deeply shallow: And where is your faith?

Wednesday, 23 November 2011

And where is your faith?

[edit: you should read this with the playlist.]

Sometimes I wonder where my faith lies in all this. This pursuit of a better sentence; of words that tug at your heart and try to build; this story that is bursting forth in mouldy rags.

Because somewhere along the way, the tangible presence became an intangible longing, and the intangible prize reached out its arms and masqueraded as the real thing. Ah, it is easier to destroy with a word than to build with a tome. And yet sometimes behind the stories are the kernels of truths, half-forgotten.

I need You, because without You all this is empty. And the longing shows in the depth of it all, because I am shallow. I skim the surface, looking for the emotions that shore me up, lift me up, forgetting the roots that dig deep into the refreshing fountains that never end. Forgetting the foundation that brought me here in the first place.

All of my life, in every season
You are still God, I have a reason
To sing, I have a reason to worship
Desert Song - Hillsong

Still You stay behind the scenes, working unseen the untold stories, playing out the hidden dramas, drawing forth the silent songs. And there is that core that says, return. It calls, drawing me, pushing me, saying there is more. Have you forgotten? These eyes have forgotten heaven in its splendour. majesty in the flesh.

Our God is greater
Our God is stronger
God you are higher than any other
Our God - Chris Tomlin

And strength cloaked in weakness bids me come again, to cry out because I cannot. Because my heart is weak; my knees, they knock; my hands, they shake. And again this dream is too big for me to hold, this mystery too vast for me to comprehend, this longing too overwhelming for me to bear. And I need You. And You are there.

So we cry out Your Name, El Shaddai, God of grace
We rely on Your grace, Adonai, crowned in praise
We Cry Out - Gateway Worship (excerpted)

And oh, the depth of this love, so easily forgotten, so easily discarded. Yet it beats; it pounds; it grasps. It never lets go. You never. let. go. And You spur us on, deeper in, higher up, further onwards, to Narnia and the north, to where the unseen realm meets reality, blended in magic and fire and glory and majesty, driven by the Great Myth.

We are His portion and He is our prize
Drawn to redemption by the grace in His eyes
If grace is an ocean, we’re all sinking
So Heaven meets earth like an unforeseen kiss
And my heart turns violently inside of my chest
I don’t have time to maintain these regrets
When I think about, the way
And oh, how He loves us so
Oh how He loves us
How He loves us all
How He loves - David Crowder Band

Still. all. you. are. Breathe. deep. Remember.

Jesus, Your Name is Power
Breath, and Living Water
Such a marvellous mystery
Revelation Song - Kari Jobe & Gateway Worship

And all He is is all we are and all we are is all of His. And round it goes, the serpent that swallows it's tail in an endless ellipse. And where is your faith in the midst of it all?
Hidden.
In the depths.
Of who you are.
Of who you have forgotten.
Of who you long to be again.