please pardon my dust

"Therefore, from now on, we regard no one according to the flesh." (2 Cor. 5:16)

In the beginning, God
created.

He created from dust
in His image, in
His own likeness.

He breathed His Life, putting
Word in empty mouth so that

He could have conversations.

"Even though we have known Christ according to the flesh, yet now we know Him thus no longer." (2 Cor. 5:16)

In the beginning, God
created.

He created from dust
One in His image, in
very nature God.

He breathed His Life, putting
Word on silent Cross so that

He could have conversations.

"Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new. Now all things are of God, who has reconciled us to Himself through Jesus Christ, and has given us the ministry of reconciliation, that is, that God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself, not imputing their trespasses to them, and has committed to us the word of reconciliation." (2 Cor.17-19)

In the beginning, God
created.

He created from stone
a new soft heart, to
fill with His Spirit.

He breathed His Life, pulling
Word from empty tomb so that

He could have conversations.

Now I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away. Also there was no more sea. Then I, John, saw the holy city, New Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. And I heard a loud voice from heaven saying, “Behold, the tabernacle of God is with men, and He will dwell with them, and they shall be His people. God Himself will be with them and be their God. And God will wipe away every tear from their eyes; there shall be no more death, nor sorrow, nor crying. There shall be no more pain, for the former things have passed away.”

Then He who sat on the throne said, “Behold, I make all things new.” And He said to me, “Write, for these words are true and faithful.” (Rev. 21:1-5)

In the beginning, God
created.

He created new dust for
heaven and earth to
fill with His presence.

He brought His Life, sending
Word to reap the old so that

He could dwell with man and
have conversations.

The air was heavy most of the day here. Thickened with tension, fraught with child cries and voices that I know are not in the air but in my head.

Cries that carried need. Voices that carried shame.

I stepped silent around them, breathing hard, breathing deep, swallowing cries and frustration and the internal screams not meant for air.

I planned and re-planned and worked and re-worked and accomplished absolutely nothing at all because I was too distraught to move beyond necessity today, because my back ached and my head ached and my eyes ached from the unshed tears behind them, tears held back by confused anger. Anger held in, stopped up by fear.

...

"Stand fast therefore in the liberty by which Christ has made us free, and do not be entangled again with a yoke of bondage." (Gal. 5:1)

Stand fast...

The words catch on the fear in my throat, choking me. How dare I think that I should stand fast?

I know this Gospel. I know this grace. I know what redemption is. I know what it means that I am reconciled to God.

Yet I hold Him at arm's length. Close enough to keep an eye on what He is doing, far enough to keep Him from tearing my heart open. I want to give my all to Him - really, I do - but the fear that thickens the air, that holds back the tears, the fear traps me. I utter the words on repeat, "I don't want to..." because I don't know what else to say.

Everything is "Christ, but..." in my head today. I feel that the Cross is not enough. That His coming was nothing, really.

But everything that is not of Him must be stripped away.

Even the good I mean to do.

...

The words spin and scatter and gather and fly now. They come with tears as I begin to pour my heart into the air that is heavy. They spill out and speak desire that is good, fear that is caging, wild hope that is true.

"You ran well. Who hindered you from obeying the truth?" (Gal. 5:7)

Yes. I ran well. I know I have lived this Truth, that in Christ I live and move and have my being.

My being that is too small for this great God. My being that is dying to dress up a little more, deliver a little more, surrender a little more before I come before Him. Oh, I do not want to need His mercy this time! I want to like the me I bring to Him.

So He lets me stew and watches me fall, waiting to catch my frightened heart.

"You ran well..."

"Stand fast."

I gather my courage. More words spill before Him, and before my husband who came early to hold me, to listen to me breathe hard and fast and hurt and scared. Words about prayer, about inviting God into our house, about doing only the things He has set before me now instead of preparing for China and martyrdom in thirty years when I just know He will require it of me.

...

My testimony is this: Jesus Christ and Him crucified. This is the grace, the Gospel, the mercy, the Redemption I own.

Here, I am not trapped. Jesus despised the shame He bore - MY shame - and He does not impute it to me.

I am not what I want to be. I am what I am, by the grace of God.

And what I am is a mess. What I am does not take the photos I want to take. What I am does not (and cannot most times) do the housework I want to do. What I am is too often afraid to love. What I am does not stop the words when they should be stopped, does not speak them when they should be spoken.

What I am is dust. Dust, and a broken heart.

