premature seeds

Faith...
it's a gift...
it's also a wild invitation.
At times it is an intimate friend... other times it feels like a stranger I keep chasing.  No matter where I fall on any given day... you can trust that my heart is seeking the  increase... this princess is climbing up on the couch of faith.

Being on the couch doesn't mean I have arrived, it just means I am choosing to dwell.  

In my rest and waiting excitement grows, and I raise my hands in anticipation...

Other times they are raised in confused frustration.  My fists express the fight in my heart.

As I learn more and more I sense the call to move over and make space for the One that offers the gift I so long to receive.

Patience... it's a costly lesson.  I feel like the toddler that wants it NOW.  And I wrestle with inarticulate groans.  I can't fully communicate my enlarged desire nor can I make faith happen.  Like most things faith often needs space and time to grow.  

Growth is often gradual and slow.... stemming from small bites of nutrition, affection, and rest. 

Change... it isn't always obvious but it's always occurring. 

And then one day... while sitting on the couch of faith you notice something different... new confidence takes a seat... something that wasn't yesterday is today... and joy shines from the growing.  

I've seen first hand how God grows amazingly large blessings from tiny, premature seeds.  Seeds that weren't ready but were called forth.  

Maybe like Charli, I don't have to be fully devoloped in order to bring life's blessing.  Maybe all my incubated gifts can still be used for the Kingdom.  It seems I have believed a lie regarding my story... gifts that aren't at full gestation don't have value...  they don't yet have life.

Many faith pictures fill the walls of my home... one piece of art has been a real piece of work... but her story speaks.  It offers truth to the lies... it calls me to see beauty in the faith- small but growing, and it sings over me to risk and love.  

For... skinny, scrawny, bird-like beauties grow and are just as much full of life as the 40 weekers... they just need extra love and tending from the One that births the life in the first place.

We all start as a tiny seed... God has different modes and speeds for everyone... when walking through Charli's beginning and in my current story I often long to get off the couch and onto the subway. 

Up until now He has been happy to hold me on the couch...  but as for tomorrow...

who knows what it will hold... for like a toddler I am known to make risky leaps of hope.

Learning through brokenness the value of ALL sized-seeds and the importance of risky leaps.