When We See. Really See

Posted on by Gary Fultz

 

Let me ramble a bit about some wilderness wanderings with my family last week. The sites and sounds were awesome! So much of our trip is a parallel to a life with God, pictures and all. Let’s talk about what we see. really see.

Most of us have our wilderness wanderings of the soul as well. One is in the seeing beyond ourselves.

otter 3
3 otter swam by in the wee hours of daylight. It seems they were created to fish and play

Let’s face it. Most of our seeing is positioning ourselves to see. Awareness is another ingredient to seeing. Capturing a photo is another step in seeing. Framing that photo is then important to explain what we saw. Maybe, God shows off sometimes. Just for us?? He loves us you know. Maybe we see (really see) that and know that He is God, Creator of all things. He has framed our world, all the molecules in the universe and beyond. He has framed you.

BWCA sunset Camp cp eml
The rain stopped, the sun came out and set as night came. See the wolf? The sun prevails.
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Our Grand daughters senior dream vacation (A wilderness canoe trip). She will outfish most.  

It’s entirely possible to have a dream vacation and only have an adventure, see a nice sunset, catch some fish, do some exploring and that’s about it if it works out.

There’s a better way. What if we position ourselves to see God’s handiwork in marvelous ways? What if we don’t? What if we spend some alone time with God expressing our wonder at the sights and sounds?

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Early one morning I waited until I could see through the fog. kind of.

What do you see? Is life just rambling in the fog between storms? Are you positioned to see God’s handiwork all around? How about in your life? God is in the business of opening our eyes you know. I only know about this because He has done it in my life and coutless others throughout time. Like the man born blind and healed by Jesus in the Bible, he knows. He sees John 9:25
He answered, “Whether He is a sinner I do not know. There is one thing I do know: I was blind, but now I see!”

I strongly reccomend some wilderness wanderings. Find someplace to have a long chat with your creator. Check out going to the BWCAW sometime. Watch out for bear! (really).

Gary

 

Mom

Posted on by Gary Fultz

veggies-eml.jpgI know you are gone, along with so many others. Bye for now our parting words. I understand I’ll see you at the gate when time is over. Meanwhile, the moms who are here…We are celebrating life and doing something special today for all moms out there. I am also doing something special for the women of my life…Here is to you dear. Our kids even turned out exceptionally well. kabobs em

Just a little something I cooked up if that’s ok. Thank you Lord for the women you put into my life. Help her (my wife) recover from losing her mom this spring. We miss her..Amen

Gary. 

 

Being Intentional

Posted on by Gary Fultz

Born with Spina-Bifida. 37 years, 35 surgeries and thousands of stares and comments. Life and significance can feel like a lone tiny battered island. 

In my quiet time with God I recently (intentionally) asked the Lord for wisdom and a way to show our handicapped daughter how much God loves her and how much her first father loves her. Later in the day I came across this very special blog by a very special lady. please visit and read.    https://writenow.wordpress.com/2019/03/04/beauty-from-slag/

Go back, click on the link first before continuing please!!  

I was able to show our daughter the picture from Shirley’s blog of what some consider to be trash (slag) but mixed with glass in liquid form creates immense beauty. We had some small talk about how it was made and how beautiful it was. I also read the short blog to her. I then said to my daughter “This is you dear daughter. You have often seen yourself as slag, trash, and people have said and done mean things to you; but God has created an immensely beautiful person in you no matter what has happened to your body. 

Realization of this truth was like slowly filling a clear glass picture of water but not shutting the tap off. First there were tears, then sobs and a heaving chest full of sobs came as her picture overflowed. A new radiance of spirit that most of us will never experience quietly came as the tap slowed and stopped. Dad & Tania CP eml

Before showing and reading to my daughter as she rested in bed, I intentionally thanked God for his answer to prayer and intentionally asked for wisdom in presenting this spectacular picture of slag mixed with glass on Shirley’s blog. I see her this way. I know and see the beauty that others may miss. See picture here

slag glass cross section
the beautiful colors of slag glass are endless

I wonder how many people I walk by every day who do not know that God can take the slag of their life, melt it down and mix with His ineffable power.  Only God can do such grandiose kind of work words cannot express in each of us. Thanks G.W for that great read.  https://collinsgw.combecoming/2019/03/06/ineffable-power/

My daughter and I talked about the word “ineffable” in her life. Joyous tears again.

