kite runner

September 19. 2005

Can you sit with your pain, shame? Let it become so much a part of you that you're human again.
Not trying to be God--the One who creates and kills, but Noah--the one who accept his ills.
Can you live with the weight of a dead child on your arms?
Let his blood stain your own. Let it connect you somehow.
Do you know that it changes when the two become one...when you open your veins to the love of a son.
You must scream inside when your jaw's bolted shut--stomach the rage, let it claw at your gut. And you can't see it now in the moment you're in. As the one thing you want is taken away
Each passing minute is stripping off sin. Leaving you nothing to hold to but God.
ashes to ashes and dust to dust
your tears mixing in with the death.
I know you can't see what's moving beyond
but can you believe that life grows on your breath?
Keep breathing brother
even if the one you lost will never sing again.
Be his lungs Be his song
and know that this was in the plan
You have his story still to tell
don't join him til your words are done.

a time for seeding

"mostly dead is not dead enough"

April 16. 2006--Easter Sunday

Failure. Falling short. Always and again.
His cup is offered to me--my choice to enter in.
I'm wavering. I hesitate. Can this God be so good?
To call me to my own demise and then to name it 'life'?
Not only life, continues he, but life abundant, known.
I don't believe how this can be when sorrow paves the road.
I want glory, fame, my life I want beauty The ecstasy of touching heaven...And truth
But I don't want to touch your cup.
Please relieve me of the dirt the death the tragedy.
You ask me to go to places full of death that I might find life??
I must be smarter that you
Because I know this makes no sense.
Foolishness.
I can make this work without you.
I think so--don't I?
I have the skills to win.
Winning may mean victory. Winning isn't love.
I'm grieving the loss of myself here, Jesus. I'm mourning the loss of my sin.
It may be a cage But this cage is the only home I've known.
Like a new baby out of the womb It's frightening I'm cold
I've lived this entire life a captive I can't trust goodness til I'm shown
Take your cup Take your cup
Take your cup Take your cup
take your cup
take Your cup
I do.
I will.
I'm Yours.
They may not believe it I may not believe it
You do You are My One

slow, dry, heat.

august 15. 2006

I woke to a slow morning--Chelan sunshine and soft sheets...nowhere to be.
I moved from bed to sunny, dappled deck. Spent time in Your psalms...wondered what they meant.
I think about how much I focus on me in my prayers. Maybe this is what fogs me in.
Deck to porch. A long conversation with Jamie...in love with Miguel? It seems so.
Praises Father! Mother, Yeshua. Praises for their love. And their journey and their unknown.
A prayer for guidance and for faith--a prayer that Jamie might hear Your Word in the midst of a baker's dozen voices.
Slow start. Now it's lunch. But where did breakfast go...?
On the boat--to the lake. Thick white sunscreen, a hat and the wind licking at my clothes.
A fried chicken hot afternoon in town. Gas up the boat. And back to paradise.
A cruise, a swim, afternoon with the Economist. Relaxed.
The sun is setting, breezes rise. And again You frost the skies with colors I can't describe. The beauty holds my soul captive, hope rises on my breath.
Lord--how do I enjoy this when I know how many suffer? How few will ever witness such beauty, privilege, freedom and opportunity combined? How do I purify this guilt?
I've been given so much. I have so much. I find my joy tainted by the knowledge of those who have so little. And my heart is far from humble and pure.
I want to understand and experience this world--every little corner. But I don't think I want to sacrifice the privilege of seeing it on my terms--my times, my people, my colors, my comforts--all about me.
Do I really want to serve? Yes. I think I do. My self-centeredness comes from being afraid. Of what? I can't anticipate.
I've never not thought of myself first. That is so sad. I have to fight past my fear. I have to trust.
Three winks at night. Your grace will subdue me.

inauspicious beginnings

mid-september. 2005

ideas drip
from my lips
forming worlds within my mind
I see a place
where worlds embrace
yet is this fantasy mine, or mine?

the dreamers float
on each new boat
that sets its sail from neverland
and seek all night
the second star from the right
but never wake up to take their stand

Our luxury offers us words to be used not as tools but as frosting. not as bridges but as prisons.
We can commit our time to spinning stories of the hypothetical. ignoring the pitfalls of the actual.
are we making a difference?
am I making a difference?

colleges idealize.
TV news simplifies.
magazine beautifies.
politicians amorphise.

And we live in our word-worlds
of mission statements, guarantees
leases, contracts, doctrines, degrees.
We tell eachother: who we are.
what we believe.
Our brand, our car, our tattoo
says more about us
than our deeds.

And I'm not blaming
but confessing
more conformity than I'd like to admit.
even the counter-culture is a club
each say I ask: where can I sign up?

So am I supposed to do or be
say or do
each week's sermon leaves me stronger confused

how come I feel I had more figured out
when I was five.