Terribly Interesting

I long to prevail upon you...to rush over you with crashing wave after powerful, crashing wave. I want to spread out my desire before you. Stop moving. Come away with Me. Share my hunger. Do you not discern my great longing for you? Have I not made Myself open enough to you? Every obstacle you set up to Me, I tear down. Stop building the walls. They are a joke against my desire for you. My desire for you is fierce and powerful beyond your comprehension. Let Me love you. Let Me heal you. Let me saturate you in an anointing that will drip love off your entire being. I am here waiting to answer you. I am here waiting to do the very thing you have asked Me to do. Lay down. Rest. Let Me do the thing. "My sheep listen to my voice; I know them, and they follow me."  -John 10:27 To read more about this segment, see this post . ©stephaniecherry.com

Debbie's book about intercession was refreshing to the spirit and wise beyond literary comprehension. Each page told of amazing missionary journeys and deep spiritual insight. I found so much peace  reading through the pages and being drawn into the heart of God. It was a nice change of pace to see a book about prayer that isn't about getting something or having someone else become the person that you desire them to be. This book is simply about having a heart for the things that God desires. It is about meditating on His word and His work. There is an intimacy that God desires to have with us. He longs to have us not only come to Him for our needs, but also listen to Him as He shares His desire for the nations.  I love the line that says "if we know how to worry, we know how to meditate." We simply must train our minds away from fleshly pursuit to thinking of God's radical provision. Allow yourself to be led chapter by chapter through exercises in letting go a...

A recent edition of Waco Today featured David Crowder's six year renovation project(we had to go check it out). I said a quiet prayer that God would let our house be completed before six years was up for us and then I dove in to the details. David and his wife bought the home of the man who invented Dr. Pepper. It is encouraging to see something that took so much effort and energy come to completion. May we soon see the same thing. You can read the story of the Crowder renovation here .

Recently, our friend Ben came to get some rest and relaxation here at Gomer's House. I think the fact that we had to go downstairs to brush our teeth made him sad. He devoted way too much time to helping us rerun some pipe and installing this vanity. I think it took 14 trips to several hardware stores and a night of being up til 2:45 to get this sink up and running, but run she does. We brush our teeth with joy!! Thanks, Ben. Many blessings upon you. Did I tell you that Denbigh sang all of Carly Simon's  You're So Vain to me at Lowe's when we bought this vanity?  Now, we are waiting for our antique frame to be fitted with a mirror from Ziegler glass and to keep working on the tub. Stay tuned. ©stephaniecherry.com

  I saw Eat, Pray, Love . I had thumbed through the book and found myself disturbed by the author telling her readers that every religion had their own version of the Holy Spirit and that we are all our own god, but I gave it the benefit of the doubt. There was a part of me that was hoping this woman would actually find something and it might turn out to be more like Under the Tuscan Sun. I was sadly mistaken. Oh, I get it. She supposedly learned to love and be loved. The parts I find so ironic are the fact that none of the things she was seeking out seemed to work for her.  She fell asleep meditating and laughed as the medicine man told each person the same thing. It was a revelation that these things were not a cure. One man in the movie had been seeking healing at the ashram for a long time and was still left desperately hungry for it. The thing that seemed to help this woman learn to love was being confronted by others about her actions and fears. Mysticism did not hea...

I have written poetry for you. I have calmed the sea and I have stirred it up. I have waited patiently for you to notice. Look for Me, beloved. It is time for the entering of a new season. Release yourself to me as we move into a new way of life. Linger in My healing. Sit and breathe. I want to give you something unheard of before now. I desire to taste this life with you. Don't exclude Me. I yearn for you. You belong to Me.  Drink Me in.  "and make straight paths for your feet, so that the limb that is lame may not be put out of joint, but rather healed." -Hebrews 12:13 For more on this segment, see this post . ©stephaniecherry.com

"A writer is someone on whom nothing is lost." -Henry James Anne Lamont has given us one of the most witty and insightful books on writing that I have ever encountered. I found myself underlining most of the book as I gleaned how to write and how to live. One of the portions that spoke to me was about learning character development. You cannot write a character into a plot. You must let the character develop into a plot and see where it takes you. This advice is for writing fiction, but I saw it as good real life admonition. We often try to fit others into the plot or role we desire for our lives instead of encouraging and allowing those in our lives to develop naturally and fluidly. Embrace the character.  The title of the book came from her father giving her brother advice on a report that was due the next day (one he had not even started). He was so overwhelmed by the many birds he had to discuss that he could not even begin to write. His father told him to relax and...

