Somebody Loved

  Rain turns the sand into mud

    Wind turns the trees into bone

Stars turning high up above

                 You turned me into somebody loved

— The Weepies

  

Maybe it's the lateness of the hour. Maybe it's the weight of sorrow from the last two weeks finally breaking in. Maybe it's my lack of sleep. And maybe it's just truth hitting my unguarded heart... I stumbled across this song tonight, sitting in the soft twinkle lights of my kitchen. And now I find myself weeping as I listen on repeat. 

So much is held in that tiny line, "You turned me into somebody loved." Not someone lovable. Goodness knows all of us have moments, hours, whole seasons of being unlovable. But when someone loves us, even in in those seasons, well... We become someone loved. Not by anything we've done, but because someone makes the choice to love us. And that choice shapes who we are. 

And maybe I'm weeping in my kitchen because I've lived my whole life with people who love me. Knowing God loves me. Not everyone gets that—always knowing they are loved. And when someone does really, truly love them, it transforms them into somebody loved. 

 

Maybe I'm letting the tears flow here in my kitchen, because I also know that love for the first time. I haven't dated many men, but the ones I dated in the past, while I knew they loved me, never made me feel like somebody loved.

However, those words pierced my heart tonight because they resonated as utterly true. Nick has turned me into somebody loved. Maybe because he sees me for me—not as a project, not as an accessory, not as a sounding board, and not as an ego boost. I don't exist to highlight his story. He just loves me. 

I've always been loved, and I don't even know how grateful I am for that incredible gift...until I see the fractured lives all around me. Until my own world cracks. I've always known my parents' love, my sisters' love, God's love—I've never known life without their love. I accidentally take it for granted. I don't mean to, and I am deeply thankful for that constant love... It has made me who I am in so many wonderful, healthy ways.

But I lived so much of my life without Nick's love that I can see the difference between who I was before and who I am now. There is a different kind of comfort and confidence that comes when you are turned into somebody loved. 

As I listen to this song, I think of a young woman, neglected, abandoned as a child. She is out in the cold, on the streets. She has been used and abused. She is skittish and gauche. And then, someone comes along and loves her, even when she is graceless. They don't love what she could become, they just love her. . .as she is. And through that love, she is changed. Because how can we not be changed when we find that we are somebody loved? And yet, it isn't who-we-will-become that the person loves. It is us, as we are—messy and ridiculous—that they love. Certainly this can happen in non-romantic relationships, too. But there seems to be something sweeter when this change comes though a spouse (or an almost-spouse). 

My my writing skills are dusty, but even if they weren't, I really can't gather into words what that two minute forty-one second song says so simply and profoundly.

All I know is that being turned into somebody loved is a miracle—a gift from God.

____

1. Somebody Loved lyrics © Deb Talan Music, Steve Tannen Music

2. Photo by Tuva Mathilde Løland on Unsplash

Invisible Friend

Raw tears
run to clenched jaws
and angry fears...

'This is your own fault,
your foolish choice'
whispers that
nagging voice

'You chose to care,
chose to listen,
now you'll tear.'

Tear into pieces
by unreasonable
expectation,
unseasonable...

Why does it never 
align? My desires
left severed

Just a friend again,
just someone to spill
your thoughts on—
invisible still

You know, I'm so
dissatisfied in the role
of come and go

Tired of being unloved
and unseen,
yet feeling small
and mean

Wishing gladness
to any friend
is not sadness

Or it shouldn't be.
Who have I become?
To be ungenerous
to anyone?

Dry eyes,
turned down, ashamed
of my lies

I've lied to myself,
that I am okay
when I'm not,
not today

And not any other,
without beholding
my Lover

Who may not appear
by my side,
but He will be
my faithful Guide

Truth will not
staunch the blood,
it spills hot

Healing could arrive
in this life,
but I may have to bide
until the Kingdom

I choose to love,
choose to care,
with Help from above

If that makes me
a lonely fool,
choosing to rejoice
rather than being cruel

Then let it be,
my only prayer:
Blesséd, blesséd, blesséd be He.

