I wear a torn place on my sleeve || A thief

Behold, I will do something new,
  Now it will spring forth;
  Will you not be aware of it?
  I will even make a roadway in the wilderness,
  Rivers in the desert.

Do not seek the because - in love there is no because, no reason, no explanation...

I wear a torn place on my sleeve.
It isn't as simple as that.

A thief

rip

rrrrrip

breath

out

blood

in

my

mouth

in my hands

nails

in my hands

darkpainbloodblackingoutheartbeat

rip

rrrrrip

breath

out

i am not afraid to die

just let me die now

throw me in an unmarked grave like the rest

rest

i need rest

no one will remember my name

to be honest, i'm glad. i'm not a good person

blacking out again

rip

rrrrrip

breath

out

memory and other things i don't need

sound and other things i don't want

beside me another forgotten

forgetful

what am i called again?

a thief?

a murderer?

a man?

there's another one beside me, wetting

me with his

black black black no air

rip

rrrrrip

breath

out

words

words

i have no use for words

why are you speaking

you foolish

what do they call you?

i don't even remember my name

let alone who you are

ogodogodogod letmedienowpleaseletmedie

rip

rrrrrip

breath

out

you are a fool

my brother

you are a fool

do you remember what you did to end up here?

i don't.

yes i do.

i can see the faces

don't you remember too, my brother?

and the one

the one in the center center center i can't

rip

rrrrrip

breath

out

i ask nothing of you

i have nothing i can ask you for

you who chose this

bloodbreathsourwineburningbloodbloodblood

i did not choose it

i do not regret it

what else could have been done me?

i would bow before you

but all i can do is struggle against these

nailsnailsnails

to say

rip

rrrrrip

breath

out

o LORD

remember me

when YOU

enter

YOUR

KINGDOM

for i will never see you again

but you will judge my soul

stretching up trying to

breatheagainstnails

will i ever

see

you

again

.
.
.

                       out




Paradise finds its existence.
(to be continued)

(Isaiah 43:19, Anais Nin's Henry and June, and W.S. Merwin's The Nails provide the epigraph.)

I wear a torn place on my sleeve || Pontius

Behold, I will do something new,
  Now it will spring forth;
  Will you not be aware of it?
  I will even make a roadway in the wilderness,
  Rivers in the desert.

Do not seek the because - in love there is no because, no reason, no explanation...

I wear a torn place on my sleeve.
It isn't as simple as that.

Pontius

The violins are a sweet song, and I like them much better than the cries of the dying and the ugly sound of a mob.

I like to think of myself as a gentleman. I'm not a bad man, not at all. I pay my taxes. Have a pleasant wife and a decent family. I do my job without deviation or bribery. I'm a servant of the people. Everything a governor should be. I'm not corrupt, not violent, just a genuinely good person.

So why do I sit here, cleaning blood out of my nails and pretending I can't see the way my hands are shaking?

My hands are clean. I have washed them many times.

But I can't escape the smell of blood. It's in my hair, in my hands, in the throats of the natives as they shout for it in the veins of the man who I am not responsible for, the one whose blood is running in rivers in Jerusalem.

He is not my responsibility. He is not my fault.

I stand up, thinking about going home. It's late, I think. My wife will be waiting up for me. It's long overdue for me to be headed home. And then I sit back down, feeling the olive trees around me and the weight of the world tipping dangerously. No. I can't go home. Not like this.

All of them shouted my name. Coupled it to things that I was afraid of. They say they know what they are doing.

No one knows the price of blood on your hands.

I don't allow myself to think about the one they call the king of the Jews.

He is not my responsibility.

If they had not brought up Caesar -

But they did. It doesn't really matter - I straighten and run my hands over the nails in the gate - I am a servant of the people. I will do as they ask.

My stomach churns. Somewhere, a murderer is laughing at his good fortune and getting drunk in celebration. Not that far away - I tell myself I can not hear the screams and smell the blood - there is a man on a hill who is innocent. I feel sick.

He is not my fault.

I never could get the hang of Passover. So  many Jews. Underfoot. Smelling of religion and subversiveness and mumbling frustration. I thought at first he was one of them. Just another Zealot calling for Roman blood.

He calls for his own blood.

He is innocent. I can not get past that.

I am all that a governor should be. I listened to my people.

So why do I stand, scrubbing at my hands as if they will never truly be clean, which, I think, they never will be?

Strange. I wash my hands and feel more dirty than before.

My wife has been crying her eyes out. She will say she knew it. She did. She was right.

No! I did what was right!

I can not get him out of my head. The way his tears were blood and his blood was water and the water that pours from the fountain is all blood too. I tell myself he is a criminal. I tell myself that the Jews want it this way. I tell myself that the lash in my hand was the scourge of justice.

I ignore the women - I refuse to give them names - who loved him most. His followers, who, with inked in lines on their bitter faces and frightened chewing-of-lips, cried their quiet tears.

The man they call the king called this love.

Love! Is this what you meant, you ignorant prophet?

Why can't I stop thinking of him? This is not the first death sentence I've given.

My stomach turns again.

He is not my responsibility. He is not my fault.

I wash my hands of you, you foolish martyr!

