Strength & Victory

Ever since my body was smashed up pretty badly I live with a certain level of discomfort.  I truly live with it, as in, I don't really notice.  When I hear a snappish tone accompanying my speech I am learning to take inventory.  Sure enough, something is throbbing/tight/weak -- more than usual.  And then, I step back and acknowledge that regular life is a little difficult for me right now and I have to grab a heating pack/stretch/sit down.

I visited a doctor lately who tested three things in a row that should have elicited a complaint.  He said as much.  

"I don't really pay attention to it," I replied.  "I guess I have just adjusted."

In this particular case, my stoicism allowed an infection to grow for almost seven months.  And infections don't just cause damage to the immediate area -- they deplete the whole body and leave it vulnerable.  

Well.

I think doctors are great and antibiotics are great and I am looking forward to regaining health.  In the meantime, I am pondering this whole weakness subject. Again.

I'm not a strong person.

I am not an excellent wife or a good mother or an honoring daughter.  I am not a respectable church member or an inspiring employer or a stalwart friend.

I would like to be -- or be known to be.

Sometimes I have the faith to live out the truth I know, in spite of all my failings.  "Let the weak say 'I am strong in the strength of the Lord.'" Most days or moments I am hindered, caught up, entangled in the pride that says my own worthiness matters.  And then I am swirling in the endless drain of maintaining the facade ...to myself most of all.

If I don't acknowledge my inability, how can I overcome?

The poor in spirit inherit the kingdom of God because they know they bring nothing.

Those who mourn are comforted because they have no other hope.

The last are first because they can never get there on their own.

It might look more holy to tough it out and act the part when my life intersects another's.  But I am failing most days.  And I need Christ most days -- or all is lost.  I don't think I can tell the story of His faithfulness if I don't describe in some measure my helpless estate.

When I admit my brokenness and huddle before Him, I am in His Presence -- the only place there is fullness of joy.  It is the spiritual submission of myself for examination, the diagnosis of an invasive infection, and the subjection to whatever means of healing and restoration.  And it must be done regularly or I will accept the status quo of a standard that falls far short of health.

These are the things I want to remember, as carefully as the antibiotic to be taken every eight hours, around the clock (for which I have set an alarm).  

Joy that dawns with the morning is sweeter because it is the promise that sustains through weeping that endures for a night.  A garment of praise is more extravagant because it is an exchange for the spirit of heaviness.  If I hold out empty, beggar hands, the riches that fill them to overflowing will unmistakably reflect the glory of the Giver...the purpose for which I was created, redeemed and am being refined. 

Jesus! What a strength in weakness--
Let my hide myself in Him. 

Tempted, tried, and often failing

He my strength, my victory wins.

Hallelujah! What a savior! Hallelujah! What a friend! Saving, helping, keeping, loving: He is with me to the end.

If I Plant A Dahlia

For my part, I am partial to the dahlia.  It is, in some respects, like the younger sister in a novel of manners:  passed over in favor of the traditional beauty for which the rose is renowned. But the rumpled profusion of color compels me with informal charm.  No introductions to be made, no ceremony to stand on -- it is a flower frank with loveliness.
I have never grown dahlias, but aspired to this very year.  I ordered four tubers from a respected farm, a hefty investment in a first attempt.  The expected range for shipping marked on my calendar, I awaited the parcel.  Meanwhile, I collected the proper household compost to fortify soil and finally tucked the delivered brown paper package away in a cool, dry, dark place until the established planting day.  My dismay on May 10th was profound, because the mailer was cramped with pale twisted forms of attempted, stifled, premature growth.  I planted them anyway, despite the fact that only one was able to head upward without first needing to execute a u-turn with its warped white stem.  I watered, hoped, and whooped it up when green leaves appeared on four upright stalks.  Over time the runt worried me, but my confidence climbed as the largest attained a robust height of eighteen inches, robed in a profusion of deep green leaves and the hint of a bud. 
And then, last week, I checked the weather through the window overlooking my new flower bed and saw my pride and joy lying broken on its side, stem trampled by some marauding beast.  When I finally accepted the horizontal condition of things, I dunked the torn stalk into a 32-ounce Ball jar and propped the wilted leaves within a sheltered nook.  It was the only thing I could think to do to give those buds just a little more time to mature.  After three days with no visible improvement (unless I squinted very hard) I dumped potting soil into the water to provide nutrients. And then I waited. 
I think the Bible uses garden analogies to apply truth immediately -- shallow soil, fruit bearing plants, trees flourishing near water -- but also to firmly fix our minds on the depth of knowledge to be drawn from contemplation of growing things. Yesterday I told God I was finished.  Wilted unto death.
I need help, I said.  Hope, I corrected myself.  Divine intervention -- because my human effort is all used up with absolutely no source for restocking.  This bruised reed has been pulverized.
All through the night I drooped -- fear and sadness and guilt and regret weighing on me while snatches from the Psalms reverberated the same cries through the millennia of recorded time.  
With morning there was hope for relief.  It was Sunday, after all, and surely God would be faithful to meet with me.  I was taking Him at His word -- going where two or three were gathered in His Name...believing He would be there.  Still, I composed a text to a friend, through tears:  Please pray.  I'm not okay.
Waiting on the front porch with my 87 year old mother-in-law we spent our last ten minutes before departure in consultation over the Ball jar contents.
"Do you think," I hesitated, "I should cut off all the large lower leaves so that no energy is wasted?"  
"I guess.  It couldn't hurt," she encouraged.  "Just be careful you don't snip a bud."
That done, I cocked my head at the results.  "What if I shortened the stem -- so that the water has less distance to travel?"
"It might work," was her doubtful assessment, followed by the suggestion -- "Maybe you should put it out in the rain so the leaves get soaked."

