Into The Light

A journey out of perfection and into the light

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Your song is the soundtrack of another's healing

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If we don’t ever try anything new we aren’t going to grow.

Our childhood years are made up of new experiences and new discoveries. Everything we do is a new thing. New people, places, knowledge, always growing and always changing. Because our surroundings are ever changing we are ever discovering new things about ourselves.

Adolescence brings a seeming familiarity. Usually it is routines that take over our whole lives which begin to solidify. Some invest in activities, others academics, and others parties.

Unless a pivotal internal shift occurs, the external dynamics are going to remain tbe same. And often an internal shift isn’t going to take place until an external shift does.

Ultimately, our growth is chosen. Because it has to do with us stepping outside of familiarity. Unfamiliarity brings growth. Often strengths we hold unrealized are unearthed in these times. This is why adversity is a fertile growing space. We are not choosing it, but it causes us into an unfamiliar space requiring untold gifts and strengths.

As children, everything is chosen for us, a parent decides what is best… We are given ample opportunity to discover our own hearts as we delve into new spheres of life. A bubbly of inquisitive child emerges.

But what if the adolescent discovery of self is not the final doscovery?

What if instead of asking young people to decide who they are we begin encouraging them in trying new things. We began spurring them on when we see them hitting their sweet spot. We begin giving them freedom to be ever evolving and free flowing in a world demanding of labels and their time.

At our age change is a choice.

In order to grow it requires a change of pace, a change of scenery, a change of attitude.

This does not give license to escapism - ever on the move - it actually invests itself fully in where it finds itself. And often enough it has to do with changes inside of that place in which we have been found.

However it looks, however uncomfortable it feels, I hope you grow. I hope you choose growth. I hope you go forward in things that make your head spin and you heart fly.

I hope you choose to plant yourself, I hope you choose a change; I hope you choose to grow.

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It may be instinctive to seek out the worst possibility In people In places In opportunities The goal is to guard our hearts To keep our hearts On lock down To preserve our lives To keep our hopes from falling To keep our realities from shattering But the truth is That holding on so tight Closing all our gates And keeping out the light Has the exact opposite outcome It gives darkness It holds out light To guard our hearts he told us And by this we know to walk in caution As to the content That we let it A grip of bitterness A voice of judgment Guard your heart To see the best And to hold an open heart This is a place of surrender A heart of self-preservation is held back from having a purpose And a heart on lockdown has no glimpse of hope Because hope is on the outside It is shining At times far off Hope is That light At the end So open your heart Upon the lies and every vice It may seem easy to rely Hiding behind a veil of fear Fleeing at the sight of unease This crutch It cannot hold you up You are healed Can't you see it? You are healed Throw it to the side And walk Throw it to the side And run He has you and he isn't letting go Let go of your shame Walk

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If you only hear what you wanna hear you won't hear anything

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Don't devistate your own heart over the hunger of your stomach

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Perhaps that is how I got tired. I felt like I could only come to you and I could only bow down and surrender. I thought seeking you meant coming low. I thought that it all had to happen in the dirt and on my face.

What if there is more… What if you are holding out your hands. What if you know the sadness in my heart I have hidden even from myself.. There is hope.

Perhaps it isn’t only in a dark room. Perhaps it is here, in the sun, or in my kitchen.

If I worship God in all I do it all becomes beautiful and wonderful.. Suddenly I remember I am intricate and this life is delicate..

As I slow my whole life down I can peel a carrot and rub from it black dirt knowing that God created for me this gift from the earth. A small act seen as one more way of spending myself becomes a great act that fills my heart.

If I have a heart to seek him in all things I can see how every person I cross is a gift from above. Every gift and quirk they hold and carry - I can see it all I can see its beauty.

If I am seeking him in everything I am finding him in everything. If I be concerned less with how I act and more with how close he is in every act - then and only then - I will find myself becoming like him. Because my likeness is formed out of intimacy and influence and not punishment or fear.

He is not harsh or cruel. He has already taken a grave beating in order to save me from the same. If I feel beaten down it is not him who gives it. If I feel broken down, I do well to ask who I have listened to and adhered to. If I feel exhausted perhaps I have been hearing lies and trusting those pieces of heartache that have followed this heart all my life..

He is good beyond all measure. He is faithful. He is kind.

