You are the scorned fancy

The forgotten dream

Your gentle whispers hide between yellowed paper leaves

Your silent thunder in the glistening eve

the silent revelation left

to the crawling things

Shadows draped, stretched transparent out to dry

Behind trunk, stem and stone

Stars wavering, waltzing 

on the iris's balcony arches 

glittering through austral, wincing glee

Light landing, aging

x-ray of veins, leafy marrow and pore

Heat caressing, muffling

warm as the womb where the heavens were born. 

On Truth and Freedom

Surely the world is one that confuses honesty with truth. One can be “true to one’s self” and untrue to the Truth. The world views the idea of “Truth” as a snare, as something that constrains and limits us:

 “We need universes that constantly expand! Moral boundaries create categories that are not real! Truth divides! Truth narrows our minds to one reality! Truth prevents us from defining who we are! It gives us a pre-made identity! It tells us to sit still, be quiet and keep our mouths shut. It tells us to throw away our toys, our joys, our name tags and customized profiles. Rebellion is noble. The shocking is glorious. Shame is a needless fetter, nourished by the spoonful with tradition. Take pride, dance in your nakedness. Let the world see your blood, your bile, your mucus, your grime. Let others see the work of your hands, your twisting, contorting, your melding and molding. Stand tall, and let your veins pop. Let your fingerprinted body take on this new skin. Finish your art with a varnish of sweat. Stand tall. This is your world.” 

And yet, the words of Jesus stand: “You shall know the truth, and the truth shall set you free.” Truth cannot be escaped from. If we close our eyes, it does not mean that the world disappears. If we cannot see truth, it does not mean it cannot see us. Truth is a threat...To some it is a threat of judgement, to others a threat of grace--a violence to the flesh and their sin. So they are afraid, and they build their own sandcastles. They play dress-up, they put paint on their skin and play their parts. They give new names to themselves. Their imaginations run wild, and possessed by them they run off the cliff. The rules of this game aren't written in ink.

But this isn’t just “them”. I know it’s me, too. I see these temptations in myself. The idea of creating my own reality, when I do not feel comfortable with Truth. Self-deception is alluring and inviting. Deception pretends to care, pretends to offer you...What?

 “That thing”. 

Deception is a very good salesman. 

“Woe to you who call good evil, and evil good.”

“Behold, You desire truth in the innermost being, and in the hidden part You will make me know wisdom.”

You shall know the Truth and the Truth shall set you free. 

Just a brush

Just a fleeting touch

He need not fix His gaze

Stop His eyes like fire

Upon my crumbling flesh

If I just—

If I can press—

My hand upon that One

In whom we

Live

Move

Have our Being

If I cannot kiss His feet

Grasp His arm

Hold His hand

One stroke will

Still an ocean

One touch will

Reverse death

One touch will 

Rock a stone cold heart

…As Jesus went, the people pressed around him. And there was a woman who had had a discharge of blood for twelve years, and though she had spent all her living on physicians, she could not be healed by anyone. She came up behind him and touched the fringe of his garment, and immediately her discharge of blood ceased. And Jesus said, “Who was it that touched me?” When all denied it, Peter said, “Master, the crowds surround you and are pressing in on you!” But Jesus said, “Someone touched me, for I perceive that power has gone out from me.” And when the woman saw that she was not hidden, she came trembling, and falling down before him declared in the presence of all the people why she had touched him, and how she had been immediately healed. And he said to her, “Daughter, your faith has made you well; go in peace.”

-Luke 8:42-48

Singleness is such a difficult subject. Sometimes, when rising to the platform of proclaiming my contentment and the sufficiency of Jesus, I feel although I'm the person with some kind of "disability" that everyone is compelled to encourage me in and give me equal respect despite its presence, but in the end everyone secretly "knows" that I have been cut short. I feel like the blind man crying out that eyes were never necessary anyway. Maybe they're not, but you're missing out on a lot and for that we pity you. We'll give you our well wishes and words of encouragement that it's probably better for you to be in this condition now anyways, and with that they send me along with a sympathetic pat on the head and an awkward silence.

