A Spirit Not Of Fear

Rambling... because the thoughts of Tonight are too awake to sleep until Tomorrow.

I cupped my hands about my face, blocking out the glaring lights and blinking owlishly up at the dark unfurled sky as I sought the stars. I found them, glinting like shrouded diamonds in the scattered white-gold dust of clouded moonlight. With each glimpse and glimmer my heart bounded with delight, captured in the sort of childish enchantment that only emerges once a heart has grown old. Painfully old, perhaps: attuned to beauty through an aching fierce and terrible.

But even as I counted the sky-diamonds, I felt a thrust of a disappointment as childish as my delight. The stars were beautiful, yet still my heart sank at the sight of them. It seemed that their sparkling was tainted, as by a veil draped mockingly between earth and sky, letting through only the barest glimmers of reaching starlight. And as though what meager light did manage to squeeze through was forced to linger far above the earth, too far to touch, near enough only to spectate quietly on the happenings of a wretched world: a world deprived of starlight.

Frustration nipped within my chest like a dog rounding upon a frenzied hare. I half-reached a hand toward the sky, wanting to tear away the shroud that hung there and unveil the burning light of the stars, to let them fall upon the earth like flame to candle and watch the trees turn to quicksilver. To set the whole world alight… perhaps it would be too glorious, too beautiful a sight for us even to go on living. But it would be enough, if only for one blazing moment, to have seen the world in molten silver.

Yet as my hand parted from my face, the church lights darted back into my vision. Slowly I lowered both of my hands and turned to the light, blinking uncomprehendingly as the dim starglow fled before a flood glaring yellow-white. I wilted before it. Though the stars' dimness had pained me, at least they had been gentle. This light was cruel, stabbing through my eyes and into my mind until its brightness washed out the memory of gentler things. 
Still, I did not turn away. I gazed, like a mesmerized owlet, at the crowd of people before me. They were dark shadows against the brightness, milling about the sidewalk and lingering within the glass doors through which the light shone. Voices, laughter, shouting—sounds I had not noticed when my mind was consumed by the stars—all came rushing into my ears. Mocking, they surrounded me in a depth of loudness and confusion: loud for the strength of them, confusing not only for their clamor, but for their joy. I could not understand the laughter, nor the voices which spoke words I could not decipher, but were full of carefreeness. They lingered in the harsh, false light, embracing the setting as though it was beautiful. As though it was… home.

I turned away suddenly, tearing my eyes away from the light. Still the glare of it burned in my vision, a brand upon my eyelids. I felt my way around the side of the large church van parked beside me and pressed my back against it, sliding down to sit upon the ground. There, with the van between me and the brightness, I pressed my hands against my closed eyes and was still. As the light faded away I lingered still, huddled beneath the moon with the cold wind chasing my wrists and the murmur of voices muffled in the distance. I hugged my knees against my chest and stared upward, seeking the stars once more; when I found them this time I rested back my head and trained my eyes upon them, drinking them in. It might have been dim, but at least the starlight was real.

Real… oh, yes, it was real. But it was dying, too. I blinked, remembering what I had always known, and yet had somehow managed to forget. For I knew that the dimness of the stars was not merely a veil between earth and sky, but that the stars shone with a fading light, because they moved with the heartbeat of a fading world. Just as the vanishing moon reflected the light of a dying sun, and the oceans the glimmering glow of both; and just as every part of creation knew the groaning of death and sorrow—as with all of these, so it was with the stars, and so it was with me. I held no bitterness for the others and their comfort in the light. But somehow, in the aching that had made me a child again, I had glimpsed a beauty worth aching for… and when I had, my view of the things of this world could never be the same.

At last I heard the falling of footsteps and voices growing louder and nearer. I scrambled to my feet as the others wandered over to the place where I waited, finally having said their good-byes. They were still talking and laughing, and they took no notice of me, though somehow I didn’t mind. As the cold wind drove the shadows closer, everyone clambered into the van, ready at last to go home.

