the Richest Affair

That's it...I'm ruined. I can't be fixed and I frankly don't want to be. Nothing can be done about this, this way that I feel. It's rooted deeply inside me and I won't budge. I won't change, life will always be this way, it's just who I am and I have to accept it and so do you. People have tried, you know? They've tried to talk me out of this. People who just don't understand. Well, honestly, even I've tried to change things, make them different. Of course it was a vain attempt. This way just isn't a path I walk, it's just even just part of me, it's literally just who I am, part of my being. Sounds so negative doesn't it? I think so. Well, at least this is how it rolls around in my head some days. Which is sad. Seriously. I've shed tears over it. Guys, I love someone so much that it's utterly joyful and terribly aching at the same time. The Richest Affair. It's Him. It's Jesus. He penetrates in ways that no one else ever has or ever could and I'm ruined because of it. Nothing or no one else will ever do. I'm stuck on Him. I just think about Him and being with Him and I'm overwhelmed because I'm so fulfilled and yet still wanting so much all at once. Sorrowful yet always rejoicing. He's better. He's so much better than anything else. He's just BETTER. He's sweeter. And I just want to go and be with Him. I went to the wedding tonight of my two friends and to just see how much they wanted to be together. Not just today, but even months leading up to their blessed union, they just want to be together in their love. Two lovers, ravished by the other and not wanting any other for their own. And so is my heart...aching, longing, calling out to Him. I just want to go. I don't even care what I do: gather at His feet, curl in His lap, fall facedown, dance/sing/laugh for joy with Him, stand in silent submission. You know, it just doesn't matter any more. It really doesn't and I'm not sure it ever really did. I just want to BE with Him. And the Book of Revelation talks about that day. That blessed day that is promised to come and bring together the glorious Bridegroom with His pure and spotless Bride. In chapter 4, the Word proclaims our promise of worshipping the King in His very presence, falling down before Him in humble adoration and wondrous rejoicing. And so I want that. I pray that day comes quickly. Haste that blessed day, Lord. And I want that promise so deeply that my spirit cries out for the place I was made for. And I seriously ask the Lord why I can't just come to be with Him now. Why, Lord, why? And He says that He has plans. Plans? Let's scrap those plans and just BE together. No. Because if that were so, then I wouldn't be here pleading with Him to let me go Home now. BIG. Something big is in store. The Lord of all creation says that His work in my life is so important that I must stay here until it is completed. And so a smile makes its way across my face and I know He is loving me. How could His longing to be with me not be far surpass mine? O, the longings between us. They are great. All of creation waits and groans for the revealing of the sons of God and for the union of Christ and His lovely Bride. There really is no other like Him. None. Go ahead. Try to prove me wrong. You'll come right back to where I am. Wondering how and why He could love a wretch like me. But He does. And I love Him. We delight in each other and our joys abound. And so, until the fulfillment of my days, I will remain sorrowful yet always rejoicing as I am delighted by the Richest Affair...

And this is Life...

So, some things have been coming my way lately that God has been using to challenge and refine my idea of living. My schedule has been thrown off and I've had to take things a little easier than I would like to, especially in the midst of the storm of dead week and upcoming finals. I experienced stuff that has made me feel like I am outside the sphere of life, on the outside looking in. It's as if I've been watching everyone else scurry about in serving the Lord in their lives in various ways and there I was uselessly sitting on a top shelf. But these are lies and not the beautiful Truth that comes forth from the lips of my Lord. Today I spent some time in Beck Chapel just praying and reading and God spoke some beautiful words to me. He brought to my mind John 14:6: Jesus answered them, "I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life and no one comes to the Father except through Me." Yeah, God, I know that you are Life. But He wanted to share with me some specifics. So in my private thoughts to Him I wrote: Nothing I do, say, think, or feel gives me life or makes me alive...not the blood in my veins, the breath in my lungs, the beat of my heart, nor the thoughts of my mind constitute my vitality. Jesus, You have given me life through the sacrifice of Your own. So that even if my heart stops beating, my breath ceases, or my mind fails, I still have life eternally in You. Praise to the Lord for He is good. How beautiful is that!

