Time to tell you...my secret

I have a secret. I´m thinking about writing it down. Is it still considered a secret if it´s saved in a Word document—black font on a screen?  I´m unsure what to do with it. Should I tell you?

Even thinking about it…it sounds so self-centered. Yet this is me—Ariana—being transparent.

I´m going to whisper it. It is a secret after all.

“All I have ever, ever really wanted…”

(deep breath) “Yeah, all I have ever, ever really wanted is to be unashamedly and steadfastly loved.”

My secret looks vulnerable typed out for anyone to see. It makes me appear needy, desperate, and selfish in my own eyes. It´s like I´m one of those people, those whiny girls, who think “everything” is about them.

Somehow today I was ready to face my secret head on. It is a truth that has caused me to hurt others or show them false kindness. It has inhibited me from purely loving because I have subtly looked for people to meet my own needs. The motives behind my actions have been so often tainted by my secret. The secret scares me because of how pervasively it has affected everything I have chosen and done in life (the wise as well as the unwise decisions). At the same time my secret thrills me because embedded between the syllables is the realization that all I have ever really needed was God Himself! Seeking this love in so many of the wrong places, my disappointment has opened my mind to the greatest reality—there is a love more wondrous than I have ever dreamed of.  Perhaps this is why I can at last acknowledge my secret…because incredible glimpses of God´s love have been enticing me with what I´ve always wanted.

As only the true Lover of my soul would do, He volunteers to share His own secret in return.

God whispers, “All I have ever, ever really wanted was for one of those who I have unabashedly loved to love me back to such a ridiculous degree that the two of us would lose track of ourselves in a joyous vortex of giving and receiving, and finally simply be one in love.”

His innocent dream melts me. I feel less ashamed, and more amazed. He IS love! I was created to be His!

I share my secret with you for one reason…I thought perhaps it might be your secret too. God and I didn´t want you to think you were the only one. Oh, and that kind of ridiculous love you´ve always secretly longed for…well it TRULY EXISTS!  

“I have loved you with an everlasting love, and with loving-kindness I have drawn you.” Jeremiah 31:3

“That they all may be one; as thou, Father, art in me, and I in thee, that they also may be one in us…that the love wherewith thou hast loved me may be in them, and I in them.” John 17:21

Keep Falling

I can still picture the scenario. My friend urged me to go over a relatively easy jump on my mountain bike. I couldn´t resist the challenge in her voice and sped up towards it. It was in mid-air that I realized I hadn´t really calculated my landing and I was pretty much headed for a large ditch to the right. Either way I knew I was going to be unsuccessful in staying upright with my bike. With my inexperience, I´d either crash into the ditch or crash trying to swerve away from it. 

The feeling of falling through the air lasted only a split second. But in that second I winced and braced myself for the impact.

Lately, the falling sensation has come back more than once. The feeling of having my assumptions, my petty ideals, and my comfortable self-image being snatched out from under me. I look up at the starry sky and realize that I´m not what I thought I was. Just like that…the ground disappears beneath me and I am falling!

It´s disconcerting. It´s humbling to know that I have so many platforms of complacency and self-delusion to fall off of as I try to earnestly seek God. I often cry as I fall—tears that taste of both remorse and relinquishment. I don´t like the falling sensation. It´s intimidating not knowing how or when I´m going to land. As gravity pulls me downward, I sometimes begin to think that God must have forgotten me. I brace myself to be hurt. 

The impact surprises me every time. For some strange reason, I land gently on a rough, solid structure. My arms cling to the warm wood that has stopped my fall through space. It is a cross. It is the cross where justice and mercy embraced. It is the cross where true love won. It is the cross where Jesus and I can be one. It is the cross where death means the promise of new life.

My heart relaxes. This landing was nothing like I had imagined. Just as I was fairly unscathed from the tumble on my bike, this is a safe place to fall. I don´t mind falling onto the cross—onto the efficacy of heaven´s ultimate sacrifice. I don’t mind even dying here. I don´t mind being impacted by genuine love.

Again the cross catches me and my plea becomes, “Keep me falling…falling on love…falling into love…falling deeper into my Savior’s heart.”

   

Unpacking

Home after two weeks. Passed are the long hours on interstates and highways.

