Author: Ashley Gatewood

Complexities of the Human Being and the Implications of Marriage pt. 2

On By Ashley GatewoodIn Love:: Lifestyle:: HealthLeave a comment

 …“the soul of Jonathan was knit to the soul of David, and Jonathan loved him as his own soul.”

Attachment

Let’s face it, if two friends can have their souls knitted together because of how they feel toward one another, how much more are two people romantically involved going to be knit together?

We are complicated, complex creations with layers of habits, addictions, quirks and adorable (sometimes annoying?) personality traits. When two people form an attachment, all their layers become one layer, together, intermingled. Soul, spirit (and body in sexual relations). But it’s not so beautifully descriptive if ever the two want to part ways. It’s more like a messy destructive entanglement than a flowing heavenly connectedness.

I think this is why we really weren’t created to be with more than one other person, monogamously. God understood the beauty of becoming one and the devastation it brings when something that is together must now separate, when there is no distinction between the two anymore. I can’t imagine. It hurts bad enough just losing a friend, like David and Jonathan, much less when two people become one bound by sexual relations.

(I know, most people don’t think so much – I get it! I like to think, it’s like a past time activity for me. And writing is how I make sense of things sometimes. In no way am I this methodical in real life.)

Anyway, it becomes more important as a Christian to be mindful of attachment. Let me share these scriptures for reference from 1 Corinthians 6:15-20,

Do you not know that your bodies are members of Christ himself? Shall I then take the members of Christ and unite them with a prostitute? Never! Do you not know that he who unites himself with a prostitute is one with her in body? For it is said, “The two will become one flesh.”  But whoever is united with the Lord is one with him in spirit.

And again…

Do you not know that you are God’s temple and that God’s Spirit dwells in you?

1 Corinthians 3.16

So here we have to understand that we are also one with God and that whoever we become one with as a triune being, we then join them with the body of Christ. Now within marriage this is sanctified, true and holy.

Jesus spoke the following,

I am the vine, you are the branches. He who abides in me, and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing.

John 15.5

Because I live, you also will live. On that day you will realize that I am in my Father, and you are in me, and I am in you.

John 14.20

In order to write about human beings in this way, I have to almost step out of myself to look objectively at human nature and how we interact with one another. But I love talking about it. People are so skittish about the things of God. Why shouldn’t we be curious about Him? Why shouldn’t we desire to draw near to Him?

God is a mystery. But He let’s us catch up to Him sometimes…

Call to me and I will answer you, and will tell you great and hidden things that you have not known.

Jeremiah 33.3

Ah! I love Him, I love seeking Him – such a beautiful Person He is.

The Mystery of God

I love peering into the mysteries of the handiwork of God, creation, science, human nature and everything concerning God’s heart. So much inside Him…

I’m there, you are there, in His heart. A heart so big the universe itself cannot expand fast enough to ever fill it – and still – He knows the exact number of every hair on our heads down here on earth. God – indeed He is lovely~

This triune being He has created far exceeds all of mankind’s thoughts about it – we try to define ourselves and who and what we are and want from life – but we can’t clearly form the words, not without His insight.

One must inquire of the Creator to understand the work.

That’s what I’m doing here really, in these posts – inquiring of God about His work. About me, about those around me. That’s all. Just trying to peer into God’s heart~

Don’t Be Afraid to Inquire of God

I love how Jesus wasn’t afraid to just go there sometimes. He spoke knowing people would end up leaving Him, turning their back on Him and walking away. But He spoke the words anyway and didn’t even bother to explain!

John 6:4-5 “Whoever eats My flesh and drinks My blood remains in Me, and I in him.”

vs 66:  From this time many of his disciples turned back and no longer followed him.

Communion of course was the reference Jesus was making. We know and understand this because we now see clearly into the mirror of the Cross. But at that time they didn’t and thought He was actually referring to flesh and blood.

All of these sayings, all of these things Jesus is speaking of makes it clear to me we are one with the Lord. And this makes me think before doing something stupid just because my carnal nature (that physical fallen nature of the human being) desires something.

He has fashioned us to also be capable of becoming one if we choose to, monogamously with someone else. This is a beautiful experience because it reflects the oneness God shares with us, His creation.

I might might write more about this in a third post sometime.

The Complexities of the Human Being and the Implications of Marriage pt.1

On By Ashley GatewoodIn Love:: Lifestyle:: HealthLeave a comment

Since about 2016, I’ve been thinking about what it would mean for me to share my life with and create a life together with another person. I always said jokingly (but not so much) that I’d meet my forever partner in the nursing home. I have no plans (who does) of needing a nursing home in later life, but the concept that I’d meet this person around 75 years of age was the point.

But perhaps I won’t wait that long. So I have been considering the impact having another person in my life and specifically the impact of becoming one with them would have on my walk with God. My life is so simple – but I’m fiercely complicated in personality.

So, I may decide this is not the right choice for me at all – marriage that is – but there are many ways to go about sharing ones life with another person.