The Scars Deep in Your Heart

Wednesday
Tonight I made corn salsa with cilantro and lime, heated raw tortillas and spread them with homemade salsa verde, and added savoury pronghorn with jalapenos and cheese. The flavours were fresh, alive on my tongue. Thus I shared a meal with a friend. Over tea, however, we shared tales and tears. My tears were flavoured with sorrow and fear—that fear of forgetting. Fear of trying so hard to be okay that I lose any semblance of who I am.
After two or three weeks of not entering fully, not encountering grief the way I had been, I put the kleenex box back on the windowsill. I wore colour—rather than black and grey—for the first time in over two months. And I felt like a traitor. Disloyal to my grief, and ultimately, disloyal to Aaron. Sometimes I fear that I am forgetting, and sometimes I fear that this bleeding wound will never heal. I simultaneously hope it never does and long for the blood to clot, the scar to form.

These are the scars
deep in your heart
This is the place you were born
This is the hole
where most of your soul
comes ripping out
From the places you've been torn
And it is always yours
But I am always yours

The shape of these words has become so familiar to my ears that they are often background noise at work. But when I stop to listen to them, they still make me ache. It is as if the scar forms from the inside out; deep in my heart the blood is either being staunched or it is left to pour out.
Though I have been living on the surface for much of the last few weeks, I wonder if it is because the grief is going deeper in and I don't want to follow it. I want to be distracted. I want to be shallow—it's easier, it doesn't hurt so much. Yet it isn't really healing—and it could end up hurting other people. But even more, it feels like forgetting. And forgetting tastes like fear rather than life.

_______

Saturday

I moved the kleenex box back to my bed from the windowsill. I'm not expecting a sudden influx of tears, but one never does expect the tears. They come when they want. . .and sometimes they dry up, even when you feel like you need or want to cry them.

Today I'm wondering what it looks like to move deeper into grief. My initial need to internalise and then verbalise is still latent, but there has been a shift. Now I feel like I'm focussed on myself, rather than on remembering everything I possibly can about Aaron. Partly because I can't live in the past, but partly because remembering hurts. Remembering reminds me of how wrapped up in myself I was—too wrapped up to see that my friend needed more than an ordinary amount of help; to see that he was reaching out to me specifically in those first few years.

My understanding of 'normal' friendship was formed from my Semester friends. They set the bar severely high for everyone else. When we all began to be beacons of beauty, truth, and goodness in our own locales, it was hard to continue investing such devoted time to long-distance friends. Yet many of us did so for years. I felt the loss keenly when school, work, marriage, or children diminished the time we had once devoted to one another. I know the changes and the growth in our own communities and families had to happen—that is healthy and good. But the 'creeping separateness' deserved to be grieved.

With Aaron, the separation was gradual at first, then terribly abrupt near the end of his time in the Air Force. Maybe I blame the AF more than I should, but they did not help my friend while he was in their care. Though, to their credit, they did serve him well after his discharge. There is also regret when I think too much about Aaron's AF years. I knew something was wrong, but I didn't know what. I have no idea what I really could have done, but I still wish I had done something.

Then there is the regret when I think about the five-ish years between the time I last saw Aaron and when he ended his life. I wish I had visited him when I could have—before I ever moved to Colorado. I wish I had called sometime in those last five years, even when I wasn't sure if he would talk to me. Maybe he wouldn't have, but I wish I had tried to show him how much he mattered. And perhaps more than anything, I wish I had said 'Thank you' when I realised how much Aaron had quietly given me. I had the window of about one year when I had that chance...and I didn't take it.

When I remember, the pain comes spilling over in salty brine. And it is good to care, but it hurts.
If it doesn't break your heart, it isn't love
Now if it doesn't break your heart it's not enough
It's when you're breaking down with your insides coming out
It's when you find out what your heart is made of

Maybe I'm tired of my insides coming out, of my soul dripping out of the places I've been torn. But I pray for the Spirit to stand me on my feet, to help me to step into the ache. Because the distractions I've chased make me less human. I begin to be inhumane toward others. . .or I fear reaching out to others, because to reach out means to care. To care means to give another person the power to hurt me; because they, too, will go away and leave me with another rend in my heart. I don't have enough blood to sustain the loss over and over.

