Learning the art of mending

“It’s the broken that become masters at mending”

                                               Author Unknown

“Why are You breaking me?” I asked You

“Why are You causing so much pain?

Can’t You see all I do is crying

Tears running even through my veins?

They told me You will make me happy

And bring me life and give me joy

Instead all that I do is fall here

And feel like I’m somebody’s toy.

Is it You that is playing

And messing up my days?

I thought You were my Sun

But I can’t see Your rays.

Can You get me out of here?

Can You make the pain stop?

You need to understand it

That if You don’t I’ll drop!

“You won’t”, I hear You answer

“I hold you with my hand

And since you’re so demanding

Yes, this pain will soon end.

I didn’t mean to hurt you

It’s hurting Me as well

And if you’re trapped in tears

I’m in your watery cell.

I didn’t mean to break you

And wish there was a way

Another way to bring you,

from night time into day.

But once you make this journey

In spite of pain and tears

You’ll know then to show others

how to escape from fears.

I know you’re angry now

And sad and so upset

But trust Me and keep going

Cuz’ we’re not there yet.

And if you do I promise

To always make you stand

And no matter what’s coming

To hold on to your hand.

You’ll be an overcomer

And take others with you

You’ll tell them they can make it

And then prove that is true.”

“The Sovereign Lord has given me an instructed tongue, to know the word that sustains the weary. He wakens me morning by morning, wakens my ear to listen like one being taught.” Isaiah 50:4, NIV

In my wilderness

In my wilderness

It was in my wilderness that He came to me

That’s where I discovered my God

He did not set bushes on fire

He just showed me that I can always be found

It was in my wilderness that He touched me

And His touch is tattooed on my heart

Always there imprinted forever

To remind me we can’t be apart

It was in my wilderness that He found me

Bound up in a ball of misery and pain

He kissed my forehead and whispered

“You will never be the same again”

It was in my wilderness that He spoke to me

It was there that we had our first date

In the desert I saw He was real

And His presence I could no more negate

It was in my wilderness that He held me

In the desert He watered my soul

Under scorning sun He promised me forever

That He’ll pick me up whenever I’m falling and then always make me stand tall.

"Don't enemy, crow over me. I am down, but I am not out. I'm sitting in the dark right now, but God is my light...He is on my side and is going to get me out of this.He'll turn on the lights and show me His ways. I'll see the whole picture and know how right He is. And my enemy will see it, too and be discredited- yes, disgraced! This enemy who kept taunting, "So where is this God of yours?" Micah 7:8-10 a, The Message 

These dry bones

There is a small voice inside me

That gently whispers "You'll be alright.

No need to fear. You're not alone here.

Even when you're too weak to fight.

Although it's empty and dry here

And you keep falling on these stones

I measure every step you're taking

And see that you're but skin and bones.

Look at Me daughter, and understand it.

That I will never let you go.

I know it's you who brought you here

But it is I who'll make you grow.

And whilst you're lying there shaking

From all the drought and all the pain

I'll tell you once again:

Remember, that these dry bones will live again.

"I have chosen you and I have not turned against you. So, don't worry for I am with you. Don't be afraid, because I am your God. I will make you strong and I will help you. I will support you with my right hand that saves you...I am the Lord your God. I am holding your right hand. And I tell you. "Don't be afraid. I will help you." Isaiah 41:10, 13

"This is what the Lord God says to the bones: I will cause breath to enter you. Then you will live. I will put muscles on you. I will put flesh on you. I will cover you with skin. Then I will put breath in you, and you will live. Then you will know that I am the Lord." Ezekiel 37:5

"I will not send anyone to attack you. And you will defeat those who do attack you. So no weapon that is used against you will defeat you. You will show that those who speak against you are wrong. These are the good things that my servants receive. Their victory comes from Me, says the Lord." Isaiah 54:15, 17

A somewhat unusual couple

"Promises had been made and exchanged- he to serve the Lord all the days of his life, and God never to forsake Him." Child of Promise, Kathleen Morgan

"Never leave you nor forsake you...though the mountains may fall and the hills be removed..." Hebrews 13:5, Isaiah 54:10

I got baptised 12 years ago. For those who do not understand the concept, you stand in front of witnesses and generally wear white as a symbol of your fresh new start and you make a promise to follow the Lord for the rest of your life in front of those witnesses. Then as yet another symbol of your new beginning you are emerged completely in water and when you come out you're a new creature, the things of old are gone.