The cloud-wreathed moon hung above us as we drove through the darkness, and I huddled by the window and stared back at it where it loomed above the night like a lesser sun. I leaned my head against the pane, suddenly realizing that I was tired. Still I gazed at the moon as our journey went on, my thoughts wandering, as my mind grew more tired, to when I would at last be home.

What home? Only God knew which would gather me first: the home that claimed my wandering, or the home that stole my heart. Yet I knew, somehow, that my feet had longer yet to wander here, in the paths that wind between bitterness and brokenness and bind them in the end, at last, into some finished thing of Healing.

Until then, in the stealing sleepfulness of  the night, perhaps I would dream; if only for a little while, of the lights beyond the night -- stars that blaze like fire, as quick and fierce as a stab of silver.

 I was huddled over my psychology book, precariously situated up-top the stool beside our kitchen island. My window reflected the same near-autumn view it has framed since this morning; all of dove-gray and charcoal. A few feet from me, the dishwasher gargled menacingly from its own little corner, loudly proclaiming the fulfillment of its duties as the backdrop for my studies.

Until suddenly, it stopped. Stopped, utterly and completely. I was left with nothing but the sound of... nothing. From a gurgling, muted sort of roar to absolutely nothing at all.

Nothing.

Nothingness.

Nothing.

I lifted my eyes and looked out the window at the gray sky swarming over the trees, heart beating amain as my ears waited breathlessly for the trumpet sound to pierce the utter silence. For surely, that was to come next...? The awful blast, the terrible rending of the sky and the furling of it as a curtain, and then our longing fulfilled; our stealing away into the deep, beautiful mystery that is all of God's splendor, to be secret to us no longer. No more the jeweled veil of the heavens to stand as a shield between us and the terrible beauty of the Almighty, as the glory of our rapture ushers us into His infinity... no more the aching of this world, no more the shadows; everything, everything swept away in the mighty gust of the Eternal's beckoning. All the echoes of eternity to erupt in splendor in the mere breath of one beautiful, awful moment.


A single moment of silence.



Had I held my breath until the trumpet blast, my heart would by now have stopped beating. It never came.

 The house soon returned to sound, my heart to its sighing rhythm, and as soon as this is posted I shall return to studying for my Psychology exam. Yet, I find that I cannot do so quite the same. For in me is a heart within which beats something of eternity, that ever-aching thrum of longing, of tiredness, of yearning... of hope. Oh, the fluttering rhythm is always there: it never leaves, but it is so often lost beneath the mutterings of the Temporary Reality. Only when these mutterings are stilled may it again be noticed, standing out suddenly as a smattering of paint on a blank canvas or the plucking of a single harpstring. The moment of remembrance is pierced with an aching like nothing I have ever known, yet which is more familiar to me than anything, because I have always known it.

 Yet nothing, not even the aching, can quell the bursting joy that slashes through the numb shadows of our temporal existence when we seize the knowledge of Reality. For the reason we long, the reason we ache, is because we are straining for something Real—a beauty beyond our tactile mirrors and smoke. It is the ardent longing for the truth of Eternity that is not only our sorrow, but our solace. What we long for will not be held away forever: it will come, in a bounding, leaping dawn of Jubilee.

A single moment of silence—may every moment be so full of eternity.

 This is Christ’s Kingdom within us, the hope and the longing combined into a burning purpose. We are made for more. We live for more, for something far beyond ourselves. We live for love beyond the offerings of this world, and in the hope of a beauty beyond the broken shadows that surround us. For we exist in a dim reflection, a world made of shattered mirrors that cannot compare to what Really Is—and yet we are so certain, so convinced in our brokenness that we see things clearly, heartbreakingly confident that we know things for what they really are.

