Good Friday's Tree

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fromthetree It is Good Friday, and my theme is trees. No, it is actually just about one tree, the one appointed for the lifting-up of our Savior--the one upon which He said He would draw all men to Himself (John 12:32).

It was said in Jesus’ time that a criminal’s death was the most shameful if it was upon a tree--by crucifixion! But our Carpenter King made this statement about the wood upon which He would be sacrificed as the place of His lifting-up.

We were looking for a king who would talk about his elevated throne covered in precious gems, high above us, from which he would recue us from the world’s political peril, and from the oppression of evil. Jesus said to watch as He was lifted-up above the world on Golgotha’s Hill on a blood-washed tree.

He came to die for us. And there was one tree selected upon which He would save us. The shame implied by dying on a tree would not get on Him, because He was without sin (although tempted in all of our ways), but every one of our sins would brutally land on the pure Savior. On His wooden Cross, which pointed always to His Father, He had a far better-than-a-throne, for the rescuing of His own. He had the bridge between heaven and earth--the only one that could span the massive gap between our fallen ways, and the God Who is Good. This was a supernaturally tall and powerful tree!

The Cross of Christ started from a little seed, perhaps planted, or blown by the wind, or hidden by one of the creatures. Its beginning, as with all of the sentry-like homes for the forest animals and the birds of the air, was with little attention, often without a thought for the coming strength and might, and with years as a blown-low sapling that could be pulled from the ground by almost anyone. Who could have foreseen which one would reach into the Home of Jesus’ Father?

The diameter of a tree spreads in layers called annual growth rings. Each year a layer of wood is grown to eventually give the girth of a forest giant.  From the very field where the Cross was felled there may have been many trees that Jesus Himself had shaped into a baby’s cradle, a doorway lintel, a dining table, a chair for His family, handles for tools, floor boards, a even boat--like the one He would later teach from. But never would the tree that had been selected for the Cross have come through His carpentry shop. He would carry that wood, His own killing machine, to Calvary, but he would not carve it.

The image that I’ve posted shows Jesus giving up His last breath on the Cross (That is how one died in a crucifixion--by suffocation. The arms could no longer hold up the chest and the lungs were shut down by the weight.) The art is from the Grotto in Portland, Oregon. I believe that it was not a part of the installation to have a felled tree next to the scene, but rather a coincidence of the care of the grounds. It made the Cross so poignant to me to see a tree that could easily have been fashioned into the Cross to which the One Who would eternally set us free was nailed.

I thought about the Annual Growth Rings that I could see on the bottom slice of the downed tree. That tree--the real one--that became the Savior’s Cross had a designated time. Jesus often talked about how His time had not yet come, knowing that His death on the bloody Cross was also appointed for our salvation.

As I looked at the drooping head of the Lord, and then back again to the tree and its timed-out rings, I realized that I too had an appointed time. The sun burst through the woodland thicket over the sweet head of the Redeemer reminding me with a stunning brilliance: When I came before the Cross of Christ and asked Him to forgive my sin and to come into my life as Lord, that was my exact time to be lifted up with Him by His Good Friday Cross.

From that time on I would be: “always carrying about in the body the dying of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our body.” 2 Corinthians 4:10 The Carpenter King had actually fashioned a bridge for me by His wooden Cross.

He has done it for you too, and the appointed time is when your heart wants the widest embrace in the universe—the one that reaches down from the Cross and invites you to walk upon its wooden bridge into an open heaven of His mercy and loving compassion. You are never timed-out. The appointed time is always now with Jesus.

Love Letters on Hearts

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roseheartshadow When it comes to love, I want something deeper than one overly commercialized, often horribly sentimentalized, shopping frenzy of a day. To compare Valentines Day to the depth of love that we all can receive through Jesus is like the difference between a gutter mud puddle and the deepest, clearest reaches of the sea. The love of which I speak is wonderfully illustrated in one of Paul’s Letters in the New Testament:

“ You are our letter, written in our hearts, known and read by all men; being manifested that you are a letter of Christ, cared for by us, written not with ink but with the Spirit of the Living God, not on tablets of stone but on tablets of human hearts.” 2 Corinthians 3:2-3

This says to me that a real love-letter is always visible on our hearts in the ways that we love others with the love of Christ. A love message is not some sad poetry, written by a marketing department, on a card that will be most likely thrown away eventually.

