I took a dip out of this worldwide reality that keeps us connected for a while. Honestly, I just got tired. I've been dancing with burn-out, straining to overcome weariness, and trying, trying to make it all count. We're a quarter of the way through the year. Whew. Instead of listing all the reasons why I couldn't breathe, much less bring myself to anything that ending in .com, let's just start with today.
I've missed you. The "I" part isn't supposed to be about me at all. It's "we" and "us" and "Him".
And we need each other. We were made to be known. By each other and by Him.
I remember that today after a 2-hour conference call with some of the women I'm closest to - and who live the furthest away from me. Four years later, they still know me. It's through their words and their prayers that I'm taking a fresh breath today. Being breathed into by His Spirit.
I don't know how to catch you up on the millions of milestones and stories. But I will, one post at a time, to invite you back into what we are doing by His strength. Today, I'm just inviting you into my heart and my journal.
To my giving, loving, never-stopping God,
Something started uncoiling yesterday. Sadness, loneliness and despair were brought to light. And they needed to rain. They needed to bleed. Like thick storm clouds, I've been stuck under their shadows. A cloud that looks like Lifa, my child so far from home. A could of exhaustion, of broken families, of unfulfilled promises. Clouds of doubt and sickness. Clouds of prejudice and violence looming all around me. A cloud created by distance. And a cloud of trying to make things that are not ok to you, ok for me to see and walk through and live in everyday.
How do I live here God?
ONE DAY AT A TIME.
What is supposed to be ok???
How do I breathe here???
How do I live like it's "normal"???
How do I not set myself apart from them, and then come home to the luxuries of a comfortable bed, running water, electricity, and a well-stocked mini-fridge???
I want to know you more.
You're letting me.
My friends opened something in me- they told me I'm experiencing Your grief and Your sorrow. Because You're not ok with it either.
Somehow, I can breathe if I know You're breathing this air too. If I know it's not just me being exhausted, weary, and lonely. I can breathe if I know I'm feeling it with You, and on behalf of You, as an ambassador for every part of Your heart.
It's NOT OK for Your kids to live like this.
You're not ok with them starving, sucking nutrients from the soil when there's nowhere else to get them.
But it's about more than their daily bread to You.
And it's about more than what I do.
I want to know every side of Your heart. I want to taste every flavor of Your character.
The part of You that cries out for justice, with righteous anger and merciful tears that flow over the starving orphan, the little girl who keeps running from the house where her mother is selling her body, the children ripped out of life and put into the death of slavery, and the little boy missing a piece of government-stamped paper that could open a door to a name, an education and a lifetime of opportunities... if someone would just sign that dotted line.
I want to experience that ravenous pursuit of wandering hearts pulsing through my own body, never exhausting and never running out of infatuated compassion, the way it authors Your Word and exudes through Your Being.
I want to touch the foot of the mighty, erect throne of the King of Kings, willing to dethrone to become a compass as a pillar of fire, a whisper in the wind, or the very breath inside of us.
I want to feel Your hands and Your heart, bleeding every time we choose an idol that You already crucified.
I want to know what it feels like and what it looks like to know, and to have, and to be a love big enough to see and feel and dwell in all the broken...
And, in response, to just love more.
To know with every part of me that, in 3 days, it'll be undone. It'll be healed. It'll be conquered. It'll be good.
I want to know you more.
Every part of you.
Broken for what breaks you - in the ways it breaks you.
Because you never let it get all the way broken.
You did once, and then you said Never Again.
You didn't want me to get all the way broken. Or them. Or us.
"It is finished." That's what you said.
And Your Word can never be broken.
It is finished. And it will be finished.
I am new. And I will be made new.
Show this body and soul, groaning for the completion, how to live and love as a new creation. Here. Now. Today. Show me how to breathe by grace and hope.
Amen.
"Now the dwelling of God is with men, and he will live with them. They will be his people and God himself will be with them and be their God. He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away." He who was seated on the throne said, "I am making everything new!"
Rev 21:3-5
AND...
Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come! All this is from God who reconciled us to himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation
2 Cor 5:17-18
We are new. He is making us new.
It is finished. It will be finished.
He has risen.
In 3 days, He will rise again.
No comments:
Post a Comment