When I got baptised it was the beginning of spring and I was wearing what once used to be the wedding dress of a sister from the church. Long, white and simple. They all came that day to witness my wedding with God. I, the one who once completely turned my back on Him and refused to have anything to do with Him, I was making vows involving the rest of my life. I was so happy and proud.

Still, I had little idea what was in fact happening on that day.

I started writing and keeping what I call my "Road signs" in 2003, a year later. If one were to read them they will soon notice a very familiar pattern emerging again and again and again...

Me, focusing with all my might on my vows- to follow and serve the Lord all the days of life and most often than not failing miserably.
Him, telling me and showing me in a million ways- "never leave you nor forsake you though the mountains may fall and the hills be removed."
Me, not understanding and not hearing Him or thinking He meant something else.
Him, patiently repeating it again and again and again...

I am married to a foreigner and half of the ones I love come from a different culture, traditions, way of thinking and most importantly a different language. But I made vows to my foreigner.
It dawned on me today that it is the same with God and I. We are from different worlds. He speaks another language and sees things differently than I do but we made vows involving eternity.
I had so little idea what was really happening on that day. It was a day of celebration. It all seemed to be about me- my choice, my joy, my white dress, my vows.
I realised today that this carried on for years to follow and was the source of much pain and doubt- my failures, my mistakes, my apparent inability to follow and serve. And I forgot something major. A wedding day is not just about the bride, her joy or her white dress. It is about the bride and the groom and their vows.

I was so focused on my vows that I forgot about His. And our vows are the strength of everything God and I are as a couple.

 My vows say I will follow and serve and I break them so often that I stopped counting. If we are to make it back home we all have to stop counting at some point. Apostle Paul said "I care very little if I am judged by you or by any human court; indeed I do not even judge myself. My conscience is clear, but that does not make me innocent. It is the Lord who judges me. Therefore judge nothing before the appointed time; wait until the Lord comes." 1 Corinthians 4:3-5

So I am not counting anymore. I declare it a futile, useless, self-defeating habit for two reasons. Firstly, when I do it my perspective is limited again to my vows and my failure to keep them. The whole thing is once again all about me and my bridezilla moment.
Secondly, it is not only I who made vows on that day. God made vows to me. And who knows maybe at the end of it all, if I stay married to Him, He will judge us as a couple. He will not only judge my failures, my mistakes and my apparent inability to follow but He will also judge His commitment to never ever leave me, His commitment to make me stand until the end no matter what.

We are from different worlds and many times we speak a different language. But if I learnt something from being married to a foreigner is that this can be a great blessing rather than a hindrance.
I can tell God about all the pain and the joys of being human and He can show me in a million ways the beauty and the sheer perfection of His world.

I lost faith many times that this marriage will work but something happened to me today. For the first time I remembered our vows rather than my vows. I think God and I will make it as a couple:-)

The Journey

"A year from now, you will wish you had started today"

"It simply can't be done

You'll never make it through

Others have tried and failed

What makes you think you won't fail too?"

I heard these things so often...

Believed them every time

Just crawled back in my corner

And then refused to climb

Days, weeks and months would pass me

My mountain still in sight

I knew if I could just get there...

...but simply lacked the might

I just did not belong here

The mountain was my home

Why just give up because they say so?

What if they were all wrong?

I knew this place so well now

The pain and the defeat...

"But whose keeping me here?

Why not stand up on my feet?

Why not move just a little?

Take just another step

What's the worst that can happen?

Who are they to hold me back?"