The kind of intentionality it takes to turn the trash slag into beautiful glass slag in people’s lives is huge, costly and time consuming on our part. Ask my daughter, it’s worth it. Ask God, it’s worth it. Ask Me and I will tell you that watching someone slowly realize the ineffable power of God masked by a broken body has more grandeur than any wonder the world could contain. 

Please comment, thanks for reading.

Gary

The two links posted are pure gold. Thanks Shirley and G.W for your intentionality in making them so worthwhile.

Once upon a sculpting

Posted on by Gary Fultz

 

A storm makes a mess. We can allow God to Sculpt us in the strongest storms of life

Wind snow sculpture close up eml
Snow sculpture edge close up     Dictionary:To carve, model, chisel, sculpture, fashion, form, shape, cast, cut, hew.     Everything is being sculpted outside our house right now. Wind, gusts of wind, bigger and longer gusts of wind, and then hold your breath I think the creaking house is moving in these monstrous gusts of wind. Wind snow blow cp eml

Lately it seems like every couple of days we are having 50 hour storms. Piles of snow. As I type and look out the window, high winds are sculpting the landscape. Nature plays for keeps. So does God.

Wind snow blow 4 eml
Not a tweety bird in sight, sometimes nothing is in sight

There are probably a lot of overlapping  lessons  here. Possible titles: Storms of life anyone? In the Storm? After the Storm? When Harsh Winds Blow? Help Me Find My Car? Winter Camping Anyone? Can’t Find My Igloo? This is Fun! Where have all the bluebirds gone?

Wind snow blow 2 eml
Disclaimer on photo quality: The only thing holding still is my camera on a tripod taking pictures of moving things from inside the house through the windows.

I know, in my head, that God uses all things to Sculpt us. The One who designs one of a kind in everything from each snowflake in the storm to you and I. When I say this I think of the abused, the quadriplegic, the cancer ALS and other disease fighters, the inner and outer scarred and broken, the forgotten in special homes and you and I. We all have, or will, fit the bill sometime in our life before the dates separated by a dash are sculpted into granite. Life can be just cruel and harsh.

In This Sculpting by God, We can Trust. He has a plan that takes all the accidents, splats and storm damages of life to sculpt us into the likeness of his son for eternity. I do not say this lightly. I have lots of life’s scars and only some are visible. You probably do as well.

Wind snow sculpture eml
A larger view of some small snow sculptures in my yard. As I type they are changing, bigger, tougher, prettier and the winds are much harder. I’m not going out there!

God is bigger than any storm and does more than patch up storm damage. He is so powerful that he can take the storm damaged life and make it part of your christ-like-eternal-DNA masterpiece

Trust God, Trust God, Trust God not only with your life but with your storms! (Proverbs 3:5-6). Walk with Him daily. He will direct your paths

Gary 

I took the above pictures an hour ago (below, just now). The winds outside are getting seriously worse. I’m going to see if I still have a boat behind the shed (or a shed for that matter), make some coffee and watch the storm. Yep wind gust coming

Wind gust coming eml
Picture taken through the patio door and through the screen porch…not going out there!

Inside Outside

Posted on by Gary Fultz

Inside outside winter 2019 eml

Inside and outside are the same.  Kind of…

Have you ever tried to take a picture inside with the outside showing? Normally there is glare, too much light and a flash is needed unless it’s dark outside. I actually set up the camera in the living room on a tripod and waited until the light density was similar inside to the outside. A 70 degree difference from inside to outside as it was a snowstorm just ending outside.

It’s February and very nice out… temperature wise.  

In september the temperature made it’s way down into the 30’s and it was cold. October made it a little colder. November temperature went down into the teens. December made it down to zero and into a few degrees below zero. this January we found 20 below zero a few times and the beginning of February in the minus 30 below zero range (some saw minus 40’s but you get the picture).  What was cold in September is now t-shirt weather. January weather seems warm from February’s view. 

