You know how farmers say they know it's going to rain because they can feel it in their bones? I feel the same way about a post. Long before I ever get to the writing stage of a post, I can feel it in my bones. Very rarely do I show up to the blank canvas of my blog without knowing where I am going. I saw a quote recently that was perfect, " I write so that I can go back and read how I feel!" Writing for me is cathartic for my heart. Frustration, pain, fear, joy, love, elation, regret, can be swirling deep in my soul, and until I can use brush strokes of pregnant words to paint my Mona Lisa, I can be a bit constipated emotionally.
I used to begrudge the fact that I had no artistic ability; I cannot draw a straight line to save my life. When I shave the back of Mark's head he has to use a shoe string as visual for me so that he doesn't end up with the Rocky Mt. Peaks as a hair line. Stick figures are where my creativity ends with a pencil. Mark does the hanging and the decorating in our house, and I am one fantastic cheerleader. I avoided an Elementary Education degree because the bulletin boards scared the fool out of me. However, in recent years, through the encouragement of my family and friends, it has become abundantly clear to me that words are my art. The right side of my brain runs on all cylinders when I gently start walking down the road of writing.
Today's composition of words has been marinating in my bones for a very long time.
The multifaceted emotional and physical intimacy of married couples, can be compared to a complicated dance. We often might trip over other each other, stumble each other, step on each other's toes, dance completely different dances while being so unbelievably frustrated as to why our partner was dancing the Rumba while we danced the Waltz. We've been dropped during pivotal lifts, cried during the excruciating process of trying to find the right music to dance to, and sometimes during the course of a marriage, one or both partners might want to walk off the dance floor entirely.
Truth.
After nearly thirteen years, Mark and I still earnestly seek to learn and understand the great dance. We have never claimed to have the dance perfected or figured out in any way. We are still students in this great study.
However, through God's GREAT graciousness, there can be sweet connection on the dance floor. The moment when the music, the scenery, the costumes, the choreography, and the dance have unfolded into a beautiful artistic expression of marriage. As humans, our hearts cling to those dances.
In recent months, Mark and I have been learning about the spot light of the dance floor. Be it ignorance or intentional avoidance, our dance can be surrounded by mysterious and harmful darkness. The spot light can shine on only one dance at a time, and the spot light can be deceiving. You see, just because the spot light, lights up the dance of an intimate relationship; creeping in the unknown darkness is danger and shame so deep and so silent that it seeks to quietly devour any remnant of the sacred marriage bed.
Isaiah 9:2, "Those who have been walking in darkness have seen a great light!"
I think if there were a spread sheet tracking the most quoted verse in our home, it would be this verse.
Dancers have to remain in the spotlight in order to be perceived how they want to be perceived. They have to strategically and methodically make sure they don't step out of the tiny light. Satan seeks to keep couples and individuals in the spot light and away from the darkness. We strategically and methodically avoid going into the darkness of the past, present, and future struggle by convincing ourselves we are safe in the isolated sliver of light. We've bought the lie that a little bit of light in this area is enough. We only let the audience of our spouse and/or other onlookers, see what we want them to see while the darkness looms and waits to destroy.
Those who have been dancing along the edges of the spotlight have discovered that the entire ballroom can be lit up by a GREAT LIGHT, and darkness will flee and full exposure will reign. Isaiah 9:2 (NISV)
I'm tired of being in bondage to the spot light. I'm sad that our christian culture has deduced it's only rhetoric to "don't have sex before marriage, and if women would do their job-- men wouldn't struggle" as its' primary platform.
*Small Clause*
I am a firm believer in the importance of a woman's role when it comes to the marriage bed, as we talked about here nearly two years ago. But as I get older, I am more and more convinced that there MUST be a very tight balance here. Men, no woman on her best day, can compete with the internet or the Rolodex of images in your brain. No amount of intimacy from her can satisfy an addiction of your heart. Both individual people have to constantly keep in check their motivation for coming to the marital bed. And it must always come from a pure overflow of a deeper, emotional connection to one another and to our God.
*Clause Over*
I am tired of sexuality constantly being high jacked and perverted by people who are MORE than happy to talk about these issues on movie screens, TV shows, and pornographic websites and books. I get frustrated when struggle, brokenness, isolation, mistakes, adultery (of the heart and body) shame, masturbation, pornography, secrets and silence go completely ignored because it's uncomfortable, messy, and complicated.
I want those who have been walking in darkness to see the GREAT LIGHT! I want the ballroom of all things intimate to be blown up in the light department. I want 1000 watt, non environmentally friendly, bulbs setting homes, marriages, and individuals FREE! I want people to walk through the darkness and NOT around it anymore.
When we only live in the spot light that Satan has to offer, we are not really living. In a marriage, you are not really partaking of the beautiful intimate relationship we were meant to be enjoying, when we refuse to do the dirty work of addressing the darkness. Darkness so dark, you cannot see your hand in front of your face. Darkness so dark, there are moments, hours, days, months, you cannot see your beloved for who they are. Darkness so dark, you are sometimes convinced that darkness is all that exists. But please, my dearest readers, keep exploring, keep peeling back the darkness, find the light, expose the darkness, run it out of town, and be set free from the bondage of the spot light.
For when you enter a dance floor that is covered in the light of truth, you will a dance a dance you never knew existed. No reservations, no rules. No strategic lies or cover ups. And for the first time, you will dance a dance that is established by a melody of real freedom, real grace, real life, real intimacy, real marriage and real love.
Here's to finding your Great Light!
~Sara
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