A prayer for the church

Your Kingdom is in-breaking,
Your loving-kindness has no end,
You only hurt to heal,
You are the one who mends.

You are not distant in our pain,
 You are not aloof or cold,
You are the one who turns loss to gain,
You are the one who destroys strongholds.

You know the depth of each human heart,
You know your children by name,
You alone can dissect a hardened soul,
You are the movement for the lame.

You are not finished with your people,
You are not throwing your hands up in despair,
You are the one who allows pain-
The Cross revealing your infinite care.

You will refine your church,
You will redeem your bride.
You are the one who removes our shame,
You are lovingly rebuking pride.

You know this moment many hearts are faint.
You hear each desperate cry.
You touch each soul with your tender care,
You will one day make every eye dry.

Tonight remind us of your love,
Satisfy souls in your peace,
Guide our prayers for you to abide,
Heal this body, from sin release.

--march 13,2016--

Exodus

What if I expected You to move mountains?

What would happen if I trusted You to part the sea?

What would become of my heart wastelands?

What miracles would come to be?

How do I pray in faith without grasping?

How do I seek You in asking for desires?

How should these finite lips call on everlasting?

How does this fickle heart pray with holy fire?

Help my unbelief

Jesus guide my heart,

Remind me You are my perfect intercessor,

In You, my requests are sorted apart.

It was You who led by fire and cloud,

It was You who provided manna,

It was You who asked if the dry bones could live,

It was You who broke walls, they marched around them.

It is You who still makes ways in darkness,

It is You who still calls by name,

It is You who asks me to pray boldly,

It is You who removes my shame.

I can hope in your provision,

I can boldly come before your throne,

I can humbly ask You to hasten your vision,

I can trust You to lead me home.

Now is the time to ask in hope,

Tonight is the night to cry out,

You rend my heart with your unfailing love,

You speak in whispers, in my circumstances You shout.

I ask because you know my heart,

I call because you are my father,

I know you’re the one who leads and sends,

When I on my own can go no further.

You see me when I’m falling,

 You know my words before I speak,

You are the one who’s ever calling,

You are the answer I seek.

You are making my heart-mountains move,

You are parting my fear-filled seas,

You are turning wastelands into streams,

You are performing miracles in me. 

How I want to love you-- a poem

How I want to love you

I want to love you with my smiles,

I’d like to love you with my laugh,

Someday I want to love you with my words—even when we’re mad.

I want to love you with a home of joy,

Filled with memories on well-worn walls,

I want to love you in a second glance as tiny feet run down the halls.

I want to love you with my passions, gifts, and mind-

To equip, encourage, and call you to use your own.

I want to love you by respecting your dreams

walking boldly alongside you- even when it all seems to unwind.

I want to love you with my patience,

I want to love you with my kindness,

I want to love you when it’s not easy, choosing covenant over defiance.

I want to love you in the evening hours

As we pray for Him to lead,

I want to love you each morning,

Reminding you He is all we need.

I want to love you as we serve together,

As we follow where He guides,

I want to love Him with you by my side.

I want to love you for thousands of tomorrows,

Till we meet upon that shore,

I want to love you like our Savior;

Loving you in a way that reminds you to always love Him more.

I want to love you today-

It seems crazy, But it’s true.

I can love you as I love Him who loved me perfectly first-

In what I say and all I do.

I can love you today as I look to Him alone,

I can love you well before we exchange those vows,

I can love you in this solitary day, as I work in my own home,

Knowing who I’ll be someday is shaped by who I am now.

I can love you as I pray,

I can love you as I wait.

I can love you by trusting His timing,

I can love you well by loving those I’m called to today,

This is how I can love you—long before that first date. 

