waiting, wondering, wishing
the meantime it’s a lean time, feels like i have much
but yearn for so much more
it’s hoping in the dark it’s trusting, it’s worrying,
then settling down
getting worked up, then calming,
tensing, then relaxing
it’s trying to see the future
it’s being OK with here and now
waiting is growing—a painful process but when the wait is fulfilled,
it’s rejoicing it’s all been worthwhile
Lord as I wait I don’t want to compromise
I don’t want to fill space and time with useless distractions,
or even useful ones
May this time be pregnant with expectancy,
hopeful that good things will come, Your promises fulfilled
may I be filled with your spirit, rather than anxiety
may I be full with You
You are alive and living inside me
waiting is letting go of control of wishes, wants, desires, plans
it’s accepting what God has in store
opening hands to accept good gifts
Jesus waits on us
He came to earth so He could be acted upon
i like to be an actor—the one who initiates the action,
but God calls us to wait for Him to act—and even so,
this isn’t something He Himself hasn’t had to endure
Jesus Christ, the divine Waiter
help me to wait like you—patiently, trustingly, honestly, lovingly
Beautiful words from Romans 8 (The Message)
In his Son, Jesus, he personally took on the human condition,
entered the disordered mess of struggling humanity in order to set it right once and for all. …Those who trust God's action in them find that God's Spirit is in them--living and breathing God!
Obsession with self in these matters is a dead end; attention to God leads us out into the open, into a spacious, free life.
This resurrection life you received from God is not a timid, grave-tending life. It's adventurously expectant, greeting God with a childlike "What's next, Papa?"
God's Spirit touches our spirits and confirms who we really are. We know who he is, and we know who we are: Father and children.
We go through exactly what Christ goes through. If we go through the hard times with him, then we're certainly going to go through the good times with him!
That's why I don't think there's any comparison between the present hard times and the coming good times. The created world itself can hardly wait for what's coming next.
Everything in creation is being more or less held back.
God reins it in until both creation and all the creatures are ready and can be released at the same moment into the glorious times ahead.
Meanwhile, the joyful anticipation deepens. All around us we observe a pregnant creation. The difficult times of pain throughout the world are simply birth pangs. But it's not only around us; it's within us. The Spirit of God is arousing us within. We're also feeling the birth pangs. These sterile and barren bodies of ours are yearning for full deliverance. That is why waiting does not diminish us, any more than waiting diminishes a pregnant mother.
We are enlarged in the waiting. We, of course, don't see what is enlarging us. But the longer we wait, the larger we become, and the more joyful our expectancy.
Meanwhile, the moment we get tired in the waiting, God's Spirit is right alongside helping us along. If we don't know how or what to pray, it doesn't matter. He does our praying in and for us, making prayer out of our wordless sighs, our aching groans. He knows us far better than we know ourselves, knows our pregnant condition, and keeps us present before God. That's why we can be so sure that every detail in our lives of love for God is worked into something good.
Friday, March 31, 2006
Friday, March 17, 2006
She is difficult to read.The position of her eyebrows, her voice,
never too high or too low.
Turns her head as the pages shuffle,
shifting in the breeze.
She searches, tries to read him first
before he gets too close. She cracks open
his cover. Eyes scanning, studying his story.
Wind whips the pages, whispers, “This story’s not safe,”
But she keeps reading—it’s just to good to put down.
Monday, March 13, 2006
Falling
What is love?Can you tell me in one sentence?
Earlier I wrote “love is a decision, not just a feeling.”
While I still think this is true, (I’ve read enough marriage books to be adequately brain-trained) I think I had it backwards.
Love is first feeling, which later, in healthy relationships, grows into commitment.
Those lovely feelings are natural and good and should come before the monotonous, every day “I am choosing to love you” decisions.
And when you truly love someone, you can’t help those feelings from creeping out, well, more like busting out.
“Love is what happens. It is not something you conjure or create. You cannot manufacture it. You cannot make it happen. It is like falling; it is out of your control. You do not climb into love or fly into love or even walk into it. You fall into love; love bruises and bumps…but it also holds.” –Ned Erickson, Falling Into Love (Relevant Books)
Regina Spektor’s song, “Fidelity” http://www.myspace.com/reginaspektor is a new favorite, in which I can relate:
I’ve never loved nobody fully / Always one foot on the ground / And by protecting my heart truly, I got lost / In the sounds / I hear in my mind / All of these voices. …all of these words…all this music…and it breaks my heart / Suppose I kept on singing on singing love songs…just to break my fall…
I have never let myself fall. But you know what? I am going to fall.
If not in love, then at least out of a plane (but preferably both).
Anyone wanna go skydiving?
Thursday, March 02, 2006
The pursuit
Wednesday she woke up needy.
Needy for sleep first. It had been fitful—she woke at 1 a.m. and couldn’t return to sleep until she drank some tea, read her Bible. Even after that, sleeping seemed a chore—until the morning when sleep was unused vacation.
