like a lake

"so much hurt and preservation
like a tendril round my soul
so much painful information
no clear way on how to hold it

when everything in me is tightening
curling in around this ache
I will lay my heart wide open
like the surface of a lake
wide open like a lake

standing at this waters edge
looking in at God's own heart
I've no idea where to begin
to swallow up the way things are

everything in me is drawing in
closing in around this pain
I will lay my heart wide open
like the surface of a lake
wide open like a lake

bring the wind and bring the thunder
bring the rain till I am tried
when it's over bring me stillness
let my face reflect the sky
and all the grace and all the wonder
of a peace that I can't fake
wide open like a lake

I am fighting to stay open. . . wide open like a lake."

-by Sara Groves

most worthy of a listen

Choosing Sides, by Andrew Osenga

Photographs, by Andrew Osenga

for a good (wondrous) read. . .

The Immersed Imagination, Part 1: The Inner Chamber

The Immersed Imagination, Part 2: The Inner Vision

The Immersed Imagination, Part 3: The Inner Spirit

The Immersed Imagination, Part 4: Inconsolable Longing

The Immersed Imagination, Part 5: The True Self

The Immersed Imagination, Part 6: The False Self

The Immersed Imagination, Part 7: Rising Above Law

noteworthy

just stumbled upon a new author, which i am so excited about i am recommending him to you before reading this book!  His name is A.S. "Pete" Peterson;  the brother of one of my favorite artists, Andrew Peterson. . .

for the bio on this author. . . . .

grace.

Grace strikes us when we are in great pain and restlessness. It strikes us when we walk through the dark valley of a meaningless and empty life. It strikes us when we feel that our separation is deeper than usual, because we have violated another life, a life which we loved, or from which we were estranged. It strikes us when our disgust for our own being, our indifference, our weakness, our hostility, and our lack of direction and composure have become intolerable to us. It strikes us when, year after year, the longed-for perfection of life does not appear, when the old compulsions reign within us as they have for decades, when despair destroys all joy and courage.

Sometimes at that moment a wave of light breaks into our darkness, and it is as though a voice were saying: "You are accepted. You are accepted, accepted by that which is greater than you, and the name of which you do not know. Do not ask for the name now; perhaps you will find it later. Do not try to do anything now; perhaps later you will do much. Do not seek for anything; do not perform anything; do not intend anything. Simply accept the fact that you are accepted!"  

If that happens to us, we experience grace After such an experience we may not be better than before, and we may not believe more than before. But everything is transformed. In that moment, grace conquers sin, and reconciliation bridges the gulf of estrangement. And nothing is demanded of this experience, no religious or moral or intellectual presupposition, nothing but acceptance.

-Paul Tillich, The Shaking of The Foundations, from chapter 19. 
 

 click here to read more. . . . .

beautiful things

stones under rushing water

. . . I hope this song speaks to you this day as much as it does to me. . . enjoy.

fairy tales

“I am concerned with a certain way of looking at life, which was created in me by the fairy tales, but has since been meekly ratified by the mere facts.”
- G. K. Chesterton 

. . . . .Chesterton believed the fairy tale had a more important value than just the ethical lessons. (After all, adults do not need magical frogs to learn how not to lie.) At a higher level, the fairy tale placed in Chesterton’s heart the conviction “that this world is a wild and startling place, which might have been quite different, but which is quite delightful”. Chesterton believed that what modern people called incontrovertible and unalterable scientific facts were in reality mysterious. He explains the difference between this “scientific fatalism” and the views of the “fairy-tale philosopher”.

Fairy tales challenge the reader to imagine magical worlds different from our own. We are reminded by the fairy tale of the thing we never should have forgotten — that our world might have been different and is magical the way it is: unexplainable, unpredictable, wild, and surprising. With our imaginations awakened, we can see with new eyes our own world filled with wonder once again.

Heartless: The Story of the Tin Man from Brandon McCormick on Vimeo.

“The books or the music in which we thought the beauty was located will betray us if we trust to them; it was not in them, it only came through them, and what came through them was longing. These things– the beauty, the memory of our own past– are good images of what we really desire; but if they are mistaken for the thing itself, they turn into dumb idols, breaking the hearts of their worshippers. For they are not the thing itself; they are only the scent of a flower we have not found, the echo of a tune we have not heard, news from a country we have never yet visited.

Do you think I am trying to weave a spell? Perhaps I am; but remember your fairy tales. Spells are used for breaking enchantments as well as for inducing them. And you and I have need of the strongest spell that can be found to wake us from the evil enchantment of worldliness which has laid upon us for nearly a hundred years.”