It could be seen as a follow up to This one, 

name change

As I scroll through facebook, I notice another friend has quietly re-changed their  last name—a small gesture relating a monumental life event—one of strife, tears, a journey no one but the two of them really knows. Heartbreak, divorce.
I grimace and pray—not another marriage, lord. Help them, help them both to seek you, to see you in the dashed dreams, broken promises; the last thread torn from a long fraying relationship. Sweet Jesus, come, restore—heal broken hearts and dreams.
I know I have no idea what I’m really talking about—perpetually single, I don’t write these words flippantly, lightly, but I can’t stay silent. My heart whispers—there is always heartbreak in this life—the ultimate relationship is broken and this infects every other. This side of heaven, life will always have aches, bitter mingled with sweet reminds us to turn to Him. He is the only one who satisfies, who can fill our voids, the only “soul mate”, “the One”.

I pray for discernment and protection—that if I do get married someday that it would began to be fortified now. I need Jesus just as much today as I will on my wedding day and each day after. We need grace for the day—not matter what season. Self-reliance and pride are just as poisonous in singleness as in marriage. Commitment has to be based in contentment in Jesus. I cannot look to marriage to satisfy what only He can—companionship, acceptance, applause. I need to recognize this, find my foundation and security in this—single, married, divorced. Only he is our hope and joy. He gives us a new name. 

Eight years out—a letter to my younger self on that day of diagnosis

Terrified, in shock, unbelieving-not me, disabled? At 2o?!  who will love me now? How can I finish college? What will my life look like now?
Four  small words forever changed my life—“you have hearing loss”.

Twenty-year-old-self—I know you can’t see past this now. It seems to mar your life, to irrevocably screw up your plans, your dreams.  It seems to shatter every truth you knew about who you are and what you’re capable of. Later that afternoon, as you sit on the beach, pen in hand, pages rippling in the forceful wind—you will make a pivotal choice—to turn to, not away from Jesus in this day of pain and fear. You chose not to get bitter, cynical, or self-pittying—and by His grace you live that out. Sure, you have moments of agony and deep fear—but your roots are strong—to him be the glory.

Eight years from now you will be thankful for this day—you won’t wish it away, dread waking up and putting your aids in, live in constant fear of losing the rest of your hearing or not having batteries for your aids. You wont hide your aids under your hair—you’ll again experience the freedom of wearing your hair up—exposing those ears. Eight years out you will be so grateful for loss—for you have gained so much of worth that surpasses your physical hearing. You’ll smile and think of how this was made for you—chosen in love to strengthen, to EQUIP—not hinder, the life you live. Your eyes will glimmer as your mind fills with pictures of how this loss is gain—from relating to a scared parent with a fresh Autism diagnosis, to the way your niece gently pulls back your hair and in awe and joy exclaims “you got my ears too!” You'll mentally change "Amazing Grace" to "I once was deaf, but now I hear" understanding why John Newton (a man who went blind) would write those original lyrics because of how physical loss can strengthen the Spirit. 


Eight years from now you will read scriptures like “Those who sow in tears shall reap with shouts of joy! He who goes out weeping, bearing the seed for sowing, shall come home with shouts of joy, bringing his sheaves with him” (Psalm 126) and your heart will leap with joy—fulfilling this verse and know it’s true. Eight years from now, today will still bring back a flood of sadness but a bittersweet gratitude—for now you have those sheaves. The harvest of suffering reminds you pain in this life is birth pains. Trembling 20-year-old-self—this diagnosis you think is ending your life—is actually the greatest beginning. 

How my hearing aids help me understand the Holy Spirit

August 22, 2015
**just posting this after months of hiatus, but Sunday marks 8 years of this hearing loss journey**
Today, after “adulting” most of the morning—sweeping, mopping, dusting, etc. I settled down to read “My Utmost for His Highest” which I pick up when I remember. One snippet of today’s devotional stood out to me.

Oswald wrote “Get to the end of yourself where you can do nothing, but where He does everything”.

I was struck by how much this resembles the relationship I have with my hearing aids. They do everything to make me here at a normal level. My ears can’t help themselves. I cannot live the same way without my aids. They resemble the true Helper.

