Africa. Beautiful Africa.

Today i had breakfast with a great couple. As i was sharing both good and hard things i was reminded of so much beauty. i was reminded that God has used my hands to touch the lost and dying, to bring hope, to pour out love. Within all of that the story's could spill on forever. How easily we forget. We forget or maybe we have been wrapped up for so long in our culture that we never realized that we don't need to feel good all of the time. As i think of the children of Sudan my heart aches with love and longing and i know my eyes have seen His beauty. They really live! They have lost but oh how they live! So all of that to say that today in the mist of my wondering and pain i realized afresh that pain is what Jesus so often uses to carve, to shape my soul. The deep tears He fills with Himself. He gives me eyes to see. He holds this 'broken' heart and in it's brokenness He makes it beautiful.

Is This Ache A Gift?

Have you ever wondered if the ache that comes after leaving those you truly love is a gift? i mean to be so torn, to have loved so deeply that now you wonder what to do with it all. i am wondering as i ache, as i hurt if He is longing to transform all of this. To partner with His sufferings. hmmmmmm. But i feel so lost and crying seems the only thing that can come close to expressing whats on the inside. If only i knew what was really going on inside. What is true i remind myself of - He is beautiful, near, good, mine...it's true i have felt it and seen it with my own eyes. It is durring these times that i must cling with all i have to what i know is true because my feelings decieve me.

Open,
Wide open,
A peice of my heart torn wide open,
It is your [Jesus] hand that covers it,
Your presence,
Elliminating the question 'why?',
The pain is near,
You are nearer,
I cry out,
Only you can bring purpose to this ache,
Even when i feel all i can do is sit in this,
You sit with me,
This pain is not empty,
You fill it,
You are what fills this tear in my heart,
Thank you Jesus,
I can sit in your hands,
lay on your heart,
And hurt...

"Love that does not suffer with the suffering of the beloved is not love at all." - Dennis Ngien

i never thought i would blog...i actually teased those who had the time. but after erin started the one for delphine i really thought it was a good idea, a way to spill open... i have had to deal with so much greif over the last year and a half that i believe this really might be a good processing tool. be warned, i want to be raw. raw about the lose of del, of those in the sudan, of those on kenya, and raw about life in general but all with Jesus, in hopes that your heart might connect to my own...