July 26, 2015 Mark 5:21-24, 35-43

When Jesus had crossed again in the boat to the other side,
a great crowd gathered around him; and he was by the sea.

Then one of the leaders of the synagogue named Jairus came
and, when he saw him, fell at his feet and begged him repeatedly,

“My little daughter is at the point of death.
Come and lay your hands on her, so that she may be made well, and live.”

So Jesus went with Jairus.
And a large crowd followed Jesus and pressed in on him.

While he was still speaking, some people came from the leader’s house to say,

“Your daughter is dead. Why trouble the teacher any further?”

But overhearing what they said, Jesus said to the leader of the synagogue,

“Do not fear, only believe.”

He allowed no one to follow him except Peter, James, and John, the brother of James.
When they came to the house of the leader of the synagogue, he saw a commotion,
people weeping and wailing loudly.
When he had entered, he said to them,

“Why do you make a commotion and weep? The child is not dead but sleeping.”

And they laughed at him.
Then he put them all outside,
and took the child’s father and mother and those who were with him,
and went in where the child was.
He took her by the hand and said to her,

“Talitha cum,” which means, “Little girl, get up!”

And immediately the girl got up and began to walk about (she was twelve years of age).
At this they were overcome with amazement.
He strictly ordered them that no one should know this,
and told them to give her something to eat.

***
Though having only read it once, the chapter, “Deadman at Grandview Point,” in Edward Abby’s Desert Solitaire, is one which remains with me viscerally. In college, having never been around death, I remembered it for its seemingly crass and inhumane treatment of the dead, their body being retrieved from the wilderness by a group of rangers as the deceased’s loved one walks ahead. Abby writes,

“The dead man's nephew, excused from this duty, walks far ahead out of earshot. We are free as we go stumbling and sweating along to say exactly what we please, without fear of offending.
"Heavy SOB. . . .”
"All blown up like he is, you'd think he'd float like a balloon," "Let's just hope he don't explode." "He won't. We let the gas out." …
"Why'd the _ have to go so far from the road?"
"There's something leaking out that zipper." “Never mind, let's try to get in step here," the sheriff says. "GD, Floyd, you got big feet."
"Are we going in the right direction?" "I wonder if the old fart would walk part way if we let him out of that bag?" “He won't even say thank you for the ride."
"Well I hope this learned him a lesson. I guess he'll stay put after this. . . . "

Abby’s description is the shop talk of those who deal with death and it is not dissimilar to the hired mourners who confront Jesus and Jairus, not dissimilar except for the Ranger’s awareness of earshot and the acting mourners lack. In each there are those whose job it is to navigate death, be it slugging a body in a bag through the wilderness, or being paid, as was the custom in Biblical times, to wail loudly and weep outside death’s door. The scripture reads,

Some people came from the leader’s Jairus’ house to say,
“Your daughter is dead. Why trouble the teacher any further?” …
When they came to his house, Jesus saw a commotion,
people weeping and wailing loudly.
When he had entered, he said to them,
“Why do you make a commotion and weep? The child is not dead but sleeping.”
And they laughed at him.

Its hard to imagine the insensitivity of telling a person their loved one is dead, with the phrase, “Why trouble the teacher any further.” As if the teacher’s trouble is not worth the honor of the dead, that he has not the time for the largest grief - of a parent over their child. It is hard to imagine until you have seen the bedside manner of a great healing doctor attempt to deliver the hard news. It is hard to imagine the about face of those hired to mourn instead laughing at death, until you yourself have attempted the charades of trying to remember at which cardinal direction is the head of coffin at which you must stand to preside over a funeral, subtle pointing and shaking of heads from the funeral director to the pastor as if we were signing baseball plays. It is hard to imagine laughing at the bloat of a body in a bag until you have attempted the twist and pull, and vaseline remedies of removing rings off a now comatose cadaver. Its hard to imagine the regularity of death until you’ve repeatedly felt its weight, delivered the news, and been summoned to mourn. Edward Abby describes,

Thus we meditate upon the stranger's death. Since he was unknown to any of us we joke about his fate, as is only natural and wholesome under the circumstances. If he'd meant anything to us maybe we could mourn. If we had loved him we would sing, dance, drink, build a stupendous bonfire, find women, make love-for under the shadow of death what can be wiser than love, to make love, to make children?-and celebrate his transfiguration from flesh to fantasy in a style proper and fitting, with fun for all at the funeral. But-we knew thee not, old man. And there is, I suspect, another feeling alive in each of us as we lug these rotting guts across the desert: satisfaction.

