Thanksgiving has come and gone, and I am left with a mix of emotions, primarily—and as is fitting for the holiday—profound gratitude. Driving back to Raleigh after being home for the holiday, I was sad to leave my family and friends from home, but I was also excited to come back. I was struck, for a moment, what a gift that is that I have a community I miss and want to come back to. The people here are good. This place is good. God is good. And I’m grateful.
I’ve been thinking a lot about the concept of blessing recently. For our Family Systems Theory class, we’re reading John O’Donohue’s To Bless The Space Between Us, a beautiful little book of blessings. O’Donohue calls a blessing “a gracious invocation where the human heart pleads with the divine heart” and “direct address, driven by intimacy.” I found his definitions powerful and enlightening
As a self-proclaimed words of affirmation h03 (haha trying to keep my blogs clean-ish!), I, of course, am drawn to blessing. But, love languages aside, in light of O’Donohue’s understanding of blessing, we all are. We all yearn to be seen, loved, valued, and known. We also yearn for intimacy, for connection with ourselves, each other, and with God. A blessing, as I understand it, is an attempt to put words to love, to speak belonging into being. It is a warm hug, a reminder that each of us has a place in this messy, often ungracious, and beautiful world we live in.
So I thought this month I would attempt to write a blessing myself. It is meant to be both universal and particular: universally, it is a blessing of belonging, of self-acceptance, and love. Particularly, it is a blessing for my Fellows class. A couple weeks ago at Round Table, we all talked about the toxic identities and self-narratives we can slip into, and the truths about us that God wants to tell us in His compassion and care. So I included words and ideas from each of the Fellows’ struggles with self-identity and their moves into love and acceptance. Get out your handkerchiefs, people. Just kidding. But it may be cheesy or weird so here’s your warning. This is a blessing for those who have blessed me (aka Raleigh Fellows + Ashley) <3:
On the day when
The lies and burdens
Break your bones
And stifle your Spirit,
May you look up to the Heavens
And call on your Creator.
When you feel people putting up those familiar cold hard bars around you,
Caging you in with their characterizations and confusion,
May the Lord unclasp the lock
And bring you to an open space.
May you be seen exactly as you are,
And may you be held there by your Father.
When you feel yourself close off,
May the Lord unfasten your folded arms.
May you have the strength to trust again,
Or, perhaps, for the first time.
When you feel undesirable, unloveable, unknown or even unknowable,
May the Lord remove your blinds,
And reveal to you your own breathtaking and bewildering beauty.
For you were chosen before time with purpose and love.
He knows every hair on your head,
And every concern that crinkles your forehead,
Every delectable and dangerous dream you dare not speak,
And every scar that mars your body or spirit.
May you hear your ever-doting Father tell you:
‘You are not invisible,
But absolutely irreplaceable, my love.
You are not forgettable,
But unequivocally memorable to me.’
You are neither “too much”
Nor “not enough,”
But perfectly plenty.
You are not uniquely broken,
Nor especially difficult,
But a child God is proud to call His beloved.
May God draw you in from the outskirts and the darkness,
And lead you into the Light.
May the Light expose you—
Not to shame you, but to free you.
May you know that you are fully seen,
And yet fully loved.
Let Grace wash gently over you,
And carry you away into its eternal sea.
May you be overwhelmed by the Father’s abiding affection,
And lose yourself in the depths of His cavernous compassion.
May you stop your never-ceasing striving,
Even for just a moment,
For in the pause and the surrender,
You will find His perfect peace.
May you come down off that treacherous tightrope,
And fall into His ethereal embrace.
May you dance without fear,
And hope with reckless abandon.
May this be the day when you know
Your bones are not so brittle after all,
Your spirit is strong.
May you look up to the Heavens,
And out to the Community around you,
And know you belong here.
Yes, you are wild - and loved more wildly still.
— Sarah