I know they mean well, but there is a strange chasm that forms when you start rolling through the twenties. When I was in high school, being single was kind of noble. It almost felt heroic to hold Joshua Harris's book in hand while my silver True Love Waits ring shone in the light. A boy sitting next to me could be expressing a form of flirtation by his choice of reclination, and that was exciting enough to giggle over. My friends dated and broke up, then many of us went in different directions in life. Suddenly the age of possibility came along at eighteen years, and I wondered at the sudden seriousness of it. Granted, eighteen is still young, but to me all of a sudden it seemed strange to go from constantly running away from dating to the beginnings of even the possibility for an actual serious relationship to take place through this new age. When the twenties began, friends were no longer just passing love notes and giggling over games of MASH. They were talking of rings.
I recently re-discovered that Joshua Harris was married at 22. I know I'm not old yet, but I've almost kissed dating goodbye for longer than he has. It's funny how ages sound so much older than when you suddenly step into their skin and zipper them up. You expect to be much fitter. You expect to be a little more buoyant.

There is all of this. And yet there is joy. Yes, there is joy. Or there can be. When I can forget the world, I can listen to the Holy Spirit, and it is precious. Painfully precious. Lonely. And precious. I am not going through depression. I don't cry myself to sleep every night. I have single friends who I can share life with and be understood with without having to make it a party of pity party-ers. But there are times when it hurts to be "alone". There are times when the yearning turns into an ache and it feels like you got hit in the gut. These are the times of beauty, the kind of times that make me feel blessed to be single, because then I get to cry out to God. I can testify to at least one memory of when God vividly flooded my heart with his love in a place where I felt that aching pain. It was wondrous, because he did not remove the throbbing wound, but instead he filled me with his love, a gesture of reassurance that he was sitting with me through it--and that was more lovely and wonderful than his removing the pain. God does not always remove suffering, and that does not mean we are sinning. Sometimes we suffer when we are obeying. Sometimes there is a blessing in the suffering.

There have been times when a part of me has almost wondered that it is not better for me to be single, because of the ways the Lord uses it so beautifully. But I know that there are also blessings that come with marriage. Marriage is not an end to itself. Life is not one big romance novel. It is all a part of God's plan to show his glory to us. And that makes marriage far more exciting, because Jesus is far more satisfying than any spouse will ever be. I have been holding onto Psalm 84:11 for some time now in this season---



For the LORD God is a sun and shield;
the LORD bestows favor and honor.
No good thing does he withhold
from those who walk uprightly.
(Psalm 84:11 ESV)

No good thing does he withhold. He is not withholding good from me in singleness, and he will not withhold good from me after I am married. Praise Him!

*Note (of things obvious and probably unnecessary, but of which I'll state  regardless): I begin this with a lot of quotes--both because I find them eloquent and thought-provoking, and because they contribute to my thought processes for this post. You may, of course, skim or skip these, but if you have the time I think you would probably find something beneficial or alluring to them. But maybe this is just me.)


“Safe?” said Mr. Beaver; “don’t you hear what Mrs. Beaver tells you? Who said anything about safe? ‘Course he isn’t safe. But he’s good. He’s the King, I tell you.” 
― C.S. Lewis, The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe




"We have really only that one light, one source for all power, and yet we must turn away from it by universal decree. Nobody here on the planet seems aware of this strange, powerful taboo, that we all walk about carefully averting our faces, this way and that, lest our eyes be blasted forever."
-Annie Dillard


Our senses perceive nothing extreme; too much noise deafens us, too much light blinds us, too great distance or too great nearness hampers vision, too many words, or too few, obscure speech, too much truth baffles us (I know some men who cannot understand that four from nought leaves nothing), first principles are too plain for us, too much pleasure is a bore, too many concords in music are unpleasing, too many benefits are an annoyance...We feel neither extreme heat nor extreme cold. Qualities in excess are hostile to us and imperceptible, we do not feel them--we suffer them. Extreme youth, and extreme age block the mind, like too much or too little instruction. In short, extremes are for us non-existant, and we are nothing to them. They escape us or we escape them.


