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Hi, folks, I've been writing a series all about  a time in my twenties when I was part of religious cult. Last week I wrote a heart-breaking story from my past about G and his sad demise. This is my version of the Valley of Dry Bones from the Book of Ezekiel. I'm calling it Close to the Bone. This is the final in the series.

Toward the end of the dark days of the cult, I was failing around for purpose. A teacher from college, Dr. Van Riper, ran into me at the supermarket and demanded to know why I had three children instead of writing books for children. I had no answer. She'd told me what to do, and I'd ignored her.

 I was slowly waking up in these days. God's chosen people were now looking like a bunch of uneducated country folk, plus a bunch of kids that had choked on embracing the future after college. That's when I saw the ad in the newspaper about some group called SCBWI.

Fellow-shipping outside the church was forbidden in manipulative, oblique way, but this was business so I figured God would give me a pass. I remember heading to that first meeting and feeling so welcome. There were 8 or 9 women and they were so gracious and kind.  I remember the first conversation  in a long time without having to say praise the Lord or how God was directing me every third word.  I also remember KA. She was a real author and the leader of the SCBWI group. Her first picture book had come out but she talked to me like I was a colleague. Bam, I was in the inner circle.

I can not tell you  how much KA's leadership meant to me. I tried to keep secret from the church my fraternizing with the world.  KA was a Unitarian. That was something I was supposed to fear. Of course, by now, I understood that I was supposed to fear everything, and it was sort of ridiculous and tiring. KA believed in me as a creative person. She never let me feel like I was a little off with my long dresses and three kids in three years. She accepted me just as I was. It was the most Christian thing I'd ever experienced.

I remember being invited to another SCBWI member's house called DC. I had friends outside the church for the first time in almost eight years.  I was hanging out with a group of women, totally normal women with varied backgrounds. It was sort of dizzying. I was supposed to have left the world behind but now I sneaking back into it. Oh, and the big problem? I loved it.

SCBWI became an island of normal in my life. Like Phoenix, I was rising from my ashes. KA tried to convince me to go to Los Angeles for the annual conference. I chickened out but her encouragement planted a seed in me.  KA convinced me to volunteer for events, write letters to editors, and even submit my drawings to the SCBWI Bulletin.  My first credit was as an illustrator in the Bulletin.  I was so proud. I was engaged in the pursuit of liberty.  I had expressed myself.  I made $50.  It was mind-blowing.

When Tim and I decided to move away the place we had known such tragedy, KA continued to encourage me until I left town.  I have no idea if she had any idea of how lost I was, and how much I needed help to become a normal person again.  She never said anything when the sorry story of my entire life was reported in the local newspaper. KA encouraged me creatively, commenting on my work and giving me suggestions, and once she sent me a card stating there would be a day when she said she knew me when.  She bridged the way for me to absolutely normal. I turned into the funky person I had been before all the religious nonsense.  I came to my senses.

Well, this is end of these posts and also time for big news. My blog is moving over to Niume.com.  I hope you consider following me an my content there.  You will receive updates of posts if you follow me on Facebook, Twitter, or tumbler.

One of those early drawings. I sent to the Bulletin on a notepad paper, a big no-no. Sm bought them anyway.

A quote for your pocket:

My people, I am going to open your graves and bring you up from them; I will bring you back to the land of Israel.13 Then you, my people, will know that I am the Lord, when I open your graves and bring you up from them. 14 I will put my Spirit in you and you will live, and I will settle you in your own land. Then you will know that I the Lord have spoken, and I have done it, declares the Lord.

Ezekiel 37: 12b-14

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 I have another whirlwind moment to share.

After I turned this blog back on yesterday I felt the need to get away for a while. To draw near to the Lord. And as I pulled out of the drive it was very obvious there was a power struggle going on. I could feel it in the air. As if there is a battle heading up in huge proportions. I felt as if I were in the middle of it.

I got a milkshake and I did a once through of the thrift shop- went on my way praying over a bed (frame) that would cost about one tenth of the one I had dreamed up in my head for her majesty's birthday present in two weeks. I prayed it would still be there when I had money in hand, and the price would be down to one I feel comfortable paying for a used item.
I was just minding my own business.
Praying.
Seeking.
No, not for a bed.
For the Lord.

