our Father :: glory

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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?

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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. 

kumbaya

{via tumblr}

it's more than three syllables, more than a simple campfire chants with guitars and jean shorts. it's more than that.

:: kumbaya. 
come by here. 

it's the word my soul speaks in the darkness when i'm reaching out into seeming nothingness and i'm empty and the dark night of soul is pressing in tighter and tighter.

:: kumbaya

it's the dance of the soul bathed in light as joy comes bringing in the morning with a laugh and a whisper of better things, beautiful things made new like He promised.

:: kumbaya

it's a silly song, one that every little child can sing by the time they've seen five summers. the words are used to mock, even, those who seem to want to lower weapons and hold hands across enemy lines. but it's more than that.

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:: kumbaya
oh Lord, come by here. 

it's the rings in the tree, repeated and widened year after year. it's that knitted line in the scarf, threads woven by hand that speak of love when wrapped around neck and palms. it's the sacred footsteps of the seeker who has nothing left, the nomad who wanders the desert to find the spring of water and sits in the shadow of Him that sees.

for I have stood in the presence of the God who sees me.

kumbaya.
a word transforming.

it is come by here, Lord. it's a little girl crying come find me, Daddy. 

and El Roi, the God who sees, Abba Daddy. oh, He comes running.

it's more than a firelight song. it's a heart's burning cry.

it's the breath of our lungs.

::kumbaya::

dive

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sometimes people ask me how i intend to keep my warrior's heart alive with a baby on my hip. that it seems glorious now to speak of the sacred and of the Light, but that my time will come when infant cries and sleepless nights will overtake me and that i will flicker out from fancies into realities. 

these are the people that set my determination even deeper to swipe the paint beneath my eyes and grip the temple pillars with white-knuckled fingers. 

since when is the sacred a fancy? and when did motherhood kill the Light? 

have i missed something? 

a wise woman once told me that the weight of her son on her back bore her often to her knees. and isn't this how it should be? where children pull on skirts and guide closer and closer to the Cross, because children are warriors too. 

and i am ten weeks with this one, still silent save for the fluttering heartbeat beneath my skin. 

but this child will not blind my eyes from seeing Light or colour or Heaven's kiss along the earth. i know that it will be hard, and perhaps tears will blur or exhaustion with draw me down to my knees, but i will not be made blind.

:: He promised that i would never be blind again ::

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i feel like i have toes pressed against the dock with water lapping soft beneath, and the wind whispering brave through my hair. 

maybe this dock is higher than i think, perhaps a ship's yardarm. and there is still this whisking, flowing water beneath my bare feet. 

and i could dive, or i could stay on the edge and wonder always what would have happened if i let go and simply slipped from air to aquatic. 

i think.

no, i know. 

i'm diving. deeper than i've dared before. and i refuse to act as though i am unafraid, because i have shaking fingers. but i've put down roots of brave and i will let the still, small Voice whisper in the night.

courage, dearheart. 

for I have overcome the world.

breathing mama :: practicing peace

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i'm loving this freedom i'm feeling.

this freedom to just be and not do, to focus on my overwhelmed heart and not dwell on the placement of the words on the page. it's truly freeing to be like this.

i understand why Mary kept each thing close and pondered them deep within her heart. there's so much that floods my mind every single day, and i feel so close to exploding.

:: and i am practicing peace :: 

i'm not a mother, yet...am i? is it alright to have practices of parenting for something the size of a green olive that only makes its presence known in lack of sleep and overpowering nausea?

but i do. and i'm practicing peace.

because i want this child to know what i have learned, and i ache that it might not take so long. and i fear i might forget when this silence is replaced by screams and this beauty is replaced by sleepless nights and the desperation for just a moment of rest in the chaos.

but i want to wrap my arms around this child as i wrap my arms around my stomach now and whisper

peace I bring you

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not as the world gives. 

because i'm birthing into chaos and madness, a world that wants to pull my little one under with every lust and doubt and fear and loss.

this wants to turn my beautiful daughter into a stick figure, never thin enough but slowly dying inside and out. it wants to turn my strong warrior son's eyes into mirrors for disrespecting the women he is born to protect.

and that is almost enough to turn me to fear and tremble, and not the kind i should possess.

but i am striving, i am aching, i am seeking peace. my first practice of parenthood, even while my child is so small and knows nothing but love within.

in a world of dark, i want to whisper Light into this yet-forming ears. i want to sing the lilting notes of Lion's song into the silence.

