Free Write Friday – Via Our Homeschooler

I love Free Write Friday (FWF) and have not done it in a while!  Kellie Elmore is an amazing writer and has a weekly writing tool for those that want to have as much fun as she does. Each week it is a different prompt and this week it is this…

This house has a story…what is it?

Image Credit: We Heart It

Our daughter saw the prompt this time and wanted to write something.  We are a homeschool family and love any new challenges she is willing to take.  So I told her if she did it, I would post it.  She wrote this in 20 minutes. So here is my 9 year old daughters take on this old house.  Thanks Kellie for inspiring even our daughter!  She hopes to have a book published soon (she has written several chapter books) and it makes this mom’s heart glad.

A  Magical Thing

Cloe and Justen jumped into the magic tree house and they sat down and waited for their next mission.  The tree house started to spin and it shook then everything went black!  Finally the black faded off and there was light.  The tree house stop spinning and shaking

Justen and Cloe climbed out.  The magic tree house disappeared.  Justen and Cloe looked around and there was a white house that was a little broken down.

“Does anybody live here?” Cloe asked.

“I don’t know but maybe that’s what we’re here for.  We are detectives you know?” Justen replied.  They climbed over the fence and hid behind a tree.  “Let’s sneak inside and find out if anyone lives here,” Justen said.  “Well,…ok.” Cloe replied.

They snuck up to the porch and Cloe looked in the window but it was too dark to see inside.  Justen creaked open the door, the wind blew and it was a little scary but Cloe and Justen kept going and went inside.  “It looks more beat down in here, “ Justen whispered. “Yeah,” Cloe replied.

They looked around and a sound came from upstairs, it sounded like a knock. “Knock, Knock!”   The sound came. “Hey, Cloe did you hear the knock.  Let’s go see what it is,” Justen said as he pulled out his flashlight and turned it on.  All that came from Cloe was a nod.  So they snuck upstairs.  There was  a long hallway and they walked down it.  At the end of the hall was door with a poster hanging on it.  The poster was so thick that it sounded like a rock banging up against the door in the wind.  Cloe and Justen walked up to it and held their flashlight to it.

It said, “Gold! Don’t come in! Gold!”  Cloe and Justen almost screamed at the same time, they opened the door.  There was a chest with a key laying on top of it.  Cloe and Justen grabbed it together and unlocked the chest.  The chest was full of gold.

Justen and Cloe’s eye’s were wide, they were speechless.  The room started to glow and a man walked in from the light and said, “I’m am awarding you with this gold.  You are one of my helpers, but I warn you.  Use it wisely,…”  He stopped for a minute then said, “I love you!”

The room glowed again and he was gone.  Cloe squealed.  They carried the chest outside, the magic tree house appeared.  They put the chest in and climbed in it.  And as the tree house started to leave, they saw the same man standing next to the house smiling.  They waved to him and he waved back.

~Muppin Schutter ©March 2014

Blood Moon

“THE SUN WILL BE TURNED INTO DARKNESS AND THE MOON INTO BLOOD, BEFORE THE GREAT AND GLORIOUS DAY OF THE LORD SHALL COME.”
Acts 2:20

Photo Credit: VegaStar Carpentier Website – http://www.space.com/18307-blood-red-hunters-moon-photo.html

There is so much today that would break my heart if I would let it.  So much suffering that on some levels there would seem to be no god at all, especially not a holy God above us.  But then you glimpse the tiny little things that cause you to wonder and ask… “Was that god?”

There are so many things that would drown out the voice of Him who calls our names that we are in danger at all times of not hearing a word He says, not seeing the miracles He performs, not feeling the love that He pours out.  The evil is growing, it is prowling and growling and stalking it’s prey… you… me… all of us.  If he could only get us to doubt that what we hear isn’t really God, or what we saw wasn’t really a miracle, then he has us.  If he can get us to shed our own blood, ruin our own lives, sacrifice our own beliefs, then we are truly his slave.

He tried to destroy our protector 2000 years ago and in the moment that he thought he won he was fully defeated and it angered him so deeply that his sole desire is to tear each of us into terrible tiny useless and ineffective little pieces.  We are the hated, despised, loathed and we have become the hunted.  We are the prey.

