hurricane season...

Tuesday, April 17, 2012

my amphibian friend is quiet this evening and so i sit in the dark and listen instead to the steady whir of that dryer spinning  around and around.

music can take many forms.


and He can speak in many ways.


i sit and listen to all that material tumbling in that hot metal and my mind...it longs to spin out of control as well.  

and it has during these last few days, wandered down roads and paths and questions and imagined outcomes.  

i try and figure out what i can't and i find myself lost in a tangle of emotions that weigh heavy and keep me entrapped.

i stand in the middle of the agonizing wait and i long to fight against it.  

it's a storm brewing on that horizon and i can feel the pressure build.


landlocked and happy, i've never experienced the power or force of a  hurricane,  my eyes have only seen the aftermath, the devastation that attests to the smallness of humanity. but it's a picture that flashes across every screen whenever that wind over water begins to pick up.  it's of those trees, bent low and at the mercy of an angry force that has whipped into a frenzy what is relentless and i nod my head in recognition.


standing in defiance of His Will will only break me, splinter this heart that has only begun to heal.  or i can be pliable and bow low before Him and surrender to whatever it is He has planned.


it's not easy.  it's scary;  to lower my posture, to lower my face means i can't see what is surrounding me, what is coming upon me, what is happening all around me.  my eyes are placed on the ground, trained on the dust, reminding me of what i have come from.


dust kneeling on dust before The One Who formed the one out of the other and the force of His Will keeps this back bent.

and it keeps me safe.


and it makes me stronger.


the more i allow the pressures of what rage around to me bring me to my knees before Him, the deeper my roots in to Him grow.  and when each season comes, with each new storm, i am able to handle a little bit more...

because my body grows used to the bending, 

my shoulders become a cradle for the cross He asks me to bear.


uncertainty becomes the catalyst for adventure and that adventure is found in the wildness of my God.


i can see those clouds brewing,  the ones dark and foreboding.

they are coming closer and the outcome is uncertain...

but if it it wasn't uncertain,what all my tomorrows hold,

how would i know, beyond any shadow of doubt,

beyond any question and fear,

that He is the Only One that is certain.

the Only One that will hold fast in any storm.


i read it tonight, in a little article that gave all those steps on hurricane-proofing one's yard and there, near the end, the author wrote this,


...we simply tie our patio furniture and barbecue to some of the sturdy trees in our yard.

and sometimes, in the bigness of all the what-if's and all those scenerios that haven't yet come to be, it's the most simple action that can calm the unstoppable.  reign in all those emotions and secure them to that Tree.  remind yourself of the promise of His Salvation - He allowed Himself to be secured to that tree so that regardless of whatever you or i may face, we are His.  always.

always.

so bowing low,  i take my eyes off of all those what-ifs and i thank Him for all that He has done...


3 gifts opened up
1439. that ground for those seeds
1440. those tulips
1441. the last of the easter lilies

3 gifts budding/blooming
1442. the plethora of pink buds everywhere
1443. yellow forsythia
1444. first glimpse of new leaves
  
3 gifts worn
1445. those rings of gold on my hand
1446. those calluses on his hands
1447. that bedspread over us

3 gifts bright
1448. their smiles
1449. spring air
1450. that sun climbing high

3 gifts found looking up
1451. his smile
1452. those hands forming crowns for their heads


1453. that home and the ones who lived in it and the one who lives by it

a gift in a bag, a box, a book
1454. good food
1456. all those notations and advice in that recipe book they gave

3 hard eucharisteos 
1457. surrender
1458. surrender
1459. trusting Him when i still can't see