I look at my reddened nails and my heart seizes.

I will never be rid of him.

I know this now.

He will never really leave any of us, will he?

His silence is haunting. As deep as the ocean. Mysterious as death.

Or mysterious as love. I can not reconcile what I know and what the king said.

I feel the tug of life and of love in my stomach.

My hands shake.

He is not my responsibility.

He is

not

my

fault.



Love is irreconcilable.
(to be continued)

(Isaiah 43:19, Anais Nin's Henry and June, and W.S. Merwin's The Nails provide the epigraph.)

I wear a torn place on my sleeve || Mary

Behold, I will do something new,
  Now it will spring forth;
  Will you not be aware of it?
  I will even make a roadway in the wilderness,
  Rivers in the desert.

Do not seek the because - in love there is no because, no reason, no explanation...

I wear a torn place on my sleeve.
It isn't as simple as that.

Mary

My mouth tastes as bitter as nails. I could swear that when I saw his blood, it was mine too. My skin all over hurts. I'm quivering. I vomit up fear and shake more.

This is no place for a lady.

I am no lady, though, everyone knows that.

I can't stay here.

I run.

Until my feet are sore and bleeding and I'm beneath a palm tree somewhere far away and I don't really care what they think of me because, really, did they expect me to watch him die?

I know it shouldn't smell like blood here. Why does it?

I'm still shaking.

He won't die. He can't. He's like Elijah, my Lord. He is like Enoch. He will be taken to heaven in glory, I tell myself. But I can't shake the image of him, if indeed that was him, covered in blood and flayed skin, holding his insides in and carrying the burden of it all on his shoulders. Nails all in him.

He did warn us, I think. But never like this. Never did I picture it going like this.

My whole life is wrapped up in him. I don't know what I'd do without him.

It's with a sinking feeling that I gag and ask myself what this means. I just really don't know. I don't know anyone like him, my Lord.

What is really a marvel is the fact that it's been just a few years. I can still remember the days before my Lord. I envy, to think of it, the girls who will come after me and know him forever. Or something like forever. He's gone now, I try to tell myself.

The smell of sulfur always and the momentary appeasement of seven inner demons brought about by doing what they wanted, all the while sleeping in trees and by rocks and in homes I did not know. Blankly, I think that I was taken advantage of a lot, by the men and by the demons, but I really don't think I was. I invited it. I wanted it. But once it happened, I really wanted to take it all back.

He didn't mind the way I screamed. The thing I had become. I am not yet at a place where I can think about the seven demons and the way I was without crying. Maybe I never will.

Oh, who cares. Today I have a right to cry.

I have cried a lot in the past week. I think usually I'd be ashamed of this. But I've known what the others haven't, that this Passover is his death wish. I don't know what in me knew, but I've been mourning his death for days. Only now, when he is actually - probably, I say, not actually but probably - dead I can't accept it.

Maybe this is why I anointed him for burial on Sunday. I couldn't have done it today.

There's a nail on the tree trunk sticking out and my hand catches on it and bleeds.

I'm all alone now. I smell sulfur once again and I start to shake. I was alone before. I can do it again.

No. I really can't.

Anyone else, I'd say I'd fallen in love. But I know that's not what it is.

Is it fear that he's gone?

I watch the blood pool in my hand.

I don't know what love is.

I've had so many men in my life. It would be easy to write this one off as a particularly bad choice. Sorry, everyone, I picked a crazy blasphemer. Oops.

But lies taste like sulfur and I can't abide sulfur.

I gag.

I don't know how to love him.

Blood and dirt and vomit.

That's just it, isn't it? I do know what love is. It's him. But it is new. Newer than the blood sun rising up.

God! Give me back the demons and let him go!

I don't know

how

help

me

I've fallen

and

I

can't

find

my

way

back

he's a man, right?




There's more to him.
(to be continued)

(Isaiah 43:19, Anais Nin's Henry and June, and W.S. Merwin's The Nails provide the epigraph.)

I wear a torn place on my sleeve || Peter

Behold, I will do something new,
  Now it will spring forth;
  Will you not be aware of it?
  I will even make a roadway in the wilderness,
  Rivers in the desert.

Do not seek the because - in love there is no because, no reason, no explanation...

I wear a torn place on my sleeve.
It isn't as simple as that.

Peter


Never have I hated roosters more than right now.

I know it's not right for me to blame it. But I choose to blame everything. Everything and everyone. And very much myself.

I think, Simon. Really. You couldn't get your act together by the third time?

I reply, No, I'm an idiot. What do you expect?

As I stare at the nails hammered into the gate, the gate to a garden which I would like to forget about, I gloomily recall other idiotic moments. There are too many of them. More since I met the Teacher.

The time I got all excited about walking on water and nearly drowned because I was faithless. Not my best moment. Me, faithless in front of the whole group. No, not my proudest moment in the least.

So many times I shouted out some stupid answer because it was just burning at my throat to be said and then I'd get this look from him or from them that was clearly saying, Simon. Stick to fishing. You don't know anything.

Bitterly, with darkness laughing against my cheeks, I realize it's true.

Three times!