in His presence, there is peace. and i am kneeling here with hands pressed to belly and eyes wide to bloodstained cross.

and i'm practicing peace.

am i overstepping by being this passionate already? 

week seven :: brushing mother

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and this marks seven weeks, and one week, too. because it was a week ago today that i discovered that my body was home to another, that i was no longer one person walking the earth. i was now two.

but the little ticker that changed from sweet pea to blueberry today made my heart do a flip, and a smile pull my lips upward and left them unshaken for the majority of this day.

even among the frustrations and the irritations that life brings, i touch my stomach and remember that it's one week less until i meet my long-awaited stranger.

looking at my body, you can't tell that i'm expecting. not really. it's a secret that i carry from the rest of the world, from the people passing me on the street or at the bank.

the exhaustion is expected, and i'm learning to breathe through it as it crashes over me in waves.

because i'm sand being molded, harsh edges worn down until i'm smooth and ready with each wave and each new facet that reminds me that i'm thirty-three weeks away from everything changing.

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but hasn't it already? 

it's more than just cravings for macaroni and cheese with hot sauce, or Asian asiago chicken salad. it's more than the water that i'm chugging by the bottle and the deep desire for the caffeine that i am slowly abandoning. it's more than vivid dreams and restless sleep.

it's this realization that sacred has taken up residence in my body. it's as though He's whispering to my soul on the daily basis

be full of Me, daughter

as you are full of this. 

do you see, even a little

how much I love you?

and i'm still singing the Lion's song. note by note from His heart to mine and into tiny ears that are just beginning to form. 

and it's seven weeks when i've only known for one. and that amazes me daily as i'm seeking to walk this path of sacred realization. a warrior now fighting for two with a King fighting for her. 

and i whisper to this tiny blueberry in my tummy

please know Him. 

know Him as you know Him now. 

learn His Name outside as you sing it within.

weary solace

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understanding why does not make the weariness easier.

i can tell you this from experience. as joyful as i am at this new knowledge, this growing beneath my skin that now occupies my every thought and action, i am still weary. and that is hard for me.

 i knew that it would come, this tiredness that seems to allow my energy to drip like water from every pore. but i wasn't ready for how powerfully this feeling would strike, and how i would feel when it did arrive.

i keep hearing His voice whisper rest and my frustrated self crying out please don't make me.

i started catching myself drifting toward the negatives, toward the nervous self-reliant what if's that can make a pregnant woman crazy without the hormones to help her out.

my soul waits in silence for God alone; 

from Him is my salvation. 

He only is my rock and my salvation, 

my stronghold; i shall not be greatly shaken.

it's not just my body that i need to rest. it's my mind, the one that crumbles sometimes when i hear a story of another life that isn't mine, but maybe could be...maybe. i can be assured a thousand times, but words can fall on deaf ears if i'm set strong to worry.

and so i find my place in the sacred corner. the place where i wrap shaking arms around body and womb and curl up there with woolen quilt and quietly repeated Words that come from the Holy Places. 

and i'm just inhaling. because there's so much worry in which i could loose myself, if i chose to be afraid. 

but this word is not afraid. it is brave. 

and rest takes brave. and motherhood takes double brave, even when the child is as small as a sweet pea and curled up safe in my body. 

even now, i seek solace and brave.

 in the quiet places of barefoot and holy, i find His peace. 

expecting brave

and now i know, this is why my word is brave.

because in a moment when a stall door slams behind me and trembling fingers tug silver and paper away,  life changes forever. when stomach is now cradle and fingers now press against soon-taut skin.

because he and me are becoming we.

and this is frightening, in the most beautiful way. i'm not me anymore. it's we, me and little one curled against my innermost parts as He weaves and crochets little eyes and fingers all together.

{via pintrest}

we are expecting a child. 

:: our first ::

and i feel unworthy. this vessel filled, and maybe now i understand my own mother a bit more. because i love this child fiercely, and it still lingers with only six weeks of life beneath my skin and bone. 

we don't know daughter or son, we don't know eye colour or richness of hair. but we know we love this tiny babe growing deeper and stronger. 

and so i press discovering fingers to my abdomen where my little one grows and i whisper of the Lion's song to these developing ears. 

mama loves you already, dearheart. 

and so does daddy.

and so does Abba. 

and i saw the light in my own father's eyes as we held hands today, a grandfather already to the unborn. and i heard the laughter in my mother's soul, a grandmother long awaited. and i heard my sister's gasp of disbelief and cry of joy as sissy turns mommy. 

and i watched my husband's eyes light up with the strangest sparkle as he pressed lips to tummy and whispered sweet dreams, baby. 

september comes fast. thirty-six weeks to go before a ring of fire and blood and life in infant cry. 

and i now know why He wanted me brave. because i'm becoming warrior of a new sort. 