I can imagine that satisfaction. I imagine it like being alone in the church after a graveside service of someone I had only known in death, hanging up my stole, and unzipping my formal black robe and placing it on its wooden hanger in the closet, back to its place and the end of a cycle, until a baptism, or marriage, or another funeral calls it out again, as it will and has over and over for generations. It is as Abby describes, “He is gone-we remain, others come. The plow of mortality drives through the stubble, turns over rocks and sad and weeds to cover the old, the worn-out, the husks, shells, empty seedpods and sapless roots, clearing the field for the next crop. A ruthless, brutal process-but clean and beautiful.” It is to load up the body bag in the coroners car and watch it drive off, and have the comfort that this time it wasn’t you, and the equal comfort that someday, like every day, it will be you, like it is eventually for everyone else. Abby writes finally, “A part of our nature rebels against this truth and against that other part which would accept it. A second truth of equal weight contradicts the first, proclaiming through art, religion, philosophy, science and even war that human life, in some way not easily definable, is significant and unique and supreme beyond all the limits of reason and nature. And this second truth we can deny only at the cost of denying our humanity.” I suspect this is what the hired mourners too are dealing with, the satisfaction of death, of the heavy permanence of a body through the desert and of its finality. Which sometimes, in our attempt to cope is, a doctor with his young children all to familiar with the pain of miscarriage and still birth delivering the news in a way that will always be too scientific and sterile, “Why bother the teacher any further.” It is, unfortunately, to laugh when Jesus says, she’s only sleeping, because as one who deals with death, you know its permanence and repetition.

But there are other times, when in reaching out to touch the hand of death, we find life. In all his healing stories, I think Jesus, must have had his own experience with the dead because he knows to touch the girl’s hand. When families were not yet arrived in the hospital to say goodbye, we would wrap warm cloths around the hands of their loved one, knowing the extremities were the first to turn cold and yellow then blue, and wanting the family to feel that warmth rather than the startling cold. When they would enter we would place our hand on the patient’s shoulder to show that touch was okay; that it too was part of saying goodbye. Then the body would turn cold, and the family, would become ready. I wonder if this was Jesus’ intent to show the family a better way toward death, rather than the crass and shop talk. I am not sure if Jesus said, she is only sleeping because he knew that a child’s death was the hardest to accept and it was unconscionable to hear it as an aside or through laughter. I wonder if Jesus came to help the process of grief fall into the larger picture of life and death. Death was something he knew. Jesus knew that the warmth of her hands would not have remained over the length of the walk, and so finding them still warm, in surprise he said, “Talitha cum,” which means, “Little girl, get up!”

There are moments like this too. Where the unexplained becomes the lore of miracle, and the fight to thrive overcomes. Where a baby born desperately underweight is an adult with a story you cannot notice from the exterior. When a split second, or a fraction of a hair separates life and death. Where the unlikely hood of our existence is remembered in the gracious relief of a parent. I think of Alex going overboard on our rafting trip and my reaching in to grab him, and the other time I sent him on a sled toward every pole on Anthony lakes, yelling bail and crying once I knew found out he turned out fine. He and I, now even. I think of the organ donation list. I think of time I saw three doctors work with sacred precision to procure organs that one life might become a next. All this is rare, but it too points to our fragile humanity, and that we will forever be insufficient to the great cycles of life. Jesus knows this. He knows that in the balance is a preciousness, a precariousness, and I think thats why he came with Jairus, and I think that why he came for us. Yes, so some might be saved, and life, and be healed in the way of miracle, but also that we would know the right way to touch the hand of death, to be an example for the crossing over and the crossing between this life and the next. To guide the hired mourners the way of the rangers, understanding earshot. To count not even for Alex and I but two for Christ and to be there when no one wins. To be the jokes which help carry a body through the desert, and the solitude and peace surrounding the nephew walking ahead. To be both in the gift of life and the certainty of death. Jesus comes to us in this balance.

July 12, 2015 Mark 5:24b - 34

A large crowd followed Jesus and pressed in on him. 

Now there was a woman who had been suffering from hemorrhages for twelve years. She had endured much under many physicians, and had spent all that she had; and she was no better, but rather grew worse. 

She had heard about Jesus, and came up behind him in the crowd and touched his cloak, for she said, “If I but touch his clothes, I will be made well.” Immediately her hemorrhage stopped; and she felt in her body that she was healed of her disease. 

Immediately aware that power had gone forth from him, Jesus turned about in the crowd and said, “Who touched my clothes?” 