There is a stony darkness in me that that is burning my belly. I think of the Teacher, who is really the only person who ever believed I could do something right. The darkness is clawing its way up my jaw. I feel my face tighten and burn. I refuse to let myself believe that he is dead.

But I know he is.

I have a nail in my hands and I'm running it against the ground, absently writing. I think it's my name.

I brush my hand over it. I am Simon now, because Peter would have held fast.

I am not a rock. I'm as changeable as the wind and no amount of excitement can change that.

Lying is so easy. You just let a little half-truth slip out, grin in bitter memory, and carry on.

His name, paired with lies bitter as soap, is burned on my tongue. I'll never be able to look him in the face again.

And I  might not be able to, I realize and then my heart seizes up again.

I don't love him, I tell myself. It's not like if Andrew had been carted off or something. Then I wouldn't deny it - he's my brother, of course not - but I would know what this tightness in my throat was called.

I'm too ashamed to look into the sky and pray, God forgive me, I am an idiot.

So I bow my chin against my chest and weep. The nails falls from my fingers and I am overcome by what I've done.

Why do you believe in me, Lord?

Because you believe in me.

My hands are dirty.

I want to make it up to him somehow.

And then I realize it. He is new. He is doing a new thing.

Oh take me back to the start

I could not hear

My ears have forgotten

I miss

I miss

The dawn comes softly and I put the nail in the garden gate, which I remember well. He is greater than me I fail not, and all is well.

It's worth it.
To be continued

I wear a torn place on my sleeve || John

Behold, I will do something new,
  Now it will spring forth;
  Will you not be aware of it?
  I will even make a roadway in the wilderness,
  Rivers in the desert.

Do not seek the because - in love there is no because, no reason, no explanation...

I wear a torn place on my sleeve.
It isn't as simple as that.


John

I weep a lot these days. They'd laugh if they could hear me say that, the men who travelled with me in the desert. "Really now, John?" They'd say, pounding nails for the tents into ground. "You, a weeping man? Where's the repent and fire business?"

Or maybe not. They had been there too, the first time I really wept before men.

My mother, when she was alive, would look at me with those sad brown eyes, turned golden by sun and by age and say, "John what is wrong?" I can't even count how many times she'd said that while I was growing up, because I did not weep. My mother was special that way. She always knew things. She saw things that others shut their eyes to, like how I never wept.

I miss mother, I think, with tears in my eyes. My father too. I think of them often these days, now that I see.

I remember being a much younger man and my father telling me about the child I was born to herald. He said love a lot, with his cloudy voice. "Father, I'm a man." I'd say. "Not some simpering magician, a prophet, Father. A prophet's passion must leave no room for silly love."

He wept at that.

For a long time, while I fought Herod among the lions in the desert, I told myself the same thing. I'd pound in the nails for my tent and say, "God is just."

I met the child, you know. The one my father used to tell me about, the Christ. He came to me as I shouted and my heart grew full of fire as I stood in the river, wet with the  Jordan and with teh sweat of righteous anger.

Oh no, Lord. I am unworthy to even untie your sandals.

I all of a sudden understood my parents in that moment. All of a sudden, my eyes were full of tears and I knew what was wrong with me when my mother asked. It was the same thing that my father had tried to ask me.

What is love?

Look how far I've come. I'm not sure if it is blood or tears running down my face. Far cry from the voice crying in the wilderness, I'm reduced to counting nails in the prison door, counting time by the shadows of the sun and times my enemy has asked me who I am now. What I am now.

My insides are being eaten away and my enemy exults and what do I do? I weep.

I weep for Herod and for the hungry fire of my enemy eating with pain at his soul.

I weep for the girl who dances while she asks for my death as a game and the way that she will one day weep in bitterness because her childhood has been stolen in fear.

I weep for my disciples, who laugh and preach and sing the psalms, but who will fall to pieces like a jar when I am gone. They just don't know. Please God, they don't know what they're doing.

Mostly, I weep for the child. My father was right. Love isn't what I thought it was. What love is this? He is my friend.

And I tremble as I think this.

I know him.

I weep.

I am just a voice, Child. I am yours, save me.

Somewhere, I think he weeps too, and there is glory in his tears.

My enemy is trembling now. I can see the devouring fire in his belly and I choose to stand and laugh amidst my tears.

This is called love, my enemy.

A dove alights.

I hear my Savior say, Thy strength indeed is small.

My head, my head

Tears fail not.

A nail falls like a pin dropping

And

i

with

it



Love is a  new thing.
(to be continued)

(Isaiah 43:19, Anais Nin's Henry and June, and W.S. Merwin's The Nails provide the epigraph.)

And even longer

When I left my glass slipper there on the step, I did not expect you to pick it up. I was running at a hundred thousand miles an hour, knowing I did not belong there. I don't know what I expected would happen to my shoe. I supposed I would have left it there in that land of polished lights and glowing wineglasses. It fit in there.

I did not expect you.

I did not expect the bloodstains on the heels from where your hands were bleeding from saving me from that roaring dragon at the ball. I did not expect your crown to be made of brambles. Princes are princes, true is true, but what prince has no gold upon him but his golden eyes?