A love letter written upon a heart stays and it can be counted upon to remain in the celebratory and the distressed times. It can be this indelible because every love of this kind has its source in the One who calls Himself Love. When we love our friends, neighbors, families, even a stranger, with the love letter from the heart we can abide because we love, in all conditions, energized and enlarged by the power of the Holy Spirit, and because of how Jesus came for us in the unfathomable choice to leave His Father to be known as One of us.

The calligraphy of this love comes not in ink, but by the Blood of Christ that was shed for us so that the Spirit of Jesus--the Living God, by His Resurrection--could make His abode in our hearts of love. This writing shines off of faces of encouragement, from hands of service, from eyes that really see, from truly listening (not rehearsing) ears, and by the Truth that astounds because it is not a thing, but a Person--sweet, caring Jesus.

The stationery for this love note is utterly rarefied. Its delivery is not upon the finest-milled paper, it’s not on a billboard, nor is it on a blackboard. Even if you hired a plane to write it upon the sky it could not come close to finding the preciousness of the material of the human heart!

In my marriage to Jim we are constantly writing notes to each other—on birthdays and Christmas especially. We have whole series of letters written (like a shared journal) when we have been going through times of transformation and transition, so that we can look back to these for lessons that we do not want to lose to memory. I greatly admire the form of a letter, especially a love letter.

But if all these messages do not emanate from the one that is rooted and written in Christ’s love upon our hearts, how can they have eternity’s enduring and mighty love as their heart’s theme? If Jim cannot trust in the letter upon my heart because of the care that he sees from me daily, how can he believe in the import of the writing? When Jim loves me in action on the tough days, it is like a brilliant P.S. to any of the written ones that I have ever received, and it says: “My heart, in Christ, is always for you!”

Even a text message on my phone from a friend is a beautiful reminder of her prayerful heart for me. When she shows up at the door, after a tangled traffic jam ride from work with chicken soup for my flu, I see the letter on her heart. And the care that she brought makes the soup greatly more healing, because I could read her godly heart in the delivery.

When the face of a friend says; “You are precious for just who you are, because of the amazing child of God way that He formed you, with all your contradictions and kindnesses, and mystery--across her lovely forehead I see the postmark reading: “A letter from Christ, from your loved-one’s heart.”

So on this February 14th I am sending you a single blood red rose that caught the sun’s light in such a way that it inscribed a heart upon its tender petals. The image speaks to me about the letters written upon the hearts of those who have loved me with Christ’s love--that they are an endlessly fascinating missive and one that I never want to stop reading, because it exceeds all of the great literature in the world. My heart is humbled today to pray that the Lord will make the letter on my heart unmistakably one of His own--overflowing with love that runs for us with the scent of the rose (just for us) all about Him.

 

The Shepherd that I Want

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Psalm 23

The Lord is my shepherd,

I shall not want.

He makes me lie down in green pastures;

He leads me beside quiet waters.

He restores my soul;

He guides me in the paths of righteousness

For His name’s sake

Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death,

I will fear no evil, for You are with me.

Your rod and Your staff, they comfort me.

You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies;

You have anointed my head with oil;

My cup overflows.

Surely goodness and lovingkindness will follow me all the days of my life

And I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever.

The 23rd Psalm has so many abiding resonances for me. Along with great throngs of little ones, I was also taught to memorize this Song to give me comfort and to hold it close in my heart when I was alone. The simple rhythms of its meter, and the direct statements that a child admires always surrounded me with the Lord’s Presence long before I could fully understand the words. After my parents left our dark room at night it was the cadence of these words that guided me into sleep.

The paintings on ancient family walls of Jesus with His staff surrounded by His confidently protected flock, or those paintings of Jesus with children on His knee were the images that came into my young mind as I said the words. I knew that like the little lambs I wanted to stay close to the One with the resources to get me through. I also wanted to laugh with the other children knowing that Jesus never hindered one of us from His side. It was clear that I needed a Shepherd of this kind because in my heart I was sure about how very little a child can really do for herself, and I wanted Him--this Jesus--to be my Defender, since my parents could not be with me at all times.

