Please.
It's a word that comes from those on their knees,
The only cry left as thought and strength flee,
please.
No battle cry, no horn loud and strong,
no beautiful prayer, hymn, lyric, or song,
please.
No self-dependence, no merit, no; nothing
But the cry of a heart begging and broken,
please.
Ask and it's given; seek, child, find,
though hopeless and pleading, helpless, and blind,
The cry of my child all heaven does mind.
Tuesday, August 4, 2015
Friday, December 19, 2014
Committed
Let my heart break at your bidding,
heal at your touch,
mourn over sin,
rejoice in your love.
Die fully to self,
live as your light,
work as your hands,
exquisite in your sight.
I pray these easily,
each little rhyme,
asking for hard things
while the sun shines.
But when the storms come,
when you answer my prayer,
Lord, mold my heart,
your Image to bear.
heal at your touch,
mourn over sin,
rejoice in your love.
Die fully to self,
live as your light,
work as your hands,
exquisite in your sight.
I pray these easily,
each little rhyme,
asking for hard things
while the sun shines.
But when the storms come,
when you answer my prayer,
Lord, mold my heart,
your Image to bear.
Monday, December 8, 2014
My Right
I wasn't late - yet. I was on time, just later than I usually was. The digital clock on my car dashboard was relentlessly changing, one minute at a time. But I finally reached the four-lane road and sighed in relief. Not long now.
I sped up to 40 miles an hour, passing Arbys, the mattress store with the large clearance sale, the strip mall with its tiny stores. I caught up with the cars in front of me at the light where the four-lane divided highway crossed my road. Two more times, the digital clock changed on my dashboard. I would only just make it in time to get my computer set up before work.
The light finally changed; green. I eased off the brake a moment, and crept closer and closer to the car in front of me. It didn't move. Didn't move. I braked again. It waited; it moved. Finally. I barely kept myself from tailgating as it moved forward, inches at a time. My digital 8 changed to a 9 just waiting for it to go on a green light. I sighed again as it started. Now, I was headed to work.
In the fast lane. Bear this in mind, I was in the fast lane, with a speed limit of 35 miles an hour. The car in the slow lane was going 35. The car in front of me? It was mimicking the one to my right. It was going 35.
I bit back my impatience. The phrase "speak evil of no one; show perfect courtesy to all people" from Titus came to mind. I prayed in response. God, I was being outwardly nice because I like to be taken for a good, kind person. Change my heart? It doesn't at all resemble what I'd like it to be. I prayed the car going 35 in the fast lane wouldn't turn when I needed to turn. It didn't - and I got to work, turned my computer on, and just got all fourteen programs up and running before the clock hit 8:30. But…
I had been impatient because a car was going 35 miles an hour. Granted, it was being driven in the fast lane, but it was going 35 miles an hour on a road where the government (my national authority) had degreed the limit of speed would be 35 miles an hour. There was an unwritten rule all over the city that 5 miles over that limit was safe, even expected, especially in the fast lanes in the city. Because of that unwritten rule, I had taken exception with a driver who obeyed the rules posted every few hundred feet, the one who had actually respected authority.
I had thought I had every right to be upset because those five miles an hour of speed were not granted to me. I had taken it to be my right to go 40 miles an hour on a road with a 35 miles an hour speed limit, and on being denied that speed, had to pray for help to calm myself because I could not do it on my own. I thought about it more, and realized that my mindset towards many things in life have the same demanding expectation of things that are not really rights.
A good day. Respect from every person I meet. Time to myself. Time for fun, time for doing what I want, at least a little. Time to write, to read, to move. Time to walk, occasionally. Family members who love me. Things I've never been guaranteed, things that are not mine by right, only things given to me on a regular basis that I come to demand. Things that upset me when they disappear.
Things I'm never grateful for.
Things that have always been gifts.
Things that I'll someday be grateful for, in Heaven, when I'll truly see each item as a gift.
I sped up to 40 miles an hour, passing Arbys, the mattress store with the large clearance sale, the strip mall with its tiny stores. I caught up with the cars in front of me at the light where the four-lane divided highway crossed my road. Two more times, the digital clock changed on my dashboard. I would only just make it in time to get my computer set up before work.
The light finally changed; green. I eased off the brake a moment, and crept closer and closer to the car in front of me. It didn't move. Didn't move. I braked again. It waited; it moved. Finally. I barely kept myself from tailgating as it moved forward, inches at a time. My digital 8 changed to a 9 just waiting for it to go on a green light. I sighed again as it started. Now, I was headed to work.
In the fast lane. Bear this in mind, I was in the fast lane, with a speed limit of 35 miles an hour. The car in the slow lane was going 35. The car in front of me? It was mimicking the one to my right. It was going 35.
I bit back my impatience. The phrase "speak evil of no one; show perfect courtesy to all people" from Titus came to mind. I prayed in response. God, I was being outwardly nice because I like to be taken for a good, kind person. Change my heart? It doesn't at all resemble what I'd like it to be. I prayed the car going 35 in the fast lane wouldn't turn when I needed to turn. It didn't - and I got to work, turned my computer on, and just got all fourteen programs up and running before the clock hit 8:30. But…
I had been impatient because a car was going 35 miles an hour. Granted, it was being driven in the fast lane, but it was going 35 miles an hour on a road where the government (my national authority) had degreed the limit of speed would be 35 miles an hour. There was an unwritten rule all over the city that 5 miles over that limit was safe, even expected, especially in the fast lanes in the city. Because of that unwritten rule, I had taken exception with a driver who obeyed the rules posted every few hundred feet, the one who had actually respected authority.
