Living with tenderness...

From time to time I discover that I am living out of a tender - almost fragile - place within myself that is startling. It is not troubling, but it is not easy either. Cruel words cut more deeply, the violence that has become common in our culture feels more like an assault and I hear - and feel - the wounds of those I love with a deeper resonance. It is a little unnerving to often be just this side of tears...

I remember an old friend from Cleveland once saying that I reminded him of Jeremiah - the weeping prophet - not the angry John the Baptist nor the aggressive social justice prophets of the Northern Kingdom - but Jeremiah who wept over the wounds and sins of the people he loved. That feels true to me - and much of my ministry - not that there isn't joy and lots and lots of laughter. But for this season, it would seem, there are also tears woven into the the feasting and celebrations. Some are tears of joy - another friend spoke of being full to overflowing - and some are tears of sorrow for wounds unhealed or sins too raw for cleansing. And, I suspect, there are also tears of grief simply for the state of the world.

I was thinking last night of the prophetic music of my youth - especially George Harrison's song "While My Guitar Gently Weeps" - which expresses the truth of the Vietnam War better than anything else I've ever experienced. And as I was heading towards sleep it hit me why this song continues to speak long after John Lennon's more boisterous and harsh protest songs have been put away. This lament comes from the heart - it is pure love wounded by sin - whereas so much of Lennon's material was adolescent frustration and arrogant rage. Oddly enough, I can't listen to much of Lennon's music anymore, but St. George... gets better and better.

I feel that way about the mature Cat Stevens aka Yusuf Islam: he, too, is a man of pure heart who knows how to celebrate each moment even while aching for the healing of the world. I celebrated his songs when I was young, but now they have just grown more profound and real as he has become an authentic peace-maker. Whenever I hear his music, they bring tears to my eyes and joy to my heart... This remake of an earlier favorite - I Think I've Seen the Light -keeps taking on new layers of meaning and power.

Every day is a gift. Every moment a chance to listen and love. Don't waste any of them... The poet, David, Whyte, put it like this:

When your eyes are tired

the world is tired also.

When your vision has gone

no part of the world can find you.

Time to go into the dark

where the night has eyes

to recognize its own.

There you can be sure

you are not beyond love.

The night will give you a horizon

further than you can see.

You must learn one thing.

The world was made to be free in.

Give up all the other worlds

except the one to which you belong.

Sometimes it takes darkness and the sweet

confinement of your aloneness

to learn

anything or anyone

that does not bring you alive

is too small for you.