Such is our true condition, rendering us incapable of certain knowledge or of absolute ignirance. We sail over a vast expanse, ever uncertain, ever adrift, carried to and fro. To whatever point we think to fix and fasten ourselves it shifts and leaves us; and if we pursue it it escapes our grasp, slips away, fleeing in eternal flight. Nothing stays for us. That is our condition, natural, yet most contrary to our inclination; we have a burning desire to find a sure resting place and a final fixed basis whereon to build a tower rising to the Infinite; but our whole foundation cracks, and the earth yawns to the abyss. Let us then cease to look for security and stability. Our reason is ever cheated by misleading appearances: nothing can fix the finite between the two Infinites which enclose it and fly from it.
-Pascal, Pensees


Large, loud, bright, powerful things can draw out such fearful responses from us. Suddenly we forget everything else. We feel our creatureliness, our temporary-ness, our complete reliance and vulnerability. As our breath hastens, we become aware that if our body could not take over the vital function we would cease to be. Suddenly we feel the muscle in our chest blaring in our ears, banging and yelling and trying its best to keep the engine running. Some people seem to live for the thrills of getting lost in something mighty. To them, danger is a game of bullfighting. 


Some flirt with death. 


Others hide from it. 


I plug my ears when an ambulance speeds past me. I crush ants, flies, and certain spiders, but I will transport a caterpillar or a beetle onto my backyard soil, while all through the process assuring it that I have wholly good intentions for it to step onto my vehicle of choice. I only ever rode one roller coaster, which was entirely loop-free (unless Peter Pan, It's a Small World and Pirates at Disneyland count).


 I watch fireworks from a distance. I don't believe in fixing my hair too fancy that I can't drive with my windows rolled down, but I would rather not lean my head over a cliff to get a more tangible taste of what 15,000 feet elevation looks like. Knowing I'm on a mountain is knowledge enough for me, thank you. 


The sun fascinates me. Have you ever considered the sun? We are so dependent on it, it serves many necessary functions for life, yet with every turning of the day it hangs like an ornament in the sky. It warms our face, yet also gives us cancer. It draws our eyes to its dazzling light, then turns us away from a staring contest we can never win, burning black spots in our vision to mark its victory. The sun is humbling. Even without knowledge of the large numbers that calculate just how big the star is, it does not take much time under its gaze to realize it could easily squash us under its thumb, leaving its mark on us in a variety of ways. 


The sun reminds me of God and his holiness. I do not mean "God" in the abstract. I do not mean "God" in the pluralistic or pantheist sense. I mean "God" as in Yahweh; God as in the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, God as in Jesus of Nazareth, God as in Emmanuel. A great deal of talk about "God" these days does not picture him as holy--as frightening. A God like the sun is frightening. We cannot control him. He can choose to give us life, but he can also burn us. We are at his mercy, for he rules the day and the night, and we cannot escape his gaze. We cannot fight against him. We cannot close our eyes and wish him away, close our blinds and live by fluorescent alone. The sun will creep in through the cracks, to remind us that the same thing that could kill us is what keeps us alive. 


When God brought the Israelites out of Egypt, God's presence was a terrible sight. The mountain shook. Because the people were sinful, they could not draw near. Light can blind us, but light can also banish darkness. We were all darkness--and many still are. Until the Light came. But this Light did not come to burn, but to enlighten. Suddenly, there was a glimmer of hope. This God, this sun-like God, could be approached--and not just approached, but known. Delighted in. Loved. Worshipped. And the wonder of this is that God took on our own darkness. And this is love. Love tangible, love intervening, love using its power to act on behalf of our frailty and depravity. We are not just at his mercy, but he has given us mercy. Jesus is our forerunner. Suddenly we can stand before the Holy Consuming Fire and stand unscathed. Suddenly beggars are invited to feast with the King. There will be no beheading. His scepter is outstretched. 


We are still small. His brightness would blind us. 


But we've been given new eyes. Eyes which can stare into the blazing eyes of Love and sing. 

The velvet carpet drapes over my head

With bright spots like pinholes

Lanterns of the outside world

The shepherd's joy

And the child's song