Ok, so it has been over two months since I've written. A crazy two months. My precious nephew was born...Xavier Deuteronomy Jones. The huge work deadline that has hung over my head for 9 months of this year has finally come and gone, with success. My sister got a cyst that was huge, had surgery, found out it was benign, and has been recovering for the last 5 weeks. I started working part-time and have been playing "catch up" on the many things in my life that have fallen to the wayside since February.

I have felt myself be distant from myself and God. On Monday night at the House of Prayer, He told me that it is now safe to unpack myself...all those emotions and thoughts that have had to stay somewhere until I had the time to let them out. Today I had a retreat day. Time. I had a few instructions from Him on how to unpack myself...and so it began...a flood of tears and of healing. Grief over what has been lost in the last year, amazement that He is still here, I am not lost, and that the Fortress has been waiting for me.

Here is a section of a Mike Bickel book that I was drawn to today. "I speak this confession to God when I face pain and pressure: I am loved, and I love You; therefore I am successful. I love You even when my love is only in seed form and is still immature. Even though my love is weak, the position of my soul is to be a lover.... Pain drives our soul into the secret place...in that posture of refocusing my soul....It is like a muscle that is worked over and over. My heart keeps enlarging in the absolute truth that I am loved, I am a lover, and therefore, I am successful."

O my Rock, help this truth to go deep.

Desire is meant to be a roadmap Home. John said this last night at housechurch when we were talking about our individual passions.

I think this echoes CS Lewis' last book in the Chronicles of Narnia: the stuff of this earth and in this life we purely desire are shadows of the life to come. Desire is not meant for us to ache or run from or push down but for us to learn about who we really are and where we are going. There's a David Wilcox song about longing. I can't remember the exact words but it's something like.... "when I feel lonely that means some room (in my heart, soul, mind) is empty. That empty room is there by design. When I feel hollow, that's just the proof that there's more for me to follow - that's what the lonely is for."

I like the concept to use desire to understand our journey. In otherwords, what I desire (or think I want) is not totally the point. The desire becomes my teacher and the journey leads me to more fufillment than just "getting what I want."

Mike Bickel from the Kansas City International House of Prayer has said over and over that we get exhausted by this life and even ministry unless we spend time in adoration, gazing on the One we love. Since we don't fully know Him yet or comprehend the fullness of His magnificence, our adoration or time spent consciously expressing love to Him will fall short, but it is still needed by us and wanted by Him. I've been thinking about our desire for Him a lot lately because we have spent a good portion of time in our House of Prayer Monday nights contemplating His beauty and adoring Him. Telling Him that I love Him and long for Him somehow makes it more real, and expands that place in my heart. The longing has grown; the love has grown. The understanding of His beauty has grown. This desire for Him is my roadmap Home.

I re-discovered a little verse this morning. It describes the famine in the land, and how Joseph was sent ahead to Egypt, but then waited in chains:

Ps 105:19 Until the time came to fufill his word,
the Lord tested Joseph's character. (NLT)

So in due season, at the right time, the promise would become fufilled. In the meantime, Joseph's character was tested. Then he would be ready for the fufillment of the word of the Lord. The New King James has a different twist on it....

Until the time that his word came to pass,
the word of the Lord tested him.

It almost feels to me like the prophetic word or promise itself tested Joseph. In his case, the dream that he was meant to be in a place of authority. Did he struggle as a servant or in jail for those years: "Hey wait! I was meant to be more than this!" I think I have echoed those same words many times about many prophetic promises that are still unfufilled in my life.

Can I, can we wait until the time comes for the word to be fufilled?

The last 8 days have been ones of trial and hardship and loss. However, despite that reality and some battles with fear, eventually this prayer to Jesus has burned brightly within me: “You have sweetened the suffering with your love and friendship. You have not withheld your frankincense from the myrrh; you have not left me with bitterness.”

How wonderful to know that in the hour of testing (where I have failed so many times in the last year), I passed with flying colors! That my faith is strengthened, that I have chosen to trust Him and proclaim His goodness before my brothers and sisters.

