12:17 AM here in Alberta, March 30 - the day of the big march to Israel by those opposed to her existence.  Since the time difference is about 7 hours, it is morning in the land.  I don't know what time the march is to begin, but Israel's IDF and police have been making preparations to protect its citizens and borders, deploying thousands of soldiers and police.
   Arabs living in Israel and Palestinians from the West Bank and Gaza are marking what they call 'Land Day' in protest of what they call 'discriminatory Israeli land policies'.  This year, those from neighboring Arab countries have planned to march near Israel's borders in solidarity with their Palestinian Arab brothers, calling their part in this "Is Israel losing the Temple Mount War?"
     Because the 'peaceful protest' turned deadly last year, Israeli police and military are out in full force to quell any trouble that may arise.  However, they want to keep a low profile as much as possible, but of course they must be available to quell any flare-ups that may occur.  They will do whatever is necessary to protect their citizens.  Roadblocks have been set up at the entrances to major cities
     Apparently, protesters from 82 countries are expected to take part in what they call 'Land Day', to "end the apartheid regime and the ethnic cleansing".
     The whole idea is ridiculous, if it weren't so tragic.  I certainly cannot comprehend such hatred,  such unwillingness to compromise.  The Arabs have thousands of square miles of the Middle East .... but they want that tiny strip of land called Israel as well.  They want Jerusalem, God's holy city.  Indeed, they want the world!
     I pray for a peaceful demonstration.  I pray that no one is hurt or - worse - killed, on either side of the conflict.  I pray for a peaceful resolution to the whole situation in the Middle East and the world, for that matter!    But I don't expect real peace .... not until the Prince of Peace returns.
     My heart is heavy tonight, when I think of what is happening perhaps at this very moment in Israel.
     Passover is only a week away .... a time of looking back to the historical freedom from slavery in Egypt, when the Jewish people were saved from the Angel of Death by following the instructions God gave to Moses - for each family to sacrifice a spotless lamb, and put its blood on the doorposts and lintels of their houses, so that when  the Angel of Death came and saw the blood, he passed over their houses and spared them, but killed the firstborn in all the houses of Egypt.  That's what it took for Pharaoh to finally agree to Moses' plea to "Let my people go!"
     However, Passover is a celebration of freedom, and believers today can celebrate, because our perfect Lamb of God, Yeshua our Messiah, shed His blood at that Passover long ago to cover our sins - He paid the price for us!  As the Bible tells us, without the shedding of blood, there is no remission of sin.
     Thank You, Yeshua, for laying down Your life for us!

Wisdom from the Torah

I was reading a commentary this morning on this week's Torah portion, particularly Exodus 31:2-3:  "See, I have chosen Bezalel son of Uri, the son of Hur, of the tribe of Judah, and I have filled him with the Spirit of God [Ruach Elohim], with skill, ability, and knowledge in all kinds of crafts."


Bezalel had been selected by God in a special calling to be in charge of the construction of the Mishkan, for all the furnishings of the Tabernacle, the priests' vestments, the anointing oil, and the incense.  God had given him great artistic abilities, so he could carry out God's mandate for him.

The name of Bezalel has great meaning attached to it.  It comes from a combination of three Hebrew words:  be (in), tzel (shade), and El (God).  This can be translated as "in the shadow of God", a secret, special place of refuge.  Psalm 91:1 tells us:  "He who dwells in the shelter of the Most High [Elyon] will rest in the shadow [tzel] of the Almighty [El Shaddai].


This name, Bezalel, was given to the first artisan mentioned in the Bible.  Names are important throughout God's word.  This man, chosen by God to be the artisan in charge of all the furnishings of the Tabernacle, was given this gift of 'artistry' in order to give glory to the Most High through the temple furnishings and instruments. With such an important mandate, Bezalel would have used the greatest care in designing and building these things in order to bring glory to God.

This suggests that there is something about the use of  whatever measure of creativity that God gives us which can be used as an act of worship, to bring glory to God, our Father and Creator.  The commentary, by a writer from Bibles for Israel, suggests that we allow this explanation to "inspire us to let our creativity flow and no longer consider creative endeavors 'non-productive' and a waste of time."

A very timely word indeed!  May it encourage all of us who have been given a measure of creativity, regardless of its size, to use it as an act of worship to our wonderful, holy Creator!

Another Hobby .....?

