Summer Eyes

New glasses and maroon mascara... Happy Summer!



Edit: Something I noticed the other day (while looking through old photos)...
 It took until I was in my thirties for my face to be clear on a regular basis. There is hope!

He Makes My Griefs to Sing

Wounded I sing, tormented I indite, Thrown down I fall into a bed, and rest: Sorrow hath chang’d its note: such is his will, Who changeth all things, as him pleaseth best. . . . . .I live to shew his power, who once did bring My joyes to weep, and now my griefs to sing. — George Herbert

“...Songs, like trees, bear fruit only in their own time and their own way: and sometimes they are withered untimely.”  

—Treebeard (J.R.R. Tolkien, The Return of the King)

And so it is with people. Sometimes they are withered untimely. 

Welcome to the fallout
Welcome to resistance
The tension is here
The tension is here
Between who you are and who you could be
Between how it is and how it should be

Nine months have gone by, and still the fallout of your untimely withering haunts me and hurts me. I saw who you could be. The poet you were...the poet you could have been, the world will never know. You died untimely, Aaron. I feel the tension of who you were and who you became—and who you could have become if...if 'how it is' and 'how it should be' somehow were different. What if how it is were changed to how it should be? You would still be here. We would still be friends. 

Or would that be how it should be? 

No one is ever told what would have been... And who can say how it should be, except the Maker Himself? You would still be here, I believe—but perhaps we would still be separated. Friendships grow, but they can also change and they can wither, too. I know that is okay, but sometimes I really hate it. I don't want to not be friends. I don't want you to be gone. I don't want to bear this perpetually bleeding wound... Because I want you to still be you. I want you to still be alive and 'normal.' I want to still be friends. I want that to be how it should be. But I don't get to be in control.


Maybe redemption has stories to tell
Maybe forgiveness is right where you fell
Where can you run to escape from yourself?
Where you gonna go?
Where you gonna go?

Salvation is here

"Where can you run to escape from yourself?" If only I knew. I think you wanted to know, too. To escape from the torn, tortured part of your mind. And honestly, I want to run from the ugly, mean, revolting me that I too often am. I want to escape the things and the people who overwhelm and suffocate me. And I think you did, too. I evade and hedge and hide... You took a more drastic route to escape from yourself. I think I understand, a very little bit. I am trying to forgive you for leaving me...for leaving your family...for leaving a broken world that needed your songs. 

Only God's forgiveness to me in my brokenness fuels my love, my ability to forgive. And I know His forgiveness inspired you. Do you remember penning this: "Unmerited favour is my only remedy"? You did...and it rings in my memory like a clear bell-cry. Unmerited favour is my only remedy! Indeed. 

When Redemption is fully perfected in the Kingdom-coming, I want to hear its stories. I want to hear redemption in your story...to see how it threads through and plays out. Will you tell me the story? Will you teach me the language of the Kingdom? Will you help my tongue and heart live the words and ways of the Kingdom? 


When it feels like surgery And it burns like third degree And you wonder what is it worth? When your inside's breaking in And you feel that ache again And you wonder What's giving birth?

If you could let the pain of the past go Of your soul None of this is in your control If you could only let your guard down You could learn to trust me somehow I swear, that I won't let you go If you could only let go your doubts If you could just believe in me now I swear, that I won't let you go

Nine months later and this song still makes me cry.

Jon Foreman said this about I Won't Let You Go: "If the Author of time and space, the one who breathed my soul into existence, were to sing me a song about trust, it might go something like this, 'I love you and I won’t let you go.' I believe that where you put your trust begins to define you."

Where you put your trust begins to define you. I've put my trust in myself, in my friends, in my family. I've had friends leave me, annoy me, and/or smother me. A friend recently asked if I got tired of them... My response was honest, "I get tired of myself and can't get away from me. So yeah, I get tired of everyone I know at some point. The only exception is God. I don't get tired of Him." I've put my trust in people (myself included) who let me down, who don't satisfy, who don't know what to do or what I need. For a season of my life, I even put some of my trust in you, Aaron. I trusted that you were a first-friend—someone who understood gloaming and poetry, who had seen the grey-green wave in the sunrise, who would be my friend in rough times. In many ways, you were and you did.

But my ultimate trust can't be in any creature or creation. As wonderful as people are, as much as mountains and pine trees and rivers are 'home,' they will fail me, even hurt me. It isn't that we shouldn't trust others or not revel in creation. If we first trust God to love us and to not let us go—even when we want to let go and are tired of ourselves—then we can trust others and love them and creation. But if we don't truly trust God first, how can we trust or love anyone or anything else?

There ain't no darkness strong enough
that could tear you out from my heart There ain't no strength that's strong enough
that could tear this love apart Never gonna let you go

It's still true. Though Treebeard also says, "Never is too long a word, even for me" I dare to say it, with God's help. Because eternity is both now and to come. And for eternity I will hold on to the love and friendship you gave to me. Not in a grasping, hoarding way, but as a handhold on the face of the mountain as I climb toward the Lord. I will hold on for dear life—because life is dear. Your love, your generosity, the beauty and wonder of your soul are supports for me on this path. I could not proceed—I would not be where I am today—without those holds you provided. Your friendship has changed me, deepened me, strengthened me...made me more like Christ. Thank you, Aaron. I love you and I miss you, friend.

~ Me