God

Slow down

~ Amelia ~ 1 Comment

Everything has popped up in that vibrant happy April green. Most days, it feels exciting and new and clean and full of hope. Tiny buds on the trees say “hello” or maybe giggle or coo. Splashes of color camouflage the former endless span of lifeless tree trunks. I have walked and walked waiting for her sweet return. Ahhh. Spring. What a verb. What a season. The violent rainfall has birthed such beauty in the form of countless species of plants, trees, and flowers. The birds sing and talk about it all incessantly. They often wake so early because they can’t seem to get it all done in the daylight hours. All of the leaves and new plants will hinder me from having stare contests with the deer in the woods. But I know they’re still in there, heads down, grazing away on the delicious spring buffet. 

Today, the sky looks like it’s about to cry. A familiar eerie greenish greyish blue, a popular Midwest crayon color. I can’t wear my sunglasses today,to cover up my sad eyes, it would be too hard for me to see my next step. I could trust my dogs to lead me which I’ve often done. Close my eyes and hold onto the leash…”the Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want…” Psalms 23 …oh, if he would make me lie down in green pastures. How would I ever get up? Most likely, the licks and panting in my face would force me out of my dull state. 

The truth is that this adventurous shepherd rescue dog of ours has lead me to the most thought-provoking places and people, despite his intimidating reputation. He doesn’t seem to know he is scary and most of the time, his sensitivity leads him to retreat or fake his best attempts at “guard dogging” the world. He sniffs while I pray and ask for God’s presence to envelop me and help me make sense of the brutally hard and complicated things in life. The utterly beautiful too. “Look over here…” God says, as he shows me the massive exposed roots of a wise old tree planted on the bank of a stream that used to have water flowing below. But the stream is now mud. I could cry because I’m not sure if that beautiful tree will survive the death of the stream.  “Are you here?” I ask. Then, I look out and see not one, not two, but three deer. Father, Son and Holy Spirit. It’s hard to be alone in your thoughts with wonder and worry and doubts. How grateful I am to have the closeness of a Creator that walks ahead of me, beside me and sets up camp inside of me too. Even when I can’t see him or feel him, he’s there. Always.

I have found that everyday the walk is different. I can’t expect or determine or predict or plan what I will see or experience. Everything is constantly changing or altered by the wind, the sun, the clouds. God gently guides me to just go for the walk, trust and take the time, “slow down.” One day, I walked through one of my favorite passages of the woods listening to the Mumford and Sons song “Clover.” Tears streamed down my face as he repeatedly sang, “slow down….slow down.” Okay. Okay. Got it. I thought he sang “divine clover” until I read the lyrics. It truly was divine clover for me when I heard it first on the trail. So many times I am rushing through days and weeks, from one thing to the next, and I think it must be pretty hard for God to get through and for me to actually hear. It’s always in the “slow down” the quiet and stillness within me where God speaks the most boldly, profoundly and lovingly. Patience and surrender. Or maybe surrender and patience. Lord, help me hold these two delicately, tenderly and with the utmost respect for your plans, provision and truth.

It’s okay to have days where I want to wear sad glasses to hide the runaway lost and confused tears. God has designed us to be such marvelously complicated human beings. We aren’t meant to feel so absolutely positively comfortable here. “Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.” Please, Lord, bring a little more heaven here today. Thank you for spring’s return. The enchanting smells, sights, and sounds overwhelm me in the most humbling of ways. Thank you for the days where I can’t wear my sunglasses and yet, you help me learn to trust and follow you anyways.

Kitchen Sink Prayers

~ Amelia ~ Leave a comment

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I looked out my kitchen window at the sky. The purples, pinks and oranges melted together as if they were exhausted but in a beautiful way. I loaded the dirty dishes as my boys ran around and around. In and out of the kitchen, careful of the open dishwasher. I tilted my head and noticed a crooked bunch of clouds shaped like a heart. Only there was a hole in the middle. I began to slow, sneaky tear cry.

I talked to God in my head and questioned who gets healed. Why not the dying child whose parents have a faith so thick it nearly suffocates all who witness it? Why not heal the women who so desperately want to fill their wombs with a child? Don’t worry about my gingivitis, but could you heal my diseased lungs? Or the starving children? Or the child that hides from an abuser day in and day out? Please heal the broken marriages. Heal the broken hearts. Heal the lonely. The alone. The abandoned. The orphaned. The neglected.

I looked out the window again at the fading sunset. The heart cloud had disappeared. My son walked in, looked at me, reached up and began pushing on my face with his hands. He was trying to physically make me smile by pressing on the sides of my mouth. I must have looked the way I felt inside. Hurt. Forgotten. Unimportant. Not worthy enough to be healed.

It’s a delicate and extremely sensitive matter. Opening up old wounds, not forgotten but semi-healed, from the inside out. Who gets to be healed, blessed, cured, saved and fed?

I wiped my eyes on a dirty dishtowel next to the stove and left a mascara print.

I can’t believe in a god who picks and chooses. I can’t wrap my head around a god that does not heal the woman who could not make it close enough to touch his clothes. I can’t believe in a god that does not love all. That doesn’t feel the hurt, the pain, the breath-stealing moments of all. The emptiness. The loneliness. The desire to do more but to be so physically or emotionally restrained. Tied to a chair. In the middle of nowhere. With no one.

I go to God. Plead with God. With a faith that’s been around the block a time or two. A faith that questions, cries out, begs, grows then nearly gets extinguished by the pain, unfairness, and people who say the wrong thing. A selfish faith that sees the world through my near-sided eyes. What do I know? Less and less.

I know the beauty of a sunset. The beauty of my son’s toothless laugh with his squenched up nose. I’ve felt the love of many, the endless unconditional love. I’ve laughed a million laughs. I’ve held countless hands. I’ve felt the kicks, elbows and hiccups of the babies I’ve held and snuggled in the middle of the night. I’ve chased giggling toddlers. I’ve answered late night phone calls. I’ve hugged mothers. I’ve heard the cries of many. And through it all, I’ve held on tightly to this faith that I can’t begin to comprehend. It’s far too complicated so I just do the littlest and the most that I can. And love through it all. And I pray that God is okay with my confused, wounded kitchen sink prayers.