12 June 2014

Loved back to life

It feels like we've already lived a few lifetimes. 
From sitting on the shores of the Pacific, to the slums of the Sub-Saharan, through the cities of North America, Jobin and I marvel at how Love brought us together from opposite ends of the earth and continues to carry us to the corners of the earth. Our hearts often feel stretched thin, spread across every continent with all the souls we hold dear. Through every trial and triumph, times of great despair to even greater rejoicing, we are held together by grace that is closer than our skin. Sometimes we find ourselves between two worlds- between where we are and where we long to be, lovesick for our Saviour and homesick for a place we've never been. But in that tension we are filled with wonder and hope for the season we're in and the seasons to come- as Love calls us to rise and come alive.

After many tears, prayers and years in waiting, we have our one-way tickets to Uganda booked from our knees. And every time I see an airplane fly across the skies, every time I look up at the stars, every time I feel the sun on my skin, every time it rains- I can almost feel the red dirt between my toes and the kids on my hips. As we vowed at our wedding altar, we pray that our lives forever be spent broken like bread, poured out like wine and laid down for Love's sake. And in our covenant and our calling, to take a hold of that which Love has taken a hold of us - from slums, villages and orphanages, living on earth as it is in heaven. Tethered together by the grace of a higher hand, our lives are a living testimony of a Love that raises us back to life.


I'm coming to understand the scripture 'so Abraham went out, not knowing where he was going' a little more. As each day comes, Jobin and I are walking each step out in faith as we prepare to move across the ocean- leaving jobs that we love, packing up our little apartment, and above all saying goodbye to our beloved community here. We are building little altars as we go, laying down everything in our hands and our hearts- trusting in the One who can do abundantly more than all we can ask or imagine into the unknown.

In a world that thrives on the possession of power and being in control, I'm learning to trust the still small voice inside of me- the same voice that whispers "just be my daughter; just, be". I'm reminded of these words over and again, from the midst of laundry piles to never ending to-do lists- from the mundane to the madness of everyday ways. That life becomes less about compartmentalizing and controlling but more about experiencing wild grace in our chaos. That our purpose does not come from what we do, it comes from who He is- Love. 
Even as Love Himself hung on that Cross, there were ones who mocked, protested and tested saying "if you are the son of God, come down". Because our world always demands the evidence of power, proof of identity, and answers to questions. But even the life of Jesus was always lived from a place of beloved-ness, from a place of being - coming as a servant to the least of these rather than living as a tyrant king. Never needing to prove anything, never placating to easy answers, and never parading any power- Jesus laid his life down for love.
Through it all, faith gives us eyes to see that heaven is always being released in and through our existence. Even through the tension of the miraculous and the mundane, there is life bursting through the struggle. Living from a place of being has never been about trying to have it all together but about dancing undignified in the undoingThere's a richness that can only be found at the end of our rope. Healing, restoration, forgiveness- all of life woven in threads of grace, redemption and purpose- accepting that some things can happen in an instant, while others take a process. Freedom is found in the letting go without the need to comprehend. Because the peace that passes all understanding only comes when we let go of our want to understand. Like the dead of winter, after each leaf has abandoned every tree, we are left to wait in the wilderness year after year. Yet nothing is wasted- each season a constant reminder that our Creator makes everything is beautiful in its time. And just as in creation, there is always a magnificence moving in the unseen, loving us back to life. 


It's the whole story that makes life sacred. Life each day, in all of its beauty and all of its mess, is an invitation to find gardens in unexpected places. Blind eyes opened, ruins rebuilt, rivers in the wastelands, broken lives restored. All that I am is a testament to that truth, being loved back to life. So we pray to live the rest of our days beholding the gardens in the souls of the orphan, the widow, and everyone whom Love leads us to.

1 comment:

Unknown said...

Hey Sister. Thank you for your blog post. It is wonderful to hear of your journey. I look forward keeping up with you and Jobin.
-Scott Tate
"lost in Him, never to be found again."

to the ends of the earth, and of myself

I used to shy away from suffering. My tight grip on control kept me bound in my comfort zone and pride had me blinded from the beauty ...