...

"For we know that if our earthly house, this tent, is destroyed, we have a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens. For in this we groan, earnestly desiring to be clothed with our habitation which is from heaven, if indeed, having been clothed, we shall not be found naked. For we who are in this tent groan, being burdened, not because we want to be unclothed, but further clothed, that mortality may be swallowed up by life. Now He who has prepared us for this very thing is God, who also has given us the Spirit as a guarantee.

So we are always confident, knowing that while we are at home in the body we are absent from the Lord. For we walk by faith, not by sight. (2 Cor. 5:1-7)

If you read my blog and think I am something, know this the truth: I am nothing.

I have spent much of the past weeks soul-searching - as much as one can soul-search beneath the constant hue and cry of my two - and I know that what I give and what I do and what I write will not be what I am hoping to give and do and write.

Because you see, I have been patterning my nothing after others who have done what I wish to do, and in the end it comes to nothing without Jesus for me, and my yoke of bondage is my own misplaced desire to be like them and not like me who God created and re-created and called good. If we all say the same thing, we become shadows of one another, and the best and brightest shadow is still a shadow - when we are really earthen vessels filled with the weight of a glory that is not meant to be earthbound.

He is so much There, and does not seem to be here at all. Yet the things that my heart knows call me to walk into what my eyes do not see, and my mess is propelled forward by faith into a Life I dare not seek in my own strength - who am I to know what Holy and Righteous is?

"For He made Him who knew no sin to be sin for us, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him." (2 Cor. 5:21)

...

I cannot live the future now.

God asks this of me today (and I have been afraid to listen): to draw near to Him. To look at Him. To open my heart to an intimacy to take me beyond the limits of my imagination so that I will know that whether I live or die, I will be in Him.

There is a question that has been niggling at me recently, an inane question that offers more direction than I thought I needed: "Am I a blogger who writes or a writer who blogs?"

Tonight, as the words come, I know the answer.

I am a writer who blogs, and it is time for me to step back into my place - MY place - and write again, instead of trying the "blogging" thing.

Several months ago, I went searching for a community who knows God - and I found it. I found you. And you and you and you. And I have been deepened and encouraged, and I hope it will continue.

But I may not be commenting so much on other blogs as I have. I may not reply to every email or track my stats or link up elsewhere or follow too many prompts or Tweet endless links as I have.

I suspect the nature of my posts will change a bit too - when I write, I write for me; I write what is deep; I write what is Him in my dust. I have nothing else.

The voices tell me that is "self-centered," but I am feeling stronger this evening, more ready to stand, more ready to claim the free that is mine in Jesus so I may bow at the throne of Grace - instead of ducking my head, anticipating the blow.

...

What does it mean, that God destroyed the gap between Heaven and earth when Jesus became man and died and rose again?

Death, where is your victory?

I breathe out slow now. Long, and slow. A sigh, but not a sigh. An acknowledgment. That God created me the way He meant. That He does not mean to crush me, but to guard me, to hold me safe in His love. That the being I have in Christ is so much glory and not so much dust.

My flesh and my heart fail.

The groaning is a given.

My spirit is waiting for that face-to-face conversation. The one where I see Him. The one where I become like Him.

God, that's gonna be so good...





(Image © Informal Moments Photography)

Breathing Through

The night passes in five, ten-minute intervals.

I am conscious that I am resting, drifting in and out of dreams and silly head-stuck songs, aware of baby-movement, of womb-tightening that has not stopped for hours.

It is an almost-normal night. There is a full moon. Pete wants to rest early; Piper napped at five, so she is awake. She plays with my hair, sticks her fingers up his nose. She giggles when my fingers find her chin in the dark, and I giggle too, and she giggles again, and we both have the giggles. Pete is grumpy. I cuddle her close.

Soon.

The midwife has been called. She is resting too. I am glad not to disturb her tonight, worried that each contraction will be the last, that I will be embarrassed because I did not know - again.

But I know. It will be soon.

Morning breaks quiet, and still they come.

I eat. I drink. I remember another morning like this, so nervous. Mom and Dad came in the thunderstorm the night before. We slept and woke and waited almost all the next day. And then Piper came, and I was a Mama.

I am not less nervous now.

Pete has left for work early, to take care of some pressing things, while Piper sleeps and labor comes slow. I breathe through as I sit, willing the baby to drop a bit, hoping to hold him soon. He was busy last night.