But it was always the first verse that gave me such a startle. I actually did not want to grow-up because of that line: “The Lord is my Shepherd, I shall not want.” I wondered what was wrong with the adult way of thinking and behaving if they both knew that they had such a magnificent Shepherd, and yet they had to act as though they didn’t want Him! What happens to the understanding when it matures that grown-up people had to pretend to not wanting Some One so marvelous? I would not do it! And I promised the Lord each time that I prayed the Psalm that I would never stop wanting Him as my Shepherd, no matter how old I got.

The Psalm’s message delivered me with great protection on a family vacation to the busy New York City streets when I was six years old. Somehow, on a Manhattan sidewalk I let go of my mother’s hand, and instantly I was lost in a moving sea of strangers’ hands.

I started to say the words to the Psalm as the Lord moved me out of the bustling place, and by His staff He directed me to move back against the building, and to stand still, and to look into the sky. I wanted to cry because of awful fear, and over how much I missed my mother. When I looked into the sky, He had placed there an image of the one who I thought was His own mother to calm me, and I was amazed over her peaceful beauty. It was as though Her face said that I should fear no evil as her Son had shepherded me into a place of green pastures and quiet waters. I don’t remember seeing anything else during this time--only the assurance on a mother’s beautiful face, and how the words of the 23rd Psalm were so real to me until my own mother found me with tears of joy and embraces.

Back in our hotel room, surrounded by the love of my family, I was sure I would always want Him and no amount of aging was ever going to change this. I was so grateful for His leading and will never forget the words as they were spoken to the kind gaze of the vision of His mother, or she may have been one of His angels. I simply knew that she was the mother in the heavens, keeping my gaze, until my own mother retraced our steps and found me, looking up into the sky on a frenetic, garish, neon-lit New York City street, in complete peace.

The 23rd Psalm is obviously quite important to me--little saved lamb that I was. During the following years I was untiring in asking questions about what I was reading in my Bible about the tenderlovingkindness of this Shepherd.

By the time I was 12 years old I still held this perplexing view that as an adult you would have to feign not wanting the loving Shepherd if you were going to follow the natural order of things. It was then that I read an illustrated poem from my mother’s Ideal Magazine. The drawing and the poem told the story of a girl and boy, just about my age, setting off in a tiny craft upon the waves that definitely looked a bit too high for their talents. They were headed, the poem told me, to the Land of Maturity leaving behind their small and charming ways on the shore. No one ever saw my reaction to this piece of literature, but I cried with my whole body wracked with spasms over the whole repellant idea.

I knew that my boat was sailing, but I just couldn’t think of not wanting Him--the One who could sail this scary boat with such great Authority!

I have told you these childhood stories in an attempt to make an important point! The issue is about growing-up and about how an adult must finally choose her own faith, not because she was a particularly pious child, and not because her family easily handed it to her, and not because her maturing proclivities readily followed her childhood tendencies.

None of these will do! I am here to testify that for the next 18 years of my life I turned away from the Great Shepherd of my soul. I couldn’t stay a child, and many things intervened which hardened my heart. I found that growing-up took toughness, and the loneliness that I felt seemed to bounce back at me from an iron heaven. I made so many wrong choices. The little craft that sailed out to the Land of Maturity for me was shipwrecked on a cruel and empty island that could only support near starvation of the heart. These were years of confusion, sadness, emotional violence, and choices filled with self-hatred.

The only things that I admired during these years of torment were people whom I thought were seeking the truth. I stayed on in my Campus town long after graduation just to be around such people in all of the grand disciplines studied at a great university. When I got to know the brilliant people beyond their chosen fields, they also seemed to share a similar brutal island--the same as mine. I couldn’t imagine that their wonderful learning and stellar abilities in their studies couldn’t redeem their lives more successfully.