You saw me.

They (not you) have all forgotten the captive monster who posed as the princess. The tinkling goblets never stop their music-box-melody from within, but I feel the horns sprouting from my forehead and the hunching of my back - I am no princess! - Oh, why did I ever pretend? Now I know too much...

The rain falls on my face and the laughter turns to thunder. I trip on my one-shoe and feel my dress soak full of mud. Your crown is beside me, and my glass slipper.

Have you really loved me all this time?

He says, And even longer.

{True love at first sight}

Paradox: on Maundy Thursday

Then came the Day of the Unleavened Bread, on which the Passover lamb had to be sacrificed...

Afraid, I walked
In gloomy streets
God, O God, pass over me...So Jesus sent Peter and John, saying, "Go and prepare the Passover for us, that we may eat it."

We walk together
He and I, we saw
On every corner, a face
Ah, how we should have known it
For it was the face of him

They said to him, "Where will you have us prepare it?"

Sadness
Glory
On his brow
Where is a place for this man?
I can not find him

He said to them, "Behold, when you have entered the city, a man carrying a jar of water will meet you. Follow him into the house that he enters,"

Water, I thirst
Why can not this void within be quenched?
I will follow you
Where are you?
Where are you taking me?"And tell the master of the house, 'The Teacher says to you, Where is the guest room, where I may eat the Passover with my disciples?'

In the corner of the room,
There is a vase
-We are all fearful -
In it, still, still his face
Why do I not recognize it?

And he said to them, "I have earnestly desired to eat this Passover with you before I suffer."

Everywhere, I see guilt
And faces
Faces, I see them, I am
Afraid, I do not know who this is
I earnestly desire to be in your kingdom, Teacher
I would not be afraid there

And he took bread, and when he had given thanks, he broke it and gave it to them, saying,^"> "This is my body, which is given for you. Do this in remembrance of me."

Broken, like my heart
I do not see anything but this unknown face
Who are you?
I remember, Lord, but
Why, why indeed, would I need to?

And he came out and went, as was his custom, to the Mount of Olives, and the disciples followed him.

I see more clearly here in the dark
Here you are!
I see the face and I know you.
And here you come to leave us all
Paradox
I don't understand, but tomorrow
Tomorrow, I will see
Tomorrow I will understand
Now I know in part
Perhaps I will understand as I am understood
What a sad, sad story
To see your face in prayer
Here among the Olive Trees
You are, I recognize, your face
In paradox

Birthday Party

Tuesday was J.R.R. Tolkien's birthday. I can't believe I missed it, for now I am sad. Tolkien is one of my favorites.... argh. So, I'll now write a post in honor of Tolkien... but since he was such a brilliant author, I may quote a bit.

"All that is gold does not glitter
Not all who wander are lost
The old that is strong does not wither
Deep roots are not touched by the frost
From the ashes a fire will be woken
A light from the shadows shall spring
Renewed shall be blade that was broken
And the crownless again shall be king."

"Faithless is he who says farewell when the road darkens."

"It's a dangerous business - stepping out your front door. "

"Short cuts make long delays."

"I do not love the bright sword for it's sharpness, nor the arrow for it's swiftness, nor the warrior for his glory. I love only that which they defend.”“It must often be so, Sam, when things are in danger: someone has to give them up, lose them, so that others may keep them.”“I warn you, if you bore me, I shall take my revenge.”

Hehe... I love Tolkien. I promise I'll write a good post sometime before MASTERS... though I've no idea when...

When Angels Sing

Today is one of those days. You know the kind - where you have to get five million things done but just want to go on watching and rambling about spider webs.

I don't particularly like spider webs, actually, but I do enjoy the snow that is trickling from the white sky today. I somehow have a split vision in my mind of Christmas - half of me thinks of the traditional white Christmas (which is what I'm having here in my homestate). The other half sees instead of snow, sand, instead of pines, palms, and instead of a warm home a cold rock wall. And then I shudder and thank God.

Christmas has always been my favorite time of year. Starting in November, I eagerly anticipate its arrival. But it's been a unique Christmas.

I think I've grown up a lot in the last year. I think I'm beginning to perceive more like an adult and less like a child. What does this all have to do with Christmas? I don't really know. Maybe just my perception. I remember my thoughts last year on Christmas. This year, they have clarified, and at the same time, grown more ambiguous.

I've been thinking a lot about joy. I love joy. I think it is one of the most important qualities to be possessed. I've also been thinking a lot about pain. This is going to sound cliche, but I really think pain and joy go hand in hand - true joy, that is. I think joy is being able to see past the darkness and embrace the light, celebrate it.

A lot of people right now are in the midst of some very black darkness. They are surrounded by death, disease, despair, depression, brokenness, strife, malice. The dawn seems far away, doesn't it?

But it's not. In fact, light has already come. Many years ago, a light entered the world, and it's been trying to get him out of it ever since. But much as they try, the light can not be quenched. It hungers, it thirsts, for the inevitable - that one day, the dawn will come, all darkness will flee, and we will be standing in the sun.

I think when that happens, we'll look all around us and see the garish colors of past attractions, the decay and decadence all around us. But it will pale in comparison, it will fade away in the greatness of the light, that bright light.

