OKAY

Am I ok?
Yes. Nothing’s broken; I can still
Walk. But I might limp a little ’til
The soreness goes away.

Am I ok?
Yes. I can get up and go on
Again. But I’m going to step a little more
Carefully so as not to slip once more.

Am I ok?
Yes. But now I understand
Some things you’ve known all along.
And I wonder how
To carry them as
Gracefully as you do.

Am I ok?
Yes.
Because someday the bruise
Will make its way from black to blue to yellow
And be gone. Someday I will walk securely
Again–unafraid.

Am I ok?
Not really.
But I’m trying.

the ultimate signature

“My dear Jesus, my Savior, is so deeply written in my heart, that I feel
confident, that if my heart were to be cut open and chopped to pieces,
the name of Jesus would be found written on every piece.” – St. Ignatius
of Antioch

qtd in NBBC Alumni update 10-22-2007

For this to be true in any heart requires a rewrite of our spiritual DNA! But that’s the beauty of the promise in Jeremiah 31 and in Hebrews 8–God promises to write His law into our very hearts. That’s the promise I love best in Scripture!!!

Wonder

I wonder how it felt to the little boy who gave Jesus his lunch.

I wonder how the poor widow woman felt as she prepared the loaf for Elijah instead of for herself and her son.

I wonder how the lady felt as she dropped her whole income–one penny–into the treasury at the temple.

I wonder how Moses felt the first time God used his stick.

Wonder.

Sometimes the sense of helplessness comes first. The sense of smallness. Maybe even the sense of ridiculousness. But underlying all of it is a knowledge of what is right. And often a tiny, incongruous sense of hope.

And afterwards . . . A sense of wonder.

A sense of satisfaction and then curiosity and then utter amazement that could hardly find the words to speak itself.

A sense of wanting to be still and quiet for fear of breaking the silence.

And sometimes there’s just the comfortable sense of knowing one’s God after all.

it’s not over yet

Oh, every year hath its winter,
And every year hath its rain—
But a day is always coming
When the birds go north again.

When new leaves swell in the forest,
And grass springs green on the plain,
And alders’ veins turn crimson—
And the birds go north again.

Oh, every heart hath its sorrow,
And every heart hath its pain—
But a day is always coming
When the birds go north again.

‘Tis the sweetest thing to remember,
If courage be on the wane,
When the cold, dark days are over—
Why, the birds go north again.

~ taken from Streams in the Desert (copyright 1925) October 9

September 11, 2009

Another September 11 has come and gone. As I wrote the date yesterday, it suddenly hit me what day it was–and what the significance was! September 11 was the day that terrorist attacks became more than just international news; they became part of the American experience.

The thing about terrorist attacks is that they are unreachable and indefatigable. Difficult to pin down, they exhaust you and make you start to wonder if there are other ways to obtain peace. Because that’s what you want–you didn’t want to pick the fight with them; they lashed out at you while you were busy living and letting them live. And as you start wracking your brain for other alternatives, as you try to make sense out of what happened, you start to see their point of view a little more, start to grasp their motives a little better. And then it’s easy for things to become more and more twisted from the effort of trying to make sense out of it all. And then you begin to accept the blame little by little for what happened, hoping that if you come half-way, if you accept your part of the blame, they will admit their part and meet you in the middle. After all, isn’t that how peace comes in normal relationships?

But terrorism is not a normal relationship. And the terrorists are not interested in making peace. They are not going to admit they were wrong. They are not the ones that want peace–you are.

Somewhere along the line we have to realize what forgiving others really means. Forgiveness stems from a recognition of the wrong that has been done to us, not from rationalizing the behavior. Forgiveness has to be firmly grounded in truth. Sometimes the truth may include the fact that the person who wronged us did so unintentionally, but it cannot ignore the wrong! Nor can it ignore the fact that there is a price to be paid for what was done to us. Instinctively we know that the price must be paid, and that’s how we get things twisted–when the other person refuses to acknowledge his wrong, we begin to wonder if perhaps we deserved it all along and then start to think that we are simply paying for our wrongs ourselves. That mindset bears only a small resemblance to the truth and it stops us from truly forgiving and moving on. Instead it makes us a slave to the one that has hurt us and now holds power over us.

It works that way with bullies on playgrounds. Why would it be any different between nations and people groups?