Where Was God?

 “Prayer doesn’t do anything. Where was God when you were getting the shit beat out of you?” she sneered.

My heart broke a little bit more. It is the one question I really don’t have a good answer for. I can’t point to some supernatural intervention. I can’t claim divine deliverance. I can’t even say that I saw a glimmer of light in the dark. I just took it hoping that it would all be over soon, and at her words I felt stripped naked as if my whole life had been a sham.

For days, that question haunted me. I knew he was there. I knew that I had not endured that for nothing, and that he had not missed my suffering, but I didn’t how to convey that truth. I didn’t even want to look for a way. That chapter of my life is closed and opening it up to sift through the pieces in hopes of finding anything concrete meant opening up a lot of old wounds. I didn’t think I had the stomach for all the gore.

Over the years, I have talked a lot about my previous marriage. I have shared my story in churches, schools, and in my book. I have been commended for being “brave in my transparency” and praised for “daring to be so open about such a painful topic.” I can give you a rundown of the abuse without batting an eye. I can recount the feel of his fingers around my neck without fighting down the need to flinch. I can even tell you why the physical violence was far less traumatic than the emotional and mental abuse he doled out as he worked up his nerve to finally strike with his fist.

God and I were good. We had worked through all the heartache of those years. I had yelled and screamed at him for abandoning me, for leaving me alone, and ignoring all my cries for help. I had even taken the radical, and some claim blasphemous, step of forgiving God for all that – not that he needed it, but rather I needed to let go of my bitterness. I had to be ok with his way of doing things, and I had to take responsibility for my foolish pride and rebellion that landed me in that marriage to begin with. I don’t resent those years anymore. There is a huge part of me that still grieves and always will grieve the effect it had on my children who witnessed those events, but for myself, it is a time that has been redeemed as I have witnessed my story help so many others.

Maybe the question stung because I had gotten used to be lauded for my ability to rise above the circumstances of being an abused woman and then a single mom. And I was stunned that this scar that I had wielded like weapon for so long had now been turned against me.

So I have been thinking about the answer demanded of me, and I have been trying to find the words to express the truth that has been hidden in my heart, to quantify it in some way that would make sense to someone who is not inside my skin.

The only time my ex would lay a hand on me was if I was holding one of our children. He never attacked unless my daughters were in my arms. The first time, I was holding my oldest daughter as he grabbed me from behind putting me in a choke hold and shaking me like a rag doll. She was only two weeks old. All I could think in that moment was, “Don’t drop the baby.” So I didn’t. I held her tighter against me with one arm and with the other I gripped his arm taking the pressure off my neck. The last time he lunged at me as I was putting nightgowns on the girls, and he sat on my chest screaming as he tried to strangle the life out of me.

He might have succeeded. I wasn’t scared, and I didn’t fight. As the waves of blackness washed over me, I was tempted to let them sweep me away, but then one of the girls made a sound that caused me to look over at them. They were small and scared of what was happening, and all I could think was how if he killed me, he was the only parent they had left. So I fought back. I got free, and I got him out of my home and my life.

Where was God in those moments? He was holding my arms around my baby so I didn’t drop her. He was showing me why I had to fight to get free. He gave the courage to do the scariest thing I ever did. He gave me the strength to endure the years of being alone and trying to keep it together for the ones who counted on me. I screwed up so many times, and I made more mistakes than I can even remember. There were days when I was certain that they would be better without me, but every time that those dark waves of oblivion seemed more enticing than returning to the battle, he was there reminding me that love does not give up, that love does not get to indulge in that depth of selfishness.

Were there any burning bushes? No. Clouds parting, voices from the sky? No. Just my kids. Just the ones who had been entrusted to me, and the ones who relied on me to keep fighting. This is probably not the answer that anyone is hoping for. We all want the presence of God to be some over the top display and then are angered when he doesn’t reveal himself that way. We think we deserve a fairy tale, for him to make everything perfect and easy when he is near, but that’s not how he works, that’s not how faith is built.

