The mornings are finding me in my sacred space, settling quiet on the patio with words and coffee. The slowdown of the summer lends freedom to pause and reflect, or unwind from the chaos. I have learned the necessity of choosing to be silent here in this place, to be willful in my wading slowly. Because the heart needs surgery, sometimes, when it is beating erratically busy with too much working. It tends to become anemic in the process.
The break of waiting heals.
I didn’t realize how desperately I needed to sit in the quiet till I was cocooned in the atmosphere of the morning song as it played its harmony chorus all around me.
As I sat there, reading words from the pen of another heart, shattered by a past that was full of a hard back-story, the silence was heavy. My own heart has been chipped reading hard words, words that led to questions. Contemplating the quiet questions of the soul, listening close to the asking… I wanted to walk away from the invitation into someone else’s pain. It is hard to witness another’s heartbreak.
Sometimes we aren’t ready for the tasks that invite us into people’s living, it feels like we are outside of the boundaries that keep us close to His mercy grip. However, when we are unreachable, God sends in the salvation of hope. Because we are never too far from God, to be found in His healing embrace, to be too far from the span of His proximity.
Grace assures us of this.
The stories of the broken break us. The more I found myself wound in the words of another, the ducts of my sympathy exposed the barrenness of explanation for the hurting in this world.
Words have a power to pull out our emotions. Words are more than a language we speak. They can be a balm, they can be a weapon. They can fill with life, they can destroy in death blows.
Sometimes words have kept me from understanding the language of grace. But they were not His words that clouded my vision, they were often my own…or the words of others.
Words that we speak together, over one another, around and about our daily living have longevity.
Words that we spill in frustration and hear at the extension of others in their real life scenarios effect us.
Words that build or condemn, words that fill or empty, words that alight or extinguish become building stones or crushing burdens.
But what if we began to practice grace in our conversations, instead of the difficult we find ourselves bringing into our daily meetings. When grace is the language we speak, we choose a path that is full of understanding which leads us into wisdom.
The object and purpose of our instruction and charge is love which springs from a pure heart and a good conscience and sincere faith. But certain individuals have missed the mark on this matter and have wandered away into vain arguments and discussions and purposeless talk….they have no understanding.~1 Timothy 1:6-7
I read the words above today and pondered the discussions that have been swirling in my memory. Thinking about the paths they took as we traveled them. I realized we never fully find ourselves at our final destination but spend so much time walking in the valleys together. Grace really is a lifelong journey that is experiential and full of words. All the bruising we feel and inflict on one another, only hampers us from learning the language of grace together.
I think of the deep pain of friends who are afraid to be transparent because it may jeopardize what we think of them.
I consider the way we hide our real because it is less painful to play a part.
I ponder the way we can change the course of a heart with the language of grace.
And I wonder…What does it look like to lace mercy and grace together in words?
- Mercy… we need to bend to the power it sways over us as we release our desires and embrace His.
- Grace… it flows because Christ’s faithfulness and the leaning of our whole entire personality on God in ABSOLUTE confidence and trust.
- Mercy and Grace… both built up in love, which feeds our souls with seeds of hope.
Even in times of learning, of admonition, and of discipline… the Holy Spirit (who is our guide in this process) always leaves us feeling whole, never broken beyond fixing from the exchange. And there is an exchange when we give our broken pieces away, whether to the Lord or to someone around us.
We release our sacred parts with trepidation. They are either restored and redeemed through the giving or we are left empty and void of the hope that our soul is bargaining for in its baring. It makes me wonder if the commodity of grace is a commerce only few feel compelled to invest in, because instead of unmerited favor, we render a merit token that is measurable and value based.
And maybe we need the tokens of mercy, grace, and love together in order to partake in the transaction of soul surrender.
…I obtained mercy because I acted out of ignorance in unbelief. And the grace (the unmerited favor and blessing) super-abundantly and beyond measure for me accompanied by Faith and Love that are to be realized in Christ Jesus.(1 Tim 1:13-14)
Mercy and Grace are poured out so that….we might display the perfected patient encouragement of Christ to lead others to salvation. ( vs 16)
What is grace for anyway if not for the extension from the throne of heaven to the breaking of the earth and those who dwell therein?