How glorious to sense His presence all around me! To sing of His sweetness and experience it, not just words. As we sang last night at the House of Prayer, “we will sing of Your beauty, we will sing of Your glory; we will sing of Your fragrance, we will sing of Your radiance.”
Beloved, He is good.

Harvest Time

Always, man dreams about the future:
what he will sow next
and where he will reap a harvest.
The planting itself is not enough;
he longs for the day of fruitfulness.

Like God, he sees that people grow too:
young boys to men,
young men to elders.
With patient shaping and instruction,
they, too, will bear much fruit.

But unlike God, he cannot see the invisible future:
he runs away from Suffering,
the most patient and fruitful of all his teachers.
He twists and turns to escape her voice
and rarely listens long enough to discover her wisdom.

My child, don't run.
After you have suffered a little while,
your Father will restore and strengthen you.
Let Suffering perform her full work,
for her harvests are always bountiful
in those who heed her words.

-klb 8/19/04, see 1 Peter 5:10

Last night my good friend Juli got married. It was beautiful and fun and all a wedding should be. There was no fear: Juli and Dave will be good partners.

Bart Campolo gave the homily and he said some thought-provoking, stretching important things to know. Part of life is change. When you marry your spouse, that will be the only day he/she is "that person". They will keep on changing the rest of their life, and so will you. Sometimes we complain "this isn't the person we married!" It's true. But instead of holding them to who they were, we need to expect them to change. We must instead learn to love the person they have become, and will become. Each time they change into a new person, we must discover it, and find a way to love them.

That is the marriage commitment: to love all of the people they will become!

Last time I wrote a poem about due season. Still chewing on that theme... at the right time, in due season Psalms 145:15-16. I was reading a book called "Come to Papa" by Gary Weins out in KC and found some wonderful thoughts on this topic.

He described Adam and Eve doubting "whether God really had their best interests at heart. They wondered whether he would really satisfy their desires for significance, intimacy and destiny." So Satan convinces them that God is not trustworthy, cannot be counted on; that his timing is not perfect and they can't wait for him to fufill their desires. Yow! That's at the core of my everyday struggle right now.

We/I crave fufillment. Will I trust him to give me everything I need at the right time? In due season. When he deems is perfect timing. In the way that he deems is perfect. Will I resist grabbing it for myself? Like Sarah who gave her maidservant to Abraham? Like Rebekah who convinced her younger son to steal the birthright of his brother? Will I resist filling myself with things, even good things, that can never satisfy me because they are secondary pleasures, not the True Pleasure. "We think that if we can just ...get connected with any one of a thousand things, our life will be better and be more fufilled."

At this point, I feel the Lord ask me some questions. "Am I enough for you? Must you have other things to be satisfied with Me?"

Oh Jesus, help me in my unbelief! You are MORE than enough.

In Due Season

Every morning—the sky—
a different color.
A glimpse into your glory.
A revelation into your
infinite possibilities.

(For even at rainy dawn,
your golden light breaks through
at a distance.)

Minute by minute, there’s a new hope
and a fresh beauty unveiled.
At the right time…
in due season, I too will understand.

-klb 6/21/04

Wonderful

You hem me in--behind and before,
within and without,
past and future.
Like a mystery glimpsed,
you have set yourself before me,
while I have been unraveled
from spirit to bone before you.

You have read my book of days—
each line and between.
Are not my unspoken desires
known to you?
Are not my hidden agendas
clear to you?
For you have created
the language of my dreams
and taught movement to my being.

O God of Jacob, God of my heart,
you are fearfully wonderful.

-6/18/04, from Psalm 139

I've just finished reading "The Heart is a Lonely Hunter" by Carson McCullers. There's a lovely passage that describes the life we live on the outside, interacting with other people, and the inner life of our mind and heart. One of the characters depicted this duality by describing it as an outside room and an inside room. As she grows from being a child with freedom to explore to functioning more as an adult and getting a job to help support her family, the inner and outer rooms change.

