our Father :: glory

{via pinterest}

yesterday was Father's Day. and i meant to write, i did, but the crush of the do and the laughter and the ice cream and pizza and s'mores in the glow of a low-setting sun overtook my inspiration.

there were hugs from the man of God that raised me, and from the man of God that gave me his son as my love and calls me "daughter," and from the man of God who looks at our tiny evenstar and calls her daughter.

and i inhaled family instead, and oh, it was so good.

and then i woke up this morning with sunrays on my cheeks and some strange realization brewing soft in the core of me. because on Saturday night, our pastor spoke familiar words that the whole room of worshippers repeated back to him, not just because he asked but also because we couldn't help it, really.

our Father
hallowed be Thy Name. 

and these words, just those two short phrases, had lodged themselves in my mind and hummed at me in the dawning. i've felt the stirrings my entire life, the pull from the place where my faith journey started where nothing was personal. it didn't feel right even to my little-child heart who grew up in the church.

why call Him Father and then be afraid to touch Him?

and i've been chided more than i can really comprehend for daring to touch the spiritual, for being so irreverent as to reach out my fingers toward His robe and even just brush the fabric. and i use that strange word so often :: sacred. and the intensity i feel scares even me sometimes, because what is there that pushes me in such a powerful way?

{via pinterest}

He does. 

and i reach up my fingers with a kind of hesitant bravery, that kind of courage that groans in the silence when we know what must be done, but there is a shakiness somewhere down deep. and it's overwhelming and we know that it might lead to something else...something bigger....maybe something  that would hurt.

our Father, 
glory. Your name is glory.

and so i grasp, tight, and i'm lifted onto a Lion's back and the roaring laugh reaches my hesitating soul. fingers in His mane, we leap to salvation, and i am so close i can feel His heart. and oh, it is a thunderstorm and a tidal wave and a comfort and a peace.

it is all of these, and a thousand things more.

and i beg Him to write His name as deep as it can go, because i don't want to forget. and i want to throw back this strangely terrified warrioress heart and howl glory at the coming moon, early seen at twilight, and radiant in the darkness.

:: my Father. 

Your name. 

oh...glory. 

Crash

And then, when the Empress ran aground / And my eyes turned blue and green / I heard a gorgeous sound / And that's when it became a dream / When the sky fell in / When the hurricanes came for me / I could finally crash again / And that's how I became the sea ~Owl City, How I Became the Sea

I am a mermaid.

An ocean obsessive.

Ever since I was a tiny girl, vacations at my grandparents' home in Florida spelled one thing for me: a visit to the salty seas that never seemed to end...a variable fairytale for a land-locked Midwestern farm girl who had only Lake Michigan as her large water experience.

The sand between my toes....sand castles to be woven from bits of broken shell and rock..the elusive conch shell to be found and taken home for a salty day reminder.

And there were the waves. The beautiful, powerfully frightening force of nature...the swelling water that rose

and rose

and rose

until it came down with a thunderous crash upon the land, dragging everything back into the depths with each pass of its aquatic fingers.

As this girl grew up, the ocean changed.

No more was it a place to play and race along the shore...now it was a place to dream. To stand on the edge of the shell-scattered sand and letting the sea breeze rustle my hair...it was a place where the voice of my God could echo with the waves.

It was the place to let the mercy crash...

...it was the place to drown.

And even now, as I find myself landlocked once again with my next oceanside visit two months yet to come, my mind drifts seawards.

Rock bottom is the perfect place from which to rise.

The waves are still crashing hard on me....dragging me back into the ocean until I feel as though I might let go and drown without a trace...

...but then I catch His swell.

I do not drown. I crash to the shore...and rise

and rise

and rise

The crystal wave holds me...

...safe in His hand.

"When you pass through the waters, I will be with you; And through the rivers, they will not overflow you. When you walk through the fire, you will not be scorched, Nor will the flame burn you. “For I am the LORD your God, The Holy One of Israel, your Savior..." ~Isaiah 43:2-3

(Guest posting over at Love August today. You can find me here.)