Category Archives: friendship

A Year’s Worth of Peace…

Please note daily updates below for the rest of the week…

I can hardly believe that a year’s worth of my living has been chronicled (at least in part) upon the pages of this canvas that I call “peace for the journey.” It’s been a good season of salt and light via your words and encouragement of me. Thank you from the depths of my heart.

I will leave this post up all week and add a prompt for your comments each day. Please note: comments will accumulate throughout the week, thus enhancing your opportunity for a win. Simply answer the prompt, and your name will be entered into the giveway. I will use random.org to select the winners.

Again, it is my privilege and my joy to serve you in blogland. Feel free to contact me anytime via my e-mail link in the sidebar. If you can think of any ways that I can do it better, please let me know. I look forward to continuing the walk with you in the days to come. As always,

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Friday giveaway and update and lingering thoughts…

1. The winners for Sarah Young’s “Jesus Calling” are #38 Lori and #64 Edie. Congrats girls. Please email me your snail mail.

2. Our final giveaway for Watermark’s A Grateful People will be announced on Saturday morning. Still time to add a final comment to this post, which brings me to my final thought…

3. Write whatever you want! Maybe tell us what’s going on over at your blog. I’m exhausted. I’m now officially over myself and all my “blah, blah blahing” on the video and will get back to the pen in short order. Seriously, this has been an extremely busy week for me; my head is spinning in wild and wooly directions all at once, and I can barely catch my breath at times. Thanks for playing along, even if you aren’t winning some of my favorite things. I would trade them all (except for the Bible) to simply have the occasion to sit and chat with you for awhile … face to face! Have a peaceful weekend full of rest and Jesus, and if that doesn’t seem possible, seek Jesus (whatever that looks like for you) and the rest will come. Shalom.

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Thursday giveaway and update: the winners for the Holman Bible Dictionary are #46 Melinda and #18 Shane. Congratulations ladies. I know you will enjoy the treasure and the teaching from this book. Please snail mail me your addresses. Today’s prompt for Sarah Young’s Jesus Calling (announced on Friday morning…sorry for the earlier oops) is as follows:

What is the one thing you know to be most true about our God as it pertains to your most recent season of living?

I look forward to reading your thoughts. God bless you in your Thursday. Shalom.

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Wednesday giveaway and update: OK…a few things I’ve learned in the past 24 hours:

  • I’m a hand talker.
  • I’m a hair toucher (thanks for counting Joy).
  • My flip ultra does a great job picking up crunching leaf noises.
  • Our operating budget at “peace for the journey” is zero; thus, you get what you get friends.
  • Last but certainly not least, I’ve got some of the best bloggie friends in the world. You have graced me with your words of support and encouragement, and I am blown away by your friendship.

Now…onto the winners of the NIV Study Bible. Congrats to KelliGirl (#22) and Kristen (#24) selected by randominteger as the winners. Girls, please snail mail me your addresses, even if you think I have it. If you don’t need the Bible and would rather someone else receive it, please let me know.

To win a copy of the Holman Bible Dictionary (#2 on the list of elaine’s favorite things), please finish the following prompt with your thoughts in the comment section:

“The day that Jesus interrupted my life with the truth of who he is … ”

Winners will be posted on Thursday morning. Remember, comments accumulate throughout the week. Shalom.

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Tuesday giveaway: Please leave your comments below to win the NIV Study Bible. I will announce the winners on Wednesday morning. If you’ve never commented before, but would like to enter, simply click on the word “comment,” leave your thoughts, and sign in as an “anonymous” contributor. Shalom.

Exemplify

Exemplify

Today, I want to direct you over to visit my blogging friend, California Kristen. I was first introduced to her through Indiana Kristen, thus, my reasoning for including their states with their names!

California Kristen has started a new website Exemplify Online. Hear now from her pen…

“The idea for Exemplify Online came to life over the course of last summer. During that season, I found myself dealing with an unquenchable boredom. I was desperate for a Godly challenge of some kind and knew I was only going to find it at the feet of Christ.

I had written a few months earlier about the lack of resources available to Christian women in the form of relevant, written media. I couldn’t believe the response! So many women felt the same. Sure, there are some great devotional sites and this awesome blog community but something was missing. I, and so many others, wanted content that is biblically sound, fun and a little more in depth than what was being offered.

