He gives me beauty for the dust that would be my life.....

The unseen aspects of my life.... the places in my heart that darkness still resides and the enemy of my soul can still land and mock... the places that upon waking in the early morning hours serve as reminders to why I need His salvation.. and that without Him I wouldn't walk... I wouldn't walk... I am not one who could casually walk the face of the earth .. and without Him I know where it is that I would reside....

I know that I walk with Him.. and I know that I share my life as an open book.... I know that I recount the times we walk together whether He joins me and embeds His foot print upon the earth again or He takes me to be where He is and we journey upon a place that is so other that the very air always brings me healing by just breathing it ....

He touches my grieving heart and applies His healing balms.. and He sits with me and looks at me and looks at me as I look at Him.. He sits silently with me in my pain and fear.. and He sits with me and bares His heart and His presence... and in that place sitting cross legged across from each other gazing at each other I know His love... His determination to never leave me nor forsake me... never to injure my soul but to bring restoration.....

His love is like warm liquid honey that pours itself upon me and over me and in me... warming cold places... soothing hurts away... penetrating to the deepest recesses and bringing its golden healing hues upon my inner most being...

It crushes me when I hear of others recounting Him in some foreign way that I know would never be Him... It pains me when I hear of others talk about Him and pass forward some demonic evil religious notion of that which He is.....

He is gentle and kind.. and while being King of kings and Lord of lords and reigning in majesty on high.. He is lowly and dwells with the broken hearted... never condemning... never ... for He knows how it is that we are made and He knows we are but dust and He loves us.. oh my how He loves us.... How thoroughly passionate He is about us....

Without that passion.. without those moments of being lost in His gaze I would be lost... and He knows.. so in mornings like this... He comes and He sits and His compassions fill the room and He sees me... He sees my heart and my mind and He touches my soul....
These moments aren't about the encounter.. nor are they about where we walk... these moments are simply and profoundly about that He walks the recesses of my heart and He holds my hand and He brings me strength and takes upon Himself my pain...

and He sits and He waits until the joy of being with Him .. the simple.. quiet... solid joy of being in His most magnificent presence burns away that which would bare itself upon my soul ... and He replaces His strength for my ashes.... He gives me beauty for the dust that would be my life.... for the ashes ... and He melts away the pain... this time... time after time.... He takes His love and burns away that which would hinder its flow... a slow and steady and ready flame... full of passion... for me....