mercy in the burial

John 19:38–40 “After these things Joseph of Arimathea, who was a disciple of Jesus, but secretly for fear of the Jews, asked Pilate that he might take away the body of Jesus, and Pilate gave him permission. So he came and took away his body. Nicodemus also, who earlier had come to Jesus by night, came bringing a mixture of myrrh and aloes, about seventy-five pounds in weight. So they took the body of Jesus and bound it in linen cloths with the spices, as is the burial custom of the Jews.”

Matthew 27:59–60 “And Joseph took the body and wrapped it in a clean linen shroud and laid it in his own new tomb, which he had cut in the rock. And he rolled a great stone to the entrance of the tomb and went away.”

when holy God bent down and
stepped inside the flesh of man
He came upon the womb of a poor woman
His fanfare heavenly heralds
heard only by the least of these
dirt of stable cave and manger
strips of linen swaddling Him safe and warm
tended to by His mother’s hands
her adoring eyes looking upon Him
her mother heart bound to His with what had been
the purest of human love

when holy God bent lower and
stepped out of the flesh of man
He left upon the cross of crucifixion
His fanfare the taunts and curses of fallen man
heard from the hidden rooms of scheming to the highest public courts
flogging scourge and splintered cross
victory disguised in loss

at close of work
last breath breathed
last holy words but a mere echo in the minds of those who remained
last spectator of the spectacle of crucifixion homeward bound
last of the taunts of dying men dead with Him

the mangled body of Messiah
punctured the silence
“who will tend to the flesh of the Son of Man?”

and the least of his followers
stepped through the fear of man
brushed past the praise of man
and set their hands upon the broken body of their Messiah
His bloody wounds stained their garments
as they tended as a loved one would their own
strips of linen bound around Him once more
costly spices laid once more at His feet

i know the honor of preparing the dead for burial
is no small thing
a last moment to honor the one you loved
to allow the rawness of the loss to unleash the tears that only come
in the quiet

confronted with what was
and what will no longer be
how these men must have grieved as they were at last near
their lifeless Savior
as they touched His blood shed for them
smelled the reality of His ruin

did their tears fall upon His wounds
mingle with the spices
drip across the linens that soon hid
the cursed flesh from their view?

did they lament their failures to follow well
their bondage to men
their lost opportunity to be by His side
their silence in the face of unjust judgements?

did they wonder why they were allowed to do
what the faithful women standing nearby could not?

but isn’t that just like the Lord
to honor the lowest with such a great honor?
while these men may have been the greatest in the kingdoms of man
they were the failures in the Kingdom of God
the ones who followed Jesus in the shadows
the ones whose flesh crushed out their spiritual flourishing
the ones who, to this point, had counted shame they may feel from man
a more costly thing than shame they carried from sin
but they were still His own
and He received their sacrifices

He chose them to tend to His body
He chose joseph to lay Him down in his own tomb
because He took joseph’s death
and when He would rise on the third day
joseph would feel the reality that He also gave him life
He chose nicodemus to bring Him myrrh
because he could bury in the tomb with Him the wisdom of man
that he would walk away from the stone
a wise man
to teach the jews with the wisdom of God

Zechariah 12:10 “And I will pour out on the house of David and the inhabitants of Jerusalem a spirit of grace and pleas for mercy, so that, when they look on Me, on Him whom they have pierced, they shall mourn for Him, as one mourns for an only child, and weep bitterly over Him, as one weeps over a firstborn.”

such is mercy

when we look on Him whom we have pierced
every moment following changes
and some of us need a closer look
some must look into the face of the child in the manger
and some must feel the finality of covering His face with a cloth
that we may know the purest of heavenly love