[And you He made a l i v e, who were dead in trespasses and sins, in which you once walked according to course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit who now works in the sons of disobedience, among whom also we all once conducted ourselves in the lusts of our flesh, fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, just as the others. But God, who is rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead in trespasses, made us a l i v e together with Christ (by grace you have been saved), and raised us up together, and made us sit together in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, that in the ages to come He might show the exceeding riches of His grace in His kindness toward us in Christ Jesus.--Ephesians 2:1-7]

Doesn't this bring new meaning to the idea of death losing its sting? Jesus has killed death for all those who believe in His name. Believers can now no longer be dead nor can we ever die because even leaving this earth means that to be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord. |2 Cor 5:8|

Oh how the Lord blessed me today with joy through the hope that is His Son, Jesus Christ. Despite how I feel, physically or emotionally, I am living the fullness of Life through Him who saved me by His grace. This is Jesus and this is Life...

+Son of God+

So, it turns out that I completely forgot that I created this blog sometime earlier this year. I tend to lose sight of the special kind of liberation and freedom God gives me through writing. I write quite often, but it's within the private confines of my prayer journal to my Lord. I think a certain vulnerability comes with putting your words out there for others to read and share in. I know it is for me because I could never spout off the events of my day in black and white (or pink and purple in this case). Feelings and emotions flow out...there is something spectacular to me about the written word. I'm not starting this blog again with the intention of drawing any kind of attention to myself or for others to simply read it. I want God Almighty to get glory from this in any way possible and to encourage others in the work that He is doing in my life. Plus, I receive joy from writing, even if it is only on an unseen blog. So, I just wanted to put forth the vulnerability I will inevitably feel by putting any part of myself out there for others to take part in. I trust and know, though, that God is working and moving around me, through me, and in me in ways that make my heart sing to Him unashamedly. I hope that all of His people come to know the complete and surpassing joy of Jesus Christ. He is my Treasure and my Song. So, here is a song that has been on my heart these past few days that I have been offering up to my King. The words are powerful because they are Truth...

Son of God, Shaper of the stars
You alone, the Dweller of our hearts
Mighty King, how beautiful You are
How beautiful

Son of God, the Father's Gift to us
You alone were broken on the altar of love
Precious Lamb, our freedom's in Your blood
It's in Your blood

Jesus, O Holy One
I sing to You, forgiven
Savior, I'm overcome
With Your great love for me

Son of God, strength beyond compare
You alone the darkness cannot bear
Lord of love, Your kindness draws me near
It draws me

Son of God, Prophecy of old
You alone, Redeemer of my soul
Come again and lead Your people home
Come lead us home

Jesus, O Holy One
I sing to You, forgiven
Savior, I'm overcome
With Your great love for me

You are worthy
You are worthy
You are worthy of all my praise
You are beautiful
You are beautiful
So I'll lift up my hands and sing

--Son of God *starfield*

Last night I was spending time in prayer with the Lord and I was overcome with a feeling that I have felt many times before. From time to time, I get an ache deep within my heart over the physical separation I feel between myself and Jesus. I have a deep longing that is so strong to see Him face to face that I ache over it. This aching is proof that I am a pilgrim and stranger in this world and I was made for another place. No matter how much it hurts to want to see my Lord, to gather at His feet, to curl up on His lap, to rest in His arms, to dance before Him, to fall facedown at His throne, I have the promise that one day it will be so. Though I am homesick, it will not last. For all eternity I will be in the amazing and glorious presence of Jesus Christ, the Lover of my soul and my Breath of Life. Alleluia! Praise the Lord for He alone is worthy. Worthy is the Lamb who was slain.

