part ONE––the suffering
heat beats down on dry backs, her back turned to The Creator who plants seeds in broken hearts and sandy soil––
but the weight of suffering is timeless, she thinks, and it knows no borders nor end.
undefined and dull grains of dried up hope slip through uncareful fingers,
purpose disintegrates into empty air, which carries not time or reason or logic, but circumstance
u n e x p l a i n a b l e
crawling through pain unimaginable, water is foreign.
down in the valley, oh here lies the burdened and troubled heart! I am in anguish Lord, O’ Healer, come save me! she pleas, and so she shouts into the void as her bones breed death and her feet stumble in sand, she knows not grounding nor strength.
her soul travels with the wind and she follows the beat of hollowness, which really lacks a beat at all.
her body aches as branches without water do in barren wastelands––
here lies the defeated human: tangled in sand and suffering, having spiralled into the chaos that is wasting time––an hourglass flipped on its side...
and so she crawls bitterly into the depths of her situation, never to escape her thoughts which captivate her environment and turn it black.
a hidden figure without form or shape escapes into midday misery; the desert is her.
part TWO––the pruning
wake up, O’ sleeper! knocks the Lord––He never stops calling her name.
if God is the Sun and she is a tree, so she opens up her branches to His golden beam
and if God is the gardener and she is a beautiful spread of weeds, so the careful hand plucks the dead and dry from her life and plants new seeds.
and oh, oh how powerful is He! And if HE is the LORD, then surely He will save her!
His spirit breathes in her the essence of truth and water and life,
and so she learns to grow. He soaks her roots with love and he tends to her soul––
she is His morning song, even when she sleeps until the afternoon.
thunder clatter on thick green stems, her suffering produces perseverance, it is
n e c e s s a r y.
He is her caretaker, even when she sinks her roots deep into the ground on stormy days,
He loves her, he loves her, he loves her.
and like drops of water on smooth cheeks, he reminds her until it soaks in,
and in time––
Part THREE––the blooming
she blooms. like a thousand sunflowers exploding into galaxies unheard of, she is a radiant amount of light which time cannot contain.
her color is limitless; she is a graceful, bold and daring rose, bubbling with romance and adrenaline always.
at her center is joy, love, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, and self control,
so long as she continues to grow…
her chest opens to the sky––
i’ve spent days lost in translation––caught in between transition and captivation––life is confusing and H A R D. i've come back to this part of the series for days, thinking that each time i arrived at a pen and paper and i would just feel better––i would have this big epiphany about God and the universe and all of a sudden i would forget how broken i am...and that hasn’t happened. i think if i sat here waiting for that to happen, i’d be waiting forever––
i have lived the suffering, the pruning, and the blooming, and learned that they don’t always occur in this order.
here is the blooming,
this is where God is good despite our suffering, even when suffering is incredibly heavy. this is where golden hour lasts until nine in the morning because the Lord gives LIGHT, even when it doesn’t make any sense.
here is the blooming,
this is the space where my friends and i
R E J O I C E D because God brought a five month long dream into fruition, where He provided, He delivered, He redeemed, He saved, He gave, He took away, He created, He lasted, He loved.
she lifts her chest to the sky and gives her heart to the Lord and allows him to KNOW HER. she embraces change and uncertainty like its her mantra, He teaches her to absolutely adore anything and everything she cannot control. He shows her how to love the people around her, how to love herself, and how to leap into the world unknown with radical and consistent faith, and He teaches her to TRUST HIM––even in suffering.
He will continue to remind her that He is good, and that the flowers of the spirit come from HIM ALONE, and nothing else.
and she will continue to grow.
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