So I have hope this Christmas, because I know that the darkest part of night is right before the sun rises. I have great peace because I know that, very, very soon, I will dance in the dawn. And I have much joy because this is a celebration of love! pure love, and great love, and love at first sight. Did you ever think about that? I hadn't. I know God loved me at first sight... before that! He loved me before there was sight.

For lo! the days are hastening on,

By prophets seen of old,

When with the ever-circling years

Shall come the time foretold,

When the new heaven and earth shall own

The Prince of Peace, their King,

And the whole world send back the song

Which now the angels sing.

Merry Christmas, everyone. May Christ's glad tidings of great joy, his love which embraces the world, his hope which waits just behind the curtain, and his peace which passes all understanding bring you closer to him this Christmas.

Today is a Holiday

Indeed it is! Today, Bluejane and I have declared it International Kylie Is Awesome Day.

This is Kylie.





She is Awesome.

And we have dedicated today to showing her how awesome she is on our blogs.

This is us.



For those of you who don't know her, Kylie is the most amazing editor ever. I have worked with her for years, and she is the most amazing editor ever.

She is the Sr. Editor for Kids of Faith Online Magazine and The Ignition Project, which is an amazing feat.

Love you, Kylie. Thanks for being so Awesome, and being my editor.

Sing With Me!

I am sixteen, going on seventeen,
I know that I'm naive.
Fellows I meet may tell me I'm sweet
And willingly, I believe!
I am sixteen, going on seventeen,
Innocent as a rose.
Bachelor dandies, drinkers of brandies,
What do I know of those?
Totally unprepared am I
To face a world of men.
Timid and shy and scared am I
Of things beyond my kin!
I need someone older and wiser
Telling me what to do
You are seventeen, going on eighteen,
I'll depend on you.

Curtain

"How strange that the Lord should wait until the day before Sabbath for his curtain to tear!" Zechariah made a buzzing sound in his throat. Since the cough had taken hold, his humming had grown steadily weaker.

Judah reached up to take the curtain from the old priest. The temple had stood, solid, since the days of Zerubbabel, and the curtain, as a general rule, had been no exception. It had certainly been strange for the curtain to tear from top to bottom on the stormiest day Galilee had seen since Judah could remember, indeed, the day before the Sabbath.

"Why do you think the Lord chose last Friday for the curtain to tear?" Judah asked, a grin quirking the corners of his mouth. He handed the torn curtain to a Levite who stood nearby to attend to it.

Zechariah smiled more broadly, a laugh gurgling in his throat, his full brown beard twitching. "Who knows? The Lord works in mysterious ways, my boy."

Judah laughed too. Though he was supposed to be too old for playing, this was still his favorite game. Growing up in the temple had not been easy, but Judah had found hope and happiness in his favorite priest, a man who was like his father. They had played the game they played now every day for years, asking questions of each other about the God they both served. Why do you think God chose to use a boy to slay the giant, Zechariah?

He still remembered the answer to that one. Zechariah had replied that boys are weak, boys are clumsy and small, and God wanted his people to know that He had won the victory, not little David.

Judah looked up to Zechariah, still standing on the ladder, staring up at the blanket which was to temporarily replace the curtain. Judah thought if Zechariah tried, he could pierce the woolen blanket with his fierce glance and see the Lord's place.

But Zechariah would never blaspheme like that.

Reminded of their old game, Judah said, "Zechariah? Why do we have a curtain before the Holy of Holies?"

The priest heaved his bulk off the ladder and sat down on the floor next to Judah. "You know the answer, don't you?"

True, Judah knew the answer. God was too holy for the ordinary people. Only the High Priest was allowed behind the curtain.

"But why the High Priest only? Why couldn't the ordinary people go through some sort of ritual to pass behind the curtain and make their own offerings to the Lord?" Judah said. A thread brushed past him. He caught it in his hand and stared into its forgiving fibers.

"God ordained for it to be the High Priest. He has been necessarily purified."

Here came the second phase of the game - trying to see how much they could get the other to prove before he said, 'It's the Lord's mystery," which was always the end to their game.

"The Weeping Prophet says the heart is desperately wicked. All hearts. Not just the ordinary people and the sinners."

"The Lord also says he will create in us a pure heart."

Judah frowned at the thread. "Why would God make it so that the ordinary people can't know him?"

"He is holy, my son."

Judah looked up. "Does he not love us, Zechariah?"

Zechariah looked away for a long time, and for a moment, Judah thought their game had ended sadly. It was quiet, the only sound the wailing of a crowd of mourners outside the temple.

"Oh yes." Zechariah said, startling Judah out of the silence. "He loves us very much. Where does it say that, my son?"

"In the Torah."

"Yes."

"How could he love us if he is never with us?" Judah said, quietly.

Zechariah looked away again. "It's the Lord's mystery."

---

Judah sat outside, on the street. It was stiflingly warm, sticky, and his shirt was sticking to him, not at all pleasantly.

In the distance, the call of a peacock, mimicking the mourners who still stood outside.

Women. So many women in this crowd. They were moving past him now. Good. He couldn't stand the sound of their hopeless, ululating cries. They made his skin crawl.