And what good is prayer? It changed me. It is still changing me. I am learning to be okay with how he doesn’t split the skies open because I think I deserve that type of affirmation. He is showing me how to see him small moments, and to how to feel is presence in the chaos. He is teaching me how to become more like him – love more like him both in the times I rage before him in my frustration and in those moments I quiet my heart to listen and to know him. Prayer is where I learn, where I see the connections, and find the answers to the hard questions of life, as I allow him to change me. For never in a million years would I have understood his the depths of his love if he had not connected the dots for me, and showed me that if I as a mere human can rise from edges of death motivated by nothing more than the love of my children, then how much more does the one who rose from the depths of the grave love me? Does he love you?

The Best I've Got - For Now

Last week, I hit a wall. As I scurried from one crises to another, wondering what in the world God was up to, I got smacked with a rather brutal realization. I had forgotten how to pray.

Yeah, you read that right. I forgot how to pray.

I know that must sound weird to you, but think about how I felt. All of these years where prayer was such a huge part of my life, and then suddenly, I just couldn’t do it anymore. Every time I tried the words got in the way, and I felt as if I had been betrayed by my best friend.

Words are a huge part of my life. My days are spent sifting through them, polishing them, and placing them in a precise order to create an image, to illicit an emotion, or provoke another to thought. It is what I do, and it is a natural as breathing for me. They are my tools and my weapons in this world. They help me make sense of what is around me, and they offer a comforting order to the chaos of my life. Yet, here I was unable to string two together without them rebelling against my attempts to align them according to my need.

Oh, I would start to pray and then I would realize that I wasn’t praying at all. Sure the words still flowed through my head, but it wasn’t prayer. Instead, I was thinking about how I was going to use them for a blog post or in the next book. I was writing articles in my mind about how I pray or what I was praying about. I was formulating the next idea I was going to present to the world, trying to find the most brilliant arrangement of words to impress you, my reader. In short, I was talking about God but I wasn’t talking to God.

And there is a huge difference.

So I did something radical. I took some time off. I put away my computer and I didn’t write anything other than replies to messages. I have to tell you it was weird. After years of arranging my days around time to write, I felt a little out of sorts and at a bit of loss at what to do with myself. I am writer, writing is what I do, and so who am I when I am not writing? What defines me if I am not doing the one thing I know I have been called to do? What if this was permanent? What if God decided that I needed to just put it down for good? What if my writing had become too much of an idol in my life, and I had to smash it if I was going to be faithful to him? So many moments of existential angst!

And it wasn’t like I could talk him about it, I had forgotten how to pray. Remember?

That meant the next step was trying to remember. My first attempts were less than eloquent. In fact, they were pretty much just groans and a repetition of the “Father…Father, Father…….Father….. Father, Father, Father.” If I attempted any other words, I would fall back into my pattern of writing in my head. Somewhere along the way something began to happen, the words stopped being important. And my mind began to fill with images of me standing before him, holding out all the broken things and people in my life. I didn’t need words to define the image. It was all there. Me small and powerless to fix things standing before my Father and King with my tangled kite strings, broken dolls, and shattered teapots, making my silent appeal for him to take them from my outstretched hands.

I fell asleep that night feeling as if I had experienced a major breakthrough. I wasn’t trying to contain or define God with my words. I had allowed my mind and heart to be opened to just being in his presence, but then I was reminded – this was God I was dealing with. Things are never that simple, even when they are.

The next day, we began phase two of remembering how to pray and this is where things got icky. It seems just giving God all my broken stuff wasn’t good enough. He wanted more, and more specifically, he wanted me. He wanted me to get real with him, to be honest about how this was affecting me, and what I thought about it. This meant I had to actually feel all the stuff I was trying hide behind a façade of faith and spirituality. Wounds had to be probed, some dead tissue removed, and some pride amputated. It wasn’t pretty, and it hurt like blazes.

