"I Am Who I Am"

You are holy.
You are happy.
You are God.
You are wise.
You are strong.
You are just.
You are jealous.
You are righteous.
You are gracious.
God. Gracious.
You are clean.
You are pure.
You're...beautiful.
You are sure.
You're...beautiful.
You are good.
God. Good.
You are lavish.
You are Love.
You are All.
You are for me.
You are worthy.
You are true.
You are You
And mine.
Shine. Eclipse.
Drown me in this.

Zephaniah and an Unexpected Song

     We grow up performing, and we want to be safe and shameless. Though we don't trust Him or seek Him, we, like tired virgins, lie to ourselves, ignoring the judgment we know we deserve, the judgment that is coming upon all men (3:1-2, 1:12). Because of the very nature of performance, a fake, outward layer of “goodness” keeps us from the joy of being fully known and totally loved. He weeps and wants us to come close to Him, but so often we reject an offer so precious. His jealousy burns and will bring a just holocaust, a fiery jealousy and flaming wrath that will consume the whole earth (1:17-18, 2:1-2). Like self-righteous Judah, we may think we'll escape His wrath and that our false hopes will give us good, but such people will stand with the Pharisees, estranged and outside of His sacred camp forever, unclean.

      Our idols cannot save us. He will “famish all the gods of the earth” and they will bow before Him (2:11). Will those whom He will famish satiate our hunger? In a delusive security, we have shamelessly exulted in ourselves and the gods we have made and said in our hearts, “I am, and there is no one else.” How dare I. How dare you. How dare we.

      The I Am who is Everything will not let us mock Him with a crown of thorns forever. He will pour out His indignation, all His burning anger, and consume the whole earth in the fire of His jealousy (3:8).

      And then He will sing, over me, over you, over us. He will save, drawing the lame to Himself, humbling the “proudly exultant ones,” and putting a song of joy in the souls of the needy, for while we were still sinners Christ died for us (3:11-20, Rom. 5:8). What we truly need is safety from His wrath and whole nearness to Him. Sinners who come to Christ are safe, secure, cared for, known and unashamed. The LORD, the I Am, takes away all of the judgment against us by placing it on the back of His precious Son, and in Jesus our Hope is secure. So much more than our defeated gods, our Jesus can save and He does save. He is with us, knowing yet loving, knowing and loving, singing an unexpected song of pleasure in His children. His voice must be so strong and so tender, so fierce and so pure, so full and so golden. In open Calvaried arms of immovable love, we are quiet and at peace. His "heart is a song that our Jesus sings."*

*from Showbread's "Sing Me to Sleep"

A Little Poem

The weeds,
the hollow macaron shells are
worthless objects of a massive mercy,
a Waterfall of Mercy,
a Rage and Rush over the needy.
Fill me.

Quote: Precious Communion

"No happiness that all the glory of this world could produce is equal to that of a broken heart at the feet of Jesus. It is sweet to creep into the very bosom of Christ, while we feel how utterly worthless and unworthy, yet how welcome, we are." 

"I think, if I had ten thousand hearts, I would give them all to Jesus!"

From Walking with Jesus by Mary Winslow (italics mine)

Sacred Communion

It is still and sacred,
This opening of me to You;
This opening of dirty hands;
This table of surrender, bread, and blood;
This giving, giving, giving that You do;
A grace from open, gracious You.

It's a reckless river,
This cleansing blood that's coursing through
The darkest depths of all of me;
This cup of water poured out pure and fierce;
This quenching for a burning soul from You;
A quiet gift from lamb-like You.

It is open access,
This curtain that's been torn in two;
Your broken body blessing me;
This opening of wounds then presence pleased;
This drawing near of prodigals to You;
A bread so beautiful it seems untrue.

But You are true
    and certain.
And as I finger signs and seals
Your heart pours into mine what's real-
Our sure
     though unseen
Union,
Me + You,
Communion.

