i want to see

I live in a garden. This garden, while beautiful, is ravaged by the Fall. The thunder outside reminds me that danger is imminent. I am not safe. Children in this garden get brain cancer and die. Adolescents are plagued by eating disorders. Some take their own lives. Mamas get breast cancer. Daddies drink themselves into an early grave. Danger is everywhere. The effects of the Fall, of the day when the Woman took the apple because she did not trust her God, are evident every moment in this garden.

I live in a garden. This garden holds the possibility of rebirth. Every spring astounding beauty is birthed. Blooms like banners of a million colors crawl out of green balls. New life is everywhere. The rain feeds these buds. The green in the grass sings to my eyes of a Creator. I connect to a Mama in trouble. I offer her my hand because she has offered me hers a few years ago. I offer her companionship on this treacherous and breath-taking path called life. My heart swells when my love picks up his son and dwarfs him in big arms cradling him in LOVE. Smiles the sizes of watermelons speak to me of wonder and mystery. Laughter fills my halls and I know that LIFE is more powerful than destruction. Hope lives in this garden.

I live in a garden. We groan for new life. The flowers and the rocks and me and the Mamas in trouble, we ache and we groan. We beg God to have mercy. We beseech Him for new LIFE, for grace, for help. We ask for eyes to see His Presence in this garden.

I live in a garden: in the now and the not yet. He is RISEN. Victory is mine, ours. Yet I struggle, fumble and fall. One day pain will end. One day death will be defeated. One day sin will not afflict my body. But that day has not yet come. Yet it has. The knowledge that Jesus won by losing fills my bones and my lungs with a scent of the promise. 

He has paid the ransom. I am free. I can live free. Laughter is the music of hope. Hope is more abundant than despair in this garden. 

Today I can choose to see Him. If I need to, I can ask a friend to help me see Him. I want to see HOPE.