One step after another

A day, a week, a month, a year

One step and then another

And now the mountain seemed so near.

Their voices simply faded

Or maybe I blocked them out

Right now it didn't matter

I simply had to mount

. A day, a week, a month, a year

The time has just flown by

I'd never thought I'll get here

That I will reach so high.

They said I couldn't do it.

They said I won't get through.

They said my name was Failure

And fail is what I'll do.

But You knew better, Father

And gave me another name.

And just because You loved me

I'll never be the same.

"Then you will have a new name. The Lord Himself will give you that new name." (Isaiah 62:2)

"I will change your name. You will no longer be called wounded, outcast, lonely or afraid. I will change your name. Your new name shall be Confidence, Joyfulness, Overcoming one, Faithfulness, Friend of God, The one who seeks My Face."

Good days and bad days

Bad things are happening all around me and I have people asking me why are You allowing this?

Why are bad terrible things happening to good faithful people?

I don’t know what to tell them. I am not Your lawyer , I don’t need to justify You. You are the Rock, Your works are perfect and all your ways are just, a faithful God who does no wrong, upright and just You are. (Deuteronomy 32:4, paraphrase). Why would I justify and defend Your works if they are perfect? Who am I to say Your ways are not just? I won’t try to explain and justify Your works as if I would be slightly ashamed of You, just because I do not understand. They hurt, I hurt... but when they ask me where You are when there's hurt the only answer I have is- in the middle of it holding me.

I thought about these things today and a verse from Ecclesiastes 7:14 came to my mind “On a good day enjoy yourself, on a bad day examine your conscience. God arranges for both kinds of days so that we won’t take anything for granted.” (The Message)

So, thank You for my good days and my bad days. My good days remind me how blessed I am. My bad days remind me that I am not alone and that I can always hide my nose in your chest whilst You hold me. Help me not to take either one of these days for granted.

Your daughter.

Debate on Israel and hate

This blog is dedicated to Eden Attias who was 19 years old and was murdered this week. Eden was a soldier and was stabbed to death by another Palestinian 16 years old boy, whilst he was sleeping on the bus.

These are the facts. Now I shall look at them closer. 

Why am I writing a blog about this? Why is this soldier more important than other soldiers killed or injured  in Israel this year? Well, I will admit that just as with Gilad Shalit, who was kidnapped and kept prisoner for 5 years without visitation rights, when I look at Eden's picture all I see are my two yunger brothers.

Secondly, last night whilst browsing on Facebook I noticed a Christian friend of mine posted some news on the work of the Israel field hospital in Philippines with the comment "I can't say I've seen this in the news". Another Christian lady whom I do not personally know posted this as a comment "It is a shame they cannot extend the same compassion and serving attitude to the Palestinians!" I've proceeded to show the said lady only one of the videos on Youtube where Israel is sending trucks of aid to Gaza only to have Palestinians use the building materials to build tunnels through which they smuggle guns and rockets from Egypt and Syria or abduct soldiers such as Gilad Shalit. The lady was not satisfied with my answer (imagine my surprise) and posted this comment " You can't actively discriminate and see yourself in a holy war and justify it! No country including Israel should get away with human rights violations. It is also not in the news about the killing of children and people loosing hope! Having powerful allies is the only reason that Israel is not being universally condemned by the world! My view is as Christians we must speak up for the oppressed and silenced in any country. Palestinians have the same rights as any other person!" 