Truth was still the pursuit. I read, and sought-out people of learning, only to be dismally disappointed by the quality of their lives--full of jealousies, and manipulations, and lying.  They studied truth, but they lived a lie. How could this be?

Some years later, I met the man who has been my dearest husband for the last 33+ years.  The Shepherd’s staff was again leading me out of the mad foray, back to a place, against the building, actually His temple, where I could hear and see His glory. It had been a long absence from such tenderness as I allowed Him to guide me to hear from this person. Jim was very smart, but humble. He was a top scholar in his field, and the first thing that he ever said to me was: “Debbie, the Truth is not a thing, it is a Person, and His name is Jesus!” This singular phrase, that my hungry heart awaited, sent me off to meeting Christians and studying His Word with the most passion-filled application, and to an ongoing study (to this very day) of the Love of Christ with my dear gift of a husband.

I awake each morning now with the child-like heart that knows clearly the meaning that: “The Lord is my Shepherd, I shall not want (for anything.)” Italics are mine.  And with a fully adult heart I chose a Truth that lives, and walks among us, and has sent His Spirit to dwell in the Holy-of-Holies-Temple within us--a Truth that would die for all my so many terrible sins to give me freedom and victory. This Truth is fully compatible in experience as He is in Word. This Truth loves the Children of His Daddy. This Truth never leaves us alone. And I will always want Him and He leaves me never wanting for anything because His love is eternally bountiful. Dear Jesus, Your paths of righteousness are so lovely because of Your glorious Name’s sake! Your Truth never ends, it never fails, it stretches beyond heaven, and it reaches to each one--lambs bleating for a Shepherd. As it says of us in Matthew 9:36: “Seeing the people, He felt compassion for them, because they were distressed and dispirited like sheep without a shepherd.” He is all Love, Dear Friend, and all Truth! He is my only want.

The Baby's Cry

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Jesus broke into time with a Baby’s cry--nothing profound, but He was all Profundity. The little swaddled Boy had no words for us, but He was all Word. He had to struggle through the pains of Birth like any baby, but His pain would always hold all of our pain.

His family appeared to be the two caring for Him at His manger-side, but His real Dad was the Heavenly Father, and His real family is all of us who love Him. His tidings are always Good News, and never the negative and evil news that the world releases unceasingly. His Baby-cooings were the first Holy Spirit breathed prayer--at places too deep for words. His Stepdad was His midwife. His Mother was informed of a cosmic mystery that she couldn’t speak of, but she would ponder for the rest of her life.

That cold lonely night brought our gift of never again needing to be alone. The angels that hovered over His Birth gave their first message to the most alone and separate in all of Bethlehem’s society. The shepherds, because they would actually be full of the wonder from a hillside and the silence of a closely starred night sky would be able to see and hear the angels. The donkey and the cattle at the Baby’s manger-crib knew somehow that the whole groaning creation had an added note of praise that night. The people who turned away the helpless pregnant couple on a donkey, so that the Baby would have to be born in a cave-like barn, were fulfilling prophecy spoken so long ago about a Messiah would enter our lives in this poor and humble way.

The common swaddling clothes that Jesus wore were the gossamer for a King, in eternity’s evaluation. The shepherds, with obedient and humbled hearts, who went to see the Baby led their lambs to the place of The Lamb. The cold winds across the land were the notation for every melodic chorus in our Christmas Carols. The dismal cave was the longing of the heart of every architect who ever hoped to design the palace of a monarch. The Mother’s labor cries were the lullaby calming the People of God that their hopes and prayers were finally met in her trusting push of this Baby into the life of our incalculable gift.

Was the Baby Himself--the promised Redeemer--given in this way as a note of touching sentimentality to the whole story of the Savior Who would grow-up in such rejection to die on the Cross for the sins of the whole world?

Oh, No! The coming of this Baby from His eternal place as the Son, always with His Heavenly Father, is a movement of such grandeur that it moves the heart over such a travail of love.  For Him to stoop to the place of earthly parents with breastfeeding for nurturance and diapers to be changed is unimaginable in the reach of the Lord’s love to find and save us. This Baby drank the milk of flesh to give us the meat of His Word. This Child, known forever as The Word, came crying unintelligible baby-tears. His wail came tearing into time, and the Little-One had to learn the language of His family in the same ways of all the children. The Word Incarnate drooled Baby-talk for us!