And none of this could happen if I was trying to get out of it by just writing about it. It seems that I have become rather proficient at using words that describe the condition of my heart to distance myself from actually experiencing the condition of my heart. I could not judge my progress by a word count or pages written. I was having to confront me, without the one thing that I had begun to think made me, well, me.

The whole process was too much to do sitting still. So I started walking more, and resisting the urge to take a trash bag with me to pick up cans or plugging in a podcast to distract me. I did a lot of fishing, contemplating life, God, and me. It is amazing the amount of thinking you can do while staring at a bobber dancing around on the water.

And then something happened. When I put aside all the things I had been using to hide out, the words started to flow. Angry words, hurtful words, and heart wrenching words. Not the kind of thing you put in a blog post or book, or at least not one where you are trying to encourage people to seek God. I began to tell him about how mad I was that all of this was happening in my life. I started explaining to him how he was falling down on his job, and how I was sick and tired of him not taking care of me and the ones I loved. I told him that I was hurt and mad that he hadn’t stepped up to defend the hearts and minds of those I love, and how he needed to stop them from being stupid, from hurting themselves. I told him my faith was wearing a little thin, and he needed to do something quick because I wasn’t sure that it was going to hold out much longer.

Then there were no more words. Just that sad empty feeling you have after you’ve released all the anger that held the sadness at bay.

I wish I could say this when I saw a burning bush or the clouds parted and a voice called down from heaven telling me that it would all be okay. Heck, I would have settled for a phone call telling me that the ones I love had come to their senses and there was sizable check in the mail box. But the truth is, nothing happened. Nada, zip, zero.

The wind just kept blowing across the water, the birds kept singing, and fish kept snubbing my minnows. No major revelations, no change in the state of the world, just me and God sitting on the lake shore not talking to each other.

I don’t know where we go from here. I can’t shake this idea that God is real and he has a purpose and plan in all of this. Intellectually, I get that, but I am still upset by the things that are happening in my world. It hurts. I hurt. Knowing that he loves me is all fine and dandy, but sometimes you just get the itch to feel like he loves you. To get a break from all this operating in faith and have something a bit more tangible, a bit more comfortable and secure.

For now, I am not operating on my feelings. My feelings are still a big tangled mess of kite string that are keeping me grounded. I am making the choice to believe, to trust, and to love. He knows I am not happy with how he’s handling all this, but right now I don’t have a whole lot of joy and happiness to give him. So I am giving him what I do have the anger, the sadness, the doubt, the confusion, and all those icky emotions that make so many Christians uncomfortable. I am not giving them to him because they are pretty or that is what he deserves. I am giving them to him because they are real and right now it’s the best I’ve got - for now.

Financial Sense and Bad Attitudes - A Confession

Years ago, back when I was single mom, I realized that my financial situation was always going to be one of constant jeopardy. I was raising my kids on less than $10,000 a year, the ex had (and has) forgotten that child support would be nice gesture, and let’s face it, none of my degrees lend themselves to lucrative careers. In fact, I read in one article that if you didn’t want make any money with your college degree, get degrees in the arts, psychology, and religious studies – guess what I have degrees in? The correct answer is all three! I’ve always been an overachiever like that.

Despite all this, I was pretty okay with where I was. Sure the numbers didn’t makes sense, and the fact that we never starved or lived on the streets was due in large part to my family who helped with things like childcare while I worked or went to school, an expense that devastates almost every single mom’s budget. Food was pretty much whatever the tribe was giving out in commodities, what we grew in the family garden, and ramen noodles, but overall, we were happy.

I figured out how to not dwell on our money matters, live within our budget, and to do without things we did not absolutely need. So there weren’t a lot of extras like cable TV, gaming systems, manicures, or trips to the zoo. We just made the best of what we had. It wasn’t always easy and a minor catastrophe like needing new tires or a hot water heater could set us back for months, but somehow things always worked out.