The pain comes low, insistent, then eases. I surrender to it, last night's shock-shivers lifted. I consider how this pain - of all pains - begs me to my knees; I wonder how I will meet God there today.

I hope it will be today. This can go on for days, they say.

I open my hands, mutely asking His nearness, His entrance into this journey of mine. The tears aren't from the labor. They are longing welling up, vulnerable seeking sufficient.

And I can ask this, for the labor of another mother brought God human into our life. Into our death. To bring Life that is God with us.

The full moon sets; the sun rises through clouds.

I wait for Him.





(Image © Informal Moments Photography)

An Open Letter to My Husband

"Your desire shall be for your husband..."
- Gen. 3:16

................

It is one of those mornings after days of passing like ships in the night, when thorns and thistles have called you early from my side and ground-curse leaves me longing for the sound of your voice, for just a moment - and another and another for a forever that isn't ours. I would never have you leave.

I am almost without function today; the thought brings helpless tears. How did I ever grow into you so much, how did I come to need you so deeply, to want you like this? Why must even the simple things of getting the breakfast and cuddling with our daughter and touching our son within raise such an ache that I pause in the house that is empty without you and look around for you, even though I know you are not here?

I don't even know when it happened, but I am changed, and now I cannot write or think or work without you in my heart, always just beyond my reach, with too-short evenings and weekends and road trips and time that flies into age - and we'll be old tomorrow, you know. Everything reminds me of you, and I see you almost always, but even the hours we are together are not enough to satiate this compelling, and you know I am not a person who settles easily. I can try to be understanding, submit myself to you, to God-who-ordained-this-desire, to wait and cling and worship - but I can never be okay with this ache for what was meant to be, for what isn't.

I have never desired to rule over you so much as I have wanted you, for you are the one with power over my desire, the one I need to give your heart to me - and I cannot demand it and be satisfied with anything I gain that way. My weak vessel is so, so empty when you are not here, and no matter what I try, I cannot resign myself to this sense of loss, the garden-moments we should have had, had I not in Eve tried to secure God-knowledge for myself, risking - no, securing death for us both and for our children, and for our children's children.

I will never understand this, for the fruit we ate gave no real knowledge of Life, and He knew we needed this incomplete to find that Life in Him, the only Source of it. I almost resent Him, except for His gentleness, mercy that offers redemption and mystery that brings us intimate together as one - just as He is One God, wholly set apart.

And my heart desire is set apart for you, my husband, and I pour me out to you and I don't make enough space for you sometimes in my need, and oh how I ache to know that heart I keep missing - though the more I find, the more of you I miss on days like today, when if I'd just get up and get the raspberries I've been procrastinating on for an hour, I wouldn't have to miss your serving love of me so much.

So I make this letter open, with the ache open and the Garden-wound tearing at me while God-redemption offers Enough that doesn't ever feel enough to this Eve. The words tremble out at first, a lump in my throat, then cascade with my runny-nosed tears (how I hate that!) into my confession of desire that cannot be conquered, no matter what we do.

................

All that to say, I really miss you today, Pete.






(Image © Informal Moments Photography)

necessary sabbath

I'm staring at my screen, unfamiliar with my own territory here, slowing from my gettin' 'er done mode to an easier pace where words have time to form, if there is any sensation of feeling begging definition.

But there isn't really any feeling tonight, just vague satisfaction mingled with stark discouragement, the letdown after the adrenalin, the settled "yes, this is where I'm supposed to be" crossing paths with the "where is this, exactly?" that leaves me feeling a bit lonely, a little starved, despite accomplished goals.

I've poured it all out. I'm empty now. Frustration, fears, inadequacies faced and fought and quashed. I am not conquered, destroyed by my own expectations. Not yet anyway.

This silence is different from the full quiet that peace offers. It is a void, really, an end of here-dwelling seeking fulfillment from Him-dwelling now, asking for refreshed treasure in this empty vessel that is okay with being clay today, an unusual development for my self-justifying persona.

I've been working non-stop since Saturday afternoon. Three weddings and a website finished, it is time for a Sabbath. I know what it's for now, more than the doing-nothing. It is for filling up again.

Oh, and nAncY posted my poem on Twitter.

perhaps that is why
we are always
missing Him...

I breathe out long and quiet now, waiting again.





