own inadequacy to do anything good. The light side is swollen and radiant, bursting open in a spontaneous overflow of light. And in the center of my heart is the pure white of Christ, shining over my whole heart, overthrowing the darkness and being the source for the light. My heart is now tethered to a cord of light and life, filled with Jesus' blood that washes whiter than snow. He is eliminating my darkness, and enabling me to effortlessly shine His love instead of drip darkness into others' lives.

Whatever we let overtake our hearts will be what comes out. We all have holes in our hearts - does your heart ooze with the sinful nature of your selfish desires, or does it shine with the radiant nature of your Savior?

 

All I Have is Christ

I don't usually post videos on here, but when a friend shared this video on facebook, I was moved to tears.

Turn off the music, blow this up to fullscreen, and just watch. Think about what Christ has done for you. No matter if you were the worst sinner in the world or have never done any "big" sins - without Christ we are all lost in darkness, bound for hell. And yet He sacrificed His life so that you and I might live... not for ourselves, but for Him. 

Watch this with an open heart. Let the words change you. Join me in asking yourself, "Can I truly say that all I have is Christ?"




p.s. if you like this video, check out "prodigal," also by the same guy on youtube.

Untitled

We've received little snow this winter, making the world for the most part bleak and dreary. But on one of those rare occasions where it snowed, I was inspired to write this story. I cannot for the life of me come up with a title that does not give anything away - so perhaps if you are so inspired after reading it you can help me come up with one.

* * *

Solemn and hushed under a full moon, the forest lay. Its dark trunks stood in perfect rows, stretching further than the eye could see. Yet in the very center, one tree was missing.

A girl stood in the gap, straight as the trees around her. Her feet were firmly planted in the sparse sprinkling of snow on the ground. The full moon pulled her shadow out behind her, painting it dark and straight as the forbidding trees. Her flaming hair flowed loose down her shoulders, barely lighter than her bright red cloak beneath. In all the cold, bleak woods she was the only thing alive.

The air crystallized around the girl with every breath she took, and her hands were blue beneath her cloak. Her cheeks stung with numbness and her pale eyes threatened to melt from the frigid wind, but she dared not move. He had promised.

The night progressed slowly and fleeting clouds shadowed the stars overhead. Snow drifted down, settling like fairy dust on her hair and cloak. The flakes clumped together thicker and heavier, but still she would not move. She could not. He had promised to come.

The full moon touched the earth at the horizon, sending its last rays of pale silver over the world. Already the eastern sky was lightening and the birds were beginning to awaken. Yet still she remained, upright and immovable. He had promised to come rescue her.

The sun arose in its splendor, warming the earth from its chill. Fresh and pure after its nighttime sleep, the earth awoke. People began to stir to life for another day.

Yet deep in the forest, a red maple stood frozen over in the midst of black columns. Its bright leaves still clung to its branches even through the weight of deathly snow. He had promised… 
©Melody 2012

A Beginning

Oh how long it has been.

This little blog has sat silent now for almost two months, cold and dormant with the winter weather.

{via pinterest}

My life has gone on as usual, practicing, studying, eating, sleeping... endless routine with little creativity mixed in. I've had my Christmas break which was a welcome reprieve, but I will be going back to that routine in little less than a week.

In all honesty, I'm scared. Scared that I will succumb once again to skimming through life just so I can get by. Some days skimming was all I could do just to get through the homework I had to do. But that became my rhythm, my routine. I began skimming everything, always looking for the next thing to do instead of the next opportunity to be.

I do not want that to happen again.

So, in this new year, I have decided to go out and hunt inspiration, instead of skimming over it in my never-ending search to finish tasks. I've determined to work my creativity muscle so it will not atrophy. I have resolved to let my thoughts spill onto this blog at least once every week, and not to worry about how structured or on-topic my posts are. Perhaps they won't be the longest or have pictures in them or even make all that much sense. But that is okay. I'm on a search for creativity... and I do not want to quit.

Are you with me?

Sometimes...

(all images via pinterest)

Sometimes those who spread the most light struggle the most with darkness.

Sometimes the roughest people turn out to be the softest.

Sometimes those who look like they have it all together are the ones who need the most encouragement.

Sometimes the strongest are only completed by the weak.

Sometimes those who say "You are beautiful," don't believe that about themselves.

Sometimes the prickliest people are the ones who need the most love.

Sometimes those who say they'd rather go it alone simply want someone to hold their hand.

Sometimes the simplest things are the most beautiful.



Sometimes sometimes happens most of the time.

So Much More

I am being challenged and inspired so much in my classes, it's incredible. Though my classes are on many varied subjects (such as Spiritual Formation, Humanities, and Music Philosophy & Aesthetics) they all seem to be pointing to the same thing. I'm learning that there is so much more. So much more of God to experience, comprehend on some level, and praise Him for.

Such is the concept I'm studying in Humanities currently. We're talking about how God is the Creator and Originator of everything - and therefore we who are made in His image are also called to create. What really struck me is the idea that God is on a "higher level" than us - the fact that He is our Creator, and we are the created, living on a lower level of "reality" than Him. (I know this sounds kind of twisted - bear with me a moment and you'll see.)

For example, in my story "Rescue My Heart", I had a character who is an author. I, as the author of the story, knew things that she did not know. Yet she, as an author within the story, knows things that her characters don't know.

This is a beautiful metaphor for how we are in relation to God and to our own creations. Each one is on a different level - but even though we are on a lower level than God, He has designed us to know in a limited sense some of His level of thinking.

Can you see how that would just open up a whole new world? If God is on a higher level than we are, He is like the real thing, and we are like just a shadowy, blurry picture. There's so much more than this world... this life.. this existence. There's a type of beauty I've never experienced, a glory I cannot even fathom, a fulness I cannot even wish for because I can't even begin to understand how I can be filled.

Doesn't this bring you incredible joy as well as incredible longing?

Like I said earlier this evening,

"It's like walking into a sunset - you don't really know what's there, but you know that it's going to be beautiful."

The Grey Havens

This last Friday night, my brothers and I watched The Return of the King. I do think that one is my favorite of the three movies, though The Fellowship of the Ring is a close second (I don't like The Two Towers as much - too many battles). I always cry at the end, when they're parting at the Grey Havens. Just that look that Frodo gives the other hobbits... and the sadness in Sam's eyes...

Anyways, tears aside, seeing the scene of the Grey Havens got me thinking about heaven. Just like at the Grey Havens, there will be partings, even of friends. Thankfully, though, Sam also went to the Grey Havens towards the end of his life. So he and Frodo were together once more. But I'm sure for many of us, there are people that we know, even good friends, who are not Christians and will go to hell. That will be really horrible - knowing they're going to the worst place imaginable and can never escape! When you think of it that way, how can we keep from telling them about God's salvation? It's pretty much a life or death situation!

In the song, "Into the West", one of the lines is "White ships have come to carry you home." For Frodo, the elves, and Gandalf, they were going home. Middle Earth actually wasn't the elves' real home - and for Frodo, Middle Earth was a place where he could never truly be at peace. After all he had gone through, he was permanently scarred with the burden he had carried. So it is with us. This earth isn't our real home; we are citizens of heaven. Though we can experience God's peace here on earth, it will always be at war with our flesh. We are never truly whole until we come into the presence of the Almighty God and worship at His feet.

Thinking about heaven really puts things in perspective, doesn't it? It makes me want to witness to others and put aside my insecurity about how they will judge me. Because really, the way people view me here on earth isn't going to matter in heaven. What does it inspire you to do?

~Melody