Her next need eluded definition. She shuffled off to work, went about the day searching for something, aching, hungering. But not for food. She felt no hunger pangs and decided not to eat until she had to.
A coworker, whose 16-year-old daughter recently gave birth, called the office, gushing with how smitten everyone is with the baby.
Another need awoke, started crying within. The need to give life, to care more for another being than for self.
She kept looking at her phone, hoping it would ring, to satisfy the need to connect. At the same time she wished it to not ring, for the fear of talking without relating. She felt the emptiness even more when she attended a party that evening. Useless words given, nothing memorable received.
Thursday was different.
She woke with a feeling. A calm sense someone had spoken to her as she slept. She didn’t remember any distinct words. I was like someone injected a peace in her veins. How else could she feel so loved, so sure that even though she’d done nothing to deserve it, someone would cherish her despite her weakness, her fear, her intentional self-abuse? Someone wanted to tell her he loved her more than she loved herself. And that made her want to change, to be better. Not because she felt the need to earn this love, but to return it somehow.
She later learned someone had prayed this prayer on her behalf:
"O most loving Father: Grant us faith that we may dread nothing but the loss of You. Teach us to expect you. Give us your adventure and abandon, your risky hope, your absolute confidence. Teach us to be sure of only You. That we may follow you with the peaceful awareness that knowing You comes before knowing; trusting You before understanding; following You before itineraries.
Interrupt us where we least wish You to come; handle and heal us where we ourselves would most protect; rattle us where we are most comfortable; astound us where we feel least safe, where we least trust You; distract us where we are most self-consumed; wait for us where we least believe we can go. Astound us, O Lord, with Your grace. We would be exuberant children, Father, more thrilled by your return home than by any gifts You may have for us in your pockets. And we Your children pray this by Your Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, Who lives and reigns with You and Your Holy Spirit, Our God of Eternal Surprises, Our Light in dark places. Amen.”
This message delivered exactly what she needed. A reminder of the hymn she relates so well with: “Prone to wander, Lord I feel it, prone to leave the God I love.”
Now He is drawing her back, once again. She senses Him pursuing her with His presence, as she’s readily ignored so often before.
This special “someone” helped her remember that the God of the universe is romantic. He pursues us with His sunshine, amuses us with laughter, and calms us in what seems disaster.
Needy for sleep first. It had been fitful—she woke at 1 a.m. and couldn’t return to sleep until she drank some tea, read her Bible. Even after that, sleeping seemed a chore—until the morning when sleep was unused vacation.
Her next need eluded definition. She shuffled off to work, went about the day searching for something, aching, hungering. But not for food. She felt no hunger pangs and decided not to eat until she had to.
A coworker, whose 16-year-old daughter recently gave birth, called the office, gushing with how smitten everyone is with the baby.
Another need awoke, started crying within. The need to give life, to care more for another being than for self.
She kept looking at her phone, hoping it would ring, to satisfy the need to connect. At the same time she wished it to not ring, for the fear of talking without relating. She felt the emptiness even more when she attended a party that evening. Useless words given, nothing memorable received.
Thursday was different.
She woke with a feeling. A calm sense someone had spoken to her as she slept. She didn’t remember any distinct words. I was like someone injected a peace in her veins. How else could she feel so loved, so sure that even though she’d done nothing to deserve it, someone would cherish her despite her weakness, her fear, her intentional self-abuse? Someone wanted to tell her he loved her more than she loved herself. And that made her want to change, to be better. Not because she felt the need to earn this love, but to return it somehow.
She later learned someone had prayed this prayer on her behalf:
"O most loving Father: Grant us faith that we may dread nothing but the loss of You. Teach us to expect you. Give us your adventure and abandon, your risky hope, your absolute confidence. Teach us to be sure of only You. That we may follow you with the peaceful awareness that knowing You comes before knowing; trusting You before understanding; following You before itineraries.
Interrupt us where we least wish You to come; handle and heal us where we ourselves would most protect; rattle us where we are most comfortable; astound us where we feel least safe, where we least trust You; distract us where we are most self-consumed; wait for us where we least believe we can go. Astound us, O Lord, with Your grace. We would be exuberant children, Father, more thrilled by your return home than by any gifts You may have for us in your pockets. And we Your children pray this by Your Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, Who lives and reigns with You and Your Holy Spirit, Our God of Eternal Surprises, Our Light in dark places. Amen.”
This message delivered exactly what she needed. A reminder of the hymn she relates so well with: “Prone to wander, Lord I feel it, prone to leave the God I love.”
Now He is drawing her back, once again. She senses Him pursuing her with His presence, as she’s readily ignored so often before.
This special “someone” helped her remember that the God of the universe is romantic. He pursues us with His sunshine, amuses us with laughter, and calms us in what seems disaster.
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