the gasp :: much

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 {over the next several weeks, maybe even months, i will be writing here and there from elora's thirty days of prompts. this is something that i have never done before, something raw and fresh and gorgeous and potentially painful. so please, be gentle with me. you can find all posts i have written from these prompts here}

:: in what ways have you found your way out of the depths? where is your appreciation and sensitivity? what makes you beautiful?

oh, to ponder these words above. what makes me beautiful? from what depths have i climbed? but, to speak of that would be making myself oh-so vulnerable. and that might be where the beauty is hiding, tucked away in the tender wrappings of a heart so easily swept under. 

i used to think that being broken was ugly. not in other people, you understand, because their broken pieces made breathtaking mosaics and all i could was stare in wonder. but my broken pieces were fragmented, distasteful. my being broken was ugly.

but then there was this metaphor, one that i've had in the back of my mind all my life but only recently jogged into remembrance :: that picture of a woman with a hand over her mouth, eyes wide as though she wanted...needed...to speak but could not. and then there was a whisper, what if that hand is your own?

and then a poem found its way into my fingers from the heart of a friend. words that made me catch my breath because they related to my soul. 

because the soft season will come

it will come 

loud

ready

gulping

both hands in your heart

up all night

up all of the nights

to drink all damage into love.

:: therapy // nayyirah waheed

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it sank in like water to the most-parched soul and i realized. my soul is trying to drink it all, reaching up my fingers for selah merging with beams of Light streaming from the eyes of the One who stopped and spoke into the pressing crowd, someone touched Me. 

i'm only twenty-two, told often that i have not experienced enough life to know pain, to appreciate what it means to wait and experience and cling to something. i won't pretend that i know, but i know my share. and it's not a competition as to who aches the deepest or who needs the water the very most. what makes me beautiful is my past, my broken cobblestones and the scars on my toes from trying to climb a mountain with bare feet. 

but i reached and i gasped with eyes wide and pleading, fingers clutching His robe while His eyes meet mine and whisper, you love much, and you are forgiven much. 

and so i'm gently gathering the jagged and the broken and the cracked into my pockets and laying them out like sea glass on the sand. my heart is there, twisted like wrought iron and molded like clay. and there's a word there, humming soft with Lion melody to mingle with my soul's gasping inhale of Light. 

:: much. 

the fourth page :: peace in glory

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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}

i almost didn't blog today. between packing our suitcases for the yearly family vacation and attempting to get my Christmas-tousled house in order, time for reflection was pushed too far behind. the press and crush of time almost did me in again.

it's a flaw i have, letting time overwhelm and to-do lists dictate my sitting and my standing and my breathing and my living. i forget to stop and rest.

silent night. oh holy night. 

behold your King

for all this crush that spells the mas where it should be Christ, we forget that there was no pomp and circumstance to herald the entrance of Christ, as God and man blended into the mystery of one flesh. 

it was as silent as a birth can be. 

there was no cluster of red carpet admirers, no throngs of people with anxious hearts and fingers stretched out to caress the cheek of this Saviour child. there was a frightened virginal couple, not even a midwife to attend them. there were animals gathered around in the stone shelter where the Prince of Peace was born, with dung and straw and nothing but strips of cloth in which to wrap the Son of the Most High. 

she called Him Emmanuel. God with us. 

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do you feel this like i do? 

:: God with us ::

:: God with us ::

:: God with us ::

and this woman, this new mother -- even a child herself -- treasured each one of these things deep within her heart. there was silence that flowed purely alongside the angelic chorus of oh, glory, glory, glory. and on earth, peace.

oh, behold your King. 

hail, hail, the Word made flesh.

so we celebrate, and we gather. 

but last night was that moment in this holiday season for me. that moment when our church was silent, save for the flickering of two hundred lit candles in the darkness, and two hundred voices rose to greet this God-made-man. 

oh, come, let us adore Him.

we'll praise Your Name forever.

oh, behold your King.

Silence

Silences make the real conversations between friends. Not the saying but the never needing to say is what counts. ~Margaret Lee Runbeck

There is something so velvet, so blissful about silence.

Those moments when all distractions fade away and you are completely lost in a perfect moment of soundless thought.

Some view the concept of "silence" as a sign of mental dysfunction, or an awkward moment between friends when there is nothing left to say.

For me, it's the exact opposite.

When there is silence, there is comfort.

The noise ends, the chaos is silenced. It's a glimpse into the comfort of Heaven.

His still, small voice speaks loudest when we cease our storms and just allow our souls to be bathed in soothing calm.

I think that's why God gave us the following truth about our relationships here on earth...

...when you are able to be silent with someone, without a word between you, it is not because you have nothing to say to one another or that a unspoken tedium has been reached.

Not in the least.

You have reached that point of the utmost love. When those moments of pain arrive between two friends, there is such blessed relief in a simple embrace where not a sound need be made.

You both just know.

There is a time and a place for silence. There is an unspoken need in each one of us to have someone understand us at that level.

It's in that moment of silence when you hear the words "...you're going to be okay" the most clearly.

Because that is a picture of our relationship with God.

Does this not make the silence that much more beautiful?

It should.

And behold, the LORD passed by, and a great and strong wind tore into the mountains and broke the rocks in pieces before the LORD, but the LORD was not in the wind; and after the wind an earthquake, but the LORD was not in the earthquake; and after the earthquake a fire, but the LORD was not in the fire; and after the fire a still small voice. ~ 1 Kings 19:11-12

True

Have you ever thought about how God sees you?

...ever sat down beneath a spreading tree and gazed up at the pale blue sky, spread lightly with wispy clouds, just to think about someone for whom you care deeply?

...danced under a midnight sky, sprinkled with the delicately burning stars?

...opened a leather-bound book that has sat on the shelf for months, and felt as if you were becoming reacquainted with a long-missed friend?
That is a picture of God's delight in you.
Have you ever had a broken heart?

...wept until you were out of tears over the struggles of a beloved brother, fighting his way through old memories, stamped indelibly in his mind...if only you could free him...if only...?

...carried the secret pains of a friend on your own heart, wishing you could fight her battles for her...wishing that you could make her understand how beautiful she is...?
This is a picture of God's pain at your sorrow.

Have you ever experienced true love?
...had someone love you so much that they would give up their comfort, their freedom, their dreams, their very lives to keep you safe?

...had someone wrap their arms around you and just let you cry your heart out into their shoulder, knowing that their heart is breaking because you are suffering?
This is a picture of God's love for you.

This is a picture of my God.
True delight.
True sorrow.
True love.
"And God demonstrates His love for us in this...while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us." -Romans 5:8
"Great love has none than this: that a man lays down his life for his friends." -John 15:13