(Image © Informal Moments Photography)

song for a season

I cried secret when I posted yesterday. I cried awkwardly at my midwife appointment over Piper's ballistic two-year-old tantrums this week. I dropped tears again on the way home to a babysat Piper, listening to this song that will likely be my song for the duration of this pregnancy. I cried too when I talked with Pete this morning about my night-dreams and the inevitable labor that is coming to bring Button into life.

With Piper, my heart-question was "what kind of love is this?" Through labor, God reminded me over and over at the height of each contraction, "I'm here and I love you. You are not alone."

I don't know what my question is now, with everything tired and changing. I'm fresh out of words, questioning everything I am or have been, aware of God's Godness and hoping I am not letting Him down with my humanness, my exhausted broken.

Here, I think, must be where grace is made perfect, in my weak, where Love Himself is the only answer for my fears, where dream-deferred heartsickness isn't so big as it feels sometimes. So long as He is... There is more than my today.

Pencil marks on a wall
I wasn't always this tall,
You scattered some monsters from beneath my bed,
You watched my team win,
You watched my team lose,
You watched when my bicycle went down again,

And When I was weak unable to speak,
still I could call You by name,
and I said “Elbow healer, Superhero,
come if You can,” and You said “I am”

Only 16, life is so mean, what kind of curfew is at ten PM
You saw my mistakes, You watched my heart break
Heard when I swore I’d never love again

When I was weak, unable to speak,
still I could call You by name,
and I said “Heart-ache Healer, Secret-keeper,
be my Best Friend” and You said “I am”

You saw me wear white, by pale candlelight,
I said forever to what lies ahead
two kids and a dream, with kids that can scream
too much it might seem when it’s two AM

When I am weak, unable to speak,
still I will call You by name.
“Oh Shepherd, Savior, Pasture-maker,
hold on to my hand,” and You say “I am.”

The winds of change,
And circumstance blow in and all around
us so we find a foothold that’s familiar,
And bless the moments that we feel You nearer
Life had begun, I was woven and spun,
You let the angels dance around the throne, who can say when,
But they’ll dance again, when I am free and finally headed home

I will be weak, unable to speak,
still I will call You by name
“Creator, Maker, Life-sustainer,
Comforter, Healer, My Redeemer,
Lord and King, Beginning and
the End, I am, yes I am.”

- Nichole Nordeman, "I Am"

(Image © Informal Moments Photography)

undefined

I've been blocked for content lately.

Not that the birds aren't still singing, the breezes blowing, the sun rising and setting, the clouds dropping rain and humid all over the place - bringing out the mosquitoes...

I could blame it on the tired that has me sleeping dead through the night from the time I hit the pillow, drowsing through the morning until my three-or-so-hour stint on the couch to relieve the sitting-up pressure from my growing baby belly. I could blame it on the toddler who is pushing all of her boundaries and asking for new ones as she goes, requiring more of my imaginative power. I could even blame it on the photography processing looming over me for a finish this month.

But I'm not sure that is the problem. I'm not sure there is a problem.
Something is happening, far beneath the surface of my daily life and worn-out responsibilities, something that began years ago with a niggling longing and a prayer that I should desire God more than anything or anyone else. I can't describe it, but I am aware, aware that He is drawing nearer, drawing me nearer - and if I turn and look at Him, stop and listen, I will find more than a lesson, more than a growth opportunity, more than the comfortable, controllable, explainable.

It almost frightens me; I don't run toward it eagerly. I take it measured, as a gift I don't know how to open, don't quite know how to receive, love that comes after a broken heart, so strong and so patient. I acknowledge it, and it travels deep into heart-quiet as I ponder what I know of it - what I know of Him.

Tears come easily, frustration easier; I am tenderized without my consent between toddler interruptions and disappointed expectations and my shallow daily failure.

How do I write this? So many others have written it better. How do I live this? It is yet undefined, and my humanity demands a to-do list for self-improvement. My grammatical conscience demands a defined "it."

"What is stopping you?" a friend asks, encouraging me to embrace the new, as I encourage others. "Nothing," I want to say, "It is unfolding here inside me, filling me up, taking me over, transforming me, renewing me."

It is a me I do not know, broken, redeemed, freed, and broken again for love of Another who invites my soul up into Himself, into Love that isn't my love, love I couldn't choose in the small strength I own, love I couldn't accept for my timid.

I wonder if I am too isolated, if I should surround myself with people for more insight, a more constant flow of ideas; I sense His quiet "be still" in a wilderness I thought was finished. Here I stand on the far bank of the Jordan, waiting the call to cross into Canaan, waiting the will to go, waiting for the parting of the waters I cannot pass on my own.