A dream from Jehovah Shammah

Last night I had a dream. In this dream, I was standing in a church with a group of friends talking when suddenly one of them said, “Oh no! I forgot I was leading worship today, I need to go set up!” She then turned to me and said, “Come on, we have to go sing.” I was very confused because I didn’t know I was suppose to lead worship and I didn’t remember volunteering because I had recently discovered my voice was really weak, so I wasn’t well suited for it in this season. But I followed her into the sanctuary. We had about 10 minutes before the service started. The church was huge, and we walked up onto a big stage where a woman was playing a piano beside a bunch of microphones and music stands. I asked my friend, “Are you sure that we’re leading today? Someone is already playing.” She stopped to check the schedule and informed me that the woman was our accompanist. Then the next 10 minutes were filled with a bunch of scrambled chaos: The music had to be printed, but there were issues with how it printed and with a slow printer; we had to rearrange the setup, but the cords and stands were a tangled mess and hard to move, at one point I tried to reach for a microphone and it came disconnected from the cord and started hissing; as tech support came to help, people started filing into the room; there was a room divider that was partly lowered over the front of the stage that had to be raised; someone tried to help read something for us and couldn’t read; I didn’t know the songs I was suppose to be helping lead; the accompanist suddenly left because she was sick and the other singers were nowhere to be found…everything we tried to do to help order things or move them along failed, every step forward was met with multiple steps back, all of the pieces of the team and the technology were stripped away and by the time the service was to start it was me and my friend and our small acapella voices. The pastor said to us, “Don’t let this set you back.” And my friend said, “It’s time to lead worship.”

We looked at each other and the people in front of us waiting, and we opened our mouths and we began to worship the Lord. Our voices were small, but after a line or two, we found ourselves suddenly accompanied by the most beautiful heavenly music I had ever heard. It filled the room and wrapped itself around our meager voices giving them strength and drawing from us a deeply renewed and heartfelt sound. The room was soon filled with a resounding song of praise and worship as every voice joined with the heavenly music, each of us singing with all our might, “And He shall reign forevermore, forevermore!”

And then I woke up.

When I woke up the second time, I head this name spoken over me again and again: Jehovah Shammah. I looked up its meaning. Jehovah Shammah means “The Lord is there.”

I’ve been in a hard season. Before I had gone to sleep, I had been on my face before the Lord weeping, repenting, confronting my lack of faith. So emptied of faith am I in one specific area that I finally had to acknowledge to both myself and the Lord that I simply no longer believe a promise He had given me. My hands that had clung and the hope that had held were too weak, the efforts for a different story and a new measure had come up empty too many times, the years had worn me down with discouragement and resign…and though I believe the Lord is who He says He is, my confidence in His promise to me has been lost in the eroding avalanche of my weakness. And I grieved as I declared His worth and offered Him my worship void of expectation of help.

And He gave me this dream and this declaration. 

 

“The Lord is there,” He whispered over me as I slept. He is there when all is stripped away; when efforts fail and time is too short and chaos crushes out peace; when the inadequate measure I walked in is tested and found wanting in new ways as the situation changes before me; when human fortifications are faulty; when every set back has left me certain that there’s no way forward; when in that place, I worship still. He is there. Reigning still, able to provide the missing measure with beauty that draws from deeper wells. Reigning forever, worthy of worship and accepting even the most meager sound that dares fall from the most unseemly mouth.

And I don’t know if you resonate with any of this, but I thought maybe there was someone who needed to be reminded with me that not only is there a God, but He is Jehovah Shammah; very present and full of grace.

how long?

 the fool who believed
©12-12-22 hannah mclean

i whimper beneath
this heap of broken things
the pieces of the crushed
the defeated
the battles lost
bury my body

strength long proven
too little
fight to climb out
too fleeting

how long?

why do i hear
the trumpet of victory
sound from
my enemy’s camp
when i lean on
the Greater Power?

the shame You promised
to bear away
has stacked itself
upon my shoulders

sin broke
and scorn remains

how long?

the enemy mocks
the seeming futility
of my faith
“where is your God?”

but i know who You are
i would rather be
the fool who believed
than the fool who scoffed

 

------

 

"Consider and answer me, O Lord my God; light up my eyes, lest I sleep the sleep of death, lest my enemy say, "I have prevailed over him," lest my foes rejoice because I am shaken." Psalm 13:3–4

The widow's faith

We’re on 1 Kings 17:7–24 in BSF. It’s a familiar story of Elijah and the widow, but I can’t seem to shake it this time. I usually hear people talk about this story in a way that somehow glosses over the depth of it, or fixes its eyes on Elijah's portion…but my considerations have been of the widow. I have been processing through why I can’t seem to move my heart past her and here is where I have landed in regards to why my heart reverberates with this widow and her walk:

Let me tell you this story in my own words. Elijah had been living near a brook during a drought and the Lord had been sustaining him in miraculous ways…until the brook dried up. Then the Lord sent him to another place with the assurance that He had “told a widow to feed him there.” So by faith, Elijah went where the Lord sent him, and there he found a widow, just as the Lord said. From a distance, he called out to her and asked her for something to drink, and the widow’s like, “I’ll go get you some water.” But then he asks for something to eat. And the widow recognizes that this is the man God sent for her to feed, and she says, ”Look, Man of God, I haven’t prepared for your coming or made you any bread. Do you want to know what I’ve chosen to do right now instead? Every day I’ve been watching my food supplies run out as I look into the face of my hungry son. Today I am on the very last of what I have, so I’m getting sticks to build a fire and have one last meal with my son before we die from lack.” Can’t you just hear the weariness in her words? But in that moment where she had run out of faith, Elijah brought enough for them both, and he said to her, “Do not fear. Go ahead and make that bread, but before you eat it with your son, give me a little portion first. Because here is the Lord’s promise to you, ‘The jar of flour shall not be spent, and the jug of oil shall not be empty, until the day that the Lord sends rain upon the earth.’” Basically, if you walk by faith now, you will reap reward. So the widow did what Elijah requested. And the Lord blessed her faith.

But it says after many days, the widow’s son died. And she went to Elijah and poured out her frustration and despair, “This is on you! Your presence here does not strengthen my faith, it simply reminds me of the weight of my epic doubt, and even as I have walked daily in obedience to the command of the Lord, now He has taken away my son. It would have been better had we died together before this miracle.” 

And Elijah, he didn’t rebuke her or argue with her…he was a man who knew the pain of finding hardship on the path of obedience. He simply took her son, and stormed the throne room on her behalf. For many days he had watched her life, had eaten at her table, had bore witness to the growing discomfort of receiving a miracle her faith did not earn her. I love how without reservation, he poured out his confusion and desperation to God. “Lord, NO! Why would You take away her son?! There has been too much loss, bring him back to her, Lord. Give this weary woman back her child.”

And the Lord listened to the voice of Elijah, and He allowed him to return to the widow with her son, not in his arms, but by his side. Elijah said, “See, your son lives.” And the widow said, “Now I know that you are a man of God, and that the word of the Lord in your mouth is truth.”

I resonate SO hard with this widow. I know what it feels like to be facing lack and clinging to the thing you desperately want to flourish with no idea how to proceed. And then from that place the Lord saying, “I want more from you.” 

I remember the moment the ultrasound tech looked up at me with her wand on my abdomen and said, “There are 2 babies.” I went home and lifted my hands up to the Lord and said something along the lines of, “What are You doing?! Why in the world would You call me to carry TWO children when You KNOW that my physical body barely makes it out of single pregnancies alive…and even though I have survived thus far, two of my babies have not. I am a broken incubator, and I (and/or both of these babies) am going to die because of what You have called me to.” I did not faithfully stride forward in my twin pregnancy, I “gathered sticks” and wrestled my fear. And when the Lord brought me a word of promise, I did not watch with expectation, I watched with genuine curiosity at how He would carry my body to the end of the pregnancy…how He would draw from my lack what was required to grow two babies…because I knew the facts, namely, that I did not hold what was required to bring it to fruition. I lived. Jane and Sia lived. And my body, the thing that bore the physical strain of carrying two humans, thrived through what it never should have been able to endure. 

But let’s look again at the widow’s journey. Elijah’s presence and the daily miracle, it didn’t magnify the widow’s faith, it reminded her that she doubted God when He called her; it ate away at her that she hadn’t been stronger, hadn’t trusted God more, had counted Him too small. And when her son died, she couldn’t quite bring herself to ask the God she had doubted for another miracle…and so she reached for the faith of the man who she knew could. By faith, he brought back her son to her with breath in his lungs and life in his bones, and his word “see…” pushed through the veil of shame and drew her faith from flailing to flourishing. “Now I know…”

My body—the thing that endured against all odds only by the promise and power of God—it has crashed and burned since the babies’ birth. Failure and weakness seem to have spoken the final word over it, it grimaces up from the dust wondering how the God who called me to such a task would leave me in such a condition when I had looked to Him every day—imperfectly, yes, but wholly nonetheless. I find myself looking around, eyes searching for the one who will let me lean upon their faith-filled shoulder, who believes that the grim realities of earth are no hindrance to the God who made it, who will charge the gates of heaven on my behalf and cry out to the Lord who loves us both and say, “No! Give this weary woman back her health.” 

