To Describe God

Below is an edited version of a prayer I wrote in February 2005. I’m posting it because I think to at least some of it you’ll relate.

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If I should try to describe You, God, I might say You’re like a mist; You form various shapes, but appear everywhere and different. I trust You to know my heart and know how I would not accuse You of changeableness, but accuse my understanding of not grasping You.

You are like a firefly on a dark summer night. I may believe You are there, but until you turn on Your light, I’m not certain where.

Sometimes You appear as a possible predator to my happiness; like a rattlesnake somewhere on a ranch, and I’m praying none of mine will step in Your path and take death’s poisonous exit.

Sometimes I long for You, ache for You, despair of being had by You. You stand nearby as my Invisible Observer, but You don’t make a sound. I end up on the floor with my paper gods with faces cut from magazines, little creatures no bigger than myself whom You have made.

Sometimes I listen for You and feel proud that I actually want to hear You. I hear buzzes, I hear cars, I hear the whistle of a train, but not one small whisper from Your lips.

I panic sometimes. If You should ever leave it to me to find my way Home, I’d be lost forever.

But I believe in You, God. You have been my Father, my Guide, my Strength, my Sustainer. In You is the only hope in which I can dream.

Funny. It is good to say that—the only Hope in which I can dream. Getting here has not been so easy. I’ve come kicking and screaming, but You didn’t put me down.

Oh, if only this was the end and all the refinement I need could be made with these “small” losses; if only I didn’t know greater sacrifices might await me. Oh, how lonely and scary and heart-wrenching one short life can be. You do not ask for more than You gave. You ask for everything.

What will Home be like with You? How is it that our tasks will look so small from the light of Home? What do I need to know or realise in order to let go and let You hurt me and still trust You completely?

Open my eyes wider. Not inwardly. Upwardly. Father, I see a shrivelled worm as I look inward. I see a sad excuse for a human—talentless, friendless, pointless, but still holding on to my pride to not get hurt and to my mini-gods.

What does it mean to be a Christian? What is it like to be free of myself? Where is the dividing line, the gulf that I can cross or be flung over and become the outward clothes of the Living Son of God? Where do You begin and I end? Draw it up. Point me there. It’s time that life began—No turning back.

Here are my fears. You’ll need to check all my pockets and hiding places. There are always some fresh ones lying around.

Here is my fear of losing those I love—of dying while they live or living after they die.  Here’s my fear of getting older and my desire to die early. Here are my fears—of rejection, of being unchanged and entering eternal shame, of success, of failure. Here’s my fear of never getting any closer to You or of getting too close to You.

Father, these are scary things to give up. All these fears, these quirks…You aren’t going to find anything left of me when they are gone.

It’s a starting place. I already feel myself reaching for my comfort “blankets.” I’ll take them all back, if you let me. PLEASE don’t let me. Let’s go forward, Father. It’s time. It’s past time.