But I will go recklessly on, loving and being loved. Because what if I didn't? What value would there be to life? God made us to be loved and to learn to love. It isn't the love that hurts, it is the deep, intolerable scar of the Fall that makes love painful, because now there is loss. Now there is total separation in some cases. Recently it has come to me what a brilliant image Lewis paints of the Fall with Ransom's bleeding heel in That Hideous Strength. He is wounded with an interminable (on this planet) injury which bleeds slowly and continuously—like the Fall pierces us with the interminable injury of sin, a wound that cannot be staunched this side of full redemption.

Sometimes, in an effort to get out of myself, I try to give to too many people. I try to love from my own flesh, my own 'strength'—every time I have tried this (innumerable times), I fail and relationships detonate. Rather, I am learning to love others in and from my weakness, because in my weakness I see that I can only do anything through the strength and guidance of the Holy Spirit. Just because someone wants or even needs a friend, doesn't mean I have to be, or should be, that friend for them.

With Aaron, I tried to be a loyal friend, and I should have. We had a solid groundwork of life-together friendship. Right now I find I need to be a loyal friend to those with whom I have a friendship groundwork already laid. In this season, to reach out (beyond common courtesy) to new friends is leaving me mentally on the surface when I need to dig deep. . .deep into the Word; deep into the things I have been learning; deep into my wounded heart. Not to enlarge the hole, but to follow it down to where the scar is beginning to form. . .deep in my heart.

___________


— "Always" by Jon Foreman

— "Yet" by Jon Foreman and Tim Foreman

Photo: "Farewell, Goodbye" Wolf Creek Pass Overlook, Colorado (2007)

Seasons: Limbs and Branches

September found our leaves light green,
like the early leaves of balmy spring,
but the nip in the air mixed the colours
into gold and rust, an autumnal dream
that shone three months on us

January came with blustery wind
and the letters flew between us, friend;
like flakes of snow on our branches bare
were those white word-pages we would send
for weeks and months on end

December blew you into my home,
like a leaf adrift, liked a half-read poem,
full of moods: mirth and sadness;
full of restless blood that made you roam,
flowing from your broken heart

May in two years more brought word,
a banishment of sorts had occurred
for us both, mine short, yours long—
Alas! You became a flightless bird
Giving your wings away to me

November dawned in glittering gold,
in a gift and a letter, for lo and behold!
I was to fly to our beloved England,
to drink it in, gain knowledge to hold
in my hand like a gift. . .from you

April saw my return from abroad,
changed, humbled, full, and awed
my leaves flourishing, blossoming,
but yours, I soon saw, were flawed,
as if frost or hail had visited

February two years down the road
had seen hard times for us both
again, while my roots were strong,
you seemed to be withering slow
and steady from within

July brought news of ill health
for your mind, once a wealth
of jolly poems, songs, and dreams,
now afraid. Your confused self
sought safe home-hermitage

January many a year I strove
to send word that you were loved,
but your blighted tree withdrew
into your world of books and stove,
while mine flourished and grew

September dawned on one black day,
your tree hewn, you went away
and left me all alone to grieve,
my flourishing seemed to decay
your once vibrant tree


________


Choice is the only thing we're given
For one to live, another dies
One road says hello, the other says goodbye. . .
Tonight, [friend], I'm gonna break your heart
Mine was broken from the start, broken from the start
— Jon Foreman, Broken from the Start

Photo: "Lonely Tree", taken at the Cliff Walk; Newport, Rhode Island (2018)

Unmerited

Kindness
flowing out
in wine and chocolate chip cookies,
in smiles and eyes, in words and hidden acts

Grace
flowing down
in water and wine and blood
over dark soul nights, to unworthy us

Love
flowing over
from hearts and hands, eyes and lips
in forgiveness again, and again—every time

Gifts
ever flowing
that we cannot earn, cannot repay,
we humbly receive with open, empty hands

Full
over flowing
hands and hearts, eyes and lives—
Lord teach us to receive with gladness and joy!