And his disciples said to him, “You see the crowd pressing in on you; how can you say, ‘Who touched me?’” 

Jesus looked all around to see who had done it. But the woman, knowing what had happened to her, came in fear and trembling, fell down before him, and told him the whole truth. 

He said to her, “Daughter, your faith has made you well; go in peace, and be healed of your disease.” 

***

I remember being in seventh grade, sitting with my best friend Ashley on a concrete bench in our middle school courtyard chatting away during our lunch period. A girl walked past us, arms awkwardly taunt, clasped behind her, holding a book over her behind. After she’d past, Ashley commented on the strangeness of her gait, and I, I knew, because I’d been that girl too. “She’s bled through her jeans,” I said to Ashley.  Our hearts fell watching her measured pace and contrived demeanor, as if even in a solider’s rigidity everything was okay, in fact jovial, when we all knew if she moved her book, she would be shunned as dirty, and dumb. I wished I hadn’t known, but I think Ashley and I, and I bet most middle school girls knew what that was like, our bodies throwing curve balls of irregular days and exorbitant amounts, and we, all the while, still on that cusp of childhood where play was paramount to planning and experience was beginning to teach us otherwise. I wish I hadn’t known, because if I was her, I wouldn’t have wanted anyone to notice. I hoped no one else would, that she would make it through the day without spotting the grey concrete benches, or the desk’s plastic chairs. That she’d already had gym, and didn't have to figure out how to change in front of the other girls. I hoped that she’d make it home, having tricked the school, everyone, but Ashley and I. 

The woman in the scripture had been suffering from hemorrhages and bleeding for twelve years, and like our culture today, she was considered dirty because of it. In Biblical times, many women would stay away in what were called Red Tents during their menstruation, so as not to contaminate the outside world. But you can’t stay in a tent for twelve years, so instead, for twelve years society learned to stay away from the hemorrhaging woman. The middle school had seen her stain and made her an outcast. Yet, she was doing everything she could to return to the fold. She had endured much under many physicians, and had spent all that she had; and she was no better, but rather grew worse. She needed healing. She longed for community.  

At that time there was a common belief that if you touched a religious person you could be healed. She had nothing to loose by reaching out to Jesus, could not be cast out further. She was always untouched, pushed away, and told to stay back, to stay out, not to sit, or enter, but the crowd was so thick, pressed in against each other that she could go unnoticed and disappear, be one of many, something she hadn’t been in years. I imagine her bravely holding her breath and almost diving into the sea of people and weaving way through like a fan at a concert until she was right behind Jesus in the crowd. She touched his cloak, for she said, “If I but touch his clothes, I will be made well.” Immediately her hemorrhage stopped; and she felt in her body that she was healed of her disease. 

Immediately aware that power had gone forth from him, Jesus turned about in the crowd and said, “Who touched my clothes?” And his disciples said to him, “You see the crowd pressing in on you; how can you say, ‘Who touched me?’” But Jesus knew that in the pressing crowd was the answer to healing. The woman who had been cast out because of the shame of her blood, had the courage to enter in blood and all. Perhaps in their pressing and her pushing she spotted the rest of them, and instead of walking rigid and alone through the hallway, now they all carried the red spot of blood and realized its lack of shame. That the spot they all wore was the thing that gave life, brought birth, mirrored the moon and the waves, and marked the transition from childhood to adulthood. Jesus looked all around to see who had done it, who blessed his cloak with the courageous stain of the spot. But the woman, knowing what had happened to her, came in fear and trembling, fell down before Jesus, and told him the whole truth, that she believed, somehow, by reaching out to him, there would be healing and she would be restored to the fold. He said to her, “Daughter, your faith has made you well; go in peace, and be healed of your disease.” Her faith that led her to drop her book, and push in against the crowd, hoping Jesus would change meaning of the stain had created peace, and made the community well, unified by their spots. The crowd I imagine, stood there with their clothes stained red, embarrassed at first, like Adam and Eve in the garden after the fall. Looking at the scene of stains and red spots, and the man whom they followed with the biggest stain of all, watching him and watching the woman, and finally they understood that all of them were healed of their disease, of shaming, of shunning, of casting out, of calling a woman dirty, and denying that which creates life, and follows the order of creation. That nothing about a body is shameful, and no person should be outcast.