One thing’s for sure, I have done my best to live life for God because after all – no offense married folk – scripture states that the pinnacle of life is remaining single so that we are free to follow God. The pinnacle isn’t marriage. The pinnacle of American society is marriage – though this is also changing rapidly with younger generations who are finding the binding institution of marriage to be stifling and restrictive.

But really, if you want to become one with another human being, there is a price to pay. And there are consequences which are not always pleasant. I think too much, I know. But then again, I make far less mistakes. There are drawbacks to each approach. So far, mine has worked rather well for me. But let’s get into this, shall we?

What Becoming One With Another Person Really Encompasses

Let’s talk for a moment about the human creation. We are triune beings comprised of these three parts: soul, spirit and body.

The Soul:

Now the soul – to further break it down – is comprised of the mind, will and emotions. It is where the human condition arises, where the battleground exists when we think of doing evil or doing good. The battle is in the soul; the mind thinking the thought, the emotions influencing that thought and the will taking control and putting that thought into action, making it a reality.

Soul: Mind

So the soul is the fallen aspect of the human which occurred when sin entered the world. This is why ‘the washing of the water of the word of God’ is so important – renewing the mind is a daily necessity. The soul and the spirit are like bone to marrow – so closely linked that only God’s word can precisely cut between them to decipher thought from intention. If you think that’s easy, try focusing on why you have a particular thought and whether or not that thought is of any premeditated intention (because intentions can lie dormant in the primitive brain which remains hidden from us). Too deep a subject to get into right now.

Soul: Emotions

Continuing with the soul: Emotions are what influence our actions everyday and either help us or hurt us depending on how renewed our thought-life is (i.e. how much of God’s word is in us, how much of God’s knowledge and wisdom we know). Emotions, still part of the fallen aspect, can be a serious issue if we are unable to control them and think through what we are feeling in a more logical way. Emotions are what cause us to do the wrong thing because it feels right at the moment.

Soul: Will

The last aspect of soul is the will. The will is the power behind everything we do. We can will ourselves to do almost anything as long as fear is kept in check. The will is also part of that fallen state that must be continually renewed – it’s not a one-time deal (there is only one, one-time deal which we’ll get to in a moment.)

The will is what started the building of the Tower of Babel for instance. God said, ‘when they put their minds together in unity, there is nothing they cannot accomplish’. We are such fragile beings, yet because we are made in the image of God, we are the most powerful creation He has made – albeit, without the Holy Spirit, the angels would be more powerful than humans because we still exist in this natural world (ah! but this is another topic altogether! Maybe I’ll write about it sometime.)

The Spirit:

Now the spirit is the true and everlasting part of our triune being. In billions of people, their spirit lies dormant within them because only God can give life to our spirit. (God breathed the breath of life into Adam.) Spiritual death is both life and death apart from God. This is not where you want to be – Christ is the answer to spiritual death. “I am the way the truth and the life. Apart from me you can do nothing”. Listen to how Jesus talks about the human condition and how he remedies all of it:

John 6:35 (paraphrased): I am the bread of life…The bread that I will give is my flesh for the life of the world and he who eats of this bread s/he shall live forever, s/he shall not die.

John 11:25 I am the resurrection and the life. Anyone who believes in me will live, even after dying.

This is profound! It is what many intellectuals and scientists long for, eternal life, immortality. But they reject it as coming from a Superior Being as they would call Him. Eternal life cannot be provided by any other means outside of spiritual salvation. This requires Jesus Christ – and this is the world’s stumbling block.

One-Time Deal

The spirit is not in need of renewal but it does need to be fed, so-to-speak, by the word of God. The word is likened to bread, or sustenance which we must eat in order to live. Without the word of God, the spirit will be too weak to contend with the soul (our fallen nature) and we will sin. Ah, the kerfuffle of the Christian walk, the soul always longing for the desires of this world which wrestles against the nature of God and spirit. Thank God for the blood of His Son that redeemed us in spite of our sin nature.

The spirit is the only part of us that gets a one-time deal on life. Once you received Jesus Christ as your savior, there is nothing else that needs to be done. Christ is the only one-time deal, praise God for Him! To understand more about this, you may read this post The Difference Between Righteousness and Holiness.

Now let’s move on to the third aspect of the human being.

The Body:

The body is our tent. It’s what houses all these complex intricacies of mind, will, emotion and spirit. It gives form to the human species and is also fashioned in the likeness of God. Our body is what makes all that we are in soul and spirit autonomous and able to move freely and have our being on this earth. The body is the physical aspect of who we are and the part of us that is mortal.

The human body is passing away – even so, the whole world is at this moment already passing away, temporal and not to be invested in. We are sojourners belonging to the eternal kingdom of God but finding ourselves inhabiting a temporal earth; we are everlasting, immortal beings born into the world for only a time and to save as many as we can that His will in heaven might come to pass on earth. Selah~

To be continued in Part 2

Next time, we will talk about how we are one with God as Jesus describes it in the vine and the branches teaching and how this relates to becoming one with another person. We’ll talk about the interesting statement Paul made concerning the human body being ‘the temple of the living God’ – wow! – and how this also relates to becoming one with another person.