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Our Spruce tree seems cold as the sun sets. We love our views from the inside

We live and adjust to relativities in so many areas of our lives, not just the weather.

We live and adjust daily without even thinking about it. I have 6 pairs of outdoor boots and combinations of 12 layers of different types of outer and layered coats and jackets (I can stay warm in minus 30 with a wind chill of -60 degrees). A few days ago I was outside unloading my ice fishing equipment and I thought “It’s warm out here”; I looked at the outdoor thermometer and it read -32 degrees. The wind had died down and it felt warm outside. I called dad mid January to let him know it was minus 20 degrees. He said “wow it’s warm there, it’s -42 here”. I just gave my oldest kentucky daughter a text telling her “it is 40 degrees colder here…must be nice”. She texted back “and I thought 21 degrees was really cold”

Even though it feels warm, it would still be a disaster to stick one’s tongue on the car door handle. There are some things that are not relative. You will still lose part of your tongue if stuck on freezing metal (I have a winter camping story with tin cups for another time). A bad diet seems ok until later in life. Smoking seemed ok for our health a long time ago. We can come up with an endless list of how we live life as relative. Maybe it actually kind of works; until it doesn’t.

A relationship with God is not relative. Sin is not relative. God’s love is not relative. Don’t stay outside in relativities on this one. Come inside. What God says and has revealed to man and carefully recorded and preserved in scripture trumps our relative spiritual ideologies.

I would encourage you to read the Bible. Unlike any other book ever written, the Holy Bible is compiled of writings that cover a span of about 1400 years and include some 40 writers. Within its pages are 66 books, yet it is considered one book, The Book, The Holy Scriptures, The Word of God. The time period recorded during those 1400 years covers nearly 4000 years of human history and God’s revelation of Himself to and through man. The history of the Holy Bible is the history of God’s involvement with mankind.

I’m getting ready for tomorrow. Another snowstorm coming. Warm weather as it will stay above -10 tonight. Maybe. Tomorrow morning I will also continue getting ready for another tomorrow (someday my tomorrow will be in eternity) as I read a passage from God’s word, pray (my personal talk time with God), reflect and allow God’s Spirit to set my tone for the day. I have a personal relationship with my creator God. It’s real and I am changed. I trust the changes in me are not like the weather outside. temporary. Relative. To be more like Jesus is reality. Truth. Inside.

Gary

Moonset Morning at Ten Below Zero

Posted on by Gary Fultz

moonset morning at ten below zero eml
I  stepped outside and took a 10 second time exposure. Long enough to get cold in my sleepwear. 

I watched the moon set before the sun would light the morning.  I pondered and identified with the Psalmist.

“You, God are my God, earnestly I seek you; I thirst for you, my whole being longs for you in a dry and parched land where there is no water. ” Psalm 63: 1

I thought of the all the sailors who have been adrift in life boats after losing their vessel in storm or war; often muttering “water water everywhere but not a drop to drink.”

I think often of the happiest people I have ever seen in a third world country and they have nothing.

I think of the change of one’s whole being when they finally understand how much Jesus loves them; enough to die for them. It’s like coming home from vacation and all your plants look dead and they spring to life with water. Only we get “Living Water.”

I ponder how this passion for God in our dry and thirsty land affects my speech, word choices and topics of conversation today and through the week. Will I use alternate swear words? slang? Will I confront or come alongside when differences arise? will I wash the dishes when my wife looks tired even though I have had an 11 hour work day? Will I say a kind word to a harried cashier? Will I live intentionally? Generously?

It’s now daylight. Will I live as a child of light? A delightful sunday morning. I read on. “I will praise you as long as I live, and in your name I will lift up my hands. I will be fully satisfied as with the richest of foods; with singing lips my mouth will praise you“ Psalm 63: 4-5 (even if I don’t know the song?)

Gary

He Restores My Soul

Posted on by Gary Fultz

6-9 people will sleep in this house each night. The Motorcycle will transport up to 4 people at one time. My world is different from this.