She says, "But now no music was in her mind. That was a funny thing. It was like she was shut out from the inside room. Sometimes a quick little tune would come and go- but she never went into the inside room with music like she used to do. It was like she was too tense. Or maybe because it was like the store took all her energy and time. Woolworth's wasn't the same as school. When she use to come home from school she gelt good and was ready to start working on the music. But now she was always tired. At home she just ate supper and slept and then ate breakfast and went off to the store again. A song she had started in her private notebook two months before was still not finished. And she wanted to stay in the inside room but she didn't know how. It was like the inside room was locked somewhere away from her. A very hard thing to understand."

I have had this feeling and sadness of "losing" the inside room many times over the last few months. But even as I type the passage above, I think there may be some deception there. Surely nothing can separate us from the love of Christ, or from himself, or from our true selves in him. Not work, not tiredness... The passage describes how I feel, but not the truth. It's not the same thing.

Some new poems....

Morning Prayer

Holy Spirit, counsel my heart.
By your great wisdom,
lead me to listen to the One I love.
I will open my mouth;
fill it with good things
that please my Beloved.
Awaken my deep to your deep.


Faint with Love
(from Song of Songs 2:5, 6:3 and Eph 5:32)

Tell him I am love sick.
Tell him I am overcome
by his faithfulness to me.
Tell him I am overwhelmed
by the fervour of his love.

I am my Beloved's
and he is mine.
It is a mystery
(too wonderful to comprehend).

Tell him I am faint with love.
Tell him I am blessed
among women by his wooing.
Tell him I am strengthened
and refreshed by his love.

I can give love
and I can receive love.
It is a mystery
(too wonderful to comprehend).

It has been awhile since I've been able to write. My work is increasing in demands on my time and energy, so I'm having to go to Plan B.... cutting out many normal activities like church leadership meetings, hanging out with friends, my Bookclub, etc for the next 4 months.

I'm tempted to complain (oh, what am I saying, I've already complained about a million times internally). But the Lord has reminded me of 00009ames 1:4 "But let patience have its perfect work, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking nothing." He's making me like Him - perfect. However, this is the way for me perfected, to be holy as He is holy, and it costs something.

Despite the craziness and pressure that I'm under, there have been some moments of true joy as well. I had the opportunity to minister with Sandie by facilitating a few hours of a women's retreat for another housechurch within our network. What joy to see how beautiful these women are to the Father! And to be used in a small way to bring them to a deeper understanding of their identity. I also attended a women's conference in Michigan with my "Barrow" side of the family. With a cultural and racial mix, I was able to dance before the Lord with ALL my might! I love it when worship gets out of control!! John and I got to spend some quality time talking in the car as well.

These moments of joy remind me of something that Dave Nixon talked about on Easter Sunday. We often feel like God is not coming through on some "deal" for us to have a good life. However, we are not promised in Scripture a life that is anything close to the American Dream. Hardship is promised, trials along with the all-surpassing joy of knowing Him. Dave reminded us that the same Holy Spirit that descended on Jesus after his baptism, that brought that pinnacle moment of intimacy and joy as the Father said to all "this is my Son, in whom I am well pleased", is the same Spirit that led Jesus into the wilderness. The wilderness where he was starving and lonely and tormented.

As Mike Bickle would say, we cannot be offended at the Lord's ways. We must accept the Holy Spirit and his leading to the moments of wonder and the days of wilderness....the myrrh and the frankincense (if you've read my past blogs and poems).

Friday night was spent at Via Crucis.... a wonderful artistic interactive "stations of the cross" experience in preparation for Good Friday. Each station was built around using different senses (sight, sound, touch, smell) to allow people to meditate in a different way the Way of the Cross. I was impressed by the quality of artists and musicians who have connected with Vineyard Central and the ways in which they use their giftings to share spiritual concepts and truths.

My life is rich!

I had the opportunity to pray with people taking communion during the last few hours of Via Crucis. Most of these people were unknown to me. I love this chance for God to show up, because when I pray something that really resonates for them, they know that it is from God and not my human intuition or wisdom.

This is the series of poems on Myrrh that I've been working on. Myrrh=suffering.