For now, I’ll leave you with a most interesting statement Jesus made, which also caused many of his followers to stumble and stop following him. This stuff isn’t for lazy religious Christians. It’s for those who want to truly understand God and know who they were created to be in God.

John 6:4-5 “Whoever eats My flesh and drinks My blood remains in Me, and I in him.”

Now hold on, don’t fall away yet. It’s just starting to get interesting…

Until next time…

Featured Photo by The Humantra

My Sunshine Walks Changed My Life

On By Ashley GatewoodIn How to Follow Your DreamLeave a comment

Over the summer I shared several ways we can move into a satisfying life which brings greater happiness and freedom. (I have so much more to share on this topic.) Sometimes this process can take years, other times only months or even days.

The first time I put these principles of unconventional living into action, it took about four years. But somehow the end result of those four years catapulted me 7000 miles across the Pacific Ocean to an island in the middle of nowhere.

This time however, it took one season and I’m not going 7000 miles away thank goodness! But the idea of breaking free from a nine-to-five job seemed unattainable. Then I started walking and praying in the park…

Those Sunshine Walks changed my life. No joke. After walking and talking with God through the summer months, and really embracing the idea of an unconventional approach to life, I have discovered a few things that have kept me from living a life more true to myself. I’ll share with you what has happened.

I have worked 21 years in the business/corporate world which consumed all of the best hours of my day. Everything I’ve ever been passionate about – writing, art, nonprofit work, reading, volunteering – I relegated to the fringes of my life. All these things would start and stop continually because invariably my 40 hour workload snuffed them out.

It wasn’t too bad when I was younger because I had the energy to halfway punt and fit everything into my schedule. But as I grew older I dropped more of the activities I cherished and reality sank in…

I was shackled to making a living – but not doing much living at all.

It’s impossible to dedicate yourself to something when it remains on the fringes of your life. What’s more, it’s near impossible to be successful at it. I thought to myself, either move it front-and-center if it means that much to you, or leave it as a mere offshoot among all the business of daily chores and career and be unhappy.

Forget that. Sometimes the heart just won’t let you betray yourself any longer.

During the course of the summer, walking gave me precious time to search my heart and I realized after some scary introspection that I had to let everything go. I had to let go of the fear of failure, the fear of others’ disapproval and the fear of going it alone. Men ambitiously forge their own path often; women not so much, though we’re getting better at it.

So I made the decision to do just that. Forge my own way. Of course God will be with me (who needs anything more?) And He’ll connect me with all the right people and opportunities to make this a successful venture.

I’ll be leaving the daily corporate grind to move a writing career front-and-center. I’ve given myself one year to establish a platform and make a living. It’s going to take a lot of hard work, but it’s work I will enjoy! If after a year I am not earning a living, I’ll seek something more in line with my values and interests: nonprofit, publishing/editing, arts, etc.

It’s just time to launch out and do what makes me happy. I believe that if I spend the majority of my day working hard at what I love, I can have more success than merely working for a living.

Finally, balance. We don’t appreciate enough the peace balance brings to our lives.

There’s nothing more damaging to a creative soul than having to work where there is no opportunity to create anything at all. It’s maddening, frustrating and ultimately depressing. It’s who we are, yet we’re given no opportunity to be who we are. It’s a recipe for sadness.

You see, everyone wants you to be what will make them happy, comfortable and less stressed. Then you get the stamp of approval. But you walk away unhappy and empty.

Not anymore.

This summer, God and I decided I’m not living for anyone else. Going to close that chapter right now.

If I think about it, I really was like Enoch, I “walked with God, and then I was not”. Haha. Not a lot of things that I thought I was. God pulled me out of my old unprofitable mindset that was killing me and brought me into His plan for my life. Spending time with God helps us find ourselves and ultimately, happiness.

Prayer is powerful. And God isn’t joking around. It’s taken longer for me but rushing is the worst thing I could’ve done, and I know God’s timing is perfect.

I have a few more months before finishing my current obligations – I wouldn’t feel right otherwise. But I’m super excited about the path ahead!

Featured Image by Toa Heftiba

Love Others (as You Love Yourself)

On By Ashley GatewoodIn Love:: Lifestyle:: Health1 Comment

To love oneself isn’t a bad thing. It is loving yourself according to 1 Corinthians 13. This is not the kind of love the world has when they make loving the SELF central to all existence.

I’m not referring to that. The SELF is not the center. JESUS is the center, Jesus said, “Love your neighbor AS YOURSELF.” So if loving yourself doesn’t matter, then we won’t have much love for others. Right?

I mean, if you hate yourself or can’t forgive yourself or are angry at yourself or impatient with yourself, then you will also be these things to your neighbor and anyone else in your life, even your friends and family.

How can you love others without first loving you? We should love ourselves according to 1 Corinthians 13 – this is biblical. This kind of love is only possible through Christ by asking Him to help us understand this level of love, free of the human condition. This is attainable by the power of the Holy Spirit and keeping as close to God as we can,

Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. Love never fails.

This level of love is attainable, but only with the help of the Holy Spirit. I pray we all gain a deeper understanding of this kind of love that never fails..