I had thought I had every right to be upset because those five miles an hour of speed were not granted to me. I had taken it to be my right to go 40 miles an hour on a road with a 35 miles an hour speed limit, and on being denied that speed, had to pray for help to calm myself because I could not do it on my own. I thought about it more, and realized that my mindset towards many things in life have the same demanding expectation of things that are not really rights.
A good day. Respect from every person I meet. Time to myself. Time for fun, time for doing what I want, at least a little. Time to write, to read, to move. Time to walk, occasionally. Family members who love me. Things I've never been guaranteed, things that are not mine by right, only things given to me on a regular basis that I come to demand. Things that upset me when they disappear.
Things I'm never grateful for.
Things that have always been gifts.
Things that I'll someday be grateful for, in Heaven, when I'll truly see each item as a gift.
Sunday, November 23, 2014
Hope
Here is another ebenezer I, by God's grace and as a testament to His glory, raise to remind me in my frailty of God's goodness and victory.
I tried to tell the tale leading up to my current spiritual state to a friend, one close enough I call her "sister," and said it started a week ago; no, wait, it started three and a half years ago; it might as well have started with "once upon a time, four years ago…
I graduated college and came home. Three months later, I started as a "customer service associate" in a call center. I have hated phones since I first got tangled up in the tangible phone line that hooked handset to receiver; I was walking nervously around as I spoke into the device held to my ear. Phones have lost their cords, but I never really lost my dislike. Through my Masters degree, graduation, then the next year and ten months, I worked at a place where what I did was truly work, never play. The end of that job, though still coming closer and closer, has been delayed time and again.
I tried not to become bitter. I tried to put aside discouragement and accept God's will. God's will had proven to be good every time; I would lean on that past faithfulness and trust Him now. By His grace, I did.
What I did not do was enjoy life, nor hope for the future. I hoped with certainty that I would have perfect joy and abounding delight in heaven, but I crumbled when I considered the future on earth. I had no guarantee that the dream I was chasing, a teaching or tutoring job overseas, would be any less like drudgery than my current job. I stopped hoping for joy in it, because then if it was drudgery, I wouldn't be hurt. Besides, it was easier to accept the present when I didn't look forward to the future.
As three years went by, I also lost hope that God would change my attitude to be joyful and grateful in the midst of my job. I'd been praying for it and fighting for it for too long. I loved God and my family, I read His word often, prayed often, I worshipped Him and tried to know Him better; that was all I could do. I left my lack of hope in His hands and told Him to change it if He cared about it, hoping He would. He didn't. I gave up even hoping that He would. As far as possible, I forgot about hope, except to pass over it quickly when praying for faith, hope, and love.
Without hope for the future, I snatched at every joy I could find in the present. My mind, ever since last week, has tried to work out the connection between future hope and present joy in various small spare moments, but I'm not very far yet. I only know that without hope for the future, joy in the present became something I craved with the senseless, destructive desire of an addict. When I heard a Christian band I'd heard once before was coming to town, I bought a ticket one random night (I find it easiest to spend money for events when I do it on a whim). Here was another chance I might find joy in the present.
I shook my head at myself when I discovered it was on a Sunday at 7:00 - my church often ends 6:15-6:30. But I slipped out to the concert that night, waited in line to pick up the ticket I didn't have a printer to print, and tried to find a seat. A coworker who had retired almost two years ago tugged on my hand as I wandered down the aisle, searching for a place to sit. Asking if I was by myself, he showed me one open seat by one of the people in his group - a group of four people over the age of fifty. Considering the band's preference for drums, lights, and loud sound - they've been called the Australian answer to Coldplay - I was amused. They were very good, kind, polite company, and I was blessed to be near them, and to have the seat I did.
I do not think I can put the actual concert into words. The band had experienced some major struggles in the recent past - one of the two brothers who sang had been diagnosed with a digestive disorder that gave him an uncertain chance of staying alive. The first time I had seen the band, only one brother had performed, since the other had been unable to continue the tour. As children, they had come to America with their dad. He'd been offered a job in the States when they lost everything on a tour. When the reached the states, five children, a pregnant wife, and not much else, he had lost his job almost immediately. God had provided everything they needed.
Despite - or, knowing the way God so often works, perhaps because of - these circumstances, the main message of the brothers' music is hope. It's not just their lyrics, either. They love what they do, the love the way God has worked in their lives, they love the truth they speak. They love that they can say
"To the one who spoke and set the sun ablaze / To the one who stopped the storm and walked the waves / To the one who took the tree so He could say / You matter, I hope you know you matter" and know it's true.
Watching and listening, hearing truth and seeing joy, hearing them recount the deeds of God, I knew that I could enjoy my future, that delight is attendant on the children of God - I remembered that joy is a fruit of the Spirit, and my life did not have to be years of dreary work. I walked out and asked God, pleading and yet daring to believe that my hope would last. I asked Him not to let this be a spiritual high, but a lasting hope that sustained my present.
The next two days reminded me that being alive in God, actively seeking His will, was absolutely crazy. We moved my sister to an apartment on the third floor an hour away, took my grandfather to a clinic, cleaned up the cigarrette-smoke-stained baseboards and doors, and put the furniture in order. Oh, and I worked a ten hour day at work, within those first two days. I drove home at nine at night, and had a call from a friend who needed to talk. I did not mind, except late at night - I enjoyed having a crazy life again.
But the next few days at work tested the hope I had been given. Most of my department (including myself) are discontent, and with the losing of several employees, understaffed. None of us enjoy the work, and several coworkers feel neglected by those higher up. God provided helps - writing a letter of these events to a friend in Greece Wednesday morning, telling the tale to three friends over the weekend, and the prayers that reminded me who I was praying to. But keeping hope was still difficult.