 

Because I am waiting. I am waiting for the moment of return…where the word “see” makes visible, and the “knowing” brings about the testimony I was promised.

I find encouragement in this widow. I may not yet be able to muster up the faith of Elijah as he stands on the top of a mountain beside a multitude of false prophets calling down fire on a sopping wet altar…but I can wrap my head around the faith of the weathered widow. I love that God brought together this unlikely pair of worshipers and used them in each others lives. Because I am certain that it is not an accident that for Elijah, the journey beside the widow preceded the altar on the mountain.

A blind song.

I read Exodus 31–33 today in my reading plan, and I am undone. I choked my way through the children of Israel asking Aaron, the leader while Moses was up on the mountain with God, to make them a new god since Moses might not return. And then Aaron obliged them and fashioned a golden calf for them to worship, and I sobbed my way through his attributing the works of God to a shiny object fashioned by his own hands, and then with those defiled hands, making sacrifices to this idol on an altar. I wept and wondered at the relationship between Moses and the Lord; how he without hesitation placed himself between God’s wrath and God’s people—leaning on the promises from God’s own mouth. Tears ran down my face as I delighted in his desire to know God more; building upon his face-to-face friendship with God a desire to never live apart from His presence and to gain ever clearer vision of His glory. A terrible, beautiful read for sure.

But tucked into the middle of these verses, I found a sobering warning that I want to share with you.

While Moses was up on the mountain with the Lord as He wrote in stone His law, and while Aaron and Israel were worshiping an idol at the bottom of the mountain in their camp…somewhere in between stood Joshua. Unlike the rest of Israel, he was still waiting for Moses to return, his eyes were still looking up and his knees had not bowed to the calf of gold. And when Moses walked down the mountain to lay eyes on Israel’s rebellion, he met Joshua who said to him these chilling words: “There is a noise of war in the camp.” But he said, “It is not the sound of shouting for victory, or the sound of the cry of defeat, but the sound of singing that I hear.” (Exodus 32:17b–18)

Joshua didn’t know what was going on, but he recognized it as the noise of war. Israel DID know what was going on, but did not recognize that it was the noise of war.
To Joshua, the noises of war should have been clear—shouts of victory or cries of defeat. He was confused that while he recognized a war was going on, its sound was unfamiliar. Those in the war were singing. Why were they singing?

Because they didn’t recognize they were in a war.

Israel had folded to their fear and given themselves over to their true enemy. They had thrown away their faith in the God of Israel and given themselves over to their sight without a fight, and while they should have been crying out at their defeat, they were blind in their own rebellion and rejection of the Lord and instead danced around singing as the wrath of God threatened to pour down.

And that’s sobering. I feel like that’s a good consideration for today; we dance around our idols (anything—good or bad—that we place above the Lord), rejoicing in their shiny surfaces, singing praises to gods of our own making…not realizing that we are in a war and we are neglecting the fight. But if we don’t open our eyes, in the end there will be no collective shout of victory, instead there will be crescendoing cries of eternal defeat.

Open up your eyes, Church! Are you holding your place in the battle? Or have you chosen instead an empty song?

Prolonged waiting

This morning my mind found its way to this poem I wrote way back in the day. It starts, "i know that You have not forgotten me..." and it speaks to the pain of a prolonged season of waiting.

How I long to wait well--exuding rock-solid faith--but I languish and waiver and cling. I lament that I don't display steadiness, I so often just display desperation; hands that threaten to let go, a heart that fights panic, feet that want to run to other means.

But today I thought that maybe faith isn't most clearly displayed through ROCK...maybe it's understood best through REMAINING; through fighting the urge to run, pushing back the doubts that threaten to derail, refusing the striving that seeks to usurp. 

 

Maybe faith is displayed most clearly by the revealing of rock; mined through the force of dislodging the unsteady pieces of self that hide and hinder.

Maybe faith is displayed most clearly when the crucible of life serves its painful, perfect purpose.

And for that, I am grateful. Because I may not yet be rock-solid, but my faith is in the One who is.