I think there are not often words for the circumstances of the spirit, not definitions for the steps we take in the journey our hearts travel toward God, with God.

So I stand still to see the salvation of the Lord.

Because there is really nothing else I can do until He bids me step into the river with Him to walk through - or to walk on water.





(Image "paint me a picture of this cloudy day" © Informal Moments Photography)

a broken still

Don’t measure God's mind by your own. It would be a poor love that depended not on itself, but on the feelings of the person loved. A crying baby turns away from its mother's breast, but she does not put it away till it stops crying. She holds it closer. For my part, in the worst mood I am ever in, when I don't feel I love God at all, I just look up to His love. I say to Him, "Look at me. See what state I am in. Help me!" Ah! you would wonder how that makes peace. And the love comes of itself; sometimes so strong, it nearly breaks my heart.

- George MacDonald

------------------------------

Sometimes it is easier to write poetry than it is to put words to the emotional maelstrom that hits me every two, three days. I know I could write facts about events. I could even attempt to identify and process and organize the mess of me so that I am at least comfortable with where I am. But I don't always have the capacity to do anything but feel.

I wish sometimes I was less intense, that my reactions to life weren't so passionate - one way or the other. Over the years, I have come to accept this part of me, recognizing that God created me this way in order to glorify Himself. I am very Peter-like sometimes - a son of thunder. Or daughter, rather.

I have a favorite quote about relationship: "I do not wish to treat friendships daintily, but with the roughest courage. When they are real, they are not glass threads or frost-work, but the solidest thing we know" (Ralph Waldo Emerson). I admit, I treat my relationship with God with that "roughest courage" most of the time.

Pete says that God lets me get away with things he'd get struck dead for - you know, the point-blank, "I don't agree with You on this God" or the "I know, but..." or the "I don't get this, so I'm not going to deal with it right now." I think God knows I learn through experience, and He knows better than I the measure of my trust, the depth of our relationship. He is so kind to me, so patient.

It is truly the solidest thing I know.

Even on the days when all I can do is feel my human, when I can't make sense out of anything past the brain fog, when my temper is short and the cats get caged (because they really are too much trouble sometimes!) and the house gets wrecked because I need a physical outlet and not even music or writing or venting releases the pent-up emotion of change.

The day began for me with a sense that God is doing something new: the year of still I have lived is going to change soon, the waiting-for-direction is coming to an end as He reveals the work He has been doing in my heart, as He opens my vessel up to pour out for more than my family. The joyful anticipation mingled with equal parts terror and annoyance sent me into a frenzy that began with a justified nesting instinct for getting the baby's bed up and ready and expanded into a whole-house rearrangement that just. wasn't. working. with the furniture I own.

This, of course, grew into discontent over the state of our finances and "why can't I just go out and buy what I need for this little guy - I never even got to do this for Piper!" I saw my contentment slipping away. Well, actually, I sent it packing. The idea of the bigger house we've just turned down was growing more and more appealing, even if it would cost us several thousand dollars we don't have to make that move two streets over. A whole room for Button would be much easier than trying to make him fit...

At the end of the day, Pete took us out for donuts. We cleaned until 11:30, went to bed with Piper (who had merely napped at 7:30) at midnight, and I woke today to find I had enough again.

Living outside of my old condemnation leaves only the embarrassment of looking God in the eye and telling Him what happened (as if He didn't know already). I almost dare to ask Him "why did You make me this way?" and realize that the 14 hours I spent on my feet yesterday is a good indicator of how much endurance I will have for labor, a factor that has been scaring me lately - I've been so tired, I've wondered how I will get through it. Pete laughed last night over my furniture-moving stubbornness when I told him that "you can move anything if you're willing to move it an inch at a time."

I wonder if God feels that way about my heart.

I underestimate the patience of Love, the fullness of Gospel-grace. I try too often to deal with my own fears, to measure out my own strength. I think I assume it is too much for Him - doesn't He have other work to do? Shouldn't I get this by now?

The love comes of itself; sometimes so strong, it nearly breaks my heart.

Then there is no more room for words, for justifications, for fears - He is God, and there is nothing left for me but stillness in knowing Him. Peace I feared lost. A long, deep breath of remembrance - His provision, His work, His rest.

In my memory of frustrated yesterday, even in my glimpse of finite tomorrow, I won't lose the today-Truth of His unchangeable I AM.

