All I Keep

Breathe deep and full.
I'm feeling the air come and go
feeling my chest rise and slow.
And I've got it.
I've got the time to be.
You've got it too
if you just stop and breathe.
Breathe deep, breathe full.
Taking a walk outside to see the moon whole.
And then
it all stills...

The world stops from time to time,

but have I the time to watch the world stop?
I do,
but I choose to walk more often than not.
The message is in the eyes of the stars
as they rhythmically twinkle:
Breathe deep, breathe full.
So, I fill that space behind my heart with air
and empty it as a kind of prayer
for who am I to breathe deep of love
and not have fear of a God
who binds and forms the mud that framed my lungs.
The air floats between these cheeks
and I savor the raw delight for He is all I keep.
For I am a creature of dust
a manifestation
of  breath.

Fullness

Content.
No, there's more.
Loved. Ahhh.
How did this fullness work its way in?
Stunningly unexpected, but oh so accepted.
At least I do now.
Oh how Someone could fill the soul
and see beauty despite the vines wrapped tight.
It's a puzzle to see Him write it in the dust,
but now the dust has been wiped away
and He doesn't see the puzzle,
but understands how we do.
I still see a mess and some brokenness.
Fingers touch my closed eyes as He smears this watered-dust over
and says, "Wash."
Washing I remember the touch
and I feel
loved.

An Advocate for Love

Sometimes all that is needed is a cup of tea, a pencil, and words on beautiful paper around to feel full. There's some tea in a tinted jar inches away and an open cup warming my cheeks with its steam. Quiet moments stolen, given, lived in become awakenings. And they happen as often as the time we give to them.

"And this is the real and eternal life: That they know you, the one and only true God...Father, I want those you gave me to be with me, right where I am...so that your love for me might be in them exactly as I am in them." John 17:3,24,26

An Advocate has come forth from the dust for the dust-filled. This is it! This is when our dusty selves are validated! Value is restored in our advocate wanting to be with us, in us, for us. A love perfect in being. The Advocate of dust pleading for his perfect love received to be given. Stop, rest, run it over in your head a few times: "...so that your love for me might be in them..." Oh, how He loves us!

It was dark and the bench I sat on was long. Candles flickered on stage and acoustic music resonated in the darkness of the ceiling far above my head. Hundreds of other voices filled the space in song to the Creator and for a few moments my voice did not join in. I was captivated unlike the other hundred times I had sung this song. And the song hit the bridge and the phrase, "Oh, how He loves us", was written over and over on the screen above and suddenly I knew: He didn't have to love me. There was no reason for Him to do so as Romans 5:8 says,

"We can understand someone dying for a person worth dying for, and we can understand how someone good and noble could inspire us to selfless sacrifice. But God put his love on the line for us by offering his Son in sacrificial death while we were of no use whatever to him."

But, the most beautiful thing is He does. love. us. And a gaping smile lifted the corners of my face and I felt loved! We are special! We are advocated for! Excitement filled me to the brim as I turned with deep humbleness filling my soul and  great enthusiasm to my friend sitting next to me and said in the midst of the song, "He. loves. us! He. loves. us!"

You are loved. You are advocated for. And you are accepted. No strings attached! Revel in it and be full!