Beautiful

At YoliJwa this past week, my lovely counselor did a devotional where she had us take a clay pot and write the things that hindered us, and held us back from being who we really were, the things that keep us from feeling beautiful as God created us. Then she took us to the fire escape and had us throw them down and shatter them on the ground. A few days later, she constructed the broken pieces of our clay pots into the shape of a crown, in a representation of beauty for ashes in our lives. And this is my poem written about that.


Beautiful,
this molded piece of clay crafted by Hands from above.
Beautiful,
the way it was formed just perfectly.
Stained,
over time these painful truths were etched across the surface of my heart.
Stained,
in permanent ink, the hurt that couldn't be washed away.
Overwhelmed,
These thoughts swirl with confusion around my mind.
Overwhelmed,
The burdens lay restless on the tablet of my heart.
Shattered,
by my own desire or maybe an unfortunate turn of events.
Shattered,
either way the pieces of my molded clay being lie in a heap on the ground.
Broken,
with feelings that none of this could ever turn for good.
Broken,
The lies dance near my heart whispering to just give up on it all.
A promise,
"just wait, only a little longer, this is My covenant."
A promise,
with an impatient longing for the results to play according to my own will.
Beautiful,
the broken pieces that made the clay of who I am dance together in a symphony that promises I am still His.
Beautiful,
We have to be so broken to the point where God's Light can radiate through.
Beautiful,
And with a healed heart, He shines through the beauty of my shattered, stained glass soul.
Beautiful.

The Puzzle

Life is like a puzzle with one thousand pieces. When you open the box, it can almost be overwhelming. You start with the end pieces. The foundation. A heart prepares for what what's to come. Dreams enhance, with no photograph that comes with the box, it is the only thing to do. No map that came with these breaths, so you dream. Once the frame is built, there's a faith. A beginning. An innocent childhood is created with a smile to last a lifetime. A faith to move mountains.

You conquer the easy pieces first, the ones that align just perfectly with one another. The ones that form a face, or piece together the line that separates sky from land. Light from dark. It's a happy time because you can see what is being created. You can understand that ideas in the puzzle maker's heart.

The dark colors come, though. The colors in the landscape that merge together, and are only a collection of murky grays and painful blacks. Frustration builds when the difficult pieces won't fit. And there are still a million pieces left. You're overwhelmed because the in-congruent piece in your hand doesn't match any that are scattered across the board. It doesn't match the plan that you built, constructed; carefully and perfectly. The dark shades bleed together, hard to separate, hard to place. The scattered pieces represent your heart, especially the dark ones, they don't match and all you want is to fix them.

There's a whisper, a silent still small voice, one that you can only here when your heart is quiet and still. It says this: “You cannot see the work of art, hidden beneath the scattered pieces, you cannot see the drawing I've created, the one I've crafted just for you. Fearfully and wonderfully made this will be. I promise, if you can only wait and see. I know it's frustrating because I've been there. Child, you need only be still and know that I am God. Cast all your anxieties, frustrations, pains, fears and dreams on Me for I care for you. Child, do not be anxious, instead turn to me, bring your burdens, and most importantly, pray. I will bring you a peace that no one will ever understand. I hold you in the palm of my hand. Do not fear. Trust that this plan is bigger than you'll know, For My thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are My ways your ways.” You will only hear His voice, when you are silent, when your heart is breaking, when your soul is alone, and your mind is listening.

When finally, this life is complete, your heart has mended, your soul is redeemed and the puzzle is beautiful, will you understand. The dark pieces were necessary to create the entire picture. You were blind to see how wonderfully they merged with the lights. How even the pain was needed to create peace and healing. With the masterpiece completed, the photograph pieced together, you will once again be able to turn to the Creator, hear His voice, fall to your knees and worship the One who knew how you would cry and doubt, who knew you would look away and fall and stumble in the dark, who knew you would smile at the little blessings, who knew you would grieve they way you did when you thought all was lost. He knew and still, He never turned His face away from you, He never let his fingers untangle from yours even though you forgot how they felt against your skin. When eternity is at your fingertips and the life behind you makes sense, you smile at the imprint in the sand you left in the span of forever, and you turn to worship, praise and adore the One who led you through it all.