 I turned onto the main street, and I began to go up the hill by the hospital (on my way to the river to be alone with the Lord). As I began to accelerate up the hill, a trucker pulled up in the left lane (had his left turn signal on, so I thought, Okay?!). I was in the right lane.

Something said to give that truck the once over so I could identify it. Couldn't figure out why I need to do that, until it began to pull over into the right lane (left turn signal still blinking).
He didn't even see me.
He kept pulling into my lane where I was.
Fear and anger almost overcame me.
Finally there was a parking lot right across from the hospital.

I remember beeping my horn two or three times and the person never even let off the gas. In fact, accelerated. My jaw was to the floor. Seriously. I just looked around. Nobody who had been behind me would let me back into traffic, so I couldn't get the license plate number. I was dumbfounded more than anything.

Here's the thing. It was like I was invisible. Like nobody saw me. Didn't see it happen. I was so freaked out, and nobody even came to my aid. And that was when the devil hit me with, "You are invisible. Nobody is going to help you. They don't care."

Wow. Not so much.

I began to speak the word of God. To pray.

And then I heard the Lord say that it is time for things to break. Not just in me, but in others all around me. And I knew I had to draw away deep within His presence.

I said the words ripple effect.

He said, "No child. Tidal wave."

I am okay with that.
Definitely.
Just protect me and mine as we all go through this.

So instead of getting into the river, I climbed the hill. The very steep, slick hill. It was about 90% humidity yesterday, and 80+ degrees. But I went. Still frightened and feeling as if something/body had it in for me. Trust me Princesses, your enemy does.

I sat on a towel and I prayed. I felt led to tell the Lord my allegiance is with Him. He knows it, but I know He needed to hear me say it out loud yesterday. There is a huge battle going on in the spirit. And it is heading up to be a war.

Children of God, listen. We have got to get our heads out of the sand. Stop believing that everything will be just fine, and we can continue to keep doing the things we are, committing the same sins over and over. We are lying to ourselves. Self included.

The Lord really does want to set us free. But something has to change. That change begins inside of us, not in the middle of a political party. The word of God says may you prosper, even as your soul prospers.
Nothing is going to change in this nation, inside our churches, our homes, our hearts, until we make up our minds that we are done with the game playing.

Stop hiding the porn, and other sexual sins.
Stop hiding the excessive drinking in private.
Stop hiding the gluttonous appetites and the gimme gimme attitudes.
Stop with the envy.
Stop with the pride and arrogance.
Stop with the anger and unforgiveness and just let go of the hurts of the past.

When we make up our minds that we truly want to change, then, and only then can it be broken and restoration begin.

It starts in the head, and when the head is convinced, then it moves to the heart (or the body...). Once the body catches on, it goes outward, and not just inward. It radiates. Calls out to God like E.T. sending his signals home for mom and dad. Turn on our heart lights. Call out to the Lord. Repentance. Truly sorry for the things we have allowed to go on. Sometimes we don't even know we were allowing something to go on until we begin to ask the Lord to open our eyes to see.

Problem is, some stop right there. They see what is going on and, oh no, please don't make me go there Lord.
They run and hide.
They are afraid to face it.

If we would seek Him in boldness and not just give the Lord lip-service, we would know that these things inside us HAVE to change if we are ever to be truly usable by the Lord our God. And if we truly have allegiance with Him then we will not shy away from those things which hurt. We will just let the Lord be who He is, and cleanse and purify us from the inside out.

People will get saved.
Ministries will grow.
Churches will have revival.
The Holy Spirit will pour out and create in us newness and new gifts.
Fears will melt like ice cream in the heat of a July day.
Children will straighten up.
Homes will no longer be broken.
Life will be so full, instead of empty.
Our hearts will be full.
There will be less poverty and homelessness.
Less sickness and emotional grief.
People will be made new.
They will understand and feel again.