I had similar thing happen to me on our mission trip. After a days work, dirty from dust and debris, I showered and put on a simple flowey and loose 3/4 sleeve cotton dress. We had worship that night, and I thought it would be nice to look a little dressier than the shorts and t-shirt that serve as mission trip uniforms. Michelle commented on how much she liked my dress, and I told her how comfortable it was, and how soft the cotton. “Can I feel?” she asked, and conquered that it was indeed soft and comfortable. A couple hours later, the site director cornered me in the kitchen. “I’ve been watching you and your dress is inappropriate. I am going to ask you to change.” “No, I’m not going to change. I’m a feminist.” I responded with an assurance that surprised me. It helped that I knew she was Southern Baptist and upon meeting she’d articulated that she didn’t believe women should be preachers, but that the last few of her twenty-four years, she’d finally learned not to debate it, though apparently not learned enough to know it was rude to state as an introduction, especially to a female minister. I told her, she was welcome to have a dialogue with me about why she thought my dress was inappropriate, maybe there was something I was missing I relented. But the more she talked the bigger the hole she dug and the further I was from changing. “I know your not that way,” she responded. “Slutty?” I clarified, almost amused, wondering, ‘How on earth would she know?’ Were there fliers on chaperone’s personal lives sent ahead of time, the box, ‘slutty,’ checked, ‘no?’ or was “that way,” just lingo slipped in like the old Southern, bless her heart, standing in for the things you aren’t supposed to talk about, but in its couched phrasing suggesting way more than a direct definition. “Slut,” means one thing, “that way,” can mean a million. She said, if my dress were shorts, the length would be fine, but as a black dress the extra two inches of lace on the bottom hem was too revealing. “I carry myself properly,” I countered, to which the conversation went on. “Yes, your fine when your sitting, but when you stand it seems short. Same with your girls, their shorts are also too short, but that’s yours to deal with.” And it was at that point I knew I was for sure keeping on my dress. It was how I was going to deal with my girls, and the idea, that their puffy gym shorts were too short. If it were just me in question, I might have wondered, replaying comments I’ve heard my whole life. As the tallest and first to develop in my class, I was used to my body being labeled as shameful or at least weird. I was told not to act my age, but act the age my body portrayed me to be. My legs were long like the Lehman girls’ and no matter the length of my shorts, be they appropriate - as their’s always are, whatever I wore was going to look short. I remember teachers testing their length, to see if the hem past my fingertips which my shorts then, and my cotton dress the other day did, (I checked and had inches to spare) but in both cases I was threatened to be sent to change. The idea, either way, that there was something shameful, distracting and dangerous about my body. It was a stain, shameful, and expected to be hidden. The site director had made me feel it all over again; I questioned what made me a woman, the way I was created to be, slightly tall. I texted my pastor friend Marci both for reassurance and comradere. 

Kathryn Nicole: Was just told by a Southern Baptist college girl that my dress length was inappropriate on a mission trip and would I change. "Nope." was the short answer. Thanks Marci for being in the back of my head! The young woman said she knew I wasn’t, "that way."

Marci Glass: wow. 

Kathryn Nicole: I should come out in a burka

Marci Glass: or a bikini

Kathryn Nicole: Nice!

Marci Glass: People need to get over their fear of women’s bodies. for real. 

Kathryn Nicole: She said to me stuff's hanging out - its not. 

Marci Glass: And think of the teen girls she has said that too

Kathryn Nicole: That makes me sad. Its times like these ministry is draining. Same old convos

Marci Glass: Glad you can be there to stand in the face of it. Damn patriarchy

Kathryn Nicole: Truly. Thanks Marci.

People like Marci have been Jesus’ cloak to me. I just needed to reach out, and feel the healing of a release of shame. Its because I know both the feeling of shame, have experienced the pressing crowd, and the spoken release of healing, that there’s not much I keep hidden away, and I’d encourage you likewise. Is it infertility, incontenance, impotence, insomnia, immobility, AIDS, addiction, Alzheimer's, abortion, arthritis, ADD, depression, deafness, diabetes, dyslexia, blindness, bulimia, bipolar, that you’ve been made to feel like your body has betrayed you, that you walk around rigid with a book over you behind? What would be like if everyone openly shared their spots? We’d have signage for restrooms, a railing up to the chancel and concrete walkway that went straight out the front of the Fellowship Hall front door instead of a dirts path and disturbed planters. Alcoholics Anonymous and Overeaters Anonymous would meet in the Fellowship Hall instead of the basement and back rooms. We’d have more large print Bibles and people like Mardelle Ebell who was unashamed to look for hers and Sid Johnson would not have had to feel weird with an ear set for amplyphing the church speakers. We’d have a row of rocking chairs in place of pews for those with arthritis and sleeping babies with new parents, and those of us who just can’t sit still. We’d have Mother’s Day sermons about infertility or adoption, and our gluten free communion option would flow as beautifully as Ginger’s homemade our bread. There would be no prayer request left unvoiced and compassion unshared. Prisons would not be running out of sanitary pads and they wouldn’t be called that. All restrooms would be public and buildings and walkways handicapped accessible. Our soldiers would be unafraid of the label PTSD and our psychologists would not be overburdened with too many patients. We’d be better at serving the mentally ill and developmentally delayed in a way that kept them in community. We wouldn’t be as surprised when our national heroes- athletes, turn out to be humans who've used steroids, and instead we’d insist on human heroes. Our heroes would be the ones that insisted on joining the crowd, spots and all, and made us see and share our stains, and in the sharing, healing and peace would come. 