Then I got married. Now, this was a good thing, and I was delighted to have married a hard-working man who was willing to take on the financial risks and responsibilities of me and my two kids. After years of debating on whether or not new socks were really necessary or could be afforded at that particular time, it was liberating to just go to the store and buy socks whenever dang well pleased.

But something happened to me in the past five years, something I didn’t realize until recently.

Somewhere in the midst of being able to buy socks and not having to wonder if fresh oranges were an extravagance, I forgot that my security did not lie in the size of my husband’s pay check.

Now God has a way of getting your attention, and well, he’s been working overtime on me since the first of the year. Ty and I were slammed with several things that sapped our money. Some avoidable with better planning and self-discipline, and some so completely out of our control that I had to wonder if God had sadistic streak. This meant that several of our plans for things we were going to do this year had to be ditched, and I am not talking trips to Tahiti, I am talking about things most people take for granted as part of being a functioning adult in our society. (Which really shows you how much I lost sight of the goal – since when did I ever want to be a function adult?)

To make matters even more poignant, there was about a six week spell in there when I was contacted almost every day by someone celebrating a blessing in their lives. And not just any old run of the mill blessing. No, they were happy because they had received – often unexpectedly or by almost supernatural providence – things that I had specifically expressed a desire for. Seriously, if I said I wanted purple wigwaddle but had recognized it as an unnecessary expense or completely outside my budget for the foreseeable future, one of my friends would suddenly come into possession of a purple wigwaddle. And as part of being a real friend is to rejoice with those who are rejoicing, I did my best to do my part. But let me tell you, after about six weeks of this, I was starting to lose my cool. Not with my friends, they typically had no idea that they were rubbing salt wounds and would have avoided doing so if they had a clue. No, I was losing my cool with God.

After all, HE knew I wanted a wigwaddle and he could have zapped one into my front yard at any given time if he had so desired. But nooooo, he gave it to someone who has absolutely no idea how to properly appreciate a wigwaddle, let alone the proper care and grooming of one.  And as if that wasn’t enough, he was requiring that I be a good sport about it if I were to properly live out my faith. I am not going to lie this is where I demonstrated some pretty awesome acting skills, but inside I was starting to seethe.

Then along comes my child who decides to spend an evening around the fire talking about the days when we had nothing, but when our house was open to everyone, when people showed up unannounced to sit and talk. When our lives were too full to worry about money, and the amazing experiences they allowed us to know as they shared their stories, asked their questions, and wrestled through the hard issues of life on a worn out couch or by an open fire. When people we had just met showed up with bags of groceries to prepare a feast in our home as way to repay for us for the kindness of opening our home to them.

In those days, money was an issue but it was rarely a worry. I knew in my gut that we were going to be alright and nothing could touch us that didn’t pass through the Father’s hand. Times were tough, and God always likes to wait for the last minute before providing an answer, but I had figured out how to rest, to be expectant, and how to deny dread a place in my heart. Perhaps it was because I was more spiritual back then, or maybe it was the only way to survive the uncertainty without going crazy. I don’t know, but I do know that I wasn’t upset about my friends getting the things I wanted. I was genuinely happy for them and their success. Sure sometimes, I had to press through to get there, but I did it with an ease and grace I seemed to have forgotten lately.

And frankly, I don’t like that. I don’t like being a petty person who is so wrapped up in my own angst that I forgot how to rejoice with my friends. So this week I started over. That’s the beautiful thing about this faith we call Christianity, we get to do that. I talked things over with God, let him know how I was feeling, and told him I was going to need some help because some rebellious part of me likes the self-righteous anger I had been entertaining. I told him that despite that I know that is not the truest part of who I am or who I want to be, and that I was sorry for putting my wants ahead of him and what he was trying to do in my life.