[Somewhere I have never travelled]

somewhere i have never travelled, gladly beyond
any experience; your eyes have their silence:
in your most frail gesture are things which enclose me,
or which i cannot touch because they are too near

your slightest look will easily unclose me
though i have closed myself as fingers,
you open always petal by petal myself as Spring opens
(touching skillfully, mysteriously) her first rose

or if your wish be to close me, i and
my life will shut very beautifully, suddenly,
as when the heart of this flower imagines
the snow carefully everywhere descending;

nothing we are to perceive in this world equals
the power of your intense fragility: whose texture
compels me with the color of its countries,
rendering death and forever with each breathing

(i do not know what it is about you that closes
and opens; only something in me understands
the voice of your eyes is deeper than all roses)
nobody, not even the rain, has such small hands

---E E Cummings

I was just thinking of poetry today and how much I love some of it. This is one of my most favorite poems by an amazing poet. Even though this is a romantic poem, and a very good one at that, I was thinking about how it relates to the way God is with me. He is the Great and Almighty God, but at the same time, has hands that are small enough to reach into the depths of me and open me. And although maybe someday I will be able to say such things of a man or him to me, I know that no one can move me to open and close with such fragility as does the Bright Morning Star, Jesus Christ, my Savior and my God! Have a wonderful rest of the day...(& you should check out some poetry today)

Here is my heart

So today is the day after Valentine's Day and I didn't get the chance to post a great song I listened to all day yesterday. It's a love song to Jesus written by Sarah Scharbrough. It's just telling Him how great and amazing His love is. It really touches the deepest parts of my heart. I just wanted to remind everyone, Valentine or not, that there is no love that can compare to the love of Jesus Christ. No other feeling will ever satisfy, if at all, like the love that is given by the Lover of your soul. So here is my heart for my Lord through this song, "Your Love."

Your love is like the rain as it falls over me
Your love is like the sun, it meets me every morning
Your love is like a fire, it burns in my soul
Oh, Your love abounds
Your love is like the sky, it hangs over my head
Your love is like the ocean, it reaches every depth
Your love is like the wind, it covers all of the earth
Oh, Your love abounds, abounds
And Oh, it covers me
Oh, it shelters me
And it reaches all the way, it reaches all the way to me
Your love is like a forest, standing tall and free
Your love is like a mountain that every eye can see
Your love is like a rushing stream, it covers me
Oh, Your love abounds
And oh, it covers me
Oh, it shelters me
And it reaches all the way, it reaches all the way to me
And oh, it covers me
Oh, it shelters me
All the way, it reaches all the way to me, even me
All the way to me
Your love abounds...

His love, oh how it does abound! Have a great night!

Intimacy in Brokenness

I wish I could understand. Just get behind it all and know our incestant foolishness. Yahweh fashioned us from the humble earth. He formed every inch of us, giving the most diligent care and detail down to the very last corner of our hearts. He doesn't just figure us out, He knows us. He is completely aware of our desires, our fears, our likes, our passions, our longings, our failures, our weaknesses, our heartaches...He just knows. So, why then, do we feel a need to be something we are not before Him? We aren't perfect, so don't pretend. We aren't without sin, so don't pretend. We have to stop trying to clean our act up, even as Christians, before we go to the One who loves us more than life. We should stop pretending the sin isn't there, stop pretending you're complete, stop pretending to not be broken. Why are we so hesistant to be broken before the only One who can fix us, make us whole? I know at times I've felt failure in my brokenness before God. Would my Maker reject me in my brokenness? Of course He wouldn't. He will scoop up His creation and make it whole once more. God never despises His children. In Psalm 51:17 David wrote, "The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit, a broken and contrite heart--these, O God, You will not despise." If we can't be broken before God, especially over our sin, who can we be broken before? God waits, all day. He is a patient Father, awaiting our call upon His Name. In Psalm 34:18, David again writes, "The Lord is near to those who have a broken heart, and saves such as have a contrite spirit." Closeness, nearness, intimacy...all gained through going to the Lord when your heart and spirit are broken. Yes, even broken to the point when you feel as though the pieces are so small that they could pass through the eye of a needle. Come before the Lord, lay your heart bare, tell Him you're hurting, you're hardened and need brokenness, be prepared for Him to draw near to you if you ask. Dependency on the Lord cannot be shameful for in your weaknesses, He is strong!