If I was standing waiting for the “walk” sign at a stoplight, and a perfect stranger asked me where I grew up, you would, “Outside of Palm Springs, in a little town called Sky Valley”.  Ask my what my favorite color is, and I would say “pink”, cause I’m a tomboy that really likes girly things.  Ask me the food I would eat above all other foods, if calories were not an issue, and I would say “baked mac-n-cheese hands down!”  I would even tell you the story about how my husband Jessie and I met…..how he proposed, and all about our wedding and where we went on our honeymoon.

But these are stories that we all have readily available at any given time.  What about your real story.  How often are we truly transparent?

We hear stories all the time.  We hear about how Paris Hilton went shopping at Prada, and how Sandra Bullock got divorced.  Did you hear the one about the sharks seen down in San Onofre?  Or maybe you heard the story about the amazing premature baby that came back to life with his mother’s touch, and calming words.  As amazing as some of these stories can be, they are all distant.  We can know stories of people we will never come in contact, yet not know about the people we see every single day.

Yeah, most of us have Facebook now, and we do our best to come up with clever status updates and comments that we hope people will comment on, or at least “like”.  We try to appear happy, and content, posting things about the awesome day we had, and how life is good.  If we are really desperate we post something about how bad our day was, hoping that someone will simply reply back with an “I’m sorry your day was a bummer”.  We want people to care, we want people to hear, we want to tell our story.  Why don’t we?  Maybe we are just too darn scared!!    There can be risk involved in showing the true you.  But, a true friend will recognize, and celebrate the honesty shown in you being REAL!

We all have our own unique story.  The path that God has led only us down.  Every path is a little bit different. Every path is filled with love, hate, faith, doubt, ups, downs, success, failure, and everything in between.  Oh how I long for us all to T-R-A-N-S-P-A-R-E-N-T!

You have a story to tell.  I want to hear it.  If you want to tell me, I am here!  Life is boring when all you do is listen to your own!

You would expect this man to be in a field somewhere, resting his head, under the shade of a huge oak tree.  Or sipping lemonade on his porch swing watching the day pass by.  You wouldn’t expect to find him on a bench in front of my favorite, albeit overpriced store (Anthropologie), at this bustling shopping center in L.A.  But there he sits. He was tired, so he took a moment to rest

I need to learn to

Come to me, all of you who are weary and carry heavy burdens, and I will give you rest. Matt. 11:28

rest wherever I am and wherever I need to.  Not necessarily to stop and take a nap.  I’m talking about taking a moment and resting in Jesus.  Stopping everything and just taking a break.  It’s not laziness.  We aren’t made to strive all the time, trudging through the day to day.  It’s not laziness, we were made to rest!  The sun goes down everyday to give us a better environment for rest than any blackout shades could ever provide!

So, this old man reminds me to take a load off whenever I need it.  Granted, he may be taking a nap, but maybe, just maybe he was praying?  You never know!

He peered over to his right to see a woman who was obviously without a home. All of her belongings were in a cart she had pulled in to the sanctuary with her. She looked unkempt, but sat quietly.

After a few announcements, the offering bags began to be passed as the worship band played a song. My husband looked over at the woman as she reached into her cart. She pulled out a jar full of coins, emptied out half of them and put them in the offering bag. It gave him chills even as he retold the story. It is almost a carbon copy of the story told in the book of Mark, chapter 12.

41 Jesus sat down near the collection box in the Temple and watched as the crowds dropped in their money. Many rich people put in large amounts. 42 Then a poor widow came and dropped in two small coins.[a] 43 Jesus called his disciples to him and said, “I tell you the truth, this poor widow has given more than all the others who are making contributions. 44 For they gave a tiny part of their surplus, but she, poor as she is, has given everything she had to live on.”

Sometimes God’s Word gets lived out right in front of your eyes, when you least expect it!  Keep your eyes open.

I’m not a real sentimental person when it comes to objects.  I’m by no means a pack rat and get rid of things regularly.  However, I never dreamed of getting rid of Baba’s Bourbon Bottle.  I use it for olive oil mostly, it is beautiful, clear crystal.  It has an amazing shape, with intricate details.  It has a beautiful stopper on top which I adore.

