Behind the Facade

I wanted to be friends with celebrities. I believe that there is enough content to me that I could be a real friend to them. Does it matter? Not really. I mean, it’s not going to happen. However, I wanted it to. Not because of the fame that would drip onto me from them (kinda) but rather because of what I see in them from afar. The facade.

It’s a heavy thing to be a celebrity. You always have to be guarded. And, not everyone loves celebrities. What can you do when people hate you for no reason? About the same thing you can do in normal life. Ignore them and try not to let their hateful words harm your heart.

If friends were loyal and were yours before fame found you attractive enough to enfold, you cling to them and are wary about the new friends, the ones that sprung up like daisies in the rain of your fame shower. At arm’s length, that is the distance all newfound people remain…except for the select few that manage to get past the guards and are proven loyal despite the fame.

Name droppers are everywhere.

So, no celebrities are my friends…my real friends…though I stalk a few on Twitter and have a few added here on MySpace. It is because of who they present themselves to be that I add them, not just to have numbers or just to have their names upon my page. No. It is because I genuinely would like to meet them. Though I realize the facade and I realize the truth…it is nice to see them.

And what did my True Love tell me yesterday? “I love you even though you’re not famous.”

And so does Pastor and Margaret, my mom and brother, Mary and Cathy B and Cathy D and Eliza and Juliana and Antonia and Eileen and Ellen…and many, many others. So, I no longer want fame to drip on me nor do I want to seek out the famous in the hopes that they will like me. One day, maybe, a normal person turned celebrity will find me worth talking to but if that never happens, I am loved by the Creator of the universe. Who could ask for anything more?

I don’t want religion

I never before thought of things the way that I’m thinking about them now. It wasn’t that it was not obviously wrong for me to have bad attitudes and to print things at work that were for my own personal use, but I see now that I have been a horrid person. Thankfully, I can look at my life and see that God has always loved me and delighted in me. It makes it a great deal easier for me to look back at myself and see the value that I believed didn’t exist.

What puzzles me is the way that we choose to live our lives. I mean, we know and we see how miserable we are and how miserable others are. We see it, clear as day, and we see the consequences of our choices and actions. Yet, we think that we can’t possibly live a pure life in the presence of the King. Why not? When did a life without anger, bitterness, violence, debauchery, lust, perversion, foulness, and murder become a bad thing? When did a life of blessing become a curse? When did it become too hard to live for the only One that sees the heart so clearly and loves with a passion that cannot be dampered even seeing the darkest parts of the soul?

I find myself looking at those that are content to wade through the filth everyday, myself included since I am far from perfect, and I wonder why we would be willing to soil our white garments again. And how lovingly He cleanses us after it’s all said and done. His grace is without end and His mercy covers us like the waters clothe the sea and yet we consider it too difficult, too hard, to leave behind the filthy sins of the world and walk an upright walk with Him.

More and more, I think about how this isn’t a game, how this isn’t a trial run, how there are no do-overs when it’s all said and done. One day, I will stand before Him and He will either enfold me in His arms or He will tell me to depart because He never knew me. That frightens me. That frightens me more than Hell frightens me. I don’t want to be sent away from His presence. I don’t want to live a life where I feel like I’m seeking Him, like I’m loving Him, and being intimate with Him, only to find that it was a fantasy in my head. Only to find that I’ve entered the wedding feast unprepared, wearing the improper, informal garment rather than the garb of a wedding guest. I don’t want religion, I don’t want fantasy, I want Jesus Christ.

There is a great deal of trash in our hearts. I’m reading a book by Leslie Ludy entitled “Authentic Beauty: the shaping of a set-apart young woman” and I have seen that my trash-littered heart is desperately in need of cleaning. I need to become all that He has called me to become. This need comes from my desire to please Him and to honor Him with my lifestyle as well as my lips, to live a life that is faithful in all areas, not only the visual areas but all the areas, seen and unseen. This is what I want to do for Him, the One that has saved me from the worst in me. Foul sinner that I am, He has drawn me out of the filth I once found so comforting and now see to be smelly garbage, dung.

I don’t drink, go clubbing, fornicate, flirt, use foul language, smoke, do drugs, or exhort violence because I don’t want to, not because of ‘rules’ or ‘laws’ but because the desire is no longer there. However, there are areas in my life that are more of a struggle to lay down. Anger and gossip, jealousy and envy, these are things that I am working to remove from my life. But, as I looked at the questions to remove the trash from my heart, the process to create an inner-sanctuary for my Beloved, I have seen why they are such a struggle for me. These may not be struggles for others, much like drinking and such are not struggles for me, but we all have our areas where we have allowed so much trash to pile up that it seems normal to be the way that we are. It seems normal for us to always have to struggle with the things that we have struggled with our entire lives.

