What a joy to sit here again, with you in my heart, with the love of Christ embracing us in unity. It feels like prayer to reach out in love in this way, using the tools of the world but the Word of God.
Do you remember the post I wrote about the Jabez prayer? Perhaps not. Jabez appears in the Book of Chronicles in Chapter 4. Suddenly he pops up out of a genealogical list!!
“Now Jabez was more honorable than his brothers, and his mother called his name Jabez, saying, “Because I bore him in pain.” And Jabez called on the God of Israel, saying, “Oh, that You would bless me indeed, and enlarge my territory, that Your hand would be with me, and make known that You will not humble me.” Then God made it all happen as he requested.”
(1 Chronicles 4:9-10)
Its many years now since this was brought to my attention, yet I find that as I pray and knock and seek and ask, this prayer and the reality of his cry to God still operates to expand my boundaries!! When we ‘have been born in pain’ and did not receive ongoing affection, nurturing and care of loving parents, we are likely to have become very narrow in what we can do. For example although I know I was taken to at least one opera, it meant nothing to me. I spent Madame Butterfly counting the design of the roof panels – and couldn’t understand why they didn’t just speak what they wanted to say.
In other words I was totally ‘functional’. I could only grasp what needed to be done but saw no beauty or ‘ornament’ as essential or somehow of value. Dear reader, I am a slow learner, but as I allow the Holy Spirit to pierce more of my darkened heart, I find more openness to the mystery of His Beauty. Some years ago, I found myself making very attractive material envelopes to hold ‘bread of Life Cards’ to give out to people. Then a friend asked for some for her wedding and they were made in material that went with her dress. Thus the Word of God was enclosed in something beautiful and precious.
It took many years for me to begin to see that God saw me (and you) as something precious!! I remember going to an evangelical conference shortly after I gave my life to Christ and came back into a church. A dear sister in Christ was quoting the Song of Songs to me about Christ’s love for the Beloved. At that time I truly could not see what this had to do with me!! But God is patient, and through being awakened to the beauty of the world, I painted landscapes that ‘preach the gospel’ (see Psalm 19). Thus my heart and inner being was gradually extended that He could be with me’, and my eyes were opened to see His love coming through me.
Since coming in to the Orthodox Church the gift of painting has been extended to icons, essentially painting people given to God, or Christ Himself. Through this I have been further invited into the mystery of His Life and Spirit working through me. I am being invited into the reality of being ‘in this world, but not of it’.
As we grow in life in faith, hope and love, our boundaries are extended and the pains we have suffered that limited our life, and indeed our humanity, melt in the Light of God’s love, and the wonder of the Cross of Christ. If we keep faithfully seeking, knocking and asking…frequently in silence as we reach out to God, even more of the hidden barriers of pain are broken down. The old wounds are gradually healed and become bearers of freely given new life, hope and purity of heart.
I once wrote a poem about the seeds of desire for beauty and life, that burst from their pod in my mind, and fell to the ground of my heart, each one holding its own cross which needed to be faced and overcome in order to bear fruit as beauty in purity of heart. My life is hidden in, and for, Christ, the redeemer of the world. Can I live for vain glory and self-interest and be happy? No dear soul I cannot..because to live and love Christ, is to live for, and love you. So I simply pray that whatever Beauty I offer is to the glory of God, and I pray your spiritual life may be enriched by this sharing of what I am taught.
Lord have mercy on our souls that seem to desire so much of You, yet You fill us when we pray for others, so fill our hearts with prayer for the hungry, isolated and vain-glorious, who long for self-satisfaction. Lord have mercy and may it begin with me. Amen