Till today. Tonight's sermon was on Philippians 4.13. The pastor - a seminary student originally from New Zealand - reminded us that our weakness is never a hindrance to God's glory, God's purpose. The strength God provides is not limited by our imagination, our strength, or our capability. God's weakness is stronger then our strength (I Cor. 15). God will accomplish His glory - and throughout the Bible he did so through weaker men. He used a sling against a giant, Gideon's 600 men against an army, Elijah against the army of a foreign king. The pastor reminded us that we can never mess us God's work; we are not a hindrance. Life is hard, but the difficulties in it are never conquered by human strength. We do not need to be strong to live, nor to glorify God. Our strength is not necessary to glorify God.
The pastor kept reminding us to pray big, to trust God, to never give up. Moses, reluctant to obey, obeyed and watched things get worse and worse before the Israelites were allowed to leave; then, well, he had Israel to deal with. But God's strength did not change - He just didn't act the way Moses was expecting, nor the way Moses desired. But His strength still supported Moses, brought Israel out, and accomplished His will and His glory. Moses, reluctant, doubting Moses, will be a prophet and a witness throughout the entirety of time on earth. God does plan a glorious life for His children, always with His timing and agenda, not ours.
This was a reminder that my future is not just work I may delight in, but a life in God's kingdom here. I have a life where I will work for that kingdom and watch it work in me. That, too, is certain hope. God, once again, gave me hope. Once again, He answered my prayer. Once again, I will take a breath and and ask for Him to sustain that hope, to work joy within me within this next hard week, and to glorify Himself and bring His kingdom in me, bringing with Himself hope, faith, and love. Amen.
I tried to tell the tale leading up to my current spiritual state to a friend, one close enough I call her "sister," and said it started a week ago; no, wait, it started three and a half years ago; it might as well have started with "once upon a time, four years ago…
I graduated college and came home. Three months later, I started as a "customer service associate" in a call center. I have hated phones since I first got tangled up in the tangible phone line that hooked handset to receiver; I was walking nervously around as I spoke into the device held to my ear. Phones have lost their cords, but I never really lost my dislike. Through my Masters degree, graduation, then the next year and ten months, I worked at a place where what I did was truly work, never play. The end of that job, though still coming closer and closer, has been delayed time and again.
I tried not to become bitter. I tried to put aside discouragement and accept God's will. God's will had proven to be good every time; I would lean on that past faithfulness and trust Him now. By His grace, I did.
What I did not do was enjoy life, nor hope for the future. I hoped with certainty that I would have perfect joy and abounding delight in heaven, but I crumbled when I considered the future on earth. I had no guarantee that the dream I was chasing, a teaching or tutoring job overseas, would be any less like drudgery than my current job. I stopped hoping for joy in it, because then if it was drudgery, I wouldn't be hurt. Besides, it was easier to accept the present when I didn't look forward to the future.
As three years went by, I also lost hope that God would change my attitude to be joyful and grateful in the midst of my job. I'd been praying for it and fighting for it for too long. I loved God and my family, I read His word often, prayed often, I worshipped Him and tried to know Him better; that was all I could do. I left my lack of hope in His hands and told Him to change it if He cared about it, hoping He would. He didn't. I gave up even hoping that He would. As far as possible, I forgot about hope, except to pass over it quickly when praying for faith, hope, and love.
Without hope for the future, I snatched at every joy I could find in the present. My mind, ever since last week, has tried to work out the connection between future hope and present joy in various small spare moments, but I'm not very far yet. I only know that without hope for the future, joy in the present became something I craved with the senseless, destructive desire of an addict. When I heard a Christian band I'd heard once before was coming to town, I bought a ticket one random night (I find it easiest to spend money for events when I do it on a whim). Here was another chance I might find joy in the present.
I shook my head at myself when I discovered it was on a Sunday at 7:00 - my church often ends 6:15-6:30. But I slipped out to the concert that night, waited in line to pick up the ticket I didn't have a printer to print, and tried to find a seat. A coworker who had retired almost two years ago tugged on my hand as I wandered down the aisle, searching for a place to sit. Asking if I was by myself, he showed me one open seat by one of the people in his group - a group of four people over the age of fifty. Considering the band's preference for drums, lights, and loud sound - they've been called the Australian answer to Coldplay - I was amused. They were very good, kind, polite company, and I was blessed to be near them, and to have the seat I did.
I do not think I can put the actual concert into words. The band had experienced some major struggles in the recent past - one of the two brothers who sang had been diagnosed with a digestive disorder that gave him an uncertain chance of staying alive. The first time I had seen the band, only one brother had performed, since the other had been unable to continue the tour. As children, they had come to America with their dad. He'd been offered a job in the States when they lost everything on a tour. When the reached the states, five children, a pregnant wife, and not much else, he had lost his job almost immediately. God had provided everything they needed.
Despite - or, knowing the way God so often works, perhaps because of - these circumstances, the main message of the brothers' music is hope. It's not just their lyrics, either. They love what they do, the love the way God has worked in their lives, they love the truth they speak. They love that they can say
"To the one who spoke and set the sun ablaze / To the one who stopped the storm and walked the waves / To the one who took the tree so He could say / You matter, I hope you know you matter" and know it's true.
Watching and listening, hearing truth and seeing joy, hearing them recount the deeds of God, I knew that I could enjoy my future, that delight is attendant on the children of God - I remembered that joy is a fruit of the Spirit, and my life did not have to be years of dreary work. I walked out and asked God, pleading and yet daring to believe that my hope would last. I asked Him not to let this be a spiritual high, but a lasting hope that sustained my present.
The next two days reminded me that being alive in God, actively seeking His will, was absolutely crazy. We moved my sister to an apartment on the third floor an hour away, took my grandfather to a clinic, cleaned up the cigarrette-smoke-stained baseboards and doors, and put the furniture in order. Oh, and I worked a ten hour day at work, within those first two days. I drove home at nine at night, and had a call from a friend who needed to talk. I did not mind, except late at night - I enjoyed having a crazy life again.
