dwelling on His goodness today

Friday, March 27, 2009


I have not forgotten my 4:8 Project this month - it's been a bit crazy around here what with wedding and herxheimer and the general busy work and stuff involved with having a life, but I've been chewing on it. Stop over at my photography blog and check it out!

I shot this yesterday during our trip to the local aquarium, and the melancholy of the shot just makes me want to cry, which I did last night, as I read myself to sleep again, afraid of the end of the world.

It is HARD to trust God when there is so much sadness and sorrow around me, and more that comes every day. I want to trust Him for my physical safety, for my children's safety, for everything going well and perfect and wonderful, but I am bound with the rest of creation to groan for Christ's return, subjected in hope to the limitations of my flesh to cry out His goodness with the rocks and trees and flowers and hills.

I'd have nothing if I lost my ability to create my own safe without the hope I have in Jesus. Sometimes when I look at the craziness around me, at the relativity of what everyone else believes and hopes and holds, this faith feels empty, like a crutch, so unbelievable and misled, but in the deepest part of my soul, I know it must be true. It is the thing I question because it can be questioned; I am not afraid that it may be argued away, that what God is doing and the Person He is is merely a figment of my imagination or the result of indoctrination.

This, I think, is how I weep with those who weep, with tears that acknowledge the pain of this world, the suffering that leads us nearer our physical death every day. And I weep with hope, sometimes only quietly rejoicing that on the other side of all of this, we will be present with the Lord. And I cannot imagine the glory of what that means, so I have to cling to His love and hand Him my fears again and again and hold to what is good.

There's a Brooke Fraser song I have about Gomer, about me, about life that I've been thinking about a lot over the last couple of weeks:

I just spoke silence with the seeker next to me
She had a heart with hesitant, halting speech
That turned to mine and asked belligerently
"What do I live for?"

I see the scars of searches everywhere I go
From hearts to wars to literature to radio
There's a question like a shame no one will show
"What do I live for?"

We are Hosea's wife
We are squandering this life
Using people like ladders and words like knives

If we've eyes to see
If we've ears to hear
To find it in our hearts and mouths
The word that saves is near
Shed that shallow skin
Come and live again
Leave all you were before
To believe is to begin

There is truth in little corners of our lives
There are hints of it in songs and children's eyes
It's familiar, like an ancient lullaby
What do I live for?

We are Hosea's wife
We are squandering this life
Using bodies like money and truth like lies

We are more than dust
That means something
That means something
We are more than just
Blood and emotions
Inklings and notions
Atoms on oceans


Because I am more than flesh, because His Spirit has breathed life to my flesh, I have hope. And this is where I live, in struggle or in joy, because God so loved me, His creation, that He sent Jesus to live my life so I could know Him.

Even so, come quickly, Lord Jesus...

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