Safe

 by Maureen Alianza

You are desperate.  In case you didn’t know it, you are.  Or, possibly in some pushed-down-kind-of-way, you have a faint, fearful awareness of its reality but the terror of confronting it keeps it just out of finger’s grasp.  But it is there.  It reaches up to stroke you, reminding you of your condition in ways just out of the ability to control.  You can’t think your way out of its reach and your wisdom and maturity wont shield you from the rawness of its palpations.  You were created, intentionally to live in an extreme state of vulnerability, desperately in need.  Life hangs in the balance, as quite literally, without the neediness being satisfied, you will die.   
Love
Your soul must receive love.  Literally, you will cease to exist without the offering and receiving of love.  Neediness exposes vulnerability.  Control is not an option.  We are painfully and hopelessly needy.  It’s a fragile existence to be positioned in, with consequences looming around many corners.  Are you safe?  Is there reason to fear, to desperately grasp for what seems to hint of life….of love?  Or, do you know a Giver who delights to give, who has no fear of lack or want because the source is in no danger of ceasing.   The gifts are new every morning and there is no destination traveled that the Giver can’t offer what is needed for life.   Gifts found around many corners, dancing through thoughts, given in the gazes of an eye, delivered in a spoken word, in the sounds of creation.   Do you see it?  Do you hear it? Do you feel it?  More importantly, do you receive it?  Your life depends on it, friend.  Your life depends on it.  I often delight in the subtleties, the breezes that love does float upon….offerings for the taking.    Amazed at the power of such whispers, I often capture them and put them on display.  A collection that offers constant reminders of what is there all the time, closer than the next inhale of oxygen into my lungs.  
 
You are desperate.  You are painfully needy.  You are safe.  You are loved.
 
I’m absolutely convinced that nothing
—nothing living or dead, angelic or demonic,
today or tomorrow, high or low,
thinkable or unthinkable
--absolutely nothing
can get between us and God’s love
because of the way that Jesus our Master has embraced us.
                                       ---------Paul