broken (five-minute-friday)

naptime is broken, snapped clean off after 45 minutes, and i try desperately to stitch it back together. 

i whisper into the monitor "good night" and you ask "coze?" and your sister is stirring. 

i climb the stairs, these knees clicking and creaking and with every click i remember the falls; holding you, holding her, landing slam on my left knee, my right.  each knee bore the weight of me holding you both, the scars, the damage.  i'd do it again without thinking twice - without thinking once - catching you comes easier than breathing.

and there is something about mothering that breaks me down, and keeps these knees pressed hard to the floor.  there is so short a time for me to catch you.
i'll never stop holding.
i'll be pulling you on to my lap when you're a freckled eleven, a brawny twenty, a thirty-year-old holding your own newborn.

and i'll keep on crashing to these knees, broken.



(writing prompt broken from lisajobaker.com)

come down!

check out the first few verses of psalm 144.

Blessed be the Lord, my rock, who trains my hands for war, and my fingers for battle; he is my steadfast love and my fortress, my stronghold and my deliverer, my shield and he in whom I take refuge, who subdues peoples under me.  

O Lord, what is man that you regard him, or the son of man that you think of him?

those possessive pronouns kill me.
my!
really?
the Lord, my rock?  my fortress?  my shield?

i think they must have killed david too, the way they come so naturally, even when approaching God Almighty.

because after that collection of pronouns, david bows and shakes his head.  what is man, that you regard him?

can the God of all creation really care about ... me?

the God who is mighty in glory?  above all and in all and by whom all things exist?  the God who spoke the universe into being, who knows the stars by name and has hosts of angels at his command?

Him?

can he really want to be my rock?

and of course, the scriptures stand firm and abolish any insecurity on that point.
God persistently pursues us, from eden to calvary to the doors of death itself ...

david calls, his voice a tiny cry in the echoes of endless eternity,
bow your heavens, o Lord, and come down!

and of course ...

he did.

but that's another story :).

courage

be of good courage.

courage.

not a character quality i've ever been noted for.  i'm definitely the stay-home-with-a-good-book type.  bearding lions in their den?  uh-uh.  let's just stay away from lions' dens altogether.

but i think it's one of the key qualities that i need to develop if i'm going to live a life with my heart turned determinedly toward God.

i've been loving matthew 6 lately.  Jesus points us to the beauty of discretion, of living a gorgeous life in secret.  as my friend's grandfather put it: christians should be better than they appear.  hidden from all but God, our hearts should be devoted to praying - fasting - giving - forgiving.

not for others to see - but for Him to see.

and i think in this twittery facebooky world, it's hard to do.  i want to announce to the world when someone wrongs me.  i don't want to absorb that hurt and quietly forgive them.  i don't want to bear injury in secret.  i want commiseration.  validation.  maybe even a little mocking session, to make myself feel better.
and when i'm doing something good?  i want to announce that too.  hey!  look at me!  i'm being awesome!
but ... that's exactly what hypocrites do.  announce other people's wrongdoing, and trumpet their own good deeds. 

shame on me.
that's not what Jesus would do.
that's not righteous.
that's not loving.
that's self-centred.  me first.  me best.  me always.

so ... why courage?
it takes courage, to live righteously for God alone.  it takes courage to admit - to myself, and to you - that i haven't been.  it takes courage to realize i'm building a legacy of unrighteousness with my self-first actions, and face the fact that i need to tear that down and live righteously.  it takes courage to value the hidden life over the public one ... to live for the one who sees my motives and intentions, not just my facebook status.

i was thinking about what God's facebook might look like.  i'm not trying to be irreverent or anything, but i think of the things he could say vs. the things he would say, in keeping with his character.
he could say:  seriously!?  she asks me for kids and then complains about them when she has them?!  gah. grow up, pansycakes!
but he'd more likely say: lovin' my peeps!
or something like that.  :)

because love covers a multitude of sins.  it doesn't bring them to light for everyone to see.  it covers.  protects.  bears.  heals.

 and that takes a brave heart.