But the next few days at work tested the hope I had been given. Most of my department (including myself) are discontent, and with the losing of several employees, understaffed. None of us enjoy the work, and several coworkers feel neglected by those higher up. God provided helps - writing a letter of these events to a friend in Greece Wednesday morning, telling the tale to three friends over the weekend, and the prayers that reminded me who I was praying to. But keeping hope was still difficult.
Till today. Tonight's sermon was on Philippians 4.13. The pastor - a seminary student originally from New Zealand - reminded us that our weakness is never a hindrance to God's glory, God's purpose. The strength God provides is not limited by our imagination, our strength, or our capability. God's weakness is stronger then our strength (I Cor. 15). God will accomplish His glory - and throughout the Bible he did so through weaker men. He used a sling against a giant, Gideon's 600 men against an army, Elijah against the army of a foreign king. The pastor reminded us that we can never mess us God's work; we are not a hindrance. Life is hard, but the difficulties in it are never conquered by human strength. We do not need to be strong to live, nor to glorify God. Our strength is not necessary to glorify God.
The pastor kept reminding us to pray big, to trust God, to never give up. Moses, reluctant to obey, obeyed and watched things get worse and worse before the Israelites were allowed to leave; then, well, he had Israel to deal with. But God's strength did not change - He just didn't act the way Moses was expecting, nor the way Moses desired. But His strength still supported Moses, brought Israel out, and accomplished His will and His glory. Moses, reluctant, doubting Moses, will be a prophet and a witness throughout the entirety of time on earth. God does plan a glorious life for His children, always with His timing and agenda, not ours.
This was a reminder that my future is not just work I may delight in, but a life in God's kingdom here. I have a life where I will work for that kingdom and watch it work in me. That, too, is certain hope. God, once again, gave me hope. Once again, He answered my prayer. Once again, I will take a breath and and ask for Him to sustain that hope, to work joy within me within this next hard week, and to glorify Himself and bring His kingdom in me, bringing with Himself hope, faith, and love. Amen.
Thursday, October 9, 2014
Waiting and Dancing
8:21.
39 minutes till bedtime begins.
Now,
8:22.
One more minute gone.
I watch them live with fascination. They're possibilities, each and every single minute. Each one is unknown, for each is currently (to use the formal word) unassigned.
There are things I could do - a letter to my grandmother has been waiting too long to be written, dinner has not really been prepared or eaten, and Notes From a Tilt-a-Whirl is still unread beyond the second chapter, merely for lack of time.
But nothing pressing. Nothing that demands completion, nothing that sternly reminds me that by tomorrow it needs to be done. No calls, no conversations, nothing but a dog, myself, and my music.
8:26.
Why must it be measured? Are not the best moments timeless, when time itself falls away before the wonder and beauty of living in that moment?
It's limited. Scarce. My mind no sooner sees the time then it measures how much I have left, how much I could steal from responsibilities to (not have fun) rest, to breath. to sit perhaps a moment, close my eyes, and open them again to see the world a little differently. To have the moment where the weight of life falls aways and I leave it lying on the ground, getting up from the chair to walk straighter for the weight left behind.
In daring moments I watch an entire TV episode - but who really has 48 minutes and 32 seconds (including credits) to spend watching imagination and truth mix?
But tonight, I forget the sensible side of my mind that measures time, and forget the to-do list that will be waiting still more urgently tomorrow, for tonight's unexpected freedom reminded me of something.
When I am too restless to enjoy sitting still, I must take time to wait. When the 39 minutes bother me because I do not know exactly what I (and I hope God) have planned, I have to release my disciplined control. When 39 unplanned minutes are too short for me to enjoy, I have forgotten the meaning of peace.
Three minutes can be enough. Sometimes one. Not just to sit and let the weight fall, but the minutes of complete enjoyment, the joy in the unplanned, un-needed, and unknown time where I am willing to let duty's weight rest on the road. I look up the way to walk, not to see the rough road that tomorrow's horizon leaves looming, but to realize I have been given a pace to walk apace, breathing, weightless, with a twist that may lead to nowhere. But twists that lead to nowhere lay beside the fey border of the joyous unknown, and thirty-nine minutes are enough to change a life.
Leave my burden on the road. I will come back to it, I will even shoulder it again, but I been given the time to walk off the beaten path my will has described, and remember that living is not just a journey. For the humans who dare to dance along the road, the dance turns the road into joy, and the arduous steps into lifts and leaps, all started by a twist in the road that lead to nowhere. When I come back, when the twist turns again to the burden I left, I may shoulder it with a sigh, but in the dust beneath my feet I still trace the steps I learned in the timeless minutes (I do not know how many now). I learned to wait, to make three minutes enough. Maybe even one minute. Maybe one minute tomorrow will be enough, now that I have been given so many tonight. Maybe I waive to the fey not as farewell, but as a promise to see them again tomorrow, and to learn another step, another dance, another way to make the rough road a starlit, fair-folk meadow filled with the steps of a dance.
39 minutes till bedtime begins.
Now,
8:22.
One more minute gone.
I watch them live with fascination. They're possibilities, each and every single minute. Each one is unknown, for each is currently (to use the formal word) unassigned.
There are things I could do - a letter to my grandmother has been waiting too long to be written, dinner has not really been prepared or eaten, and Notes From a Tilt-a-Whirl is still unread beyond the second chapter, merely for lack of time.
But nothing pressing. Nothing that demands completion, nothing that sternly reminds me that by tomorrow it needs to be done. No calls, no conversations, nothing but a dog, myself, and my music.
8:26.