I am not going to tell you that since I got my attitude right God is going to send me a $200,000 check in the mail. I mean he might, but if that was the only reason I confronted this ugly bit of me then I sorta missed the point. In fact, that type of expectation would just show that I was still hoping money was going to solve all my problems, not God. See, he’s far more creative in his solutions than any methodologies I would prescribe, and I need to be okay with that. It is part of walking in faith, and even more importantly, it is part of letting God be God without imposing my rules upon him. Because if I were real honest, I have to admit that when I let him do his thing and get out of his way, his methods blow my mind and leave me in awe. I simply do not have the depth of imagination or scope of knowledge to dream up the wondrous things he brings into being, and those are the things I truly want to experience in my life.

So until he does whatever it is he is going to do, I am going to do three things: I am going to faithful with what he has given me. I am going to see every blessing my friends experience as proof that God is still able and willing to bring good things into the lives of those who love him. And I am going to keep my heart and eyes open in expectation for the mind blowing and awe inspiring things I certain he has in store for me, my family, and my friends.

A Request

Lately, I have been finding it hard to write. I have no way to describe the craziness that was released into my world since the first of the year, or the massive amounts of craziness that still loom on the horizon. As the events that have rocked my world involve so many others, out of respect for them I am not comfortable sharing the specifics at this time. However, always the writer, I do find solace in the knowledge that I have gained enough material for no less than eight new books if life will ever permit me the time and mental space to work.

As most of my writings are based on what is happening in my world, issues brought to my attention by things I am experiencing, or studies prompted by my needs in that moment, you can see where all of this causes me to be wary of the keyboard lest I needlessly expose another to shame. I am left with a bit of a quandary, wondering how to maintain the transparency that I strive for in all my works while still being faithful in the obligations to the covenant of love that I have with each of these people.

Nor do I wish to forego the support and love that so many of you have expressed to me since starting this blog. Because now more than ever, I do need your support. I do need your love and encouragement in my life. I am faced with many difficult, almost impossible decisions, and I covet your prayers for wisdom and guidance I move forward. Perhaps that is selfish of me, but rarely in my life have faced such a difficult and demanding situation.

I am also asking for your prayers for time and energy. I have a book that is currently being edited, lacking just a bit of polish and the cover art before it is ready to meet the world. I have been working on it for almost ten years, and I believe that it is a significant work. While such a thought never crossed my mind in the initial writing phase, that has been the opinion of several who have been kind enough to read it in its roughest form, and as I have been met with resistance with every step of its competition, I am beginning to think that they might be right.

To record the number of straight up catastrophes that have occurred each time I believe the end is in sight would require the writing of entirely different book. The short version includes: illness, my own and of loved ones; financial straits, prohibiting me from covering the various cost associated with self-publication; various scenarios with Ty’s job that have stolen time and energy from the project; malfunctioning technology; the loss of friends and allies in ways that have broken my heart; and now I have been blindsided by another event completely out of my control that has left me without the myriad of resources required to finish this work. And I strongly believe that this recent event is just one more attempt to keep this book from finding its way into your hands.

If this sounds like whining, please extend a little grace, for whining is not my intent. I am simply in a situation where the only resolution I can see is divine intervention, and all I know to do is to ask that my brothers and sisters pray that God provide ways and means that I even my over-active imagination has yet to conjure up. I am profoundly grateful for the friendships that have been extended to me since the release of Scandalous and the starting of this blog. You have all been an encouragement and strength to me as I try to share the little that I know, and it is among my deepest desires to continue exploring this thing called faith together.

So I am imposing our friendship now to ask that you keep me in your prayers, that resolution will come to this circumstance and that I will have the resources necessary to continue with my writing – peace, clarity of thought, time, energy, creative solutions to tangible obstacles before me, and of course, abundant inspiration. I will be praying the same for you no matter what your endeavors may be, for who among us could not use more of these precious gifts from our King?