I imagine it a little like our youth group mission trip. When you’re on a mission trip you get to know one another well, and the things you often try to hide, become obvious for the group. Kourtney was affected by the heat more than any of us, and ended up getting sick to her stomach one night in ear shot of the rest of us. Like the hemorrhaging woman, the crowd knew her illness, but what meant was they were also able to care for her. Bryson and Luke stayed up with Kourtney and the first thing out of Calli’s mouth, come morning, was, “How are you feeling Kourtney.” People didn't gripe when Kourt needed a break from the hot sun in the AC of the van, and all packed up without comment from swimming when it got too hot. Ironically, we had shared some spots the night before by turning a game which normally is played with animal actions into one where you make bathroom humor noises. We closed our eyes and belly laughed because everyone knew the noises and the best ones were the most accurate. The next day, Benny said he heard Kourtney, Bryson said, “Did it sound like this _____ and Benny said, “No, like this_____” and made the best throw up sound I have ever heard. We all laughed, not at Kourtney, but because we shared the same stain, the same spot. We’d all been there and Benny in his naivety nailed and named it and we’d been healed of the shame and there was peace in the laughter.

July 5, 2015 Mark 4:35-41

On that day, when evening had come, Jesus said to his disciples, “Let us go across to the other side.” And leaving the crowd behind, they took him with them in the boat, just as he was. Other boats were with him. 

A great windstorm arose, and the waves beat into the boat, so that the boat was already being swamped. But Jesus was in the stern, asleep on the cushion; and they woke him up and said to him, “Teacher, do you not care that we are perishing?” 

He woke up and rebuked the wind, and said to the sea, “Peace! Be still!” Then the wind ceased, and there was a dead calm. 

He said to them, “Why are you afraid? Have you still no faith?” 

And they were filled with great awe and said to one another, “Who then is this, that even the wind and the sea obey him?”

***

Would you rather, know God cares, or not die? Is living worthwhile if you feel alone and helpless? Conversely, does being cared for matter if your dead? I don't think the disciple who questions Jesus has time to ponder; all he can do is react and reactive he is. 

In the night darkness a furious squall had arisen and the boat was beginning to fill to nearly full. I imagine all hands on deck, buckets circling like wheels - down to hull, up and over pitching seawater back to the murky chaos from which it came, the empty bucket plunging down toward the deck again, and from the corner of the disciple’s eye, he is eying Jesus. Jesus - asleep in the stern, a miracle in itself, like a infant unawakened by an ambulance, like an act of pure peace against the siren’s noise and resistance to the existence of a painful world, or in the disciple’s plight, placid calm in the wake of a diluvian demon. Maybe it is awe, maybe it is fear, maybe it is projection - maybe the disciple wishes it was he who could be sleeping through the storm without a care in the world but right now his every care is before him measured in buckets of saltwater. He calculates Jesus’ contribution to the bucket brigade vs. his own brief desertion to wake Jesus and in the end the calculations don't matter and what does is his conviction, his fear, and the hurt underlying it all. That this man who led them into the wilderness of the desert and then of the sea, this man whom they had followed and trusted, could care less if there they perished. That is pain. His sleep a rejection of all they had done for him, and all he had said. 

Despite the toss of the boat, with surefooted anger the disciple walks steady, and over the howl of the wind and its thawp in the sails, the disciple yells mockingly, “Teacher!” and then the truth comes out with a shake of the voice, as it does so often when we are angry, and scared and hurt, “Do you not care that we are perishing?” It could be seen as a call to arms, but perhaps too, perhaps more, it is call to be reassured, to know that the one for whom they are risking their risking their life stands beside them in the storm. But Jesus doesn’t do it that way, always teaching, even in his sleep. 