Something like a magazine.

So, here we are. For whatever reason the Lord started breathing in me a desire to see this thing through. He blessed me with such talented writers who were willing to come aboard Exemplify’s team, joining the mission.

Our mission is simple really. It is our exclusive intention to encourage women to live lives that glorify and exemplify Christ’s name. We want to see hearts set on fire for Him.”

(-Kristen from Exemplify Online )

Kristen is not only a great writer but also hosts a creative mind that has allowed her vision to come to life in the form of her online magazine. I encourage you to hop over for a peek and to sign up for her monthly e-zine which will come to you in a downloadable format via your e-mail.

Thanks, Kristen, for your heart and your willingness to be a “scribe to our King” (sound familiar?). He is well-pleased with your penned obedience.

As always,

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Loving Deposits

“Dear children, let us not love with words or tongue but with actions and in truth. … Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love.” (1 John 3:18, 4:7-8).

I went to the bank to make a deposit this morning. It is a doing I’ve been doing for a long season.

As a child, I would often accompany my father to the bank and watch him make his deposits. They were occasions filled with greetings and laughter and the simple joys that came with growing up in a small town where everyone knew my daddy’s name and offered me, because I was his daughter, the obligatory nod of approval. I always walked out with a lollipop. Most banks still honor the tradition—a small punctuation of thanks for the exchange of trust between client and banker.

I appreciate my bank even as my father appreciated his. And lest you think it was and is all about the transaction of money, bank visits with my father exceeded the customary function of the visit. Deposits were, indeed, the order of the day. Not solely in terms of cash, but more fully in terms of something far greater.


People.

When daddy went to the bank, he did so knowing that there would be on occasion for him to invest his love into the lives of others. In fact, going anywhere with my father yielded such a platform. He’s a people person with a generous heart to match. Watching him love is one of the noblest classrooms that I have attended as a student of the human race. His hugeness of heart for humanity is where mine began. And while his capacity for loving easily eclipses mine, I caught his spirit early on, and it’s been working out its perfection in me ever since.

Loving pure and loving big. The overriding and constant prayer of my heart.

When I examine the outgrowth of the fruit of the Spirit as scripted in Galatians 5:22-26, love stands at the helm. Without it, every other manifestation of the Spirit’s seeding breathes less. And when I walk in understanding of the magnitude of the Gift I’ve been given, I am humbled by the reality that my love often walks lacking.

The Purpose Driven Life has coined the mantra “It’s not about you,” but the purpose driven Elaine usually banks to the contrary. On my best days, there is still an awful lot of me in the mix. Thus, the constant prayer of my heart for the filling up and the spilling forth of God’s immeasurable love, not mine. Left to myself, my love deposits less—impure and small and of little worth in my Father’s kingdom economy.

My words and my pen may voice big, but at the end of the day, have my actions proved accordingly? I don’t want to simply write love, I want to live love … what my friend, California Kristen, would call “being the evidence.” Am I the living and breathing witness of God’s reach to humanity, or am I simply keeping my investments … my deposits … close to the vest? Are my transactions with others limited to the safe and the perfunctory, or do they extend to the deeper level of a heart to heart exchange?

Good questions to ponder this day. Not for condemnation’s sake but for eternity’s.

What we do with God’s love matters. If loving comes naturally to you, if the outgrowth of your inward pulse speaks love, lives love, and unwraps love in lavish measure, then there is something of our God living in you. You may not fully understand where your propensity for loving comes from, but its anchor holds in heaven, gripped by the hands of the Almighty Father who’s always been in the business of making deposits.

For our gain and for his glory.

God is love. He has gifted us with the capacity for knowing his love and for being his love to others. And while it sometimes might be more convenient and less messy to skip the process, as Christians, love is our requirement. No one gets a pass on this exam. Rather, it will be the measure of heaven’s reward.

“God is love. When we take up permanent residence in a life of love, we live in God and God lives in us. This way, love has the run of the house, becomes at home and mature in us, so that we’re free of worry on Judgment Day—our standing in the world is identical with Christ’s.” (1 John 4:17, The Message).

