The thing is, I have held on to it, as though it is my story, and mine alone.
Then, in the middle of the night, like a whisper that screams loudly into one’s heart,
I knew that I had to give it back to you.
That you needed to hear it, with your heart.
That you needed to own it, possess it,
as your own.
It is the story of you.
The dream you were, the battles fought for your presence in our life, this life, your life.
The sadness, the sorrow, the struggles that came before you …
those heartaches that led us to you.
I recalled our first awareness of your presence, our excitement, hope and fears.
I shared that almost right after that, shadows fell,
the fight was on!
We fought, I fought,
YOU fought.
From the moment you had a physical presence your determination and perseverance were already obvious.
Then, on your very first birthday, you were born, silent and still. No rosy cheeks, no loud warrior cries.
We thought this was the end of your beginning.
But, you are a fierce force and your cries rose to fill the room, our hearts.
Your pre-birth struggle to live, your first year of adjusting to life on the outside …
those were the building blocks of your greatest strengths.
You have, from a young age, had an uncanny ability to feel the sadness in others, to see people only through the lens of human, to comfort and fight for those who cannot do so themselves.
You offer gentleness to others.
Now I ask you to apply that gentleness to yourself. That you fight for you. That you see yourself only through the lens of being human.
Remember that you were and are, a highly anticipated gift, that you have so much to offer this world, that today is just one day, but “tomorrow is always fresh” (LMM).
The Lord bless you and keep you; the Lord make his face shine on you and be gracious to you; the Lord turn his face toward you and give you peace.
It occurred to me recently that we tell our children their stories when they are littles, curled up in the safety of our laps, but maybe … just maybe, they need to hear their stories even more when they are grown, but still in need of the security and encouragement of their own coming into existence. Maybe a glimpse of their past will give strength for their future. Or, as fellow blogger, Carolyn Collar, says, maybe “God can help us find new meanings to old stories.“
A plant was growing, just outside our garden gate. As my eyes noticed it, I could not remember seeing it the day before, yet it must have been four inches tall. Days and weeks passed, each day the plant’s growth noted. Now, it stands feet above my head.
A neighbor in our complex had taken sunflower seeds out, when they went for a walk. The popped a few outside the gates of everyone in our complex, anticipating a colorful late August floral display.
Of the four planted outside our gate, we have only two (the grounds keepers were rather thorough in their ‘weeding’). The one is a bit of a slow developer … perhaps it’s growth was stunted in our earlier heat dome. But the one still present, that first one I saw.
It has been growing in the shade of a tree, only getting direct sun late into the afternoon and evening.
Unfortunately, I don’t think anyone ever sees it’s bright yellow flower, for it has grown straight up into the branches of the tree.
For the person walking on the sidewalk, all they see is a big stalk, growing up and into the branches of the tree.
But …
I know it is there
So,
every time I walk out my gate,
I lift my eyes,
to see it’s beauty.
Proverbs 8:17 came to mind the other day as I was peering through leaves to see the flower.
those who diligently seek me will find me
What a reminder this hidden flower, this bit of yellow beauty, this gift from a neighbor …
Everything is meaningless … so says the writer of Ecclesiastes.
I think that writer was in the winter of their life! Maybe a bit bitter, full of regrets, disappointments.
I think too, that all of us have had such a thought. Perhaps even at much younger, earlier seasons in our lives.
We live and learn and work and play and some days we just shake our heads and wonder the meaning in it all.
We watch others struggle (or struggle ourselves), we see and hear of unfair, unjust and immoral acts and we just can’t see the rainbow in the clouds. Can’t see the forest for the trees. Can’t feel the cool air after the heavens thunder, shaking us to our core.
Why?
What is the point?
What is the purpose in all these days?
You know … I am not sure that there are (always) answers. I am not sure that God looks down on our melancholy view of the world and life and provides answers. For, I think, sometimes He is very aware that the most true answers might be heard as pithy statements that our ears receive like salt on our wounded hearts.