I am going to do some trash removal. What I want is Jesus Christ. What I desire is Him. To be with Him and experience deep and lasting love that is unchanging, unwavering, and pure, love that no mortal person can give, but love that allows the one loved to love in return and to offer more love to those around them. Someday, the promises my Beloved has given me will come to pass. I don’t want to be where I am now when it happens. I want to be His in every way.

Today is the day of salvation. There may not be a tomorrow. All things on this earth are fleeting, passing away, and the investments here pass away with them. The human soul is forever, investments there do last, but the only way to truly do things of content that will last, is through the love and guidance of Jesus Christ. He is the one that gives to me all that I need to be all that He has called me to be. It is not by my own strength that former desires have died away, that the thick bondages and chains have been shattered, that the prison gates have been thrown wide open and I’ve been set free. It is by the strength of my Beloved Savior, the very One that calls to us all. The Bible says that many are invited but few are chosen. This is not because He picks and chooses, but rather it is because we pick and choose. We choose this world and all its filth as our prize, rather than the true treasure, the pearl of great price, the One that paid the ransom we could never pay ourselves. Our Redeemer, our Deliverer, our Savior, our King, our Friend, our Father, our Protector, our Healer. I want Him to be my Everything.

As the deer longs for the water, so my soul longs, cries out, craves, desires, burns for Him. Oh, my Beloved Jesus Christ, thank You for Your love, kindness, mercy, and compassion. You are so wildly tender, so gentle, so near to me. I cannot live without You, I cannot face this world without Your presence, love, and strength. Draw me ever closer…ever closer to You. It is in Your presence, in Your arms, that I find my worth. It is in Your will that I find my purpose. It is in You alone that I find my hope. Thank You, my Beloved, for loving me. Thank You, my Beloved, for choosing me. Thank You, my Beloved, for saving me. Thank You, my Beloved, for all that You are in my life, heart, mind, and soul. I love and adore You!

Shalom veh Ahava!

Kicking down the door

I once was afraid of what would be seen if someone grew to love me enough to kick down the door I hid behind and revealed all that lay inside. Long ago, it was easier to keep the door barred and speak through it rather than open it and my fear was that someone would take the time to kick down the door and rescue me.

I wouldn’t have seen it as rescuing then.

It was a gentle, persistent knock that brought me to peek through the peephole and see who was standing on the threshold. His eyes met mine, as though He could see me looking through the little circle, as though He knew my fears. His knock continued as I sat crouched in the trash strewn about the room. I wanted so badly to let Him enter but what would He say when He saw all that was around me? What would this wonderful Man think of me when He saw truly what I lived with? Yet, He refused to leave.

It was not a wary opening of the door but rather a wide throwing open of it. When I finally realized that He could see what was there even with the door closed, I so desired to have Him there, in the midst of it all, to help me do things that I never before even dreamed of trying.

I expected Him to get right to work when I let Him in, to deal with the large pieces of debris in the room of my heart and life, but instead He looked at me and smiled. It was as if all the filth that surrounded us had no bearing at all on how much He loved me. He opened His arms and I fell into them, into the most wonderful and comforting embrace I would ever know, one that would be a constant in my life, through every storm and failure, through every sunny day and triumph, the hug of true love and acceptance.

Soon, we got to work. He was encouraging whenever I felt like I couldn’t do it. He lovingly asked me to allow Him to be my strength. I would look at Him in wonder. He was so strong and He wanted to be my strength! That meant that I could do all that I was setting out to do. With Him as my strength, all things were possible! I would work with renewed vigor whenever I would realize that He was all the strength I needed.

Slowly, the room began being cleaner and cleaner, the air fresher and full of a fragrance that cannot be matched on this earth. Yet, behind me, a pile of trash loomed. It was the little things that I kept from His gentle hands because they weren’t such large issues, not compared to all the heaps of garbage that occupied most of the room. It wasn’t until most all the trash was gone that the pile behind me was seen for what it truly was…a large, smelly pile of garbage.

