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.