reclaimed

I've been running from it all summer.  Effectively dodging and weaving, turning down my chin and looking the other way.  It was pursuing me, in the shadows and on the lips of others.

I would run into it in the grocery store and on the streets and briefly acknowledge with my eyes, turn into the wind, walk the opposite direction.  I knew it had no place, had no weight.  But it's existence threatened.

Summer heat waves, cool dark nights.  Bright lights of traffic and the revealing early morning light.

I took what was handed to me and put it on, perhaps in attempt to disguise.  So in the mirror was reflected something not so painfully familiar.

Justification surfaced like an angry bruise and as I crossed enemy lines, I was grazed by the bullets of my own army.  Caught in the traffic, precariously standing on the double yellow lines.

Despite the distorted reflection, beneath the guise, still I bear a name.  Tattooed deep.  Branded.  Regardless of the filth, accumulated on hands, cheeks, the heart within still pulsed.  I find myself crouched, cowering, hiding from the ensuing battle.  Covering my own head, paralyzed in enemy territory.

And my name is called.  That name.  Loudly.  Written in the stars and buried in sand and wiped clean by an empty tomb.

I respond, as instinct.  He called my name and I know Him.  He called my name and I love Him.  He called me to Him and I belonged there, with.  Stood, turned, then faced them both.  The avoided and the Holy.

I anticipated condemnation, to be overshadowed by shame, guilt.  But there in the path of my eyes, stood He with arms reached.  He had stepped in front of that which I'd been evading, blocking out the accusatory glow and the spiteful heat.  On His lips was my name.

With gentleness He removed the ill fitting coat from my shoulders, wiped the dirt from my cheek with His thumb. The chaos persisted, all around colors blurred and noises folded into one another, and He pulled me close.  Remember how I do this.  Remember how to do this with Me.


He is one of grace.  Grace, which overcomes the shame.

And as the air clears and I find His breath in my lungs again, I catch a glimpse of my own reflection in His eyes.

There you are...  I whisper.  Familiar.  Tired, worse for wear.  Fully whole and strong in the brokenness.  I did not go as far as I thought.  I was not as lost as I feared.  And over the dissonance I heard Him, you are mine, my child, with whom I'm pleased, whose heart belongs to Me.  I know you.