The blood moon is coming and as it makes its way the enemy of our soul will stop at nothing to make us believe a little less, pray with less passion, seek rarely and love conditionally… all only shadows of the real power He has given us.  If he can do those things, though we “may” be saved our treasure will be small because we were not a true light in the darkness of this world.  We were too busy listening to him who binds our minds to hear Him who frees all of us if given the chance.

How will He find you on that great and glorious day?

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This was written for Free Write Friday from the image prompt  above using what is called stream of consciousness writing, no editing, no proofing just writing! Please check out Kellie Elmore’s official site or click on the Free Write Friday Image for more information.

Post your submission with a comment and link to your blog on Kellie’s blog, post on twitter with the hashtag #FWF, Facebook and join the fun!

 

The Agenda

Most of us spend our lives in this country free.  Of course we have jobs to go to, commitments we need to adhere to and there is always someone to answer to.  But for the most part we live life in the “Land of the Free and Home of the Brave.”

My question for you though is, are you really free?  I know most of us have been brave because of the way this world is today you have to be. There is murder, rape, abuse, slavery, drug abuse, hatred, and war.  There are lairs, thieves, adulterers, gossipers and those that just care nothing of anyone else unless it fits into their agenda.  Of course the agenda.  Whose? The world’s!  If you aren’t busy and aren’t making sure every moment is filled to the brim, there is something wrong with you.  The world makes sure you are so busy that you stop hearing that voice inside of you that screams RUN! Run away, hide… rest in Me! So on some level we all have to be brave.

But freedom, that is another question.  Am I free?  In my country I am free.  In my home I am free.  In Christ I am free.  In my mind however, I am a slave to fear and worry and the agenda… whether the world’s or my own.

We spend so much of our time worrying about what might happen that we never let ourselves rest long enough to hear how He wants to help us.  We are bound by our own prison walls. Does He want us to pack our bags, pick up and run away leaving everyone behind?  For most of us no, He wants us to run to our prayer closets and hide there resting in Him!  We hear things from every side of us.  Newspapers (mostly online now 😉 ), television, the internet, phones, iPads and people all around jockey for position to tell us what we should think, believe, and do.  It is simply overwhelming.

He wants our lives to be so much simpler, so much more peaceful, without a lot of other voices in our heads that want nothing more than to knock us down so they can be elevated and made king of our lives.

The picture above is perfect because it shows simply what I want to do most days.  I want to pack my bags and leave now, leave to a simpler life, one of joy and peace.  Some days I never want to see another living soul and others I know I would die without those I love.  But always I am wanting something simpler.  Sometimes I wonder if the Amish have it right and the rest of us have lost our minds, though deep down I know that just because their lives are lived differently, they have the same demand on their lives from their community that would threaten to drown out the voice of God.

As I sit here and pour my thoughts out onto this page God speaks to me and calms my heart.  He tells me not to leave as the man in the above picture… with his suitcase in hand.  But to run to Him with nothing in hand!  He wants me to let the Holy Spirit provide for my every need and and for me to let Him comfort me.  Jesus already paved the way for me, all I have to do is accept His road and let the Holy Spirit do all the work that I seem to get frustrated with.

What a gift the Holy Spirit is, the Comforter, the Helper, the Healer!  I am so blessed and most of the time I do not see it, do not feel it, and do not even want to recognize it.  But today I do.  And today I run helplessly into the hands of the Holy Spirit and let Him decide what I do next and let Him worry about how it will get done.  Today  I will just keep my eyes fixed on Jesus and that is all I have to do.  That is freedom, simply and fully.

Are you free?  Or are you still bound?

The above was written as part of the Free Write Friday prompt by Kellie Elmore.  Click on the picture below to be part of it too!  Blessings!

Negativity

What negativity do you let into your life?  Crazy isn’t it?.. How we don’t even notice it, but before long we are swimming in negativity and sometimes even drowning.  Like the proverbial frog in the pot of boiling water.  We don’t know what has hit us until it is too late.