What If...

What if freedom's price is higher than I want to pay down the road?

What if the investments of the years, of the now, come up hollow?

What if I am not ready for love until all my chances have passed me by?


What if fear doesn't own me?

What if I am strong in Someone else's strength?

What if that Someone is more faithful than any man I know?


What if all of my friends forget me?

What if there is One who sticks closer than a brother?

What if friendship's price is a high stakes sacrifice?

What if the wounds of a friend are the faithful sort?

What loss, if my heart were not shared with those I have been gifted...


What if all the unknowns crash in on me?

What if the future is darker than I know?

Then I'm glad I can't see it.


I'm glad I know the Faithful One.

I'm grateful that Someone knows what I need and when.

I'm glad my timing is not what matters.

I'm glad this life of mine isn't about me.


I'm thankful for Love Eternal.

Thankful for deep calling out to deep.

Grateful that I am not alone.


I am grateful that the price of my freedom has been paid.

That I know the Light of the world.

That He was wounded for my transgressions.

That I need no longer bear the marks of sin in my body.


I am free.

Free to give.

Free to live.

Free to love.

Free to be fearless.

Free to face the unknown.

Free to be known—and still loved.

Free to drink deep of the waters of Life.


What if...

                                                    ...I am free?

Why?

Do you ever find that the answer to "Why all of this, God?" is, "I am Good." It is not "I am God" - though in another way it is that, too. But His answer is "I am Good." 

And He is.

He is good, whether or not the situation changes. He is good, when the heart of a man is slow to change, and all we feel is the tension. He is good when cancer is not cured, or the car crash happens. He is good when He holds us in the midst of searing pain, though He may not remove us, or it. 

God's goodness is not trite. And often pain, sorrow, suffering, and loss are felt more intensely in the midst of knowing just how good God is. Yet it is His goodness that brings Him to walk with us now through the valley of the shadow, through anger, through disappointment, through realising we do not have what it takes to be this or that. We do not have a God Who suffered with us, but a God Who suffers with us, present tense. That is Good. That is God. And that is why.

~ Johanna

The Icon Tree

"...Indeed the only way in which I can make real to myself what theology teaches about the heinousness of sin is to remember that every sin is the distortion of an energy breathed into us - an energy which, if not thus distorted, would have blossomed into one of those holy acts whereof 'God did it' and 'I did it' are both true descriptions. 

We poison the wine as He decants it into us; murder a melody He would play with us as the instrument. We caricature the self-portrait He would paint. Hence all sin, whatever else it is, is sacrilege."

~ C. S. Lewis, Letters to Malcolm Chiefly on Prayer

Fog renders the foothills out my window nearly invisible this morning. In much the same way, sin renders the good thing from which it derives existence unrecognisable, incomprehensible. There is so much good in the things God made, because He made them, and He is goodness itself. Yet when we take a good thing and turn it on its head, it becomes vile, wretched, utterly broken. Lewis chooses well when he says that sin is sacrilege. Sacrilege is defined as a "crime of stealing what is consecrated to God." Indeed, that is what every sin is; stealing God's glory, or God's good thing and using it to satisfy our cravings, to harm others, or turning it into an idol.

God is greater than our sin, more imaginative and redemptive than our corruption of His good things. All we can think to do is twist something good into cruel, sick, selfish means to our own ends. God, however, creatively, completely, redeems brokenness. He turns the Fall upside down in the most ludicrous and paradoxical ways.  The God of the universe, Creator of all things, becomes part of the creation,  dwells inside the universe. He Who could not sin, became sin itself in order to make us the very righteousness of God. When the first Adam failed to obey, the Second Adam fulfilled the Law in spirit and in truth. When we could not atone for our sin, the blood of the perfect Lamb was shed in our stead. Who is this King of glory?

