27 February 2008

My Failure and Beyond

When is my time of wandering over? Every atom in my body is running away from me, searching for that missing part that will complete me and they've left me teetering on the edge of an oblivion. But what is down this great chasm? Is it nothing but despair? Or is it a great adventure? While I wait for my season of fulfillment, I continue to waver. Do I lean toward safety? It is what is recommended, what I see by way of common sense is the correct thing to do. But I continue to hang in a delicate balance, the deep unknown calling my heart, calling my soul to chase it beyond everything I know. But then again, I’d be fine without you.

I cease feeling, and the numb drives my heart to skip a beat as I plunge too far forward and I fail and I fall into a foreign space. I remember that risk, oh sweet beautiful risk is my heart’s true desire. But I only wanted the edge, I never asked for this unknown. My mind is consumed by doubt. Did I choose to jump, or did I fall? Despite my uncertainty, I am certainly falling beyond, so far, so deep.

Then a strange thing. Fingers of flavour flood my senses, it's tough hands grip my heart. It pleases my insides; I can feel them laughing incredulously because I am light and free despite my fear. Something is taking hold of me. Now a choice faces me: do I fall in fear, or do I clutch the strands of simultaneous joy and pain as hard as I can and latch on for life? Do I look back or close my eyes and see where I am taken? I choose the latter. God is sweet on my tongue, and the fear of falling takes a backseat to this new quest. I enter the unknown with grace and stride with purpose. This is my adventure now, and it pleases my soul.

26 February 2008

Mounting on Walls of Frustration

How do you keep adding and adding things to an already full life? I've been learning about dependency. Dependency on God, but also on others. It's something God's been trying to teach me for a long time, but I'm a little slow. The problem is that I don't want to change. That requires risk. But of course, God's teaching me about that too. I reach out through words, and I want to reach out more. I recently read an article about the difference between the way we speak and the way we write. If you read something aloud, chances are that what you say flies right past the listener's ears. And if you type what you say it looks rather funny. And confusing. I think like I write, but I can't speak like I think.

It's like blowing snow on a windy day, the way my mind works. The pattern of coming back to this moment time and time again has convinced me that what I need is you. And what you need is me. It's so simple, I know. And profound, on striations beneath the level of our eyes. And that brings me to my next problem.

Someone asked how to treasure that dependency recently. This question bothers me. How do we treasure our dependency on God? We can thank him, but we can't put it in a safe or a jewelry box or a secret box with all our old notes and photos that have sentimental value. It's something that needs to be portrayed, out in the open and in the risky places. It's going to get dented and scratched by life. But we humans, as a rule, do not do that to the things we treasure. It kind of reminds me of Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade...when they find the holy grail, this elite treasure, and it's plain and used. The least obvious of all of the beautiful treasures in the room. And it's like Jesus. This precious gift we have that is tossed around and discarded time and time again. So how do we treasure Jesus? I don't know. We live our lives for him. But is that treasuring him? I don't know how to treasure something that is intangible. Dependency is too abstract for me to hold on to, like soap in the shower. Once I start to grasp it, it slips away, out of reach.


03 February 2008