Myrrh I
The mountain of myrrh: heights of passion that rise with deep suffering.
This passion crushed
releases the sweetest scent.
The scent of suffering
draws the lover.
The Beloved One is enticed
by the fragrance of sacrifice.
He is drawn to the one
who has chosen to be like him,
to wear suffering deep in her heart.
He has been so alone on the mountain.
He has felt forsaken by all.
No one has journeyed to this place –
they were afraid of the heights, afraid of the pain.
The Beloved One is the only one
who has gone his way to
follow the will of the Father.

But now she wears the
bundle of myrrh between her breasts.
In the dark night of death
when her faith is tested,
each submission of her will,
though imperfect and weak,
still releases a tiny scent of suffering
and draws him to rest there.

-Kendra Barrow, 2/28/04

Myrrh II
This is my bottle of perfume,
this is my box of myrrh
that I throw at your feet to be broken open….
my desires, my grief, my lack, my incompleteness
(each day, over and over).

Rise! Rise up, Perfume of my Suffering!
Rise up to the face of
my Beloved.
O Myrrh – give my Beloved this message:
I am willing
to go my way to the mountain of death.

-Kendra Barrow, 2/29/04

Myrrh III
I’m the candle that is burning;
I’m the myrrh that has been crushed.
Even in my weakness,
The very Flame of God
has torched my impurities.
They’re burning away:
my selfishness, my pride, my
domineering spirit, my wants and my
needs.

Beautiful Flame, come and burn
away all my life that’s less
than glory.
Remove the impure so that
only love remains.
Remove the scent of my will so that
only myrrh remains.

-Kendra Barrow, 3/16/04

As I've written about before, I've been in a season of suffering. The suffering mostly comes from the pressure at work and how that affects my mental, emotional being and my marriage, my home, etc. I've also been trying to start seeds for my garden in the basement. As the Lord often does, he gave me a planting metaphor to apply to my current situation.

Some seeds require light to germinate, but some require darkness.

Interpretation: the seeds are the things that God wants to grow in my heart: maturity, patience, faithfulness, etc. Some of these seeds require God's presence, the Light, in big doses. As I am exposed to Him, I am awakened within, I experience new possibilities and am given inspiration that I never had before.

But some of these seeds, like patience, require trial and suffering. The seed requires darkness, the experience of feeling like God's presence is hidden from me, in order to produce an environment that really gives patience an opportunity to grow!

I was reading in "The Purpose Driven Life" this morning and it reinforced this same idea. Rick Warren says that "temptation provides the choice" to do the right thing and that God can develop the good seeds in us by allowing us to "experience circumstances in which [we're] tempted to express the exact opposite quality."

It is these glimpses of God's purpose, of the Truth, that make me commit in my heart to stay faithful in the moments of testing and to choose to praise Him.

Last night (I started writing this 3/29 and never finished posting it) I went to the Cincinnati House of Prayer and had the priviledge of worshipping the Lord with my teammates, Mike and Sandie. We have a two hour time slot dedicated to adoring the Lord, praising his marvelous works, and giving him our love. The format is a combination of hymns, current worship songs, prayer and spontaneous songs. In one of those Holy Spirit moves, we didn't want to stop, so we kept going for another hour! It is this kind of worship that helps me understand that we will never ever be bored in heaven.

These are some of the spontaneous songs that the Lord put on our hearts last night:

All things are held together by you. (We went to Colossian 1:15-20 and sang through these verses. Later, I found in my Bible that this was an early Christian hymn that Paul had quoted. So we were singing a song that Paul and the others sang!)

Let it [our worship] be a sweet song,
let it be a fragrance,
let it be the sound Your heart desires.

Awaken your bride, awaken your lover

Break the chains
Break the yokes
Set us free to follow you

Your fire breaks the yokes of bondage

Like a jealous lover you will come for us

In the light of your countenance,
We become beautiful

I'm thankful for today, a true day of Rest.

John and I took a long walk at Spring Grove Cemetary, letting the spring breeze and the sunny sky fill us with happiness. As the Song of Songs says, "Come, the winter is past and the springtime is here." You don't really understand what that means until a day like today. Our Bradford pear has spontaneously burst into flower and every bush has buds. Though all seemed dead and hopeless in the winter, each of these plants were doing things unseen that are now appearing. Thank you, God, for life!

