Worn

This song pretty much says it all.

My heart.
My prayer.
My hope.

Worn 

by Tenth Avenue North

I'm tired
I'm worn
My heart is heavy
From the work it takes to keep on breathing

I've made mistakes
I've let my hope fail
My soul feels crushed
By the weight of this world
And I know that you can give me rest
So I cry out with all that I have left

Let me see redemption win
Let me know the struggle ends
That you can mend a heart that's frail and torn

I want to know a song can rise
From the ashes of a broken life
And all that's dead inside can be reborn
Cause I'm worn

I know I need
To lift my eyes up
But I'm too weak
Life just won't let up
And I know that You can give me rest
So I cry out with all that I have left

Let me see redemption win
Let me know the struggle ends
That you can mend a heart that's frail and torn

I want to know a song can rise
From the ashes of a broken life
And all that's dead inside can be reborn
Cause I'm worn

And my prayers are wearing thin
I'm worn even before the day begins
I'm worn I've lost my will to fight
I'm worn so heaven come and flood my eyes

Let me see redemption win
Let me know the struggle ends
That you can mend a heart that's frail and torn

I want to know a song can rise
From the ashes of a broken life
And all that's dead inside can be reborn
Yes all that's dead inside will be reborn
Though I'm worn
Yeah I'm worn

The God of Missing Pieces

"Excuse me sir, but is this the church?"

A quiet roomful of humanity turned to stare at a blurry, black and white photograph of an ancient cathedral.

And he, he was speechless. As his eyes met the trembling hand that held tightly to a piece of his past, a silent tear slowly trickled down his cheek.

Finally the words came. Slowly, deliberately, full of awe, as if someone had offered him the fortune of a lifetime. Perhaps for him it might as well have been the same thing.

"Yes, yes. I believe that it is. Come and see me after I am finished speaking."

83 years old. The man is 83 years old. And for more than 70 of those years he has not known the name or place of the one who saved him from annihilation, from "hell on earth", as he described it, simply because he was a Jew.

It was, after all, only a place; only a place  and a brave catholic priest who found the courage to extend a compassionate hand to a trembling, orphaned Jew. He was only a boy. He did not think to ask his name. He did not think much of where he was or where he was going. The prevailing thought was only that of survival and not being sent back to certain death in the ghetto. He considered himself fortunate to have been among only 17 Jewish survivors from his hometown. After the war, he left for Israel, then onward to America, never to return to his beloved Poland.

 Now thousands of miles and years removed from those fateful days, part of his life was being handed back to him by an anonymous Polish woman. Something he seemed to have given up long ago, when all the pieces of his life were scattered to the wind in the aftermath of death and destruction. But here she was, at least 40 years his junior, offering closure. Offering to let him see and remember one more time so perhaps he could heal a little bit more.

I do not know where or how or why this all came about: Why this woman chose to hear him speak; what about his story touched her enough to locate his childhood safe haven and the brave man who saved him. I just know that I was there when it happened. That in a world full of pain and suffering and "I-don't-knows", a world that seemingly produces far more questions than answers,  The Healer let me see His beautiful restoration at work.

It's hard sometimes when our fields get ravaged by locusts, when the fig trees don't blossom, when our barns are empty of a bountiful harvest; it's hard, but it is not impossible. The cross is always before a resurrection tomb.

The scattered things, the missing things...He keeps them.
He gives us back the years that locusts have eaten.
He keeps track of our wanderings.
He bottles our tears.
He is the God of missing pieces.

"You have taken account of my wanderings; Put my tears in Your bottle. Are they not in Your book?"

[Psalm 56:8]

"I will restore to you the years that the swarming locust has eaten, the hopper, the destroyer, and the cutter, my great army, which I sent among you."

[Joel 2:25]

"All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation: that God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting people’s sins against them. And he has committed to us the message of reconciliation. We are therefore Christ’s ambassadors, as though God were making his appeal through us. We implore you on Christ’s behalf: Be reconciled to God. God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God."

[2 Corinthians 5:19-20]

Between a Seed and a Storm

30 And he [Jesus] said, “With what can we compare the kingdom of God, or what parable shall we use for it? 31 It is like a grain of mustard seed, which, when sown on the ground, is the smallest of all the seeds on earth, 32 yet when it is sown it grows up and becomes larger than all the garden plants and puts out large branches, so that the birds of the air can make nests in its shade.”