 But when comes the New, and when all is Remade, the filthy, broken glass will crumble away to nothing, the shadows to Not; and the fog shall be rent as a curtain torn away and we shall see, finally see things for what they are. Beauty we have never dreamed of, the reality of Love finally felt by our bodies made new, the sight and sound and scent and taste and touch of eternal Newness; the murkiness of this shadow-world finally torn away from our eyes and the light of what is True bursting forth into our souls—breaking the dawn of a day that will never, ever end.

 But there is more to the restless longing. Because we, through Christ, have been redeemed from the shadows; ransomed from the captivation of the darkness, drawn back into the original purpose of our Creation—back into the More that is God Himself. But Fully More is still a promise, a promise for when Christ returns and we and the world are remade. For now, we remain here, left in the darkness in order to spread the light.

 …No, not left. Never abandoned. For though we long, though we ache, we cannot truly want. Wanting exists of emptiness, of absence, of need. We do not exist of emptiness; we exist because we are filled. Christ has filled us, freed us, redeemed us, and, in so doing, fulfilled us: already in Him our souls are made new. In Him we have the strength to endure, the love to survive, the purpose to go on. We have everything we need, and without need, we cannot truly want. But still we long; oh! we long, and we ache, and we break for the beauty of what is, for now, beyond our touch. The loveliness of everything we were created for.

 But it is not time. Not time, yet, to see the precious wonders limned by God’s hand far beyond the curtain of our sky; not time, for the Resurrection and the Remaking; not time, for full awareness of everything that Truly Is. God Is. This we know. And until the day when everything changes, knowing this is enough.

And until that day, my soul will sing itself to sleep: "The LORD is my Shepherd, I shall not want..."

I’ve been silent for way too long. My fingers have been itching, DYING to type out everything that has been on my heart and in my mind. Yet it’s as though each time I sit down to type, there’s a stopper wedged in the door of my mind. Everything that God has led me through this summer, everywhere that he has taken me, the experiences I’ve had; it’s too MUCH. I can hold it in my heart and in my head, and it’s filling me nearly to bursting, but I can’t squeeze it out into typing. The words won’t come, and it’s driving me to distraction, because I want them to come so badly.

Yet God is bigger than my words. He’s bigger than my summer. And the awe that has humbled my heart because of the glory that I have seen this summer is just a taste of the utter brokenness that my Father wants for me. As I served the broken this summer, I was learning how to be broken myself. As I split rails, cleaned bathrooms, wacked weeds and renewed old pathways while working at camp, I was humbled immensely by how present God was in the most dirty, difficult tasks. His glory spilled over in every blister, dirt stain, and moment of pure exhaustion as we surrendered ourselves to being poured out by Him.

As I walked the streets of our nation’s capital this summer, I looked into the eyes of so many people who were desperately in need. I saw men and women who were sleeping in the sidewalks and starving on the staircases of the monuments, some out of true need and others by pure complacency and personal choice. Still other people walked past in business suits, protected by the shoes on their feet and the clothes on their backs, yet inwardly, thirsting to death. I ate with the homeless and was given a glimpse into their hearts, their desperate need for love spilling over in every encounter. I played with children in a Boys and Girls Club - children who had parents with jobs, shoes for their feet, homes to go to - and I saw the same desperate need flooding their hearts. Each man, woman, and child had a story; they all had joys, fears, and needs. And though each need, story and situation was different, in every face I looked into, I saw the same thing. It was Jesus.

"Then the righteous will answer him, 'Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you something to drink? When did we see you a stranger and invite you in, or needing clothes and clothe you? When did we see you sick or in prison and go to visit you?'
"The King will reply, 'I tell you the truth, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did for me.'”
- Matthew 25:37-40

From the other side of the nation to practically my own doorstep, I have been confronted by Jesus everywhere I turn. Because need is everywhere. In the homeless and in the working, in the adult and the child, in the believer and in the unbeliever, need is overflowing. Their physical, emotional, and spiritual needs are all different, but the ultimate need is the same:

It’s love. It’s compassion; it’s the willingness to seek out their needs and the desire to meet them, not out of obligation, but out of the extreme love that Jesus showed us. Because when we are filled with His love, it overflows.