Today I've been thinking about some lines from a poem, "Hospital", by Karl Shapiro. A physician had mentioned it at a meeting and it has rattled in my brain since then.

"Kings have lain here and fabulous small Jews
And actresses whose legs were always news"

A humorous way of stating that the hospital is filled with the pompous and the humble, (describing both patients and staff, I might add). In my tiny sphere of influence, I wish to spread hope and humility. Humility to mean "not thinking lower of myself or better of myself than what is true".

Last night we enjoyed hosting a dinner for a group of young adults from Madison, Wisconsin. They are in a 3 year program at Mad-City Training Center (or something like that). My husband made a bountiful Mexican meal and we had good conversation about what God is doing among artists and how to they can grow into more intentional community. They are good folks - kin of the Spirit!

Another recent delight, Monday night at the Cincinnati House of Prayer we had such a wonderful time with the Lord! Steve Eklund was visiting that night, and during an especially anointed period of time, he played his trumpet. It was so beautiful! I have a mini digital recorder, and though not great sound quality, I have been enjoying replaying it.

I can't talk about the last 5 hours at work so far without using expletives, but I can still be thankful for these moments of clarity. Ahh, worship and intimacy...... that is what matters in life. These momentary trials will fade away.

Being a bit sick, I've decided to stay home for the day instead of letting guilt strings bring me to work. John is helping some friends do manly man things and so I am just enjoying the quiet and freedom of an empty house.

I took a leisurely walk with Sarah Klinefelter this morning. A woman to woman chat - it is good!

A poem from February......

Holy Spirit, blow through my wide open spaces.
Reduce me to this:
clean, crisp, Montana-like snow fields.
I want to lose Distraction,
leave behind the spirit of Hurry.
I’m ready for Solitude,
space to think,
time to be.

-2/8/04

Today was a good day....housechurch shared with the Tilden group (from whence we came) with good discussion about what we've been doing in our 2 housechurches and then about the movie "The Passion of the Christ". Since our housechurch just saw this last Thursday, it felt really good to discuss into some nitty-gritty. My wonderful husband helped me to work on this blog, talked to a few friends on the phone, did a little housecleaning, and just chilled.

I've been reading a book by Gary Weins, a teacher out at the Kansas City International House of Prayer, called "Come to Papa: Encountering the Father that Jesus Knew". Since many in my spiritual community have been discussing identity (who are we? what are we made for?), there was a particular passage that really grabbed me. Gary was describing that in our brokenness, we tend to look toward people and things to tell us who we are: parents, jobs, ministries, etc. However, "the yearning that exists within the human heart has a God-shape to it". So only God can tell us who we are. He says, "I am the One who defines you, and the One who imparts to you all your significance." Therefore, He "alone has the power to speak that identity into our hearts. His definition of us is the only one that is real and the only one that really matters."

What would we look like if we could really understand and live in this truth?

I have just returned from a tiny pilgrimage; a journey to one of the spiritual fountains in America – Kansas City, Missouri. I went on this pilgrimage with 2 of my closest friends: Sandie and Beth. Hidden away in Kansas City is the IHOP, International House of Prayer, that has worship and prayer going around the clock 24x7. It was a blessing to be in the presence of God without distraction for 8…12…15 hours at a time!

There are many spiritual gifts that the Father gave me on this pilgrimage, but right now I am thinking about one in particular. Friends, this is difficult to understand because it is “solid meat”. I heard a teaching by a fiery heart, Wes Hall, about a particular verse in Song of Songs 4:6. It may be familiar, “Until the day breaks, until the shadows flee away, I will go my way to the mountain of myrrh, to the hill of frankincense.” Wes talked about how myrrh is a burial spice (one used on Jesus’ body), symbolizing death or suffering. He believes frankincense is a spice symbolic of communion, intimacy, and that there is this beautiful tension between the two that happens in our earthly life as we go back and forth being close to God and feeling separated or hidden or forgotten by God. Yet both intimacy and suffering teach us about our God and draw us toward him (even when we don’t feel him). So, to give you the gist of the teaching, I’ll reinterpret the symbolism of Song of Songs 4:6 in this way, “Until the True Light (Jesus Christ) returns and the shadow of death and sin flees away, I will choose to go my way (the specific daily path chosen for me by the Father) to the mountain of suffering and also the hill of intimacy with Him.”