For me it is all about image.  How do I look?  I have hated how I look since I was a small child and the scary thing is when I look at my photos from then, I was a beautiful young girl with absolutely nothing wrong with me.  I wasn’t overweight nor did I have any other issues that would cause me to stand out or think I look terrible. But I hated how I looked none-the-less.

Today I struggle with my weight and other health issues and I am working hard to remedy that.  I am doing CrossFit and eating healthier but what I lack is self confidence and a belief that God can truly help me through what I am dealing with.  I have thyroid issues and pain issues and just plain self hate issues.  God can deal with those and heal them if I “let” Him, but I let my negativity over how I look and feel now overwhelm and even kill how I will look and feel in the future.

I truly need to remove the negativity and completely replace it with God’s truth and that is that I am wonderfully and beautifully made and that God created me for a purpose, and part of that purpose is to be healed and lead others down that same path through my story and my faith.

Not as easy as it sounds, but with His help… I believe it is something that will truly come to pass.  What negativity are you holding on to?  How does it affect your life?  Are you still above water, or are you sinking?

This was written from a prompt from Free Write Friday.  The topic was the picture that is shown above.  To join the writing prompt click the button below and it will take you to Free Write Friday’s page.

Keepsakes

Kellie Elmore has a wonderful little thing she does each Friday called Free Write Friday and each week she comes up with amazing prompts.  This week her prompt is “Keepsakes”.  What is the one special item that we have and what does it mean to us?  Or maybe our keepsake is a memory or a special moment in time we will never forget.

~Monkey~

It was difficult for me to think of my special keepsake at first.  I have lots of things that mean something to me but nothing really that was coming to the front of my mind. Then I thought of my daughters little monkey.  We got Monkey (monkey’s official name) in September 2004, two months before my daughter was due.  We were on an early anniversary trip to the coast because my doc didn’t want me that far away from home so close to my due date.  It was an amazing trip and that is where we saw this little monkey in one of the toy stores and knew we had to have it.  It was so small and cuddly that it would be perfect for her to love on while she was little.

My pregnancy was not easy to say the least.  It took a long time to get pregnant and we thought maybe we would never have a child because of the problems.  Then once pregnant I seemed to have one difficulty after another, from severe nausea/vomiting throughout the whole pregnancy, nerve damage in my leg,  and gestational diabetes to name just a few.  The scariest parts of my pregnancy though, would come when we got home from our trip that brought us Monkey.  For the last almost month before my doctor insisted on taking her early my daughter had stopped moving and growing in my stomach.  This little monkey became so important to me and I remember thinking that I can’t lose my little girl, and I held that monkey many days when I was home alone just praying she would be ok.

My silly little Muppin and Monkey at one month old.

My daughter was brought into this world only two weeks early yet she was so tiny.  What an amazing day it was to bring her into this world.  She was beautiful, full of life.  We ended up in the hospital all week because she was not thriving as well as they hoped, and I had some minor complications because of a reaction to the drugs, but we were ignorant to that because to us she was amazing!  We were only allowed to go home over the weekend if we brought her back on Saturday for more tests to make sure she was ok.  I remember the first couple weeks (maybe more) going to the doctor’s office every other day, yet thinking nothing of it, because that is what you do… right?

I am so glad I was not all with it in those short weeks!  If I had known how sick she was I might have fallen apart. Monkey though was with her through it all.  She was in her little bed at the hospital, next to her many nights and days at home, and while she was meant to bring my daughter comfort, it was me that she really soothed.  Monkey was a silly little gift from God that no one would really understand.  And to this day it holds a special place in my heart.  For me, it tells the whole story of the joy and trials of my daughters entry into this world.  And what a wonderful thing that is.

And my beautiful little Muppin today with silly Monkey! What a joy she is in our lives and what a joy Monkey still is in hers.

If you have not joined Kellie Elmore for her Free Write Friday prompts you are missing out.  Click the picture below to go to her site, you will be blessed!

Dark Halls

Credit: Richard Baxter

I am so lost.  Weeping inside the dark is all I have anymore.  So much has come and gone and all that is left is the rubble in my heart, the shattered pictures of my past cloud and overtake the halls of my mind.  Nothing is the same anymore.

