Many Blessing,
Nicky

Your heart, your words, your faith, your photography, your family, your very life pours out a tremendous gift of encouragement, hope and healing. From those of us who know what it is to suffer and survive, thank you! May our lives pour forth such blessings to others. I heard a song today, it simply said “When your faith is hard to find, borrow mine.” Thank you for sharing your journey and helping others hold on and have faith.

You are inspiring! As I was reading tears stream down my face. You are so honest and generous with your knowledge and experience in life. Thanks for inspiring me!

I have only recently come across your work and, of course, it is beautiful! But what keeps me coming back to your blog is your sweet, sweet spirit that is so evident in your entries. It is obvious that God has given you the ability to reach people’s hearts, not only through your photographs, but also with your written words.

Thank you for your willingness to share from the deepest parts of your heart. You will never know how many lives you have touched…but God does…and I have no doubt that he is well pleased!

This is one of my favorite Bible verses…one (of many) that I cling to in times of weariness & exhaustion.

Matthew 11:28-30
“Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.”

Thank you, Me Ra…you are a inspiration!

I heard a very poignant query in a very silly, but sweet movie recently. In it God asks the Wife of the New York Noah, Evan “Let me ask you something. If someone prays for patience, you think God gives them patience? Or does he give them the opportunity to be patient? If he prayed for courage, does God give him courage, or does he give him opportunities to be courageous? If someone prayed for the family to be closer, do you think God zaps them with warm fuzzy feelings, or does he give them opportunities to love each other?”

When I heard this…it was in the middle of our divorce, a lack of funds, and a shake in my foundation of faith that began making itself known I must go this way instead of that. We have crappy neighbours, we fought over child support, and I am dealing with my own personal madness some days. The depression, the rage, at what my own mother did to me as a child until I left home. Horrible times. And yet…this line and the book “The War of Art” came to me serendipitously the same week. The Lady of Wisdom, Mighty Athena and ArchAngel Michael have been been present in my life, but this is when they converged upon me, took my face in their hands and laid it down for me. I need to move from the tree to the work and the work will prevail. Amid all my shortcomings, dropping the balls, missed deadlines, forgotten ideas, they insist that this crap that stands in the way of my success is conquerable. Had I not had it in my life, I would not have the knowledge, the Son, the talent that I do.

That tree, my sweet woman, our tree…our Grove…is a reminder that we will prevail. No one can take our soul. People can damage the spirit, they can break the will, but just as our Faith won’t let us go neither will the challenges to keep us from moving forward. Sometimes, you need to plant a new tree and look upon the old as firewood when it’s green vein runs dry.

I adore you, and have yet to meet you. The Guidance has brought your wisdom to my door and I thank them, I thank them so. We share pain, Me Ra. We share it well and with exhaultation….

Love and Honor.

The Burr Oak was my tree. I visited it often during my senior year of college, a year that was filled with suffering and loss.

A photograph of the grand, old Burr Oak now hangs in our bedroom, contextualized by the warmth of a home that knows the transformative, redemptive power of grace. Andrew surprised me with the photo when he asked me to marry him. He waited for hours in the cold Missouri evening to capture a time-exposure of the Burr Oak.

That photo hangs next to these 2 quotes:

“God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks in our conscience, but shouts in our pain. Pain is His megaphone to rouse a deaf world.”

— C.S. Lewis, The Problem of Pain

“Accept your loneliness. It is one stage, and only one stage, on a journey that brings you to God. It will not always last. Offer up your loneliness to God, as the little boy offered to Jesus his five loaves and two fishes. God can transform it for the good of others. Above all, do something for somebody else!”

— Elisabeth Elliot