Well, this afternoon, I decided to reorganize, and probably get rid of some stuff I no longer needed.  I was getting into that cabinet over the fridge, you know the one where things go to be forgotten!  Teetering on a chair,  I picked up Baba’s Bourbon Bottle.  In a moment of clumsiness, the lid toppled off, and hit my white tile floor with such force that it shattered into pieces all over the place.

Bummed out, I got to the task of cleaning up the mess I had made.  As is the norm with any mess, you start with the big pieces first, but then I realized that the pieces weren’t isolated to just my kitchen, they had made it all the way out into my living room, which is of course white tile  too….making the clear crystal hard to find.

As I was picking up the pieces, my mind wandered (as it usually does – doesn’t take much for me to get distracted).  I was thinking about a current struggle in my life, and having a little conversation in my mind with God about why it wasn’t getting any easier…..”Why am I still struggling with this God?  Why won’t you make it better?  Why can’t you just take it away?”   I started thinking about how the pieces of glass had gone WAY further than I had thought they would, and how I was having a hard time seeing the little shards of glass that were littering my house.

I began to think about how SIN affects every area of your life.  How lack of obedience to God, in the smallest part, will have repercussions on a grander scale, and they can shatter you in ways you never dreamed.  We may think that the little white lies, or the gossip, or the discontentment, or the anger in our lives are no big deal…….but sin is sin…..it says so in God’s word.  God made me realize today that this current struggle wasn’t getting any better because I wasn’t obeying Him in the small things.

As I hunted through the living room looking for pieces I had to turn on the light, as dusk was snatching the sunlight from the windows.  As I flipped it on, I was reminded that light exposes the hidden things.  When the light shined, the minute pieces of glass began to sparkle and I was able to pick them up.  When we come to God, and ask Him to expose the hidden things in our heart, sin that we may not even realize exists, He is faithful to do it in an instant.

Now, I’ve gathered all the broken pieces, and I sit here looking at Baba’s Bourbon Bottle.  I still have it, I can still use it, but it is incomplete.  My final reminder in this little “divine mishap” today was that sin will always steal a little something from you.  God restores, as He has been so faithful to heal brokenness in my life, but you can not always get those pieces back, whether it be wasted time or friends lost.

It’s amazing how the little chores of life can become lessons, as you let God speak to your heart.    My prayer as I finished the clean up was Psalm 51, that God would create in me a heart that is clean and pure.  That I can present myself before Him as a woman who will obey, even in the small things.

So, there you go, lesson learned through Baba’s Bourbon Bottle.  I hope that today you will see God and obey Him in the little things.

Complete in Jesus,

Shannon

Wow, right!?  My reading with C.S. Lewis goes pretty much the same every time.  I find myself having to read sentences, paragraphs and pages over and over again so I can grasp what my eyes just read.

The quote above made me get this visual picture.  When we are feeling pleasure, our hearts feel at peace, not much going on in our heads….like when you are sitting on the beach, waves crashing, the sun warming your face, not a care in the world.  ”God whispers to us in our pleasures”.  We whisper back, “Thank you God, for this amazing place!”

We are often faced with temptations, times when our conscience is kicked into high gear…”should I, or shouldn’t I?”  Our minds are a little louder now, we are speaking to ourselves a little more now…..”God speaks to us in our conscience”

But pain…..pain is a different story.  If we are not displaying the hurt outwardly, inwardly we are screaming at the top of our lungs..”WHY GOD?  WHY?  WHY WOULD YOU LET THIS HAPPEN TO ME?  WHAT DID I DO TO DESERVE THIS?” Yet, God’s voice can be louder than our own.  I once heard it said, that in times of adversity, we should stop listening to ourselves, and start listening to God.  He “shouts to us in our pain.”  Why?  Because sometimes He has to.  To remind us that He is bigger, stronger, and above any pain we would ever feel.  He is reminding us that He has not disappeared.  I envision Him shouting “Calm Down!”  Or to be a little more Scriptural “Peace!  Be Still!”

His point was when we have gone through the darkness of despair so thick that you can’t see…..and come out the other side realizing that God never left you, you emerge stronger, wiser, and brimming with faith that God is all in all.

Have you gone through pain, sorrow, suffering, sickness?  Have you seen God come through in the end?   I know that without the deepest sorrow I have encountered, I would not know God’s love in such a deep way.  The adversity has produced wisdom, faith, endurance, and a drive to keep on going even when things are drop down, give up, hopeless.