:: mother :: 

stony place :: ebenezer

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i'm still in the stony place. the  rocky, rough place that i think we all touch from time to time.

the place where i'm learning to rest for a time, but i feel like i can't let myself breathe without guilt. 

inhale no rest

exhale too much to do

it's the funny place where we feel guilty for doing right, for stopping for a half a moment just to breathe. because i'm learning to embrace the do not need to do instead of dwelling on the must do now or else. 

and the whole day yesterday, i had a window open to write a new blog post. but i never wrote a word. and i thought it would be a bad thing, that i would wake up to negativity or a heart overflowing with shame for slacking. 

but i didn't. 

:: i woke up breathing ::

and that's what i'm supposed to do. and i made toast and coffee and ate both slices, slow and without worrying about the clock with the silence of the house and the whisper-scent of winter breezes that smell like springtime. 

and i still felt strange, but i didn't know why. but it was a good kind of strange, like icy-cold soda on the hottest day and the way it runs down from lips to stomach and you feel the coolness all the way down.

so i'm taking these stones that make my place rocky, and i'm building an altar. and i'm carving ebenezer into the bottom stone. 

here has my Lord helped me. 

{linking my broken prose with emily today}

unforced rest :: whispers

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sometimes, it's good to be restless. it's good to pulse and feel and breathe.
but sometimes, you have to close your eyes.

i'm bad at resting.

even when all i should be doing is leaning back, eyes closed to recover, i don't want to stop. i want to keep tossing, keep turning, keep moving and doing until i'm thin as paper and torn into shreds.

and right now i'm sick. and i should be focused on recovering, tucking my chills under a quilt with a steaming mug of tea and a brand-new book. and t i'm snuggled under these blankets with tea and Hell's Kitchen and fluffy pillows, but oh, my mind is fluttering in a thousand directions.

why can't i rest?

so close your eyes

you can close your eyes.

:: it's alright :: 

how many times does He say be still? 

it's important to Him that i rest, that i be still and know. and yet, it's not important to me. is that not such a horrible slap in His face? what matters so much to Him means nothing to me? 

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it makes me sick to realize how foolish i can be when my eyes go on me and dart to the lists instead of closing to serenity for His whispers of 

courage dearheart

breathe deeply, daughter.

because this Lion's song is what i should be singing, instead of this thudding drum of 

go now 

go now 

go now 

go now. 

it's this restless mind, this broken spirit that aches to overcompensate. 

i strive too hard to fix my own mistakes instead of sitting in His hand and listening to the whispers that linger past the storm, the wind, the fire. 

i must rest

in these unforced rhythms 

of grace. 

understanding brave :: being

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it's the first of three sixty five. 

i woke up this morning and laid in bed, staring at the curtains as they fluttered in the frozen breeze. 

:: and i didn't feel brave ::

i made coffee, the first strong pot of a new year, steaming in my mug with fragrant wisps of steam. 

 :: and i didn't feel brave ::

and i looked out the window at the snow-less ground that could perhaps be confused for spring. 

:: and i didn't feel brave ::  

but brave isn't feeling, is it? because feeling lie and emotions betray and too often hearts don't know what they should, and minds know too much of what they shouldn't.

no, brave isn't feeling.

it's being. 

it's not about awakening and leaping from bed to floor with sword in palm. it's about living, all on its own. about thinking less and meditating more. about inhaling and exhaling and repeating the action a thousand times with barely a thought. 

that's my first portion of brave. 

the day came when the risk to remain tight in a bud

was greater than the risk it took to bloom. 

:: anis nin :: 

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because brave isn't a battlecry, not really.

it's a love song. 

it's those halting, lonesome notes that ring over the night. it's the sweetness of a Lion's song, of a call to come and drink. 

because brave isn't something that comes naturally. it's waking, and knowing. it's living and breathing and standing and clinging to the mast in the storm and knowing that there is an end. 

it's watching the gale blow from the shelter of His arms, and knowing that a Lion's mane is stronger than a thousand storms. 

it's not being unafraid, because fear comes and fingers shake and there's so much unknown in the silence. but He promised a rainbow, and it makes me brave to know that colour comes again and grey is broken like shards of glass that slice the bonds between Life and death. 

it's brave to be His.

final notes :: in review

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tomorrow is 2012. 

honestly, it's hard for me to believe that another year is so close. i can almost feel the smoothness of the chalkboard, that clean slate that lurks so near. it's refreshing. 

this year has been remarkable. 

and you've blessed me. 

and life has changed for the sacred, for the beautiful. 

i'm humbled to be surrounded by such incredible brothers and sisters as you, once strangers turned beloved friends who have held my hand as this year has tossed and turned. in the beauty, we celebrated. and in the darkness, we held up the candleflames. 

it has been a year of Light in this place. a year of drawing closer. 

and so, here they are. 