Why must it be measured? Are not the best moments timeless, when time itself falls away before the wonder and beauty of living in that moment?
It's limited. Scarce. My mind no sooner sees the time then it measures how much I have left, how much I could steal from responsibilities to (not have fun) rest, to breath. to sit perhaps a moment, close my eyes, and open them again to see the world a little differently. To have the moment where the weight of life falls aways and I leave it lying on the ground, getting up from the chair to walk straighter for the weight left behind.
In daring moments I watch an entire TV episode - but who really has 48 minutes and 32 seconds (including credits) to spend watching imagination and truth mix?
But tonight, I forget the sensible side of my mind that measures time, and forget the to-do list that will be waiting still more urgently tomorrow, for tonight's unexpected freedom reminded me of something.
When I am too restless to enjoy sitting still, I must take time to wait. When the 39 minutes bother me because I do not know exactly what I (and I hope God) have planned, I have to release my disciplined control. When 39 unplanned minutes are too short for me to enjoy, I have forgotten the meaning of peace.
Three minutes can be enough. Sometimes one. Not just to sit and let the weight fall, but the minutes of complete enjoyment, the joy in the unplanned, un-needed, and unknown time where I am willing to let duty's weight rest on the road. I look up the way to walk, not to see the rough road that tomorrow's horizon leaves looming, but to realize I have been given a pace to walk apace, breathing, weightless, with a twist that may lead to nowhere. But twists that lead to nowhere lay beside the fey border of the joyous unknown, and thirty-nine minutes are enough to change a life.
Leave my burden on the road. I will come back to it, I will even shoulder it again, but I been given the time to walk off the beaten path my will has described, and remember that living is not just a journey. For the humans who dare to dance along the road, the dance turns the road into joy, and the arduous steps into lifts and leaps, all started by a twist in the road that lead to nowhere. When I come back, when the twist turns again to the burden I left, I may shoulder it with a sigh, but in the dust beneath my feet I still trace the steps I learned in the timeless minutes (I do not know how many now). I learned to wait, to make three minutes enough. Maybe even one minute. Maybe one minute tomorrow will be enough, now that I have been given so many tonight. Maybe I waive to the fey not as farewell, but as a promise to see them again tomorrow, and to learn another step, another dance, another way to make the rough road a starlit, fair-folk meadow filled with the steps of a dance.
Saturday, September 27, 2014
Beauty from the Broken
It was just this morning I turned to tell her, forcing the stubborn chair to swivel as it was made to, telling her what I thought was simple news. My father would be visiting on Monday; he wanted to see the new home I'd made for myself. He'd be there Monday night.
She's always been honest, a blessing, for I never had to wonder what she was thinking. I just didn't expect how much it could hurt.
She was horrified, saying he could come, but make sure he didn't stay long. She'd heard of what he'd done, the reasons my mother had divorced him, his unfaithfulness, his atheism, his desire to verbally abuse my mother. She rethought what she said, saying I needed to make sure she didn't have to meet him. My voice grew quiet and I woodenly said "I understand," several times; I promised the visit would be short and I would text her when we left, so she could come back. In God's mercy she walked out the door in the next minute; I leaned on the desk and tried to breath; I covered my face and cried.
Shield them from his presence;
Shield him from their horror;
how do I shield my heart?
Shield them from a person;
Shield him from the truth;
how do I know what's right?
Shield them from discomfort;
Shield him from disdain;
how do I bear this cost?
I could not be angry at God, not after how well He's taught me that His will is good; I cannot be angry at my housemate, because I know what it is to fear someone outside my circles; I cannot be angry at him, because I love him. God, I love him, I love him, I love him - I trust him as far as I can (not far), and love him as much as I am able.
Cannot they see he is a person too? God saved murderers, liars, Paul - why is my father different? Why can't they see he's made in God's image?
Yet haven't I know that his words can be dangerous, that he's hard to argue with, that he's very persuasive, that he's so convinced he's right?
Broken, broken, broken, I try to let them break a little less, shielding them from each other. I break instead.
Then I read The Hiding Place, skimming through, reading of God using fleas to make heaven touch earth as His children were able to gather in freedom because of the fleas, reading of a lieutenant lost in darkness and hearing the light - unknown if it reached him, reading of their Father's death, how Corrie marked it on her stone calendar as his release date, the day he met his saviour and his wife. I read of Betsie's body transformed after death, how just after she died Corrie described her as carven figure of yellow ivory where every tooth was clearly defined through the skin, every rib showing - and yet God gave her one more glimpse of Betsie's body, and it was young, healthy, her body transformed back into the "Betsie of heaven," glowing with youth and health.
Ashes, cruelty, and death.
Ashes of the people burned in the smokestacks.
Cruelty of the guards who mocked the starving, weak, and miserable prisoneres.
Death of family, friends, death everywhere.
Betsie transformed.
Father released.
Corrie lived
lived
and wrote
and worked
and brought forgiveness, hope, health, life, and the light of the world to millions -
millions through her book, hundreds through her lifetime.
My life transformed.
My father alive
my God living
living
working
in me,
transforming pain to light,
transforming beauty from the broken.
She's always been honest, a blessing, for I never had to wonder what she was thinking. I just didn't expect how much it could hurt.
She was horrified, saying he could come, but make sure he didn't stay long. She'd heard of what he'd done, the reasons my mother had divorced him, his unfaithfulness, his atheism, his desire to verbally abuse my mother. She rethought what she said, saying I needed to make sure she didn't have to meet him. My voice grew quiet and I woodenly said "I understand," several times; I promised the visit would be short and I would text her when we left, so she could come back. In God's mercy she walked out the door in the next minute; I leaned on the desk and tried to breath; I covered my face and cried.
