++I Pity the Fool++

   

Psalm 53:1 tells us, "The fool says in his heart, there is no God."  That scripture makes me feel like a small, white, female Mr. T.  I read it and think, "I pity the fool."


One time I sat in an adult Sunday school class and the teacher said, "If you think God comes to you in dreams in the bathtub, you are certifiably crazy."  I never went back.  Know why?  'Cause I don't see dead people.  I see God.

I see visions of me on a potting table made of old barn wood, with a one inch lip on all four sides for my fluids, just in case.  It's out in an open field and the sun is a brilliant yellow white.  I look like a life-sized, girl version of the board game, Operation.

God stands next to the potting bench.  His hands work inside me.  Tweeking a spleen.  Polishing a wishbone.  My friend I ask God questions to said it reminded her of this one part in Song of Solomon.  I love the translation that reads, "You are my private garden, my treasure, my bride, a secluded spring, a hidden fountain."

Another time, I watched God hold my heart.  Actually, I just saw his hand.  It looked like the giant hand chairs outside the Cool Ridge store on High Street.  My body's engine was nestled in his ginormous palm and it was huge too--beating, throbbing.  Ba-boom, ba-boom.  ba-boom.  And it was aqua.  God knows aqua is my favorite color.

When I consider God, it's like I have to set off an M-80 in my brain.  Not to hurt it, but to clear out the junk--the recipes, pin numbers, and vocab lists from high school.  I have to do that to even begin to think on God.  He made and he knows every person--past, present, and future.  He is aware of every thought, prayer, and deed they will ever come up with before they ever do.  He intimately perceives the detail of every creature, each cell.  He knows the greatest thing beyond my peewee comprehension, and he knows the least thing ever--sub, sub, sub-atomic stuff.

Sometimes when I pray, I picture God and Jesus and heaven.  There was a lady mystic who did the same thing, centuries ago.  I read about her in an A.W. Tozer book.  I'm glad I'm not alone.  I spend a lot of time wondering if I'll be able to see the Spirit when I get to heaven.  Will He be a silvery aqua mist, hovering over us all?

Some believers poopoo me trying to envision God.  They say I'm trying to create my own God like that guy who wrote The Shack.  To them I say, am I so very different than Moses?  He wanted to see God too and Bible scholars call him great.  I just want to look at whatever God'll show me, even if it's his backside.

Sometimes I picture myself up in heaven with God and Jesus.  I sit criss-cross applesauce on the floor of the throne room.  In fact, I'm snuggled right up to them.  My left arm is looped around God's right leg, and my right arm hugs Jesus' left calf.  Don't ask me if their appendages are flesh, spirit, or polished bronze.  They just are.  God and Jesus pet my hair as I take it all in--endless worship, passionate intercession.  Folks are flinging crowns and those wild, flying creatures--all eyeballs, wings, and praise?  I come undone.

One time--  No, there's been lots, Jesus asked me to dance.  We waltzed on the crystal sea.  Perhaps it was the Sea of Galilee.  When we dance I'm a cross between a kindergartner and an eighth grader at her first dance.  The kindergartner part of me stands on my daddy's feet to be taller, to let him lead.  The eighth grader in me laces my fingers behind my date's neck and melts against him, longing to be one.  And then the best thing happens.  A hole opens in my chest and his.  My heart beats inside him and his heart beats inside me.  We are one.

I'm not making this stuff up.  I saw it all with the eyes of my heart.  It's not imagination or fantasy as some will no doubt say.  Those people who put God in a wet matchbox?  I pity them too.

Afraid of the Dark

I'm so glad it's sunny today.  I like light.  I mean, I really like light.  Sometimes I go through the house and flip every switch and turn on every lamp. Then I run around and light bunches of candles.  Little campfires to ward off the absence of illumination.

See, I'm afraid of the dark.  Have been as long as I can remember.  I'm scared because--  Well, God, you of all people know why, right?  That omniscient property you have?  Oh, and eternality, that too, you know what they mean, don't you?  You were there.

That fact used to burn me up.  If you were there, in my baby's breath pink room, with lime green shag carpet, and French provincial furniture, why the heck didn't you show up?  Be big.  Call down fire or locusts.  Do some signs, miracles, or wonders.  On my behalf.

As I got to know you though, I backed off the shoulda, coulda, wouldas.  It is what it is.  No amount of tears, wailing, or teeth gnashin' is gonna change the past.  And besides, you had your own bullies--tons.  I only had one. 


In therapy, I tried so hard  not to compare my pain, my experience, with other folks.'  Trust me.  That's a bad place to go.  "What happened to you?"  Counseling clients shouldn't be able to ask that.  It's like houses, cars, wedding rings.  You know how big yours is, what it's worth.  So then you try to figure out if theirs is larger, worse, sicker than yours.

I remember this one time.  I was in a group with a whole bunch of other damaged people.  I didn't say anything, but man, they did.  Jacked their jaws 'til I wanted to smack the big, long conference table and scream--SHUT UP!!

This one lady, she saw a car wreck.  Ooooh!  Scary!!!  She wasn't in the totalled car or anything.  Just watched the accident from the berm.  Said she had PTSD as a result.  Liar.  She just wanted attention.  Was willing to pay $95.00 an hour to get it.  She shoulda taken her money up to WalMart and bought herself a life.

This one gal sat across from me.  Probably 20, maybe 22.  For the longest time she didn't say anything.  Not a peep.  Boy howdy, she was  big.  I saw her lips move.  I cocked my head.

"Excuse me?"

Her voice was wee.  "If I get huge, maybe they won't want me no more."

I leaned toward her.  "Who, sweetie?"

Her gnawed nails traced the woodgrain of the table.

"The bad men.  They tie me up.  Stuff a rag in my mouth.  Drive me to that cabin way out in the woods.  Ever since I was four."

I'm glad she didn't look me in the eye.  No one wants to see pity and horror in someone else's gaze.  My fingers clawed into fists. 

"Who are they?  Where are they?  I'll kill 'em for you. Cut off their--"

Her eyes weren't pretty.  Not even when they got big and shiny with tears.  That just made 'em look muddy.  She folded her head, like she wanted to bury it between her prodigious breasts.  She leaned forward, then back again.  Did that.  Over and over.  Hummed something.  I think it was Ring Around the Rosy.  Wasn't that song about the Black Death?


Jesus, I'm sure glad you're light.  You know how the preacher man always says, "Jesus is the way, the truth, and the life?"  I always thought he said, "The way, the truth, and the light."  I wanted you to be light.  Needed you to be.  And now you are.  To  me.

One time I was at a ladies' luncheon, and a speaker gal told her story.  Dang!  She had a tough rough to hoe.  At the end of her talk though, she said,  in her sweet, quiet, tiny like a wren voice, "As I look back over my life, bad as it was, I wouldn't change a thing."  I almost stood up and said, "Lady, someone needs to knock you up side the head.  You are a fool."

But now? I think I kinda get what she was saying.  It's like the end of the Joseph and the Rainbow Coat story in the Bible.  Joseph told his brothers, the ones who sold him into slavery 'cause he was a goody-two-shoes, "You intended to harm me, but God intended it for good, to accomplish what is now being done, the saving of many lives."

I hope I can do that someday.  Save many lives.  From gloom, despair, and agony on them.  I just have to find the afraid-of-the-dark people.  Hand 'em a candle and say, "Guess what, friend?  Jesus is the way, the truth, and the light."