love

this is my beautiful portland. a haven of art, music and culture tucked away between massive rivers, breathtaking mountains and an ocean of forrest. nearly 4 million people live in the greater portland area, and yet we are an hour from the pacific coast, 45 minutes from the ski lifts and 30 minutes from the columbia river gorge national scenic area.

not a day goes by that i don't see some play of light on the hills, some reflection on the river, or some other sight that takes my breath away and deepens my love for the God who made that just so i could see it on my way to work. of the places i've been so far in my life i still have not found any quite so beautiful as here.

tonight we had a dhop meeting with (among others) kathleen, patrick, roy and ben. i wasn't going to be there because i could feel a migrane brewing, but i had to lock up at the end so i went anyway. i'm so glad i did...the least reason being my headache is gone.



we did some planning for our 48-hour straight prayer gathering that starts on thursday (i think we should call it 'fortystr8'). with that done but still in mind we spent the last hour in prayer. by the end the picture the Lord presented was both encouraging and impacting.

as we began to pray i felt heavy with the petition that God would help us know what it is to abide in Hiim. i was drawn back to the prayer of Jesus in the garden, and how He asked the Father to make us one in Him as He was One with the Father. there's a prayer i sang a few months ago at one of our friday all-nighters that i haven't been able to get out of my head since then. "You go on forever and we are but a moment. graft us into Your heart so we can go on with You." as i prayed tonight an echo of what Jesus prayed that night before He died, i found my old prayer came back to me again.

ben read from Jeremiah about the coal on the lips, and he said he saw a picture of coals touching and igniting little fires around the city until it was one flame. he read further about the desolation, saying he felt that described the spiritual desolation of this city. as he said that i was drawn back to Isaiah 58, and as i was looking it up kathleen began to read out of Nehemiah 4 where it tells of the heavy work of rebuilding the wall of jerusalem. heavier because of the sadness of the desolation and the words of sanballat, tobiah, the ammonites and the men of ashdod meant to discourage them and make them afraid to do the work. as kathleen read it she began to repent for the fear the people of God walk in that keeps us from accomplishing the work, and she asked for strength for the watch and the work. she prayed that we would not be overwhelmed as we cared for eachother's burdens.

as she prayed i looked at Isaiah 58 and saw the picture of what God has been saying, to my church as well as dhop and myself, about this season. as we line ourselves up with the heart of God (feed the hungry, clothe the naked, care for the sick, widows, orphans, felons, lonely and desolate) we take on that thing that urges us, moves us as Jesus was moved to act, compells us to respond to the need. it is two-fold. we are compelled to do all we can, all the time realizing the need it too great and we cannot do it unless God comes and does what He called us to do.

in this place we find ourselves coming together to cry out on behalf of those in need, and this is the place where we must 'do away with the yoke of opression and the pointing of fingers' (vs9) and we lay aside our doctrinal and denomonational differences because we so desperately need Him to come. in this place the Glory of the Lord surrounds us and is our 'rear guard', our refreshing, our strength and the one that continues to keep the intense longing in our hearts for those who need to find Him. this is where He promises we will be like a well watered garden with a never-ending spring.

as i shared this ben quoted from Isaiah 27 where it says,
"In that day we will sing of the pleasant vineyard. I, the LORD, will watch over it and tend its fruitful vines. Each day I will water them; day and night I will watch to keep enemies away. My anger against My people will be gone. If I find briers and thorns bothering her, I will burn them up."
and as he read that God reminded me of a vision He gave me a while ago where (after showing me several things) He showed me my city, but before any human had settled there. He showed me under the ground where He had planted the roots of His love at the beginning of time.

there is coming a season of fruitfulness to this city. God is grafting to His heart the hearts of those who care for the things that matter to Him, and in the unity of our working together and our crying out for Him to come and do what we cannot - for Him to do what He has called us to do - He is coming to tend this vinyard and make it fruitful again.

amazing.