It was so warm, so lulling and warm. He felt himself begin to relax into waxy half-slumber.

But someone was shouting, breaking him from his very comfortable dream.

"He is alive!"

A female voice, happy. He opened one eye, recognized her as a woman he had seen in the temple on occasion. An older lady, respectable, quiet.

It seemed to him that something was unfortunate about her, but he couldn't quite place it.

"He's alive!"

Who's alive, woman? and would you be quiet? I'm trying to rest.

He felt like saying it, but he didn't.

"Jesus is alive!" Something about that name stuck with him.

Oh. That was the unfortunate thing, wasn't it? Her name was Mary. She was the one with the maniac blasphemer prophet as her son.

Alive? He couldn't be alive. Wasn't he the one who had died, the day of the storm?

The day the curtain tore?

He had listened the man speak once. He had called himself the good shepherd. He was a carpenter, this Jesus, but he called himself a shepherd. What did that make Judah? A sheep?

The thought had struck him as funny when he first heard it. Now, it seemed vaguely familiar, and faintly disturbing. What was it the prophet Isaiah said?

We all...

we all like sheep...

We all like sheep have gone astray; each of us has turned to his own way, and the Lord has laid on Him the iniquity of us all.

Who is the He in this verse, Zechariah?

It's the Lord's mystery.

"The Good Shepherd lays down his life for the sheep."

Judah could hear that voice, that perfect voice, in his mind still.

But I don't understand. You are a carpenter, not a shepherd. And you're dead.

"Jesus is alive!" The woman's shouts mingled with the mourners.

We all like sheep.

Judah heard something, but couldn't seem to place it. We all like sheep have gone astray.

Maybe he was the good shepherd. He had laid his life down. And his mother seemed to think he had returned.

The Lord has laid on him the iniquities of us all.

More unidentifiable sound.

The iniquities of us all.

Judah remembered the lightning, the thunder around him, cowering, as the curtain tore. Unreasonably loud, that thunder. And the words, over and over, soundless and screaming, in his mind and above him like the thunder itself, It is finished.

And it was. The good shepherd had laid down his life for his sheep, he inexplicably understood. Because the Lord had laid on Him, that shepherd, the iniquities of us all.

The sound he could not hear shrieked in his ears.

He had killed the Lord of hosts. He had been the one the weeping prophet, Isaiah the prophet, and all the others had spoken of. It was his iniquities, it was his pain.

That was his criminal death that the Lord had paid.

Oh, Lord. Oh, Lord. I am afraid.

Why so afraid?

I love you. You know that, don't you? I love you. Where do you find that, little Judah?

The Torah.

That's right. And I have a question for your game now, little Judah. Why did I choose Friday for the curtain to tear?

It is the Lord's mystery.

No mystery is hidden with me, little Judah. How can I love you if I am never with you? I do not dwell in the Holy of Holies, behind a forbidding curtain. I am among you. You are my people. I am your God. I love you. I will always be with you. How can it be otherwise, dear little one? I dwelt with you as Christ the Savior. Now I dwell with you as your friend, your lover, your king, your Messiah. I am with you, to the very end of the age.

Who are you, Lord?

I am Jesus.

Judah could still hear the sound in his mind, and now Jesus' words showed him what it was. The curtain was torn in two. The path to God was open.

The Night

And God said, "Let there be light," and there was light. And God saw that the light was good. And God separated the light from the darkness. God called the light Day, and the darkness, he called Night.

It was now about the sixth hour and there was darkness over the whole land until the ninth hour, while the sun's light failed. And the curtain of the temple was torn in two.

For at one time you were darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Walk as children of light.

I, Jesus... am the root and the descendant of David, the bright morning star. The Spirit and the Bride say, "Come." And let the one who is thirsty come; let the one who desires take the water of life without price.

It is so dark out here, Father. It's so cold, and chill, and I am frightened. The stars even hide their light. I cannot break this blackness, this perfect, pure blackness.

Father, I am afraid.

Why is the night here? Is it not daytime? Why, Father?

These torrents of rain cover me. They are in my hair and my eyes, and the scream - the pained, pained scream - fills my ears and my heart. Who is crying out, Father? And why is he anguished?

Then the wailing begins. I cannot tell where it begins from. Perhaps the man in the center of the three? The wail is unbroken, unadulterated pain. The man arches his back, trying, trying so hard to...

To breathe, I think. Below him, the woman is wailing too. Their screams harmonize together in cacophony with the screaming. I think it is the wind.

I am afraid, Father.

Above the shout of rain and wind and tears, I can hear just one thing.

Small gasp. Small gasp.

The man in the center is making the noise. He tears his hands on the spires and raises himself up.

"Father! Into your hands I commit my spirit. It is finished."

It is.

The wind is louder. The rain pounds harder on my face, my outstretched hands.

I'm crying. And I don't know why.

It is finished.

That is why. It's done here. The suffering, finally over. The pain, finally done.

But his life is ended. Cut short.

The darkness plunges even blacker. And then I realize.

Light has perished from the world.

Come back.

Come back.

End the night, forever.