If I cannot see him, perhaps there is a bleary dirt covered lens in need of being removed. Worry not over new glasses, how I ought to see. Simply remove what is covering your eyes. Your impaired vision is better than the thick of dirt that has been holding you back. Start here.

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Your poetry is constantly holding me reminding me that I was made for melodies and harmonies and everything inside of me its you you are music to my aching ears and everything I have ever known is held in the quiet ways you remind me that ‘I love everything about you’ too close to you to walk away too far to understand hold me closer closer please my anxious heart it knows not how but longs and longs to just be held so hold me here please and show me what it means to be loved by a love that is greater than I or he or she or we you are everything and until I see your face I am nothing and as I hear you coming closer I realize that nothing is really anything anything without you is nothing and life is not worth living you are everything and I will ever sing songs of praise to you who keeps me close and saves me even when I’m letting go no one knows a love like yours those who do cannot fathom your love for me for in my mothers womb you created me amd all along you have been waiting patiently here I am I cry and I open my eyes just long enough and just in time to realize all I have ever wanted needed dreamed of ran from cried over longed for is standing right in front of me all my life longing waiting searching yet here you are and here you have been all along I can’t begin to understand how good you are how you take my hand again and again god you take my hand how can it ever be how can it really exist a love like this you are absolutely everything to me and how I fail to express my love in a life at peace still you accept me I get it wrong and I get it wrong and I get it wrong and I get it wrong and still you accept me how can it be so as I sit in front of things that kill me selling my own heart short and longing for fulfillment you stand alongside me and you cry and you sing and hold your love in alabaster things that over flow and explode and here I am dying and asking why and wondering when I know that you alone are life and I’m running away away away from the only faithful thing I have known because my aching heart longs to be made whole I am searching searching in all the wrong places I long and look and cry out for love and love is standing right in front of me how can it be I fail and hurt and wrong I fall and still you love how can it be how can it be how can it be you are awaiting for me how can it be open arms how can it be you love me how can it be as I walk in shame towards your home to beg a place as a servant alone you have arms and hands and a heart wide open you cry because joy your heart has overtaken and you say to me ‘welcome home’ to your servants ‘this calls for a celebration’ you hold me and care for me how can it be you never stop loving me how can it be

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We were made to fly

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Freedom

Is in the air today

He’s alive, He’s alive!

And because of Him, We too Can truly know what it means To live

[alurium]

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Influence Happens up Close

It hit me, watching my two year old niece interacting with a girl six years old. She was laughing and playing and acting as I had never seen her act before. She became a little girl whom I had so long seen as just a baby.

Of course her mother has in influence on her like no other, this little girl lives and breathes her momma. What is said and done, whether positive or negative, finds its way into this sweet young ones habits and ways of seeing and approaching life. A great responsibility.

And, yes, I hear her copy my words and sentences and crazy laughing and dancing. Telling me how I am funny or pretty in an echo of what I tell her. “Pretty girl” I say to her, and she touches my face, “pretty girl, Becca, pretty girl” with a huge grin.

Yet there is something so different about the way I saw her interact with a girl only a few years older. Because it seems this girl had no authority over her, no way of feeding her or providing her needs, yet this girl could make up stories for her and run in front of her and jump for so long on a mattress with her. I had never seen this little girl so alive and excited. The way she looked at her new friend was filled with awe and wonder, knowing perhaps that she was so close to being the same size as her but somehow taller and somehow able to speak more of the English language. She was inspired it seemed, in awe almost, of this friend she could run with so freely.

I wrestle with the concept of mentoring. Being a mentor to young girls only several years younger than I am I tend to wonder what exactly is my role in the life of another girl. It can be so easy to fall into the need for teaching and living intentionally, but perhaps this is not what young girls need. Perhaps what they need is someone with whom they can run free. Someone they can look to, inspired and in awe that they have found a friend who is like them only a little older and a little more familiar with some of the ways of this crazy and broken world.

Perhaps there is a time, in relationship, to be a mother to those who have not. And perhaps there is a time to be a sister, a friend. Perhaps there is a time to simply come alongside and run freely with the young ones who look on in wonder - perhaps our role is to be a piece of kindle in the fire of such wonder. Let us not be those who seek to mentor and in doing so snuff out their living fires by our own heart aches or insecurities.

