CCU Silent Retreat 2011 – Day Two

Retreatant #2
April 9, 2011

Papa,
Today I was just sitting and couldn’t help but marvel at Your majesty. Creation all around sings Your name in such an unfamiliar way. Each roll of the hillside, or fold on the mountains edge, in harmony, exclaiming praise. As I became lost in the jagged folds in a mountain in the distance, I couldn’t help but to take in just how closely You pay attention to details. Every curve, crack, fold, and page on that mountain, whispering of the workings of Your intricate hands. You created this mountain so intricately and You created me ever so intricately as well. You are the Creator of all things, the Creator of me. Who better to come to with the intricate splits of my heart? Papa, You know every part of me, You know every part of my heart, You know every junction and intersection where pain and anger collided head on, every crossing where bitterness and resentment intertwined, every shattered corner, where tears had a nearly silent rock-meets-glass sort of interaction. And where splits of all these roads meet, twisted into one, they then plunge into the depths and make up the walls of a prison that I’d so long been held captive to, You know these parts of me too. You know these intricacies of my heart, and like the whole mountain radiates Your glorious work, only You can bring these splits of my heart to proclaim Your glory.

In reading, I couldn’t help but resonate with the main character who was voicing his “if only’s”, and the “if only’s” of my past came creeping in.

If only I hadn’t agreed to meet him…
If only I decided to not attend that party…
If only I hadn’t stopped fighting…
If only I fought a little bit more…

If only, if only, if only. I could drown in a sea of my if only’s because of how many there are. And yet these if only’s seem to form the questions that I have found myself asking for years. Questions of why on so many different levels. It isn’t until no that I realize that these questions and if only’s have only caused these junctions in my heart to splinter deeper and have begun to suffocate the parts that hadn’t yet been taken over.

All of what I thought were my defenses are actually the implementers of my drowning in this sea of suffering. My main buoy all these years? Bitterness. The only thing left for me to hold onto that was “keeping me afloat”. I have realized that this “lifeline” of mine is actually pulling me below the surface, doing its best to pull me out of reach of my true Buoy. In a step of faith and tears, I let go of the “one thing that has been keeping me afloat”, crying out, Papa, I have nothing left to hold me up, only to be greeted with a subtle, still,

Hold onto Me.

So here I am, all my comfortable defenses that I’ve held for so long, are no longer in my grasp, and I’m holding onto the One who created me intricately, and is mending me in ways known only to Him.

April 9, 2011 – late afternoon

“We’re not justifying it. We are redeeming it”.
Papa, one of my deepest thoughts about what I’ve been through is that, in the end, what justifies what happened to me? And deeply embedded in these thoughts is that seed that says that nothing will ever justify what happened. There isn’t any final outcome I can think of that would justify this. And that is very unsettling in my finite human mind. I need justification. As if justification would make it all better. I seek out justification, so that I may explain things away, or so that I may have an excuse for something. I am constantly seeking to justify words or actions. Yet as I’ve been seeking to justify what has happened to me, I seemed to have lost sight of Your hand in this, and what You’re doing in it, Papa. All I’ve been doing is searching for answers and in the midst of this chaotic searching; I let go if the One I should be searching for.

All I’ve been wanting is something that somehow justifies what happened, and in the midst of that, I lost the desire for You, Papa. My desire became so answer focused and I began drowning in my sea of unanswered questions. I lost any sight of how You might work in this, to the point of no hope. How much You love me, slipped out of the concepts of my mind and became buried underneath all the “why’s” and “how come’s”. And yet, what I’ve been seeking all this time is not at all what You have been seeking. I’ve been seeking to justify it; You are redeeming it.

You’re not here to justify what happened to me. You’re here to redeem it.

Retreatant #1
April 9th 2011:

God, I don’t even know what to think right now. Not that there’s a thought I should think and one I should not, but whatever could be going on in my head remains a silent nuisance. I love the silence, I really do, so why does it not come when I beckon it politely?
Every time Many times when I choose to go out of my way and attempt something great for you, something that my heart yearns for, you choose not to “come through” (to my human, infallible knowledge). I may meet with you on my bustling college campus, yet when I set a weekend apart for you and only you – nothing. I don’t need human knowledge right now; I don’t need to attempt to find my own solutions or come up with hypothetical hypotheses. I need pure divine pneuma breathed into my own spirit. I realize you can give us answers through our own logic, and this is the point when I contradict everything I say and attempt to find out what you’re up to looking at every possible angle from the outside perspective, so I’m just going to stop that HERE. You know my heart, you know that I love you; I’m going to unleash my already knowingly questionable thoughts and ask you to take them as they are meant.