Gun-Shy

There’s a really detrimental view of what walking out our faith journey with Jesus is suppose to look like; the American version of the gospel is that once we accept salvation, all will be rosy. But the reality is, growing in faith can be painful. And I want to be real and open with you about a current painful refining moment in my life. You might read this and recoil at the audacity of what I say out loud...but here’s the thing, I already poured all this out before Jesus and He still loves me. So I can lay out what is shameful about me because I don’t carry that shame anymore, He voluntarily took it from me when He climbed on the cross and let His blood flow for me. 

Recovering from delivering twins has been hard, my hormones are still so wacked out that one month my hair will be dripping grease and the next my eyes are so dry I have to pour eye drops in them continually. I realized yesterday that my typical urge to cast myself and my physical challenges at the feet of the Lord has been checked within me...I am gun-shy. 

Yes, you read that right, I am gun-shy about entrusting my health to the Lord. Meaning, I don’t trust Him with it. 

Yes, I realize how insane that sounds. I have spent the last 15 years intentionally placing myself in the Lord’s hands. He has sustained me through the violent ups and downs of my health; He has healed deep wounds my physical weaknesses have inflicted on my heart and mind; He has gently tended to me in the ordinary needs and in the unusual; He has provided me with strength when I have had none and hope when I have despaired; he has even used my health problems as a bridge to salvation. 

And yet, yesterday I laid down with my face to the floor and wept as this poured out of me:

———

i don’t trust you
i desperately long 
to cast myself upon You 
to rest my physical body 
in Your creating, sustaining hands 
with confidence 
that You will 
tend 
and not break

pushed repeatedly 
to the edge of despair 
though You have sustained 
my heart bears 
the scars 
of painful valleys 
of dark nights of the soul 
of endless days of waiting 
looking to the hills 
for help to come 
and finding only 
the rising and setting sun

i do not trust You 
i weep at my doubt 
ashamed that my heart lies wounded 
when you have blessed 
and carried 
and revealed 
through every moment 
of bleakness 
and dread 
and fear 
and floundering 
i feel abandoned 
entrusted to my own 
helpless hands 
holding nothing 
but the realization that 
my faith is too small

i know that You are 
good present living kind
Healer Hope life
abundant safe Refuge
strength Redeemer 

help my unbelief 
help me step from 
under the shadow 
of years lost 
and into the shadow 
of years found

a crushed reed 
i may be 
but it is only the might 
of Your hand 
that can bear up 
beneath the weight 
of its fragility 

Father 
i long to rest myself in You
i long to feel my fear 
dispel in the presence 
of Your love 
weak but unwavering 
hoping but not waiting 
content in my lack 
and in my gain

———

Because here’s the thing, I just somehow endured a twin pregnancy. And yes, it was full of miracles, but it was literally my greatest physical fear and I had to look it in the eye and plow through it for ~240 days. I walked out of my first ultrasound honestly believing I would die. I had to feel the pain and strain of it on my physical body knowing I never even started with what was required to see it through. 

And I’m gun-shy. I am afraid of what trials I may face within His hands. Because here’s the deal...I know that the Word says that “a bruised reed He will not break,” but I also know...KNOW...that sometimes the fact that the bruised reed doesn’t break is not because it has been given strength, but because He is kind enough to sustain it through the storms it must endure. 

And maybe I’m really afraid of the storms in front of me...the sound of rushing waters hit my ears and I do not know if they are in my path or not. And I long to trust. 

And Jesus, oh my Jesus. He is so tender with my sobbing mess. “Let Me bear those scars,” He said to me—faithless and broken and poured out before Him, “I have scars enough for you. The score your body keeps, let Me wipe away the marks of days lost and let Me write upon you a new score of days redeemed and days restored.” 

And how can I not trust THAT love after all these years.

"Death and life are in the power of the tongue..."

I’ve been processing through my insecurity with the Lord; it’s been a somewhat ugly journey so far...but sanctifying as I am intentionally leaving no stone I come upon unturned.

I came to the realization yesterday that I find myself facing a deep juxtaposition in regards to my voice. In one hand I see the opportunity to bring life and in the other, the fear of bringing death. When I hold these together, I become painfully paralyzed.

If you know me well or have heard my story, you’ve possibly heard testimony of my physical voice’s disappearance and return and what God did in the space between. I am very much indebted to the Lord to even have the ability TO speak. Since that point in my life, I have often held up my voice in wonder to the Lord asking, “You gave it back to me, how do You wish to use it?”