And yet, wearing them is a choice.  I can decide whether or not to put them in, to utilize their vital help in my daily life. In a somewhat similar way, I can choose to listen to the Holy Spirit, to daily turn to His voice, his leading , his essential aid.

We tend to see the Holy Spirit like Jiminy Cricket—advice giver, someone on the side to guide us. Yet, he’s more than that. He is vital. He is how we can Hear. He is our ever present help. 

Let Love in--Part 2

Earlier today I began a separate post, one I hope to share in the, future, but it needs refining.

 I recently borrowed a friend’s copy of “Counterfeit Gods” by Tim Keller.  Read it at your own risk—for your own edification and joy. Throughout the work Keller expounds upon the idea that “the human heart is an idol factory” and how we tend to just deal with the surface idols—money, relationships, work success, instead of looking to the root—what our desire for those things is really pointing to. For instance, you and I could both have money as an idol—something that we find our sole sense of identity, security, and affirmation in. But—I could be using money because it makes me secure and in control of my environment (or so I think) and you could be using money to gain approval—so that others will applaud you and you can know you’re successful. The surface looks the same, but the roots are different.

While the book in its entirety impacted my life, my faith, my views; one section in particular kept coming back to me. In chapter 2, Keller articulates that “love is not all you need” by sharing the stories of Jacob and Leah. Both of them faced life unloved. Jacob spent most of his life looking to others for blessing—he stole the blessing from his twin, was cheated out of the woman he first loved by his father in law, and lived in fear. He was always looking to others to fulfill him and bless him. Likewise, Leah, who the Bible basically calls ugly, lived life in the shadow of her beautiful younger sister. Her own father gave her away in marriage to a man who didn’t love her. She thought she could earn her husband’s blessing and love by having children, but it never worked. In both of their lives they finally turned to God for blessing and love after many unfruitful years of trying to siphon it from others. With the birth of Judah, Leah finally said “now I know God has blessed me”—realizing that all along it was God’s love and favor she had been searching for. Keller further relates that “The text says that when the Lord saw that Leah was not loved, _he_ loved her. God was saying, 'I am the real bridegroom. I am the husband of the husbandless. I am the father of the fatherless”.  In my own life I can see how I have looked to others for acceptance and love—after the early years of being rejected by peers and friends, I spent much of my teenage and early adult years seeking to know that I had true friendships that were like the siblings I never had—I too tried to suck the love out of others or do things for them so they would love me—like Leah I have learned that it never satisfies and pushes others away. There was nothing Leah could do to make Jacob love her more or to make God love her less.  Similarly, Jacob spent his life taking blessing into his own hands—he learned from a young age that he had to fight for it, earn it, and do what it took to get it from others. I too, look back and see how I have spent much of my life trying to earn the unconditional love of God by proving myself to my parents, my bosses, my peers. I thought that if I could just be consistent enough, care enough, share enough—that THEN I would finally be treated that way by others. Like Jacob, I wrestled with others when really, it was God I needed to wrestle with. In Jacob’s story he finally turns to God on the eve of the night that he thinks is his last—his brother Esau is coming toward him and he is certain that this is it—the ultimate rejection by family and retaliation for his past. In the night a man approaches him and they fight—in the midst of it Jacob is told it is God—and instead of fearfully cowering, Jacob clings. He finally fights for the blessing he’s been looking for and tells God that “he won’t let go until You bless me”. As Keller relates “Jacob finally looked to God for blessing”. The approval of others—the encouragement from my parents, the social media rat race, the academic achievement—all of it will fail, all of it is a vicious cycle that never satisfies. People will come through and then fail me, encourage and then tear down.


You see, I do need to let love in—the one who IS love. Who created me to delight in, not deify, the love and approval of others. What we do here is an echo of eternity, the one who loves. It’s time to let Love in.