There was no accusation in His eyes as I realized all that I had kept from Him and looked at Him ashamedly. He opened His arms again and enfolded me in His warmth. He told me things that I had never heard before and I saw all that I was in His eyes, more than I saw myself to be in my own eyes or the eyes of others. Together, we faced the pile and began the hardest work of all. Though I was loathe to admit it, the things I had kept back were the things that I truly wanted from the sins of my life, the ones that I considered vices okay to keep. Now, we would work through them and see the decay within their folds.

It has been awhile since I’ve stood in that room with Him. At some point, dealing with the garbage and being in love with Him became second on my list. It happened so slowly that I didn’t miss it until I was standing behind that closed door again and fearing what would happen if it were kicked down. It is only now, as He knocks once more, that I realize I should have kicked the door down myself. I should have taken it off its hinges and added it to the pile of debris to be burned up in His consuming fire. I don’t need the door there for with Him dwelling inside this room of my heart, I am safe.

I don’t know when I forgot that He is my rescuing Knight, that He is the one that has pulled me out of the sea and saved me, that He is the one that hugged me when I was covered in filth, that He is the one that knocked so patiently and so persistently upon my heart’s door, that He is the one that has loved me for so long and so deeply, that He is the one that I desired to breathe in like oxygen. How could I forget that He was the one that held me and laughed softly when I relayed my ‘bug’ incident? How could I forget that He is the one that counts every tear I cry? How can I forget how He took my face in His hands and reassured me of His love when I was abandoned by all I sought to have love me? How could I forget how truly wonderful He is?

I am kicking down the door because I love Him and I want to adore Him. I want to fall head over heels in love with Him and I don’t ever want to close the door to my heart again to keep my trash hidden. I want to let Him have all of me and to be able to dwell in that place, cleansed and intimate. Come, my Beloved Jesus, and let’s create a place that is truly Yours. Remove the door from its hinges and have complete access to all of me!

Being with You…

Being with You is like strolling along a tree-lined country road,
Calm and serene.

Being with You is like sailing upon a storm-tossed sea,
Chaotic and unpredictable.

Being with You is like dancing in my husbands arms,
Safe and cherished.

Being with You is like falling from great heights,
Intense and unstoppable.

Being with You is like falling asleep in the arms of the one I love,
Restful and loving.

Being with You is like running full speed into the wind,
Breathtaking and exhilarating.

Being with You is like falling in love and being caught every time,
Faithful and comforting.

Being with You is like kissing lips saturated in wine,
Intoxicating and delicious.

Being with You is like being with my best friend who knows me completely,
Engaging and joyous.

Being with You is like living a dream every minute of every day,
Wild and changing.

Being with You satisfies me,
Being with You delights me,
Being with You changes me,
Being with You captivates me.

You, my Love Jesus Christ, are the truest lover of my soul,
My soul mate, my perfect match, my one and only Beloved,
I am so glad that I am Yours and You are mine,
It is so amazing, being with You!

Men

I was thinking about men yesterday. As I drove down the road, I marvelled at all the differences between men and women and what a wonderful compliment we are to each other, assuming that we’re allowing ourselves to be what God intended for us to be.

Oddly enough, I began by thinking about their arms. Men’s arms are different from women’s arms. They are the perfect place to rest in, to be comforted in. This leads one to think about their chests and how different those are from women’s. The perfect place to rest your girly tresses as you sleep in your husband’s arms. Safe, warm, comforted, loved. How wonderfully they compliment the supple softness that is a woman!

Then, I moved on to their brains and the way that they think. They see things completely different than women do. It is due to this that a good man can help his wife work things through without frustration. It is through this that a good man can teach a good woman many things.

I mused about their smiles. How different a truly masculine smile is compared to a feminine one. The things communicated through the showing of a man’s teeth when he smiles tenderly at the woman he loves, when he laughs loudly along with her melodious laugh, when he smiles in joy upon seeing her enter a room.

I love the sound of a man’s sultry voice. So different from a woman’s, even when her voice is deeper than most. The kind of voice that can make a woman smile, that can ease her fears, that can comfort her, than can send a thrill through her soul.

All of these things, and many more, reveal the differences in men and women and the reason that God made the opposite sex. How wonderfully we compliment each other in God’s plan.

Of course, most of us aren’t living God’s plan. So it is that arms are abusive and voices are harsh, so it is that women don’t feel safe in the arms of their husbands and fornication is rampant, so it is that men allow women to make all the decisions, rather than being the man they are called to be, so it is that homosexuality exists.