Frame Savored Memories

Memory savored in a frame, 

locked on a heart,

trapped in time.

The face is hidden,

abandoned by this stratosphere.

In the heavens,

dwelling with the angels.

A never-ending fall,

through an endless black hole burned in my heart.

A void,

from the star that shone brightly in my soul.

Silenced in an instant,

shattered in a second,

yet unbreakable for eternity.

It's your face I'd dance to life.

Tragedy feels so real,

I wish to awaken from restless slumber

and discover death a nightmare.

The chilling numb

 just a dream.

The raw wounds 

only a fear.

The tears 

a frozen rain.

The antiseptics dowsed,

still drowning a wound,

but if this is numb,

then what is pain?

 Peace indwells the numb

in a miraculous uniting joy and pain.

Even when you cannot feel,

your heart longs,

in rest.

Even when the fear approaches in a haunting moment,

Your soul breathes,

in peace.

Even when looking at their smile through framed glass,

threatens to drown you in tears,

your heart beats,

in joy.

Even when the burden seems more to bear,

you revel in the lightness resting on your shoulders.

It's these moments when Eternity is engraved deep within our hearts.

The wonder of waiting is discovered,

and the Peace is overwhelming.

Still Alive

My feet revel in their vulnerability. For the first time in months, they are free from the clausterphobic entrapment that kept them safe from the winter. Protected skin from cold. The gravel is warm, an almost summer feel, as I walk barefoot and alive to build the comforting callouses. The grass, still brown from the deathly winter wind and the frost that drained it's luminescent identity. I dig my toes deep into the mushy earth, still cold from the thaw. I twirl in my skirt, still dressed from church. And I breathe as I feel the weight of winter leave this soul, if only for a while, the overwhelming burden ease a smidgen. I stand beneath the sun and I can just feel it smiling down on me.

This God, my God, whom I stupidly lose my faith in when the overwhelming feeling of tragedy forgets to stop, the pain is unrelenting, and I let doubt seep beneath the wings of His prescence. It takes a day like this, and a trustworthy friend for God's promise of never, ever forsaking me to set in. He never forgets the details to turn me around and make me stand in awe. 

The shadow that follows me when I lean against an old tree, offering wisdom from it's hundreds of years. How many times has someone leaned their weary head against it? How many times did it offer comfort in the nature it indwells in? How many times has God used it to portray His Glory? 

The breeze that offers peace, God's peace, blows my curly mess of hair behind my face and suddenly I can see. The constant of a rushing stream, because sometimes we need the fast pace to make it through, and also the stillness of stagnant water offering rest in the crazy of reality. And it's here that I can reflect.

 It's not that this hasn't broken my heart, it has, sometimes I feel into a million tiny pieces. So I swept them up, and gave them to God. But even the pieces I can't seem to find, I trust they are safe with Him and maybe there is a reason He didn't want me to find them again. It's that I've found joy, a joy that doesn't let me forsake my God, a joy that can still smile through every tragedy that comes in the middle of the night, while you're restfully slumbering, and wakes your peaceful dreams to a living nightmare, and all you want to do is sleep again. But still, you feel joy, still there is peace. It's not that the wounds don't hurt, they do, but the antiseptics of people that haven't forgotten a shattered heart and deal with your stubborn ways allow the hurt to subside, if only for a while. It's the first air that allows me to breathe and cast my burdens on Him. It's the blessings through the tragedy that remind me that there is still breath in my lungs. The pain reminds me that I am still alive and the joy lets me feel my heart beat, strong, inside this tiny life of mine hoping to create a snapshot that reflects God's beauty and capture a photograph of His glory in the millisecond I'm given in the span of eternity.