Hannah - The Story Of A Brazen Woman

The women of the Bible will never cease to fascinate me. Living in a time and culture of total male domination, one would think that only the meek and the docile would be deemed worthy or remembrance, but with few exceptions, we find the women most celebrated to be those whose actions pushed the boundaries of societal constraints and refused to be silent in the face of injustice. One such woman was Hannah of I Samuel chapters one and two.

Too often we read this story at the mercy of our modern conditioning. We fail to see the historical and religious significance of her actions, and as usual present her as a pious soul who meekly turned to God in her hour of need. However, a closer reading of the text coupled with an understanding of the times reveals a bold and daring woman who was not just going to shut up and take what life, or God, had given her.

Her story opens with the introduction of her husband, a man with an impressive family tree, and her inclusion in a family where she was one of two wives. Unlike the second wife, Hannah was barren and like so many women the first wife was catty, constantly rubbing it in Hannah’s face that she was a failure as a woman. Despite this Hannah managed to be her husband’s favorite, meriting special treatment and receiving his feeble (and, oh, so male) attempts at comfort. This is our first tip off that Hannah was something special for in this day a woman’s value was often calculated based on the number of sons she presented to her husband. Love matches were a rarity, and marriage was more of business agreement between families than a romantic venture.

From this stand point it would be easy to say that Hannah was far more blessed than many other women of her time. For not only did her husband keep her as a wife, showing affection and consideration of her situation, he further blessed her with a double portion during the time for sacrifices to made.

To understand the emotional ramifications of what Hannah was experiencing we need to understand that barrenness was not considered a simple medical malfunction. Barrenness was a curse from God, often viewed as a judgement for wrong doing, and as Hannah was the only wife barren the judgement would have been seen as failing on her alone. This would have made her suspect among the other women and possibly held social consequence such as being ostracized and topic of small town gossip. Wrapping our modern minds around what she must have experienced is difficult at best.

The story unfolds as the family celebrates together, eating and drinking, while I can only imagine Hannah watching her husband blessing his children by his other wife and fending off the smug attitude of the other woman vying for her husband’s attention. The pain she must have felt knowing that all those present considered her to be a failure and a shame to their family was probably what pushed her over the edge.

For in verse nine we find that Hannah arose, leaving the festivities behind to go and pray at the Tabernacle.

I want you to really think about this for a moment – a woman, unescorted, goes to the Tabernacle! This is where the men gathered to make plans, to discuss battle strategies, to determine how to govern the people, and to do the bloody work of sacrifice. Women went there, but they went as a family to make the appropriate offerings together with their husbands or fathers. Just making that walk was an exercise in courage.

Or was it something else?

Verse ten literally said she was “marat nefesh” or “bitter of soul” - not the typical attitude we are encouraged to have when seeking an audience with God. But could you blame her? God was the one who opens and closes the womb. He was the cause of her disappointment and pain, and she knew this.

The writer of Samuel records her prayer:
“O LORD of Hosts, if you will look upon the suffering of your maidservant and remember me and not forget the sufferings of your maidservant, and if you will grant your maidservant a male child, I will dedicated him to the LORD for all the days of his life; and no razor shall ever touch his head.”

And with those words, she changed the nature of prayer forever – so much so that we do not even recognize them as radical as this has been the way we have been taught to pray since we were children, but to the fledgling nation of Israel, they are unprecedented.

The first words, the title of LORD of Hosts, had never been uttered until they fall from Hannah’s lips, here was a woman who recognized God’s sovereignty not only in her own life but in all the machinations of the universe.  Her prayer simultaneously exalts God beyond previous words spoken to him while declaring her need and right to be remembered as his handmaiden. The demand and glorification stand at odds with each other, presenting the divine tension between humanity and deity in stark contrast to the humility deemed fitting for a woman. Perhaps it takes one who has experienced such agonies to know that if God is too be great, he must be bigger than any pain we experience, and who knows pain better than one whose hopes and dreams have been ripped to shreds?