Shield them from his presence;
Shield him from their horror;
how do I shield my heart?
Shield them from a person;
Shield him from the truth;
how do I know what's right?
Shield them from discomfort;
Shield him from disdain;
how do I bear this cost?
I could not be angry at God, not after how well He's taught me that His will is good; I cannot be angry at my housemate, because I know what it is to fear someone outside my circles; I cannot be angry at him, because I love him. God, I love him, I love him, I love him - I trust him as far as I can (not far), and love him as much as I am able.
Cannot they see he is a person too? God saved murderers, liars, Paul - why is my father different? Why can't they see he's made in God's image?
Yet haven't I know that his words can be dangerous, that he's hard to argue with, that he's very persuasive, that he's so convinced he's right?
Broken, broken, broken, I try to let them break a little less, shielding them from each other. I break instead.
Then I read The Hiding Place, skimming through, reading of God using fleas to make heaven touch earth as His children were able to gather in freedom because of the fleas, reading of a lieutenant lost in darkness and hearing the light - unknown if it reached him, reading of their Father's death, how Corrie marked it on her stone calendar as his release date, the day he met his saviour and his wife. I read of Betsie's body transformed after death, how just after she died Corrie described her as carven figure of yellow ivory where every tooth was clearly defined through the skin, every rib showing - and yet God gave her one more glimpse of Betsie's body, and it was young, healthy, her body transformed back into the "Betsie of heaven," glowing with youth and health.
Ashes, cruelty, and death.
Ashes of the people burned in the smokestacks.
Cruelty of the guards who mocked the starving, weak, and miserable prisoneres.
Death of family, friends, death everywhere.
Betsie transformed.
Father released.
Corrie lived
lived
and wrote
and worked
and brought forgiveness, hope, health, life, and the light of the world to millions -
millions through her book, hundreds through her lifetime.
My life transformed.
My father alive
my God living
living
working
in me,
transforming pain to light,
transforming beauty from the broken.
Saturday, August 23, 2014
The mornings I desire, the days I have been given
"For if I could please myself I would always live as I lived there. I would choose always to breakfast at exactly eight and to be at my desk by nine, there to read or write till one. If a cup of good tea or coffee could be brought me about eleven, so much the better" and on to reading, writing, talking, walking. But "It is no doubt for my own good that I have been so generally prevented from leading it, for it is a life almost entirely selfish. Selfish, not self-centered: for in such a life my mind would be directed toward a thousand things, not one of which is myself" (Surprised by Joy 142).
For if I could live to please myself I would always have times like this morning. The thunder startled me awake soon after five, and I wrapped myself in a flannel blanket and went unwillingly downstairs. But it was a weekend, so instead of preparing for work I could go and stand on the porch, watching the lighting freeze time as the air became a three dimensional curtain of motionless raindrops. The sound of falling rain went on and on. I soon came back inside and dressed, created breakfast, taking my time, enjoying the food. Then, with the thunder still sounding but the lightning far off, I went and got my food and cash for the week. I drove home in the dark with flashes of lightning and the music filling my head and heart as it always does when there is nothing else around. Time slowed and stopped again, as I disappeared in the darkness and the music, being filled with nothing of myself; being filled with something else.
I came home, put the groceries away, and choked on the jalapenos in the newly-made cornbread my roommate offered me. It was good to make her laugh. I went upstairs, where my candle was still flickering and the lights were off, took off shoes and coat, and went for a walk in the rain.
The first part of the walk was the river, the river roaring, its sound louder than my own singing. The tenseness left my shoulders as I turned from sidewalk into forest. The stream had become a river, for the storms had been pouring themselves out to the earth for three days. The river rose so close to the path the beginnings of the fenceposts between the path and the drop were under water. I walked for almost an hour, avoiding streets, and gradually entered the borders of the faery realm. It began with an awareness that there would be no-one else around, for it was before seven on a weekend and raining, so only the eccentric or the mad were out and about. I could not see under the trees, and could barely see the path, but the watery pools and soaking leaves were cool beneath my feet. I became aware of the faerie when a deer paused just ahead, its stillness an indication of its caution. I slowed, stopped, and barely moved as it stood waiting for me to declare myself foe or imagination. But at last I wiped a raindrop from my face and it fled, my movement scaring it back into the woods. Later I saw two fawns, whose caution was the echo of the deer's but whose curiosity almost caused them to come closer; then they too turned and fled, but the presence of others remained. I loved the walk, the river, the life, and the presence in my mind of those who dwelt in wood and shadows, never clearly seen but beautiful beyond the knowledge of the human. I turn back several times when the path led me back to the sidewalks and roads, wishing I could have dwelt in the world I didn't belong in for longer. But the back held beauty too, the man-made flower gardens guarded by pavement borders holding the sense of life and stillness that only comes after rain. Passing by a pine tree I saw each pine needle was letting fall drops of water, and every flower close to the bat was covered with the small circles of water that is finally still. Life was growing, soaking in, and in the wake of the power of the thunder and lighting came the stillness of the life that they give. The passing of one to another reminded me that the loss of something loved can be happen without mourning as something good and beautiful comes in its place.
Coming home, I made some tea, finished the errands for the day, and sat down to read. I'm reading a book I love, A Severe Mercy, where the author and his wife know the hunger to explore the earth, to cherish beauty, to test their boundaries of what their minds know, to study the challenges of life, and have a life filled to the brim with love, laugher, loss, and beauty. In it the two, not yet Christians, record thoughts like this:
The best argument for Christianity is Christians: their joy, their certainty, their completeness. But the strongest argument against Christianity is also Christians--when they are sombre and joyless, when they are self-righteous and smug in complacent consecration, when they are narrow and repressive, then Christianity dies a thousand deaths. But, though it is just to condemn some Christians for these things perhaps, after all, it is not just, though very easy, to condemn Christianity itself for them. Indeed, there are impressive indications that the positive quality of joy is in Christianity--and possibly no where else. If that were certain, it would be proof of a very high order. 85
Or perhaps like this: "Then we encountered the Germans--the 'demythologizers' […] our real 'salvation' from these wreckers came through our recognition of the quite unverifiable fundamental assumptions […] Christ's word were misunderstood by His followers and the early church though quite clear to [these] critics. Assumption: the mind of the infinite God is not unlike that of a German critic" (106-107).