I fell asleep praying and pondering deeply on Psalm 23:3 last night. I awoke praying and pondering the depths of God’s work of restoration when I let him. I think somehow I prayed and pondered in my sleep…is that possible?  I’m quite sure His remake is quite different and beyond what I have in mind. Like the picture above we might be asking for a bigger bike when our house needs a rebuild.

new house
A brand new house in Guatemala

 

On this day of thanksgiving (our american set aside holiday to mostly over-eat), May we say “The Lord is my Shepherd” and allow his remake process to be happening in our lives.

Our team built a new house for a family. Great as it was for them, it’s only a house. Oh the undiscoverable depths God wants to build restoring our soul.

Now that’s something to be thankful for. My personal challenge: Give someone else a reason to be thankful today.

Gary

 

 

A Time to Tell

Posted on by Gary Fultz

It’s a story that needs telling. Maybe some stories are sacred enough to leave for the telling in eternity. Maybe some can be told as a teaser for story time a hundred years from now. I will leave most things out but you will get the gist.

sunset in the storm eml
  Ominous sunset with a storm coming. I wonder what clashing spiritual forces look like? 

A while after moving to a strange place with hardly an acquaintance, my wife casually mentioned to me she had an aunt I had never met living in the same very small town where we lived. Odd situation, I guess. Auntie didn’t like any of us or care to meet, but she had cancer and was not long for this world. My wife had never felt any urgency to get to know auntie until now. “I’m going to visit her starting tomorrow” she announced “and she probably will not want to see me”. 

My wife found her address, knocked on her door and when the door opened a crack with a “What do you want” greeting, she was quick to stick a foot in the door and let auntie know whose daughter she was, that she wanted to visit and she brought a few cookies. Auntie took the cookies and shut the door.

This went on for a while until my wife made it inside the door to talk a little longer and visit with one old-cold-bitter women. Seems Auntie didn’t need sympathy, prying relatives and even rejected her own children half the time. Auntie had no time for prayer or anything to do with God.

Auntie believed that when one dies, that’s it. No after life. No purpose to life. No God. Nothing. “Burn the body and get rid of the ashes” kind of aunt.

In all this, my wife seemed more and more confident that God was pushing her from a weekly visit over time to daily visits by the time Auntie went into the hospital. “She needs someone” my wife kept saying. The nurses drew straws (they actually did) to see who had Auntie duty. Auntie was not a nice lady and even refused to let her grandchildren visit her. She did not want to even know their names or see their faces. When my wife or her  grown children would visit, Auntie would pretend to be asleep. If they tried to hug her she would say “You may shake my hand”. My wife would not ask. She would hug her anyway. Gradually her stiffening at hugs became somewhat less like hugging a wooden board.

My wife would sing hymns and read Auntie bible passages about knowing Jesus when Auntie would pretend to be sleeping. Some days Auntie would actually talk to her. She would not let any clergy see her or anyone pray with or for her.

A few days before Auntie died, My wife felt moved to ask her if she could pray for her. Auntie said “I suppose it would be OK”. My wife thanked Jesus for dying for all the things that separated us from God. She prayed the whole plan of salvation as she had been reading to Auntie in the bible. She prayed for Auntie to just believe in Jesus. If she would just believe. When she was done Auntie said something no one had heard from her lips in a very long time, “Thank you”. Then she went to sleep and My wife went home.

The next day some of Aunties kids said to my wife “What did you do to her?” Alarmed my wife said “I prayed with her, why?”

Auntie spent the last few days of her life smiling, thanking nurses and asking to meet her grandchildren. Hugs happened and Auntie was a different person. Auntie never acknowledged praying with my wife or believing in Jesus but there wasn’t any other evidence to explain the complete change from an angry and bitter old dying women to a sweet little old cancerous women in pain. She actually seemed to be living beyond the pain drugs. She died much happier than she had lived most of her life.

“All I did was do what I felt God was telling me to do” says my wife.

