the beauty of creating

i received an encouraging email today.
from a woman who was encouraged by the words on my website.
in response, i shared that i, too, am often encouraged by the words,
even those that are my own.
that is the beauty of creating, in whatever form:
it sets something beyond yourself that can give unto to others
and even back to you.
what a delightful thought then,
to think of how God,
the Creator,
might be encouraged and blessed by His creations...
including us.
He has set something beyond Himself
that can give to others
and to Himself.
sixpence none the richer, indeed!
the economy of God is truly strange and beautiful.
i am grateful to be made in the Imago Dei,
with the power to create.

contrasts

i know light for i have seen the darkness.
but good does not owe its existence to evil.
nor are they equals in delicate balance.
evil only feigns to have such power and prominence.
in truth, the light would be light still, were there no dark.
but all dark would be nothing were there no light.
evil is defined only in contrast to good.
evil is good defied,
an utter lack,
a sucking, blinding, chilling emptiness,
a vacuum of spirit and life,
tragically embraced by devil and demon and many a man.
for lucifer sought to be beautiful beyond beauty Himself,
to have power beyond the Source of all power,
but beyond Him, there is nothing.
and the fallen one embraces that nothing still.
a finite death vainly striving to o'erwhelm eternal beginning.
but good is something tangible and true.
beautiful before there was ugly.
wonderful before there was dull.
honest before there was a lie.
and the light of its qualities shines out,
now even brighter and richer and deeper since the darkness came.
and i, born here in murky twilight,
have seen the dark before my eyes
and felt the pull of evil in my own heart,
yet i choose to embrace the light,
for the light is not drowned out by darkness,
it is proclaimed by it!

the worst of silence

as ever, her silence speaks to me in soft and painful whispers, saying all i wish i didn't hear, ever gnawing upon the edges of my soul. oh, for apathy! to shed the very burden of care and be free! but is this not the most fearsome risk of love? not hate nor rejection in turn, but rather, to be ignored by one pervading your daily thoughts? the distance from hate to love was ne'er so far as that from either to nothing! to think how it must pain God that we, His beloved creation, so oft choose to live not even in open rebellion, but as though He did not even exist! is there any rebellion more subtle and insidious? any rejection more cruel and utter? to deny the very being of He who created us, loves us and gives us all is surely an odious sin! do not, then, wonder that God should send such men out of His presence into eternal hell. indeed, is that not where they have sought to be?