Featured image by Debby Hudson 

Write. Just write. That’s all…

On By Ashley GatewoodIn For Writers2 Comments

Here we go again. Distractions. Always the same, something not right about my position in front for the TV, or about the fact that I’m in the living room with the TV beckoning to me as I try and grind out a few words onto this digital paper. So many new words introduced to the English language in the last decade alone. Hard to keep up. 

Jump up. Grab the dangerous wiry thing that the kitten is threatening to swallow which will surely get lodged somewhere in her intestinal tract if it’s not retrieved. 

This is not easy. 

The words are easy the thoughts too but not the composing. Not the broader picture of telling the story, laying it out, leaving mystery without being too vague and boring. Creating suspense or humor or whatever one tries to conjure up to help themselves believe they’re doing something important or productive with their time.

I have a lot of rust to get off. Shake it, scrape it, whatever it takes but get it out of the cogs. It’s holding everything up. The problem is not with starting. Not with me. At least not most of the time. It’s sticking with it. I have no time. Being a writer is a very glamorous thought; and deceptive. Anyone who writes is a writer. Same as anyone who talks is a talker or lies is a liar. 

It’s always something. It’s hard to write if you don’t read much. Got no words, no understanding of descriptions apart from boring verbs. Something more is needed. Insight; shedding light on a thing. Oh forget it; a better way to communicate. Something better is needed. 

It’s storming tonight. I hear, here, hare the rain pinging on the abandoned metal pipe vents of this nineteen-sixties home.  Hoping the lights don’t go out.  And that my cats aren’t tearing away at the furniture in the back room.

I just don’t want trouble period. Who does? I want mornings to sleep into. And coffee to leisurely wake up with on the porch.

I don’t cook now precisely because I am too tired and have no time.  And though a woman may catch her game, she will certainly starve if she doesn’t take the time to roast it. 

Let’s go get dessert; ice cream? No, actually just brush my teeth so I can go to bed. Why can’t teeth be like eardrums? I don’t have to brush my eardrums before bed. Albeit, I’m not sticking skittles into my ears to digest, never mind…

Perhaps I should keep the notebook near just in case a dream or sleep-thought is a good one and I need to wrap the butterfly net over it quickly in the dark before it gets away.

Sleeping is good. Still rusty and need to do something to shake the consequences of sedentary thought out of my ears and eyes and well, off my life. I just want to get up to feed the kittens. They are really hungry tonight.  Ravenous is a better word I think. I should have used ravenous. 

I should read more.

And the fact that my nose feels like a block of clay. It’s the middle of winter and it was 79 degrees yesterday and 30 something right now. So I just asked Siri to open the weather app.

Silence.

And she should be on standby listening to me so I don’t have to press the button each time. Or key or whatever.  Dear Jesus.  Fix her already. 

I don’t know what to do next. And now I’m hungry. Anyway, I need a plan. Do I need to start thinking about what type of book I want to write? 

Storyline

Characters

Plots 

And foibles 

I just don’t know

Still rusty. 

I can think back on little sparks of ideas that seemed so good and I never wrote them down, never captured them or if I did, I don’t know where the slips of paper I scratched disappeared to. Perhaps buried or crushed or thrown away; lost forever. Those ideas and thoughts were in my mind; so vivid and true. 

Now they are gone. Unbelievable. 

And I’m hungry. Why didn’t I go to the grocery store last week. Oversight. Now I have to eat canned spaghetti sauce over cooked noodles. So bland and boring. But I’m hungry and didn’t go to the grocery store. 

This time, I didn’t even hunt my game.

Featured Image by Jess Bailey 

Love is the Freedom to Let Go

On By Ashley GatewoodIn Love:: Lifestyle:: HealthLeave a comment

How to stop controlling and start loving

The freedom to love and be loved without fear is an internal work we can do with God’s help. It will eliminate the need to control others in order to keep them from getting too close or to keep them from leaving. One can freely let people come into their life or go out of our life without feeling broken. The connections which remain are more secure, nourishing and real when we learn to love and let go of our fears.

Love that controls is selfish in that it seeks to protect the controller. Keeping someone at a distance so we don’t get hurt and shackling someone to us so they can’t leave isn’t love, it’s fear-based anxiety. And it only causes more anxiety because, alas!, we can’t control other people.

One way we can let go of our fears is by accepting them and not being overly fearful of being hurt. In-other-words, we may know what it feels like to be abandoned or rejected and accept that it hurts. But we can also understand that we are worth it. Finding true meaningful connections is worth trying and losing sometimes throughout the course of life.

Identifying the source of controlling behavior

Controlling others in order to keep ourselves from getting hurt stems from two pressure points:

  1. The fear of intimacy – getting too close to those we love, thus risking hurt
  2. The fear of abandonment or rejection – a direct hit to our self worth

God’s love will envelope both of these fears, I promise you. But we have to yield to Him and let Him do the work within us to learn that people come and go and our worth isn’t based on their decisions.