Mark 4:30-32

35 On that day, when evening had come, he said to them, “Let us go across to the other side.” 36 And leaving the crowd, they took him with them in the boat, just as he was. And other boats were with him. 37 And a great windstorm arose, and the waves were breaking into the boat, so that the boat was already filling. 38 But he was in the stern, asleep on the cushion. And they woke him and said to him, “Teacher, do you not care that we are perishing?” 39 And he awoke and rebuked the wind and said to the sea, “Peace! Be still!” And the wind ceased, and there was a great calm. 40 He said to them, “Why are you so afraid? Have you still no faith?” 41 And they were filled with great fear and said to one another, “Who then is this, that even the wind and the sea obey him?”

Mark 4:35-41

Same day. Same disciples. Same chapter. 3 verses later. 

From faith to fear. From trust to trembling. 

Somewhere, somehow the mustard seed of hope and promise got covered over by the waves of doubt and despair.

It's easy to hold on when you're standing on the land; cozy, dry, and surrounded by a great cloud of witnesses. It's a lot harder when you're out on the ocean; cold, wet, alone and uncertain;  trying to figure out how to hold on to a miniscule mustard seed with the same hand that needs to steer the ship clear of danger. 

Two of the most oft-repeated stories---one of faith, the other of fear. Often told separately, in such a way that one might never notice that these disparate emotions occurred on the same day. In the same men. Walking with the same God incarnate. 

I don't know exactly they were thinking, but I can imagine. I can imagine going to sleep in the presence of the Most High and waking up to storm-blown chaos. I can imagine images of peace and calm being replaced with feelings of fear and trembling. I can imagine them trying to get their bearings, asking themselves "Is this how it all ends? It ends in a storm?" I can imagine impetuous Peter asking Jesus, "Lord, I thought I planted my seed...I had faith...but where's the tree? How can there even be a tree when there isn't any dirt? Will I ever see dry land again?" And all the while their Teacher was sleeping.

Jesus could have rebuked them...

Rebuked them for waking Him up.

Rebuked them, professional fishermen, for not having an emergency plan; for not having all the answers.

Rebuked them for panicking. 

But He didn't. He rebuked the "wind and the waves" instead. He rebuked the obstacles, the very things that were causing them to panic, to lose faith, to lose their mustard seed. 

And then He asked them a question:

"Why are you so afraid?"

And another:

"Have you still no faith?"

 
The answer lies in their response: They still didn't know who their Teacher was. They still weren't sure their Rabbi was Steadfast, the one who made them, who sustained them, who loved them, who would walk the way of the cross for them.

This wasn't news to Jesus. He already knew what they would say, how they would respond. But it was news to the disciples. They didn't know that they didn't know. 

Jesus wasn't rebuking them. He wasn't saying "Get it together guys, or I can't use you anymore".  As their Teacher, as their Rabbi, He was helping them understand. He was helping them find their faith. He was showing them their empty places. 

The storm was a point of revelation, not condemnation.  


Because willingness to learn, to follow, to believe always comes from a place of knowing that we don't know. 

That's how small we are.

That's how big He is. 

And that is where the mustard seed is planted.

Love Waits

Sometimes they come, sometimes they don't.

But they know we're there if they need us.

Some days we answer phones, fix broken copy machines, sort donations and pray.

Other days He lets us clothe the naked, feed the hungry, and  be the answer to their prayers.

Some days their stories make us laugh and we rejoice together; but some days, more often than not, their brokenness, our brokenness, causes us to weep: abuse, racism, rejection, despair, loneliness.

I've never been very good at waiting. Always impetuous Peter and rarely patient Paul. Always on the go, always looking to help and go and do the next thing (or jump off the next cliff). 

But I'm learning. And God is letting me see. I'm learning from some very broken, very brave women that a huge part of love is just being there. I think God calls it steadfast [immovable, unshakeable] love.

So every Thursday I join some beautiful people at the crisis pregnancy center and commit to wait.  I am learning that my waiting IS doing. If they need us, we will come and we will be ready to help. If they don't, we will  still come and we will be ready to help. They know this. Maybe that's why it's easy for them to trust, to open up to us, to feel loved.

And maybe that's why it's so much easier  for me to hear the Good Shepherd whisper "This. This is how I love you. When you show up, I love you. And when you don't, I love you. My love is there. Always."