The Christmas Child, who could have had legions of angels at His disposal at any time, came as any other child--entirely helpless, accept for His ability to cry and smile--the only things that can ensure the survival of the Dear-Ones to bring help to their sides. By these wordless calls the infants bring those who love them to care for them. Jesus came without any resources. He was utterly helpless, except for His need for us to care for Him. What god, but the Only One, who fully wanted to identify with us would be willing to suffer the humility of this Baby—who was indeed, God With us, Emmanuel?

The Son, free through all of heaven, had freely chosen to come to earth to be bound by our human cloths. From a swaddled Baby to His death-cloths He would be wrapped-up in all of our ways, so that in another cave--His tomb--He could leave behind the grave clothes finally as evidence of the possibility of our Resurrection in Him, if we just embrace the One who came helpless—the One Who is our complete Helper.

The Jesus Child came as a Baby in the deepest part of the night along a forgotten rocky lane, in a barn barely fit to house the animals. His life, from such dark beginnings, brings Light always--even in the places of dense darkness and evil. If you look richly into the Face of Jesus there is no end to the transforming life He will bring to you: cries for carols, baby-talk for the Word, pain for embraces, loneliness for abiding love, shepherds before royalty, caves for castles, a poor Baby as King, common clothes for regal robes, milk for meat, labor shouts for redemption, the helpless as The Helper, death cloths for Resurrection, brief lives for eternity, deep night for the Light of men. As we are told in the Gospel of John 1:4~~”In Him was life, and the life was the Light of men.”

In the image attached, a beautiful Christmas card from DaySpring Press, we can see the Holy Infant in His manger. I have placed it with a gift that we received of a seashell bearing the calligraphy of the Lord’s Prayer. Jesus always wanted us to know how to speak readily to His Daddy. He knew how important the words were to us. He had learned the language of man. And so, He gave us prayer long after He left His manger origins so that we would have the kind of prayer that he always spoke to His Father from a hillside under the close-by stars over His lovely head. If you will pray it you will know Emmanuel’s heart to give us dear entrée with His Father! Glory on a bright Christmas night!

Away in a Manger

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       Away in a manger,

No crib for His bed

The little Lord Jesus

Laid down His sweet head

        The stars in the bright sky

 Looked down where He lay

 The little Lord Jesus

 Asleep on the hay

       The cattle are lowing

The poor Baby wakes

But little Lord Jesus

No crying He makes

       I love Thee, Lord Jesus

Look down from the sky

And stay by my side,

‘Til morning is nigh

       Be near me, Lord Jesus,

I ask Thee to stay

Close by me forever

And love me, I pray

        Bless all the dear children

  In Thy tender care

  And take us to heaven

To live with Thee there

On this last Friday, December 14th, I was awakened much earlier than I expected as I had been working into the small hours of the night. It felt incisive, as though I was instantly alert, and that there was an urgency of prayer. I didn’t have a theme, so I asked the Lord, in a rather unusual way to give me one of the old hymns to pray, as the words to all the verses are remembered so readily when they are put to song. He gave me a Christmas Carol (I had not expected that, even though the season was fitting), the lyrics of which are quoted above to Away in a Manger.

I looked at the digital clock in the dark bedroom. It’s red quivering numbers told me that it was precisely 6:36am, Pacific Time. During my prayer, which follows, I had no knowledge of the tragedy happening at the same time (9:36am Eastern Time) in Newtown, Connecticut. The Lord wanted that place to be covered in prayer!

I started the prayer following the verses of the song and it suddenly became a vision that the Lord gave me about sweet and valiant armies of children. I somehow felt unworthy to sing the song never realizing before how fully it is a child’s song. I had the sense that unless I could become humble and accepting like the little-ones, then and only then, could I keep up with the precious lyrics. I prayed to have the dignity and transparency that the children have when they sing this trusting song, so that I could continue.