It’s called being broken. It’s called being a jar of clay—fragile on the outside, but filled with a power that cannot be reckoned with. It’s the power to reach the hearts of the world, to be a beaming light in shadowed places, to overcome the things that this world says is too painful, too debilitating, too tangible or intangible for us to face. To not just face those things, but to do battle with them; to go THROUGH the enemy ranks and to wage war against the gates of Hell which cannot stand against us! It’s what we do when we choose to love. Because when His love captures us, captures us to overflowing, it pours into the hearts of the world to set them free.

I’ll follow You into the homes of the broken,
I’ll follow You into the world.
Oh, I’ll meet the needs of the poor and the needy,
God, I’ll follow You into the world.

Blindness. There seems to be nothing more fearful in all the world. It is why we fear the dark when we are children — it is why, no longer as children, some of us still do.

Yet it can seem, at times, as though we walk in a constant blindness. For who can claim to see the steps that lie ahead of them? The ones behind are easy to see; yet for lack of the future, even the present ones are full of fear. It seems that we who walk by faith are doomed evermore to the urgings of sight: the taunt of a world which cannot see that it lies even more deeply in plight than we. It is a world lost in the comfortless pursuit of comfort, blind to everything but its perception of our seemingly visionless faith — we, who have only been called to set our eyes on Joy, yet find ourselves so often begged to look only upon the fading things of the Ending.

Soooo... Life is tough. That seems to be the general idea I'm getting at.

But this is not the matter's end. I have never seen an odder thing, nor a truer thing, in all my life than this: Without fail, the limited must impose its own limitation upon that which is Limitless; then, with all the wretchedness contained within its tiny and finite self, bemoan that which still escapes its understanding. Shall we never realize that any attempt to control the path which lies before us is nothing other than an attempt to harness its Maker; to place a bridle on the One who placed Pegasus at untamable heights, the One who breathed a soul and a heartbeat into the dust itself? Should it not be a comfort rather than a curse, that the Author of my life has a vision that extends beyond these present pages? It must be so; for to demand that that which by very definition must be beyond comprehension become as small as myself is nothing less than to demand that God cease to be deserving of His Name.

But you cannot make me. No, you cannot; and none shall convict me otherwise — no matter how long the world weeps bitter tears of betrayal over the audacity of its Creator being bigger, wiser, truer, more good and more faithful than itself; though it claw and weep and rage at me, though it claim that the dimness of this mirror-world is unfair, though it do all it can to argue the unjustness of these small understandings — though it do all of this and more, I shall not compromise the greatness of my God.

You see, there comes a time for every soul, when the eyes of those who seek their Maker are brought gaze-to-gaze with that question, that truthful blight that can lift the lowest heart in laughter and bend the highest head in shame. That question — Wouldn't you think we would know better by now? Is it not time that the little side-paths that ever evade our vision might become to us no longer a thing of fear, but of joy? For the One who holds our hand is ever faithful; oh, He is faithful! And not a Promise has been reached by a pilgrimage that did not, by some walk or wayside, leave a wilderness in its wake.

Yet the school of day-by-day is teaching me its lesson; though it is a lesson slowly and arduously learned. The name of that lesson? None other than Trust. Oh, Trust is a wild thing; and the taming of it is equally so — but aren't the best and truest adventures always touched by fear? There is no one I would rather cherish, no one that I would rather follow, than He who holds the fragile universe perfectly on tilt, beautifully balanced, yet still cares for me with a love so deep that He would die for me. And did.

For such a One must be great, indeed.

“Oh, the depth of the riches of the wisdom and knowledge of God!
How unsearchable his judgments, and his paths beyond tracing out!
"Who has known the mind of the Lord? Or who has been his counselor?"
“Who has ever given to God, that God should repay him?"
For from him and through him and to him are all things.
To him be the glory forever! Amen.
– Romans 11:33-36

 

Sometimes...



