I Love You

"I love You". Nothing else said. Nothing else spoken. I repeat it often during my day. I catch Your fragrance, a memory, a wooing, sometimes an intentional direction of my affection. It pours from my lips like rain off saturated leaves. For a moment I'm embarassed. How silly and simple I must sound! Couldn't I come up with something more eloquent for the One who created words? So I pose the question, to the One who writes language and ask "if You tire of me saying it to You, over and over again"?

Your answer comes instantly. Immediately my mind races back to three little toe-headed girls, all dressed in pink. Always dressed in pink. Never failing, as I would walk into their presence, with their backs turned, or fine wisp of hair hanging over eyes playing with babies of their own, never looking up, softly spilling into my hearing, "Mommy, I love you". Several times a day. Countless times stretched over years as they toddled. Never once did I weary of hearing it. Never once, did it grow old. As a matter of fact...it almost took me by surprise each time. It delighted me to often be reminded of their affections for my presence in their little worlds of pink. It wasn't necessary for eyes to meet or smiles to be exchanged. All that was needed was for the fragrance of their love to be spilled out, onto my listening ears and exposed heart. It was enough for them to simply share it. Love simply shared is never too simple. It is the glue that connects heaven to earth...and my heart to my Beloved's. He assures me that He never tires of hearing of my love for Him. I can feel Him smile!

In The Center of Peace

How does life get so complicated? Where does one go to find peace? I am always looking for an exit sign to the closest route out of here. It's a different circumstance with different characters and different scenery...but everything about it looks all too familiar. I am the common denominator. It's my heart that is wrestling against my reality once more. Thinking if I can make it out of this one alive...I will be able to enjoy the next season. Somewhere my thinking gets all misconstrued. So I hang on for life and try to ride the current out to a peaceful place of rest...only to be hit once again by a swollen surging wave.

I heard a comedian sharing about a tortuous night he had on a house-boat on a tornadic stormy night. He was tossed to and fro with sounds that were deafening. He could hear the freight train funnel going through the area where his boat was being all but capsized against the tiny marina where the boat was tied. When the nightmare had passed and he slowly crawled out to see what damage had occured around him, he began to talk to another owner of a nearby boat. As he used his humor to explain how horrifying the storm had been he finished by saying "If I had known I was going to live through it...I would have just enjoyed the ride!"

How many seasons have I spent wondering if I was going to make it through? Only to get to the other side and find myself with the same question in the next season. How would my days look if I just assumed I would survive? How might the script of my life read differently if I just chose to enjoy the ride...trusting that I was going to live through it? Finding peace in the midst of the moment. Finding rest from the legs that always are looking for the exit sign. How would it feel to simply sit down in the big middle of now and breathe? To determine that I will make it out of this one...and I will enjoy the ride. For I'm not riding alone. You are with me. Your right hand upholds me...and all is well! All is well! Be still my soul and breathe! Simply breathe in peace, for it is all around. Open wide the eyes and enjoy the ride!

Breathless

You never fail to surprise me!I found a new song today. As I'm learning the lyrics I realize I already know them. To an outsider they may seem risque'...but to one whose heart has been ravaged...they are but breath! There was a time, not so long ago, that I would not have been able to sing in harmony with such deep intimacy. I would have thought the words belonged to another. To one more beautiful. To one more pure...more lovely than I.

But, once again, You have written them so slowly and so tenderly upon the pages of my soul...that I believe they belong to me. I find myself "knowing" that this is the light you see me in...with rays of color and hues of light that rapture. You know my every thought and yet You call me into such deep melody with Yourself. We are caught up, just the two of Us...and I am not sure where I stop and where You begin.

Everything within me pants after You and Your presence...Your heartbeat. You are light to my eyes and melody to my heart. When I come and dance with You I find myself...like never before. Eye's open wide and heart exposed beating there right next to Yours and I am a million miles away, yet I am here. It is there against Your chest, as We dance into the night, that I hear the hush of eternity as the stillness of a symphony. I am breathless. I am raptured! I AM YOURS!

Identical Twins

Faith. It seems like such a complicated word. More complicated at times than others. I have recently read that faith is when the thoughts of our head are in agreement with the thoughts of our heart. Faith is when our theology is an identical twin to our deepest heart-held beliefs.