------------------------


This post also linked at Holy Experience for Walk With Him Wednesday.





(Image © Informal Moments Photography)

A Morning Ramble

Awake, my soul!
Awake, harp and lyre!
I will awaken the dawn.

For great is your love, reaching to the heavens;
your faithfulness reaches to the skies.

- Ps. 57:8,10

5:30 a.m. Piper spent all of 20 minutes in her own bed last night. I woke for good an hour ago, unable to return to sleep with baby on the outside, baby on the inside.

I've much to accomplish through the worn edges of my consciousness today, tomorrow. This is the first time I've attempted processing all of my weddings at once. In a way, it does reduce the stress levels of "oh my, I have this many waiting in the wings," but my emotional journey back through the photos draws strength I'm not certain I have to give.

Give it I must, though. For Pete. For Piper, for Button. For my clients who are not simply clients but friends who gave me a chance and didn't plan on a four-month no-computer delay on my end for an unexpected first trimester foray into nausea.

I think I want to be as awake as this Psalm implies, ready to wake the dawn. I am not; I own a fuzzy concept of it all in this pre-dawn hour, knowing what I know of God, a little unsure of how I ought to interact with Him today. I guess, like any relationship, this one too has an ebb and flow, a level of trust that allows freedom to be who we are without molding the other to our will. (Well, if you don't count the work of the Spirit transforming my mind so that I think and feel and act and react more like Him. What a mystery, this sanctification!)

Sometimes, I look at who He is and say, "Well, that's You," and leave it without trying to figure out the why behind the Who, the "I Am." I sit down beneath His shadow, ponder Him, accept that He is more than I can fathom. Indescribable, uncontainable, eternal, and yet so near...

My flesh and my heart may fail,
but God is the strength of my heart
and my portion forever.

But as for me, it is good to be near God.
I have made the Sovereign LORD my refuge;
I will tell of all your deeds.

- Ps. 73:26, 28

-----------------------------

A wish and a prayer for His nearness from Laure at Selah...

See also this more for drawing near from Bonnie at Faith Barista...





(Image © Informal Moments Photography)

grateful - my need to remember God

Because He does not always seem so near as I would wish Him to be.

"It seems that we humans need a practice of gratitude and that the practice requires repetition, as if it were a kind of spiritual breathing. We don’t forget to breathe but we can forget to express our gratitude.

Emerson has a remarkable image at the start of Nature: “If the stars should appear one night in a thousand years, how would men believe and adore; and preserve for many generations the remembrance of the city of God which had been shown! But every night come out these envoys of beauty….”

Every night they come out…, and we walk under them unaware. A gratitude practice feeds awareness such that we might be less forgetful of the mystery of creation. How strange to be born into a human body! How mysterious to have the gift of consciousness! How wonderful to find companions whose spirits mingle with ours, and enlarge us, so we are not alone."

- Lewis Hyde, in a letter to his The Gift readers at High Calling Blogs, posted today at High Calling Blogs

Words written to thank, to encourage gratitude, words written in Spirit-tandem with One Thousand Gifts at Holy Experience and a still small voice reminding me to dwell on what I have seen God do, on who I have seen Him to be, on what He has said of Himself, for Himself.

I don't have words, just feeling for heaven-directed question-wonder, a little confusion, a little bit of lost. I feel I am always late, slow to come, slow to see, slow to remember. But I ponder today, grateful for grace, for time outside of time and eternal patient wooing of this one small and frightened heart. It is good to thank Him, for He is good.

Oh give thanks to the LORD, for he is good,
for his steadfast love endures forever!
Let the redeemed of the LORD say so,
whom he has redeemed from trouble
and gathered in from the lands,
from the east and from the west,
from the north and from the south.

Some wandered in desert wastes,
finding no way to a city to dwell in;
5hungry and thirsty,
their soul fainted within them.
Then they cried to the LORD in their trouble,
and he delivered them from their distress.
He led them by a straight way
till they reached a city to dwell in.
Let them thank the LORD for his steadfast love,
for his wondrous works to the children of man!
For he satisfies the longing soul,
and the hungry soul he fills with good things.

Some sat in darkness and in the shadow of death,
prisoners in affliction and in irons,
for they had rebelled against the words of God,
and spurned the counsel of the Most High.
So he bowed their hearts down with hard labor;
they fell down, with none to help.
Then they cried to the LORD in their trouble,
and he delivered them from their distress.
He brought them out of darkness and the shadow of death,
and burst their bonds apart.
Let them thank the LORD for his steadfast love,
for his wondrous works to the children of man!
For he shatters the doors of bronze
and cuts in two the bars of iron.