I want to be a compliment to the man God has for me and I want him to be a compliment to me. I want him to be a man and myself to be a woman. I don’t want him to conform to the foolish ideas of this world but, rather, to the wonderful, beautiful ideas of our Creator. That is what I want and that is what I’ve been promised. What about you?

At Bat

“Sometimes I wonder, where I’ve been, who I am, where I fit in…”

It seems as though life enjoys throwing curve balls. It is always the first pitch that makes you comfortable. Swing! Home run! The crowd cheers. You smile and before you know it, it’s your turn at bat again. Well, what do you know? Another hit, another run, another estatic crowd cheering wildly. Your confidence soars. Again and again this happens. Then, the curve ball. Swing, miss, shock spreads through the crowd. You muster up your confidence, a little fractured, but still intact, and you step up to the plate again. Another curve ball, swing, miss, silence from the crowd. Your confidence is broken now but you can still manage to hold it together with shaking hands. You step up the the plate once more, hands sweaty, brow furrowed, you just have to overcome these failures, you just have to make that home run one more time. There’s the pitch. It heads straight for you. You lick your lips and swing, only to see the ball dance away at the last minute. Another curve ball. You’re out. How can you be out? You are, though, and that turns your confidence to goo running through your fingers as the crowd that loved you moments before glares at you with condemnation and anger. It is all your fault, after all.

I feel as though I took a vacation from what I should have been doing and sat at the dock of the bay and drank cherry Dr. Pepper every day while musing over the uses and misuses of my talents. Then, I returned and felt the solid ground beneath my feet and I was ever so ready to tackle life again. Of course, things went wonderfully. And then the curve balls of life came my way.

Even if you value yourself greatly, see the worth within yourself clearly, it doesn’t help when someone leaves you. Especially without an explanation. I did this to my friends a few months back. Boy, did we all feel that! Now, sitting here beside Mary and wondering, simply wondering, if life is going to repeat the devastion it wrought over a year ago to our friendships, I feel at a loss of what to do. I want to call, but what if there’s an answer? What do I say? What if they respond with anger and irritation? What if they don’t answer? What if they don’t respond? They haven’t yet.

So, friends hiding away, curve ball number one.

Then, the coldness of people washed over my mom and I recently, mixed with the kindness of people, giving us the ability to survive the cold cruelty. But, why so cruel? Why so hard? I have reached a place of white-hot fury and have allowed God to remove it and keep me sane. But, one day, we won’t be there anymore. One day, we won’t allow you in anymore. Then, where would you be? So willing to forsake us for others, so willing to toss us aside…until tragedy hits you. Then you want us there. Until you have plans and need us to make the way for you to do what you want, then you want us there. I want us to be closer…but I will not pay the price you’re demanding. I will not watch her cry over your hateful ways. I will do all that I can to eliminate the pain that you cause.

So, hurtful, hateful people, curve ball number two.

I have likened falling in love with Jesus Christ to a person standing on a cliff. All they have to do is jump. The thrill of the fall, the cool spash of the refreshing waters below, all a packaged deal. But, if one does not jump, one never knows. I want to leap. However, I am, oddly, remaining on the cliff edge. This frustrates me. How could I want something so badly and fail to leap for it? It seems like so long ago that I was madly in love with Jesus Christ, to the point where life was wonderful simply because He was mine and I was His. How did I lose that? It was the compromises that set it all afire and sent it away. My desires is to know Him, to have Him know me, and to be completely consumed.

So, drifting away from my Beloved, curve ball number three.

These have all added up to me being out of the play right now. Though I am still seeking Him, though I am still believing in absent friends, though I am not being cruel in response to cruelty, I am sitting on the bench, waiting for my next turn at bat. And this time, no outs!

Wondering May

She stares out the window,
And studies the leaves.
She watches the rain fall,
And feels the weeping inside.

May wonders when he’ll come,
When her true love will arrive.
May wonders how long she’ll wait,
Before he’ll kiss her lips.

She hasn’t been alone long,
Though she’s always been alone.
She doesn’t dare believe in love,
Or cling to the hope of romance.

May wonders where he is,
And if he’s wondering about her.
May wonders about his smile,
And the timber of his voice.

Her friends are unaware,
That the pain is deep and sharp.
They go about their lives,
Sharing their tales of love and romance.

May wonders what he enjoys,
And what likes they will share.
May wonders what it will feel like,
To look into his eyes while in his arms.

Time seems to pass so slowly,
As she tries not to doubt love will find her.
Every day is a struggle not to cry,
To keep her smile in place no matter what.