–C.S. Lewis, “The Weight of Glory,” in The Weight of Glory and Other Addresses

sailing. . .

"We’re adrift on a sailboat
My love is the sea
Yours is the horizon
Constant and steady

You set my limbs locked hard afloat
Lifted my lonesome sails
The tide is out, the moon is high
We’re sailing

Darling, your love is healing
It makes the bitter sweet
Warms the winter to spring again
Secures the colds defeat

We’re cutting anchor
Casting out into the glorious deep
The tide is out, the moon is high
We’re sailing

When we’ve succumb to decrepitude
Still our love will remain in its youth

The tide is out, the moon is high
We’re sailing
We’re sailing
We’re sailing"

living!

today began with a frost all upon us and a beautiful sunrise to take off the chill. God is so good to us. . .

"The steadfast love of the LORD never ceases; his mercies never come to an end; they are new every morning; great is your faithfulness."  

Lamentations 3:22-23 

the Farmer's market was lovely this morning- delicious raisin walnut bread & this bouquet lit up my arms!

today most certainly will entail hot tea-sipping, Silas-snuggling, and  reading an assortment of the many books i am currently entangled in. (yes, i am one of those. . . it seems to have happened  to me in the past year or two)

pizza & football game tonight at my parent's house. really looking forward to it, since its the last time we'll all be together until Christmas. . . My sweet sister, Lydia heads back down to Tennessee tomorrow!

Just living this weekend . . . on Monday I begin a whole new chapter: the bank job.

Park National Bank, here I come! I'm a little nervous, but I am sure it will turn out to be wonderful.

“The glory of God is man fully alive.” – St. Irenaeus

a breath of fresh air

^"If you've gotten anything at all out of following Christ, if his love has made any difference in your life, if being in a community of the Spirit means anything to you, if you have a heart, if you care— then do me a favor: Agree with each other, love each other, be deep-spirited friends. Don't push your way to the front; don't sweet-talk your way to the top. Put yourself aside, and help others get ahead. Don't be obsessed with getting your own advantage. Forget yourselves long enough to lend a helping hand.

Think of yourselves the way Christ Jesus thought of himself. He had equal status with God but didn't think so much of himself that he had to cling to the advantages of that status no matter what. Not at all. When the time came, he set aside the privileges of deity and took on the status of a slave, became human! Having become human, he stayed human. It was an incredibly humbling process. He didn't claim special privileges. Instead, he lived a selfless, obedient life and then died a selfless, obedient death—and the worst kind of death at that—a crucifixion.

Because of that obedience, God lifted him high and honored him far beyond anyone or anything, ever, so that all created beings in heaven and on earth—even those long ago dead and buried—will bow in worship before this Jesus Christ, and call out in praise that he is the Master of all, to the glorious honor of God the Father. 

What I'm getting at, friends, is that you should simply keep on doing what you've done from the beginning. When I was living among you, you lived in responsive obedience. Now that I'm separated from you, keep it up. Better yet, redouble your efforts. Be energetic in your life of salvation, reverent and sensitive before God. That energy is God's energy, an energy deep within you, God himself willing and working at what will give him the most pleasure.

Do everything readily and cheerfully—no bickering, no second-guessing allowed! Go out into the world uncorrupted, a breath of fresh air in this squalid and polluted society. Provide people with a glimpse of good living and of the living God. Carry the light-giving Message into the night. . ."

-Philippians 2- (from The Message translation of the Holy Bible)

 

My Love Hasn’t Grown Cold

You shake your head
What is so hard to believe?
When you are in your bed
I sing over you the sweetest things
Because oh, my love, it does not tire
I’m awake when the moon is full
And I know the times when you feel lost
And you just aren’t sure


Lo and behold
My love hasn’t grown cold
For you


You could steal away in the middle of the night
And hide in the light of day
While you cloak yourself in the darkest lies
But oh, my love, it swims in the deepest oceans of fear
And as soon as you lower your head
I am here


If only you could see how heaven stills when you speak
I know all your days
And I have wrapped you in mystery
And oh, my love for you is as wide as the galaxies
Just hold out your hand and close your eyes
And come be with me.

-by Bethany Dillon


“I will lead her back once again. I will lead her out into the desert and speak tenderly to her there. I will return her vineyards to her and transform the Valley of Trouble into a gateway of hope. She will give herself to me there, as she did long ago when she was young, when I freed her from her captivity in Egypt. “In that coming day, says the Lord, you will call me ‘my husband’ instead of ‘my master.’” 

(Hosea 2:14-16)