The Righteousness of God in Isaiah

    God has given us a treasure of unexpected righteousness. It’s a righteousness that will break your heart with joy, like a sunrise after a moonless night, like a crocus at winter’s end. It blossoms so beautiful that it seems untrue, but it’s utterly true. He has told us in Isaiah (and in all His Scriptures) and He cannot lie.
    This righteousness doesn’t come from us and it never could. He looks for righteousness in us, the people He’s made and has ever only shown good, but He finds none (Isaiah 5:7). Isaiah paints a bleak picture of us. So lost are we in our unrighteousness that “all (absolutely all) our righteous deeds are like a polluted garment” (64:6). We make ourselves our own gods, thinking we can decide what is good, we who are “wise in [our] own eyes” (5:21). Like the king of Babylon, our pomp will bring us to Hell (14:11). God taunts the Jews, who are just as wicked at heart as the nations around them, and we are no better than they are, wearing our proud crowns atop our kingly heads, decking ourselves in fading flowers that are nothing to Him and His beauty (28:1, 5). Isaiah exposes us as not only wicked, but foolishly wicked, irrational in our idolatry. The things we choose to worship are “less than nothing” and make us an “abomination” just like them (42:24). Worshiping things that are not gods, things we make into gods, as if such things could ever be above us and bless us, we “feed on ashes; a deluded heart has led him astray, and he cannot deliver himself or say, ‘Is there not a lie in my right hand?’” (44:20). But “there is no other god besides [Him], a righteous God and a Savior; there is none besides [Him]” (45:21).
    And a righteous God He is indeed. He is not like our idols and not like us. The Holy God “shows Himself holy in righteousness” (5:16). Isaiah reveals a zealous God who punishes the prideful and unrighteous nations, laying low the lofty idols and counselors of Egypt (19:1), defiling the “pompous pride of all glory” of Tyre (23:9). Against the fallen glory of the nations, the judgment of even the entire earth, the world hears “of glory to the Righteous One” (24:16). Such a glory is darkness for the unrighteous ones against whom the LORD sets Himself.
    And somehow the Sun of Righteousness rises with healing in His wings.* It seems contradictory that a righteous God could rule and that such a rule could be good for us. How can Isaiah write of the result of righteousness as peace, quietness, and trust (32:17-18) in a world where “no one does good, not even one?”** Christ sits on the throne of David with a scepter of righteousness in His hand (9:7), justice and righteousness, which go hand in hand, and yet this King with righteousness about His waist brings good to the poor of the earth, as if the poor were not unrighteous (11:4-5). But it is not that the poor are more righteous than any other. It is that Jesus comes for the poor, to save those who come to Him with no righteousness of their own and who know that God is the only savior, the only one who can bear the burden of our sin (43:11, 46:4).*** In Isaiah, righteousness and salvation are meaningfully linked; the author sets the two against one another as parallels. When His righteousness draws near, His salvation also goes out (46:12-13, 54:5-8). He “speaks in righteousness, mighty to save” (63:1). The climactic consolation of Isaiah (or at the very least one of them) is that, when there was no hope for us in ourselves, “the righteous one, my servant, [makes] many to be accounted righteous, and He shall bear their iniquities” (53:11). How beautiful is Jesus! God in His righteousness does not only judge us in our lack; He brings His righteousness near to us, decking us out in a robe of righteousness and garments of salvation, the imputed righteousness of our Savior, “as a bridegroom decks himself like a priest with a beautiful headdress, and as a bride adorns herself with jewels” (61:10). To His glory (60:21), we wear this radiant righteousness and burning salvation, no more cast off, polluted and poor as we are in ourselves, and we are delighted in by God, our God who justifies the ungodly (62:1-5).**** “I will greatly rejoice in LORD; my soul shall exult in my God” (61:10).
   
*Malachi 4:2 and Charles Wesley’s “Hark! The Herald Angels Sing,” ESV
**Romans 3:12, ESV
***Matthew 11:28, ESV
****Romans 3:26, ESV

Quote: The Rent Veil

The broken body and shed blood of the Lord had at length opened the sinner's way into the holiest. And these were the tokens not merely of grace, but of righteousness. That rending was no act either of mere power or of mere grace. Righteousness had done it. Righteousness had rolled away the stone. Righteousness had burst the gates of brass, and cut in sunder the bars of iron. It was a righteous removal of the barrier; it was a righteous entrance that had been secured for the unrighteous; it was a righteous welcome for the chief of sinners that was now proclaimed.

