As the Ruin Falls

All this is flashy rhetoric about loving you.
I never had a selfless thought since I was born.
I am mercenary and self-seeking through and through:
I want God, you, all friends, merely to serve my turn.

Peace, re-assurance, pleasure, are the goals I seek,
I cannot crawl one inch outside my proper skin:
I talk of love –a scholar’s parrot may talk Greek–
But, self-imprisoned, always end where I begin.

Only that now you have taught me (but how late) my lack.
I see the chasm. And everything you are was making
My heart into a bridge by which I might get back
From exile, and grow man. And now the bridge is breaking.

For this I bless you as the ruin falls. The pains
You give me are more precious than all other gains.

When your parents wake you up at 6:00 AM and tell you that your 17-year-old brother has been killed in a car accident–this is the moment we are to fall on our knees in worship. God has given grace to so many of His children, that when tragedy strikes, one can repeat Job’s words and say, “The Lord gave, and the Lord has taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord” (Job 1:21) with a genuine and honest heart.

These are hard days, but there is a comforting sense of closure.Yet, as the first weeks go by and the community that faithfully provided you meals, hugs and encouragement slowly stops sending a card or a fruit-basket…you are forced to get off of your knees and continue on walking with the rest of life.

It will be 6 years on this coming November 22nd since his death and to be honest I constantly miss him. I miss his smile, his clothes, his zeal…our fights, our family prayer time, our differences…I can’t sever this grief, but God has pursued me more and more because of this.

One of the poems I recited a year ago was this one:

Time Does Not Bring Relief: You All Have Lied By Edna St. Vincent Millay

Time does not bring relief; you all have lied

Who told me time would ease me of my pain!

I miss him in the weeping of the rain;

I want him at the shrinking of the tide;

The old snows melt from every mountain-side,

And last year’s leaves are smoke in every lane;

But last year’s bitter loving must remain

Heaped on my heart, and my old thoughts abide.

There are a hundred places where I fear

To go,—so with his memory they brim.

And entering with relief some quiet place

Where never fell his foot or shone his face I say,

“There is no memory of him here!”

And so stand stricken, so remembering him.

—————————————————–

For those who have never been blessed (I truly mean this) with a sudden tragedy, yet know of a friend or even a stranger that has (in the past or present)…don’t stop sending the fruit-baskets. Continue to pursue them in their grief, don’t be afraid to talk with them about it…sing with them, cry with them, shout praises at God’s goodness with them…in all these things BE with them.

Now for those who’s loss has been months or even years past, yet the grief is shouting in their soul that it was only yesterday–know this: Since Christ is eternal–He knows that your suffering never gets old or fades. Know also this, that He is not a God who abstained himself from the pain in the world…for He suffered more than anyone AND is willing and earnest to comfort all who cry out His name. Let us yearn for the day when we see death, suffering and pain’s eternal end, and everlasting joy’s eternal beginning.

read this by John Piper

Pray for me and praise Him, even now in these 6 years past, for taking my brother home and for opening my eyes to His beauty.

-emily

The Pulley

When God at first made man,
Having a glasse of blessings standing by;
Let us (said he) poure on him all we can:
Let the worlds riches, which dispersed lie,
Contract into a span.

So strength first made a way;
Then beautie flow’d, then wisdome, honour, pleasure:
When almost all was out, God made a stay,
Perceiving that alone of all his treasure
Rest in the bottome lay.

For if I should (said he)
Bestow this jewell also on my creature,
He would adore my gifts in stead of me,
And rest in Nature, not the God of Nature:
So both should losers be.

Yet let him keep the rest,
But keep them with repining restlesnesse:
Let him be rich and wearie, that at least,
If goodnesse leade him not, yet wearinesse
May tosse him to my breast.

“Thou madest us for Thyself, and our heart is restless, until it rest in thee.”

–St Augustine

Sleep, sweet boy–

Until you embrace

The One who’s full of glorious grace.

Sleep dear brother

For soon you’ll see

By the price He’s paid

Death has no victory.

This last embrace

Shall last forever

And you will see his face

My dear, sweet sleeping brother.

Hello Everyone,

My opinion is of no grand value; however, I wanted a place that I could just unleash meaningful words that have affected my life and worship of Christ. This means I will post things that I have written and then more of the refined art that others have done in poetry, literature, and other sorts of media.

How great is our God–that we can worship him with our words…words that he daily gives breath to out of his loving grace.

In His Sovereign Grip,

Emily Marie Mortvedt