When grace dwells in our ordinary, it is built up in mercy and hedged in by faith, enclosed together by the powerful love that flows red for us and we see his generosity spill out. Inevitably, we are changed, we are altered, we are different for this gift He uses to restore us…because ordinary days are full of excessive grace when we recognize the language being spoken in our hearts.
“They (ordinary days) are generously excessive. Like a whole bowl of mismatched beads just asking me to thrust in my hand and wave my fingers. Like a sky spilling over with stars. Every moment I fail to record… is like an unseen galaxy or an unnamed planet. Created but unobserved. Made but unremarked.” – Christie Purifoy- Roots and Sky.
And this is the thing that strikes me… Grace is a language.
Something to be learned and to be explored. Something to study with a passion that draws us up out of bondage and liberates our knowing. Something that is beyond our expanse of knowing full or defining completely. It needs to be searched and sought and discovered.
The consistency of His extravagance in our unhurried ordinary becomes the making of our built up extraordinary hope. Faith nuggets that fill us with overflow of seasonal living that will be an encouragement to you and to others for a purpose that is only rooted in love.
Rather than the harsh and unlovely, words meant to edge and refine with syllables that scar the soul… instead, let’s speak the conversation of grace together. It will change the way we find ourselves praying and loving and confessing our needs to one another. It will always lead to healing and hope.
Let grace be worn around your neck, like a shield sheltering hope, as a protection of the sacred and holy place of God’s habitation, where that seedbed for miracle plantings in faith leans the entirety of self up on the only definitive source of mercy.
G.R.A.C.E.
It is there, dwelling and waiting for us to step into. It is there hovering over the seeds with the water that will force the seedlings to sprout. He has a plan… a lofty goal for us that involves more than our today eyes can see.
“It is out of our words, from the core ache within us, that we find our calling.” Dan Allender
And this language of grace is a perpetual goodness because it marks our souls for eternity and it leads us into our calling. Grace changes the pain of our back-stories of shame and regret, and leads us to plant seed beds of hope for the healing of others.
Learn this language, speak it, and be one who chooses words that bleed love.
IT’S YOUR TURN TO BE A GRACE COUNTER! SHARE YOUR GRACE MOMENT IN THE COMMENTS BELOW AND THEN COUNT GRACE WITH A FRIEND WITH COMMENT ON A BLOG OR TWO.
If you are a blogger, link up here with a post about finding grace moments in your life or one of your favorite inspiring and encouraging posts from this week. Share your thoughts in the comment section telling me about the #Grace Moments you experienced this week. *(only 1 post per link please)*
Take time to visit your neighbor next to you, and if you want visit a few more friends on the journey. We all need a little encouragement and affirmation as we travel together.
If you don’t have a blog, you can connect with me via my Journeys in Grace FB page by sharing a photo or a comment. Or you can join the party by sharing your images on Instagram with #Gracemoments hashtag.
Each week I will try visit as many of your amazing posts as I can.This is a safe place to sit and dwell in grace together, friends. I can’t wait to pour a cup of friendship with you and take in the grace moments you have to share. Don’t forget to leave a comment below, I love to hear from you.
This is so true the language of grace is spoken when we realize that all words from us as believers are holy and all ground we walk is holy because the Spirit lives in us and through us – thank you
Your words have blessed me so. The intricacy of both grace and mercy can be woven into the Lord’s beauty if we will only allow this. The peonies are absolutely gorgeous and remind me of my mother, her favorite flower. She is gone now and I am grateful that God allowed me to shed His grace and mercy upon her years with dementia. I have to learn, depend upon Him many a time, but I did the best I could and He did perfectly! I have spoken words in my life that I could not take back. I have also held words that wanted to spill and by being still, God blessed those relationships in years or months later. I am always in school but thankful that the doors never close. Thank you for teaching me quite a lot today.
Caring through Christ, ~ linda
So grateful to have read your words, Dawn. May my mouth be filled with the language of grace. Thank you also for reminding me to make time for the still and the slow this summer. Blessings!
Lord, teach me to speak grace. Amen.