     My daughter sent me some info regarding Altered Books, a subject I had heard of, was rather curious about, but had never really checked it out.  Until today.  I think I'm going to like it.
     I need another hobby like I need a hole in the head!  But hey, that's what 'creative' people do, right?  We create.  And a new way of doing so is always fun.  The trick is to find the time to 'do' all these different projects.  I'm good at starting .... but it sometimes takes me awhile to finish it!
     After I returned from my trip to Israel a few years ago (is it that long ago already???) I began a series of watercolours of different photos I had taken, thinking I'd like to do a calendar with them.  But I have yet to complete twelve watercolours in order to complete this project.  I think I have four done!



     It was put on hold while I wrote a book (GRAFTED IN), which is now completed, published, and available.
     A couple of years ago I was given a gift of a beautiful hand-made leather-bound book from Italy.  As it is definitely too beautiful to simply use as a journal, I began doing colourful calligraphy of Bible verses on its pages.  I have enjoyed this project, but have not yet filled the book.  One day I'll get back to it.  I do enjoy it, and am fairly pleased with the results.

     Another project I've been working on off and on is entering favourite quotes in another special book which has a wooden cover with leather binding - again, a book too beautiful to use as a simple journal.
     I also scrapbook.  The very first one I ever did was for my Dad's 90th birthday.  It was originally all in one volume, but it was so thick and unwieldy that it broke, so I have since put it into two separate volumes:  one of Dad's life, and the other of his kids and our families.  Since Dad passed away a few years ago, this special book is now in my possession.

     Right from the start I loved scrapbooking!  There is so much a person can do with all the embellishments, fancy papers, fabric, ribbons, buttons ..... and of course, pictures!  But a scrapbook is SO much more than a book of pictures!  It is a work of art which tells a story.
      Once Dad's book was done, I started working on an 8X8 one for myself.  That was fun.  It briefly tells my story.  I remember that the very first page I worked on was 'My Favourite Things', which I had begun listing long before I ever actually began work on the book itself.  I had printed each 'thing' on several different coloured strips of paper, then put them together - it was sort of like a puzzle, trying to figure out what fit where on the page.
     And now I have Altered Books to play around with!  I'm presently working on a couple of pages.  I'll have to post them the next time I write about my 'projects'.

It's Been Awhile

Life can definitely get busy!  Sometimes it feels like I'm trying to run in several directions at once, with this to do ... that to finish ... oh, and I must get to that too!  Can anyone relate?

It's my own fault.  That wonderful word - procrastination!  "Why do today what can be put off until tomorrow?"  The problem with that is that I suddenly find myself with a 'to do' list as long as my arm and the deadline is just around the corner!  And I feel overwhelmed.  Why do I do this to myself?

Part of my problem - besides just not getting at the job at hand - is that I have a hard time saying "No" when someone asks me to do something.  Always willing to lend a hand .... well, not always .... but definitely often.  I like to do things for people.  I like to help out in a situation, especially if it has something to do with creativity, like making cards for people, or scrapbooking .... or singing.  Not that I have a great voice.  I don't.  But I can carry a tune.

However, it's the P word that causes me the problems - PROCRASTINATION!  "Don't do today what can be put off until tomorrow" .... or the next day ... or next week!  And then the crunch comes, and I realize I have six things to do by Wednesday or something!

Another 'turn of phrase' I use too often is "One of these days ....".  One of these days I'm going to re-sew the braided rug that my mother made many years ago out of my Dad's old suit pants.  It's a beautiful rug, but the stitching where the braids were sewn together is coming undone as a result of me throwing it in the washer.  Well, it needed to be washed!  But now it's coming apart, and needs to be sewn together.  And believe me, 'one of these days' I'm going to get around to doing it!

Believe it or not, I do get things done - eventually.  If I have a deadline, I meet that deadline.  However, if there is no deadline ... well, I get around to it eventually.  I love retirement!  I love the freedom it gives me.  I love the different types of things I've been able to do.  I've been able to write a book.  I've been able to paint, although I haven't done any paintings for the last couple of years - too busy with my book.  However, now that my book is out, it's not quite as time-consuming.  No more editing.  Just interviews and signings, initially.

Life is good!  I just have to get a handle on this procrastination so that I'm not always doing things just 'under the wire'.  Time management!  That's what I need!  I'll have to look into that .... one of these days!

It's That Time of Year

Nearly Christmas.  I have a hard time with Christmas, because I know this is not the time that Jesus was born.  I know how this date was chosen, so many years ago, by a Roman Emperor, to coincide with a pagan god, Tammuz.  I know, from reading Ezekiel Chapter 8, that God was not happy about the women weeping for Tammuz, when the Spirit took Ezekiel to the temple in Jerusalem to show him the abominations that were taking place there.