The steadfast love of the LORD never ceases (Lamentations 3:21-23).
The hesed (love based on covenant commitment, Your "over and over" again love) never stops .
Hesed is who You are. And through our "hesed", you show Yourself to the broken.

Love cares. Love does. Love is patient...

Over and over again.

Love waits.

(C) 2012, Fiona DeSimone

"We need to be with the poor. That can seem a bit crazy because it doesn't look like a plan to change the world. But maybe we will change the world if we are happy.

  Maybe what we need most is to rejoice and to celebrate with the weak and the vulnerable."

[Jean Vanier, Living Gently in a Violent World: The Prophetic Witness of Weakness]

Flesh

Flesh.

Stinking, dirty flesh mixed with the smell of human refuse and rotting garbage, intensified by the heat and dampness inherent to the area weather.

Flesh.

Covered in dirt that somehow manages to hide in every crevice of your body, no matter how many times you attempt to wash it away.

Flesh.

Easily torn, bruised, and mutilated; some shaped by accidents, others by the cruel hand of fellow human beings.

Flesh.

Sensitive and diseased.

Flesh.

Vulnerable and exposed; mortality chained to an immortal soul.

Flesh.


Offering public proclamations of our stories before we ever have a chance to speak. So that others can easily determine where we belong among our brothers.

And yet You embraced it;

embodied it;

subjected Your God-ness to it.

An inconcievable eternity of Love and Power and Truth

wrapped in the most vulnerable covering;

in the most vulnerable place.

And the Word became Flesh and dwelt among us.

No longer above us or beyond us.

You bent down so we could touch you.

Not in a seminary.

Not in a church.

Not in a conference room.

Not at a crusade.

Not on a stage.

Not in a palace.

Not on a throne.

Although you certainly deserved all of those things and more.

But You were born in a crowded city. 

In a nasty, stinky animal house.

To unmarried parents.

And then You lived as a refugee, fleeing with your family from place to place.

Because so many people wanted you dead before you'd even really had a chance to live. 

The lives that we discount,

the "unfortunate"ones we ignore or merely pity from a distance,

that is what You were.

A man of sorrows (Isaiah 53:4).

 The Word became Flesh and dwelt among us (John 1:14).

And we have seen Your glory. 

Not in a seminary.

Not in a church.

Not in a conference room.

Not at a crusade.

Not on a stage.

Not in a palace.

Not on a throne.

But in dirty, unlovely, weak, vulnerable FLESH (Isaiah 53:2).

Tonight I Weep.

Crack.

The inescapable feeling of heartbreak.

The knowledge that the unexpected burden about to land squarely on your shoulders is going to deal a crushing blow that's far too heavy for you to carry.

Change.

You know the world is somehow still turning, but you don't know how and you don't care because all you can manage to do is breathe, one slow, painstaking breath at a time.

Noise.

And then the "answers", though unsolicited, start pouring in. As if you'd asked for them. But you didn't. And all of them are lacking. So you tune them out and quietly slip away into a lonely place of silence and grief that's known only to yourself.

Anger.

It is easier, and perhaps more socially acceptable, to raise our clenched fists to the sky and at each other than to allow our brokenness to flow out from us in a flood of tears, like melting snow. Anger is ok. But are we truly angry or are we just trying to find a way to deal with our grief?

 Solutions.

We would rather talk than listen; we would rather have our five minutes of fame than learn a lifetime of lessons from the silence.

Place.

I'm not a parent.  I didn't lose a child, brother, sister, or mother. But my teacher-heart is broken and my cheeks wet with tears over what has been lost.

And I remember that we were never made to be broken.

But we are.

That our human hearts and minds were not designed to carry the weight of the knowledge of good and evil.

But they do.

That the reason death, especially death of young ones, full of promise, is so devastating is because it is so final. So permanent. So un-fixable. A slap in the face to remind those of us who left childhood long ago of our own mortality, of our own unknown end.

 "What do we do with such evil?"


The same thing we do with a load that is too heavy for us to carry, yet has to be moved: we help each other. By the grace of God, we help each other.

We listen.

We love.

We imitate.

We go to the tomb.

We go to the place where Jesus heard that one of His friends died.

We find Him weeping.

No sermons, no accusations, no "what-ifs", no question of their life or their faith.

Just tears for the one who had died and perhaps for those who remained behind to mourn his loss.

Jesus wept (John 6:35).

The least amount of words that say the most.

Compassion is a choice to suffer with.  And so tonight I set aside the quest for answers; I join my God and I weep.