One of Those Days

It's been one of those days.
One of those days when you suck at serving the birdie in gym class while playing badminton and it radiates your failed athletic ability even more.
One of those days when you realize you didn't make the right decision and you make life difficult to try and turn it around.
One of those days when you want to scream to make people understand but then you realize they already know.
One of those days when you're reading a book and it's really good, but then you discover it's values go against yours and you have to put it down.
One of those days when you question everything you know.
One of those days where it's raining and you think "look at the bright side," but the sun isn't even out, so how can you?
One of those days where being a teenager is so discouraging because nothing seems stable and the adults around you seem to try and take over your life.
One of those days when I discover that I have so much further to go in this life, so much to face and so much to learn.
But it's also been one of those days when I was walking down the hallway a little bit earlier than usual and I accidentally bumped into a girl with my books. I look over to apologize. She looks at me and says "Oh, it's okay! I'm Cynthia, It's so nice to meet you!" She shakes my hand. I tell her my name and we talk about what grades we are in. When she turns to go down the stairs she turns to me and says "It was really nice to meet you." She brightened my day and gave me a sun to look at even when it's raining outside.
It was one of those days when Psalm 77: 6, 11-12 was burned to my heart, " I thought about the former days, the years of long ago; I remembered my songs in the night. I will remember the deeds of the Lord; yes, I will remember Your miracles of long ago. I will meditate on all Your works and consider all Your mighty deeds."
So I remembered. I remembered His blessings in disguise that came to brighten my days before. I remembered the day my friends and I went outside and drew with chalk in the dead of winter and frolicked around under a blanket. I remember the little four-year-old boy at my church who runs to hug me like I'm the last person on this earth and smiles up at me with the priceless smile he has. The way he prays for his neighbor friend because he wants him to have what he has. How my devo touched on exactly what I needed to read. When I find just the right verse at just the right time. When I get a letter in the mail from my beautiful pen-pal correspondent. When a friend confides in me because they trust me, and I have the opportunity to show Jesus' love back. A memory hits me at full force and I can't help but smile. A prayer request is answered in front of my very eyes. I stand to worship and the reality of God's love overwhelms me and I can only stand in silence.
 It's those blessings that come to shower my memory that make me smile through today. It's those memorable days that remind me they were only right after the days of tragedy. And it's then I recall that God hasn't left me and I can't trust my feelings. And I smile at the beauty God doesn't forget to show me despite the rain. And it's on these days I can see the blessings through the raindrops.

This I Believe

This is an essay I wrote for Creative Writing a couple of months ago and I though I'd share  (:

 

This I Believe

I pleaded with the God I knew existed, with the God I thought I knew everything about, the God I hoped wouldn’t allow pain to sear through my being like a laceration deeper than skin. I prayed, telling myself He would listen to my heart. Convincing myself that if He was the God I thought to know, Death was not around the corner. It was all a nightmare. He would not take a mother from a child the time she needed her most, when my prayers were entwined with silent pleas and selfish bargains.

   Yet when circumstances seemingly got worse, and God seemed all the more silent, I had to redefine the god I created Him to be, into the God He really was.

In my mind He had become the god I prayed simple prayers to. Prayers to help me succeed on a test, not to allow my mother to be sick. He was my Sunday friend and only that.

The jolt of a cancer diagnosis, an earthquake forgetting to end, brought a carefree, brand new teenage girl to her knees. Because it happened to other people. Not me. It threw me onto a thin tightrope with the promise from God, “Don’t look down, Trust me.” Looking down meant falling, it meant denying all I’d learned as a child about the God above.

As I pleaded for healing, a young girl desperately trying to be fluent in prayer so that the God above would hear my silent call, I learned that maybe He had something better. Something concrete to walk on, rather than the unstable ground moving beneath me in the never-ending aftershocks of the earthquake. But my plan had seemed perfect. It made sense, my mother would get better, and we could glorify God with the story to others of the miraculous healing.

My plan was beautiful, I could see it all mapped out before me. I wouldn’t be hurt, she wouldn’t suffer. But God’s was different. He had the blueprints. I did not. The part of my heart He planned to remodel, after it fell apart with an earthquake, was not a room I was willing to surrender. Walls I didn’t want torn down. I had carefully constructed them.