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By Eve Donegan, Sales & Marketing Assistant

David Ehrenfeld is a professor of biology at Rutgers University and holds degrees in history, medicine, and zoology. He is the founding editor of the journal Conservation Biology, lectures internationally, and is the author of The Arrogance of Humanism and Beginning Again. His most recent book, Becoming Good Ancestors,focuses on the interactions, both negative and positive, among nature, community, and our exploding technology, and explains the critical role of honesty in moving towards a sustainable society. In the post below, Ehrenfeld celebrates Earth Day by reviewing the role of environmental restoration in the Florida Everglades.

Environmental restoration is a case in point. We cause environmental damage with comparative ease. We have many ways of doing it: the reckless application of pesticides, indiscriminate use of chain saws and bulldozers, strip mining, carpet bombing, the excessive withdrawal of groundwater, the obliteration of wetlands, the spread of invasive species, and even the relatively rapid alteration of global climate. The speed of the destruction may lead us to think that environmental restoration can be achieved almost as quickly; and the word “restoration” implies a return to the original condition. Yet even though many restorations work well, our most optimistic hopes are not always met.

The environment doesn’t function like the diagrams in the economics textbooks, where the arrows point in both directions, and flows of capital and labor are readily reversible. When the environment is altered, some changes (like species extinctions and introductions) are irreversible, and some (like the removal of topsoil) have a painfully long recovery time.

Take the case of the Florida Everglades. A complex and beautiful ecosystem, a “river of grass” dotted with teardrop-shaped islands of trees, it was created and sustained by the sheetlike flow of water from Lake Okeechobee and the lands to the north. In the last fifty or more years, the Everglades have been dramatically altered by human activity.

The flow of water has been curtailed by agricultural use and diversionary canals, and the trickle that comes into the glades is contaminated with phosphates and mercury. The pattern of wildfires has changed. Ecosystem alteration has imperiled species such as the snail kite and the Cape Sable seaside sparrow. New species, often from released pets, have flourished. The Burmese python, as large as eighteen feet long and 160 pounds, has become common – it can swallow a deer, a pig, an alligator, or presumably a person. The introduced climbing fern, Lygodium, coats and smothers native vegetation. Intense development along the Miami corridor to the east consumes groundwater, which leads to saltwater intrusion in the aquifers, and the traffic and other human impacts all have their effect.

What can be done to restore the Everglades? Part of the answer is that if a dependable flow of relatively clean water is once again made available, damage can be slowed or halted in the central part of the remaining Everglades, and natural recovery will be given a chance. The State of Florida has already spent a vast amount of money to achieve this, with preliminary success, and the federal government has promised to spend more. But it would be foolish to expect that the existing phosphate and mercury will have no lingering effects, the exotic animals and plants will all be controlled, that human population on the park’s eastern border will cause no further changes, or even that the rapidly rising sea level can somehow be completely contained.

It is harder to achieve environmental restoration in some places than in others. In the remaining intact areas of the peatlands of Canada and northern Europe and the rainforests of the Amazon, the Congo, and Australia, preservation is still an option but extensive restoration is not likely in the foreseeable future. On the other hand, restoration is thriving in urban areas, with the replacement of brownfields and concrete deserts by parks and gardens. Wetland and prairie restoration is an exciting new science with many success stories. Some endangered species – the peregrine falcon, the wolf, and the Costa Rican nesting population of green sea turtles – have responded dramatically to restoration efforts. The mixed deciduous forests of New England recover most of their species and much of their beauty a mere 50-75 years after cutting, with minimal management on our part. Even in New England, however, new diseases and pests introduced by human activity – gypsy moths, sudden oak decline, beech bark disease, emerald ash borers, hemlock wooly adelgids – may make restoration to the “original” forest impossible.

Environmental restoration is vitally necessary, and it deserves a far greater commitment of resources and effort than it is getting. But we have to guard against unrealistic assumptions about what it is possible for a restoration to do. In any particular restoration, everyone should decide at the outset what an acceptable end result will be – not necessarily a carbon copy of what was once there. Restoring processes, such as proper water flow in the Everglades, is likely to be easier and faster to achieve than restoration of the original species composition and ecosystem structure. Given enough time, an acceptable plant and animal community will follow the repair of ecosystem processes, but there is a good chance that it will not be exactly like the original one. Appreciate it for what it is.

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