I am twisted words
A life of falling
Falling to be faster
Bowing to be higher
Weeping to be happy
Repentance
An expectation of the divine
Humanity's gift
When I twist words, they become me
When others twist words, they bend me to believe
To break me
When He untwists words, I become them
Reclaiming their worth
Removing their shame
Regaining their purpose
Selfish—
I pray in isolation
Prayers warped by entitlement
Blinded by the thick dark lens of me
The unholy trinity: me, myself, and I
Now and forever…
But “I” turns to “us” in a moment of illumination
We the people
For the people
All
The
People
I in them and they in me
And we are all together
(goo goo g’joob)
My breath is for us now
I can fight for us now
I can cry for us now
I can break for us now
Guilty—
Isolated words, literally read
Twisted to induce a guilt coma
Moral code used like a skillful fencer
To pierce our hearts with shame
I am creature
Creature thoughts are my way
Causing pain to others
To myself
But I am renewed like a psalm
Ebb and flow of hate and love
Judgement and mercy
Pride and humility
Catching glimpses of God in the high things
Giving me eyes to see clearly
And endure my base life in joy
Sinful—
Darkest dark
All light to illumine, absorbed
Dividing time and space
Tricking me to believe
That was then, this is now
Used by the sick and twisted
To instil fear
To gain control
To make money
Lost in translation
My shirt label now reads
Missing the mark
I am wearing this shirt thin
Me and my bro St. Paul
Self-proclaimed “chief of sinners”
We are in good company
As we do not do what we will to do
Weekly
Daily
Hourly
Lost—
I use “the day I was saved” to make black and white the grey areas of the continuum
I use “the hour I first believed” to make “us and them” judgements and criticisms
My need
For a Saviour
Hasn’t changed
Repentance is the cozy armchair I can rest in
Communing with the Creator of the Universe
Forever there
Calling me home
Becoming more comfortable as time shapes me to its cushions
Prideful—
Humility’s long-standing rival
Archenemies through the ages
Pride: adorned with heavy armour
Glinting in the spotlight
Fighting its nemesis at every turn
Humility: donning a sackcloth cape
Ashes as war paint
Clearing the path to repentance
Disguised as silence in Pilate’s trial
Healing a mother’s daughter with scraps meant for dogs
Seeing The Baptist exit, stage left
I bow low before the mighty weak that have gone before
As I hear in the distance
The publican beat his breast
Unworthy—
Feeling like the backhand of God
Calling out bad things
From bad people
Used like a slave master’s whip
Reminders cracking in my ears
You will never amount
You will always be wanting
A backpack to carry our shame
But tables turned!
Salvation is in the house of Zacchaeus
Overwhelmed by grace
Exorbitant!
Overwhelmed by forgiveness
Disproportionate!
Overwhelmed by love
I can hardly breathe!
Too much good to handle
Unworthy!
I am twisted words
A life of falling
Falling to be faster
Bowing to be higher
Weeping to be happy
Repentance
An expectation of the divine
Humanity's gift
———
Reading my morning and evening OCA prayers brought up a ton of issues around daily confessing my sinfulness, unworthiness, etc. Yet in all the saints I’ve read about they had no problem with these words. So I continued to read them instead of my former evangelical pick-and-choose-only-the-ones-
I saw that:
- The prayers and psalms are cyclical in nature starting in a place of repentance and ending with God’s goodness.
- I could connect to the time and place when I first recognized my need for Christ—I still need him the same.
- My prayers are not individual but include humanity and the human condition can easily bring me to a place of repentance
- Sin (or sinner) is better translated as having missed the mark—something easily and daily done.
- Being unworthy does not mean I am bad but humbled in the presence of a God who loves and cares for me more than I handle.
- Humility is the reversal of the first sin of pride. (Jesus at his trial. Canaanite woman “even the dogs”. Zacchaeus story)
I think that section is very important and have similar ways of processing it.
At first, I found St. Basil’s prayer of preparation a bit cringe-worthy (through old eyes of shame),
but eventually was surprised to have trouble getting through it without touching deep emotions that felt healthy and healing nearly every time.
It feels like gratitude for the great grace that we’ve been given–similar to what we would expect of the thief, the prodigal, the woman at Jesus’ feet, etc.
I also saw how the rhetoric of it works: the emphasis is on helping people understand that absolutely no one can say, “this isn’t for me.”
That is, Basil’s prayer isn’t about emphasizing how shitty we are, but rather, declaring that there’s simply no shit you can imagine that he can’t wash.