Be

hold

the eye

of beauty,

drawing the spirit

in elegant lines sweeping out

continuously

through the flesh,

and so

be

held.

Love's

way

always

is the right

way, but love doesn't

demand it. Love is recklessly

wronged, but still remains,

miracle

of faith

and

hope.

 

She

pours

the oats

and measures

out the salt, but words

are harder to count. Cold fury

boils over easy;

paper-thin

eggshells

break

fast.

Today, I'm talking about poetry and motherhood over at Homemaking Through the Church Year.

These days, it's hard to write much prose.

Tonight is something of a windfall, though. I can't exactly go to bed until the load of vomit-covered bedding comes out of the dryer. Hence the midnight writing time.

This is how it always seems to go. During this season of motherhood, writing happens in the most unexpected ways. I take what I can get.

And usually, what I can get is verse.  . . .

You can read the rest here.

And poke around the archives while you're there: it's a blog well worth following if you don't already. Whether she's talking about crafting, spiritual formation, the writing life, or housework, Jessica's words make for good companionship.

You should also check out her new book series on the church year. Good stuff.

Love

is

patient,

suffering 

along with the long

lines drawn, quartered, and otherwise

tortured and divided. Love sits down brave and serene

in the rubble, resting, wrestling.

Love knows just how long

these things take,

and love

won't

fail.

The Bible tells me so

The Bible is an incredible gift. It is an amazing thing to be entrusted with the oracles of God. An advantage in every respect, as the Apostle Paul would say.

We search the Scriptures day and night, and well we should. They are God-breathed and useful for training in righteousness, equipping us for every good work.

Equipping. Equipment.

In other words, the the Bible is a means to an end, not the goal itself.

Bookworm that I am, this is a bit hard for me to swallow. Bible study comes easy for me, and I'd really like to believe that my affinity for words gives me Christian superpowers, or at the very least a few extra automatic holiness points.

But that's not what the Bible says about itself. The Bible tells us that Bible study is a very (very!) good thing, but it also tells us that Satan himself knows his way around the holy text, and that zeal for the Scriptures is not necessarily even a sign of faithfulness.

Love is. Love is the goal, love is the sign. Love is how we (and everyone else in the world) can know that we're not just wasting our time with all that Bible study.

We search the Scriptures day and night, thinking that in them we have eternal life, but the Scriptures point to Jesus.

On the Day of Judgment, God is not going to ask us how much time we spent reading our Bibles, but rather, how we responded to Jesus.

We encounter Jesus in the holy pages, yes, definitely. But more importantly, we encounter Him hungry and exposed and lonely, in the places where we least expect to find Him. All our studying is to prepare us for these practical pop quizzes that face us every day, and none of it matters if we don't prove to be a people marked by love.

The Bible tells me so.