This week we launch our eleventh devotional poem. The next five weeks of blog posts will draw from themes in this poem.
When I am tossed,
When I am thrown,
And when I feel a little bit blue . . .
In the ebb and flow of my churning emotions
I hear His whisper in the wind,
“I am enough.”
˜
Oh Lord, my strength is Your presence.
You are my firm breaker
Amidst the violent waves of my emotions.
Tucked away inside Your love
I am convinced of one thing alone:
Nothing matters . . . no,
Nothing but You.
˜
I want only the good –
The crest of the wave
So high and free.
I want only the good.
˜
Amidst my resignation to the ebb and flow
I hear the sweet wind of His presence blow
And there discover a confidence I thought I’d never know.
˜
Oh frustrating ebb and flow!
Why do you trick me with your ways?
One day your waves of wanton joy,
The next your waves of weeping woe!
˜
In the crazy ebb and flow
This I’ve learned and this I know –
That when upon the Lord I wait,
He hears my cry, my prayer for escape.
He lifts my feet and makes my way straight.
˜
There upon the Rock I stand
Safe and sound within His hand,
And Christ the Rock becomes my Raft.
˜
The ebb and flow is a fact of life.
Away from it we cannot run.
We shall be tossed, we shall be thrown,
But our raft we choose.
˜
The raft of emotions,
Secure on the crest, though
Unstable and tossed
From its perch to its depth.
Or Christ the Raft,
Secure on the crest,
Secure in the depths,
Stable and firm,
Led by God’s breath.
˜
Though the ebb and flow shall not remit,
I determine that to Christ I’ll submit;
Emotion now servant, not Lord of my peace,
When patient endurance is fully released.
˜
The mission of this raft –
Found in faith, not emotions.
The ebb and flow now incidental
To the Voice of the Wind
Which carries me on
And satisfies my need.
˜
And now I whisper back to the Wind
“You alone . . . yes, You – You are my Home.”
My soul finds rest in God alone; my salvation comes from him. He alone is my rock and my salvation; he is my fortress, I will never be shaken.
PSALM 62:1-2
This poem has been adapted from the poem by the same name in, David Trementozzi, Light for the Dark Night: Embracing a Heart of Holy Desperation (Maitland, Fl.: Xulon, 2005).