I think, that sometimes, he simply hears our agonizing questions and lets them echo back to us in silence.
I think, that sometimes, he wants us to feel the feels of struggle, to ask our questions and shake our fists, so that we remember that he is there … there to hear, not just our words, but our hearts … that he stays with us, as our offering is sincere anger or disappointment in our perception of His failure to act, to save.
I think, sometimes, he wants us to remember that his shoulders are wide enough, that he is not going anywhere.
I think, sometimes, he wants us to feel His feels. To be reminded that he too aches, mourns the meaningless of this sin-filled world.
because we cannot truly see eternity through rose-colored glasses.
Eternity, our eternity, is paved with the blood of his Son. It is the least meaningless act that ever was, or will be. It is sacrifice personified. It is meaning made flesh.
There is purpose in what seems meaningless.
Maybe the purpose is simply to tell God that is what we think …
One is in love with the other, who is not so sure about the first one. One pursues the other, relentlessly, despite all efforts being pushed away by the other. Not pursuit as in pushy, inappropriate or abusive, but pushy as in being willing to go to any lengths for the other‘s good, even if it is never reciprocated.
Basically, one does not love for their own good, but for the good of the other … the one values the other beyond their own needs and wants, for their needs and wants come to serve the other. The love of the one is so great that, if required, they will even stay away from the other.
You see this storyline in movies such as Love Affair (1939, 1994), An Affair to Remember (1956) or in the Francine Rivers book, Redeeming Love.
Of course, the premise of such a story is a tale as old as time ( 😉 ), for it is the premise of God’s love for His created, his bride, us.
He pursues us, endlessly, every day of our lives.
He is ever available, willing and wanting for us to receive Him … his love and presence and guidance. Yet, he is not rude, not pushy … for He knows that love is best, most sincere, when it is given freely … when we choose to love.
My most favorite poetic writing is by Francis Thompson, The Hound of Heaven. In this poem, the writer is equating God’s pursuit of himself to that of a hound. I think I love this ode because I can so easily see myself in the writer’s pursuit of life, with my back firmly in God’s face. Through much of the poem we read of fleeing Him, avoiding Him, Ignoring Him. Though I (we?) do not acknowledge His presence, we are always aware that he is there … here.
This poem ends with a not so classic happily ever after. The pursued turns to his Pursuer, takes his hand. But I think that he, like many of us, like CS Lewis, simply gave in … knowing that there was simply nothing left to run to that is better than who is chasing after us.
It is after we turn (often dejected) to Him, tired of our running, tired of our own pursuits, that that joy of forfeiting our life and will to Him begins to invade our souls, bursting through ourselves to reflect the greatest love story.
The Breaking of the Drought by Frederick J. Atwood
Listen!—it rains; it rains! The prayer of the grass is heard; The thirsty ground drinks eagerly As a famished man eats bread. The moan of the trees is hushed, And the violets under the banks Lift up their heads so gratefully, And smilingly give thanks.
And on, and on go the list of recreation we take part in during this season.
A few days ago, I was stretched out on my back on our outdoor two-seater lounge, legs hanging over the side, book in hand, held up at just the right distance (which is becoming more and more difficult to navigate). Suddenly, something caught my attention and I peeked to the right of my book to see something absolutely glorious …
the cloudless, azure blue sky.
I stared in complete delight for minutes … just taking in the beauty of the day, the moment. I whispered formless prayers of thanks to God for this moment, because this level of beauty cannot go without acknowledgement, gratitude expressed.
Then, in that staring up at the sky moment, I got it. I understood more completely than ever in my life before what God wants from me …
to be rather to do.
2 Corinthians 3:5 tells us:
“Not that we are sufficient in ourselves to claim anything as coming from us, but our sufficiency is from God.”
