"When the whirlwind passes, the wicked are no more, but the uncompromisingly righteous have an everlasting foundation."

Proverbs 10:25

God you are my strength, Jesus you are the joy set before me. Not once have you gone out from underneath me. Not once have you left me to fend for myself. You have surrounded me and covered me. You have brought me to know your goodness. You have taught me to endure your silence, and not only endure it, but press through it. You have shown me that there is always breakthrough coming, it's constantly on its way. Every surge of my own resistance is met by a typhonic flood of your grace. The winds of this life, both uncontrollable and ones created by the fan of my own desires, cannot endure the strength of your love. The seas of inescapable emotion that wear on my soul, they are silenced by you alone. You have shown me that the whirlwind, when endured by a righteous person, produces only an everlasting foundation for them to stand on.

I have wandered in out and of your presence, and as sure as the tides of the ocean, have wandered to and fro amongst many shifting shores. Will I serve you with my whole heart. Will I love you even when I feel forgotten.

Forgetfulness, a word not in your vocabulary, except in the wondrous way of your forgiveness. You forget my sin, and bring to life every fiber of my being. You are not capable of forgetting a single cell in my body.

I've seen my worth through many lenses, but all these have been shattered. The image of your Son has come into clearer focus. The colors have began to brighten, after countless days spent relying on black and white images, strung together to embody a motion picture that I thought was my life. Whether I jumped backwards or looked ahead, it was still only greyscale living. You are stripping my mind of the memories of colorless living. You are painting new dreams upon my heart, using the red of your blood and redemption, the yellow of your glory, heaps of blue that bring your eternal presence into my life, lacing it with the purple of your majesty, and highlighting it all with the purest white. You are my creator. I often stumble backwards in awe of the beauty of your masterpiece.

Day by day, You give to me more of the promise. The hues of color come alive to me! You're teaching me to see again. You're teaching me that without contrast, and saturation, and exposure, there is no perfection! You bring to the table what I cannot.

So what have I left, if not you alone? I'm seeing the hand of the painter, the strong right hand of the one who calms the storm.

Jesus, in light of all of this...in light of you, the only reasonable response I can conjure is to allow you to use every storm, every heartache, every pain and trouble to reinforce the foundation I have in you. I'm sure in the end, it will not matter the things I do for you or the things I don't do for you. What will matter is whether or not I loved you more than I ever thought I could, and this only by your grace.

Jesus I am amazed by you.

Elyxis