Saturday, October 31, 2015

Whispers in the Silence



What whisperings of new beginnings can you hear emerging from the silence of darkness?

This is the question attached to my daily Abbey of the Arts email today.  It is pregnant with possibilities.

We enter into this Autumn awaiting a prodigal's return.  He is coming home a new creature in Christ.  But as everyone knows, it takes time for reformation.  Seldom does the Lord transform us all at once.  And David and I are here to witness whatever comes, to partner in it really.

I read what I can about the difficulties in returning to society after prison and it can be scary.  Thankfully, Josh doesn't seem overly institutionalized.  He has fought against it, and I think that will help him.  He is excited...and a little scared...to get out and begin this new life with all the demands and expectations.  In the past, he's not done well with those.  But perhaps this new man will take them on and succeed, that is my prayer.

So my whisperings from the silence of darkness are that the Lord loves Josh, He loves us, He will make a way like He always does.  Josh truly belongs to Him now and wants to serve Him, so he now is held in loving, able hands.

It's been a rough week.  We needed the landlord's approval for him to stay here and the landlord wanted to think about it.  Time marched on, yesterday we took a letter and rental ap with Josh's information and as we talked....he signed the letter right then!  I must admit, and I hate it, I was pretty much a basket case.  There aren't enough words or pages to hold what has been in my heart since Josh went in.  I'm not sure I even understand it all myself.  But to turn him out in the cold, with nowhere to go....and no, they don't tell the inmates where to go, they simply release them and expect them to show up at the Corrections Officer's office on time, was more than I felt I could bear.  So my mama's heart was breaking at the thought of all this. 

Many pitfalls lie ahead and we will have to be more patient and loving than we've ever been with each other.  It's a big change for my love and I.  We are now used to living by ourselves and not having anyone else to consider.  We won't have the privacy we've had.  And Dave has been absolutely wonderful.  I was in such bad shape yesterday, he came home early to be with me until we could go to the landlord's.  He and Josh have had run-ins, though they generally get along well, but that's always in the back of my mind.  But this man, whose blood children are independent and self-sufficient, has had to be drawn into this drama of a confused and at the time, arrogant, young man who wound up in prison.  Never once has he made me feel that he resented it, and now he is opening our home to him.

The thing that I am not proud of, disappointed in myself actually, is the lack of faith I had.  I know that the Lord could have a reason for wanting him in Corvallis, but all I could think of was how much better off it seemed for him to be with us and I let it get the better of me.  There are Christian women I admire, who seem to pass through crises fairly unruffled and full of faith.  That is my goal, but at 61, not there yet.  And then again, aside from faith that grows by hearing the Word of God, I am how He made me, those other women are how He made them.  I just struggle with this, have all my life.  I want never to disappoint the Lord.  How grateful I am for His love, mercy and grace.

So my darkness whispers to me that perhaps this will go better than we think, perhaps He will continue to make ways where there seem to be none, perhaps this scary, hard thing will turn out to be the sweet, healing thing.  Only He knows.  I, at least, am able to trust Him for what lies ahead today.  There are some other challenges, and who knows, I won't really believe all this until Josh walks through the front door, so many hoops to jump through, but it is true that God is good, and Jesus loves me, this I know, for the Bible tells me so.

Saturday, October 17, 2015

DROPS OF PRAISE....OR...



I had intended this to be a completely different slant.  I was in prayer and as anyone who's walked with the Lord very long knows, tears often are a part of praise.  I was thinking they are drops of praise.  That each one holds the gratitude of a heart that had just about given up hope....but God.  And when words cannot accurately convey what is in the heart, tears, just tears to a God who understands and keeps those tears in a bottle.

But almost as soon as I was thinking about that, something took place that made me want to change, and acknowledge that most of the time tears are for when words won't do for sure.  Words weren't made to express the broken heart.  When one is so completely misunderstood by one so dearly loved.

My son called and what he proceeded to say so hurt that I could not continue the phone call.  He was calm and not on a rant, but explaining some things he took issue with.  And "those" kinds of tears fell.  They are teeming with pain and disbelief. 

What I am coming to realize that midst the process of aging with a disease I can't get a handle on, weariness from a 7-year wilderness journey, but the love of precious family and friends, and a man that so blesses me every single day, i'm getting off that train.  Disembarking.  I no longer have the strength to do battle over imaginings and the past.  I go forward now.  There is no reverse on this car.  ;) 

But when I come before my first Love, wounds are tended and hearts made full because He paid the price for all our imperfections and bad choices.  I come away having wept out praise once again.  He is in control and one very important difference now, He is in control of my boy's life too.  So though there be set-backs here and there, the path he is on is straight, finally.  Nothing but tears of praise for that!