When love “runs the house,” love rules the heart. And a heart ruled by love is a heart that is welcomed by a world in need of its deposit. Be it…

in the bank.
at the check out line.
in the doctor’s office.
at a school program.
in a courtroom.
in a classroom.
in a restaurant.
in our pews.
around our tables.
at the bedside of loved ones.

Wherever our journey leads, love in action is the one investment that seeds eternally. Thus, a doing I’ve been doing for a long season. A bank “deposit” that not only nourishes the flesh, but also tends to the soul as well.

Perhaps this day, in some small or huge way, there is “bank” awaiting your loving deposit. It probably won’t look like mine; no matter. God’s love breathes in all shapes and sizes and dimensions to fit specific needs. Your requirement is simply to come alongside his heart and to complete the process. To put action behind the thought and to “be the evidence” of your Father’s residency within.

It’s the stuff of small town living with a focus toward big kingdom gain. A day in the life of a believer, where laughter and joy abounds because others recognize our heavenly Father by name and give us the obligatory nod as his children. A sacred punctuation for the exchange of trust between man and his Maker. Between me and my God. Thus, I pray…

Help me to love, Father, even as you love. Fill me to overflow, and keep me making deposits accordingly—into the lives of others for their gain and for your increasing glory. You have entrusted me with the gift of your love. Let my actions and my obedience breathe with the witness of such a lavish endowment. And when I am tempted to love less, to invest safer and to the withdrawal therein, remind me of my family bloodlines that trace back to heaven and that require my privileged participation in the matter. Let your love run my house and rule my heart this day. Amen.

Copyright © December 2008 – Elaine Olsen. All rights reserved.

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To make a “deposit” like I did this morning, please visit Indiana Krisen at “Over the Backyard Fence” for this recipe of pumpkin crisp.Worth the baking, friends. I promise! Shalom.

The New World

The New World

“However, as it is written: ‘No eye has seen, no ear has heard, no mind has conceived what God has prepared for those who love him’—but God has revealed it to us by his Spirit. The Spirit searches all things, even the deep things of God.” (1 Corinthians 2:9-10).


Not long ago, I sat down to watch Elizabeth: The Golden Age. The story is well-known to many but fairly new to me. I’m not a history enthusiast, although I am drawn to its memoirs via the silver screen. There’s something majestic and grand about visiting another era. When crafted well, “period pieces” etch their eccentricity into my soul, leaving me breathless for more.

The intrigues of yesterday’s “long-ago and far-away” are a worthy pause. They reveal truth by framing the past within the present. They trace our ancestral beginnings to our now, weaving a path of incomprehensible moments that lead us to this one moment in time. A day called today, when every yesterday bears the worthy trust of a purpose and a plan.

We couldn’t see it then because we didn’t live it then. Our lives were meant for this generation, but we are the witnesses to what remains—those blossomed remnants from a long-ago seeding that have fed our imaginations and scripted their influence into our current. Whether it be 500 years ago or five days ago, the past hosts the stage for the right now … for the future.

In one particular moving scene from Elizabeth, the Queen is listening to the wild rantings of explorer extraordinaire, Sir Walter Raleigh. He is describing the depth of what it was like for him to discover the new world. The tempestuous seas. The brittle cold. The weary nights and days and days and nights of water upon water with no land in sight. His is a compelling story, crescendoing with every detail until he unveils the moment of his discovery—the virgin vision of land in sight.

It is an edenic moment, one that scripts with the lush and green and wild of a fresh unearthing.

Elizabeth is undone with the telling, imagining the far-away and what it must be like to live within the edges of such adventure. With tears brimming from emotion, she voices the penchant of her heart…

“Do we discover the new world, Mr. Raleigh, or does the new world discover us?”

And with that question, I am undone. It’s a worthy wondering, for before me … before each one of us … is a brave, new and unseen world offering up its invitation to come. To set our sails in a new direction that is fraught with the unknown and the unimaginable.