Some versions or translations substitute sufficient and sufficiency with competent/competency, or qualified, or adequate. I love how the Good New Translation says it,
“There is nothing in us that allows us to claim that we are capable of doing this work. The capacity we have comes from God“
To do is often to act on our own strength, our own capabilities. Yet, to truly do the work of God is to let him fill you with his Spirit, his strength. We have no capacity to do for God, if we have not first emptied of ourselves, allowing him to not just provide, but to be the capacity required to
There is nothing in us that allows us to claim that we are capable of doing this work. The capacity we have comes from God, God alone.
That God, that Spirit within us made available through sacrifice. It is the sacrifice that is what it, life, is all about.
Jesus sacrifice is about who we are, not what we do.
It is about our being, not our doing. For, there is no doing that will make us able to do his work … be good enough, deserving enough.
So, stop.
Stop doing.
Stop striving.
Stop the busyness
that you say is in the name of God.
and be …
Just let him lead you to Him,
and like Mary who sat at his feet,
listening,
just being with Him.
“(Mary) decided what was important, and she did not let the day-to-day get her away from that. As a result, she was drawn into a greatness we don’t even dream of.” – Tim Keller
For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God Ephesians 2:8
A heat dome (a new word for the local vernacular) last month resulted in over 800 heat-related deaths. If you walk around it will quickly become obvious that plants and trees have been dying in this heat in which they are not designed to survive.
Everything is dry!
There has been no rain in July, only 37mm in June … the first half of June.
It is dry.
With the heat dome and the dry conditions forest fire season is upon us. Every day I awaken to updates on the radio, the weather websites. Images of smokey skies, people in shelters and fire racing up tall trees and hillsides are the daily visuals.
The other day, while listening to a podcast about (ironically) Moses and the burning bush, it took on new significance in this hot, dry summer.
The story of Moses is told in Exodus.
Just the other day I wrote about the conditions into which he was born in the post, Hidden in Their Hearts. His destiny at birth, like all the other Hebrew babies, was a permanent water bath (drowning).
So, years later,
Moses,
born in love
given back to God in trust
was in a hard place.
He had been raised in the palace of the Pharaoh,
killed an Egyptian guard,
run away,
protected seven sisters from shepherds who hadn’t allowed them to water their flocks at a well (but … maybe he was the one who was really thirsty?)
was given one of those daughters, in marriage (a Midianite woman who thought he was an Egyptian … so maybe he was still struggling with his identity?),
and now he’s off wandering in the dessert with his (his father-in-laws) flock.
Though it would appear that he knew his location, I think Moses was lost. The identity he portrayed was not that of a Hebrew, but Egyptian. He held within him the unconscious memories of songs and messages and prayers of his mother who buried them into his lovingly nurtured heart.
I think Moses might have been as dry as much of the landscape of British Columbia is currently … ripe for fire to burn it to ashes, to dust. He was a man born to a purpose, one his mother knew was a purpose given by the God who saved him as a baby. Yet, here he was, tending sheep in the hot, dry desert.
“the angel of the Lord appeared to him (Moses) in flames of fire from within a bush. Moses saw that though the bush was on fire it did not burn up.” (Exodus 3:2)
Moses was seeing the impossible. A tree, on fire, yet the tree was not destroyed. That would catch my attention!
Then he said something that reminded Moses who he was,
“I am the God of your father,
the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob.” (v. 6)
“the God of your father” … in this statement and the following fathers of the Jews, God reminds Moses of his identity, of who he is, of the whispers of his mother, buried in his heart before he could understand. This is the beginning of his rebirth, the beginning of his life of really living. This is his holy ground moment.
As God tells Moses his plan to save the Israelites through him, Moses gets doubtful (the dry bones of doubt). And he says, “Who am I that I should go to Pharaoh and bring the Israelites out of Egypt?” (v.11)
Now, if I were God, I would be rolling my eyes (like a parent) and saying, “did you hear me? were you listening? I just told you who you are!”