Some were fools through their sinful ways,
and because of their iniquities suffered affliction;
they loathed any kind of food,
and they drew near to the gates of death.
Then they cried to the LORD in their trouble,
and he delivered them from their distress.
He sent out his word and healed them,
and delivered them from their destruction.
Let them thank the LORD for his steadfast love,
for his wondrous works to the children of man!
And let them offer sacrifices of thanksgiving,
and tell of his deeds in songs of joy!

Some went down to the sea in ships,
doing business on the great waters;
they saw the deeds of the LORD,
his wondrous works in the deep.
For he commanded and raised the stormy wind,
which lifted up the waves of the sea.
They mounted up to heaven; they went down to the depths;
their courage melted away in their evil plight;
they reeled and staggered like drunken men
and were at their wits’ end.
Then they cried to the LORD in their trouble,
and he delivered them from their distress.
He made the storm be still,
and the waves of the sea were hushed.
Then they were glad that the waters were quiet,
and he brought them to their desired haven.
Let them thank the LORD for his steadfast love,
for his wondrous works to the children of man!
Let them extol him in the congregation of the people,
and praise him in the assembly of the elders.

He turns rivers into a desert,
springs of water into thirsty ground,
a fruitful land into a salty waste,
because of the evil of its inhabitants.
He turns a desert into pools of water,
a parched land into springs of water.
And there he lets the hungry dwell,
and they establish a city to live in;
they sow fields and plant vineyards
and get a fruitful yield.
By his blessing they multiply greatly,
and he does not let their livestock diminish.

When they are diminished and brought low
through oppression, evil, and sorrow,
he pours contempt on princes
and makes them wander in trackless wastes;
but he raises up the needy out of affliction
and makes their families like flocks.
The upright see it and are glad,
and all wickedness shuts its mouth.

Whoever is wise, let him attend to these things;
let them consider the steadfast love of the LORD.

- Psalm 107, ESV

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This post also linked at Holy Experience for One Thousand Gifts.

My apologies for the second post today. I process Life as I can in writing; there is much on my heart.

Touching This

Ann Voskamp writes of touch that brings you alive, and I look at this painting and know that it does. I am not the mother that plays well; I don't make easy conversation with my words. I have heard that time flies and our babies grow up too fast, yet I bear no regrets, not that she grows, not that she becomes more alive in every interaction, not even that I will say goodbye one day. She is her and I am me. I am her mother, the path God chose for her to breath. Her story is His, as mine is His.

He gives others the strong ones, the ones like them, the ones who challenge them most, the sweet ones; I was given the one who needed love, who really demands nothing more than intense, lay-your-life-down-for-me love. Every day she touches desire in me, desire for her, desire to love without measure.

I never quite escape this desire that drew shy lullabies from me as I rocked her to sleep, though I would hide it away if I could. For love does not guarantee happily-ever-after every time - at least not as I think of it. But I am less for not-loving, for not-touching, for not-desiring those lives He gives to me.

So my heart is daily opened to new depths of desire, and I touch with wonder the life He gives, and I hope never to forget the tender that I learned from my Father's heart. Sometimes I measure my love, my life out, then remember that He poured His without measure on the dust beneath a Roman Cross, and how can I do less or be less or trust less in His very goodness that raised His only Son to Life that conquered death for us all?

I feel life moving within my womb, hear life making happy messes in my clean house, sense Life in my soul that has not been there before. I know I am being quickened, deepened, seen, touched, changed.

A wry laugh bubbles upward as my short time to dwell here becomes a moment to fetch and understand and reach and love, and I wonder at how God made me in His image, that I may be one second in eternity and the next caught in time that my daughter can't yet transcend. Somehow, strangely, the one leads to the other, and back again as I become one with Him. I yield to love, and wonder how He touches through me, wonder if He touches at all as she runs from my "no" in utter frustration.

My sigh is tired; I need rest again. I pick my way through her toys, across scattered pillows and leftover balloons to sink weary into our soft couch, thinking of last night's dream-wasted sleep. She will come when I lay down, and I will hold her and tell her to be careful of Mama and the baby, and she will touch my belly button and ask about Christmas and kiss the baby in my tummy. I will pull her close and tell her I love her and rue my sighs and wish away the knowledge that she'll be upset again before the day is out.