The armies of children were of varying ages--of the young elementary school years. They were so beautifully from all the races, and both boys and girls marched before my eyes. They marched with no animosity or discrimination amongst their ranks. There was such bright and genuine fraternity in their groupings--really like the sweetest play.

I saw what an immeasureable treasure they are to the heart of Jesus, and how they belonged to all of us to protect and defend, as He would have us to do. I also saw how they moved in such love and unity toward a worthy goal, each one valuing the other as much as they did their own life. I prayed to be equal to such darling nobility, as they seemed to me to be marching upward. Their purity and beauty was so touching that I thought I would lose the thread of the simple lyrics. I kept saying the song like a prayer of encouragement over the little ones, even though I regularly felt unsuitable to pray anything for their dear knowing hearts. They were the ones encouraging me.

By the end of the song (many times over), the faces of the children had given me the courage to claim each verse for myself, as well as for them. And I knew that His final tender care of us is, as the last lines say, that He will take us to heaven to live with Him there--because the children had shown me the necessity of bearing a Child of God’s heart within our breasts, no matter our age.

The repetition of the song/prayer ended and I fell back to sleep with such a sense of honor for having been awakened to see such dear beauties, for their reminder to me that Jesus never hindered one of the little-ones to come to Him, and I knew that my heart needed the lesson to become more like a child. I had seen their hearts, and I also wanted that same transparency.

A couple of hours later when I awoke, I knew that we had a long and challenging day ahead of us as we were changing our provider for all of our media, computers, and the phones in our home. The workman arrived at 9:00am and the tasks were demanding with lots of decisions about transferring data, making connections, and drilling lines. I didn’t have the ability to see any news, or read any postings until about 3:00pm.  That was when I heard about the horrific events at the Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn. I was stricken with a heart-sickness over the loss of the children and their wonderful defenders.

I still did not make any connection to my early morning prayer, not until I heard the awful time of the horror at the Sandy Hook School. It was 9:36am Eastern Time--the same time that I had been called on the Pacific Coast to intercede for the ones so dear to my heart, and for the brave adults who covered them.

I knew I had seen an army of gorgeous children, and now I knew why I had been brought to this precise prayer. I wondered if there had been a whole other army awakened at the same time to uphold the dear children--to lessen their fear, to exhort them into the arms of Jesus, to let them know that the Baby that they sang about knew everything that they had, or would ever face, as He brought them to Himself.

He had become one of them, so that they could trust in Him for their ultimate safety. They could know that as the song said, He is always near them, close by, forever. The purity of the children that I saw in the prayer that I prayed earlier gave me a peace that the real children in their schoolrooms must have seen Jesus’ face even at the time of such horrible earthly fear, and that they were instantly embraced in a way that only The Parent can love, and hold, and tender, and allay the fears of His own.

My prayer and vision over this heart wrenchingly terrible event has nothing to do with answering any of the why questions. It is only about one small woman’s heart that was wonderfully called to prayer on such a dark day and to meet the beaming faces of each beloved child as they marched into heaven to the tune of Away in a Manger. How I shall never forget their love for me, which flowed from the child’s testimony of the heart of Jesus’ love: “Bless all the dear Children in Thy tender care and take us to heaven to live with Thee there.” I shall never be the same by the glimpse of the glory of their dear countenances on the day of their home going to blessed Jesus.

“Therefore be imitators of God, as beloved children; and walk in love, just as Christ also loved you and gave Himself up for us, an offering and a sacrifice to God as a fragrant aroma.” Ephesians 5:1

A beloved child walks in the manger-way by the One Who called Himself the Way. Oh, to be such an imitator, to be such a fragrant aroma--far better than a bouquet of two dozen or more white roses!

Incense of Thanksgiving

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Today, on Thanksgiving 2012, my heart wanted a list. This won’t be the kind of list in which you victoriously cross off things, but one where each line is a flight to wonder--each entry an addition to gratitude. There will be no order of importance, except that the Last One will really be the First One. I am thankful for:

Children at the beach, their feet dancing in steps that no choreographer could notate.

Silhouetted figures of beauty against a dazzling diamond-lit-up sea.

Waves that crash to shore with heart-stirring percussion.