The Church celebrates Jesus' birth on December 25th, but that is not the day He was born.  From research I have done, I have discovered that Jesus is the fulfillment of all the Feasts of the Lord as presented in the Book of Leviticus.  When I was doing a word study years ago on the word 'tabernacle' in Hebrew and Greek, Holy Spirit dropped these words into my mind and heart:  "And the Word was made flesh and dwelt (tabernacled) among us."  I knew then that Jesus was born in the fall, during the Feast of Tabernacles. Now, many years later, I have discovered that Messianic Jewish believers also believe that Yeshua (Jesus) was born during the Feast of Tabernacles.

Usually, when I mention the feasts to my Christian friends, they respond with, "You mean the Jewish feasts?"  Yes, God gave the feasts to His Jewish people, but He calls them His Feasts - the Feasts of the Lord.  As believers, they are our Feasts too.  However, the Church has become so far removed from her Jewish roots through the teaching of Replacement Theology and Dual Covenant Theology that she no longer obtains nourishment from those roots.

Today, Christmas has become a worldly holiday.  North Americans love their Christmas celebrations!  It has become the greatest retail season of the year!  Ka-ching ka-ching!!  Cash registers raking it in, people standing in long lines to buy the latest gadgets and brightest glitz, fighting the crowds.  If 'Christmas' was truly a 'Christian' celebration, would the world be so intent on celebrating it?  I think not!

Christmas trees - pagan in origin;  Santa Claus - a lie we propagate to our children.  All the lights, the parties, the glitz and glamour, the shopping frenzy .... the drinking, the accidents .... most people who celebrate Christmas are certainly not celebrating Jesus' birth!  Why does the Church turn a deaf ear on history?  Most people don't even think about the history of it.  They celebrate it "because we've always done it this way!"  That reminds me of the story of the woman who always cut the ends off her roast before putting it in the pan.  When asked why, she said her mother had always done it that way.  When she asked her mother about it, her mother told her that usually the roast was too big for the pan, so she had to cut some off so that it would fit!

Yes, Christmas is often a wonderful family time.  But so could it be if we forsook our 'traditions' and celebrated Jesus' birth during the time it actually took place - during the Feast of Tabernacles, in the fall.  Make it a true celebration of Jesus' birth!

Call me a 'grinch' if you like, but I really don't like 'Christmas'.

A Long and Winding Road

The title above indicates that I have not always been the person I am becoming. There were many hard lessons I had to learn in my quest.  However, if that's what it took to get me to where I am today, it was worth it.

To begin with, I have always believed in God, even though I did not always follow Him.  I was brought up in the Catholic Church, and even as a child I was full of questions.  When I was four years old, sitting beside Mom in church on Sundays, when I saw people going to the front for Communion, in my child's mind I thought they were going to 'get a piece of God', and I wanted to go and get a 'piece of God' as well.  However, I was told I was too young, and could not do so.

When I was five, I was allowed to go and sit in the front pew with the other little girls, and - you guessed it - I went up to 'get a piece of God'.  Well!  The ruckus that caused!  I was told I was a bad girl because I had not made my 'First Holy Communion', and promptly was put in the kindergarten class with the 6-year-olds to prepare for that event.

Kindergarten had a lasting impression on me because of a story a nun told us one Sunday.  The story was about some martyrs who would not deny their faith and were killed by having their tongues nailed to a table.  That horrified and frightened me, and I just knew I could never love God enough to ever let anyone do that to me!  So of course, I felt guilty.

Guilt is a terrible emotion.  It eats away at you from the inside.  I didn't know how to make it go away.  I went to confession every week, and did my 'penance' of whatever prayers the priest told me to say .... but my guilt remained.  Sometimes I put pebbles in my shoes to show God that I really did love Him.  I would look up at the huge crucifix at the front of the church, seeing Jesus hanging on the cross with drops of blood across His brow, at His side, and His hands and His feet ...... and I knew my sins put Him there, but I didn't know what to do about it.  I could find no answers.

Eventually I left the Church, having become very disillusioned.  I figured if the 'truth' I was searching for wasn't in the church, then maybe it was in the world.  I searched for truth, reading psychology and philosophy books, and New Age stuff .... and each time ended up with the proverbial 'sand in my mouth'.

I had begun drinking at university, and discovered that when I drank I didn't know when to stop.  I had blackouts from the first.  But it took me a lot of years to realize and admit that I was alcoholic.  I was married with three kids, divorced and remarried before I finally found sobriety in AA.  Thank God for AA!
And thank God for my sponsor!  She was wonderful.  The first thing she told me was to ask God for help in the morning, and to thank Him at night.  This I did.  I began having a 'quiet time' in the morning before going to work - a time with God.  I read spiritual books.

