What if

What if I began to be mesmerized by beauty? 

What if I adored the adorable? 

What if I loved the lovable? 

In this way what if my love grew more and more, until finally 

it overflowed and I could love the unlovable too?

What would happen if I started with the most lovable and spilled down from there? 

If I watered others with grace and love, flowing down from the Source, from the Spring, from the Fountain -

God? 

God is love. 

What if I start with loving God? 

From there I would have a strong foundation on which to stand. 

From that strong foundation of love to God I would be able to reach out and 

to love even those who do not love me in return; 

because the source of my love is not found in their love for me, 

which can be fickle or nonexistent, 

but in God's love for me, which is infinite and neverending. 

We rely so much on equal parts in a relationship. 

We give only as much as we get, and no more. 

What if I gave more? 

What if I ventured into the unknown?

What if I exhausted myself in loving others, 

poured myself out in showing others the beauty and mercy of 

the Beautiful Merciful One? 

What if I cared nothing for what I received in return, 

only what I could give?

Why am I so afraid? 

I want to grip the hands of my Father in heaven and let him twirl me around, 

lift me into the air and set me down in a different place - 

a place that might even be precarious, were it not for 

his steady hands holding me tight. 

If I stand on the brink. 

If I take a deep breath. 

If I plunge in. 

What then?

imperishable beauty

...but let your adorning be the hidden person of the heart with the imperishable beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which in God's sight is very precious. (1 Peter 3:4)

What a humbling verse this is. It rebukes me for my senseless forsaking of the better things. I trade matters of the heart for matters of fashion and outward appearance. I am often just like Narcissus, so wrapped up in myself that I forget others, blind to everything, even my own state.

"Narcissus so himself forsook,

And died to kiss his shadow in the brook."

There are some things I must daily learn and apply in my life:

- hidden
Unlike outward appearance, this adorning is never for show. It is concealed. Often we can have competitions with others regarding how we look on the outside. We are critical beings, gazing with our self-appointed-expert eyes upon others and giving them a thumbs up or down. This adorning, this hidden person of the heart, is an adornment that only God can see. With this hidden adornment, we do not say, "I thank you God that I am not like these terrible-looking other people....", modeling and parading ourselves in front of others in order to raise ourselves just that much higher. Taking care of your outward appearance is fine, but it is far more important to take care of this hidden beauty of the heart.

- imperishable
Physical beauty changes and fades, but this beauty is incorruptible, immortal, never out of style. It is an eternal beauty, which makes it far more important - and far better. Outward beauty is good, and caring for our appearance is not an evil. But we ought to pay attention to the imperishable, spiritual beauty.

- gentle
The first thing about this hidden and imperishable beauty is gentleness. Gentleness is "demonstrating power without undue harshness". It is reserve and strength, power and self-control. It is having power and strength, but restraining it. It is giving a soft touch when you could give a falcon punch.

- quiet
The second thing is quietness. It is being peaceful, tranquil. Steady, "settled due to a divinely inspired inner calmness". It is not lashing out with words and actions, but "keeping one's seat". Being able to control yourself rather than exploding in anger or frustration.

- precious
Of all the reasons to cultivate a gentle and quiet spirit, this is number one: God finds it precious. What he finds precious ought to be our number one desire. That it is precious means it is of great value. Costly. Excellent. Of surpassing worth. In God's sight, a gentle and quiet spirit is very precious. Friends, let us see the value just as God sees it, and let us seek to cultivate this gentleness, this quietness, that we may better represent Christ and better love one another. Amen.

"War must be, while we defend our lives against a destroyer who would devour all; but I do not love the bright sword for its sharpness, nor the arrow for its swiftness, nor the warrior for his glory. I love only that which they defend."

- J. R. R. Tolkien

Hope

Simmering silent in my heart's secret corners, there lie my hopes. 

They hide in the depths and the dark.

They have been bruised before.

Not crushed; despair has never yet quite won over my hopes. 

There has been no total devastation.

Hope might be a flickering flame, but it is a stubborn one.

It will not so soon be snuffed.

SORROW AND JOY

Sorrow and joy,
striking suddenly on our startled senses,
seem, at the first approach, all but impossible
of just distinction one from the other,
even as frost and heat at the first keen contact
burn us alike.

Joy and sorrow,
hurled from the height of heaven in meteor fashion,
flash in an arc of shining menace o'er us.
Those they touch are left
stricken amid the fragments
of their colourless, usual lives.

Imperturbable, mighty,
ruinous and compelling,
sorrow and joy
- summoned or all unsought for -
processionally enter.
Those they encounter
they transfigure, investing them
with strange gravity
and a spirit of worship.

Joy is rich in fears;
sorrow has its sweetness.
Indistinguishable from each other
they approach us from eternity,
equally potent in their power and terror.

From every quarter
mortals come hurrying,
part envious, part awe-struck,
swarming, and peering
into the portent,
where the mystery sent from above us
is transmuting into the inevitable
order of earthly human drama.

What, then, is joy? What, then, is sorrow?
Time alone can decide between them,
when the immediate poignant happening
lengthens out to continuous wearisome suffering,
when the laboured creeping moments of daylight
slowly uncover the fullness of our disaster,
sorrow's unmistakable features.

Then do most of our kind,
sated, if only by the monotony
of unrelieved unhappiness,
turn away from the drama, disillusioned,
uncompassionate.

O you mothers and loved ones - then, ah, then
comes your hour, the hour for true devotion.
Then your hour comes, you friends and brothers!
Loyal hearts can change the face of sorrow,
softly encircle it with love's most gentle
unearthly radiance.

- Dietrich Bonhoeffer

Thunderstorms

I am deeply in love with thunderstorms.

I miss them in winter, so much so that I have to go to rainymood.com to soothe the absence.

I am unsure why I love thunderstorms so much, but I imagine it must have something to do with the fact that I've always equated them with God.

I remember being little, shorter than the counter tops, hearing the thunder, seeing the lightning. During particularly close, forceful storms, every time the lighting flashed my siblings and I would say, "Wow!" and wait for the thunderclap, counting the seconds.

My Mom would point us to God, his power, his authority over creation, and his compassion for us. We would discuss the science of storms, and the Source of them, so I did not feel fear, but fascination.

The rain and thunder represent compassion and strength, bringing life, and humility. I am nothing compared to a thunderstorm; the thunderstorm is nothing compared to its Creator. The lightning flashes, the rain pours, and the thunder booms out of some necessity to praise the God of the heavens and the earth.

I hear you, thunderstorm, and I love you deeply. 

You remind me of my Heavenly Father, who loves me deeply. 

Welcome back.

A robin

I observed a robin through the window. He sat still and feather-puffed on the sill, waiting for the rain to cease. Ever so slowly I approached until nothing separated us but the glass. I was inside, he was out; we were in two different worlds, observing each other, wondering.

Then he flew away.

True Courage

Bilbo: I have never used a sword in my life.

Gandalf: And I hope you never have to. But if you do, remember this: 
True courage is about knowing not when to take a life, but when to spare one.