hope deferred

time is a funny thing. not all time...because i'm not sure i believe in time. But the time that binds us as humans, the time that binds what we know of our lives. All we can know of ourselves is from our birth to our death. No one remembers themselves pre-birth and no one has returned to explain post-death. So the time that we can perceive of our lives is a funny thing. In a sense we aren't bound by time but by knowledge.

Hm.. that's not what I wanted to talk about though. I guess I've been thinking about the tension of past and future. Is it that tension that results in the present? Or is the present just present. I prefer to think so. Even a person without a past lives in the present. It's always interesting to think about the future. In five years what will I be doing? Will I be alive? If I am will I be doing anything I ever planned, or will I be in a completely different sphere of life? Or, will I be sitting like I am now, contemplating the future? I hope not. It's good to be vision orientated, but only as long as it drives the present. I've always been time-sensitive. (not that i'm ever on time anywhere), but I guess I'm very aware of the unpredictability of our lives. I want to hope that my life will be worth something 5 years from now. I want to hope I will have done things to help others and change things for the better. Hope can be a driving vision. But, it can also be a depressor. "Hope deferred makes the heart sick, but a longing fulfilled is a tree of life." Interesting. I always expect hope to be an encouragement, but hope unattained "makes the heart sick." I get that. I know what it's like to hope and wait and feel deprived when I don't see that hope realized. It's only hope fulfilled that is really hopeful. So how does that fit? Hm. Hope is a "ground for believing good will happen." So maybe even as I hope for greater things in the future, I need to find the hope fulfilled in everyday. I need to find the small pieces of good that reside in my daily life. I think without a daily realized hope, I would have a hard time living. People need joy. People need pieces of light in the midst of a long waiting. I think those pieces can be a memory, a smile, a blue sky, a good song, anything when looked on with the right eyes.

Yet, on a deeper level, maybe that is what God is for us. Maybe he desired to be the hope fulfilled every day. Maybe if I could find God as my hope fulfilled daily, I would walk in a way that is patient and trusting for those other hopes. I think I know that. I think I know that a life that discovers God daily, is one fulfilled. But I've forgotten how to discover Him as hope.

I've forgotten how to recognize him as hope.

Here's to searching with new eyes.

Strange Embrace

tired eyes that see through mine
and follow the paths of my estranged lines
the hands that break from the arms
the legs that walk from the spine
stranger we have come so far
to know so little

tired eyes
that have traveled far
and stepped
inward to find
a stranger inside
and a stranger out
an awkward embrace of anonymity

tired eyes
please be kind
don’t bite into
this brittle core