I would I could spend most of my life like this, thanking God for rain and thunder, walking in the beauty of His creation with the knowledge that so much more lies beyond what I see, whether it be fairy or just the miracle of His creation happening and rebirthing, then coming back and reading with errands done and work accomplished, then recording a morning to the glory of God. I would I could spend all of life with eyes wide open to beauty from early in the morning on, though I would it would be here and in Japan and Africa, in Europe and Asia. Those are my dreams, to travel there, but dreams can be different than desires, and I desire more mornings like this one. God's gift of this morning is precious and beautiful.
But even while walking, though less while reading, I was fighting to keep heartache from my mind. Some of it is what I watched, the sad moments in the stories that speak to me perhaps because of what I too have lost. I stopped reading before the wife became ill, not wanting anything to curve my mind away from happiness, then realized too late it already had, for I read the portion where they lived at Oxford, and much in it reminded me of the joy of my own time at school, and then I read where they left it behind, where a friend of theirs says "'This, you know, is a time of taking in--taking in friendship, conversation, gaiety, wisdom, knowledge, beauty, holiness--and later, well, there'll be a time of giving out.' Later, when we were scattered about the world. Now we must store up the strength, the riches, all that Oxford had given us, to sustain us after. She stood there, Oxford, like a mother to us all with her hands heaped with riches" (118). But that chapter ends, too, with a good note, with C. S. Lewis striding away after saying "I shan't say goodbye. We'll meet again," and then on "reach[ing] the other side, he turned round as though he knew somehow that I would still be standing there in front of the Eastgate. Then he raised his voice in a great roar that easily overcame the noise of the cars and buses. Heads turned and at least one car swerved. 'Besides,' he bellowed with a great grin, 'Christians NEVER say goodbye!'" (125).
This morning seems a respite, a cessation of the battle against drudgery, against the mundane work week that makes my soul cry out for life. I'd wondered, on my walk this morning, which was harder, the cross, or Christ's 33 years of daily living with humans. I know our idiocy cannot compare to suffering the wrath of God, but my mind idly wondered which would be worse, hours and hours of agony and grief that would seem like an eternity, or the daily frustrations and temptations of living as a perfect, godly man among those whose sin turns into fools or rebels. But then I realized it wasn't just thirty-three years, Christ--God--has dealt with the fools, the fallen, every since Eden. He's guided, loved, and grown us since Adam and Eve, through history even down to today. His love is overwhelming in its patience and tenderness, in its demand to hold nothing back and yet to be sustained in everything by God Himself. Many of the songs I hear on the Christian radio capture the idea of sacrificing everything for Him, but so often make it a one-time offering, a glory of giving up everything; I find Him asking for the daily sacrifice of working well in the small things. Yet He said those who are faithful in small things will be faithful in great ones, so why am I surprised? Yet even in the small, I fail; even here I need to be sustained by Christ.
But though I fail, He does not forget my desires, the things I long for, and after a day of failure and complaint yesterday, He still gave me this morning, gave me the desires of my heart. God, give me grace to give back gratitude, rather than holding too tightly to time that is passing! The desire to keep what He gives longer than He intends to give it always spoils the gift; under my tight grip it crumples it into ashes, instead of becoming a beautiful memory. I have written this that I may look back and remember, and remembering, thank God for the gifts of this morning. He does give us the desires of our souls, and hears us when we cry for them. Thank God that I am under His mercy, and that it was His pleasure to give me a morning such as this. May the grace given here sustain me as I go into another week, and may I wonder at His kingdom in that week as much as I did here.
For if I could live to please myself I would always have times like this morning. The thunder startled me awake soon after five, and I wrapped myself in a flannel blanket and went unwillingly downstairs. But it was a weekend, so instead of preparing for work I could go and stand on the porch, watching the lighting freeze time as the air became a three dimensional curtain of motionless raindrops. The sound of falling rain went on and on. I soon came back inside and dressed, created breakfast, taking my time, enjoying the food. Then, with the thunder still sounding but the lightning far off, I went and got my food and cash for the week. I drove home in the dark with flashes of lightning and the music filling my head and heart as it always does when there is nothing else around. Time slowed and stopped again, as I disappeared in the darkness and the music, being filled with nothing of myself; being filled with something else.
I came home, put the groceries away, and choked on the jalapenos in the newly-made cornbread my roommate offered me. It was good to make her laugh. I went upstairs, where my candle was still flickering and the lights were off, took off shoes and coat, and went for a walk in the rain.
