Take it. Take it all. I have so often cried to God. Hands elevated. To Heaven. Throwing it all away.
“I don’t need it anyway. I don’t need any of it….If I have you,” I used to say.
Emphatically. Irrationally. Words, emotionally thrown around, not considering their significance.
But, then today. I stand here. Prayer answered. Resources stripped. Left naked. The bareness of my own soul left exposed. Abandoned….by all that coddled it…..
Yet, it is here where I learn your greatest worth. Angel wings minister. And I sense the presence of you…..
Greater than I ever have.
And I see so clear….it was never in the “can”….but in the “can’t” that I learn…..
I don’t need to work, or strive, to earn my own salvation. Salvation is here.
Now. In this weak place. This barren place. Where I can admit I am nothing more than flesh and bone.
Coming to you empty……Finding you most of all.
And when the world seems to formulate everything un-flawed. I lay down my standard of life.
Taking hold of the only thing that can protect me now….
Here. All out of questions. All out of answers. Empty of intelligence. Like a child in the weakest sense….Where I find my God strength grow.
And when colors get smeared. And wars rise. And people suck for power, clinging desperately to life…….
I can stop. Close my eyes. And here in these trials…..
Find peace. Hear your voice. And let go my will…needing you and you alone.
Letting loose, at last, all selfish desires of my own. Letting every cell clinging desperately to life….
Finally have rest.
And I can lean on Your Significance…..needing none of my own. Here in your presence.
And it is here…..I know I am safe. In the arms of the Father. Touching heaven out of pain.
Carried through this circumstance…..By His winds….and His unrelenting grace.
Here….
In His presence.
Linking w/ Ann @ A Holy Experience
Imperfect Prose
6 Comments
sweet meditation – inspiring – and beautiful pics
Yes, friend.
Oh, I have been there. Like how we think we see so clearly . . . until He rips away the veil and we realize we’ve been shrouded all along.
Love this prayer and the way you take your readers with you through the tension — into the peace.
This is my constant struggle too, Jen–the dying to self that feels like a physical death sometimes. I know what it feels like to surrender, but so easily forget it when I’m in the battle. But like you’ve said, it is in those broken moments that “we” feel his presence most. Thanks for this reminder!
Old Ollie – Thanks to you.
Kelli – Exactly. I love how you state this, “…we think we see so clearly . . . until He rips away the veil and we realize we’ve been shrouded all along.” Beautiful & true.
Beth – Oh, yes that slow loss of self that comes at the “yes” to God. I so want those moments, don’t you? But, then at the same times seem to resist them. Tension, indeed!
I think you’re so brave to unclench those fists and offer back to God everything He’s given. You’re miles ahead of me, I think.
Brandee – Sometimes we unclench willing and sometimes God “helps” us unclench them…if you know what I mean. Sadly, my life has resulted mostly in the later. Hesitantly opening only to find they needn’t have been clenched all along. Yet, how beautiful when empty. Openly abandoned to Him, huh, my friend?