In one hand I hold a deep desire to be heard: I long for opportunities to testify and to teach; to encourage and to exhort; to bless and to prophecy; to proclaim Truth and freedom; and to impact the world for the glory of the Lord and for His kingdom.

And in the other, I hold a great fear of my voice: I am terrified that I will unintentionally deceive someone or discourage a fainting soul; I am petrified of misrepresenting and dishonoring the name of Jesus; I am afraid that I will say something that leads someone astray or that my opinions would speak louder than the Truth; I find the idea of my voice adding to the destruction of another’s soul utterly unbearable.

Because “death and life are in the power of the tongue,” (Proverbs 18:21a) and I know what death from the tongue feels like--both to receive and to give. As I look over my past, both the desire and the fear are no surprise.

I didn’t really get a voice growing up; I’m female, in the context of the church I was raised in, that meant I was born into a position of silence. I also was a pretty strong people-pleaser, so I mostly quietly stayed within the bounds I was given. I was told what to think, what to wear, what to do and what not to do. My voice was usually downed out or cut off.

And I was told a lot of things in the name of Jesus: I was fed twisted theology under the guise of truth and beat into compliance to the rules of men with pieces of God’s word. I was manipulated with fear, and presented an image of the Lord that was so lopsided it is a wonder I ever learned to trust Him. My honest questions were met with condemnation and I was deceived by the ones who claimed all others would deceive me. And until I became a believer in Jesus, I used my tongue in the ways I had learned; controlling my environment and the people around me with my words and manipulative tactics (in case you were wondering, yes, my first journey of repentance when I became a believer was a long and painful one).

But I am not who I was, I am redeemed by the pure blood of Jesus and there are 14 years of sanctification and learning behind me. I am sitting now praying that the Lord would help me discern between healthy fear and unhealthy fear. Because the former will secure me humbly at the feet of the Lord, intentionally submitting all I say to Him, while the latter will paralyze and silence me, rendering me ineffective for the Kingdom. I must learn to speak in my new life with confidence, secure in the Lord’s hands. I must not doubt that the One who calls me to stand and speak will protect my voice and respond to the deep desire of my heart to honor Him and not myself. Because He’s a good Father and He does not send us out to succeed or fail on our own; He empowers, equips and upholds us in the work He has for us to do.

I need to trust Him, friends. I need to wrap myself in the security of my identity in Him and not waver. And sometimes that's a hard thing to do because I must look my fear directly in the eye and remain there until it flees amid the assurance and presence of His unfailing love for me. 

So that is where I find myself in this journey; bowed down at the Mercy Seat with my fear laid out before me.

the sorrow of a tired woman

unchanging tomorrows
©3-21-18 hannah mclean

my fight is over
drained of perseverance
i gave my all
and came up empty
every last hope laid out
and i have gathered in
only empty sheaves

my head hangs
my feet drag
my knees bloodied
from feeble, staggered steps

there is nowhere to sit
no comfort on which to lay my head
and so i limp slowly on
in the sloughs of my discontent

how do i stand
without hope for my present pains?
on what can i lean?
where can i rest
to regain strength to face my
unchanging tomorrows?

i am too tired
to look upon this journey
another day

You call out
“shamar”
to preserve
to keep
to guard

psalm 145:20
“the Lord [shamar]s all who love Him”

in this promise
i close my eyes

fearfully and wonderfully made

Psalm 139:14a “I praise You for I am fearfully and wonderfully made.”

I’ve heard a lot of thoughts on what this verse means--though considerably less on the “fearful” than on the “wonderful.” I think the explanation that has stood out to me the most was one I heard during a podcast by Ravi Zacharias on a fairly unrelated topic; he gave equal attention to both of these words and his explanation was profoundly simple. When I heard it, I tucked it away in my "box of pearls." Ravi explained this verse something like this: We are fearfully and wonderfully made; the care and complexities of a body’s ability and design to function is utterly filled with wonder...and yet, the reality that the smallest of organisms, unseen by the human eye, can take it out makes it equally fearful.

If you have followed this blog for any length of time, you’ve most likely heard me talk about Psalm 139; it is the first passage of scripture that I memorized by choice after becoming a believer. Over the last 12 years the Lord has brought me back to it at deep, identity-shifting times; it is as though I am tethered by its stability and no matter where life moves me, I cannot go beyond its reach. The Lord brought me to this passage the other day, and it has had a profound impact on my heart. I am going to attempt to tell you about it.