I am such a klutz

I am SUCH a klutz.... less than twelve hours till Christmas and I told my mother by accident what one of her gifts was. Oh. My. Goodness. I. Am. Such. A. Klutz.

Anyway,

MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!

Your sister in Christ,

C.

Tagged Again!

I've been tagged by my Mom, so here is my tag:

8 TAGS - HOLIDAY EDITION!

8 Favorite Holiday Shows

1. The Bishop's Wife

2. Muppet Christmas Carol (yes, I'm a hopeless Muppet fanatic - Gonzo's my favorite)

3. It's A Wonderful Life (which I saw for the first time this week)

4. How the Grinch Stole Christmas (the original cartoon version)

5. Elf ( I know, not a very intelligent, sophisticated movie, but incredibly fun)

6. The Santa Clause (refer to the above)

7. NARNIA!!!! (Duh! How could I forget that one?)

8. I can't think of any others that I don't consider remarkably stupid movies... so I'll leave you with seven.

8 Christmas Things I Did Yesterday

1. Put up the Tree of Sheba (my mom's tree)

2. Put up the Holly Jolly Christmas Tree (my siblings' and my tree)

3. Sang a million Christmas carols in harmony with my sister

4. Read my friend's Christmas card (it was actually last year's Christmas card... )

5. Looked over my very exciting choir music for Carol of the Bells that I found and am learning with my sister

6. Watched Muppet Christmas Carol (I told you - I'm a hopeless Muppet-lover!)

7. Watched the snow.

8. Worked on my Christmas short story for KOF

8 Things I Look Forward to at Christmas

1. Celebrating the birth of my Savior

2. Duh, the Christmas carols (my sister won't let us listen to Christmas music or watch Christmas movies until after Thanksgiving... it was misery this year)

3. Wrapping presents (call me weird, I LOVE wrapping presents and curling ribbon)

4. Christmas cards/letters

5. Christmas movies

6. Eggnog (mmmm)

7. Having people over for Christmas

8. Christmas break (I love school, but not enough that I don't love a break : )

8 Favorite Things to Eat at Christmastime

1. Eggnog!

2. Prime Rib

3. Apple Cider

4. Trifle

5. Jocelyn's Egg Nog Pie

6. Random things with peppermint in them.

7. Turkish Delight - and if I get a candy thermometer, I may actually get it to turn out (another continuing story- Catey's battle with the Turkish Delight. It came out once and now it goes runny every time I make it, but I think a candy thermometer may cure that... maybe)

8. Gingerbread

8 Things I Pray for at Christmas

1. Salvation of friends and family

2. My Awana kids - they really weigh on my heart during this season

3. Renewed focus - that Christ would keep my eyes trained on him.

4. Snow - or lack thereof, depending on how many people are coming over to my house (or if I'm going over to someone's )

5. Specific people who are hurting in my community

6. People who are hurting outside of my community and around the world

7. God's glory

8. That others understand the real gift of the season

I tag Judi, when she's done with her current tag game, and Never-Again, and FaithfulFollower

Just Another Chapter of My Eccentric Life

Happy Thanksgiving!

I hope yours was great. Mine was. We had the entire world over to our house today. Food was everywhere! On the counters, the cabinets, all in my brother's hair...

Anyway, this isn't a typical Thanksgiving blog post. I wanted to first recommend that you read Patrick Dunn's thoughts on Thanksgiving (he's amazing and hysterically funny - check it out here) and then that you read another chapter in the continuing drama of Catey and the random store clerks. I promise - there will be a Thanksgiving-related point somewhere in here (if I can find one... no, really! There will be a point!)

This blog continues the drama of the store clerks where the posts titled "But I Don't WANT a King Soopers Card!!!" and "Why Can't I Just Have A Normal Life???" left off.

Yesterday, when I was dropping off my contest submission (yeah, the one that is exactly 1,499 words long) at PakMail, I was there with my dad. I come in and the guy behind the counter looks at me and says, "Hey! Haven't you been in here recently?"

Yeah, he was talking to me. I said that I had been. He took my envelope and said, "Is this another writing contest?"

How did this guy REMEMBER that stuff???

That's what my dad said (but without several of those question marks after it so that it sounded more civil). The guy behind the counter (who, by the way, did not have weird long hair) shrugged and said, "I don't know. I have a memory for useless stuff."

He ended up remembering a lot of other crazy stuff - for instance, that I had come with my mom the time before, that I'd stood at the other counter, that one of my other contest entries had also been going to Purcellville... It was totally weird.

What is it with me and random store clerks???

Oh yeah! The point!

When I was sitting at the table with my sister and brother with the rest of my family close by and surrounded by most of my friends in this state (and thinking of and praying for the ones who weren't with me visiting or living other places) I found myself thinking about the little experiences that make life special. Topping the list I made of things I'm thankful for was the fact that God gives me a heart for writing and that he gives me stuff to write about! Some of that is big, like my novel where the whole story idea came formed pretty much in one shot and I just had to develop and expand. Some of it is just the little things that make life unique and worth it. If I didn't have grocery store clerks going a little overboard on their job and Pak-Mail clerks stalking me, then I probably would have lost my zing for life a long time ago (and you probably all know just how zingy I am about life - some people might call it hyperactivity, but they simply don't understand that to keep up with the speed my brain's going, my body and mouth go a little fast too : ) ) In that case, my writing would dry up, my enthusiasm and fire for God would be gone. How depressing would that be? Instead, I thank God that He gives me those little things (as Patrick Dunn writes, things like raisins and puffy sea creatures - those things taht no one thinks about and therefore doesn't appreciate).