Let us be those who run free, and let us run alongside those younger than us remembering forever that we are sisters. Remembering forever that none of us has more to offer than the other. Remembering that where I lack, in gift in character in perspective, another gives. Let us hold hands, sisters who love and need and cherish each other. Let us run freely alongside one another. And let us stand in awe of the glory of the one’s He created so wonderfully.

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A Call for Sons and Daughters

This world is crying out, broken and unsure. Hidden behind perfectly applied makeup, inside well shined cars. We think of orphans and our hearts wander to the far corners of the earth. But what if there is more to this phenomena? What if orphans are not always far off and starving for food with flies surrounding them in their broken states of living? What if the orphan is in front of us. What if the orphan is looking back in the mirror. The orphan hearted are looking for a heart that is wide open. They, we, are longing for more than the affection of a father or a mother... We are longing for the living breathing closer than close bond of brothers and sisters. Our generation is in an identity crisis. Who are we? Are we defined by how good at a sport, how well on a test, or how personable to others, we are and have been? Who are we? We are sons and daughters. We are loved by God, truly and deeply. We have a Father in heaven who looks down and cries when we cry, He even laughs when we laugh. And yet, if He is a Father of so many, then how has loneliness come to plague His children? We are called to care for one another we belong to each other and the Bible speaks again and again of this very truth. From the people of Isreal journeying together, to Jesus and His disciples' constant communion, unto the church of the New Testament and even now, today. Countless examples and analogies of this family - this body with many parts all needing eachother. If we belong to eachother, perhaps we can care for each other. The world is longing for brothers and sisters who will come alongside. We are broken and in need of the humble care that comes from one who says - brother, sister, I am here. In the midst of an identity crisis, we are called to stand in the truth of who we are. If we cannot acknowledge that we are called to be sons and daughters of the living God, how can we come into the full reality of being brothers and sisters to His children? We must stand strong in who we are - ask God for a heart change - to know with all our hearts that we are no longer orphans. We are adopted by a Father who will never leave us nor forsake us. And those are the kinds of brothers and sisters that the world is crying out for, orphans looking and hoping for a family to call their own. We hold a key in that God has welcomed is in by His grace. Jesus is that key. We are no longer held captive, we are given over into a family brimming with love. If we can get this, if we can really get this, then perhaps we can love eachother right. And if we can love eachother right, then perhaps we can be the family God has ultimately called us to be. Brothers and sisters, calling the orphans into our family and back to our Father. Healing happens in community - if we can only open out hands, our hearts, and maybe even our homes. We are not called to go it alone, we are called to revel in the glory and joy of being loved by a good family. God has called us into His family. Being adopted as His children means new siblings and new ways of doing things. We do not walk alone. We are called, we are loved, we are His, and we are eachothers. Being independent I can find this a struggle, but why can't we give it a try? Ask someone to talk, invite someone over for dinner, begin hosting a small group, create safe places where those who are looking for a family can come and find and know that they are loved beyond anything they can ever do or offer. Bask in His love, grasp the identity found in His love, embrace a crazy and divine family, be loved by God and by His kids. Accept His unfading love and the paradoxical love of His family given to us... And out of a full heart, begin loving as you have been loved - unfadingly and paradoxically.

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North Winds

A sweet sound for today

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I'm beginning to see These boundary lines Were made for me so that I could find All of these treasures Hidden inside a holy God.

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There is always an opening up of something before it can be filled.

You open your fridge, notice it is empty, and fill it.

Perhaps you open your fridge, notice all the food has gone bad or is no longer if use… You empty it, clean it out, as fill it.

Open your heart.

Is it empty? Our good Father can fill it.

Is it in need of emptying and cleaning? He can make you new, pure, clean and holy.

If you empty your heart of things gone bad, He will make it clean.

If we let Him have His way, He will fill our empty spaces with the abundance of His goodness.

He take the old, He takes the empty, and He makes it new.

He makes it beautiful.

The emptiness, the dirtiness, the neediness of something must be exposed before it can cleansed, before it can be filled...

Will you let Him in?

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Obedience is formed in us by the one to whom we are called to obey. He knows our frame, He knows that we are but dust (Psalm 103). And so, as He calls us into obedience, into changed lifestyle, into a changed heart - truly He is calling us into closer relationship with Himself. For only His perfect hands can form in us the heart He intended. The heart which remains in Him is the heart which is shaped by Him (John 15).

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No matter how fiercely our pride will deny it, we are constantly being shaped by each other.