:: the ones that blessed you ::

woman 

//

we need more than our silent allotments of stand and sit and worship and listen and nothing more than this. we crave Him. we ache to go deeper. we want to search His will and see His heart and wrestle with Him in hand-to-hand until we find ourselves undone and exposed before Him. because He chose us too. 

grace alone

//

i am walking on Grace alone.

Sometimes, I find myself at a loss for how much poetry I dream and then promptly forget upon my waking.

It is a powerful ache to realize just how much this world of chaos, of tears, of sleep-stolen moments and overbooked days has ripped my art from me.

dreaded souls :: imperfection

//

if He makes all things new, all things good, all things beautiful -- then this i ache to emulate. i want to follow in His footsteps, stepping down the path with the ambition to dwell in His mercies
to make all things beautiful. to take my imperfections and make them into Art.
to make them dreaded. 

ink of wait

//

the three years worth of familial well-meaning words cut like the lies mixed with truth that they are...because really i'm not wasting anything.

why don't i go? i'm not called.

but i have wasted nothing.

this is rebirth, i would say. and it's painful.

three things

//

and so i take my pen and my paper and my too-many thoughts and i sit and i wonder just what might happen if i knew something, anything at all.
i watch the people, feet on pavement and pavement on feet. and i realize what i know.
i know three things, because sarah kay says good things come in threes, and she's right, after all.

:: :: :: 

i cannot thank you enough. the blessings that you have poured over my head like anointing oil in this past year has been more than i can understand.

it's been a walk into sacredness, toward gripping the hem of the Son of the Most High. a walk into adventure, hand in hand with my Abba.

it's been the vigil of death with candles lit and joy coming fresh in the morning. it's been a path with more stones than i expected, and more joys than i could even fully pen.

be blessed in 2012, dearhearts. 

{also, for those of you that have been following my OneWord journey here and here, i have found my word. 

tomorrow, it will breathe. and it will begin. 

so much gratitude for all your prayers and all your blessings.}

inked :: tattooed :: inscribed

{i am left, she is right}
photo by dramaticelegance

today, i crossed another item off my bucket list.

i now bear my first ink. a small kanji on my right wrist whispers two unknown words that beat with my heart.

:: elder sister ::

they match, her ink and mine. as much as two sisters, so different, can have eternal art on their skin, and it be the same. 

hers is thin, almost airy in its strokes. mine is thicker, bolder, with lightly feathered ends. they're different, like we are. 

but there's still one part that is the same. that one word, six letters that makes them the same. 

sister. 

i find profoundness in the marking of one's skin with permanence. it's a sacred act, a mirroring of the marks that my Father bears on His palms. 

the Son is pierced, the Father is tattooed. 

behold, I have inscribed you on the palms of My hands; 
your walls are continually before Me.

inscribe: to write, to carve, to engrave. 

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there is permanence in this, this thing of marking love on the skin. of speaking volumes to a world that might not understand these strange words we speak of "born again" and "redeemed" and "sanctified."

but they understand ink, and blood, and eternity. 

never erased. 

always there. 

and so i wear ink. it's not my last, not by far. it's beautiful and powerful and so sacred. i'm overwhelmed and undone, almost feeling unworthy by the beauty, the reminder. 

because i'm inscribed on my skin, and i'm inscribed on His palms. 

eternity. engraved.

overflowing // pie {213-219}

i'm at a loss for words this afternoon.

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the Christmas rush is finally starting to trickle down, barely twelve hours from the twenty-four that spelled out this sacred day, we are back to life again. back to normal, i suppose.

but can you ever really be normal after knowing?

is that even something i want? 

because this Christmas was more than just presents and sparkling lights, and perhaps even more than singing certain songs with hands raised in the candlelight. it was about being emptied, and then being made full again. because isn't that what we celebrate?

this thing of being empty. because how can something that is already full be filled anymore?

it's an overflow when the shell begins to brim over and then the Light tumbles over the edge and spills over in a waterfall over the edges and down the sides and falling down on everything and everyone beneath.