When I read this I found myself with a dilemma. I mean where do I even begin? Shall I take a lawyer like approach and address each point? Shall I start with who is actively carrying out a "holy war"? Israel never called this a "holy war" they call it survival and a nicely lifted middle finger pointed at all those who dream about pushing them into the sea. My first conversation with every Israeli so far was "we want peace, we had enough of this" Hell, I have a Muslim friend who actively condemns what the Palestinians do http://unitedwithisrael.org/why-a-british-muslim-of-pakistani-origin-defends-israel/

Or shall I point the well intended Christian lady to the 22 UN resolutions against Israel by comparison to the 4 voted against the rest of the world and ask her whether she still stands by her comment that Israel is not condemned by the rest of the world? As some of you know I come from an ex-communist country. One of my pastors had his finger nails pulled out in torture. My mum was not allowed to go University because she was a Christian and my uncle whilst a soldier had a gun pointed to his head by his superior and told to shoot at the people during the Revolution. And these are only people that I know personally. Hundreds of thousand of people were killed in Romania and they conducted scientific experiments on abandoned children. I never personally heard about a UN resolution against Romania. Why not? Why just Israel?

I decided I will shorten my answer and I told the nice lady this: "Well X, this is where you and I are parting ways. I am a Christian girl too, and I absolutely agree that as Christians we must stand against abuses such as the ones you describe above. But before I start throwing stones as Israel and follow the general masses fed by the rubbish in the media, I decided to dig a bit further. It is easy to comment from far away in our cozy homes where we enjoy peace and a cup of tea. But take a look at what Israelis have to put up with. So far, only this year alone over 2,000 rockets were fired from Gaza into Israel destroying people's homes and lives and this is a yearly occurrence  http://www.idfblog.com/.../rocket-attacks-toward-israel/
This week an Israeli 19 years old was stabbed to death in his own country whilst sleeping on the bus by a 16 years old Palestinian who grew up watching this on his TV screen http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YIBNRVgq59Y

I am all for standing up for the oppressed, X. But I want to know first who the oppressed are. Please notice, I did not even make reference so far to what we are told in the Bible. But I can suggest verses such as Isaiah 40:1-2; Jeremiah 33:20-26, or the famous by now Romans 11. Unless you are of the opinion that The Old Testament is not valid anymore and is there only to make our Bibles thicker and make us feel better when we find verses like Jeremiah 29:11."

Nothing breaks my heart like anti-semitism in the church. I used to suffer so much because of it because I was literally broken in two between my two loves- my Christians brothers and Israel. I don't necessarily take it that way anymore. Yes, as Christians we are part of one body, but if I am called to be a hand I will never walk. I will touch. If I was called to be an eye, I will never hear. I will see. I don't have to feel the same way as the rest of my Christian brothers to be one with them (even though the large majority now support Israel). Jesus was a Jew and He still is a Jew. So rather then me being split in two I will leave this task to those who profess they love Jesus, but stand against His nation. All I will do is not keep quiet. For the sake of the millions that died. For the sake of my friend, Michal Reznic, who's grandparents and extended family was killed because Christians kept quiet. I will not shut up for the sake of Eden and his family, for the sake of Gilad and all the other Israelis who suffer. I will not keep quiet because my Father in Heaven commanded me "Comfort, comfort my people. Speak kindly to the people of Jerusalem." (Isaiah 40:1-2 a)

I will speak against the evil and hate indoctrinated into the Palestinian children, whose greatest dream is to become a martyr and take as many Jews as possible with them. Apostle Paul said in Ephesians 6 that "Our fight is not against people on earth. We are fighting against the rulers and authorities and the powers of this world's darkness. We are fighting against the spiritual powers of evil in the unseen world." (Ephesians 6:12)

As Christians, if we wish to fight against evil, we must remember that the worst kind of evil is the unseen one. It is the loss of innocence and destruction of purity. It is hate being pored into the heart of a child who should be playing and laughing, until that hate turns him or her into a murderer at 16. If we wish to stand against something, this is what we should be standing against. I for one will follow the hymn "Though none go with me, still I will follow" because my life will be forever united with Israel. I know no other nation loved by God so desperately and I want to love what He loves.

Children in Israel (the song is Ad Mahar(Until tomorrow) by Eviatar Banai)

אביתר בנאי - עד מחר - קליפ by ahoovati

Palestinian Children TV



As a result of the hate campaign on children, a kid stabs another to death. I am all for protesting when you don't agree with something. But there are other ways to protest as this 16 years old Jewish boy proves.