Open gates that show the longing of closed hearts.

The reliable newness of each day to work, and play, and listen, and love.

The V-form of bird flight—how they rotate out the one taking the first windblast.

The connection to eyes that ties with a ribbon of celebration to hearts.

A sunspot that comes from 93 million miles away to bedeck a tree with a joy-globe.

Gardens placed like a variegated bouquet to cheer us.

The monumentality of trees that looks like a praise dance.

Benches that wait expectantly for sweet dialogue.

Fruit hanging heavily on branches equal to the bounty.

Plumeria blooms that look like the stamp of holy kisses on a love-note.

Hummingbirds as the sign that size and power are a receipt not to be measured.

Silence and moments in which to ponder.

Words that reach all the way to the heavens to find wordless and holy mystery.

Horizons that really are not a line of limitation.

The stamina of a sapling in a rainstorm.

Seabird flocks at the waves’ edges rivaling any corps-de-ballet.

Roses, and the industry of bees, in a symbol of such extravagant passion.

Shadows like the great pen and ink etchings in the finest museums.

Trellises that assist the Morning Glories to cover us in waking hues.

Art-makers who honor the Creator.

Dandelions so the children always have their enchanting take-home-bouquets.

Homes that exude the heart-welcome of godly hospitality.

Places of rest and refreshment for the weary traveler.

New buds for a metaphor of audacity.

People who place birdhouses in the wilderness.

A maze that opens us to growth in ingenuity.

A wreathed front door in any season.

Curiosity and the skill granted for discovery and healing.

The heart of the word: Love.

Backpacks for the Way they leave hands free to search and exclaim.

Fountains that sing and radiate light--tossing rainbows abroad.

Books and their mission of sweet narrative and brilliance.

The meeting of the ages across the affinity of joy.

The way that the coiling waves bring ruffles to the edges of the land.

A worshipful camera.

Stairways that call to the dance of ascent to new territories.

Solitary walkers, and their faces, that somehow cannot leave childhood behind.

Breaking bread together that has its own special anthem-song.

The creatures that are not actors.

Cloud formations that make a museum seem tame—even one with a Van Gogh.

Pods on trees that wait for their special wind.

Heart rocks polished and shaped over eons just to lavish a message of cherishing.

Time, especially when we are unaware of it.

Athletes: marathoners, runners, joggers, walkers, and those using a walker.

How a wild thing never decides to become tame just for a visit.

How I so often see crosses in all kinds of structures.

Storm clouds that are outlined in a backlit emerging light.

Rocky shorelines just for the hopping.

A tree not yet in bloom that writes a calligraphy of readiness upon the sky.

The smell under a Grapefruit Tree.

Floral buds that look like little baby-fists ready to amaze with their opening.

A candle that dances to inspire us to light-up.

Prayer--the incense of thanksgiving--anywhere and anytime!

A library in which each spine speaks of a strong structure just awaiting receipt.

A homeless person really seen, regaled, and found at home again.

Quilts to wrap into and the people who make such gorgeous patterned coverings.

Butterflies who stop their lovely staccato flight to pose for a moment.

Children’s art--whether on the sidewalk or on the refrigerator.

Mailboxes, of any type, that are bursting with good news.

The gifts of a loved-one--best of all a true-heart.

Flowers that grow right out of the seam of the sidewalk.

A waterfall that explains electricity in a glimpse.

Reverence along the shore of a stained-glass sunset.

A smile that enkindles.

Balloons and kites, because the best toy is being at the other end of a flying object.

Birdsong that charms by melodies that ring over the hillsides from such tiny breasts.

A grape vine dressed in the beautiful jewels of Communion.

My local church where the faces bear the true expressions of compassion & blessing.

The unique gift of your precious life, dear Reader.

My family of friends who are worth more than any treasure chest could ever hold.

My husband who tenders me to the love of Jesus through his own dear love for me.

And the Last Who is always the First—The Love of the Father, Whose Son came to save me, and Who would never leave me alone by sending the Holy Spirit as my Truth and Comforter—for the journey.