• 213. joy

• 214. Him coming, Him saving. 

• 215. sparkling eyes in Christmas lights

• 216. those grateful words on innocent lips when toys and games spark wonder

• 217. my precious family. words cannot express.

• 218. a God who loved enough to give. 

• 219. a Son who loved enough to die. 

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:: it's a pie shell ::

you see, i made pie this Christmas, blueberry. and as i poured the dark purple berries in their thick syrup into a patiently waiting pastry shell, i watched them flood and fill until the edges were brimming with sweetness. 

but even as i covered the pie with carefully cut lattice strips and slid it into the waiting heat, i felt the touch on my soul and the whisper

do you see this thing of being filled?

it's okay to be out of room, dearheart.

because when you spill over, you bless.

it's about having more than you can handle, more than your words can fully form and it spills over. maybe that's why i'm counting my blessings differently this Monday, this day that normally flows with rising numbers as i tick them off one by one. 

because i'm overflowing.

{linking my continuous blessings with Ann}

the fifth page :: mystery

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{to read the first page, visit here}

{to read the second page, visit here}
{to read the third page, visit here}

{to read the fourth page, visit here}

conviction is a powerful thing. it's something that can come out of nowhere, something that you never saw before a hand touched yours and words were whispered, you should look.

today, it took a whimsically tangled ski trip and a sacred blog post to grip my soul and turn my head toward you should look.

it's time to look at ourselves, the sisters and the brothers and the sons and the daughters of the Mighty One. it's time to look at who we were and the mold into which we are squeezing ourselves just because we think we have to fit. have we gotten stuck in the place where sacred gets sidelined, talked about in whispers and not fully understood anymore? 

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because it feels as though we let it go, and we stopped seeking when we stepped through the church doors. 

we have somehow entered the place where candle-lighters are greeted with wrinkled brows and those who seek the holy are the strange ones who look to hard for "the emotion." because mystery in the Word, not understanding everything that greets our eyes and tugs our souls...

is this wrong?

shouldn't we just know?

we need to step back and breathe and seek. we need to be free to acknowledge that it’s okay to be a mystic, a seeker in this dark world. where candles make your soul ring in the darkness and we invite the Creator to come and create WITH us.

this season is God with us, celebrated and overwhelming with candlelight and silence in the beholding. this here, this is the time where we find ourselves willing to open our door to the fragrant and cast aside the understandable. and for this, i raise shaking hands to broken clouds and whisper, 

come have me, won’t You?

the third page :: the Father's beginning

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{to read the first chapter visit here}

{to read the second chapter, visit here}

sometimes i don't feel like getting ahead, this thing of push and pull and jerk and tug that seems to be so prevalent this time of year.

sometimes, i feel like hanging back a bit, because there's power in beginnings because it shows where you've been, where you used to stand and who you used to be.

because stories rarely start with once upon a time and end with and she stayed the same forever.

:: there is a change :: 

and sometimes i think we need to go back past the first breath of Saviour Child, before the word spoken to the cosmos when dark became light and nothing became something.

to before the beginning, even, when Heaven crossed swords and one thing lower sought to be Highest and overthrow the One who made him. when sonic booms and broken skies led to the the tumbling down of the once bright star and a third of his followers until they struck the earth and still kept sinking past the earth's burning core and into a vile black place of their own.

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when a Father touched His Son's shoulder 

and knew. 

because we see virgin mother and awestruck mortal father and tiny infant hands and feet tucked in manger straw with angels singing and shepherds worshiping. but there's another sacred corner. another Father, the only One who truly knew what must be done.

because He held the future in His Hand, and saw the coming. saw the scream of crucify Him crucify Him and saw the blood as lashes struck and thorns pressed into His Only Son's forehead as His sinless blood flowed into His eyes merging with the tears.

and He heard the wail of a broken Son crying out

My God, My God, oh, why have You forsaken Me? 

and still He touched His Son's shoulder and knew. and still He stood at Heaven's gates and gazed down upon this scene of nativity with moral flesh clothing His precious Son.

because His love for His broken ones, His people wandering in the darkness with hands outstretched and whispered pleas for deliverance...it overcame all.

so this is Love

not that we loved God

but that He loved us

and sent His Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. 