And God was there in worship.  And in a picnic lunch just three of us.  And in an afternoon visit with friends whose family has expanded from two to five through miraculous provision.  

This evening, while taking her walk up and down the driveway before bed, my mother-in-law called out to me.
"Have you seen your dahlia?"
"Oh, no," I breathed out.  "Is it worse?  Did it die?"
She pointed, and we both grinned as I clapped and jumped up and down like a pogo rider.
It was strong and straight and green.  At least for today.

But you, O Lord, are a shield about me, my glory, and the lifter of my head.

I cried aloud to the Lord, and he answered me from his holy hill.

I lay down and slept; I woke again, for the Lord sustained me.  Psalm 3

Straining Gnats

It's an odd thing to be a human being in the spring.  We feel the pulses of growth, catch the invigorating whiff of life, and become giddy at the clear cornflower daytime sky or the deep navy of night.
In sunny moments we soak it in, and in stormy sessions we observe the grass and weeds lengthen almost visibly.
We are impacted, yet buffered by the boxes we live, work and travel within.  Artificially controlled brightness and temperature distance us from the vibrancy, but the underlying rhythm taps time to the pulse in our wrist and when we lay a finger across we are surprised by the insistence of it, the regularity, the truth.

God's love is like Spring, I think.  It comes with brilliant life-giving light, it douses with torrents of nourishing hydration, it anchors and envelops in growth.
I am in existence and will remain so because of Love.
Nothing more; nothing less.  I was made, redeemed and am being transformed (ever-so-slowly) by the Eternal God who is glorified when I trust His promises and heedlessly plummet into the depths of His great affection for me.

Thinking about the high bar in 1 John that charges me to imitate God's charity, I want to brush it aside as impossible and go on with the status quo.
Within relationships, it's just common sense to reciprocate with distance and parameters - with careful regard for my own precious personhood - frugally measuring out a proportionate degree of warmth and vulnerability.

Like God with me?

What if I don't observe propriety?  What if I eschew decorum?  What if I ignore the signals to keep my distance?  What if I am the first to love?

God is, as Francis Thompson says, the Hound of Heaven, who pursues me, even as I flee His Presence.

How can I claim to believe such an eclipsing statement as God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son...and yet maintain barriers based on peripheral distinctions?  How can I settle for divisions, whatever the social or theological distance?
As with the boxes that enclose our lives perhaps I have forgotten that shelters are for the purpose of safety from high winds, lightning and freezing cold -- not to regularly barricade me from the creation of which I am an element: important, but still only one part.

I wonder if  Aslan's great laugh and the Eldil who flashed with reflected light...or the inhabitants of Rivendell, resplendent in their nobility were intended by Lewis and Tolkien to catch our attention and turn us in wonder to worship the pulsing Glory that is able to make all things new.  
Worship -- and grow, battered image bearer though I be.

To love my enemies is dangerous.  
To bless those who curse me is imprudent. 
To keep no record of wrongs is not safe in the least.

"There remain faith, hope, love -- these three.  But the greatest of these is love."