And even if you are a Writer, and you Like Ink... that is not a compliment.

Sometimes, I feel like an inkstain on the written work of my life, penned by the hand of God. Like a very unsplendid blot that landed in the middle of the page somehow; the sort that makes you wince, trying to rub it away with your fingers, even though you know it won’t do any good.

I hear people say that “God don’t make no dirt.” (The grammar? Horrid. The phrase? Existent. More's the pity.) When I hear it, two things come to mind (apart from the miseries we shall soon endure if we do not learn to better wield the English language). The first: I know it is true. The second: I’m perfectly capable of making my own dirt, thank you very much, and ruining my life to the fullest of my abilities without any help whatsoever.

There are times when I believe I am more capable of doing wrong than I am of doing right. And it frightens me.

In the midst of this petty life, where the wakeful darkness of my Saturday nights is spent wondering how to be as impossibly perfect as possible at church the next day, living through a sermon about the splendid potential within the 'Good Christian' who has somehow invaded our expectations, and then returning home to face every unholy thought, word, and deed that has plagued my steps and not knowing which is better—avoiding the truth, or facing the reality of what I have been—I cannot help but wonder, sometimes, what this trembling heart could be missing. 

Perhaps, it is 2 Timothy 2:11-14— the promise that no matter how faithless I am, His faithfulness never fails. That He is constant where my own failings can never be—into eternity itself. That He has overcome the self within me, and now: torn, slain, and conquered back into life, I am His.

What is His is His forever. Even an inkstain.

And by a queer thing called Grace, He turns those inkstains into love stories. Because the truly beautiful love stories are about those who were loved, without having anything loveable to offer—and through that love, becoming worth loving.

If you don’t believe it, just ask the inkstains.

Somehow--I'm not entirely certain how--I found myself at a conference last weekend.

Being, as I am, a most uncertain person at the best of times (and I assure you, you do not wish to know me at my worst), the level of confidence that assailed me regarding this conference is surprising. Less surprising, being that I am neither a great optimist nor an adequately convincing pessimist, is that my confidence was placed in what I might expect of the conference; and though none of it was particularly cheerful--well, I managed not to paint the utterest picture of Doom that my mind, when properly stimulated, is perfectly capable of contriving on the most creative of occasions.

Do not misunderstand: there were plenty of things that I was told to expect, among them being: a worship band, loud concerts from which I would willingly make my escape to roam the enormous halls of the conference center (it is amazing how many drinking fountains one can count in the examination of such a building), and - this most appealing of all - a little beach just beyond the hotel window, offering all the rolling and beautiful majesty of the ocean in its waking. Not to mention the warmth of springtide, for whose enjoyment said beach presented itself as a lovely host.

So you see, I was not entirely hopeless. But I did just nearly type that I found the beach 'appalling'. So perhaps I was rather hopeless after all.


Ye Goode Olde Realitie Cheque:

So, I was wrong. And I was right--in some things. Worship band, loud concerts, and daring escapes from said concerts, all yes. Warm weather heralding the come of springtide? Eh... not exactly. However, the freezing temperature and wind chill factor encouraged me to explore this mysterious invention known as the Hoodie, and the results were not altogether discouraging.

As for the hotel room, it was quite lovely, though I never got the chance to inspect any of the rooms. This is due to the fact that I happened to arrive last up the stairs, and upon stepping into the suite, immedately learned that the only bed left upon which to stake my claim was: the hideaway bed! (Thus named as an indicator of its very deceptive scheme to masquerade as a couch. Rather devious, but I caught on quickly -- as soon as I was suitably convinced that sleeping on the porch where I could see the ocean better was not among my list of recommended options. This, my friends, is the distinct disadvantage of taking eighteen flights of stairs whilst the others of the party see fit to utilize the hotel elevator...)

