The Beginning Place

I don't know where that soul seed arrived from.

But the little blue strips tell me it's in there-

The beginning place.

Father, thank you for the promise and presence of this new life, please be present during the shaping, sculpting, evolving and....

Pause.

Isn't asking God to enter the womb and oversee the process a little like inviting an artist to attend his own canvas?

He is already there!

In the secret place- The Beginning Place

Doing what He does...creating;

He who binds the beautiful pleiades and loosed the cords of Orion.
He who cuts a path for the thunder storm and knows the place where lightening is dispersed.
Who made the behemoth and knows the abode of light.
Who knows the currents of the deep and calls each star by name.
He who has walked the recesses of the deep but now sits seated at the high hand of God.

Him.

You, Oh LORD.

At work, deep within in her.

The very finger of god- the very presence of holy.

Dust cleaves...God breathes.

Consecrated crafting.

 Knitting together, perfectly piecing,

Sinew meets soul, bone joins body.

A tiny toe, a lip, an ear. 

Muscle twitches. Heart beats. Lungs draw amniotic air.

Miracle.

Who can comprehend? Who can comprehend?

Such knowledge is too wonderful for me.

For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mothers womb.

I praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully (being) made.

My frame is not hidden from you in this secret place...your eyes see my unformed body.

Psalm 139:13-15

Blessed be your glorious name, and may it be exalted above all blessing and praise. You alone are God. You made the heavens, even the highest heavens, and all their starry host, the earth and all that is on it, the seas and all that is in them.

You give life to everything, and the multitudes of heaven worship you.

Nehemiah 9:5b-6

Psalm  8:8  91:1  Job 38   40:15  Jeremiah 32:19

Upside down hands

I grip the slender twin twines attached to the small wooden 2x4 suspended from the garage rafters above and sway my young frame rhythmically until the gentle motion carries me away and into the land of my imagination.

The words come then.

And the songs happen while hands hold fast to the braided anchor that rocks me.

I sing about a high blue sky and birds on electrical wires, dandelions in the grass, ladybugs, and the forbidden kitten hidden in my closet.

I sing with the angst of a 9 yr. old over a report card.

I sing about the aging neighbors next door, the brothers that bully, and the roast for dinner.

My father constructed that course pendulum that lifted me to heights beyond the moment. To him it was just a recreational rig. To me, well, it was my retreat into the clouds.

Dad will be 83 this August. 

Dad has Alzheimer's now, so they say.

And just as my tiny hands held on to the ropes and pulled my body back and forth to the rhythm of youth, so now those same hands, aged themselves, will grip tightly to the mind and body of a man rocked by the rhythm of years.
He holds on for dear life, but the cords are frayed and the mind is leaving and the body is slowing and the spirit is sagging and confusion is stealing and the hurt cuts deep.

My hands and my heart hang all upside down.

Dad has Alzheimer's now.

The flickering light of a gentle soul may soon cast it's shadows through empty eyes where:

"the keepers of the house tremble, and strong men stoop, and those looking through windows grow dim; when the doors to the streets close...and all their songs grow faint; and the grasshopper drags himself along..."  1

But it won't stay that way for long, all upside down, because-

You have come to set the captives free, that we might have life and have it more abundantly.

Isaiah 61:1  John 10:10

I have had a tremor of bliss, a wink of heaven, a whisper, 

and I would no longer be denied; 

all things proceed to a joyful consummation. 2

For I the LORD your God will hold thy right hand, saying unto thee, Fear not, I will help you.

Isaiah 41:13

1.) Ecclesiastes 12: 3-5
2.) T.S Elliot, Murder in the cathedral  (New York: Harcourt, 1963), 70

Tabernacle

If you know me at all, you know there is no other place I would rather be than deep in a wooded enclave, alone, in prayer. Nothing can settle me more than the life and peace I find in that natural sanctuary.
This is where I rest, heal, renew.

My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness. Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ's power may rest on me.     
2 Corinthians 12:9

REST  1

The Greek translates 'rest' in this passage as 'Tabernacle'.

Tabernacle;
To spread a tent.
To tabernacle over, to cover.
To superimpose a time, place, order.

To occupy as God did in the old testament tabernacle for the purpose of protection and communion.

I can scarcely wrap my head around this glory- God covering me with the canopy of trees and, more profoundly, himself.
Hiding me in His secret place for the purpose of communing with me, protecting and advising me.
Superimposing his divine and eternal plan, place, time, and order for my current weakness, trial, and trouble.

Such knowledge is too wonderful to me, 

too lofty for me to attain.

Psalm 139:6

1.)  Strong's expanded exhaustive concordance of the bible, Red letter edition. James Strong, LL.D., S.T.D. Thomas Nelson Publishers, 2001. Number 1981.

2.) Psalm 91:1

Stay here and pray with me.

She annoys me. I can almost clock when the call will come...Friday afternoon, just shy of closing.
It's been an arduous day.  I just want to be finished and go home but, she knows this, and so the timing is deliberate-- call at the 11th hour and it will be easier to sway the narcotic from my hand; the panacea she desperately needs for the emotional pain buried under the guise of physical illness.
But compassion wins out, and I stay, and carry a sister with the comfort and encouragement she secretly seeks.

Don't hang up, but in the spirit;

Stay here and pray with me.

I pass him everyday on my way to work.
I guess his age to be about 16 though it's clear there is an impish innocence within.
Standing on the corner, backpack slung over his shoulder, father protectively near, he waits for the bus that will transport him to a place of cafeteria cliques, hallway hecklers, bathroom bullies, locker room pranksters,  impatient instructors and the ever existent, impenetrable circle of peers.
A place he won't fit in.
Will the academic microcosm be kind to this gentle, special needs boy-man today?
Please God, let someone be brave enough to claim him as friend!