What we sometimes don’t realize is this; if there is anyone who does not deem us worthy to be with them or part of their lives, we never question if maybe it’s because they shouldn’t be or at least, not yet. If God is making you wait, it means He hasn’t said ‘no’, but get busy while your waiting and improve yourself. it may just be that God has something better for us. Let’s stop giving people power to set our value. God’s already set our value: we are worth the blood of His Son, Jesus Christ. Priceless.

Every one makes judgments, as we all should, just make sure you aren’t directly tying your self worth and self esteem to someone else’s judgment of you. This is co-dependent behavior. The ultimate correction to this is putting God first, and not another human being above God. Codependency is a form of idol worship, hands down! Don’t do it. It will crush you and your relationships.

How to recover and learn to love again

Moreover, we can make it a choice that losing isn’t going to harden our hearts but instead, we can learn from bad experiences and keep our hearts soft and palpable.

Do you think that’s weak?

On the contrary, when we are weak we build walls and turn cold. The truly strong person is the one who is able to dust themselves off from a huge disappointment and go on to love again, completely open and vulnerable. It’s called endurance. It’s called courage. It requires staying humble and understanding our worth and value.

Is that difficult? Sure it is, but it reaps far greater rewards.

And we don’t have to do this inner work alone. God’s love can help us stay warm and positive in our relations with others. We as humans are defensive by nature as a form of self-preservation. It’s our ego that betray us because we can’t see our true worth. When we understand our true worth, then we know we are complete and lacking nothing. No one else can complete us. God will bring the right one to compliment us, but never to complete us. This is codependent behavior when we think we aren’t whole without someone else. It’s also idolatry. But more on that later.

A great article here if you want more on how to eliminate defensive behavior in your life and relationships.

Protecting ourselves from the pain of heartache

Should we not worry about protecting ourselves? I think we should protect ourselves – but not by worrying about getting hurt or trying to control our circumstances to yield less hurtful results. That’s exhausting.

Let’s go about it with a totally different mindset: put God first, serve others, do our best in relationships to be open and caring and know that anyone who stays is genuine, and anyone who leaves is not meant for us. Our lives are God’s tapestry work, some threads come in and go out of the tapestry, others are worked throughout the entire tapestry of our lives.

God knows what He’s doing. When we try to manipulate outcomes, keep people stuck and unable to leave or push people out because we are afraid, we are getting in His way and hurting ourselves and others. He knows what is best for you and me – He cares about every big thing and small thing that concerns you. Let go and let God work things out in your life.

Let God’s love lead the way

Love affords us the opportunity to be at peace. Listen to how God talks to you and comforts you:

Cast all your anxiety on him because he cares for you. 1 Peter 5.7

For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future. Jeremiah 29.11

“If you remain in me and my words remain in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you.” John 15.7

When anxiety was great within me, Your consolation brought me joy. Psalm 94:19

“And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Comforter, [the Holy Spirit] to help you and be with you forever.” John 14:16

Will life bring hurtful situations? Sure, that’s life. But the grace to handle those situations should flow from a place within us where we are confident in who we are, confident in God’s love toward us, and that we know we’ve done our best.

The understanding of God’s love remedies codependency

Ask God for wisdom about this and ask Him to open the scriptures to you. He’ll lead you to the right people who can teach you and feed you the pure milk and substantial meat of the word of God. God never disappoints!

“Only ask, and I will give you the nations as your inheritance, the whole earth as your possession.” Psalm 2.8 (wow! God always goes above and beyond)

If any of you lacks wisdom, you should ask God, who gives generously to all without finding fault, and it will be given to you. James 1.5

Taking the first steps forward to love

So then, dealing with the controlling, fear-based approach to love and patiently changing that into an ability to allow people to come and go from our lives without reacting negatively and trying to control them is a good step forward.

Putting God first, serving others, working on ourselves by asking God to increase our knowledge and being open and vulnerable (with God’s help, prayer is the most powerful force on earth) is another good step forward.

Love is the freedom to let go

Learning how to process hurt and rejection so that it is understood as a feeling separate from our worth and value is so extremely important to our healing and growth as individuals. Remember, we want people who stick with us because they choose to stick! We want people who come into our lives and bring beneficial positive contributions longterm, where the equality is on-point and the partnership is mutual.

We don’t want to keep people in our lives we feel compelled to control, who don’t care to stick with us and leave us feeling anxious all the time. Controlling behavior is toxic, negative, unfulfilling and hollow. When we allow people to come and go freely, then those left in our lives are the result of genuine mutual interest. Once we better understand this, when quality connections come into our lives we’ll be able to make positive connections and keep them. Putting in the extra effort then will be rewarding when the feeling is mutual and each individual has excersised freedom in their choice of each other.

There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not made perfect in love. 1 John 4.18

God’s love instills us with courage

Perfect love casts out all fear. God can help us with this understanding. It’s His love that endures all things. What I am writing about is not a simple, easy change. This takes work – a lot of hard introspective and difficult work on oneself. It has taken me years and I’m still growing every day in the ability to become more vulnerable and less defensive. I’m not writing about something I don’t know and haven’t struggled with – and one thing’s for sure, God has made ALL the difference. His love is perfect over us..

Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth.  It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.

 Love never fails.