And when she leaves her place over my heart, I'll be disappointed.

(Image Credit: Behold by Jean Monti)

On Being

It is during my times of greatest change that I feel most threatened at the prospect of losing my identity. Here, the innocent remark from a friend sparks an internal war between truth and my feelings of betrayal. Here, the not-knowing becomes the only enemy, and I fight for control of my destiny. As if I believe I can own my destiny. I want to be, to exist in this void.

And God is "I Am" and I live and move and have my being in Him, and I resent Him for that some days, and others I quietly acknowledge that I am glad to fall into Him and let Him live for me because I'm too tired to hold onto me anymore.

I am like the wind, like the mountains, too free-spirited, too wild, yet I understand that He has made me this way for His purpose, and He does not desire my captivity - merely the love of my whole heart. Merely. I say it as if it is a simple thing, and simple it is, if I will let it be simple, if I will thank Him for the void and trust His creating hand for my today and my yesterday and my tomorrow. He is, after all, the God who makes the crooked paths straight and leads the blind in ways they do not know.

I know I will always be a restless heart, for I am always seeking more of Him and He is always changing my perspective and stepping outside the bigger and bigger boxes I make for Him. His words burn and ache inside of me and bring life that I do not understand and cannot question, and I am broken and whole at once and I ache to see Him as He is so I may be who I am meant to be.

Already, I feel Him creating new love in me, freeing me from my pursuit of one thing so that I know it is all right to pursue another, but the release of that one thing is the release of a part of the being I have assumed, as if I am laying down a part of my armor in my fight for my destiny. I am more exposed, more vulnerable, more able to love, more afraid to give my affirmation than I should be, for I am not truly threatened by those who ask it.

But perfect love casts out fear, and I am new at throwing myself into His love and trusting Him with who I am as the me that knows His voice struggles against the me that must know and control who I am. My testimony is Jesus Christ, and Him crucified, and I am nothing without Him, and everything that I am that is worth anything is Him, because God chose the weak and the fools who would let Him be their God. And He is not ashamed to be their God because they live and move in Him, through all the change and all the being that they didn't choose as they walked by faith that was solid and sure and nothing at all like a blind leap into the dark.

I remember these others who have gone before, my cloud of witnesses, those who spent years with Him in the wilderness before they learned of grace to teach it, who wandered years after Him across plains and desert looking for Canaan, who died believing His promise that He would give them everything they longed for. He waited to give them the promise, but I know the fullness of it in Jesus, and in my own wilderness I learn of His grace for me, and I learn of His grace for others, and vulnerable me learns more of love without fear.

To find rest in Him, this is my destiny, seared upon my soul by the only Word that brings light into darkness and reaps where it seems nothing has been sown. I seek and I don't seek, but every day I am changed, and my heart is changed, and I want to love and to rest here in this void and trust His love for me. Who I am is no longer the point; I cannot define my identity for myself, for He has become more in me than I knew.

All my being is to be found in His "I AM" and, oddly, I don't resent Him for this. What, after all, would I really be without Him?

What I Don't Know

"If we feel that we already know something in its totality, then we fail to keep our eyes and ears open to that which may expand or even change that which we so zealously think we know."

~Madeleine L'Engle, Walking on Water

I was told many times at a certain point in my life that God was unable to operate outside of His principles. These principles, drawn largely from out-of-context Scriptures as interpreted by various doctrinal sources, were little more than a meager attempt at Christian morality. They did not describe God at all; they merely prescribed a pattern of behavior that would, if seen to the end, allow us to "grow" into the image of Christ, which, of course, was the ultimate goal.

And yet the behaviors which I was compelled to live did not account for the wild beauty of grace. There could be no truth, no abandonment, no miracles. Everything was impossible; faith demanded only lip-service.

But I was already stamped with the image of Christ! He Himself was enough to cover my nakedness before a living God of purity that burns like fire.

These principles that so supposedly bound HIm fell far outside of His actual cracter. They did not lend their followers a picture of God - they merely offered a means by which to appease a "vending-machine" deity. The "if I/then He" mentality left no room for curiosity, adventure, or passion for the deepest heart in the universe.

Because of fear, or duty, or control, those who insisted I accept these principles as true consistently refused relationship - with one another, with me, and with God. All in the name of "what is right."

There is more to this God than we know.

~Journal, March 30, 2007