Window to God

It was just an ordinary day when I carved out a little corner of the world, gave it a name, and started filling it with words.  And I think it's fair to say I didn't know what I had done.

There were plenty of fears that day and the ones that followed.  Fears that I'd find no words to write, or that any words I found wouldn't mean a thing to anyone at all.  But it's two and a half years later, and I might still wonder sometimes if the words are running out, but I finally understand that God's the One writing this story of a life.  And me?  I'm just this sheet of glass, letting all His handiwork show through to a world aching for His revealing.

I might've had this notion when I first began, but it was long months before I fully understood--it wasn't a corner of the world I carved out that day but a window frame I hammered in, a place to hang my glass life, a stage for His revealing.

And this is the piece I never would've guessed--this transparency of a life has been at the heart of my becoming.  Because God's always at work shaping and refining, tearing down and building up, but I never feel it full and deep when I hold it close in hands clenched tight, hide it from the rest who walk this road.  No, it's in the revealing of Him that truth settles in, healing reaches farthest depths, and I am most truly the woman He created me to be.

But I'd be holding hands over glass, drawing curtains against the world if I declared this to be easy.  I'm just a shy girl with a whole lot of fears, a woman with a million damaged places she can't even name.  And I might be brave enough to tell the broken story of a life, but there are days when I'm too scared to walk down the street with everyone watching and me trying not to fall.

It might not make any sense at all for God to give this trembling woman the vision of a life lived open, but I'm not surprised by the way He does the unexpected, asks for the impossible, turns me into something I never thought I could be.  That's just the way He is, this God Who heals and loves and leads.

But even still, I didn't expected to draw much attention here in this corner of the world.  Until that day when a woman named Ann read my humble offering and called it beautiful, profound, a reflection of Christ Himself.  And now I'm here, still holding up the glass, knowing there are all these people gazing in, looking for God among words and pictures and pieces of a life.

And it's not hard to imagine why I might be afraid of falling.

Because some days I feel the weight of all the world in need of healing and I know I'm too small to make any difference at all.  But didn't I already say it here, that God's only revealed when I'm broken and He's beautiful and it's Him and not me the world needs anyway?  And if I'm just this sheet of glass and He's the One with all the healing in His Hands, why can't I just keep clearing away the dust, pulling back the curtains, and letting the world see what He's been doing all along?

I might be small and broken and scared of my own shadow, but God?  He's chosen me to be a window to His workings.  And maybe I don't understand the why and the how of all this living, but I know I can't be the woman He's created if I won't leave my heart open on the table, let the world watch while He turns these ashes into beauty. 

Oh, I'll fumble and I'll fall on my face and there'll be days when I can't keep from pulling curtains across the glass.  But He'll still be here working and I won't be able to keep Him hidden for long.  Because who really wants to hide the only Light there is?

And I'm here to tell you that it's okay to press your face up close, peer in to see what He's up to in the midst of a broken life.  It might scare me deep to expose these wounds of a soul, but it's you seeing Him here that makes all the fear worth facing.

Because God, He's beautiful and glorious and our only hope of healing.

And I never want to hide Him from the world.