Although the entire teaching was extremely meaningful to me, I am stuck on the relevance of the myrrh, the suffering, to my own life. There are several areas of my life that feel out of control right now: my husband losing his job, my work schedule requiring more for the next seven months than I want to give, etc. I have struggled with my response to these things by self-pity, frustration, anger – you name it. However, through this teaching, I have begun to understand that there is another way. The willingness to suffer (even though the things making me suffer seem silly in comparison with martyrdom) allows me to be changed, to be transformed in the areas that the Father knows are areas of weakness for me. They bring to light my immaturities, the places in my heart that hinder me from being able to give love and receive love fully – which is the whole purpose of my life.

These two poems are my efforts to grapple with this teaching………………

Myrrh I
The mountain of myrrh: heights of passion that rise with deep suffering.
This passion crushed
releases the sweetest scent.
The scent of suffering
draws the lover.
The Beloved One is enticed
by the fragrance of sacrifice.
He is drawn to the one
who has chosen to be like him,
to wear suffering deep in her heart.
He has been so alone on the mountain.
He has felt forsaken by all.
No one has journeyed to this place –
they were afraid of the heights, afraid of the pain.
The Beloved One is the only one
who has gone his way to
follow the will of the Father.

But now she wears the
bundle of myrrh between her breasts.
In the dark night of death
when her faith is tested,
each submission of her will,
though imperfect and weak,
still releases a tiny scent of suffering
and draws him to rest there.

-Kendra Barrow, 2/28/04

Myrrh II
This is my bottle of perfume,
this is my box of myrrh
that I throw at your feet to be broken open….
my desires, my grief, my lack, my incompleteness
(each day, over and over).

Rise! Rise up, Perfume of my Suffering!
Rise up to the face of
my Beloved.
O Myrrh – give my Beloved this message:
I am willing
to go my way to the mountain of death.

-Kendra Barrow, 2/29/04

I’ve woken up with a burning message in me today after the housechurches’ leadership discussion the other night. Some of the people in housechurches feel disconnected from the larger whole; they also feel lacking in certain areas and have been going to other churches to get more teaching, more corporate worship, etc. This is said with some sadness and guilt.

This morning as I pondered these things, very real issues and disappointments for these people, I started to think about Scripture. When Paul goes on some preaching and prayer rampages he tends to talk about specific churches in specific cities. In some of his letters, he ends with some messages for smaller groups meeting in someone’s home. However, the sense is that these smaller groups are still seen as part of the larger “Church of Ephesus” or “Church of Philadelphia”. The glorified Jesus, in the first few chapters of Revelation, also refers to these city churches. Churches made up of all the believers in a city; churches that when connected become the entire Body of Christ.

What would it be like for our housechurches to truly understand that they are members of the church of Cincinnati? If Jesus Christ sees them as members in the church of Cincinnati, not just a part of a housechurch, isn’t there freedom in that?

To me, it feels like the door is wide open to attend every and any gathering of believers in Cincinnati; they are all my brothers, all my sisters, all my family, all my church. We all as believers in this geographic location have responsibility according to how the church in Cincinnati lives out Christ’s commands (at least that’s how I interpret the Revelation passages). But how can I be responsible for the church of Cincinnati if I don’t know who the church is? The only way to share in the life of the church of Cincinnati is to begin to make relationships with the church of Cincinnati. As Andrew Jones has said of Deep Ecclesiology – “let us honor the church in all her forms”. In two or three. In our homes. At our work. At corporate worship services. Over coffee. At the pub. In the stadium. At any place where there are other believers.

There is real intimacy and relationships and discipleship and worship that can be experienced and lived in a housechurch. But hey, maybe that’s NOT the end of the story!!!