It’s worth the embrace

When it’s hard and lonely in my

Journey with the Lord

What I’ve heard more than once

Is that I’ve sinned or am in the wrong

When now I’m understanding

By trial, error, risk and prayer

That the tension is where

I’m finding God.

He’s meeting me there.

What’s true and quite certain

From my lived experience

Is to keep it comfortable

Make it cozy

Return to familiar

Where it looks like cookie cutter church

And sameness and neatness -

I’m certain that isn’t it.

God has yet to change the world

Reach the far off

Establish His Kingdom

Through ease and comfort.

I repent of that.

I must embrace tension

Loneliness

Listening

Imaginative prayer

Risks that don’t look like my neighbor.

Jesus, I embrace you

To see what God sees

How God sees.

Does God wonder if we get it?

“Might He still feel alone

As we pursue our own agendas,

Eyes to the ground,

Unable to see the big picture?”

-Luci Shaw wrote

What will I do with what I know

That is true about God?

That is true about me and God?

I refuse to get an opinion from the world

Or from tradition.

Rather, I make this my prayer:

Jesus, here I am

All of me.

What do you see when you see me?

I hide nothing from You -

What’s the use when You see

It all anyway.

Show me what’s wrong.

Show me where I can be more strong.

Show me what I’m getting right.

Show me what to set down,

It’s just not worth the fight.

It’s worth the embrace.

pictures from Yosemite late 2025