This King of glory rode into Jerusalem one day to the shouts and praises of His people. They shouted words to the effect of, 'Save us, O King!' that day. Less than a week later they screamed, 'Crucify Him, crucify Him! His blood be on us and our children!' And what was condemnation for this demand, was turned right side up. Rather than guilt and culpability remaining on those who appealed for Jesus' blood, that same blood was upon them, to cover all their sin. Rather than covering their hands in blood, Jesus offered to sprinkle them entirely to remove their condemnation.

Often Christians will say this all took place on the cross. After all, that is where the blood was shed. But many innocent men have been killed (though no other sinless men have been executed), how does the bloodshed of an innocent man save anyone? Partly it is because Jesus was sinless and took the penalty we all deserve and He did not. The wages of sin, the payment for sin, is death. So Jesus died on the cross, that image we see throughout the ages in churches, on necklaces, on wall art, and more. So He paid a debt that we owed and could not pay. So what?

This is where many Christians miss the mark. Too often we stop at the cross, we end the story on Good Friday, and Jesus is still in the tomb. What I love about Eastertide is that it is the co-mingling of Good Friday, Holy Saturday, and Easter Day. The fact is that the tomb is empty, and the One Who formerly occupied it had the authority to defeat death.  In fact, He had the authority to declare to those chained in darkness that He had won. 

The cross is no icon of hope at all if the empty tomb is not set beside it. The cross does not tell the whole story -- not without remembering that the cross is empty and the tomb is empty because Jesus is alive.

“Why do you seek the living among the dead? He is not here, but is risen!"

 ~ Luke 24:5b-6a

Let me encourage you not to turn the very cross of Christ into an idol. We do this when we do not tell the whole story, when we forget the risen Christ. 

Let the cross instead be an icon to us. An icon is a real object that reminds us of a historical or spiritual truth. Let the wine be drunk physically to remind us of the blood shed to save our bodies and souls. Let us bow to the cross because it reminds us that Jesus is our King, and we must revere and honour Him. Let us delight to be where the Composer has placed us in the melody of His symphony. Let us look at the scarred tree, the paintings of the scarred hands and feet, and be reminded that He was pierced  and wounded for our lust, anger, pride, and over desire. Let that empty icon tree remind us to seek the living Jesus.

Blesséd, blesséd, blesséd be He!

~ Johanna

Marriage

In case you thought I was going to expostulate about marriage, I am not. If you thought I was going to extol the benefits of singleness, I am not.

The fact is that today, 7 March, my parents have been married for 43 years. Forty-three years. Forty-three years!! Now that is something you do not hear about very often in this epoch. But it can be done, by God's grace and kindness, it can be done.

Today I am thankful for parents who have worked through hard times, who love one another, who still flirt with each other, and who have loved us girls. I am grateful that I grew up in a peaceful home, where my parents worked through their disagreements without a lot of yelling and name-calling. I am thankful for the examples my parents have set in honesty, love, wisdom, knowledge, teaching, giving, forgiving, and much more.

I love you Dad and Mom!

~ Johanna

An Empty Page

Sometimes I walk through life giving thanks for the obvious blessings God has given. Other days, I stare at the empty page before me and think how it mirrors life... Empty. Dull. Meaningless. I am afraid to love, because if I love someone or something, it can be taken away from me, it can cause me pain.

Love often goes hand-in-hand with pain, sorrow, and loss. I feel the depths of sorrow and suffering in love because I have felt its heights of joy and goodness. Just like I hate death because I know what it means to live. 

However, that same empty page is full of possibility. It may begin as a blank sheet, which has no meaning, but it is ready to receive whatever story the Author sets upon it. An empty page is malleable, ready to be shaped by words of despair and lies, or by words of hope and truth. Sometimes there isn't a whole lot of hope in facts, but I do think there is hope in Truth.

This day finds me staring at the white page, wondering what the Author is about to pen. There are some less than pleasant facts rearing their faces before me. Yet there is hope in Truth. I am a little afraid of finding out how painful love is. Yet I would rather take the pain if it is the price for knowing the greatness of that love.