But in the end, I wouldn’t trade those two nights of sleeping on a pullout couch with a thin plastic mattress, and the ocean outside the sliding-glass doors singing me to sleep for anything. The conference itself? Meaningful, in ways you may or may not ever hear about. The beach? It was freezing as winter and windy as Nebraska, but without the tumbleweeds and with the lovely addition of people I happen to care about. All in all, my expectations were met in some ways, overturned in others, and exceeded in other ways still...and in the midst of it, God showed Himself good to me, in even the littlest ways.

For all of that, I just may become a convincing Optimist after all.

To Wrappe This Uppe (and Make a Timelie Escape from Olde England):

My blog posts are usually different than this. I seem to have rambled on for some time without managing to write anything particularly impactful or profound. (Dare I insinuate that I am profound most of the time? Possibly profounder, at least...) Eh... it appears to be somewhat longer, too. And I dare say that boring does not lag far behind. Yet still I have thought it worth writing; for last weekend, I remembered something important.

(...And I have remembered the necessity of ear-plugs when forced to remain within buildings determined to host a series of explosions under the pretense of a concert. But don't mind my irrational paranoia of hearing loss; heed only my thankfulness at having survived nonetheless. )

I'm rather certain that none of this is profound. And yet... it doesn’t have to be. God is good, and that alone is enough to make Him worthy of all the praise, worship, and thanks my little heart is capable of giving. He is Good. And He is God.

 And that, frankly, is all I need have written in the first place. Because I don't suppose anything I could have to say is quite as important as it.

Of Switchfoot:

To begin with, let me be perfectly honest with you. (It's a fair way to start, I suppose...)

It is a rare day that I listen to Switchfoot music. A very rare day. Misunderstand me not: I've nothing against such musical endeavors, nor those who may be involved as either production or audience. It is merely that the combination of electric guitars and drums tend to overstep the more sensitive side of me, which you can usually find lingering in some old washtub, delightedly testing the acoustics it provides for the more primative harmonica.

Still (being perfectly honest as we are), I have lately heard a song that has eased its way into my affections. And – as your irrepressibly bright noggin has probably already decided – it happens to be by Switchfoot.

Which song? It is likely you have guessed that is well. Yet worry not if you have not gotten ahead of me this time; you only make me feel somewhat better about my manner of rambling  (a feeling which, when given in moderation, is not such a very bad thing). Yet to shed a bit of light, the chorus is as follows: “Your love is a symphony; all around me, running through me. Your love is a melody; underneath me, running to me. Your love is a song.”

It is not the most complicated of songs; yet often, I think, the simplest responses to God’s love are the best and deepest ones that can be given. And perhaps, if not certainly, the same rings true for the love that we share between ourselves. But I fear that is something Ye Goode Olde Shakespeare (we arrive at last!) may or may not have realized…


Of Shakespeare:

Shakespeare was not particularly known for his simplicity. And as I did not attempt the reading of Love Poems and Sonnets of William Shakespeare with expectations to the contrary, I was fortunately spared any disappointment that may easily have occurred. Yet amid the rhyme and rhythm of such a flourishing lyrical greenhouse, there was one budding verse that stood out to me among all the other blooming things around it.

I found it in Sonnet LXXV (do not dare even attempt to ask me what number that is). And this is the verse's beginning: “So are you to my thoughts as food to life, or as sweet-season’d showers are to the ground.”

I do not have enough hope for Shakespeare to imagine that he is attempting to describe anything but a humanly love. Yet when first I read it, the timbre and color of his words gave me pause. It seemed not so familiar as to make me think that I had read it before -- yet only that somehow, somewhere, I had heard something very much like it.

And at last, it dawned on me. There was a shepherd boy, you see, who used to write things very much like that. And though his heart has long been stilled, his voice was not kept silent; and still it rings clearly in the hearts and souls of many, urging them onward in the love of a greater Shepherd.