Who can really plan for a sea’s crossing in advance? Who can measure the depth of the dark and the waves and the ill-effects of climate shift prior to departure? Who can reason the sun’s heat and thirst of a long journey? Who can forecast the wide open skies of a sea’s starry night or the brushstrokes of a horizon’s morning? Who can fathom the ups and the downs and the side to sides of a watery perimeter? Who can fully comprehend the completed journey even before it begins? Who can see the new world prior to leaving the old?

Who indeed?

God can. He did, and he continues to do so. On our behalf and on behalf of those who’ve come before and those who are soon to follow. He sees it all, from beginning to end—the new world. It commenced on the shores of his sacred understanding; it will finish accordingly. But sandwiched in between those eternal bookends?

A sea’s crossing. A journey’s now. From coast to coast, where faith becomes the wind that sails us home into safe harbor.

Do we discover the new world, or does the new world discover us?

Yes and yes.

It’s not that it hasn’t been there all along. Its shores have always sung. Its land has always known the generous breathing of a big and mighty God. Its width and length and heighth and depth have been measured and established by the wisdom of its Creator and sustained accordingly. The inconceivable has been conceived by the only mind capable of holding such vision.

And if we, by the grace of God, have set our sights on Jesus, then with every passing day, in unsuspecting and unimaginable ways, we catch glimpses of the harbor that stands on the horizon. A reachable Eden that scripts with the lush and green and wild of a fresh unearthing.

The new world and us. An unlikely coupling. A joint discovery on both counts. Together, a profound weaving that breathes and brims with unending possibility and with the breathless yearning for more.

More adventure.
More edges.
More moments.
More risks.
More faith.
More discovery.

More nights of stars and days of horizons, piece by piece until we arrive on the shores of the new world, and we trade in our weary remnants for the full dressing of our forever.

Who can fathom the worth of such a journey? I am compelled to try, for long ago and far away, in another era it seems, God’s love called out his invitation for me to come. A “period piece” from my history that etched its eccentricity into my soul. I’ve been sailing its waters ever since. It’s been a worthy row, friends, and one that is drawing me ever closer to my discovery of the new world. I bet you could voice the same. May God keep us, everyone, to the journey until we land in the seen reality of our unseen and wild imaginings. It won’t be long, thus I pray…

Bring us home, Father God, into safe harbor with you. Keep our eyes fixed on the horizon instead of the sea that seeks to drown our faith in the process. Thank you for the process of discovery and for the vision that you’ve seeded in our hearts for the inconceivable realities that you conceived on our behalf long ago. Your grace is the unimaginable gift that allows us participation in the new world. It leaves me breathless and with a heart of thanksgiving for the life I’ve been allowed. Keep me grateful. Keep me mindful. Keep me moving forward, straight into your arms. Amen.

Copyright © November 2008 – Elaine Olsen. All rights reserved

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Happy Thanksgiving to you and yours! I will be traveling this week and plan on stepping away from the computer for a few days. Enjoy some turkey and some fellowship with family and friends. I am thankful for you, my blogging companions, who have spent the better part of 9 months on the journey with me. What a joy to share this road with pilgrims like you! I mean that. Shalom.

A Morning’s Reminder…

What does an early morning obedience yield?

Reminders.

#1—My story is part of a bigger drama.
#2—There is coming a day when the graces and ills of said story will weave a completed and understood work.
#3—My full participation in that story has come with a costly price tag.

But for now, in this moment and on this day, I only see glimpses. I feel them in part. I hear them in fragments, but rarely do I fully grasp them. They are but reminders of an unseen reality that is working diligently on my behalf. Yours too.

And lest you think that you don’t need them—that your faith is so strong, so deep, and so mature so as not to look for them—then may I suggest that your faith bleeds weak? A faith that doesn’t look for reminders is a faith that poses little threat to the enemy and his many schemes for destruction. A faith that refuses its growing is a faith that falls prey to its burying. A faith that doesn’t need moments of breath-taking glimpses of God’s glory is a faith that expects little. Hopes little. Lives little.

I want a big faith. My today longs for it. I desperately need the hope of the faith that I so boldly proclaim. Why is today’s need more profound than yesterday’s? What prompts the search for faith?