Long had the blood of bulls and goats striven to rend the veil, but in vain. Long had they knocked at the awful gate, demanding entrance for the sinner; long had they striven to quench the flaming sword, and unclasp the fiery belt that girdled paradise; long had they demanded entrance for the sinner, but in vain. But now the better blood has come; it knocks but once, and the gate flies open; it but once touches the sword of fire, and it is quenched. Not a moment is lost. The fulness of the time has come. God delays not, but unbars the door at once. He throws open His mercy-seat to the sinner, and makes haste to receive the banished one; more glad even than the wanderer himself that the distance, and the exclusion, and the terror are at an end for ever.

O wondrous power of the cross of Christ! To exalt the low, and to abase the high; to cast down and to build up; to unlink and to link; to save and to destroy; to kill and to make alive; to shut out and to let in; to curse and to bless. O wondrous virtue of the saving cross, which saves in crucifying, and crucifies in saving! For four thousand years has paradise been closed, but Thou hast opened it. For ages and generations the presence of God has been denied to the sinner, but Thou hast given entrance,-- and that not timid, and uncertain, and costly, and hazardous; but bold, and blessed, and safe, and free. [...]

"May I then draw near as I am, in virtue of the efficacy of the sprinkled blood?" Most certainly. In what other way or character do you propose to come? And may I be bold at once? Most certainly. For if not at once, then when and how? Let boldness come when it may, it will come to you from the sight of the blood upon the floor and mercy-seat, and from nothing else. It is bold coming that honours the blood. It is bold coming that glorifies the love of God and the grace of His throne. "Come boldly!" this is the message to the sinner. Come boldly now! Come in the full assurance of faith, not supposing it possible that that God who has provided such a mercy-seat can do anything but welcome you; that such a mercy-seat can be anything to you but the place of pardon, or that the gospel out of which every sinner that has believed it has extracted peace, can contain anything but peace to you.

The rent veil is liberty of access. Will you linger still? The sprinkled blood is boldness,-- boldness for the sinner, for any sinner, for every sinner. Will you still hesitate, tampering and dallying with uncertainty and doubt, and an evil conscience? Oh, take that blood for what it is and gives, and go in. Take that rent veil for what it indicates, and go in. This only will make you a peaceful, happy, holy man. This only will enable you to work for God on earth, unfettered and unburdened; all over joyful, all over loving, and all over free. This will make your religion not that of one who has everything yet to settle between himself and God, and whose labours, and duties, and devotions are all undergone for the purpose of working out that momentous adjustment before life shall close, but the religion of one who, having at the very outset, and simply in believing, settled every question between himself and God over the blood of the Lamb, is serving the blessed One who has loved him and bought him, with all the undivided energy of his liberated and happy soul.

For every sinner, without exception, that veil has a voice, that blood a voice, that mercy-seat a voice. They say, "Come in." They say, "Be reconciled to God." They say, "Draw near." They say, "Seek the Lord while He may be found." To the wandering prodigal, the lover of pleasure, the drinker of earth's maddening cup, the dreamer of earth's vain dreams,--they say, there is bread enough in your Father's house, and love enough in your Father's heart, and to spare,--return, return. To each banished child of Adam, exiles from the paradise which their first father lost, these symbols, with united voice, proclaim the extinction of the fiery sword, the re- opening of the long-barred gate, with a free and abundant re-entrance, or rather, entrance into a more glorious paradise, a paradise that was never lost.*

Therefore, brothers, since we have confidence to enter the holy places by the blood of Jesus, by the new and living way that He opened for us through the curtain, that is, through His flesh, and since we have a great priest over the house of God, let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, with our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water. Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for He who promised is faithful.**

