A few weeks ago I discovered a blog that has truly touched my heart. I have been wanting to share this blog with you all for a while, but I’m just now finding the time to do it because this blog is different - it deserves some time. I didn’t want to just through something up and say go check out this blog, I wanted to personally introduce you. I wanted to tell you about why “I love this lady!” (as I exclaimed to Bryan after reading one of her posts). So, why do I love Ann at Holy Experience?

Because she writes with honesty. She opens her heart. She writes with pose and emotion in her words. She writes with beauty. She shares her struggles. She shares her triumphs. She invites us all to growth just as she is growing.

Here are some posts that have particularly touched me lately:

What to Do When You Want to Give Up and Stay in Bed – this post could not have been more timely for me. It conficted me to the core. But, it was a gentle conficting. A conficting that led me somewhere and said, “come, you don’t have to live this way.” Here is an excerpt from the post:

Why can’t I remember: the state of my space doesn’t reflect the state of my soul.

I ring the dinner bell for boys to tumble to the table. This morning, even the cast iron bell in the hand feels like a millstone around the neck.

I eat breakfast in silence and I don’t know how I am going to get dressed for church, rustle up a meal for 10 when we get home from church, make it through Latin and spelling and the early Renaissance and piano scales and fractions and the three meals a day for eight people this week and the 4 loads of laundry a day and all the prayers between now and church again next Sunday.

I do the next thing. Clean off the table.

“Thank you, Lord, for the food that filled these dishes, that I am well and here and I can clean off this table.” It sounds mechanical. And a tad lame. It is. I am doing the next thing.

Wipe the counters. And I say it aloud,

“Thank you, Lord, for water to wash off counters and that the dust bunnies around here haven’t yet grown into monsters and that the jam stuck sticky all over everything really does just wash off, and for this husband that treats me tender when I’m stuck.”

Can I feel the stirrings… the lifting?

One foot in front of the other and one murmured thanks after another and underneath the everlasting arms will hold.

Wearing a One-Piece: on the road to Calvary – This post is writen from the parspective of Mary at the cross watching as Jesus dies and contemplating the seamless robe of Christ. Here is an excerpt:

How you were slashed that our lives could be seamless -- all holy.

That the veil in the temple rents in two because of You, and there is no longer a divide between the common and the hallowed and the whole earth is full of your glory and You are the continuous, unending, divine thread that weaves through all of the world, holding all together... even when you, Son, are rent apart.

And hanging naked and blood smeared and dirt defiled, You nodded slow and You said yes --- You gave us your one-piece robe of seamless holiness and You clothed us, the filthy ones, in all your white righteousness.

Has Anyone Seen the Signs of the Easter People? – Here she talks about Easter being more than just a weekend or a Sunday, but a season. Easter Sunday is just the beginning. I highly encourage you to add this blog to your blog reader. The photos, thoughts, quotes and stores will challenge you, touch your heart, and call you to worship.

Rejoicing in the journey - Bethany