The Shepherd, who gathered His sheep in with love and in turn wrote the sweetest, dearest love song that shall ever be heard in the reaches of the universe-- the love song of the Ransomed.


Be grateful, my friends, that I did not attempt to write this post in Shakesperean. Not only would I have failed, in the utterest sense of the word, but I would likely have driven you moaning from your computer screens, groping away to find something more loving toward the delicate nature of the eyes.

Yet I hope that this post was simple enough. For it is that which I have learned, and that which I have come to treasure: the very simplicity of love. There is nothing of which I know that has the capacity to be so deep and yet so simple in a single stab of its essence: nothing can be so quietly piercing as love, nor dig as deep nor heal as gently. Love is the most simple complication of life: those who can complicate it, will. Yet those who see life simply will see love simply as well - the deepest expression of our human simplicity, all the sincerity of our faith reflected in that ever-living ember of our souls.

And in the end, it's not so very hard to see... that it's not such a complicated thing, as it is a wildly beautiful thing, this love song we echo.

No. It's not so very complicated at all.

-

We come now to the long-awaited explanation (or, as is more likely, the Not-Awaited-in-Any-Way-Shape-or-Form Explanation) for the undoubtedly strange title of these recent posts. You see, it is a little phrase that I heard, once. Or twice. Somewhere. Or perhaps, Somewhere Else... but it is not the Where that matters. It is the What, and this is it:
 

If you recall (and especially if you don't), these recent posts were spurred by the memory of a lady who did little more than secure me a place in front of her in a very ambiguously-located line. Yet in doing so, she offered me an entire world of thought; thoughts for which I could not be more grateful. I can guarantee her forgetfulness of me; and if questioned at the time, I'm certain she could have guaranteed my own forgetfulness of her. Yet such is not the case. Praise God, I did not merely allow a brief thought about the woes of subjectively located checkout lines, and then cease to dwell on the matter -- for though some people may argue that I dwell far too much on many things, I would argue in return that those who dwell too little on the little things are far more likely to undervalue those things most often seen as important.

For I have come to question myself. It is with the greatest ease that I might live out my actions in a blind state of obligation, even an obligation that has little to do with my God and far more to do with the expectations of those around me. But that is not what I long for. My longing, my yearning, is that all which comes from me might be planted not by selfish, gain-seeking hands--hands which I have known all too well--but by a heart whose very roots and soil are watered by Love.

For that was ever the promise: from that to which life is given, more life still shall come. I need only be faithful in sowing my seeds — and truly, the apples are best left to Him.

Two little things haunt my steps: their names are Service and Courtesy. And they are two little things which I question. Really, I don't question how often we follow them. I question the motive of our hearts when we do. The human heart, if I have learned nothing else, is very selfish and frail a thing -- and no one could argue that laying down one's self does not, in fact, hurt.
 
No service may be rendered to us by the rendering of our own service. We can hardly hold open a person's door out of the hope that it changes their lives. Nor can we even feed the hungry in the hopes that they might remember the face and name of the ones who offered them food. And no, we can't do anything because maybe, just maybe, we’ll get mentioned on someone’s blog (let’s face it: it probably won’t happen, and if it does, we’ll never know it).

But perhaps—just maybe—the question is not of why I serve another. Not even of why I should want to do it. Perhaps, first and foremost, the question is of how I serve my God.

“Now that I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also should wash one another's feet. I have set you an example that you should do as I have done for you. I tell you the truth, no servant is greater than his master, nor is a messenger greater than the one who sent him. Now that you know these things, you will be blessed if you do them.” (John 13:14-17)

I said that How was important. But Jesus gave us something more. He gave us, precious gift that it is, a Why.

"A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another." – John 13:34-35

And so it is that, even in seeking to evade myself with a How and Why that comes from Him, it drives me ever back to... me. Yet in doing so, it drives me back to Him after all. For I am called to serve, no longer as a fragile reflection of myself; but instead, brighter and brighter,

(To be continued…)