His Delight

When I showed up for church this morning, I was wearing my jeans with holes and not feeling particularly holy.  I woke up with a big zit on my face, and because I'm a picker, I popped it first thing. I mean...some things can't be left alone,  even if you haven't had your coffee, right?  Of course it would be a bleeder so I stuck a piece of toilet paper to it and let it stay while I tended to other business, like trying to tame my hair, for instance.

Some people might not appreciate a wife with a bloody tissue stuck to her face as she sucks down two cups of coffee then begs for a kiss.  Not my Shoulders.  He kissed me and held me and looked me straight in the eye as if I'd never slept on my eyebrows wrong.  He is a brave man.

He's leaving see.  He needs to look beyond my painfully slow starter-ness, and he needs to inhale, fully, my coffee breath: slight scent of frankincense essential oil because it's working on the pre-cancerous spot on my face.  (It's the one that makes me smell like a Christmas tree...or an entire forest as the Shoulders likes to say.)  Yes.  I am something in the morning.

I watch him pack the car and drive our brave and beautiful daughter down the lane and out of sight.  A working road trip, and I don't know whose going to enjoy it more.  The father, my Shoulders, or my girl who brings out the best in her daddy.

We've had so many of these goodbyes.

That's why I was surprised when I showed up at church today and saw the Lord.  It was such a regular morning, right?  I stood in worship surrounded by my three mountainous sons.  (Oh, Thank You Lord, for this brief opportunity to feel tiny again.)  I slipped my shoes off because I hurt my foot water skiing, and my shoe was too tight.  Boy, am I glad I did.

I can't even remember the song we were singing, but suddenly I was standing on holy ground.

I tipped my head back a bit.  Took a deep breath, and...

Saw the Lord.

He smiled at me and said to my spirit, "Well THERE you are!"

(If you think Jesus doesn't know that you miss church to go on vacation, you're wrong, even if you had church every single day out on the water.)

My face split in half because I could see that He was happy to see me.

Jesus.  Was.  Delighted.  To.  See.  Me.

Jeans full of holes.  Life full of holes.

Needing Jesus.  Needing Jesus.  Needing Jesus.

I remember when I first started reading the Word as a woman saved by grace.  Finally,  I knew the author of my Bible personally, and it began to make sense.  When I read Zephania 3:17, I couldn't breathe, and I read it a hundred times a day for months.  Maybe years.  (I still recite this verse hundreds of times to myself each year.)  This...seemed so impossible to me.  And yet, it is what I saw in the Lord's face today at church.  Despite me.  Despite morning me, and the Shoulders leaving for two weeks me, and the rush of the fall school schedule me.  Even so...

I saw His delight in me.

And friends, just go ahead and ask me what in all this world I want, and I will tell you plainly...

I want to see the Lord, and I want to see His delight.

 As for the rest?

Just so many holes in my jeans,

Bernadette

Zephania 3:17
THE LORD YOUR GOD IS WITH YOU, HE IS MIGHTY TO SAVE.  HE WILL TAKE GREAT DELIGHT IN YOU, HE WILL QUIET YOU WITH HIS LOVE, HE WILL REJOICE OVER YOU WITH SINGING.