May wonders if he’s ever coming,
If he longs for her as she does him.
May wonders if he dreams of her,
Like she’s been dreaming of him.

If love cannot find May,
May will survive despite this.
Assured of her value even alone,
She will not be broken.

May wonders…and discovers…love has been waiting for her…in the arms of her Savior.

Broken

My heart shatters,
And I stare at it,
As tears run down,
I can’t fix it.
Good-bye.

I can’t imagine,
That you miss me,
That you think of me,
As you live your life.
Good-bye.

From a distance,
I watch you dying,
And I can’t do it,
I can’t see you lose.
Good-bye.

Amidst the chaos,
Wrapped in the sin,
I watch the decay,
You wander away.
Good-bye.

My eyes cloud over,
Tears I will shed,
How I’ve missed you,
So much I can’t see.
Good-bye.

The darkness thickens,
And you remain,
Lingering in shadows,
While I fight the stains.
Good-bye.

What can I tell you?
There are things,
I can’t ask you.
I don’t know you.
Good-bye

In the shattered remains,
My heart still bleeds,
My eyes still weep,
My friend, I love you.
Good-bye.

What you don’t say…

It amazes me, what you don’t say,
It’s almost like a silent movie.
Sometimes, I read your motives wrong,
Sometimes, I read them correctly,
But every time I feel your distance.
It amazes me, what you don’t say.

It frightens me, what you don’t say,
It’s almost like abusive hands,
Pounding my flesh into submission.
My heart beats frantically but I don’t cry,
Knowing that you’re hiding things inside.
It frightens me, what you don’t say.

It worries me, what you don’t say,
It’s almost like you’re afraid of me.
I’ve never sought to cause you pain,
Never tried to make you hurt or cry,
But you remain closed and distant.
It worries me, what you don’t say.

It tests me, what you don’t say,
It’s like a word search without a list.
I have to read between the letters,
Seeking out the truth in the hidden things,
Trying not to become too worried about you.
It tests me, what you don’t say.

It removes me, what you don’t say,
It’s like being erased from your heart.
I feel like it’s all so fragile and silent,
That nothing will ever change in us,
Because you’re silence locks the prison door.
It removes me, what you don’t say.

It amazes me, what you don’t say,
It’s become the way of things with us.
I will wait until you’re confident enough to speak,
The others and I will wonder about your walk,
But we won’t speak because of the walls between us.
It amazes me, what you don’t say.

In your solitude, you despair and fall away,
And you blame us for the way that you feel,
But how can we help you when you won’t speak?
How can we be there if you don’t call for us?
The time has come for you to decide once and for all,
Are you truly wanting to be close to us or not?

Because it’s all in what you don’t say that your true feelings are revealed.

April 28, 2009

I love being me!

I have decided that I really and truly love to be me. Most who look at my life would wonder why, I imagine, I would love to be me. I am not swimming in wealth or fame, I am not model material, I am single, living my life as best I can, in a world that values the wrong things and allows their lives to be robbed of true life.

I love being me because I have Jesus Christ! Sometimes I can forget the wonder of belonging to the King of kings, but today, as I sat at my desk at work, I realized that I truly love being me.

I am beautiful and nothing can be said to change that. I find my worth in the eyes of the Beholder. I love my personality and the quirks that define me as ‘Julie’. I love the friends that truly love me for who I am, the ones that allow me to be me without feeling like I’ll be rejected should they come to really and truly know me.

I love my life, with my three dogs, my cat, my mom, my friends, my family, and my church. I love that I have a wonderful, attentive Savior that guards me and leads me, teaches and heals, strengthens and renews. I love that I have mediocre talent in art and photography and singing and above average talent in writing. I love that God has given me the gifts of leadership, teaching, and initiating that I can use to edify my church family.

I love that I can see myself differently now, that I can look in the mirror and see the beauty that lay sleeping for so long. I am sleeping beauty and the kiss of my Prince has awoken me at last!

I love that I have been offered a new chance at things that I had failed at before and that God makes it appear so effortless when I look back. I love how encouraged I feel when I think about my life, my future, my past, my dreams, my goals, and the promises my Beloved has whispered to me. I love that someday I will see all that He promised come to pass, despite my journeys through the valley of doubt and worry. I love that I can be confident and sure of my Beloved’s love for me, that it never lessens, that it never grows fickle or cold, that it never turns to indifference.

I love being me!