Love your God with your Soul Passage for tonight… Deut 6:1-7 “Now this is the commandment, the statutes and the judgments which the LORD your God has commanded me to teach you, that you might do them in the land where you are going over to possess it, 2 so that you and your son and your grandson might fear the LORD your God, to keep all His statutes and His commandments which I command you, all the days of your life, and that your days may be prolonged. 3 O Israel, you should listen and [ a ] be careful to do it, that it may be well with you and that you may multiply greatly, just as the LORD, the God of your fathers, has promised you, in a land flowing with milk and honey. 4 “Hear, O Israel! The LORD is our God, the LORD is one! 5 You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might. 6 These words, which...
Posts
I feel like the summertime for me is always a return to creativity. Often, during the school year, my energies are poured into my students, my relationships with people that are only here for a short time, and more importantly, my marriage and family. After that energy is spent, I'm spent. And all I can bring myself to do is write a bit, poke around on Facebook, and maybe take a few pictures that are fun and entertaining (sometimes only to myself!). So, today, I've cracked out the paint, the crayons and the pastels, and determined to do something, anything, to engage my creative self, even if it just means taking a piece of art off my own wall and copying it into "my version". Halfway through, it barely looks like the original, but its mine. I really don't do well at drawing or painting, but I do it for me. I do it to process, to think about something else besides work, and to find a few moments of getting my fingers dirty to see what my heart tells me. To...
This week both Andrew and I went to a flamenco benefit concert for Japan, and ironically enough, there was an earthquake that rocked Southern Spain just 24 hours before the concert. A sizable town called Lorca, its located about 200 kilometers or 130 miles east of Granada, in the province of Murcia. A brief google search yields the info that at least two evangelical churches exist in the town of about 91.000 people. 13 Catholic churches exist. There were two major earthquakes in a period of about 2 hours, and than about 30 aftershocks. The nine people who died were outside due to the first earthquake and squashed by falling debris. Two of the nine women were pregnant. The 13 Catholic churches suffered such damage that no one can enter them. Crumbled, shaken, semi destroyed. Is this the church ....on whom Christ's rock will stand? Wow. The images are startling, as many of these churches have stood for hundreds of years through thousands of tiny earthquakes and the one day this...
I took Andrew to "work"today. He's currently in the midst of English classes that he's giving to a photographer, one of the best here in Granada, in exchange for photography classes. So, once a week, I actually kiss my man goodbye as he takes the bus, or drive him to the other side of town, and come back home and get to be alone in my house. I know that sounds funny, but since Andrew works out of the home, and I go to work, this is a rare moment that I'm savoring this morning. On the way home, I drove slowly, loving the moment of "commute"from La Chana to Zaidin, where Andrew and I live. Its only like 5 miles, and with traffic, took me about 15 minutes. Today however, is one of those incredibly clear spring mornings, when the sun rises over the Sierra Nevada and the snow glistens on the peak, La Veleta. All I could say was, I live here...and enjoy the moment. Why do we live here? For the last two or three years, our live has been rather topsy-tuvy, b...
This weekend Andrew and I wandered down to a town called La Linea, a town across the way from Gibraltar. A friend of ours, one of "our" students that was here 3 years ago, got married. The youth from our church had retreat this weekend, so many were unable to go. We went as representatives to a beautiful wedding, but I get ahead of myself. Tamary, the bride, had been in Granada for just one year. Her dad would come and visit every chance he got, and he was so dynamic, so fun, we just adopted him as one of our own. He would come to every event he could, and joyfully stood and worshipped. They came with us on church retreat, and rejoiced with us as we baptized new believers. 10 months after that great retreat, Tamary's dad was brutally stabbed while walking away from the doctor's office. A case of mistaken identity. A senseless death. We had always wanted to go and visit the family, but we were unable to do so. Our own family drama was unfolding. Finally, we w...
Today we officially enter the Lent Season. I grew up Protestant, and so distinctly Protestant that somehow I missed the whole, what is Lent season, until after I went to Bible College. I even sneaked through a course on Western Civilization without having it properly explained to me. After I went to Bible college, I started work for an incredibly pagan man in the catering business. I became a server first and then ended up working in the office when they realized I had more than half a brain like a lot of the servers that were working for their next pot fix. I worked for them for almost 8 months when Ash Wednesday rolled around. Since we always had tons of food (catering) we could eat lunch free. That Wednesday our mostly Mexican chefs served us fish and only fish. I didn't realize what it was until one of my office collegues said, its Ash Wednesday and had to explain to me that today, we eat fish and we will eat fish every Friday until Easter. I found it strangely ironic tha...