Hurting hearts, that’s what. And mine is breaking today on behalf of a friend. The doctor’s report didn’t spin they way that we had hoped. The longed for conclusion was for remission. The reality spoke otherwise, and today, she is left with her questions and her decisions and with a heart in need of a few reminders that her God is good and that he has her in his watchful care. I am in need of a few myself.

Thus, I went looking for some of God’s sacred reminders this morning. First, in a book. Second, in God’s Word and thirdly, outdoors in God’s creation. I found them—my glimpses of hope; not because they weren’t there all along, but rather because my eyes and my heart were inclined toward perception.

#1—John Eldredge’s book Epic: the Story God is Telling, is a reminder to us that our stories are part of a bigger drama. That we were created with that drama in mind and that our individual parts are the central and key components in making the story come alive with a richness and depth that bring color and texture to the whole. Without our participation, the story reads with gaps. Your life and mine were meant to fill in those gaps. We were intended to be a part of God’s story. Epic gives us the permission to participate accordingly.

A gentle reminder of the bigger picture around 1:00 AM.

#2—Exodus 15 was the Scripture text for my morning devotion. A song of deliverance sung by Moses and the Israelites after walking their faith through on dry ground.

“‘In your unfailing love you will lead the people you have redeemed. In your strength you will guide them to your holy dwelling…. You will bring them in and plant them on the mountain of your inheritance—the place, O LORD, you made for your dwelling, the sanctuary, O Lord, your hands established. The LORD will reign for ever and ever.’” (Exodus 15:13, 17-18).

God’s mighty and outstretched arms were more than enough to lead a people from captivity to freedom. This has always been his way. His arms and his stretch, reaching long and wide and high and deep on our behalf and for his kingdom come. His strength will lead us home. To the mountain of his inheritance where breath-taking glimpses of his glory will be viewed in their entirety, forever and for always.

A gentle reminder of the bigger picture around 6:30 AM.

#3—The F-15 Strike Eagles were out in large force this morning as I took to the streets for my usual run. They are hard to miss. Their noise makes it so. Living in a military community requires my frequent notice of these tactical fighter jets that are designed to penetrate enemy defense and to outfight enemy aircraft. They hold my wonder and my constant gratitude.

The F-15’s fly with a bird’s eye view of their below and with a breathtaking view of God’s above. The men and women who pilot these aircrafts are doing so on our behalf. For the freedoms we now embrace and for the freedom we hope to remain. It comes with a hefty price tag. That is the way of freedom.

It costs. It exacts a price. It requires a sacrifice. It is a gift undeserving, yet willingly given. As it is with the F-15’s so it goes with my Father who willingly paid the price for our spiritual freedom through the sacrifice and his one and only Son.

A gentle, yet forceful reminder of the bigger picture around 8:00 AM.

A book that weaves a story of Epic proportions. A song that sings a story of deliverance. A plane that flies a story of protection. Three sought-after reminders. One conclusion.

God’s still writing the story … with his deliverance, with his protection, and with the bigger picture in mind. And while I cannot always fully see his hand in the matter, I can see the tracings of a greater Epic. One that allows me a few lines of participation and a few minutes on the stage. And the stage, my friends, is always a good place for a few humble reminders.

Today I am humbled, even as I am hurting. I am reminded, once again, that the best is yet to be and that I walk toward that best with God’s deliverance as my cloaking, with his holy intention as my guide, and with his protection as my shield against the enemy’s plans to the contrary.

I can walk home with a bigger purpose in mind. So can my friend. So can we all. Thus, let us walk it with God’s truth as our song:

“Depart, depart, go out from there! Touch no unclean thing! Come out from it and be pure, you who carry the vessels of the LORD. But you will not leave in haste or go in flight; for the LORD will go before you, the God of Israel will be your rear guard.” (Isaiah 52:11-12).

Our covenant Father, Yahweh, sets our course as he leads the way. The Creator of the entire Universe, Elohim, guards our steps and keeps watch over us from behind. From beginning to end, we are nestled in between the Sacred. Find your rest in this reminder today.

Amen.

~elaine

Copyright © November 2008 – Elaine Olsen. All rights reserved

I was so blessed by my reading of John Eldredge’s Epic, I want to make a few copies available to my readers. Simply leave a comment, and I will pick the winners by week’s end. Shalom.

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