Carousel of Death

There's a new post over on the Sojourn Women's page.  I'll warn you... it's a little different!  I wrote it in a moment of prayer for myself and those around me based on Psalm 116.  I've always had an affinity for Psalm 116 and I've always been intrigued when the psalmist says, "Precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of His saints." I'm so thankful that God loves us enough to watch us die to ourselves so that we may live in Him. Even when we have no clue what that actually means or looks like, He is still faithful to help us actually do it. It's an amazing and sometimes excruciating process to experience the work of God's Spirit and grow.

As you're reading this post, I encourage you to think about the weight each line carries.  My prayer as you read is that you will ask yourself questions such as, "Whose glory am I really longing for, mine or God's?", "What things do I give most value to and why?", "Whom or what do I give power to in my life thinking it (or them) will get me somewhere?", "In what places am I living a lie instead of living a rich life in Christ?"

Post here or below.

Carousel of Death (Based on Psalm 116)

By Rebekah Hannah

You run to the high-positioned and cling to their legs. You claw up the ladder, hoping someone will notice your “newness of life.” But yet you continue to suffocate and suck in dirt. Respect is given to those who make the spot light, to those whose gifts are paraded in front of others… Clinging to their coat tails, you ride the wave of low-level, culturally biased celebrity politics and hope for someone to notice you belong.

But this life is short-lived and death by drowning occurs. Placing God’s glory on his subjects rather than The Subject causes misplaced hope and miserable pain. When will you learn? When will it stop?

It doesn’t. So instead a new version is born. A hipster preacher, a modern day spin, a new idea, and another fake grin. The life we’ve been called to seems ridiculously mundane. I want great. I want new. I want the exception. And you do too.

But it’s not found where you are looking. You give respect to those you hear even before listening, and to whose book you read even before thinking. You ascribe value according to position instead of worshiping the One Who Decides.

Hearts are inclined to what others say God’s testimonies are, and we mimic with selfish-intent. Ripping off sparkle from worthless things, we strain life out of every plastic fruit we see, desperately trying to compartmentalize the spiritual from unspiritual. If I can just reach this level, if I can just stop doing this thing, if I can just be “faithful” in this way… If I can only be stronger.  Who’s it all for?

It never ends. The carousel keeps turning, but instead of enjoying the ride, you become a plastic horse with pastel saddles and sticky fingers are clinging to you for just one more turn. In this place, all life is an optical illusion. You’re in a dark room with blank walls, bodies moving in motion never going anywhere, and never changing the darkness.

Hope given. 

But He still comes. Not IN spite of us, but DEspite us. We plead and beg for mercy, but it was already given. He opens the door to the pitch-black room and welcomes you to a new place.

Look up! There is a place where the fruit is real and laughter rings from the carousel of life as those riding hold his dear hand.

DEspite us, He saves us from our self-absorbed polity.

He saves us from ridiculously mundane and turns it into a purposeful pain.

He gives sparkle that can’t be ripped off or found at your local pub.

He’s the one who ascribes value, not by putting a shiny crown upon our heads… but by dying an ugly death to save the already dead.

Good grief, (literally).

He. Is. Powerful.

Psalm 116:4-11, 15, 19b

Then I called on the name of the Lord:

‘O Lord, I pray, deliver my soul!’

Gracious is the Lord, and righteous; our God is merciful.

The Lord preserves the simple; when I was brought low, he saved me.

Return, o my soul, to your rest; for the Lord has dealt bountifully with you.

For you have delivered my soul from death, my eyes from tears, my feet from stumbling; I will walk before the Lord in the land of the living.

I believed, even when I spoke, ‘I am greatly afflicted’; I said in my alarm, ‘All mankind are liars.’

Precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of his saints.

Praise the Lord!