The first part of the walk was the river, the river roaring, its sound louder than my own singing. The tenseness left my shoulders as I turned from sidewalk into forest. The stream had become a river, for the storms had been pouring themselves out to the earth for three days. The river rose so close to the path the beginnings of the fenceposts between the path and the drop were under water. I walked for almost an hour, avoiding streets, and gradually entered the borders of the faery realm. It began with an awareness that there would be no-one else around, for it was before seven on a weekend and raining, so only the eccentric or the mad were out and about. I could not see under the trees, and could barely see the path, but the watery pools and soaking leaves were cool beneath my feet. I became aware of the faerie when a deer paused just ahead, its stillness an indication of its caution. I slowed, stopped, and barely moved as it stood waiting for me to declare myself foe or imagination. But at last I wiped a raindrop from my face and it fled, my movement scaring it back into the woods. Later I saw two fawns, whose caution was the echo of the deer's but whose curiosity almost caused them to come closer; then they too turned and fled, but the presence of others remained. I loved the walk, the river, the life, and the presence in my mind of those who dwelt in wood and shadows, never clearly seen but beautiful beyond the knowledge of the human. I turn back several times when the path led me back to the sidewalks and roads, wishing I could have dwelt in the world I didn't belong in for longer. But the back held beauty too, the man-made flower gardens guarded by pavement borders holding the sense of life and stillness that only comes after rain. Passing by a pine tree I saw each pine needle was letting fall drops of water, and every flower close to the bat was covered with the small circles of water that is finally still. Life was growing, soaking in, and in the wake of the power of the thunder and lighting came the stillness of the life that they give. The passing of one to another reminded me that the loss of something loved can be happen without mourning as something good and beautiful comes in its place.
Coming home, I made some tea, finished the errands for the day, and sat down to read. I'm reading a book I love, A Severe Mercy, where the author and his wife know the hunger to explore the earth, to cherish beauty, to test their boundaries of what their minds know, to study the challenges of life, and have a life filled to the brim with love, laugher, loss, and beauty. In it the two, not yet Christians, record thoughts like this:
The best argument for Christianity is Christians: their joy, their certainty, their completeness. But the strongest argument against Christianity is also Christians--when they are sombre and joyless, when they are self-righteous and smug in complacent consecration, when they are narrow and repressive, then Christianity dies a thousand deaths. But, though it is just to condemn some Christians for these things perhaps, after all, it is not just, though very easy, to condemn Christianity itself for them. Indeed, there are impressive indications that the positive quality of joy is in Christianity--and possibly no where else. If that were certain, it would be proof of a very high order. 85
Or perhaps like this: "Then we encountered the Germans--the 'demythologizers' […] our real 'salvation' from these wreckers came through our recognition of the quite unverifiable fundamental assumptions […] Christ's word were misunderstood by His followers and the early church though quite clear to [these] critics. Assumption: the mind of the infinite God is not unlike that of a German critic" (106-107).
I would I could spend most of my life like this, thanking God for rain and thunder, walking in the beauty of His creation with the knowledge that so much more lies beyond what I see, whether it be fairy or just the miracle of His creation happening and rebirthing, then coming back and reading with errands done and work accomplished, then recording a morning to the glory of God. I would I could spend all of life with eyes wide open to beauty from early in the morning on, though I would it would be here and in Japan and Africa, in Europe and Asia. Those are my dreams, to travel there, but dreams can be different than desires, and I desire more mornings like this one. God's gift of this morning is precious and beautiful.
But even while walking, though less while reading, I was fighting to keep heartache from my mind. Some of it is what I watched, the sad moments in the stories that speak to me perhaps because of what I too have lost. I stopped reading before the wife became ill, not wanting anything to curve my mind away from happiness, then realized too late it already had, for I read the portion where they lived at Oxford, and much in it reminded me of the joy of my own time at school, and then I read where they left it behind, where a friend of theirs says "'This, you know, is a time of taking in--taking in friendship, conversation, gaiety, wisdom, knowledge, beauty, holiness--and later, well, there'll be a time of giving out.' Later, when we were scattered about the world. Now we must store up the strength, the riches, all that Oxford had given us, to sustain us after. She stood there, Oxford, like a mother to us all with her hands heaped with riches" (118). But that chapter ends, too, with a good note, with C. S. Lewis striding away after saying "I shan't say goodbye. We'll meet again," and then on "reach[ing] the other side, he turned round as though he knew somehow that I would still be standing there in front of the Eastgate. Then he raised his voice in a great roar that easily overcame the noise of the cars and buses. Heads turned and at least one car swerved. 'Besides,' he bellowed with a great grin, 'Christians NEVER say goodbye!'" (125).
This morning seems a respite, a cessation of the battle against drudgery, against the mundane work week that makes my soul cry out for life. I'd wondered, on my walk this morning, which was harder, the cross, or Christ's 33 years of daily living with humans. I know our idiocy cannot compare to suffering the wrath of God, but my mind idly wondered which would be worse, hours and hours of agony and grief that would seem like an eternity, or the daily frustrations and temptations of living as a perfect, godly man among those whose sin turns into fools or rebels. But then I realized it wasn't just thirty-three years, Christ--God--has dealt with the fools, the fallen, every since Eden. He's guided, loved, and grown us since Adam and Eve, through history even down to today. His love is overwhelming in its patience and tenderness, in its demand to hold nothing back and yet to be sustained in everything by God Himself. Many of the songs I hear on the Christian radio capture the idea of sacrificing everything for Him, but so often make it a one-time offering, a glory of giving up everything; I find Him asking for the daily sacrifice of working well in the small things. Yet He said those who are faithful in small things will be faithful in great ones, so why am I surprised? Yet even in the small, I fail; even here I need to be sustained by Christ.
But though I fail, He does not forget my desires, the things I long for, and after a day of failure and complaint yesterday, He still gave me this morning, gave me the desires of my heart. God, give me grace to give back gratitude, rather than holding too tightly to time that is passing! The desire to keep what He gives longer than He intends to give it always spoils the gift; under my tight grip it crumples it into ashes, instead of becoming a beautiful memory. I have written this that I may look back and remember, and remembering, thank God for the gifts of this morning. He does give us the desires of our souls, and hears us when we cry for them. Thank God that I am under His mercy, and that it was His pleasure to give me a morning such as this. May the grace given here sustain me as I go into another week, and may I wonder at His kingdom in that week as much as I did here.
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