The Rabbis call her words insolent even as they laud her example as one who dared to speak their heart to the Creator. So impressive was this bold feat that the prescribed methodology for prayer was modeled not after the patriarchs of the Jewish faith, but upon the heartfelt cries of a woman. Daring to be this impassioned before God was a level of bravery that no man had dared to attempt, the fear and trembling of awe struck wonder had been erased as heartache compelled her to brazenness.

If her story had ended there, she would have been mocked and ridiculed as the drunken woman who dared to defile the sacred environment of the Tabernacle with profanity, but thankfully for us all, it did not. Eli confronts her, scandalized by her hysterics, demanding that she be proper before the Lord and in this holy place. Most women would have been cowed and accepted the harsh rebuke in silence, but not our Hannah!

She fires back him with both barrels, “No, my lord, I am a woman troubled in spirit. I have drunk neither wine nor strong drink, but I have been pouring out my soul before the Lord. Do not regard your servant as a worthless woman, for all along I have been speaking out of my great anxiety and vexation.”

Now, read this as a woman who has been wrongfully accused, not as simpering milksop. Take her prompts for the proper tone and voice for her words. Remember that Hebrew is a very limited language in comparison to ours and know that words often have more than one related definition. She isn’t just saying she was slightly vexed. She deliberately chose a word that also means anger. She wasn’t just dealing with anxiety, once again she chose a word that can mean complain, as in legal complaint. She is letting Eli know that she is beyond just hurt she is MAD and with a just cause. Now plug in all that new knowledge and read her reply again.

Go back and read Eli’s response. Does it sound familiar? It reminds me of my husband when he knows that he had better not argue with me because I am going to go psycho crazy on him for even questioning my right to be upset. It’s the cautious pat on the head before hitting the door to avoid the fallout. It’s the placation in an attempt to defuse the ticking time bomb, but Hannah grabs on to it. You can almost hear her skipping away as she says, “Let your servant find favor in your eyes.”

In Hannah we find far more than an abstraction of piety and humility. We find a woman with a voice, a backbone, and fiery spirit who will not be silenced or dismissed. She rejects cultural norms that would threaten to remove her from the provision of her God, and declares that her identity is ultimately found in him and her relationship to him as his servant. She reveals the true object of her faith as her Lord and Creator, not the men who appeared to have authority over her and recognizes God’s sovereignty to act on her behalf and her right to request it – even when it meant rebuking the spiritual leadership of a nation.

Women should read her story not as rebuke to pray silently and in humility, but rather, that we take our requests boldly to our King. We should not see her as proper, because she wasn’t, and should learn when to disregard propriety for the sake of honesty. From her we should draw inspiration to cast aside societal constraints when they stand between us and our need to have the Father act on our behalf, and most of all, we should be reminded that God remembers us and all the things that have wounded our hearts. He is there, waiting in those holy moments to respond with blessings beyond our imagination if we are brave enough to take even bitter souls before his throne in prayer.

My Prayer to the Lord

Preparing for a presentation, and I found this in my notebook - my rewrite of the Lord's Prayer.

My Father who fills the heavens
Holy is your name.
Your Kingdom be known
Through the loving kindness
You empower me to give
As a gift to this world.

Your will in my life fulfilled
In this act of obedience
Sustained by goodness to me,
From heaven to earth - in this land of the living

Give me bread,
Spiritual so that I may truly live
Physical so that my body is strengthened
To share the Bread of Life with others

Forgive me my debts owed to your love
So that I might abound in the joy of your presence,
I will forgive the debts of those who have wounded my heart,
as you inspired in me and shown me to do.

Lead me not into temptation
For I am weak and flawed,
And I desire to only be near to you.
Deliver me from all that would take me from your presence
And draw me deeper into your arms.

For I am nothing except in your kingdom,
The place to which you have called me,
And I stand here by your power.
For your glory alone I shall remain forever.