I have found myself in a pivotal place because I have a question. The way I answer this weighty question has the power to determine my future perception of my life and whether I will walk in it as a whole person or a divided person. It is deeply important that I take the time to answer the question that the Lord has graciously bought completely into the light (I know I have bumped into it before) and to the forefront of my mind:

Of what value is my body?

We are, when whole and undivided, at peace in body, soul and spirit. I have never doubted the Lord’s care for nor the importance of the soul or the spirit, but when it comes to the body, I have wrestled continually with questions of the Lord's care for and the value of my body. I do believe that scripture would say that, “Yes, He does care about the physical body.” However, it is more important that the soul and spirit are healthy than that the body is. So while I have answered portions of my quandary, I am still left with this question that I have to resolve because if I do not, I will continue to walk through this life as a divided person, unable to usher others into wholeness, because I have been unable to reconcile my body with myself.

So a couple of days ago I brought this question before my Creator. I sat down with Him and His word and asked Him to show me one way or another: Does MY physical body have any value?

You might think this is a silly question (I probably ask a lot of those), but as someone who has spent her entire adult life battling chronic health issues and discovered that her coping mechanism is to completely dissociate with her physical body, as someone who grew up being told and shown that this body was just a shell carrying us from this life to another, as someone who learned to see the beauty in humans that has nothing to do with their outward appearance while being shaped by the lives of her handicap brothers, this question would more fittingly be described as tragically honest because I just turned 35-years-old last week and I hate my body--it has failed me 10,000 times, it has wreaked more havoc on me than any other thing, at times it has felt like pure torture to be connected to it. And that breaks my heart, because it is 1/3 of myself, and I have basically been in a civil war for years and the casualties have added up.

I opened my bible to Genesis, and began at the creation of man. I heard the purposeful decision in the Lord’s voice as I read “Let Us make man in Our image, after Our likeness.” (Gen 1:26–28) I wondered at Yahweh’s hands personally forming the first human out of the dust and imagined what it must have looked like when He breathed His own breath into this creation so that it shared in His life for the first time. (Gen 2:7) I found purpose for this creation of body being “formed” and “made” in the book of Isaiah: To bring glory to the Lord (43:7), to declare praise (43:21) and to be His servant (49:5). And then the Lord brought Psalm 139:13–16 to mind, and when I read the words of verse 14, tears filled my eyes and I knew, “There it is.” These 10 words hold within themselves the answer to whether my broken body has value and purpose: It is not just in the perfection of a body adhering to its design to function that displays the mighty work of the Lord, mercifully it is also in the body’s utter frailty and fallibility that the might and wonder of the Lord is seen.

It is only in the fearful wonder of the careful Designer’s mighty and meek hands that I will find the ability to reconcile my whole person.

And the fact that the answer to my question is “yes” and that this is accompanied with the promise that the pursuit for wholeness will end in victory, I find myself repositioned onto a path of hope and peace.

when i have nothing left

enough
©4-26-16 hannah mclean

You are enough

no matter the deficits i hold
nor the reality of my inability to fill them
no matter the wounds that mar me
nor the reality of my inability to bind them

i may stand before You
with startling gaps of insecurities
with fraying edges where i have been too long battered
with scars that leave me beyond recognition

but i do not stand before You alone

You do not cringe when You look upon me
You do not turn away in disgust
You do not pass by on the other side of my desperation
You meet my gaze
You lift my head
You kneel beside me in the dust

You are enough

You are enough for the moments
when i can bear it no longer
You are enough for the moments
when my voice is hoarse from pleading
You are enough for the moments
when i’m worn so thin a breeze could blow me apart
You are enough for the moments
when i have nothing
when i am nothing
when i feel nothing but pain and dread and longing and doubt

if all i have as i face my tomorrow
is You
this i know
i have enough

Psalm 29:10 "The Lord sits enthroned over the flood; the Lord sits enthroned as king forever."

fighting doubt

Psalm 94:17 “If the Lord had not been my help, my soul would soon have lived in the land of silence.”