Philippians 4:6 tells me that thanksgiving is the necessary accompaniment for all dialogue with the Lord. Its message is so sweet: “Be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God.”

I request, Dear Lord, thankfully that You would show us ever more of Your glory from the sidewalk to the clouds on high! My camera remains--always worshipful of You.

Journaling Out of the Fog

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A recent walk in the fog had me thinking about what we can really know in those times in our lives when we, like Abram in Genesis 12:1, are told by the Lord to head out: “…to the land which I will show you.”

In the image posted of the lover’s bench with foliage, right in front of me in an otherwise foggy morning, they were found to be very clear, almost highlighted in distinctiveness, by the surrounding mists and as I moved further from the little outlook it lost its shape fairly rapidly. It must be that there is something extremely significant about the present moment in those times of moving without knowing the destination (metaphorically, in the fog)--something that really should not be missed.

How can we value the gift of the here and now when we just want to get to the then and arrived? The lover’s bench kept impressing upon me a message and it had to do with a favorite passage of mine in Psalm 45:1: “My heart overflows with a good theme; I address my verses to the King; My tongue is the pen of a ready writer.”

I was transported to the very beginning of my marriage to my dear husband, Jim, and how we moved from our Eastern roots to San Diego by a call of the Lord. We had, neither of us, ever been beyond Chicago in this great Country. We took a Greyhound Bus across this new land. We didn’t know anyone in our newly appointed home. We had no idea about a church home. We had no jobs. We didn’t know how we would find housing. We used public transportation in a city that even in the early 80’s made this to be quite a challenge. We had a tiny, very small, savings to live on. And as well we were just launched into the grand adventure of seeing how the two become one in the poetry and authenticity of such a remarkable union.

It was writing then, and always has been for us, that surrounds us in the joy of the journey--keeping us alive to His Presence when the future seems so uncertain. I am looking at, even now, an exchange of letters (150 pages worth) that we penned upon the exhilaration and trepidation of this first pioneering event to become established in a place that the Lord would show us. They are delightful--really like the writing of someone else since in a sense, by distance, we are new and deepened people, by this first trek and so many more godly stretchings that we would never have wanted to miss in sweet Jesus!

We wanted to keep the present-day indelible for the following times that may be surrounded in fog--as an exhortation to stay at our post with the Lord’s leading--the map ultimately in His hand. The letters are indeed love letters to the One who guides with His arm around our shoulders, whispering: “You’re a Child of God! You’re a Child of God!” As well they are a record of the deepening fervency of the love that the Lord can grant over the decades of the long gift of a godly romance. Without these lovely sharings, the remembrance would have been a wonderful evanescent feeling without the gift of the words that astound in retrospect—things that surely would have been forgotten.

This first series was entitled: Letters: Sharing the Spirit of Christ. We also have an extended group of letters on our reflections on the book of Acts from the New Testament. This was especially helpful as we searched for a church home to be able to ponder together over how the first Christians lived out the love of Christ. These shared writings have paralleled individual journals that we have both kept, and exchanges of poetry, stories, essays, aphoristic lists, and love letters that we have given to each other, and always read aloud, on holidays, anniversaries, birthdays and in those grateful just-because- times.

By the time of my return walk the rolling mists had lifted, and there before the lover’s bench was the expanse of the broad and beautiful Torrey Pines Golf Course with the stunning cliff to the Pacific crashing below. The fog that preceded our trip to San Diego continues to open out upon such glory. I sat on the bench knowing of the deep surrounding of the Lover of my Soul and also that I would have to document this reflection because writing can make the mundane stunning, glistening in the dew of a gliding fog that brings with it the clarity of the Lord’s plan.

If you will write, even a paragraph, in the midst of times of seemingly foggy tumult, I can assure you that a new peace and gifting can descend upon the lover’s bench where you will submit to stop and give thanks! Even if you think the words themselves are chaotic, if you will just be real with Him, He will come to settle you down. You are loved back in your love letters to the One Who is Love! On the bench provided for you by Him you will see the fog lift and feel His good right arm around your shoulder. Your heavenly love letter today reads: “I love it when you write to Me. You are endlessly fascinating!”