My wife and I thought God had relocated us 300 miles from family, friends and great fishing lakes for a job and better income. Now we are thinking God had far bigger things in mind. It’s very possible that God moved my wife here for Auntie and gave me a job while He was at it.

  “For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways,” declares the Lord  “As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.  Isaiah 55:8-9

Gary

Merry Christmas everyone!

Posted on by Gary Fultz

Ice fishing cp eml
To all you readers and fellow bloggers, Merry Christmas from the frozen lakes areas of northern United States. The sun is a bit inconspicuous through the cab and the trees as it sets over the small lake I was fishing.  A safe 7″ of ice with the fold up shelter allowed me to see 9 fish and catch 3.

When I read your blogs from South Africa, UK, South America and so many warmer countries, I often wonder what I am missing that excites you. I only know what you are missing if you have never driven or walked on a frozen lake or peered down a hole in the ice as a monster fish suddenly appears to bite your hook (Or decide not to).

I dropped a camera down the hole to show you just what it looks like down there. I was catching some blue gill that day.  Check out this utube video 

Have a Merry Christmas fellow readers and bloggers. may you keep connected. May you also become more connected to the God who created all that we know and love.

For me, Christmas is a time where I reflect on how our creator exchanged His eternal Glory for a different kind of glory never seen before. A glory He wants to pass on to us through God in a finite human body as a baby. Inconspicuously inserting himself into his own creation to make a way to restore our relationship to Him.  “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men. ” Luke 2:14. take some time to mull over what the angels proclaimed to some obscure shepherds who would worship God in the form of a baby born in a barn. Glory to God both in heaven and now on earth

May you make room for Jesus in your everyday life this next year.

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We have a christmas tree wall for some of our Christmas Cards

 

Merry christmas All from the Frozen state of Wisconsin, USA. It’s -8 F actual temperature and diving. Wind chill close to -30 F.

Gary

The Real Deal

Posted on by Gary Fultz
Jims project
I had to take a picture of this intimidating project

My neighbor shot a framing nail through his hand (between the knuckles) on his DIY project. He obviously could not do much for a while. What would you have done?

I have more than some experience in building projects. At that point the “what should I do?” is a dumb question.

Answers I have weeded out so far: 1) I’ll pray for you. 2) “What a bummer man” (yes we are products of the 70’s era). 3) Were you drinking again? 4) Well. I’ll put you on the church prayer chain (I might without his knowledge).

This is real life. I have an ongoing daily walk with God but my neighbor admits he personally does not like “religious people” for a long list of sad and real reasons. He likes us as neighbors and hopes our house does not sell so we stay put. So, how far does one go for his neighbor?

One of my favorite quotes by Francis Schaeffer; “The Bible is clear here: I am to love my neighbor as myself, in the manner needed, in a practical way, in the midst of the fallen world, at my particular point of history. This is why I am not a pacifist. Pacifism in this poor world in which we live — this lost world — means that we desert the people who need our greatest help.”

Consider this; I do not even consider “religious reasons” to be a factor in how I treat people. Let’s face it, we are who we are, and the core of our being is tested by those around us every day. Who are we and who are we becoming? Does what we say, do and post on social media draw people into becoming more like Jesus? Most everyone except for the religious flock liked Jesus.

If Christ lives in us, His unstoppable unimaginably infinite love will go to great lengths to shove our plans aside to help our neighbor in need.

Being a “spread it around” kind of guy is my spiritual gift. I enlisted some help. I asked a couple of guys (who are on the church prayer chain) to lend a hand. I scoured the neighborhood for a monster forklift as I felt my back would not like carrying the shingles up the long spindly ladder. I ended up getting a better ladder. Meanwhile, we had some great conversations and built trust that probably wouldn’t have happened any other way. Later on in the summer I started building my large shop, my neighbor right beside me. I would like to think this is in part who Christ wants me to be, and it turns out, quite a step in who Christ wants him to be.

        I thought of this verse when my neighbor came over with a DIY first aid bloody hand in the middle of his project.  Give to the one who asks you, and do not turn away from the one who wants to borrow from you”. (Matthew 5:42)

Gary