to settle or to remain
©hannah mclean 4/24/16

i’m falling apart
confusion meets doubt
and too much is required

i travail
crying out to You
to no avail
and i wonder
if You still hear me

“if the Lord had not been my help
my soul would soon have settled in silence”

this is where i am

my eyes upon the hills
far too long
awaiting Your help that has not come
and my soul within me
threatens to call no more

like an orphaned child
whose cries have gone unanswered
until it no longer makes a sound

silence stands before me
beckoning

but i don’t want to be alone
i want to see You appear upon the horizon
in the place my eyes have blazed
all this time

Psalm 121:1–2 “I lift up my eyes to the hills. From where does my help come? My help comes from the Lord, who made heaven and earth. He will not let your foot be moved; He who keeps you will not slumber. Behold, He who keeps Israel will neither slumber nor sleep. The Lord is your keeper; the Lord is your shade on your right hand. The sun shall not strike you by day, nor the moon by night. The Lord will keep you from all evil; He will keep your life. The Lord will keep your going out and your coming in from this time forth and forevermore.”

"If I make my bed in the depths, You are there."

Life has been bumpy lately...like I’m sliding down a hill and hitting jagged rocks on the way down. I feel bruised and my eyes can’t see the top of the next mountain, only the darkness of the pit in which I reside. I’ve been here before, I recognized the rocks on the way down. It’s dark and I can’t see my feet; I dread the next step because I don’t know how much farther I have to go before the Lord lifts me up.

So some days are harder than others, and I have been grateful for the hands of Jesus that reach out to grab hold of my grasping hand; assuring me that I am not alone and reminding me that “though I fall, I will not be cast headlong, for the Lord upholds my hand.” (Psalm 37:24)

Let’s be honest, my health sucks. I have been sick for 15 years. It’s true, I’ve had a stretch of probably 5 years in there where my body balanced out and I felt pretty good, but it doesn’t take more than the slightest breeze to send it back into chaos. It doesn’t help to tell me I look fine, I am not fine. And no, I can’t explain what is wrong because even the professionals can’t. Aside from my health, I’m not an unhealthy person; I exercise, eat healthy food, take my vitamins, have solid relationships and love Jesus...but my body just laughs at the science of living a healthy lifestyle.

To be honest, I’m in a hard place; I am worn out as I wait on a miracle from the Lord. I believe He is my Jehovah Rapha (the Lord who Heals), and I expect Him to be who He says He is. Most days I find peace in hope, because I’m hoping in a God who is always faithful to His word; some days I sincerely rejoice as though I have already received what He promised. But some days, I simply doubt; gut-wrenching, devastating hopelessness threatens to sweep me off of everything I stand on with the force of a tornado of fear, pain and the sense of abandonment. And those days, those days are the hard days where I have to make choices: Am I going to choose faith? Am I going to hold up the truths I know of God beside the facts of my health and choose to believe what I can’t see? Am I going to shout the name and mercy of Jesus in the face of the enemy’s accusations that His love and His blessing are not for me? Am I going to agree with the Truth or with the lies when it is the lies that make sense when one considers my physical well-being? Those days, those are the days I have to make the hard decisions: faith or fear? Truth or lies? Love or hate? Jesus or self?

I am grateful as I write this. I am grateful because I am proven...I want Jesus’ face more than His hand.

I am grateful as I write this. I am grateful because no matter the ugliness of my doubt and the fruit it bears, God presents me with His word where He declares His affection for me whereever I stand...or sit...or wallow:

Psalm 139:8–10
If i go up to the heavens, You are there;
    if i make my bed in the depths, You are there.
If i rise on the wings of the dawn,
    if i settle on the far side of the sea,
even there Your hand will guide me,
    Your right hand will hold me fast.

Oh the beautiful Jesus:
He is with me always.
He is with me when I worship Him; when from my earthly post my soul rises up to the heavens and my voice joins the hosts around His throne. He is there.
He is with me when I clamor in the depths of the pit; when I wallow in despair, unable to lift up my voice or my feet, doubting I can hope another day. He is there.
He is with me whether I am early or whether I am late.
He is with me whether I wander far or stand near.
He is there, His hand guides me because He is faithful.
His right hand holds me fast, because He is my anchor.
And my Anchor holds.

My Anchor holds when life is bumpy;
when everything around me is dark and the only light I can find
lies in the hope that the One who is sure is with me,
and when He deems the moment right,
He will lift me out of this desolate pit.

And between this moment and that one, perhaps you will put me into your prayers?