I had a strange, awful dream. The kind you force yourself awake from and when you do, you find yourself with real tears on your face and pain in your heart. I had to write it down. Dreams are strange and this one cut between scenes like a movie. As dreams often do, it doesn’t make much sense to anyone outside of dreaming.
“It’s so wonderful to watch a child, to see how he experiments.” She is one of many elderly we see peacefully strolling the beach. As she walks by and says this, I am thinking the same. Luther is in the sand, mesmerized by how it falls through his fingers. I wonder when exactly I lost that capacity to be in awe of everything, of anything.
I’m shocked at how often my reality does not match what I imagined life would be like. And at how often I let that ruin its goodness and pull me down into despair and disillusion. How silly. I’ve been thinking and sensing a growing conviction inside me and it’s this: dishonest, idealistic, fantasized art is largely to blame. To be completely transparent, I’m talking about love as it’s portrayed in films and media. There really are magnificent, miraculous love stories out there but I don’t ever get to see the whole story. I don’t feel the whole story. Or perhaps I see what I want to see.
I had the sudden urge to jump and spin in the quiet of my room. There are so many things I’m eager to do, so many stories that are inspiring me this minute. How does one contain it all?
A prayer jumped from my lips, “Thank you, God for these gifts! Life really is beautiful.” My mind was captured by a thought: He really does want you to be happy, you know. You see, it’s almost automatic for me to slide into religiosity, forgetting that that is absolutely not what God is after. There’s a living, breathing relationship here in my hands that I have forgotten about. He doesn’t want my duty if it means I stop talking to Him, singing to Him, trusting Him. But that’s exactly what I’ve done.
Two small slaps on the door makes me smile. “Hello?!”
“Okay, you can open it, Luther!”
He strains and grunts for a few minutes unsuccessfully. Chuckling, I sneak to the door and push and he believes he’s done it himself. My two year old friend rushes in, so ecstatic. He runs around to every corner, to every little thing worth exploring and points. I put on the new Radiohead record. He stares at it, transfixed for a moment and then starts to spin and dance.
I remember each choice I made today to love. And yet it happened so quickly. One quick exchange cuts me down and I am crushed. My love feels worthless. So I withdraw and spit fire. It’s what I always do. And though it feels right, it is always a mistake.
A persistent chorus of Alleluias summon tears to my eyes. I turn my head to hide from those around me on the bus and soak in the sound. The industrial district of Seattle rushes past my window and I find beauty in the miles of train tracks and cargo cars stretching out below.
“I have been snoozing this reminder to grab my tomatoes out of the fridge for the last half hour.” My coworkers respond with genuine concern and a touch of mockery. “Oh my goodness, go! They’re crying out for you.”
Gracious words are like a honeycomb, sweetness to the soul and health to the body. Proverbs 16:24
How I long to be someone whose lips drip soothing and sweet words to all I encounter. But oh how my tongue can be a dagger more often! I have left a trail of wounds in the side of the one I love.
I always knock twice and wait with an expectant smile to hear a muffled, “come in”.
He was absorbed, contorted over his guitar, cords snaking and coiling into various devices. I knelt in front of him and lay my head on his knees, just listening.
I don’t quite know how to describe this. For some time my mind has felt “closed”. Constantly preoccupied. I have been conscious of it when it’s happening which makes it all the more frustrating.
But today, I feel free. Free and present and open. Like the walls of a cage have come down; like the constant weighty fog of distant mind has withdrawn for a moment.
Perhaps it is inspiration, perhaps I am remembering what I miss, perhaps it is the absence of social media and the chosen silence of my phone. Maybe it is all of the above. And maybe it is the Holy Spirit reawakening inside of me because a fissure in my stubbornness has emerged. Oh God, I hope that is true.
I so appreciated that she had asked me. And I didn’t know what my answer was. She’d been talking of her struggle with using profane language within the context of a band that had once led congregations in worship of God. A rift was growing and that fact presented to her an issue that was difficult to ignore in good conscience.
“We’re supposed to be united and this is causing division. That doesn’t seem right.”
“You guys are mad at each other all the time because you love each other. It’s weird,” he said. I’m not sure how to respond so I just laugh. But some part of me enjoys glimpsing our relationship through anyone else’s eyes but my own.
I am not a welcoming presence—I am reluctant. I do not love the homeless. I argue against everything he says. I am forgetful, unthinking, a poor listener. I do not pursue his family. I do not respect him. I demand instead of discuss.
These things were said in anger but they are not entirely wrong.
If the current artistic trend and belief is nihilism and meaninglessness, we need to push back with truth in our art.
All kinds of evil can come out of a corrupt imagination but out of the imagination comes good as well. Our hearts cannot be reached without the imagination.
“The only way to create freely is through a sanctified imagination.” —C.S. Lewis (?)
The church needs more imaginative activity to usher hearts back to aliveness.
You don’t need to prove your worth. Your dignity has been given to you by God. Making demands, exerting force, and being ugly doesn’t win you the respect you’re looking for.
There is nothing better than to be joyful and to do good as long as they live; also that everyone should eat and drink and take pleasure in all their toil—this is God’s gift to man. Ecclesiastes 3:12–13
This is God’s world. All is because of Him. Genesis 1
Focus less on your desire to be properly loved and respected by people on this earth and more on Me and My love.