Wednesday, January 16, 2013

Answering Lillie

(Words from March 2008/reworked--in answer to the question, "Why do others see your call before you do?")

Lillie,
We are built for these kinds of questions
Often others see our callings before we do
because we often just are walking them out
and not reflecting on them at all
just doing it or being shaped by life
by the hand of God
by providence
by Divine humor
We do what we are assigned
even when we don't know it's an assignment
And people begin to see
the new shape

but like wise old women who can tell another woman
is pregnant before that woman knows,
or before she even misses a menstrual cycle
people take note of Moving Mystery
and the Cloud that overtakes us even before
we know we're consumed in it

We never fully see ourselves

That is why it's wise to listen 
to the voice of counsel and judge it 
against what we know about the way God
works in our particular histories
paying attention to the sacred texts
and how fruitful are the lives
of the people who claim to "see" us

I ended up many of the places I have
and doing much of what I do because of
the 2 or 3 or several witnesses who confirmed
the where and the it of my life 
long before I could commit my heart
to it or even say it was a Divine commission

And oftentimes, God is on a timeline 
that does not give us the luxury of hesitation
we need the mothers to let us 
to get up and get moving
in the direction of that last
Whisper, even if we have no
idea where it's taking us.

© Valerie Bridgeman
January 16, 2013, with words from March 2008


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