An exert from my ask for partners in my attempt to get to Thailand. I was told by a friend and I agree that I should turn it into a picture book :)
...Hello Dearest Friends,
I've been told by people wiser than me that I need to vision cast ...which makes me feel a little like a magician..I'm basically Genny Weasly guys.. ok!
ANYWHO. Are y'all comfortable? Can you see the pictures? Did you get your snacks? Just be careful, it's really hard to get crumbs out of that rug...ok. Let's begin.
Once upon the beginning of time, God and people and animals all loved each other not just well,
but perfectly.
Peace on earth did once exist.
SHALOM. My favorite word.
I like to think we could see all the colors, just like hummingbirds, but cooler.
Speaking of hummingbirds, during shalom, they didn't have to fight to get nectar. There was enough to go around and then some.
No scarcity.
There were no stressed-out college students vying for success at the cost of cutting each other off.
There was no tension between Mother and Daughter, Father and Son.
Bambi never lost his mother.
Flowers never died.
No one's house got crushed by trees because no trees ever fell.
They stood tall.
But see that tree was a problem.
Assuming you grew up in the church or even just the west you know where I'm going.
We humans...we got scared.
We wonder if this perfect shalom was too good to be true.
Surely perfection couldn't exist for us.
How very boring.
Noone likes Superman. (for the record, shalom looked nothing like superman's world, that would actually be awful...so boring).
We reached for something that did not belong to us because we wanted to understand this beauty surrounding us fully.
We wanted to be God.
We did not want to be beholden to an outside force.
Then perfection got blurred.
We broke Shalom.
I like to think the tree snapped in two that day.
No longer standing tall.
You know what that snapping sounds like.
It sounds like that friend you thought was going to last...until it didn't.
It sounds like that wedding ring clanging against the kitchen floor.
It sounds like that child's cry in the middle of the night needing your comfort to fight the dark things that come out at night.
It sounds like the sound of footsteps behind as a female walks the streets alone at night.
It sounds like the beer breath brushing up against your ear.
It sounds like a small featherless baby bird hitting the hard concrete sidewalk, dead.
It sounds like the sizzle of fire coming from a trailer park because the woman has set another one in her quest for drugs and oblivion.
It sounds like the words, "I just don't want to hurt anybody. I hate knowing I'm going to hurt somebody."
It sounds like the mental war of Gollum.
It sounds like the word failure. On repeat. 24/7.
It sounds like knife piercing outside organ in a quest to feel...something...anything...
It sounds like the trunk door thunking shut in a hope to keep those knives hidden.
It sounds like a noiseless, animal-like, screech let out, leaning against the bathroom door, knowing this person you love and who loved you is now dead.
It sounds like listening to a majestic waterfall and wanting to feel wonder but only feeling horror knowing how many have died under it's crushing water.
It sounds like not being able to understand what someone is saying.
It sounds like hearing another language and assuming ignorance from that person.
It sounds like the word, HELL. Being apart from God.
It sounds like nothing...complete isolation.
It sounds like hearing a girls video journey to healing and freedom was then taken, edited, and used as clickbait for someone's porn site.
It sounds like hearing that the buying and selling of human beings, rape, and labor for profit..is very much a part of our word's reality now.
It is the brokenness in all of our lives.
Everything that breaks from SHALOM, peace.
But this my friend, this brokeness? It's not the end.
My favorite word became my favorite name.
SHALOM entered the world in the form of a baby.
Who happened to be male. That does not mean all men get to claim perfection, just so we're clear
Shalom interacted with the broken world.
He felt the depths of the brokeness in every aspect of his life.
He had to have his soiled clothes cleaned.
His siblings probably quarreled over silly things.
I'm sure his mother was tired.
He learned to work those trees into different things.
He probably got at least one splinter. Blood drawn, foreshadowing what was to come.
We grow accustomed to the brokeness it becomes for us, reality.
Our built tolerance.
We don't know anything different.
But for him.
He never got that.
He never got to become numb.
Constantly on full alert.
Complete, perfect, constant, empathy.
Hurt.
Stubbed toe times the biggest number you know.
But instead of being scared off by the pain, the complete -insert word that I won't use cause I'm not sure if I'm allowed-, he entered in.
He crouched down.
Leaned low.
He drew lines to draw people in.
Not keep them out.
He fought.
Fought the brokeness. He fought through healing.
He fought through teaching.
He fought through communing.
He fought through resting.
He fought through loving.
He allowed others to have the chance to clean his feet.
To clean the actual -that same word- off of his feet.
God incarnate. Let people touch his gross, ugly, hairy, stubby, feet.
But only after they let him wash there's.
Only after they were put in that vulnerable position.
The position of being served.
This past month or so I have learned some of what it is to be served.
It is a beautifully uncomfortable,
Intimately vulnerable thing...
Comments
Post a Comment