Tag: frustration

A psalm

45 years old and I’m still wasting time.

Waiting (in vain) for some life to start: waiting for more than just getting through, just finding something to look forward to, just distracting enough to fill moments with meager amusements only to find that it’s all ash and dust, leaving me more hollow, bereft, and with less time to fill, with the quality I crave, than when I started.

What if I – we all – were just honest with Him?

Remembered this terrible plight, admitted our utter inability to be different than we are – (by our own hands and efforts) and held up all these teeny lives for His loving scrutiny, His healing care?

What if I allowed Him to crispify the ugliness, the complete folly and sin of all this wastefulness and trusted Him to transform the ashes to beauty?

What if I were honest? What if I trusted the Life that’s there to be the Life it is and simply let It Be? Simply enjoyed and celebrated that He Is So?

What if I just handed over all-that’s-wrong to All-His-Right?

What if I remembered to celebrate the Life more than I bemoaned the death?

It would not be wasteful. It would not be in vain. It would not be disappointing, hopeless, a dead end, a new regret, or just another guilt infusing pursuit.

The only ashes would be turned beautiful. There would be no more hollows or scramblings, guilt, regret or lost time.

There would be – because there is if we’ll have it – living water brimming up and spilling over.

There would be fullness and it would well up by virtue of its generosity, its very inability to atrophy, and spread more goodness.

Like spring in the light and the warmth, the pulse of this great sleepy life would quicken and enliven to its Creator, by its Creator, because of and in response to His Life in it.

Praise and thanks, great God, for fresh starts, new seasons, and most of all that You Are and So.

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When? When’ll it get written ‘cept now?

When? When’ll it get planted and how?

‘Less someone like me cares a whole awful lot

Nothing is going to get done, it’s just not.

‘Cept what happens when caring’s not in the equation

When my mind is so full but so dull

What happens when I’m paralyzed with my self

And I just can’t distinguish my call?

What happens when my brain’s so full of turmoil?

(I’ve been stewing, despondent and down)

Feeling a victim all over the place

Smiles are scarce ’round this face: s’mostly frowns.

See nothing gets done – I just stop and I stare –

Then obsess more with all that’s not done

I am weak, Lord, You know it, wish I had more of a scapegoat

But my self is at fault – I’m the one

That is faulty and sinful and wretched and dumb

Full of Amy and all of her woes

I forget – least don’t act like – all Your goodness is here

That I could myself on Jesus throw

I’m sorry, I am, I’m so sorry ’bout these:

These leanings towards over and whelm 

I don’t know what the cause is, the source or the problem

That threatens my place at the helm

‘Cause it’s that: it’s that feeling that I’m not in control 

Of my destiny, life, or e’en hope

And it leaves me despondent (yes I know it’s redundant)

And I wonder how better to cope

I can’t figure it out (it’s only been 40 years)

So maybe the answer’s not there

Maybe the answer’s in just looking up

To the One Who assures me He’s here

See “what would Jesus do” is slightly off base

It’s “what’s Jesus doing” that’s now

It’s a matter of aligning myself with His Self

(And relaxing these lines on my brow)

I can trust Him (we can!) we can trust Him always

And forever to do what is best

I can trust that my angst, and my self, and these pains

Can be completely shored up in His rest

It’s not a naive sort of trust that I mean

Rather it’s hard and a battle for sure

But it’s all not for naught – there is good purpose here

Makes us loving, gentle, right, and pure

In order to separate the good from the dross

Some fire’s required: heat and light

The yuck must be skimmed from this soul that is His

That His presence is all that’s in sight

See there’s too much of me too much world and distraction

That it muddles one’s right view of Him

So these troubles I feel – though they seem very real –

Must be brought more to Him so to dim

So now on to remember – Lord, help me do better –

Remember Your presence always

Remember what You’ve done, are doing, begun

Fixed-on-Jesus-eyes are what must stay

Thank You, Father, for even now I realize

That You’re helping me this very minute

To remember Your goodness, faithful, gentle leading

Redeeming all that is amiss

That’s the God that You Are, the One who rights all the wrongs

Who brings healing and light to dark places

Turns all things inside out, turns all things upside down

Transforms shame into beautiful spaces

Thank You for help, and thank You for love

And thank You for helping to love

And thanks for redemption, freedom, and reminding

Me blessedly towards You to move.

Wisdom (and its elusive accumulation)

  

I accumulate

Snippets and scraps of wisdom

Furiously copy and collect quotes

Try and grab on to ideas in hopes that they’ll stick.

But they drift and settle

In nondescript locations

And no matter how badly I want to hold on to their quality

They dry up, break down, and lose their initial splendor.

Rarely permanent

A wind change and they’re scattered.

I grasp at them;

But no sooner does the fist close ’round

Than they dissolve and fade from memory.

No sooner do I identify one

Than that leaf blows neath the rest of the heap

No longer remarkable, decipherable, identifiable

From the rest.

Further proof that 

All these – none of these –

Are mine to keep or hold as my own.

Neither wisdom, nor moments, nor leaves, nor snowflakes

Nor any other of the divine’s holdings

My property.

A steward is all

Whose domain’s graciously on loan

And hopefully, whose care and keeping            

Not wasted.