I find it no 'random coincidence' that in the 12 days of Christmas, today is the day set aside to remember the 'holy innocents' - the young male children killed by Herod when he tried to destroy Jesus. Death is a result of sin; sin is the result of the fall; and it is this very thing that Jesus came to set on its head and turn backwards. Death will be swallowed up in Life. And all manner of things shall be made well.

I am thankful for Life, and for love so deep that it hurts... And for a Love Who was 'hurt' for us by being separated from His Father... So that we might never have to be.

For He made Him who knew no sin to be sin for us, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.

~ II Corinthians 5:21

~ Johanna

A Golden Jubilee

Fifty years is a long time for many things, including having a solid marriage and running a successful business where the president himself is not above fixing sewer lines.

Tonight, Summit folks spent the evening talking about how much Doc and Mrs. Noebel mean to us, and the un-imagined impact their service, wisdom, grace, knowledge, and kindness have had on thousands and thousands of persons. Just today I heard at least two people say that they came to know Jesus because of Summit, and dozens more met their spouses somehow through Summit. I think several thousand persons can easily say that Summit has helped them learn how to be a thinking Christian, one who can reason through why they believe and behave the way they do. 

God could have used anyone to accomplish this purpose, if that 'anyone' were willing, humble, and self-sacrificing.  The truth is, the LORD knew that Doc needed a dedicated, disciplined, servant-hearted, kind, gracious wife to support him. God knew that the right man to begin Summit was one who was witty, intelligent, humble, soft-hearted and tough-minded, and who was willing to do every job at a 100 year old hotel in quirky Manitou Springs. 

When I think how many hundreds of people would gladly come clean toilets here just to be in and around the Summit community, my perspective about my job shifts. I am incredibly blessed to work for Summit. I would not be who I am today if I had not attended the two-week course, Summit Semester, and Summit Oxford. Nor would I have daily lessons in humility if I did not  labour alongside persons who really care about one another -- both at work and personally. 

Due to my time at Summit I am a better thinker, a more well-rounded reader, and I have known the love and discipline of Christ in ways I had no capacity to experience before. I have been stretched out of my comfort zone, been challenged to do hard things,  and been given opportunities to study, travel, and know more that I thought possible. I have met my best friends and kindred spirits through Summit. In fact, I have had more than just three or four very close friends in my very brief lifetime, all because of Summit.

Doc and Mrs. Noebel, Rich and Sherry Honken, Jeff and Danielle Myers, and the whole group of staff (past and present) continually show me what servant-hearted leadership is.  Because of Summit I know Jesus more - and I love Jesus more. I am who I am because God led me to Summit Ministries. I am one of so many who can say that... Because Summit is not about whoever is at the helm; it is, at its core, about knowing Jesus (with both our head and our heart), and sharing His love with others.

Tonight's jubilee was golden not only because Summit is fifty years old, but because there is a golden richness to all that God has done through Summit. When most of our culture is not thinking beyond tomorrow, those whom God has called to lead the Summit are thinking about the next fifty years and  impacting multiple generations after that.

 

May the LORD be glorified and His name be lifted high because of what is done here. "The LORD has done great things for us, and we are filled with JOY."

~ Johanna

 

  

(Special thanks to Lauren and Nicole for doing my hair, to Lyndi for the mascara loan, and to Stacia for lending me lip gloss for the evening gala. It was a full roommate collaboration - success!)

True Love is Costly

Beloved, let us love one another, for love is of God; and everyone who loves is born of God and knows God. He who does not love does not know God, for God is love.

In this the love of God was manifested toward us, that God has sent His only begotten Son into the world, that we might live through Him. In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins.

Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.

~ 1 John 4.7-11 ~

We have a God whom it cost the very life of His Son to ransom us. His love is deep. His love is costly. His love 'labours to make us loveable', as C. S. Lewis once wrote. His love will not let us go, even when we let go of Him. His love often feels like death.

And who are we? We are the love-hungry little cats at the feet of the Maker, pawing at His ankles. Yet He looks down upon us. He shines the light of His face toward us.

He loves us with a costly, inexorable, jealous love. Hallelujah!

~ Johanna