What would disappointment look like in my life, if my theology became my feelings? This is where the tug of war begins. It is where it always begins. There is a dicotomy within my members. My experience boast of a truth that is in dark contrast to that which my spirit declares. It is here the war begins! Sadly, my experience, my flesh, often wins the battle. Which leaves me as less than a conquerer, not more than, which the bible promises.

We think doubt is a lack of faith. It is not. Doubt is faith in something "other than" Truth. Doubt is not unbelief, as much as it is a strong-held belief in something "other than" what God, The Creator, has told us is true. We ask God for more faith. But we are told that to every man is given a measure. It is not faith which we are in need of. I believe that our measure of faith is found in our spirit-man. It never leaves or forsakes us. Doubt on the other hand is accumulative and grows each time we are hurt or disappointed. Each time life doesn't seem to add up, doubt becomes bigger. The identical twins of theology and heart-held beliefs have become double-minded men.

James tells me "to consider it pure joy when I face trials of many kinds...if I lack wisdom in the trial I should ask for it from the Father. But when I ask, I must believe and not doubt, because he who doubts is like a wave of the sea, blown and tossed by the wind. That man should not think he will receive anything from the Lord; he is a double-minded man, unstable in all he does."

Double minded means to seperate one's self in a hostile spirit, to oppose, strive with dispute, to contend. To be at variance with one's self. When we are in opposition to Truth, we are in opposition to self. We are in a civil war...as Truth resides in us if we are a beleiver. We are not living in harmony with our "true-self" when we are in doubt. It is not that faith does not reside in us...it is that doubt occupies too much of our hearts real estate.

God cannot reward our half trust in Him. Let not the double-minded man think he will receive anything from the Lord. God cannot reward anything that is in direct opposition to truth, because it is in direct opposition to us. It is in war against the very faith that resides in us. To reward doubt would be to dilute faith...and faith cannot be diluted.

Over My Head

I should be asleep...I should be at peace...I should be at rest. Instead, I'm typing trying to express what my heart is trying to tell me. In the dream I was racing down a busy highway... backwards. I began to lose control and the truck and I began to flip. It's there I began to view it in third person...not allowing myself to become fearful or injured. The talking clock at my Mother-in-loves reminds me again it's only 4am. I know when I climb out of bed to change my Father-in-loves diaper, I wont' be able to go back to sleep.

I'm over my head. Once again!I know from memory, this is where I find You. Grief always expresses itself in the body between 3 and 5am. How many mornings have I been reminded of this? How many times have I failed miserably trying to hand it over to You?

Alzeimhers use to be a term I only knew in jest. "Old-timers" with a laugh following. It's anything but funny. Locked inside that medical label is a wonderful man that I have had life's priviledge to call my father-in-love. Most would call him their father-in-law...but it's love that has bound me to him...not law. And it is love that has called me to the commitment to care for him in his final season. First and foremost, it is an honor and priviledge to care for both he and his beautiful bride. But, it is way out of my league.

Again...I search through the long moments of our day, looking for Your eyes, Your voice, to show me how to care for his needs. I spent all day yesterday wrestling tears. After spending a lifetime trying to hold them in, I've learned to just let them flow. Science says that the chemical composition of tears is always different. That they are created as a specific remedy to counter that which is causing them. Like a God-designed perscription. As they flow, I realize I feel guilty that his rash and bed sore have worsened. I feel responsible.

In my head, I know I'm doing the best I can. But, my heart doesn't wamt him to hurt anymore. Hip surgery for an eighty six year old was enough!

You told me a few months back, that every circumstance which causes me to lean into You harder is an opportunity. In that case, this is a season of "great opportunity". In the dream, I was out of control. Everyone around me was watching my every move. As the vehicle began to flip I removed myself from the impact..from the pain...from the guilt. Real life is different. I can't, at will, remove myself from the pain. But, with the help of Grace, I will learn to remove myself from the guilt...of feeling responsible for that which I can't change. I will learn to lean into You hard!

Every since I was a little girl, I have tried to carry the weight of 'my world' on these shoulders. I know it is an impossible task. Once more You try to convince my heart that "that" is Your job. You remind me that it is the power of Your word that sustains earth on it's axis. It is the same power that will sustain me! Once more I will shift the weight with Your word, and trust my responsibility is to respond to Your ability, not that of my own. You've got the whole world in Your hands! I can rest!