But God, still burning in that still full of life bush, is much more patient and compassionate (v.12).
“And God said, “I will be with you.””
And this is the God I serve. He reminds me who I am and then he reminds me that
He.
will.
not.
leave.
me.
alone.
Yet, Moses still has doubts …
I think what is happening here is fascinating because there’s a bush on fire, but it’s not destroyed. God is speaking to Moses, telling him who he is, that he will not be left alone and it is Moses who is brought to ash in the face of this fire.
His life so far has been one of confusion and feeling lost and lacking attachment to anything and anyone. There have always been whispers of identity within his soul, yet they have always been out of reach, a jumbled mess. Now, in the midst of an isolated desert, the God of his people, God himself is challenging him to abandon his fear. To make the faith of his fathers HIS OWN FAITH. He has a choice to make … the choice we all have to make … do we chose to live the life God has for us?
And who shall I tell them sent me? This is Moses last question and the answer, though perhaps odd and indefinite to us (and to him) is nothing short of definite,
“I am who I am. This is what you are to say to the Israelites: ‘I am has sent me to you.’” God also said to Moses, “Say to the Israelites, ‘The Lord, the God of your fathers—the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob—has sent me to you.’
“This is my name forever, the name you shall call me from generation to generation.”
I am … no beginning, no end. Reliant on nothing and no one.
This is the God who creates, who never leaves our side, and, later in this story of Moses being willing to follow and obey God, we get to hear God’s ultimate promise, to the Israelites and to us all …
I will redeem you
Redemption is the result of obedience, of trust. It is the result of our ashes being born into new life. Only God can make new things out of the rubble of our dry and thirsty lives.
With this in mind, I thought it was interesting that the podcast I listened to on my walk the other day was about Moses and the burning bush.
The story of Moses and the burning bush is in Exodus 3, but the story of Moses begins in the previous chapter.
The life of Moses began with a mother who loved him. She knew what his destiny was, for Pharaoh had ordered that all Israelite babes to thrown into the Nile and drowned.
So, rather than do what every mother wants most to and hold him close, she chose to take her chances and let God determine his fate. She placed her newborn into a waterproof basket and set it in the Nile RIver.
Where other neighbor babies died a violent death, she chose to lovingly trust her God. She released her son from her hands and control to the only one that she knew who loved him more.
I think one could say that she gave him over to the river of life, by trusting her son to her God.
Her trust in her God resulted in her having him (temporarily) returned to her, to nurse him … with pay from the Pharaoh’s daughter!
Reminder:
God does not just give us what we need, he often gives extravagantly!
So, this mamma gets her son back, but she knows that it is temporary. She knows with every sunrise, every hungry cry, every coo and smile that her days are numbered with this child, this flesh and blood.
When we know that our time is limited, we do not waste our time!
What do you think she did with her son?
What do you think she spoke to him?
If it was me … if the son in my arms had been returned to me because of my God, who I had trusted …
I would tell him of God.
I would sing songs of worship.
I would pray over his future.
I would thank God.
And, I believe, that is what she did.
For her son was saved, his life was delivered from the cultural ‘sin’ of having been born into the race so despised in that time, that place.
God saved her son, so she would hide words of wisdom and love of God in his heart.
And that is the calling to all mothers,
To bury the word of God in the hearts of our children,
Then,
to release them
trusting the God who once placed them in our arms,
Though we didn’t communicate this as a gift, we also did not, not communicate it.
The offer was in our wording, to be revealed if asked, if the one condition was met.
The one who could benefit from this offer, this gift, had only to meet one condition.
But,
that condition meant hard things …
patience.
humility.
sacrifice.
But,
for us to follow through, to give the gift, they had to take the next step.
The gift had a condition, a hoop to jump through.
I was frustrated as I realized that they were so focused one their goal, they were going to miss what was being offered. That they would miss out on the thing that would bring greater help and ease, long term, because they were so focused on the short term desires.