Perhaps it seems to a regular reader of this blog is that all I ever write about is suffering and death. I have begun to feel like a broken record myself on this topic, but I want you to know that my desire is for my audience to understand the everlasting hope I have in an afterlife. Yesterday our little church in Granada said goodbye to one of its pillars, a woman named Isabel. Isabel was only 78, in Spanish standards of life expectancy, is fairly young. However, for most of a decade she had suffered with various aliments, mostly heart related. Right as Andrew and I started to attend and particapate in this little church, she had a heart valve replacement, and we all thought that we would lose her. However, God gave her six more years, and she lived those to the fullest. She saw her daughter married,and both of her married daughters had children, all boys! Finally, after her daughter had a baby last December, Isabel began to slowly fade, and for the last two months she has been in...
Two distinct musings today, perhaps not related... Last Sunday I listened in Sunday school as we talked about Proverbs. One of the point made is that in the OT times, the heart was not the emotional center, but rather the mental center of the body. So when the proverb states, "guard your heart..." its actually speaking about guarding your mind. Hmph. How many times have we heard this proverb misused, usually in the context of some woman talking about not loving a man too quickly, or vice versa. Perhaps this would be better thought of in this context, "Guard your mind, for it is the wellspring of life." Wow, to me this makes more sense. I was watching some sci fi type show, I think something to do with zombies, and they showed how the brain stem acts when the person is alive. It vibrates with electricity, thousands of connections made per second...when the brain is dead, i.e. has no more activity, we pronounce the person dead, even though the body may continue ...
Today marks one year since my mother-in-law walked through the veil, and joined those saints who have gone before her. She breathed her last sometime in the middle of the night, and all I could think when I saw her earth shell, was, "A new Body." For one earth year, she has enjoyed this new earth body. I wish we could share some cinnamon rolls together, you and me, and her too, and we could talk about these things, but this is of course for the next life. Yes, there will be cinnamon rolls, and they'll be so much more amazing than the ones I'm baking today. This last year a friend convinced me into signing up onto which is a site that sends you a passage of Scripture and a bit of a devotional (sometimes) daily. Sometimes it has all I've been able to chew on and meditate for the day, as I couldn't seem to have the energy to sit and read my Bible. Today, of all days, this passage was sent to my email box. Listen to today's call. Jamie, Here...
Today I received an email from a pastor in Ok. looking for an evangelical church here in Granada. I realized everyone has been directed to an almost four year old blog post I wrote regarding the church my husband and I attend here in Granada. So, I've decided to write a new post and give you all a little more information. We attend a Baptist church here in Granada, one that belongs to the Baptist Union in Spain. It is located in Granada on Calle Angel Barrios and Calle Arabial, right across the street from the Parque Garcia Lorca. Services in the School year are at 12 pm and 6 pm. Sunday school is at 11am. Wednesday evening prayer meeting is at 7 pm, and once monthly there is an English worship service. When I know this years dates, I'll post them here. If you have any questions, please don't hesitate to comment on my blog, or email me at jambilee at gmail. Hope this helps you! If you will email me, I'll send you my phone numbers and we'll chat! Most Sundays...
Andrew and I wandered with my uncle Peter today to a little village outside of Granada. We went with the intent of visiting a family, and when we finished 7 hours later, they had become our family. Antonio and his wife and daughter and brothers and sisters and wifes and husbands and kids and parents all invited us for migas, a traditional Andaluz dish that is flour fried in olive oil with sausage, onions, peppers, garlic, you get the drift. This gypsy family says they make it when it rains, and they can't work the fields of olives, asparagus, almonds or whatever harvest season it is. It takes two full hours to make such a delicacy, and that's why they only do it when it rains. We ate until our bellies burst, and laughed until we cried. Then talk turned to music, and guitars suddenly appeared, the small children were summoned, and summoned and then pulled out from underneath the bed they were hiding, and then they sang for us. And boy did they sing. Rocio, whose name means...
