Vengence is mine. The beauty cream worth millions.

What will it be? Cream or bent forks.

I have my little games of retaliation. As a young girl at home, if I was mad at someone I would retaliate while setting the table.  Positioning the crooked fork carefully by that plate, I would retaliate in a very safe way.  I would smile inwardly at my game.  I was taking revenge.  My silly cloaked methods of revenge were secret and cowardly. Protecting myself from scrutiny, I was the judge and jury.   Perhaps I decided  my victim had been mean to me. Deciding I was powerless to avenge myself in any other way, I gave myself  this acerbic satisfaction.  Affirming myself as wronged, this inner 'frontier-justice'  fooled me into thinking I was powerful over my enemy in some little way. Childhood habits can morph into grown-up attitudes, and mine certainly when unchallenged.  I was the Sheriff of my town!  What I say GOES!

I am a score keeper this way.  Are you?  Do you figure out the score and remember?  Do you justify your system and keep a tiny little book in the back drawer of your mind?  I do.  When the Preacher says something about forgiveness, I say 'Yes, but'.  Do you?

This is the truth.  There is no joy in this practice.  There is only thickening of notebooks and folders with certain names on them.  There is no freedom and only a ball and chain around my heart.  I am weighed down by my little tucked away list.  It festers back there and sours my thoughts.  It hammers down my light hearted-ness. These thoughts make me a victim. 

The enemy wants me to see myself this way.  He wants me to add up insults, to categorize hurts.  'Assign blame' is his big goal.  And I can see it from his point of view, after all he is right in a certain sense.  There has been sin.  There has been un-love and insensitivity, has there not?  Only problem; this method does not remove any bit of the weight, the pain, or the twisting of soul.  Its is a trap.  A very well baited trap of the enemy's way of thinking. 

What to do? What to do? When I feel so aware of the hurt, the pain, the twisting of a knife into the soft underbelly of my vulnerable heart, what other thing can I do?  In the back of my mind a refrain runs over and over, and I remember a phrase that sounds so archaic.  "Vengeance is mine!  I will repay!"

 It might take me a long time to get there, but when I have finally had enough of these futile thoughts I finally get out the jar of salve.  Lettered upon this jar in big letters are these words: "Eye Salve".

Its jar looks ancient, it's ornately carved.  As it sits on the shelve it adds panache to my decor.  Upon opening it, the first sent of it reaches my nose and it is bracing.  Tingly and spicy with a hint of the heady plumeria flower from Hawaii, ahhhh, so beautiful. It smells very expensive, exotic.

I rub it into my eyes and I begin to weep.  This salve acts like a wine or a drug!  I am seeing my self in situations where I have said mean things!  No! NO! I want to think about that other person! They were worse!  But the salve is strong and once it starts working I just have to let it wear off.  I weep and weep and I cry out for the pain to stop.  I cry out for by now I feel my vulnerability.  I am a crumpled heap on the floor, weak as a kitten new born.  I can't stand against hatred or jealousy, I can stand against injustice toward a weaker one.Maybe I am the weaker one.  I see myself and feel my inability, and struggle with that dreaded 'utterly helpless' feeling.

But then I begin to feel such a seeping into my pores of rest and safety.  I feel like I am in a spa of comfort.  I close my eyes and dream.  I dream of a garden of beautiful scent.  I see a high wall and a bench and a lover with strong arms of love and kisses for me.  For these EYES look into mine and now I see those eyes!  The 'Eye Salve' has worked!  I only see these beautiful eyes looking at me, really seeing me and really knowing and really loving me and holding me!  And I know this treatment has worked again!

I do not care about anything outside this garden of delights, anymore.  I want to stay here forever in the love of my lover who knows all and sees all.  He is so strengthening!  His love is better than wine and better than being seen as right.  It's our secret love!  He is totally faithful and totally strong!

I nod to him and repeat: "You know El Roi, my king, my prince! You will not forget ;so that I can!

My skin is smooth, and it glows! My eyes sparkle and shine.  In the market square they say, 'She looks years younger!!  They whisper behind their hands "I heard she has a spa that she goes to, its very expensive!" 

I laugh inside with lightness and a sigh of knowing.  That spa is free to join, but your eyes have to sting first.

I love storage containers

Why is it I love to organize? I have much to organize. There are piles of Christmas decor waiting to be returned to boxes that have been accurately labeled and categorized in a computer file for reference next November.  There are baskets of laundry to be folded and a yes, small, but frustrating pile of white things that are waiting to be ironed.  There is mail! The dreaded and loved mail! With catalogues by the glossy stack, what? Even after Christmas they still come! There are ministry appeals and fund raising letters from all the worthy causes I love.  There are fabulous magazines with wonderful Organization ideas and tips for healthy living and fashion news and worldview updates that are vital for perspective shaping.  There are piles of maps, brochers,  postcards and vacation info that I am putting into my online photo album before my besotted memory allows these glory moments of vacation slip into oblivion. 

Rushing around putting these things in labeled and neat plastic boxes, online albums, the recycle bin or my own besotted mind somehow 'checks the box' and I feel, for a time, organized.  Whew! It feels good!  For about two minutes.  The promise of that fabulous goal of "Organized" is however much more than it, in reality turns out to be. I want the chaos of life to fit into a neat box!  I have found that if I manage to 'get it in there' for a moment, it just doesn't stay there!

Prov 16:1 says "The Plans of the mind and orderly thinking belong to man, but from the LORD comes the wise answer of the tongue.  All the ways of a man are pure in his own eyes, but the LORD weighs the spirits (the thoughts, and intents of the heart).                                             

Why do I love to organize?  Because it feels orderly, but it isn't necessarily about wisdom of the LORD.  I know, its good to clean out clutter and streamline my home so my time isn't wasted looking for stuff. But does it accomplish an ordering of the thoughts and intents of the heart?  Does it satisfy the thirstiness of my anxious heart, does it quench the thirsting of my chaotic soul? NO! It is good but it does not satisfy my real need for peace.

So, Dear LORD, let me sit with you, MY BELOVED. Let me quiet my soul, my thoughts. Then I can listen while you show me the intents of my heart. Ah! I see!  My quest for peace through 'organization' is futile!  Quiet down, piles!  I will get to you after I drink deeply of my lover's love for my heart. He pours in peace. Truth about what lasts.  Priorities for my day. After being strengthened in this way, I will go back, not loving MY organization.  But loving my soul's lover. 

Thanks, my Adoni, for drawing me to you with my thirst for peace.  You give it first, not through my business, but through relationship and time with you in my heart. Now I ask, would you show me your type of order? With the stuff that lasts? Help me let go of stuff that I no longer need.  Help me make room for all that you have for me.  Give me discernment between those two.  Ah!!!! No more rushing around to prove my worth, to gain peace.  I walk in that peace today.  Thanks so much my LORD.