You Are Good

This song. On repeat. Every day for the past 3 weeks.
I can’t say what it is exactly about particular songs that move me.
I guess there’s an honesty and rawness in certain lyrics, with certain artists, that I relate to.
I sing songs from the stage every Sunday, but I’m just a girl who struggles and doubts as much as, if not more than, anyone else.
But I think it’s important even in those moments – especially in those moments – to sing songs like this one. To repeat to ourselves, over and over again, that “You are good.” 
That you won’t ever let us down.
To let that be our mantra, our anthem.
Because I don’t think it matters if we’ve got it all together or not.
Or if we question on some days, or weeks, or even years, whether or not we’re going to be let down, whether or not we already feel like we’ve been let down, whether or not “You are good” applies to us.
I think what matters is our willingness to be vulnerable, raw, split wide open.
To be brutally honest.
To say I’m here, and I’m going to sing and dance and lift my hands and cry out from the caverns of my soul, from the chambers of my bruised and beat up heart, 
“You are good. And you are never going to let me down.”
Sometimes we just have to forget everything around us,
Everything that holds us back,
Everything that would tell us that it’s safer to keep our guard up,
That it’s more socially acceptable to keep the mask on.
Sometimes we just have to let go,
If just for a single, solitary moment,
And scream hope.

Moves Like David

I think if I could relate to anyone in the bible, it would be David. He was messy and emotional and flawed, but I think he had this way of being able to worship with a sort of reckless abandon. That is what I feel bubbling in my soul. That is what I want – to truly be able to dance, not just in my livingroom but within the confines of traditional church walls. I think we collectively talk about freedom, but we’re actually afraid to let go and truly be free. Maybe we’re all waiting on each other to make the first move. 

Letters to God

I am standing out here in the storm, screaming. I’m screaming at you, God. I’m screaming for you. What do I need to do to get your attention? If you want me to believe, then be here. Show up. People are starving – for sincere community, for meaning in tragedy, for shelter in chaos, for love amidst hate. What am I supposed to do about this mess of a world we live in? The brokenness and suffering is immeasurable. If you are, then be. Here. With us. Be here, not in corporate songs we sing, but in the trenches of our darkest nightmares. Be here, until your warmth seeps into our veins and frees our hearts from all the pain and all the doubt and all the insecurities and all the unworthiness.

Despite all my best efforts to ignore you, to rebel, to push you away, to scream profanities when no other words seem to express my despair adequately enough, and to annihilate your very existence in my mind – despite all this, I cannot help but see you in the seemingly minute details of the world around me:

In the sun when it rises on the horizon;
In the wind as it sweeps through the trees and cools my face;
In the beauty of foreign landscapes;
In the last bit of light before nightfall;
In the still of evening when an owl swoops overhead and perches on the branches above, looking down at me with wide, almost understanding eyes.

In those brief moments, I want to believe that you're present; and that somehow, everything will be okay.