i can't believe it!

Five years ago about this time, our daughter entered treatment for the second time.  However, this time God was up to something like we never dreamed.  It felt so good to have her pursuing recovery and safe from all the "hell" she was surrounded with.  I am sure at times it didn't feel like hell to her but to us every minute she was "out there" it was hell!

This week the filming of the movie "Renee" began...just part of the story that has been unfolding for the last five years. God is full of grace, I can't explain it in any other terms!

being still

I have been reading a daily devotional titled Jesus Calling by Sarah Young.  Today is about being still in Jesus' presence but it was this sentence that "wowed" me.  "Some of the greatest works in My kingdom have been done from sick beds and prison cells."  It is just like God to show Himself in this kind of paradox.

I have a tendency (strong tendency) to push these quiet times away, "waiting impatiently to be active again."

Lord, please remind me that "in returning and in quietness I will be delivered."  Isa. 30:15

...recognize it (tragedy) as the rule rather than the exception.

I am reading a book by Dan Allender titled to be told.  This sentence really got my attention.  "We begin reading the tragedy of our story when we recognize it as the rule rather than the exception."  I experience this but did not really acknowledge it.  I keep wanting to believe tragedy in our lives is the exception but I can look back over my years and find many places of tragedy of various degrees.

Tragedy shapes our character.  Characters welcome!

the "why" behind the title, i am her father.

Several years ago an effort was made to rescue my daughter from destructive decisions she was making at the time. A small group of her peers went boldly into the night and battled (not physically) with her and those around her to ask her to leave and get treatment.

She did leave...the next day...but was refused entrance to the treatment center.  She had fresh wounds on her arms from cutting and lots of alcohol still in her system.

So this small group decided to be with her 24/7 for the days it took till she would be accepted to treatment.  At the conclusion of those days one of the persons among the group was writing some things about those days that ended up being a story and an international movement.

The story and movement is titled To Write Love On Her Arms.  The "her" in the title is my daughter.  I am "her" father. She has a mother, brother and sister.  She has grandparents, an uncle, aunt, several cousins of various numbers like first, second, third etc. She in fact is now an aunt herself. 

I say this because in her rise to notoriety it could easily be forgotten that she was not just deposited on the earth like an orphan.  Rather she is connected to relationships and family and loved by them all before, during and after all the story is told.