When It's All Too Much

Our church's outdoor service. <3

I grit teeth and I say it too loud, too edgy. Please, be quiet. Eat your dinner.

And I mean it but don't say it, For the love of all that is holy, stop driving me mad.

It has been a hard day. A frustrating, two-steps back kind of day with the sort of adoption news I was praying against and this just-fine-sized home feeling awfully crowded with chatter and stained clothes, today. 

Too much buzz, too much energy, too much old jelly plastered in fingerprints to the side of refrigerator like purple glue globs. I glance my own face in the mirror and my eyes won't even rise the whole way, drooping over worn skin, freckled like my mother's, tired eyes green like my boys'. There is no life in mine to speak of, no love. Somehow they look paper thin like my skin and the rest of me melts into transparency too.

I will it but the chatter doesn't stop, the skinned knees, flushing toilet, flickering lights and slamming screen door. Crashing bikes. Skipping sandals. Bickering brothers. 

Loud stadium voices, train-station voices, cacophonous circus voices.

It feels like assault and all too much.

It bubbles in and up and out through my mouth. I need to get quiet. I need to hear, to listen.

I think we'll skip church tomorrow to get it, to get quiet. I need quiet before the Lord, I think, over and over and over, just quiet. Just quiet.

Be quiet.

I flip open pages and by no coincidence I happen upon it.

"Sons are a heritage from the LORD, children a reward from him. Like arrows in the hands of a warrior are sons born in one's youth. Blessed is the man whose quiver is full of them."

And a glance to the opposite page sings the tune of my heart.

"Restore our fortunes, O Lord, like streams in the Negev. Those who sow in tears will reap with songs of joy. He who goes out weeping, carrying seed to sow, will return with songs of joy, carrying sheaves with him."

It rips open and I know we will go. We will go to lift hands and sing loud and sing long and marvel barefoot at the open sky because in summer, this is the way we worship. It is the single thing I love best about church these days. We will get loud before the LORD to quiet the sounds which steal our postures of praise. We will savor wafer and wine and let it transform. We will go out weeping and return with songs of joy.

Restore our fortunes, O Lord. Indeed. 

Does God Need Worship?

“Do you really think there’s a God up there that needs us to all sit around and worship Him all the time – sit around telling Him how great He is instead of doing good things in the world?”

The question blind-sides me as I admit my own struggles with doubt to an unbelieving friend.

Do I?   I stare silently, for a moment, and roll this thought through my mind, down into my heart as the words sting and I feel defensive on behalf of My Father, and guilty on behalf of my selfish heart. 

“Well…,” I begin.  “No... and yes.  And no.”

This is difficult to answer.

“I think worship is vital to our relationship with God, but…”  I continue, ever so slowly.   

I want to get this right.  I am talking to myself more than my friend, in this instant.

“I think it’s more for us, than for Him.”

She looks at me, wrinkled brow, skeptical.  Where am I going with this?

“God doesn’t need anything from us.  I mean… He doesn’t doubt His own greatness… but… I believe… He calls us to worship in order to stop, as often as possible, and ground ourselves.  Remember ourselves in the scheme of things.  Remember that this whole big deal isn’t about us but about Him.  Acknowledging His holiness is putting everything in its proper order, so that we can do good things in the world.

“When we’re focused on ourselves, as we are, by nature, our desire is not to do good for others, but… that is His desire for us.  And worship connects us to the heart of that.  To look up, to go low, to get real.  To realize our smallness, and His magnificence and to remember, often, that the closest we can get to being like Him is to be love in the flesh.”

She nods.  I see that this is the first time she’s heard it this way.  And I don’t know where these words have come from, as I have never seen it this way before, but as I speak what flows through my mouth, without input from my (selfish) brain, it is all so clear. And I long, like never before, to worship, here and now, in this new understanding.

Worship is opening our hearts to our smallness and His greatness.  Not because He needs it, but because we do.  And we are free to be small, miniature even, inside of His Great Big Love.  To be lost in it.  To swim and dance and twirl in its open spaces.  To love enormously and make ourselves smaller as He grows bigger within us.  He loves us by making us smaller.  We love Him by reflecting His big-ness, by showing Big Love to a hurt world.

And I am glad because this is new to me, this realization, this connection, but also painfully aware of just how big I have made myself in this little life of mine.  

And it is there my heart whispers:  Lord… make me small.
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Grateful, with Ann: 

279.  Compassion, where it is much needed.
280.  Running water.
281.  Peachy-orange roses, picked and shared by tiny hands.
282.  Impromptu dinner parties.
283.  Guests, full of grace for mess and imperfection.
284.  Twenty-two full bellies and smiling faces around our dinner table, yesterday.
285.  Enormous, extravagant love.
286.  Warm blankets.
287.  Bagels with cream cheese.
288.  Newly planted bulbs, sprouting.
289.  Anonymous notes of encouragement, given and received.
290.  Psalm 118:24
291.  A stack of books, fresh for the reading.