I began to ask God to show me His truth.  I told Him I didn't want a church's truth, I wanted His truth.  After about a year of asking Him for His truth, Jesus spoke out loud to me, and said, "I am the way, the truth and the life.  No one comes to the Father but by Me," and, not as loud or clear, He said something about "the Father draw Him."

I did have a Bible by this time, and I took it from the shelf, held it in my hand, and said, "If You want me to read those words, You'll have to show me where they are, because I don't have a clue where to look."  Then I let the Bible fall open, and my eyes landed on the first words Jesus had spoken.  I flipped some pages once with my finger, several pages moved, and my eyes landed on the words, "No one can come to Me unless the Father draws Him."  I was overwhelmed!  That Jesus would speak out loud to me!  I was such a sinner!

That was close to thirty years ago.  Believe me, it changed my life!  That is not to say I immediately changed.   For me, it took time.  A friend had told me that when I read the Bible, to ask the Holy Spirit to show me His truth, and that I did.  I studied the Bible for several years, and every time that I watched Billy Graham on TV and he gave an altar call, I would ask Jesus to be my Lord and Savior.

Finally, I was ready to be baptized.  I went to a Baptist church a few times, and finally spoke to the pastor and told him I wanted to be baptized.  He and his wife came over to my apartment one evening, and after some discussion, he agreed to baptize me.  We set a date.

The big morning arrived, and the pastor's wife phoned and told me I might want to reschedule my baptism, because the hot water heater had quit working overnight, and there was no hot water.  But I told her I didn't want to reschedule, I wanted to be baptized.

Let me tell you, that water was COLD!  But I was baptized!

Since that day my life has changed dramatically.  Somehow I began to change 'from the inside out'.  It wasn't so much that I was making conscious decisions to change, but rather that Holy Spirit was changing me.

Today, twenty-some years later, I'm a different person than I used to be!  Glory to God!  It's all about Him, Father, Son Jesus, and Holy Spirit.  Three aspects or Persons in one God.  He changed me, and continues to change me!  Oh, how He loves us!  He loves us enough to change us and move us out of our misery and striving to a place of peace and joy.

Yes, it has been a long and winding road .... but what a ride!  The excitement continues!

Procrastination

Procrastination - the 'art' of putting off today that which can wait until tomorrow.  That's my definition, and unfortunately, I'm very good at it.  Sometimes things get put off indefinitely, in which case it either doesn't get done at all, or else I'm scrambling at the last minute to get it done!

I can sometimes come up with a lame-sounding excuse for not just doing a task:  I don't feel motivated at the moment;  I'm tired;  I don't feel creative ..... the list could probably go on.  However, in all honesty I have to admit it comes down to laziness, which is not a characteristic I'm at all proud of!

I have been procrastinating about blogging, simply because I don't know what I should write about most of the time.  How personal should I get?  Most of the things I am passionate about revolve around God's truth, especially with regard to Israel and the Church, and I confess I become frustrated when Christians look at me like I've gone off my rocker when I mention the Feasts or our Jewish roots, thanks to centuries of Replacement Theology, as well as Dual Covenant Theology.

My desk area needs an overhaul, and I've also been procrastinating about that.  Papers and books, slips of paper with 'notes to myself' ..... It would be wonderful to be highly organized at all times, but I'm ... NOT, unfortunately!  It would be wonderful to have a nice-sized office with enough shelves and filing cabinets for all my books and papers.  However, that isn't going to happen.  Instead, my 'office' is part of my bedroom, and I'm a big fan of books, which overflow my bookshelves.  I do have a filing cabinet, in which I do file my paid bills ..... but I also have all these little 'notes to myself' and interesting quotes I jot down on a slip of paper, to be added to my book of quotes at some point in the future, as well as sticky notes regarding upcoming appointments or someone's phone number stuck to the hutch of my desk.  How did I ever get a book written?  It boggles my mind!

I've been procrastinating all day about a card I was asked to make for a friend.  I made one a few days ago which turned out very well - in fact, I really liked it.  Maybe I'm just not feeling 'creative' today ....waiting till my 'creative juices' get flowing again .... or maybe I'm just procrastinating...... after all it doesn't have to be done until Tuesday!  I still have tomorrow!

I really admire people who can see what needs to be done, roll up their sleeves and jump right in!  Most of the time.  At other times all that energy I see just makes me tired, and I think, "Chill out;  take a break."

And at other times still .... I wish I had that energy and motivation I see in others.

Maybe tomorrow .......