I have looked for the light that burst through the darkness.  The light that holds together the days and pushes away the long devastating nights of hell.  I have looked inside my soul for a piece of something that used to be there, something that was good but have long since seen.

How many more times do I have to see the devastation of the past come forward and ruin what I have worked so hard to build?  Those moments in time that shatter a person are so strong that they echo forever on into the wild future, a future uncertain and as dark as the past.

How do I wake up?  How do I move out of its clutches and into the light?  How do I become what I was destined to be instead of this torn apart and molded piece of broken flesh and bone with nothing left to offer?

I am so lost.  The shattered halls of my life have nothing left for me; they are ruins, dark, ugly and dangerous.  They are death.

Beautiful

It is whispered into my ear soft and subtle, almost unheard.

Precious

What is this I keep hearing?  It is a foreign voice one not heard in ages.  One that was once trusted but now is barely remembered.

My Treasure

I am truly broken, I know that voice and have been avoiding it for so long I forgot how deeply affecting it can be.  The light… My heart is overwhelmed with the love that flows through those words.  How do I reconcile what He is saying and what I know about me, my life; my shattered, tattered life?

You are mine and I love you.  I knew you before you were born, I created you; knit you together and breathed life into you. I love everything about you.  I want your broken pieces.  I want your weeping heart, your shattered tears.  I want you.  I have given you a new home, one built on the Rock, one built to last, one more beautiful than anything you lost.  Come… Let me wipe away your tears and pick up the pieces. 

It all melts away, all that I have been seeing, hearing and feeling for so many years; the darkness.  The peace is overwhelming.  It is intoxicating.  Do I follow?  Oh I want to so much so I feel it overwhelming my soul.  What about the dark halls?  They are so familiar?  He beckons me…

Come…

The above was written for Free Write Friday from the image prompt  above using what is called stream of consciousness writing, no editing, no proofing just writing!

Post your submission with a comment and link to your blog on Kellie’s blog, post on twitter with the hashtag #FWF, Facebook and join the fun!

 

Infinite

Image Credit: Maddy Bartlett

Have you ever had it?  I have had it.  More than once to be exact.  And when I had it I felt and thought of nothing else.  It was glorious!  Because of it I have had wonderful feelings of peace, safety and awareness that I was not alone anymore.  Not much in this world affords us those feelings.  They are pure gifts from God.

I never thought I would feel this way.  I mean, I never wanted to feel this way.  I was going to be alone for the rest of my life.  I didn’t want anything to do with ’till death do us part’ and certainly wasn’t hoping for even the short term thing.  I trusted no one, and men even less.  I was happy and content relying on myself.  Well, maybe not happy… and well, maybe not content either.  But I was used to it and it seemed safe.   Amazing how what seems safe can be fatal and what seems dangerous can save our lives.

As you probably know by now I talk of a man.  And I must say… poor man indeed, he didn’t know what he was in for!  He didn’t know he had to break down the steel wall standing between him and me.  He worked hard at it and even though I pushed him away and it seemed he gave up on me once, he didn’t really and truly give up.  In my time of crisis he was there, checking on me, being kind to me, not expecting anything in return… he put a hole in that steel wall.  That stole my heart even more.

I remember the moment I knew it was forever, the moment that led to the rest of our lives.   He had been gone on a trip taking care of some personal things and when he got home I went to the airport to pick him up.  Excitement welled up inside of me as I saw him walk down the runway.  Of course that was in the days when we could meet someone in the terminal… not like today 😉

We went directly to the park and walked and talked and ended up setting on a bench in the dark.  I can’t tell you all we talked about and it didn’t matter.  Sitting with there him alone in the dark… I felt safer and happier than I had ever felt before.  Those moments have been repeated over and over again in the past 17 years.  But in that first moment as we sat in the dark and talked, I knew it was forever, I knew we would never be alone again, I knew we were… infinite!

This was written from a prompt from Free Write Friday.  The topic was “Does this quote (from the above picture) remind you of the abandon and freedom of youth? Or maybe you have one moment that comes to mind? Or maybe the word infinite leaves you pondering its possibilities? Whatever this line says to you, tell me…”  To join the writing prompt click the button below and it will take you to Free Write Friday’s page.