*From Horatius Bonar's The Rent Veil
**Hebrews 10:19-23, ESV

Quote: The Cross Once Seen

    "Hear the just law- the judgment of the skies!
He that hates the truth shall be the dupe of lies:
And he that will be cheated to the last,
Delusions strong as Hell shall bind him fast.
But if the wanderer his mistake discern,
Judge his own ways, and sigh for a return,
Bewildered once, must he bewail his loss
For ever and for ever?  No- the cross! 
[...]
There and there only is the power to save.
There no delusive hope invites despair;
No mockery meets you, no deception there.
The spells and charms that blinded you before
All vanish there and fascinate no more.
    I am no preacher, let this hint suffice-
The cross once seen is death to every vice"

From "The Progress of Error" by William Cowper

A Sketch of a Woman, Guilty and at Peace

    The lurid eyes of death always a picture in my mind, I felt a burning weight upon my chest, felt as though I were drowning, panicking, suffocating, and there was none to help, none to help.  Over and over again, I turned the pages of my life, searching frenziedly, reading between the lines even, for a reason as to why I was so cursed.  Was I not cursed?  Is that not what they would all say?  Perhaps this is why I felt so deserted; I expected no one to help me now.  Sinners did not merit care, and, without anyone to care for me, I knew that was how the town viewed me.  And in the deepest parts of me I knew. My fiery guilt is true, as real as the cold, stagnant body of my son.
    My dear, only son’s body was hoisted upon the bier and carried by a few men through the town for the procession.  The wailing of the crowd, considerable in size, was intense enough to give anyone nightmares.  Perhaps the women considered their own sons.  To add to the torture was the haunting memory of another funeral procession which seemed not very long ago in my mind, and I wailed.  More grieved than any, my wails stood alone.  Shock had not comforted me much, so at least I had a chance to express the ache already in my heart, released many a times since the day before in a groan here, a sob there.  The hours of worry released themselves also in my howls.  Where would I find food?  Shelter?  How long could I make it on our last loaf of bread?  My last loaf of bread.
    As we reached the gate to carry him out, from the head of the crowd I spotted another crowd coming toward us, a great crowd, and did not take much note of them.  However, for some reason, the other crowd stopped- I believe because their leader stopped- and the head of it looked at me, His face flushed from His journey, unattractive, beside the zest of life in His eyes, eyes that rested on me.  Turning my sallow face toward him, my eyes- I’m sure of stinging, pathetic, wild grief- met His eyes, compassion welling up in them, passionate compassion, almost fierce, that lively sparkle in His eye- or His look or whatever it was- ever present.  I note this all only looking back; when I first saw Him, I cannot I noted anything at all inhumane about this man. 
    Then He spoke.  “Do not weep."  His voice…it was excited, tense, gentle, magnanimous in its feeling, as if compassion spewed irresistibly the words from the depths of Him.  Queerly, then he walked up toward the bier, the men holding it standing still, and touched it. “Young man, I say to you, arise,” He said, confidence in His voice.  The Prince of Life collides with Death and Sin and wins. 
    My dead boy sat up and began to speak!  And the man gave him to me.  Relief swept over me like a refreshing sea breeze at noon, but wonder, fear, seized me even more, along with the rest of the crowd.  “A great prophet has arisen among us!”  “God has visited His people!”  God has visited His people, and peace has visited the earth among those with whom He is pleased.*  In a moment of desperate need, when all is lost for me and to me, He comes, merely passing by my town in His journey, with no reason to stop here but compassion, unasked for by me or any other as far as I know, unnecessary on His part, Life and Mercy dripping from Him, meeting me, guilty and helpless me, drawing near to me with Joy in His wake.  And peace flows like a river through my sin-scorched veins.**

Therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.***

*Luke 2:14, ESV
**Isaiah 66:12, ESV
***Romans 5:1, ESV

Dialogue and story from Luke 7:11-17

A Sketch of a Woman, Sinful and Forgiven

    The moment I heard that Jesus was dining with a certain Pharisee at his home, I hastened to Him.  My feelings ordered me to halt, Experience on their side; Reason continually pointed out to me the foolishness of my way, but neither could she stop me.  I set my jaw and forced myself to move.  I forced myself, but do not think, reader, that I was not compelled to go.  Paradoxically, I forced myself, while a confident belief forced me.  I had seen this Jesus before, and somehow, from that vision of Him, I knew. 
    My heart flew wildly like a caged bird, paced like a caged, passionate tigress, as I made my way through the city to the Pharisee's home, cradling gingerly my flask of ointment, by far the most valuable thing I had, perhaps more valuable than myself in many eyes, myself who was cheapened so by my sin, but still I wish I had more to give to Him.  Mind you, my goal was not to pay Him back for what He had done for me.  A beloved one is honored; the more costly the gift, the more value it attributes to the receiver.  Oh, how much more He deserved!  May He receive His reward.  My heart was empty when I first saw Him, all need, with so much I needed to give, so much Justice compelled me to give, so much I could not give, my heart only a black hole of sin.  His eyes pierced the pit of my heart with hatred, well-earned.  “Go to hell!  Away from me!”  The idea of His repulsion burned my soul, as did the realization that I merited it.  I caused the breach, not Him.  Oh, no, not Him.  The sin ran so deep in me, as if it were the blood running through my veins, pumping in my heart.  But now…I knew.  I would be welcome.
    It did not take me long to reach the Pharisee’s home.  Uninvited, I went in, clutching my flask, weeping.  I dared not stand before Him, not because I couldn’t; perhaps it was the very fact that He would let someone like me before Him that caused me to stay behind, at His feet.  Awe made me tremble as my tears fell- oh dirty tears!- onto His feet, beautiful feet.  I wiped them tenderly with my hair, trembling still that I was so close to Him.  I had to go further; He demanded more honor, though He said not a word.  I had to kiss Him, His feet, over and over again.  Then I poured the alabaster oil all over His feet, rubbing it in, stopping here and there for another kiss, to wipe another tear, the wetness of all three mixing together.  “I love you,” I said wordlessly in every tear, every kiss, every stroke of my hand along his oily feet.  I had purposed to go beyond customary attributions of worth.  I must have tears and hair instead of water and a towel, kisses on His feet, as though He were a King, alabaster ointment instead of common oil.
    To himself, Simon, the owner of the house, said, “If this man were a prophet, He would have known who and what sort of woman this is who is touching Him, for she is a sinner.”  I did not look up.
    For the first time, Jesus spoke.  “Simon, I have something to say to you.”
    “Say it, Teacher.”
    Throughout their exchange, I could not look up.  I kissed, and kissed, and kissed.  “A certain moneylender had two debtors.  One owed five hundred denarii, and the other fifty.  When they could not pay, he cancelled the debt of both.  Now which of them will love him more?”
    “The one, I suppose, for whom he cancelled the larger debt.”
    “You have judged rightly.”  Jesus turned to me; I felt His welcoming eyes upon me.  “Do you see this woman?  I entered your house; you gave me no water for my feet, but she has wet my feet with her tears and wiped them with her hair.  You gave me no kiss, but from the time I came in she has not ceased to kiss my feet.  You did not anoint my head with oil, but she has anointed my feet with ointment.  Therefore I tell you, her sins, which are many, are forgiven-”
    I know! my heart cried in confident, astonished joy.  Many sins, forgiven.  Oh, now He did not see the blackness in my veins, but beauty, purity, goodness, righteousness, all His own. 
    “-for she loved much.  But he who is forgiven little, loves little.”  The one who is forgiven much loves much.
    At last I ceased my kisses, an occasional tear still rolling down.  He said to me, “Your sins are forgiven.”  I looked at Him steadily.  His lips confirmed what I had known all along.  And you, who were dead in your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh, God made alive together with him, having forgiven us all our trespasses, by canceling the record of debt that stood against us with its legal demands. This he set aside, nailing it to the cross.*  How you forgive such a nothing as me, Jesus!
    Those who were at the table with Simon and Jesus began to say among themselves, “Who is this, who even forgives sins?”
    I suspect Jesus knew their words, and, affirming His power and being dear to me, said, “Your faith has saved you;  go in peace.”  Peace for my tumultuous soul.  Peace with God, forgiven all the wrong I’ve done Him.  There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. For the law of the Spirit of life has set you free in Christ Jesus from the law of sin and death. For God has done what the law, weakened by the flesh, could not do. By sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, he condemned sin in the flesh, in order that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us…**
   