I think I felt trapped in myself for much of my growing up. It was like an episode of HGTV's Designed To Sell where people live in cluttered, run down houses that could be easily fixed. They live that way until their house won't sell and they need help. The disrepair that these people were satisfied to live in is evaluated and eliminated. This overhaul took a matter of hours and a few extra hands. Hours and hands. I don't want to stay there. I don't want to live in a run down house that I can't even sell to people who don't have good taste. I want to do the work. I want the story to develop. Several years ago, people in my life started dying. Losing brothers, babies, and grandparents is something that makes you evaluate your life. I noticed something in each of them that I was so impacted by: Passion. This started a whirlwind season in my life where I began yearning to write a better story. My grandfather's paintings hung outside of the oval office, but tha...

We were privileged to spend some time with a couple who lived in our house for almost 40 years. He was a writer and PhD in counseling and she was a painter. One of the funny things that came up during our conversation was the bathtub. She said she had painted it pink on a whim and she was sorry. I laughed because I had, a few days before, said to Denbigh , "I wonder who thought that would be a good idea." In a recent edition of a home restoration magazine, there was an article on redoing the outside of your cast iron tub. It sparked Denbigh to start sanding it down so we could repaint it. After this you prime with Rustoleum primer and paint. It costs about fifty-five dollars. I am looking for a soft blue, like sea glass to paint it. I am sure you will see it come to fruition in the coming weeks. Thanks for keeping up with our progress. ©stephaniecherry.com

I am just going to be completely honest. I feel like I am not supposed to talk about the deep hurt that I have recently been walking through or the years of emotional abuse in church that led up to it, but I know God cannot be glorified in me feeling shamed for the actions of others. I have to let them own those and I have to take ownership of the healing and ministry that comes from it. When God gave us the vision to prepare a respite for those wounded in the church, I thought I had enough empathy at the time to understand. It seems laughable now. I cannot tell you how many times I have wept with God over heinous things those who claimed to be serving Him did in His Name. Over the course of the last few months, I was reminded time and time again that people who work in ministry desperately need to be reminded that God in heaven loves them. I begged God to let me help Him remind them. We all need to be reminded that no matter how others treat us, we are tenderly loved by our Father. I ...

I created this day for you. Look at what I have done. The brilliance of it is a gift. Slowly drink it in. Engage is the beauty and the grace this moment offers you. Listen. I want to be with you and hold you. I want to share the splendor and divinity that are locked in each second. Don't miss it. Don't miss Me. I am the Rose of Sharon . With great delicacy I have begun to unfold Myself before you. Remove the distractions of this life. Bring the cup to your mouth. Drink. Indulge. Feel the warmth of the sun on your face. Look up to see the canvas I have laid out before you. The glow of morning was made for you. Every hue was hand painted to delight you. Take delight, dear one. Rest in the colors of my love. Breathe. Like a child emerging from it's mother, let the air fill your lungs. Scream. Feel. Live. This is not a life I designed for you to live by rote. I have created a unique sensory experience for you.  Awaken your senses. Come awake. "Arise, shine, for your l...

I believe I paid under a dollar for this book. It is only 35 pages long. Though cheap and short, it addresses the love we should have for one another in John 13 in the most comprehensive and intelligible way I have ever seen. Francis minces no words. He boldly addresses our need to weigh if those who claim to be in the faith truly are. One who is a false brother or a "Christian" by religious affiliation only cannot receive the Spirit love that we are endowed to give one another. The love between true Christians is a unique gift that we are only able to give and receive because the Spirit within us enables us to do so. If we are in Christ and refuse to give this love to a fellow believer, the world has every right to judge us as not being in Christ. To not love is to refuse His mark. John 17:21 tells us that we should be one as Christ and the Father are one. To refuse to be unified as one tells the world a deep message according to this verse. It tells the watching world t...