{linking this imperfection with emily and all my dear ones}

the second page :: foreshadow

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{to read the first chapter, visit here}

another page now to turn, when books and words show more than we dare to realize. because we get stuck, i think with away in the manger when no one really went to this quiet manger where cattle are lowing and babies don't cry.

because there's more to this than just picture-perfect nativity and glowing mother and oh so proud father and stars and a Star that shine down over this little Kodak moment where someone should have had a camera.

sometimes it seems like they did, but they didn't.

there was blood. there was tears and there was pain. and there was a crying child who lay in a pile of straw, wrapped in strips of clean linen,  because the world who should have opened their doors to Him shut them tight and shouted

no room 

no room 

no room 

a hundred thousand times over until a cave cut into rock was His only place to be born.

and then His only place to lay when the hearts of every Pharisee shut tights and cried

no room 

no room

no room 

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a hundred times over. and they wrapped Him in strips of clean linen -- and they laid Him in that cave to rest. not in life, but in death.

and then there were the seekers. the shepherds and the Magi from every walk of life, coming to behold and kneel with gifts of wealth and gifts of hearts.

 because the shepherds were disciples that came and laid their nothing but praise at His feet, because it was all they had. and a man named Joseph was the Magi who gave his garden and his herbs and his never-used tomb. because that was his honour.

and there was the angel in the sky singing "you will find Him lying in a manger. Emmanuel. Jesus." and the seekers ran to Him after waiting all their lives to find this Messiah, this one to save them, their land and their souls.

and then there was the angel again. who sat this time, no singing or multitudes. just the one. but this one's message was just as full of power, if not more.

this time,

He is NOT HERE.

because He is risen.

so the writer in me finds the foreshadow, finds the promise in the silent night and the holy night and the bright and the calm.

and so as i sing, the tears will fall down my face because there is more than sacred touching earth and life being changed as we know it forever by an innocent child soon to become the darkest with our sin. not His, but ours.

fall on your knees,

oh, hear the angel voices.

oh, night divine. 

connection in the Sovereign

{via pinterest}

when i tell people that i blog, sometimes i get the strangest looks. when i mention a friend that i have made, how dear she is to my soul but our only connection has been the one that flutters through cyberspace, the looks intensify.

because it doesn't make sense, if you give it too much thought, and if you don't understand.

how does it work, exactly, for women of every walk and every age and every standard to merge their souls and bare their hearts to one another?

does connection take face to face, hand to hand, and breath to breath?

or is it about heart more than flesh?

because there is love that radiates 

from screen to screen. 

there are voices that ring together with laughter over steaming coffee mugs, and then there are the clusters gathered to weep and mourn a broken heart with tears that flow in brokenness, despite the distance.

there is connection. 

this i promise you.

this is the blending of earthy and sacred. i've said it before, and perhaps too often.

but, oh, God became flesh, and gold became straw.

and connections become invisible and fingers touch and grasp together.

these sisters, these seekers that stand together with one hand stretched to Heaven and the other pressed to qwerty keys, they understand.

this is sacred connection of the strangest type.

this is Sovereign sisterhood.

droplets :: rain

{via pinterest}

i love the rain.

some find it gloomy, overbearing. almost depressing when the sun is blotted out with grey and fog, when water pours like tears from Heaven's eyes and there is nothing bright anymore.

but in my experience, tears heal.

and the rain cleanses.

there is no sun seen, but it's still there. it's just waiting for the healing.

driving in the rain is complicated. the roads are slick and damp, and there are puddles that gather in the low points that lead to a skid or a tidal-wave splash. but it convicts me, too, when i drive while the water pours from sky to ground.

but there's that blur when the water patterns the windshield and for that moment, you can't see the road. and then the wipers glide over the glass and all is clear again.

and that's the way it should be. the tears come and for a moment, all seems blurred and unsure. and then the fingers brush the tears aside. the bottle in Heaven fills with a few more drops, and peace descends.

{via pinterest}

You have taken account of my wanderings

put my tears in Your bottle. 

are they not in Your book?

{psalm 56:8}

these are not just our sorrows, i think. He keeps our joys in this bottle, too. and i think one day that He will take me into this room, this place where this bottle is stored.

and He and i will talk, and He will take this bottle off the shelf. and He will pour them into His palm where my name is written and smile.

i keep Your tears

of sorrow and joy and Light and pain and beauty and confusion

so that You could see

that I am greater

and I love you. 

so this is why i love the rain. the knowing that while it is unsure, there is beauty. and while the joys overflow into water down my cheeks, or the pain trickles down in the only release i can understand

i can stand. secure and dry in the Light of the Son.