We can learn to love each other with His love and not our own, broken, selfish love.

But letting the right people move freely into and out of our lives means that the ones who stick are the ones that are real, true, committed and pure in their intentions. These are the bonds we should look to nurture.

Embrace love, trust in God and let everything go. Instead of wasting energy and time controlling people, let’s use those precious commodities to love others. Know that it’s a process that starts small and then grows with time. Those who stay are the real deal and worth our time. Whoever doesn’t stay leaves room for the real to show up and form secure bonds which will last and fulfill us for life.

Featured Image by Karim MANJRA 

The Difference Between Righteousness and Holiness

On By Ashley GatewoodIn Bread & Butter Morsels1 Comment


Righteousness and Holiness are not the same thing, but it’s easy to get them confused. They sound like the same thing, right? But they are actually quite different. Here is the difference between each. let’s take righteousness first.

Righteousness: Being right with God the father. 

If you are a believer, you are right with God. This reality is true because of one Man, Jesus Christ. Make no mistake, you and I have nothing to do with how right we are with God. Our righteousness is as filthy rags the bible says. That means we can live our lives following every rule and always doing good in the world – which is impossible, even rush hour traffic takes care of most of our own righteousness – and we still would not be right with God. Only one Man could have ever paid the price of our right standing with God and remain standing in the gap today as High Priest and Intercessor, and that is the Son of God, Jesus Christ.

Since God Himself wrought this work, it is perfect. He alone has made us right with God. No mortal man could do it. The righteousness of God IN CHRIST JESUS. Without Jesus, there is no beginning your walk with God. 

Which brings up the next reality: Holiness.

As Christians we want to walk with God…well most of us do. Relationship is the whole reason why Jesus offered Himself as a sacrifice and God accepted him, so that God might be reunited with His people. Sin separated God from His chosen people, it’s a long story but His chosen people started with Israel and then God graciously allowed us Gentiles to also be grafted into the olive tree. Before Christ, God could only get as near as the appointed earthly mortal priest, the Levite who would be appointed to carry out certain tasks in the tabernacle. Only the priest could enter the Holy of Holies, the very innermost part fashioned on this earth where God’s presence resided.

Jesus made it possible for the Holy Spirit to dwell within us.

Oh but praise God for Jesus! No more of that, God lives in our hearts, Paul said WE are now the temple of the Holy Spirit. John Chapter 15 explains it. Wow, just take a moment and wrap your mind around the awesome power of God and the blessings which come through Jesus Christ…thank you Lord.

So now we have God so close to us, we become one in Him. the root, the branches the fruit, we are one with God as Jesus said He was one with the Father, I in You and they in me. This is where holiness is so very important to understand. 

Holiness: Right living before God.

Those who are not Christians don’t have to worry about this – they have much bigger things to worry about…like understanding who Christ is and accepting Him as Savior. One cannot begin to understand the need for holy living until they understand the reality of the need for a Savior. 

God is not present in unholiness. He has mercy and grace in the face of it, but He isn’t going to hang around for long without holiness. Be holy for I am holy He said. One cannot do this without the Holy Spirit and some good old fashion discipline. Let’s take a look at what hospitality means.

Our Hospitality toward the Holy Spirit

You have a friend you’ve invited over for lunch. You know he doesn’t like smoke and is allergic to it, but you like to smoke. When you know your friend is coming, you do your best to clean the house and to not smoke while your friend is with you. Now, what kind of friend would invite you over, knowing you hate smoke and are allergic to it, and fill the house with it right before you show up – maybe blow it in your face while you’re eating, and continue smoking while you are trying to talk, share and visit with each other? Not a very respectful gesture right? Not a hospitable environment for your friend. That friend isn’t going to hang around for long! Not because they don’t love you, but because they are allergic to smoke, eyes burning and watering, unable to beathe and terribly uncomfortable.

Let’s work to welcome the Holy Spirit into our daily lives! And make an environment He would be pleased to dwell in and remain. This is where holiness is so important. Holiness is what we can do for Him, just like we would for a friend.

Don’t Be Nonchalant About Sin: It still has consequences

Paul warned us of having a nonchalant attitude towards sin and God’s mercy saying “God forbid we go on sining just because grace would abound.” There is still death residing in sin, dear people, and it will kill. And believe me, there are a lot of ways death can happen without it being mortal death. Remember King David sinning with Bathsheba and killing her husband? What did God say, “The sword will never leave your family…” That’s what the prophet Nathan said to King David and David had trouble with his family for the rest of his life. Please take heed of this – there are inescapable consequences to sin.

So in wrapping up, we must rightfully divide between these two realities.

1.Holiness is not being right with God. Holiness is right living before God and it is the only way to grow our relationship with God.

2. The righteousness of Jesus Christ is what qualifies you to walk with God in the first place. We as human beings can never be righteous enough – Jesus took all of our unrighteousness, He was the only One who could because He was perfect and blameless before God. We have the righteousness of Christ, what a gift from God!

I pray we all gain understanding of the difference between righteousness and holiness, and that your passion for God far out shines the need to walk according to the flesh. Walk in the Spirit and be led by Him and you won’t fulfill the desires of the flesh. It takes practice, patience and persistence. Praise God He is faithful and long-suffering and will never give up on us!

