I drew a picture once with the phrase, “Give me your tears of sorrow and I will turn them into joy. Oceans of it.” That very picture and phrase enveloped me in 4D as I stood waste deep in the ocean of St. Lucia last weekend. Warm and salty, like tears, the ocean waves wrapped around me like a huge hug from heaven. (Although the following day, the waves came in torrents, sometimes punching me in the gut and toppling me to the sinking sand beneath my toes, (ha!) but that was a different kind of joy and laughter for later.)
There’s just something about the ocean. The surround sound without speakers, the humbling incapability of stopping a single wave. How small and vulnerable we are as humans, consumable by sharks or the angry ocean currents themselves, yet God decided we were the crown of all creation. Precious, delicate, breakable but rebuildable.
I needed this joy, the warm salty tears that fell from my cheeks just days earlier as thieves had broken into my house and stole some very important, sensitive, and precious items, namely a hard drive that has 10 years of life’s work along with photo albums of every child for the last 8 years and counting… They had been watching my house strategically for some time and knew our daily schedule. They knew what was in my house because they targeted the solar batteries and electronics: my TV, laptops, iPad, tablet, hard drive, and a fan. (The fan, really?) It wasn’t the loss of items or the breaking in that was the hardest, it was being strong and stable for the rest of the campus – being the “head of the household” I felt like I couldn’t be weak; I couldn’t be afraid; I had to be the strong one. But I just couldn’t last with that facade. I couldn’t hold it all together though I tried, and in those moments I questioned why God would allow this to happen now and why I am still having to face fears of being a single lady leading the ministry. Doesn’t God want me to have a husband? Isn’t that HIS plan, not mine, from the beginning of time that a man (husband/father) should be the head? Or if I’m meant to stay single, why did He pick me, couldn’t he have picked someone else with a packaged deal that includes a strong man? I’m tired of being the “strong man” I told God. And as I went on retreat that weekend to St. Lucia (it was planned for the graduates, and I almost canceled after the break-in, but knew that’s exactly what satan would have wanted), God reminded me that my weakness and vulnerability are beautiful and healthy expressions of Himself in me. And that the only Strong Man we need is truly Him.
While the ocean waves lapped around me, I watched my grown up kids (almost all in their early 20s) play like school girls in the waves. They screamed and ran away from the crashing currents; some belly flopped and dove at the waves head on. Some got swept under and stayed their distance, others stayed in the entire two hours, begging to stay longer when it was time to go. In those hours, my heart was filled with the most joy I’ve felt in a long time. Difficult to describe the kind of freedom I experienced as I watched and played with them in the ocean. Their joy was my greatest gift, my deepest delight! There could not have been any better medicine than that! It was the most carefree, stress-free, uplifting, peaceful experience in a long time!
That night, as I reflected on the day in my journal and prayer time, I felt the Lord reminding me of that scene and whispering, “And that’s how happy you make ME, Mary-Kate. The way you felt watching your girls and the joy from within – that’s how YOU make me feel. You make me happy. I am a proud Father. I want to delight in you. I want to give you joy and give you more of these moments. Let me be Your Father and you be my child. You don’t have to lead all the time or be the parent all the time. Sometimes, you just need to be a kid again and let me love you.” With eyes closed I had this vision of me as a little girl on top of God the Father’s shoulders. We were both laughing and I was pointing to something extraordinary in the distance that I normally wouldn’t have been able to see had I not been on his shoulders. He was simply laughing, with a huge smile, enjoying me being so happy and excited at what I was seeing in the distance. “See, this is what I want to show you. I want you to have this experience with me. Trust Me, and let me take you to places you’d never go on your own.”
During another retreat session about the images of God, we were asked to pray over the images and discuss who God is to us and how we see God in our lives. The memory that came back was me in second grade giving a presentation on our heroes. Our teacher gave us an assignment to draw and talk about our heroes. While most of my classmates drew their parents or grandparents, I drew God and boldly proclaimed He was my hero. I got teary eyed thinking back to my second grade self, and how different I am now. Why hadn’t I connected to God as my hero in such a long time? And now was time to go back to being a kid and let God be my Hero.
With God as my Hero, we are making amazing progress on the break-in issue (they’ve come back twice for two more attempts but unsuccessful) and the support from people around the world has shown me once again, it is not by my own strength or by trusting in people, but in trusting God our Father, My Hero. I can be weak and scared and vulnerable because He is strong and stable and constant. He knows – every detail of the break-in, every detail of each thief and their own lives, where every item was sold to, and He knows the heart behind EVERY single person who has donated to help support our security.
I am moved to those warm, salty tears – but not of sorrow. Rather of surprise, blessing, and joy. Oceans of it!