*Colossians 2:13-14, ESV
**Romans 8:1-4, ESV

Dialogue and story from Luke 7:36-50, ESV

Look Up

Dear Believer,
This is a land of hungry, roving eyes. It is so easy to lock in on things that are so much less than Jesus, to lock in on a “worldly” life or a “righteous” life. There is a clean, warm sky above, but perhaps each time you sin, you find yourself gazing more deeply into the mud, greedy for idolatrous mud and muddied righteousness. It is so easy, perhaps, to look even too much to how you are looking at Him! But if and when you look up from your sin, you will find that He is still here. And He still saves even those who are so messed up that they can’t even look to Him rightly. You will find that the cross still stands and His blood still covers you. You will find His eyes waiting for you, even searching (and He finds) for you, full of love and warm welcome. You will find eyes that say:
“…where sin increased, grace abounded all the more…” (Romans 5:20)
“The steadfast love of the LORD never ceases; His mercies never come to an end; they are new every morning…” (Lamentations 3:22-23)
“I am the bread of life; whoever comes to me shall not hunger, and whoever believes in me shall never thirst.” (John 6:35)
“Whoever comes to me I will never cast out.” (John 6:37)
“My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me. I give them eternal life, and they will never perish, and no one will snatch them out of my hand.” (John 10:27-28)
And you won’t be able to take your eyes away.

Rose: A Sonnet

His skin was thin, discolored green, with pikes-
The beast that dwelt within the castle’s bars.
The white old man was withered, shaking like
A brittle prisoner of a bitter dark.

The prisoner flapped his arms and begged. The beast,
With prickles piercing through his serpent cheeks,
With greedy eyes, a child before sweets,
Revealed unto his prey his thorny teeth.

A girl, her face with passion blossomed red,
Grew up the stairs to plead her father free.
Her voice was like a sword. The beauty bled
With love, though both at first refused her plea.

She cut him with a gaze of living green;
The beast the beauty conquered and made clean.

An Introduction

Hi, and welcome to this little blog! I hope you find a beautiful place here. The whole Christian life is very much a life of seeing beauty. In the gospel, God reveals and invites us into the most beautiful Beauty imaginable- Himself. There are a lot of blogs out there, even a lot of blogs about “beauty,” beauty in every day life, food, family, fashion, projects, the arts. Many of these sites point, not only to the beauty in this world, but the “beauty” of you, humanity’s “beauty.” But He is so much more than these things, and He is shown so little in this world.

Even on Christian websites and blogs, even those sites with wise words, I fear we miss out sometimes on that which will bring us the most joy- a simple sight of Christ. In Christian circles, we do a lot of focusing on ourselves. How can I be better at this or that? Sometimes our motives are sheer self-righteousness, other times perhaps a desire to honor Christ. It’s not wrong to seek wisdom and growth, but these things don’t come through five helpful tips on how to be Proverbs 31 woman or how to reach out to our communities. See, we are not so beautiful as we think, but there’s a lot of “freedom in failure”* and a lot of life in being helpless. What if we are totally needy and entirely ugly in our sin, but offered a complete salvation and an infinite love in Christ? Now that is beauty. It’s arresting beauty. He is Beauty, that He would live and die for wicked sinners who hate Him so that He might justly bring them to Himself, justly and fully welcome them into His presence in which there is fullness of joy.* Seeing Jesus in this way changes us and makes us live as fiercely His.* 

So, in all things here, be it a poem or theological thoughts, I hope what you read here will help point you to the beauty of Christ in the gospel. There will be no perfection, just a weak girl needing Jesus and receiving His grace. Hope you will join.

*Quote from Brave Saint Saturn’s “Recall”
*Psalm 16:11
*2 Corinthians 3:18-4:6