Blogs are so public. Why would I let anyone with an internet connection know the thoughts inside my head?





I am listening to Europop, putting off my paper on Thailand.





No one reads this blog.





Is my closed-off heart - to most, not all, mind you - safe, or suffocating?



'

fragile

On Large Fights

When I surrendered something to God during the persecuted church prayer evening, I expected to be a big fight. I guess there was a small one during the few days afterward. But more of what happened was it just drifted away from me.

Maybe surrendering doesn't mean launching a big fight. Maybe it means letting go and letting God. He's already done the big fight anyway.

and now, for a song

A Wounded Life

Can you live where things are real
Or do you spend too much time in a dream?
Can you brave this winter night
If there is hope and love left to redeem

I would rather live a wounded life
Than be listless inside
Aching, weeping, you’ll find me on my knees
Anguish my doorway to peace

I will touch the calloused hands
and walk the road with suffering and pain
I will love the broken ones
What’s loss to me is ultimately gain

I would rather live a wounded life
Than be listless inside
Aching, weeping, you’ll find me on my knees
Anguish my doorway to peace

And I hear you say
This is the better way

A bleeding man upon a cross
Dying so that I could love and live
His words they crush me to the core
To love completely, your life you must give

I would rather live a wounded life
Than be listless inside
Aching, weeping, you’ll find me on my knees
Anguish my doorway to peace

friends.

 
 

these are my friends.



 

I am

people etching plastic faces creating plastered smiles facades
people building up barriacades putting sand bags between fences must keep out storm
people protesting life holding signs my body's for sale its just an empty old life
people watching television hypnotism mass media appeal commercial claws grasping lies
faster faster give them something to feel something to do keep this noise from invading my head must drown out noise must drown
splash
waves

silence.

people kneeling in broken down cathedrals praying cracked rosary beads
turning pages of creased, weathered Bibles.
Jesus Christ, son of God,
weave together the discarded pieces of these shattered lives
victory the shout of the quiet
life the fullness of a rested soul
in stillness
I am.

Brokenness

When a shepherd breaks the legs of one of his sheep, it is to keep that sheep from wandering away from the flock. The result is that the sheep becomes close to the shepherd, for the shepherd carries him. The sheep no longer lives by its own efforts, but learns to be sustained by the shepherd.

When bones heal improperly, sometimes they need to be rebroken in order to heal.

Brokenness can result from a variety of causes, one of them being wrongly ordered emotions. Feeling is too painful, so don't feel. Sweep the shattered pieces into a dark, abandoned corner or underneath a table with a nice long tablecloth. We don't want to feel pain, fear, loneliness, judgment, heartbreak. So we decide we are over it. It's finished. Time to move on.

Yet we haven't moved one, we've merely ignored the issue. The bone that was broken begins to heal improperly. As a result of turning off those emotions in our heart, other emotions are turned off.

I think the heart has one switch for emotions. I cannot avoid the depths of pain without avoiding the depths of love. I cannot redeem myself from the consequences of broken relationships without sheltering myself from the consequences of good ones. Safety from bad emotions becomes a safety from all emotions. One can turn him or herself off completely, or in a variety of degrees. Perhaps we allow ourselves to feel some pain and some love, but not too much, just enough, just what is not risky. We invest ourselves in others to the extent we are willing to risk feeling again. Ultimately, our decision to "move on," to heal ourselves from pain on our own efforts, hurts both ourselves and others.

And so we live, until God rebreaks that bone that healed wrong. He graciously takes that lamb that has tried to walk on its own emotional strength and rebreaks its legs.

" . . . the Lord will strike Egypt, striking and healing, and he will listen to their please for mercy and heal them" - Isaiah 19:22

He strikes to heal.

"Make me to hear joy and gladness; that the bones which thou hast broken may rejoice." - Psalm 51:8

It hurts, deeply, often more than the original pain. Sometimes it seems as though healing may never come. Saint John of the Cross wrote, "Why then, if you so broke my heart, do you refuse to make it heal?" But there is healing. It may not always seem like it, but there is. It comes from the arms of the Beloved.

The way to deal with damaged emotions is to not deal with them yourself. It is to offer your broken heart to God, and allow Him to bring healing, for "he heals the brokenhearted, and binds up their wounds" (Psalm 147:3).

Yes, the shepherd breaks us emotionally. And He heals our shattered pieces and, as a result, draws us closer to Him. Somehow then we are able to love others more, to empathize; somehow then we are able to glorify Him more, through suffering, through pain, through brokenness.

"We shall draw nearer to God, not by trying to avoid the sufferings inherent in all loves, but by accepting them and offering them to Him; throwing away all defensive armour. If our hearts need to be broken, and if He chooses this as the way in which they should break, so be it." - C.S. Lewis

What armor are you wearing today? Are you willing to give it to God?

Will you let Him break you?

Will you let Him heal you?

Macbeth is tempted

Macbeth is tempted
Originally uploaded by Rachel924.