Transfigured.

This morning it's like I'm there. Standing. Speechless.
Watching while my humble Teacher is unveiled to be the King of glory that He really is.

I want to take off my shoes, but I can't.
I want to do something, but I can't.
I want to say something, anything that would fit the moment, but I can't.
I'm glued to the ground, hands behind my back, lips sealed shut.

All I can do is observe in silence.

My eyes flit back and forth between faces like a dancing butterfly.
This glory, this radiance, is too much for me. Yet then I hear a voice speaking.

I turn to identify the source and abruptly realize, it's me. 

What in the world am I thinking, saying, doing? 
You don't just go and interrupt a divine experience like this!

I clamp my mouth in silence while my mind does a virtual replay.
Tents? Tabernacles? For Beings accustomed to golden mansions? Blinded moment.
If only I could rewind ten minutes and try again, prepare a script, something…

Suddenly I hear a voice from the sky declaring my Master to be His Son. Then all is hushed. Glory is gone.
I feel a penetrating gaze upon my flushed face. It's as if He can read my mind.

"It's only when you dare to speak, my child, dare to do for divinity, that you can be transfigured. Even if what you say is illogical and what you do is awkward. It's the heart I see, the heart I pay attention to.

"Don't be afraid to dare for Me, for as you do, you will be transfigured.
And it's when you're transfigured that you can truly begin to know My heart."

Dare to do. Dare to be.

Transfigured.

Beautiful Ugly

I love all things beautiful.
And it's a beautiful life I live. Every part of it.

Oh, I may cry. I may wonder.
I may wish things were different.
I may at times wish to see beyond the misty shroud upon my pathway.

Yet my God is also a lover of the beautiful. 
And making my life beautiful is exactly what He is attempting to do. Even through the ugly.
Because sometimes it is the ugly that makes something beautiful. 

Sometimes it's the only thing…

The beautiful-ugly.
If anything falls under the category of miracle, that does.

A miracle of Love poured out upon an ugly planet bathed in ugly scars.
A miracle that transforms ugly hearts.

A miracle that looks past ugly surfaces to discern uncut diamonds, hearts of beauty covered by years of filth.

He calls the ugly beautiful…
        He calls each beating heart beautiful…
                He calls me beautiful…

And He promises to love me forever and always. Not because I'm beautiful, but because I'm ugly. 
It's the ugly that makes the greatest contrast when transformation occurs anyway.

He calls my ugly beautiful.
My love overflows.

Lighted Eyes

I always learn a lot through people watching. 

Heightened perception sometimes allows me to notice subtleties that others miss.

The past few weeks have given me ample opportunity for such activities. A week of VBS followed hard by joyful wedding preparations culminating in a beautiful ceremony. Four lives committed to their Savior. A weekend event highlighting missions.

Now I'm home again, for a few short days, reveling in quietness and contemplation of days past.

It's the eyes that hold me.

Eyes lighted with an undimmed brilliance. Eyes that have tasted freedom. Eyes filled with a new love.

There is nothing better than seeing luster kindled behind the eyes of my friends, and I call a lot of people friends.
You are my friend, and I want to see your eyes lighted too.

If your eyes have grown dull, Love's gleams are waiting at your command because my God is a Chain-Breaker. He opens prison doors, sets captives free, heals brokenness, ignites new love.

Will you let Him? If you are unsure of how, I would love to share.

I want to see you with lighted eyes.

A Thorough God

{Jeremiah 51 & 52}

Last chapters. Last words. At first, I'm not entirely impressed. 

I mean, the ending is usually supposed to be the most climatic, the most powerful…

But then I see it… A thread of thoroughness.

My God is thorough. He leaves nothing uncompleted.

With painstaking thoroughness He eradicates sin. He completes His judgments. 

Those found with sin are consumed with the sin itself, yet in the end, He is always fair, always just.

And if we are willing to be separated from the sin, thoroughness works in our favor.

Because my God will be just as thorough in perfecting my character as He is in eradicating sin. (Isn't it really the same thing?)

He is a thorough God. Thorough to save. Thorough to restore. Thorough to cleanse.

Thorough to redeem.

Faces of the Rejected

{Jeremiah 49}

Precious people abandoned in the ruins of cities and rubble of villages. Faces haunting the desolated landscape. Faces lined with pain, traced with fear. Faces of the rejected.

These are the orphans, the widows, the maimed, the sick. These are the ones to whom favor is shown.

They are some of His most precious children of all. They have nothing, yet they have all.

“Leave the fatherless children, I will preserve them alive; and let thy widows trust in me.”

And these next six weeks I get to interact with these very ones… 

Orphanage. Honduras. Here I come!

Healed Wounds

{Jeremiah 30}

God had inflicted a serious wound. Not out of anger, but out of love. 

Yet because of their ugly injury, all so-called friends of the nation had fled. 