Stay tuned for more adventures of Catey and random store clerks... with my luck, there are sure to be more... many, many more...

Fifteen

Today's my birthday. I am fifteen. Just for fun, here are some fifteen-item lists about me for the sake of remembrance...

FIFTEEN IMPORTANT THINGS I DID THIS YEAR:
1. We brought home Sam, my baby brother, from Korea.
2. I finished my last year of Squire Christian Writer's Guild.
3. I was invited to write for a website (realteenfaith.com)
4. I went on an insanely long road trip to California.
5. I Bible Quizzed through Awana and took second place (by one question) in the state.
6. I wrote a whole novel and storylined and began two others.
7. I read through over half the Bible.
8. I learned how to harmonize in singing MUCH better
9. Because of that, I helped lead worship for my High School Awana club.
10. I ran through three (count 'em- three) five-subject writing notebooks.
11. I completed my first year of state testing for school.
12. My sister made me my very first character scrapbook.
13. I studied through Romans and Revelation with my Awana group in an in-depth study
14. I started this new site.
15. I learned to love God in a deeper way.

FIFTEEN RANDOM FACTS ABOUT ME:
1. I was born in Mountain View, CA.
2. My hair USED to be thirty inches long before the haircut incident... which I will soon be writing about.(It's about twenty-six or so inches long now)
3. My genre of writing is like a eclectic and sometimes disastrous mixing and breaking of forms that I call Revelation fiction, because it deals mostly with the topics of Revelation and other prophecies.
4. I have two cats, and two dogs.
5. My current novel's name is Illumination (one of the places I got Sparks of Illumination from)
6. My room is purple!!!!
7. Some of my favorite authors include: J.R.R. Tolkien, Ted Dekker, Madeleine L'engle, Gloria Whelan and John Perrodin.
8. I always read three books of the Bible at a time- the Psalms, an Old Testament book and a New Testament book.
9. I talk to myself. Not just a little. A LOT.
10. My Quizzing coaches called me everything from "not normal" to "mutant".
11. One of my favorite books in the Bible is Jeremiah.
12. I speak some Latin.
13. My favorite flower is the pansy.
14. I have this thing for pencils. I'll write with anything... but I love the really fine tips on ultra-sharp pencils and pen tips.
15. I am 5'2", usually six to thirteen inches shorter than the people I know....



FIFTEEN OF MY FAVORITE THINGS BIG AND SMALL:
1. Sunshine
2. Sharp pencils
3. My family- Dad, Mom, Joss, Carli, Tim and Sam
4. My friends- all the many I can't name here
5. The Bible
6. Falafel
7. Awana
8. The smell of cinnamon bread
9. Gluesticks
10. Singing
11. Acting
12. Purple
13. Music
14. Elevate worship
15. Jesus

Rethinking Independence

Today is Independence Day. Millions of people across the United States of America will be celebrating this day that changed history, when we declared ourselves independent from Britain and our own country, governed by God and under God.

But is independence really what we're celebrating?

Independence is simply the lack of dependency on anything- a mother country, a monarch. Independence is being NOT a part of something.

Our Constitution declares that the citizens of our country are dependent on each other for the good of all. That we see plainly in all people that they are equal and given certain unalienable rights by God, among these, life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

That is not independence from everything. That is dependence on the God who gave us the rights and freedoms that we experience in the United States of America. That is dependency on each other also.

It isn't independence. It's freedom.

Freedom is what gives us the right, unalienable, to have eternal life and to shout that message from every rooftop, hill and church pulpit.

Freedom is what gives us the right to make decisions based on conviction and not fear.

Freedom is what gives us the right to speak out against what is wrong and defend what is right.

Freedom is what our country was founded on, NOT independence.

But are we being given independence or freedom now?

I have loved to say that in America, we have the freedom to choose our religion. And we are. But in the days of "tolerance", our freedoms as Christians are squashed. Right now, the Bible is illegal in my state because it discriminates against homosexuals. Christians are painted in this country as misguided, rigidly conservative, backsliding and above all, judgmental. Tolerance, we are taught! Tolerance for everyone but us?

Movies, books and television with Christian undertones are not accepted by general society. Everywhere non-secular (Christian or not) views are taught, they aren't accepted, not only by many students, but by overseers. (If you haven't seen "Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed", it sheds some excellent light on the subject)

What about the rights of parents? Homeschooling was almost made illegal to uncertified parents in the state of California this year.

Maybe it's time to rethink independence. I think we're not looking for that, because it gives us this void, depraved "independence" of God. I think what we're really celebrating- really longing for- is freedom.

So let's remember the freedoms that we may have in this country. Never forget those freedoms and never let them die.

Happy Freedom Day.