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