Featured Image by: Bart LaRue@bartlarueeppler

Sunshine Walks

On By Ashley GatewoodIn How to Follow Your DreamLeave a comment

“Enoch walked with God, and then he was not, for God took him.”

I have been walking every day I can find the time and making the most of the pleasant weather. When I first started walking, I just threw on some flip-flops and headed out to one of the parks in town. My main thought was to get some sun and fill up my vitamin D tank. (Be healthy about it and don’t forget to grab some sunscreen to put on.)

But as the summer progressed, I found my walking had some beneficial side-effects. One particular benefit I wasn’t expecting was better posture. It just automatically comes with toning and exercising your core. Sitting behind a desk in an office all day is not good for the body. (or the soul for that matter.)

Getting Serious

I upgraded to some cushy walking shoes because my speed got faster and I went from leisurely flip-flopping for 30 minutes to walking at a faster pace for more than an hour. Any longer than an hour-and-a-half, and I’m feeling it in my back and hips. But hopefully I’ll build up endurance to keep it up for two hours. Then, if I can ever get my hands on a bicycle, I’ll switch over and cycle come Fall with its cooler weather. It’s been a fluid progression to start out walking like I was headed to the mailbox and my body increased in ability over the course of a month. Pretty cool how efficient and adaptable we humans are.

Just start, that’s all. Ten minutes, fifteen minutes. And before you know it, you’ll have your own little program going. The shoes I bought were cheap enough – nothing crazy – but importantly, they fit well and keep my knees from hurting. Good shoes will help you walk for longer periods of time without wearing you out.

Here’s a great article for beginners that goes into the specifics of walking on Very Well Fit And more info about shoes and such.

But the best benefit of walking, besides the sunshine, is it gives me time with God. I talk to Him, or pray to Him – really it is a conversation. If you’ve never had a conversation with God – like you would with a friend – I would encourage you to approach Him in this way.

God is Always Available

He’s not a God that is only accessible when we are in church, or quiet and in a reverent posture (whatever that means to you) but He is accessible at all times, in all situations. A personal relationship with God is like no other. He created you, He knows you like no one else ever will. He counts every hair on your head – that’s how much everything about you means to Him!

Enoch Walked With God

The Bible says Enoch walked faithfully with God for 300 years. Then I guess he got so close to Him that one day, God just took him. All other people were described as ‘died’ or ‘was laid to rest’, but not Enoch. He was just taken up to heaven it sounds like to me. Fascinating!

So, concerning these sunshine walks; maybe one brisk morning while I’m out talking with God among the cicadas songing in the trees, the sun shining, or the summer rain sprinkling and like that – “I was not, for God took me”….

Yeah, probably not but if nothing else, I’ll have walked and talked with a Friend who will never leave me, and that’s good enough for me.

Find your ideal park and get out there in the sunshine! Fill up your vitamin D tank, enjoy the extra benefits and let your body take care of the rest. You’ll feel much better, trust me : )

I Slept, But My Heart was Awake

On By Ashley GatewoodIn Love:: Lifestyle:: Health2 Comments

Song of Solomon is a fascinating dance between two lovers unmistakably bound to each other yet struggle to make a connection they both long for. It’s beautiful, haunting and perfectly revealing of the human condition. This parallels God’s pursuit of mankind – the love of God faithfully wooing us, in spite of our sin, never giving up drawing us nearer to Him.

Surely I would have given up if not for His faithfulness to find me time and time again.

Song of Solomon Chapter Five

I slept, but my heart was awake.
A sound! My beloved is knocking.
“Open to me, my sister, my love,
    my dove, my perfect one,
for my head is wet with dew,
    my locks with the drops of the night.”
3 I had put off my garment;
    how could I put it on?
I had bathed my feet;
    how could I soil them?
4 My beloved put his hand to the latch,
    and my heart was thrilled within me.
5 I arose to open to my beloved,
    and my hands dripped with myrrh,
my fingers with liquid myrrh,
    on the handles of the bolt.
6 I opened to my beloved,
    but my beloved had turned and gone.
My soul failed me when he spoke.
I sought him, but found him not;
    I called him, but he gave no answer.
7 The watchmen found me
    as they went about in the city;
they beat me, they bruised me,
    they took away my veil,
    those watchmen of the walls!
8 I adjure you, O daughters of Jerusalem,
    if you find my beloved,
that you tell him
    I am faint with love.

For more on the Song of Solomon A Seal Upon Your Heart delves into God’s protection over us when navigation relationships.

Taking a Closer Look

Now I am no religious scholar but I see a lot in these verses, and these two figures haunt me – I think we can all relate to both the Lover and the Beloved at times. So let’s look into these verses from the perspective of the human condition..

I slept, but my heart was awake. (Wow, so much in just one sentence. I’ve been here before – the mind shuts down, turns off and forgets. Love hurts sometimes. The intellect really can’t comprehend love – it’s lost to it. But the heart, it keeps beating, waiting, watching for what it is looking for and knows it immediately even if the mind is still asleep and unable to make the connection.)