Now back to where all is familiar—Humboldt. Suitcase unpacked. Attempts to put my room back in order. The living of 2014 waits expectantly. Fresh responsibilities clamor for attention.

Honestly though, my heart is not yet unpacked. I hold within me experiences, conversations, and sights that I´m afraid to categorize and put away.

In a ridiculous way I am attached to 2013, specifically the last 3 months of it. I unequivocally consider them the most vivid, most impactful 3 months of my life. The experiences of our year-end road trip were like a needful weaving together of various strands of my recent existence. I am not eager to walk full stride into my common routine when I am still trying to interpret the meaning of so much.

What if I forget? What if the emotions didn´t sink in deep enough to change me? What if I make the same mistakes again? What if time convinces me that over-flowing happiness is transient and transformation not possible? What if the laughter, tears and prayers of the last 2 weeks lose their significance? What if the all-consuming desire to know the Love of God fades in the busy schedule of things?

I admit…I´m too nostalgic. I always have been. God doesn´t mind. He actually grows excited as He listens to my woeful questioning. His own response makes Him gleeful.

“Precious child, the moments we´ve spent together have delighted me to no end, but the best is yet to come! The love you´ve found in me has no starting point and no ending point…nothing can quench it, whilst every prayer, and smile, and unselfish act make it grow more intense. You´ve been caught up into something eternal, beautifully entangled in something lovely, captivated by something rather invisible. And yet it is real. I am real. Greater love never ceases to give its life for the beloved. I will fight for you and continue to win your heart more profoundly with each sunrise. Our memories are sweet, but our future is sweeter. The coming hours, days, and months will not be easier or without trouble, but they will be increasingly lovely as my character and plan unfolds before your eyes. What glorious beginnings—simply a foretaste of heaven itself!”

(deep breath) I feel ready to unpack now. I´ve found a special place in my room for all my blessed memories. Their echoes will inspire me to scramble over rocks, run into waves, stare up at the stars, and reflect my new joy—unhindered.

New Year's Love Letter

Precious Lord...the One who in moments is more precious than life, whose quiet conversations with me have opened my eyes to see color:

Why this year, dear God? What pieces of this world, your universal vision, were in place?

I sit on the other end of the continental United States. New Year’s Eve solemnity in the core of me. The personality of friends filling the room, laughter and also serious gaze. I find your cool breeze here, your warmth in the morning hues on the Atlantic horizon. And I know you are nearer now. Nearer than when? Nearer than when I said your name the first time. Nearer than when you poured sorrow over me and gifted me with strange tears. Nearer than when I jubilantly admitted that my heart had begun to love you. Nearer than when I last forgot you, and then remembered you and smiled.     

I look the same. The same things surround me. But I see imperfection in the mirror. The best of me has let myself down and so inside I feel different. I know that if I ever stop feeling different, I will be walking away from the one thing that matters. And so I try not to mind my differentness too much. I spend my waking hours with a new pursuit on my mind and heart. I laugh, and talk, and drive, and run beneath trees…all the while feeling like I should be searching. I was destined for this search. I was born to be on this journey, to find joy in this endless and intricate wandering.  I don´t know why I´m seeing things I never saw before, things that are beyond words and thus, easily misunderstood unless experienced.

You never forget that I am human and in need of reassuring embraces and new mercies along this way. You never forget that I am meant to fly with wings like an eagle. You trust and You see some unique beauty in my soul. I doubt and want to run away from the unknown. But I don´t run away because in the incriminating mirror I also see You in the face of Jesus Christ. Why do you reveal such beauty? Why this year, dear God? How do I deserve to know the constant presence of heaven? Why did time bring this imperfect girl to such a perfectly beautiful experience that I can only respond to with brokenness and continued failure? I intuitively know that this experience can change me, but WILL it? Will I be open enough to changing? Will I be committed enough to saying “Yes”? Will I be captivated enough to follow You anywhere? Will love triumph and be the one tie that binds my heart to yours?

I run out of words at this point. At this moment as 2014 approaches, I know I am not worthy of You. Can you accept a love letter from a heart in need? For verily You are my true Love, you are my God—the call on the wind, a line of song in the rising suns, the tear running down my cheek, the hope of infinite possibility. "Continue your love to those who know you." Psalm 36:10 

Love, your Ari