Not one offered medicines of healing. Not one pled for their cause. Israel was an outcast.

Yet that was exactly what Israel needed.

For in the pain and loneliness of feeling utterly forsaken and mortally wounded, they finally sensed their need. 

The concept shared with me by friends seems to jump out at me from the page.

Only when we are broken can we be blessed and transformed.

The Administer of punishment now promised to bind up the very wounds He had inflicted. To heal their bruises. To restore health and that, more abundant than before.

The yokes of bondage were broken. 

The nation that had held them captive so long set them free.

Blessings of fruitfulness and multiplied families were given.

Laughter was again heard within the homes of Jerusalem.

Yes, their wounds were healed by the Giver’s hand. Unfortunately the lessons God sought to teach them didn’t remain fresh in their memory, yet only because they forgot Him again in their prosperity.

--

My vision is expanded. I see new possibilities, thanks to friends who were willing to share. Our experience doesn’t have to follow their example of repeated failure. My brokenness can be my restoration, my transformation. My wound, the cause of healing. My sorrow, my joy.

Through brokenness I can find blessing and in the blessing, forever restoration.

Found!

{Jeremiah 29}

After seemingly endless declarations of His people’s heartless rejection, it’s a breath of fresh air.

A herald of restoration. A token of forgiveness.

My face breaks into a smile. 

“Ye shall… find Me.”

There is always a tenor of jubilation when something, or someone is found.

But to find Him? There is no greater joy…

We may discover Him through a variety of means, yet only by earnest seeking can He truly be found.

So seek, and you will find…

He promises.

Broken Pieces {Beautiful Vessel - Part II}

{Jeremiah 19}

Shards. Shattered fragments. Broken pieces.

The Israelites had made a mess of themselves, no doubt about that. And God was ready to cast them onto the ground like a potter’s bottle to be broken beyond repair. 

It seems utterly heartless. 

How could a God of love execute such fearsome justice?

Yet I realize they were hardened. The material of their hearts was as brittle clay, unfit to be molded. 

He had no other choice.

But the beautiful thing is, although the shards of our sin are utterly shattered, He doesn’t reuse those pieces. He starts afresh with new material.

And the outcome is more beautiful than anything our finite minds could even desire. Yet still He is not satisfied.

Yes, you’ll be used for hard labor and go through harrowing experiences, but He has a special place on His glass shelf embedded with amathysts and diamonds just for you…

And He cannot be truly satisfied until you are there—His beautiful vessel.

Cause Them to Know

{Jeremiah 16}

Horrible things. Absolutely horrible.

Degrading. Defiling. Desecrating. Defaming. And ultimately, destroying…
They have sinned big-time. And they deserve their punishment.

But even though God declares that He shall first doubly recompense their evil, He promises to show mercy still…

Echoes from history mostly forgotten by Jews of their current society reverberate in the words uttered.
He will yet again cause them to know… To know His hand. His might. His name.

His hand… yes, the hands scarred forever. Engraved with my name, your name… A perpetual reminder of His grace, His sacrifice, His love.

His might… Strength Himself employed to break our chains, to make us free…

His name… a character so perfect that sin cannot remain in its presence. Yet He delights to call us by His name.* He rejoices to cover us with His spotless robe and call us to perfection.

Those three elements are the secret to breaking bonds of sin.
Forgiveness and cleansing are not the work of lifetimes, but moments…

Yes, scars take time to heal…
But chains take only moments to break if we will but realize His intense love and plead for His rescue.

Examine His hand. Claim His might. Receive His name.

He will cause you to know… Him.

*{2 Chronicles 7:14; Isaiah 43:7}

Reprobate Silver

{Jeremiah 6}

A metal of value and worth, instrumental in trade and commerce, the worldly “mark of a man,” the proof of his wealth—yet the children of Israel were likened unto reprobate silver? Spurned, despised, worthless?

Yes. Most definitely.

We, as God’s people, are the instruments of trade with the earth, the ambassadors of our King—to reveal to the world in our deportment, words and actions His character. Yet we have defamed His name, marred His reflection, defiled His character.

Only He can recreate us into an element of perfection and beauty otherwise we shall be cast away as worthless silver…

Oh, may I not be found as reprobate silver, but precious and purified gold…

Raising the Standard

{Jeremiah 4}

What has become of our standards? Our morals? The things our ancestors gave their lives for?
They hang tattered and neglected in moth-infested closets, forgotten by this generation.

“Set up the standard toward Zion…” says the faithful prophet.

We would do well to heed his plea.

...

Restoration of our standards can occur.
Our lives can reflect the King of Zion.

Under the marching orders of the Commander,
                                    we must unfurl our banners,
                                                hold the standard high,
                                                            march unashamedly
                                                                        live for one purpose alone—

… to show Christ to the world.
   
We are in His army. Let us hold the standard high.