Then, it came to me …
that’s me.
I want what I want, when I want it. Often, my mind is so focused on my goal and my expediency to accomplish it that I miss out on the longer term goals, that can bring better results.
When I think of this sort of impatience, I often think of times of buyer’s remorse. When I have seen a shiny item that lights up my moment and have to have it! Often I spend too much, or spend money on something that truly has only momentary gain … at the cost of something of better quality, because I refused to wait.
God’s love for us is freely offered to all. It is a gift that satisfies us, not just today, but for always. There is nothing hindering our receipt of his love … except that we have to accept it, accept him as our one and only way to a better life, to redemption.
His word reminds us of what is offered to us, the opportunities and gifts that are ours if we would …
Even John 3:16, no doubt one of the most often verses quoted, has an if – then statement.
“For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.”
The eternal life that is offered to all of humanity is an offer with a condition … and conditions come with some sort of sacrifice. In this case the condition is to believe in God … sounds easy enough. But, when we are in the midst of why God moments … belief is a sacrifice … to our understanding, to our pride. It requires patience and humility. But, our understanding and pride are short term … this life that God offers is eternal. It is the long term goal, over the short term.
When we really take the time to understand the offer, we also have to realize that our sacrifice is nothing in comparison to the cost of it … that of the Son of God.
May our … my … eyes be open to what is being offered to me, every day. I pray my focus is on what lasts.
Who would have thought that sitting in a dentist’s chair would have been where God decided to speak clearly (though I am certain that many have called out to God from a dentist’s chair)?
I have sat in that chair, facing that painting for probably over twenty years. I have admired it while taking my seat in front of it (or was it in front of me?). I have yearned to be there, standing on that pathway bridge, taking in the waves crashing on shore, the eagle soaring out over the water, the light streaming down from beyond the clouds.
This day, as I walked into the room, I was only able to see one facet of the painting and I was in it.
Right there, standing on the smaller rock. On this rock, in the foreground, the waves crashing onto it and my feet. I could feel the icy cold of the water on my feet, ankles and lower legs. I could feel the cool air on my face. My back to the beach, I could see only the waves, the threat, as fear gripped me.
As I took my seat, chatted the same introductory conversation about work, children and the news of the day that we have had every six months for over twenty years, my mind’s attention was still in front of me. Finally, as our conversation was silenced by the work that needed to be accomplished, I could focus completely on my perilous situation, as the breakers crashed at my feet.
“you are not hopeless”
The words of a song I’d heard while driving to my appointment.
“I hear your SOS, your SOS”
More lyrics. Chill ran through me as the waves hit at me.
“you’re not defenseless”
As I sat there in the chair, my eyes continued to be focused on the painting … the painting that I had been somehow been transported into. Though I could no longer see the physical scene, for my position was now mostly fixed to the ceiling … to a place above and beyond my physical self. Now my inner gaze also drifted higher.
“I hear you whisper undernearth your breath I hear you whisper you have nothing left”
In an instant my mind’s eye lifted from the waves, to the eagle, soaring effortlessly on the air thermals. To the light streaming down, those crepuscular sunbeams (sometimes called the “fingers of God”). The fear eliminated, dissolved.
“In the middle of the hardest fight, it’s true, I will rescue you”
I was now standing above the water, on the other side of the cabin, facing the light pouring down from the clouds. I have no idea what the other side of the cabin looked like, for my back was to it, my face focused on the light.
The description of this painting, by Fred Buchwitz, writes:
“The morning sun bursts through the clouds, casting its warm glow in this remote bay on the northwest coast. The crest of each wave is illuminated by the golden rays of the sun. The crashing rhythm of the ocean and the cries of the gulls provide the musical backdrop for this enchanted vista.”
“The crest of each wave is illuminated by the golden rays of the sun” … for me, that day, the threatening waves were illuminated by the reminder
itsawonderfilledlife 