On Sunday morning I was in a time of contemplative prayer and meditation and I came upon this reading from Amy Carmichael.
The son greatly wished to make a "Song of Lovely Things" to sing to his Beloved - but he could not find singing-words.
He heard the voice of his Beloved saying, "You are walking on the road where all who love Me walk. Some of them walked this way singing, and they've left their songs behind them. Find their songs. Sing their words. They will be your song to Me."
But the son became full of grief, because there came a day when he could find no words to sing - neither his own, nor those of others. And yet he wanted with all his heart and soul and mind to ascend to higher places, to stand in the presence of his Beloved.
And He who is love eternal whispered, "Then, I, too, will approach you, silent in my love."
And the son entered into this silence, to meet the eternal Beloved there...
After a while there was a sound in the gentle stillness, a voice that whispered, "Even your silence is, to Me, a song of lovely things..."
I was once like Miriam, I led the women in worship and praise of God - I was a force that strengthened and encouraged many in healthy directions, strong choices and understanding. But this is a different season. My energies are different even though my heart is the same.
I am being led in the way described by Terese of Liseaux as "the little way." I am grateful for those who are raised up to lead the chorus, because I am no longer the one who will sing the first song. And in the silence I hear the voice that says my silence is a song of lovely things.
3 comments:
"Always we are chasing words, and always words recede. But the greatest experiences are those for which we have no expression. To live only on that which we can say is to wallow in the dust, instead of digging up the soil. How shall we ignore the mystery, in which we are involved, to which we are attached by our very existence? How shall we remain deaf to the throb of the cosmic that is subtly echoed in our own souls? The most intimate is the most mysterious. Wonder alone is the compass that may direct us to the pole of meaning. As I enter the next second of my life, while writing these lines, I am aware that to be swept by the enigma and to pause—rather than to flee and to forget—is to live within the core. To become aware of the ineffable is to part company with words. The essence, the tangent to the curve of the human experience, lies beyond the limits of language. The world of things we perceive is but a veil. Its flutter is music, its ornament science, but what it conceals is inscrutable. Its silence remains unbroken; no words can carry it away.
Sometimes we wish the world could cry and tell us about that which made it pregnant with fear-filling grandeur. Sometimes we wish our own heart would speak of that which made it heavy with wonder."
(Abraham Joshua Heschel, Man Is Not Alone)
Love you Marilyn... Sandy
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My cousin played Therese of Lisieux in a movie that actually went to theatres. She even traveled to Vatican City and got to meet Pope John Paul II as part of the movie tour. No joke: http://www.theresemovie.com/
I only see Lindsay when I hear that name. And she sure taught me a lot about Therese of Lisieux!
I like this excerpt, by the way. I like it a lot.
i couldn't agree more. "Even your silence is, to Me, a song of lovely things..." i think that it is harder to sing the song of silence. i think it is a song that we learn to sing only in deep grief, or after some years of singing the other songs loudly.
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