During this moment in my personal history, I have found it incredibly difficult to focus on the Virgin Birth, but rather my focus has been placed on the death of Jesus. Perhaps my own personal suffering has caused me to look further than the birth, and see the death and how painful it really was. Yes, we've all read the doctor's reports on how physically aunguising the death of Christ on the Cross was, but we neglect the emotional and mental aunguish as its too close to home, to hard, to think about Him as He walked up to Jerusalem, as He was betrayed by a kiss that mean friendship, kinship and love. Why? Because we've walked through it all this year, Andrew and I. We've had the kiss of greeting turn into betrayel, we've walked up to Jerusalem with Andrew's family, not physically, but metaphysically, knowing that the painful walk would only turn into a more painful end. We have breathed the words, "It is finished." We too, have watched a loved one ...
Last week we had our monthly English service, and one of our church members, Peter Jones, spoke. His passage from Luke was when Peter encounters Jesus in realife, by the Lake of Galilee and Peter is pretty discouraged. Jesus says, Throw out the the nets, and Peter says, Man, we didn't even get a minnow last night. Its not terribly far from how I feel regarding these last two years. In 2008, Andrew and I did a whirlwind travel of the Eastern US, and we didn't see a whole lot of financial results, even though a lot were promised. Instead,we limped back to Spain on a lot of broken promises, and the news of Penny's cancer in her bones this time, not just her breast. And for a year a half we bumped back and forth from Spain to Atlanta to Atlanta to Spain, with a few brief moments in Chicago, but not as many as I would have liked. If you've read my blogs from last Thanksgiving/Christmas, you saw how I personally wrestled with going back to Atlanta, and not to Chicago or...
Only in Granada..... Last night, we were coming home from the gym after a long day and a good workout. I had taught 4 hourss of English classes,and then drove in from where I teach to meet Andrew at the gym. He had taken the bus into town, gone to prayer meeting and then joined me. After lots of swimming and a few minutes in the spa....we walked out the door about 11 (not late for Spain) and were on our way home dreaming of bread and cheese and yogurt and fruit for dinner, when all the sudden BAM, someone hits us from behind as we waited for our turn on the roundabout. We both turned around and SURPRISE! Its a waiter from a local cafe Andrew and I frequent on Sunday mornings. Fortunately the worst damage was only a broken headlight on his car, and we have scarcely a bump on ours....so alls well that ends well. The waiter was grateful and I won't be surprised if the next coffee we have at the cafe is "on the house".
I can see from my status updates on Facebook that many of my friends have been as excited as I am to see the Chilean miners slowly pulled out one by one from their underground existence. I thought I wasn't going to cry the first time I watched one emerge from the Phoneix, until I read the back of his tshirt. Roughly translated, it says on the front, Thank you Lord, and on the sleeve, Jesus. On the back, it says something like, "Because He holds in His hands, the depths of the earth. And the heights of the mountains are also his. To HIM be the honor and the glory." I cried. What a fitting statement, as they are pulled from the lowest depths of the earth known to man, and as they come out of the little capsule dubbed Phoneix, to these beautiful, but harsh mountains that tower over them. No matter where they go, they are in God's hands. One miner stated how he had seen the Devil and instead, taken God's hand. The commentators over and over kept remarking on t...
Written by a friend. The ache of sorrow in my breast, The hurt that gnaws deep at my chest. I must confess... I feel like nothing is made right Oh where, oh where is the light Here I stand again it seems Taken back to horrors dreams O death you wheeled your power free Yet I look for life found upon the Tree Still my heart will feel the sting And miss our loved ones set free to sing Our lives entwined there too short a duration, I trust, will one day be rejoined in joyous celebration! All tears and fears will be washed away, As we sit together on that happy day. Yet now as I say my last goodbyes I must confess...I still feel.... The ache of sorrow in my breast, The hurt that gnaws deep at my chest. --- Isaac Ring, 2010
A lighter hearted post... Tuesday evening we headed back from the UK to our home in Granada after a few days of wonderful time with friends in the Oxford area. We took the train from Pangbourne to Reading, enjoyed a half hour break with some wonderful enormous coffees and took the hour and half long train to Gatwick airport. After checking in, and walking through security, we saw our plane was delayed a half hour. I had planned that we would arrive mostly on time and have over and hr to pick up bags etc, and then take a cab to the bus station in the South of Madrid, and then the 5 hr overnight bus ride home. Yes, it was the slow boat to China as my aunt Debbie says, but it was cheap, and that saved us over 150 dollars to do it that way. Needless to say,we were delayed out of Gatwick and arrived in Madrid at 12:45 in the morning and we had only 45 minutes to get out of the plane, get our two bags, grab a cab and then make the last overnight bus at 1:30 in the morning. AS we desc...