He wakes like an angry teen, hormones out of whack and time-clock adjusted to a different light, as if the disciple has just flipped on the florescent bulb before the birds even started chirping. As if the siren sound of the squall is an unclean spirit, Jesus rebukes the thawping wind, and says to the sea, “Peace be still,” as if he is merely shutting off his alarm, rolling over and pulling the covers up over his head. But his parent, the disciple, is still standing in the frame of the open door, unrelenting, “Why are you so frightened?” Jesus exasperates, and with a slight whine pushes his parent’s buttons by asking the poignant, “What will be so lost by a good sleep and sweet dreams, that is accomplished by buckets and buckets of seawater?” “Have you still no faith, faith in the peace that dives under the covers of waves and on that single cushion, sleeps amidst the squall of a noisy and painful world?” But filled with awe all the parent disciple can think is, “Who then is this, that even the wind and the sea obey him?” “Who then is this, who can can do bucketloads of work with mere motion.” The work, the lifting of buckets, the measure of a man. But perhaps, there is that which is more important than perishing, peace. Perhaps if the disciple listened to the quiver of his own voice, its betrayal of the brigade, the rat race, and keeping up with the Joneses, he would know that it is care he longs for most. The times when held his son so close that not an ambulance could wake him. Perhaps faith is not in the lining up of men to achieve peace bucket by bucket, for there will always be storms and sea, but instead faith is knowing the Son’s loving care so deeply, that to wake him is unnecessary, and instead faith looks like lying down next to the Son in the midst of the storm because ultimately that peace is what you would rather. 

I didn’t sleep last night, I tossed and turned, I set and re-set my alarm, wrote my morning list, bucket down sermon to scoop up, bucket down car to prepare for Mission Trip, bucket down trash to take out, bucket down - plants to water, bucket down Pastor’s Report to finalize at the office, and if I am honest there is a siren of heartbreak and I am in the ambulance, seasick in the tumult. It doesn't get much noisier than that, a bucket brigade we all know, some of us more than once, a testimony to the roughness of seas and the seasoned strength of seafarers. These too shall pass - like any storm, but its not the passing I desire, its the peace which passeth understanding. That from my place, a deserter in the doorframe, I might not flip on the florescent, but instead, come toward him on the stern with the faith that I am cared for and there is peace and shelter from the storm. 

What squall has you scared? Is it illness, a death, finances, our church finances, your relationships, the state of the world, the longevity of our Open Door and Backpack programs, your occupation, upcoming surgery and healing from surgery, the mission trip on which your about to embark, addiction and enablement, your children, your spouse, your extended family? 

What buckets do you need to set down? The bucket of complete healing, longevity, or perfect health, the bucket of the distraction of being busy, the bucket of indirect communication, the endless daily news bucket, the daily grind bucket, the self-help parenting or couples book buckets, the way the house looks bucket, or the trash which should go out bucket, or the one person you hope to get sit by on the mission trip bucket and the bucket of the one your really hoping to not.

  What brigade has you sworn to human tenants? Our country, our town and the way its always been, this denomination, this church, the idea of church as four walls and a steeple, the idea of God as only Christian and we God’s only people? 

Whom have you been eyeing with jealousy because they seem to have to reassurance and peace you desire? The Facebook posts of newborns and engagements rings, and graduations, and new jobs, or stable jobs, or boats, and families together for fireworks, and bathing suits that never looked on you, or the house that is always completely put together, or the popular girl or boy, or some far off place that you long to go but you cant because its the middle of the night and there is storm on deck. 

What would compel you, in the midst of the storm, to walk toward the stern and instead of yelling, stop in the door frame? What fear arises? Is it perishing, is it how the the outside world will see you or how you will see yourself, is it not living the dreams for which you’ve hoped, is it believing that you must turn on the light before the birds are even chirping otherwise someone else or something else will suffer. Is your fear that your voice just might quiver and the pain you feel betray you, that you don't feel cared for, that you are rightfully angry, and scared. 

What will take for you to see the miracle that peace is paramount, even to perishing? What will it take for you, for us, to have faith we are so deeply cared for, we need not wake the Son, but instead curl up beside him, sleep well, and have the sweetest of dreams in the midst of the squall. I would rather. I would rather sleep in peace but it means not worrying about my to-do list, and giving up trying in-vain to bail myself out of heartbreak and instead paying attention to the quiver in my own voice. I’m diving back under the covers. I have faith I can sleep.