A page with words.

When I don't write. It's not because I have nothing to say. When I don't write, it's because I have too much to say. Thoughts crowd my mind like so many books weighing on old shelves. Thoughts. Fragments. They float mid-air. If I don't write, I don't give shape and form to these floating things. I feel that I fail.

Lately the thoughts come thick and fast. They fill the shelves of my mind so full they tumble off into a cahotic heap. When I lay down at night my head is heavy as lead because it's so full of thoughts.

I know very well my thoughts are not always, if ever, original. My small mind contains questions that have been asked by millions of minds before me.

But there's something satisfying in expressing something in your own words even if it isn't your original idea.

What is the good of having thoughts, opinions; ideas, if you can't give them flesh and bones in clear words? Thoughts without words are faceless clocks that can't tell time, croissants without butter, books with empty pages.

I feel as though I could lock myself away for a long time and just write. The words would spill reckless over the pages. In the end, I wouldn't have an incredible manuscript, something brimming with oringinal ideas. I wouldn't have a New York Times Bestseller. But what I would have, would be mine. It would be my thoughts and ideas made flesh.

questions.

 

He is a boy. He is a man.

 He is a boy man.

Teetering on the edge of boyhood,

looking into the vast unknown of manhood.

 

 

His lips are pursed, wondering.

 

His eyes are open questioning.

 

 

 

He is a man who looks,

sometimes unsure, sometimes with questions into his future.

 

We all have questions.

In each season of life,

we ask.

we wonder

...

 

Foot in mouth.

Do you ever put your foot in your mouth?

Not just the toes but the whole huge foot, all the way up to the ankle. And you're sitting there with your foot flapping in your mouth looking the picture of stupidity.

This happens to me more often then not.

It just recently happened to me. I was talking with someone I don't know very well, but I greatly respect.

{this always makes me painfully prone to putting my foot in my mouth. I always over-analyze what} {to say, till I'm so confused I don't know the right words from the wrong words}

 

"I never regretted something

I didn't say."

{I think that's how the quote goes by Abraham Lincoln...}

 

True words.

Unfortunately I'm never sitting here NOT regretting what I didn't say, I'm usually sitting here regretting what I did say.

 

Feeling that I'm an awkward fool with so much yet to learn...

A pretty accurate feeling about myself.

Why Christmas?

Holy Trinity.

Three in one.

Father, Son; Holy Spirit.

Glory of Heaven.

The Son leaves the splendor,

the glory.

He comes to earth small;

insignificant.

Babe born of a Virgin's womb.

Born in a stable in a crowded little town.

The hay was soiled.

An incredible star shone above the stable.
Its light filled the land.
Mary struggles, strains
to bring this God baby to the waiting world.
White angels come to shepherds in a field.
The angels fill the sky.
Bright.
Their voices resound.
Echoing loud as they praise God.
Shepherds stand beneath the brimming sky.
Their mouths agape.
Their ragged cloths and beards swaying in chill breeze.
Three kings.
Dressed in deep red, gold; blue.
They watch the sky.
They know of a prophecy.
A prophesy written in ancient scrolls.
Of a king.
A messiah coming, for all mankind.
This star is made of three planets aligning in the Heavens.
This star means a king.
The kings travel.
They travel on camels over miles of desert.
They seek the King.
Mary's breathing regulates.
Her heart is full, overflowing as she looks at the baby in her arms.
Jesus.
He is here.
He is born.
The world need wait no longer.
The King, the Messiah is here.
For all mankind.


This is why we have Christmas.


 

  

Miracle.

I sit in a cold barn, in my pajamas, on a hard bale of straw. I am sobbing out my heart to the Lord. Choking on the words that come from my soul through my hoarse voice, uttered in the still of the big barn.

Goats chew softly, their hay. I cry out. Weak pleading. All the ugly that is my heart spills out through hot tears and prayer.

My God hears. He knows.

He knows.

No one knows so well as He the depths of this wayward, sinful heart of mine.

How easy I see the speck in another's eye. How can I see at all? Logs protrude from my eyes.

Our human eyes are prone to see the inconsistency in others. We don't look in the mirror often enough for our inconsistency to glare back at us.

My hot breath hitting the cold air turns to clouds of fog. Hot tears barely escape my lashes before they feel cold.

I sob out loud to my Lord. I ask Him to teach me how to love those around me without condition. I ask Him to teach me how to live joy; how to live in the Spirit not in the flesh.

I hold out my heart, a throbbing, bloody mess. I ask my Savior to take it, renew it, make it new. Fashioning the ugly broken, into something God-glorifying.

He takes this filth I hand Him. He knows the dark depths of my soul.

But.

He loves me still.

This is a miracle.

After the hot flood of tears; the surrender. My Father sends me a peace. A quiet stillness in my soul.

Later on, as I bustle to prepare something delicious for Mommy and family, who are feeling sick, Mommy thanks me for working with such a joyful spirit.

I am taken back.

I have a joyful spirit?

This is not me.

The joy, it is God.

God inside of me. God chiseling away at the ugly scab of my nature; growing inside of me His tender Spirit.

Philippians 1:6
And I am sure of this, that He who began a good work in you will bring it to comletion at the day of Jesus Christ.