I cannot comprehend why you would answer prayers as minimal as shooting stars, but when I turn to bigger things you turn a deaf ear. When I am at the point of physical empathic pains for my friends, pains that only you could have led me to feel, my prayers jump right back into my ears with the mocking drones of uselessness. I have seen the impact of prayer; I know what it does to the spiritual atmosphere of a place. The moment our lips part and the first syllables of words are breathed, angels and demons are forced into motion. Battles are being waged in the heavenly realms and savagery wages on in my heart down below. So why, with all of this raw, primal power that you exude, would you choose to tend to the least of my worries? Why if I care about something, do you suddenly choose not to? I know this is not being fair to you and that it is incompatible with your character, but still; I’ve taken enough psych classes by now to know that what we feel (Dr. Mitsch – your little t truth) is just as important as what is really taking place.

It makes me wonder if I could wring my heart to the point of apathy, would you answer? If I carelessly threw together a stream of meaningless words and then said, Oh God, let your will be done, would your fingers snap and create magic? I apologize if this comes off as sarcastic and degrading; I honestly can’t figure out what it is you would have of me. I know that a broken and contrite heart is your perfect sacrifice, more fragrant and beautiful to you than the words I attempt to express; why then is my fragmented heart thrown to the pigs? When I choose to be vulnerable and to pray for someone to just witness a taste of you, my broken heart is then crushed and the ashes are smeared on my forehead as a constant reminder of the words you chose to flick off your fingertips. Why dirty yourself with such filthy creatures. We practically moan as we drag our sorry heap of self up your steps to the footstool of your feet, and your foot pushes the hand aside that grasps for a glimpse of the glory. I am Smegal and I am decaying on the royal steps. Does my stench not rise before your throne as my prayers so earnestly do?

This is why I hate prayers like these: I feel as if everything I say just feeds off the last comment, and it’s not truly what I’m feeling, but my own head caught up in emotion. I desperately cling to the gifts that you so lavishly laid at my feet and backed away with head bowed…bowed to me! Your eyes were rimmed with tears as you wondered how I couldn’t see the hand that caressed me into sleep. How did I not see you as you sat by my side, trance unbroken, and sang the sweetest words to ward away the nightmares? Why do I so easily forget the miracles you so graciously showed me last year; they flow together so well I can’t see where it all began and yet how it all abruptly ended. What mystery.

You have been there before I even started to question. I asked you to take my heart and hide it within the folds of your cloak, knowing I could not trust it to myself, and there it has stayed. By your grace you have led me down a path that is so blessed beyond measure, I cannot articulate the spoils I have received. Everything I have ever needed has been provided, and an extra giggle each day. You have kept me from the torrents that continually pull at my feet, and though I fear the undertow is too much, the pact you made drags you in and leaves me standing on a dry, sandy beach.

Why is it that I so easily forget? I hate this about me! I hate that I forget what you’ve done and I continually beg for another miracle, another glimpse, another touch, another moment. Have I not had enough? Why do I continue to question? Why do you put up with me? You’ve given me more than enough reason to be satisfied for a lifetime, and yet once again I find myself dragging my feet to our quiet place and whining about why I can’t have my way.

I may have slightly expounded, for I believe whining is beneath me and lower than any comment that should be heard by your ears. I long to get my point across though, and I’m floundering in my attempt to drench this paper with theoretical ink.

Like I said, this doesn’t really feel like me. Perhaps it’s coming from somewhere, but I’ve never drawn out a Smegal comparison, so I question how much of this is just my psyche in need of a little imagination. No coincidences, just boredom. Who knows, maybe I’m just writing. Maybe I’m just in need of something to throw in your face in hopes that I’ll come out the victor (in the sense of getting what I want, not beating you to the punch – I’m surely not picking any fights here).

Well, for what it’s worth, I felt like I needed to write something. Since my thoughts won’t leave my head, I might as well splash some on faux paper. Hmm…sure used a lot of commas; what a waste of this imaginary ink. Condensed precision, I think that’s what I’ll work on (and more contractions!)

*Come burn your face into our hearts*

Come as close as you want
And burn this heart

Though your fire may hurt
I’de be far worse
Without you.

Even when times are hard
We say yes
We submit ourselves.
We say yes to how you want to move in us.

He’s dazzling
He’s excellent
He’s chief among ten thousand
He’s fairer than the sons of man

Behold your God!