Denbigh whisked me away to Salado to celebrate our anniversary. We slept at the cottage on the property on at the Inn at Salado Creek . I loved it. For the cost of your average hotel room we spent the night in a quaint cottage with two big rooms and two baths...complete with jacuzzi tub. I highly recommend it. The location is perfect. It is located right on Main Street within walking distance of all the shops, restaurants, and the creek. We took in the annual art fair, indulged in food, and shopped (my fave is Splendors ) til we dropped.  Check out Salado . We would love to this around the tree in our backyard. ©stephaniecherry.com

Dear friends, this is my dream sink . I am completely enamored with it. I want to buy it and remodel the kitchen around it. I am in love. I have this thing for copper. It's 859 dollars. That's way out of my budget for remodel, but that's because there really isn't a budget. We just pray for things and God is gracious enough to answer us. If you saw my current sink or my current kitchen, you would pray for this sink as well. My kitchen is frightening (except for my lovely stove). We don't even have a floor anymore. All the cabinets need to be ripped out. It's a disaster area. Much like some of our lives, I would say. So, I am praying that all the lives that come here have their old ugly stuff ripped out and they find it replaced by the exquisite garment of praise. May that be physically manifest in my kitchen with my dream sink. Amen. 

I absolutely loved this. Sweet Pea Beauty is the first movie geared just for girls from Veggie Tales. It gains it's insight into true beauty from the book of Proverbs. See more info on CrossWalk . ©stephaniecherry.com

I want to provide for you. I want to teach you to love your children, your family, your husband in such a way that it seems decadent to others. Don't try to figure it out. Let me work.  I know it is hard for you to hear me tell you that you are beautiful. Listen. Embrace this truth and stop being afraid to let the world see what I have been quietly working on. It is time to come out of your cocoon. Exposing loveliness makes you very vulnerable. People will refuse to see. People will try to mar your beauty, but there is beauty in that. It exposes their own fears and I can offer them healing. It's not personal. It is a divine story board. Let Me tell your story. Stories are so much better told through the eyes of a lover. ©stephaniecherry.com For more on this weekly segment, see this post .

Warren's book was a nice break from mainstream Christian books. There was no formula for success. There was no grand vision or theory on how to do something. This book is full of good old fashioned wisdom that was given by God. I truly enjoyed revisiting Proverbs in an easy paced, direct look. The stories to go with each Proverb were full of wisdom of their own. How often we stray from the simple truths of God to attempt to find complicated solutions. These solutions end up simply being a bandaid on an open wound. Proverbs invites us to remember that the lucid gems given to us can impact every area of our lives. Pursue righteousness, love your wife, and be kind. These words could transform our every day life. This would be a great daily devotional book to do each day. A proverb a day. You could follow it with this  Journible . This book was provided by Warren Baldwin for review. Thank you, Warren. ©stephaniecherry.com

If you are looking for an excellent date place, Jack Allen's is a hot spot. It's rustic elegance makes it a perfect Texas experience. Sitting under the covered patio was quite comfortable, even in July. The service was befitting the atmosphere of laid back hospitality. All around, it was exquisite.  Now, what you really want to know. What did I eat?  Chicken Nachitos Slow roasted chicken, black beans, American cheese, cotija cheese and house pickled jalapeno. The black beans and cotija cheese  on these made me melt. 13 Spiced Chicken Pasta Red pepper linguini, spinach linguini, fresh jalapenos, chipotle cream and cotija cheese. The pasta was perfectly spiced and the raw jalapenos were divine. Dive in if you like a little spice. Lastly, I had a chocolate mousse topped with ganache and garnished with a slim praline. It would be worth going for all on it's own. Fabulous. Oh my! I will be seeing you again, Jack Allen . ©stephaniecherry.com