A sound! My beloved is knocking. (The heart hears it but the mind is still playing catch-up..)
“Open to me, my sister, my love,
    my dove, my perfect one,
for my head is wet with dew,
    my locks with the drops of the night.” (Sensual and alluring. At this point, I’m wondering, where did he go? And how long has he been looking for her? Where has her Lover been that he is now in such a state? The passing of time can be cruel to the soul.)


3 I had put off my garment;
    how could I put it on?
I had bathed my feet;
    how could I soil them? (So here we find her hesitating to move toward him. It’s as if she made the decision to move on and change her clothes, change her circumstances and situation, put off the old and put on something new because – well – maybe she thought he wasn’t coming back. She was comfortable and sleeping (though her heart was awake and wouldn’t let her go) she’s going through the motions until the knock and voice of her lover jarred her – now she’s questioning, ‘what to do?’ She wasn’t expecting him..


4 My beloved put his hand to the latch,
    and my heart was thrilled within me. (He grew impatient. One translation says ‘My beloved thrust his hand through the latch-opening.’ The symbolic intimacy of this verse is undeniable: love will pierce our strongest defenses and break through the walls we build around us which we think protect us but really only bury us. Love causes us to arise from our cold slumber. Love breaks through the lock she had placed on the door and she is moved, excited, hopeful and anticipating a positive exchange with her Lover.


5 I arose to open to my beloved,
    and my hands dripped with myrrh,
my fingers with liquid myrrh,
    on the handles of the bolt. (Oh my goodness! She’s anointed herself for him and changed her course. She’s fully awake. But it’s too late! She hesitated, dithered about, questioned for too long – and now, though she makes haste to the door to throw the latch, her hands are too slippery with oil and she’s unable to get a good grip. So more time passes fumbling around with the lock until…..


6 I opened to my beloved,
    but my beloved had turned and gone.
My soul failed me when he spoke. (It’s heart-wrenching. She’s lost him again.)


I sought him, but found him not;
    I called him, but he gave no answer.
7 The watchmen found me
    as they went about in the city;
they beat me, they bruised me,
    they took away my veil,
    those watchmen of the walls!

The Impact of Love

Love can move us to do things that would otherwise be unthinkable. Love is beautiful. Love is fierce. Who can withstand it? She is laid bare, dignity trampled, pride bruised – those who think they know better for her tell her she’s wrong to be outside, searching the streets like a mad woman and ‘beat her up’ emotionally so-to-speak. I can hear them now ridiculing her; ‘how could you ruin your clothes like this? What were you thinking? Don’t you care how you look? You’re a disgrace for all to see in the city streets.”

But she didn’t care because her heart took over and her intellect finally made the connection. There are those who resist being moved by the power of love while others embrace it, are moved out into the streets by it, hair dripping with the dew of the night, tossing-turning struggling to understand it, care less what others think about it – they are all in. Unrelenting, passionate and unwavering in pursuit of their beloved…


8 I adjure you, O daughters of Jerusalem,
    if you find my beloved,
that you tell him
    I am faint with love.

Featured Image: ‘Song of Songs IV’ by Marc Chagall 1958

Want more information about different interpretations of Song of Solomon? Check out Britanica’s insightful article Song of Solomon Biblical Canticle

A Seal Upon Your Heart

On By Ashley GatewoodIn Love:: Lifestyle:: HealthLeave a comment

Let me be a seal upon your heart, 
Like the seal upon your hand. 
For love is fierce as death, 
Passion is mighty as Sheol; 
Its darts are darts of fire, 
A blazing flame. 
Vast floods cannot quench love, 
Nor rivers drown it.” ~Song of Songs 8.6-7

I wish I could speak more eloquently about this verse. Passion without God, to me, is a fire that will consume everything without mercy. It is ignorant of itself and has no proper direction. It’s a carnal love that excludes the spiritual aspect, and leaves only the fallen nature of human beings trying to connect to each other without the divine cords of God’s love leading them.

But when love and passion have God’s seal upon them, it’s like the fire which set the bush in the desert aflame, yet did not consume it. There is direction, hope, faithfulness and truth within the connection as well as an unquenchable fiery passion as fierce as death because the fingerprint of God is woven into it. Where there is wisdom and love, passion can exist without harm.

Passion can be disastrous when separated from God – after all, God is love which is gentle, patient and kind. Passion is hollow, draining and dissolves into lust without the protective seal of the Holy Spirit. But a union solidified with God’s love is satisfying and transcending when God is understood to be the giver of it. Love fulfills it’s purpose when God is invited into a union. Then the passion, the fire and all that comes with it can be experienced with trust, happiness and freedom because there is no fear of harm in it.

The above verse from Song of Songs is written by the Beloved, in-other-words, the woman. A beautiful expression laid down into scripture as a means to understand Jesus’ love for His Church. The Holy Spirit used a woman’s sentiment to express this love – I find that powerful and beautiful.

Featured Image taken at the Cincinnati Art Museum exhibit: “No Spectators: The Art of Burning Man” 2019