This is what my heart began to believe even when the ground beneath me is threatening to shake with yet another aftershock and the new buildings I try to construct will yet again, collapse.

This I Believe.
   I believe that the broken shards of a tragedy can be beautiful when God’s light shines through. I believe the dark, dusty and cobwebbed crevices of a sinful heart can be ignited when God is the source of their flame. I believe when sifting through the rubble of your heart after a tremor of the earth, you discover the true friends that help you build back up, you find the friend that allows tears to soil their shoulder, and they are so close that they feel some of your pain. I believe God uses the people in your life to provide antiseptics for the gaping wounds that seem to never heal. I believe in an overwhelming peace in a nearly unbearable pain. I believe in a faith slowly reviving through the ruins that loss leaves behind. And most importantly I believe in a holy, omnipresent, and omniscient God, and His sufficient, never-ending love, mercy and grace for a heart that deserves nothing of the kind.

This I Believe.

Be Still and Wait

I am generally an impatient person. Lately, my patience has been getting shorter and shorter. Especially with my sister. If you knew her, you'd understand. God has been really convicting me, telling me to have patience with her. But where do I find that patience? I've been praying and praying for it. I was looking in the section in my Bible titled "God's promises when you...", and I looked up impatience. I had done this multiple times before. But this time, I was getting a little desperate, and on my last rope, so I read a little closer. This is what I found: Psalm 37:7 "Be still before the LORD and wait patiently for him;

   do not fret when men succeed in their ways,

   when they carry out their wicked schemes"

I've heard the whole "be still" thing before. But what does it mean?? 

So now I have a problem, I have two commands and no idea how to carry either of them out. 

It says to "be still before the Lord and wait patiently for Him." Don't get me wrong. But I kinda think to have patience, I have to be still. And Vice versa. Both things I have am horrible at: Patience and Being Still. 

 Am I right to come to the conclusion that being still and patience are best friends?

Maybe to conquer patience, I must first conquer being still. Or maybe I'm not the one in charge of conquering at all. It's God. In Exodus 14:14, Moses tells the people "The Lord will fight for you, you need only be still." So here I am fighting my impatient attitude, and God's telling me to first be still. I have no ability to fight or even know the sinfulness in me. God has to reveal it to me. Once he reveals it to me, He has the battle plans, I don't. I know that if I press on, and allow God to fight for me and move in me I will win the battle. It is promised in Philippians "I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus."

So, before God can conquer my impatience. I have to learn to be still. I have to stop worrying that I will never have patience. I have to stop worrying that the things that drive me crazy will never stop. I have to stop worrying that my sister will always act the way she does. And I have to be still. 

God told us in Psalm 46 to be still in the crazy. In this chapter everything is in chaos. The earth is giving way, mountains are falling into the heart of the sea, the waters are roaring and foaming, nations are in an uproar, kingdoms are falling. Then God says "Be still and know that I am God." 

Now replace the circumstances for your own. For me it would be no mom, and little insane sister who talks nonstop, laundry, school, and just everything, every little piece of the world the makes me feel a little more frazzled every day. 

And then God throws this in "Be still and know that I am God."

How can I be still when everything around me is crazy? With this there is another crazy thing God asks us to do: Trust. Trust that if we are still through the crazy he will fight for us. He will provide the patience. 

If I'm the one constantly searching in myself to find patience, I'm never going to find it, because I've forgotten I have none to provide. God does though, so I must search for my patience in Him while I'm being still and then He will provide me the patience I need, for the moment. For the moment when my sister comes running up, ruining my peace, screaming "Look, Look, LOOK!!!! Have you seen this? Can you come here for me? Please! Please!" He will provide that patience, but before He does, I need to be still before him, know He is God, and trust that my God is one who can provide patience even to the most impatient. Trust that my God is in control and even though it seems all wrong the way things play out, He is God. 

I think I'm coming to believe that once I trust, I will learn to be still, and once I'm still, I will have patience. And most importantly I'll be striving to be like Jesus ("Love is Patient"), and I will be trusting the God that fights my battles for me and each day, draws me closer to Himself.