Maybe you are going through a huge inferno of strife right now?  Do you feel alone?  sorrow?  sadness? pain?  fear?

The Bible says “Do not fear for I am with you”.  I know you’ve heard it, I know you’ve read it, but stop for a second, and let it soak in…….let it seep all the way down to the most doubtful part of your heart.   You know the place…..it’s where you have accepted that those most painful things will never stop, that the sin will always fester, that the guilt will always breed more and more guilt, the shame will embed itself into your soul, until you are so paralyzed that you are rendered useless.

Do not fear because God has AMAZING things for you.  I mean it!  Had God not rescued me from my own place of sorrow, sin and despair, I would still be wallowing in hopelessness.

God has MORE!  SO MUCH MORE!!

Now my site is back, and better! I am going to work on getting some more links up here, and most importantly, working on that new record, for real! I really am making plans to start this summer! God is doing some great stuff, and I can’t wait to share it with you! It’s time to get a move on!

Keep checking back for updates!

I am looking forward to a great year, filled with some pretty cool stuff!  There’s a benefit concert coming up in January for Live2free (Live2free.org), and human Trafficking Awareness day is coming up on January 11th!  I’m so excited to be partnering with some pretty awesome bands who are going to be playing at these events!!!  More details to follow!

I can’t hardly believe Christmas has come and gone!  I’ve just moved into a new place which I LOVE!  However, the Christmas tree lights never resurfaced after the move, so we had a light-less tree, but it was decked out nonetheless!  We took a beautiful walk down to the beach, in our sunny 80 degree weather!  Did you hear that 2/3 of the USA got snow for Christmas!  Holy Cow!!  That’s crazy!  So, I was super grateful for our sun-shiny day!  I am a California girl for sure!

I’ve received lots of requests for a copy of my old CD……so, as requested, I just placed an order for some more.  If you want to get your hand on one, just let me know!  I can set one aside for you when they come in!  And, the next CD of course is in the works!

The newest song on the list for the CD, I will be borrowing a quote from John G Paton, a pioneer missionary to New Hebrides (today’s Vanuatu).  He had lost his wife and child, and was surrounded by hostile natives hiding in a tree.  I was so humbled when I read his words

“The hours I spent there live all before me as if it were but of yesteday.  I heard the frequent discharge of muskets, and the yells of the Savages.  Yet I sat there among the branches, as safe in the arms of Jesus.  Never in all my sorrows did my Lord draw nearer to me, and speak more soothingly in my soul……..Alone, yet not alone!  If it be to glorify my God, I will not grudge to spend many nights alone in such a tree, to feel again the Saviour’s spiritual presence, to enjoy His consoling fellowhsip.  If thus thrown back upon your soul, alone, all alone, in the midnight, in the bush, in the very embrace of death itself, have you a Friend that will not fail you then?”

Needless to say I was indescribably inspired, and I can’t wait for this song to be completeled and recorded!   I can’t wait to share it with you!

Loves to you all, and Happy New Year!

Shannon Q

If you think of it, please pray that we can get this new CD recorded soon!  I have lots of new songs that I can’t wait to share!  Thanks for praying and stay tuned!  More music is on the way, via my closet.

Loves,

shannon

First of all, thanks for  checking out my new website!  I’m excited to get the ball rolling again!

Over the last few years, I’ve been writing a ton of music and I cannot WAIT to get it recorded.  Now it’s just about finding time, the right people and the right place!  With 2 kiddos, it’s a bit tricky to find “extra” time!

I am also super passionate about fighting against human trafficking around the world and in my own community.  Check out the Orange County Human Trafficking Task Force website.   Look for it under ‘categories’ here on my site, should be on the right hand side of the page.  I would LOVE for you to get involved too!  Check out the site and see where you can do your part to help! (Isaiah 58:6).

Keep your ears open and your eyes peeled!  I will be getting new music posted as soon as it is recorded.  In the meantime, check out the newest recording.  It’s a live version recorded at Refuge Huntington Beach’s Wednesday evening service (09-30-09) of “Safe in His arms”.  I reworked an old Fanny Crosby hymn that was close to my heart lyrically.   Let me know what you think!

Thanks for listening!

Shannon

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New Song!

(recorded live)