Don't drive away, but in the spirit;

Stay here and pray with me.

My second story window gives me a birds eye view right smack into the family room of our neighbor across the street. Her husband died just recently; she's only 50 something.
I occasionally catch a glimpse of her walking the same linear path through a dimly lit house in the late evening.
Alone.
No one to even bring her a cup of cold water.
I ache for her.

Don't pull the blinds, but in the spirit;

Stay here and pray with me.

How is it I somehow envision God spiritually and tangibly absent until he is summoned?
As if it were me that happened upon the scene first.
As if it were my idea to pray.

Is it really about us petitioning God's presence, or God calling us to enter into His?

******

Where two or more are gathered in my name, there am I in the midst of them.

Matthew 18:20

He took care of them on EVERY side.  

2 Chronicles 32:22

Stay here and pray with me. 

Matthew 26:38

Those Eyes

"...One problem we modern readers have with the Bible is that we read it as we did when we were children. Our storybook Bibles split the text into short morality lessons, so we assume that's how we should read the text as adults. But it's actually not meant to be a collection of simple children's stories. It's a sophisticated, epic saga with a complex, interwoven plot". 1

The bible, an epic saga of salvation where we find ourselves woven into the written word and known by name.

I have called you by name, you are mine.

Isaiah 43:1

Those eyes.

They draw me in, I am mesmerized. I sense a peculiar intimacy in the pools of prayer taking place within and wonder, just what has him so intensely contemplative?

While we were yet in our sins, Christ died for us.

Romans 5:8 

Could it be that 'certain sin' we covet, coddle, pamper, and pet today incited a holy zealousness within Christ that day for an ardent intercessory plea for mercy to The Eternal One on our behalf ?

Is it possible the serpent slithered up close to Jesus' ear, sneered, and hissed--
shes'ssssssss not worth it?

Was my name brought up in that ancient wilderness?

Was he beholding my face as he prayed?

Was he hunched and heavy in prayer for me that long ago moment in time, knowing full well the choices I would make today?

Father, I pray for them. 

Holy father, protect them by the power of your name, 

the name you gave me, so that they may be one as we are one.

I am coming to you now, but I say these things while I am still in the world, 

so that they may have the full measure of my joy within them...

Sanctify them by the truth; your word is truth.

FOR THEM I SANCTIFY MYSELF, THAT THEY TOO MAY BE TRULY SANCTIFIED.

John 17:911,13,17,19

******

O LORD, forgive! O LORD, hear and act! For your sake, O my God, do not delay, because we are your people and bear your name.

Daniel 9:19

I am convinced  he took each of us with him into the desert those 40 days and prayed for us by name.

And, I imagine, as the hot sands of our sin burned the soles of his feet, the heat of his affection for us seared his soul with a sold out conviction-

You're worth it.

May you read that epic saga again today as it is meant to be read, a personal letter of love to you.

1)WALKING in the DUST of RABBI JESUS, Lois Tverberg, pg 150

The Banks of Babylon

Psalm 137

On the banks of Babylon I knelt,
by the rivers of sin I sat and wept

when I remembered Zion
when I recalled my youth.

Now, on the poplars of confusion
 I hang the harp of my heart, 

the fickle chords of errant inclinations.

My captor, desire,
has asked for songs of obeisance and sacrifice.

My tormentor, delusion,
has demanded songs of joy saying; Sing! 

Sing songs of  'you deserve happiness'
and 'Didn't God say...?'.

But how can I sing songs while in a foreign land,
 this land of carnal captivity?
Where is the happiness
in chasing worldly tributaries?

How can I sing when my first love
has become my last choice?

If I forget you, O Jerusalem,
If I forget you, O God my saviour-
the lily of my valley, 

the Garden of my God and,
the calling of your holy covenant,

may my right hand forget it's skill,

 may my tongue cling to the roof of my mouth

if I do not remember you,

if I do not consider Jerusalem-
The mountain of my God,
My God himself;

my true home

my true heart

my one desire

my highest joy.

SELAH

*****

You shall have no other Gods before me.

Exodus 20:3

You have forsaken your first love.

Revelation 2:4

"Come now,
let us reason together,"
 says the LORD.
"Though your sins be like scarlet
they shall be as white as snow,
though they be red like crimson
they shall be as white as wool.
If you are willing and obedient
you will eat from the good of the land."
Isaiah 1:18-20

She Weeps for Two

Death is not a Diminuendo...It is the Etude of Eternity.

Life has a way....

That's what she said, Life has a way...

What does one do with words like that?

Those words, like a crescendoing elegy, beat with the arrhythmia of life on the keys of my heart and left me murmuring a mournful duet for the two husbands she has lost and weeps for.

We buried him then, right there on that swell of land over looking the lake.

And after the bugle moaned it's dutiful taps, after the flag was folded and placed in her upturned palms, after epitaphs rang and tears wrought warm and memories flowed fluid, we buried him.

I never thought you could love someone again like that, but you can.

That's what she said, I never thought you could love someone again like that, but you can.

What does one do with words like that?

I suppose we learn to live in the Sacredness of The Now;

Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life...

Do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself.

Matthew 6:25,34

Seek first the kingdom of God

and His righteousness

and everything else that you need

will then be given you as well.

Matthew 6:33

And then, we live life.

We "dance it, sing it, cry it, feel it on our skin and in our bones". 1

May we all acquire a passion and pleasure for life as you did, Gene.

May you find comfort in the arms of your savior now and know the true passion of Christ in all His glory.

*****

  I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.
John 10:10

 Life has a way....

1.  Sue Monk Kidd,When the Heart Waits (San Francisco:HarperSanFrancisco, 1990) p.22