Friday night was spent at Via Crucis.... a wonderful artistic interactive "stations of the cross" experience in preparation for Good Friday. Each station was built around using different senses (sight, sound, touch, smell) to allow people to meditate in a different way the Way of the Cross. I was impressed by the quality of artists and musicians who have connected with Vineyard Central and the ways in which they use their giftings to share spiritual concepts and truths.

My life is rich!

I had the opportunity to pray with people taking communion during the last few hours of Via Crucis. Most of these people were unknown to me. I love this chance for God to show up, because when I pray something that really resonates for them, they know that it is from God and not my human intuition or wisdom.

This is the series of poems on Myrrh that I've been working on. Myrrh=suffering.

Myrrh I
The mountain of myrrh: heights of passion that rise with deep suffering.
This passion crushed
releases the sweetest scent.
The scent of suffering
draws the lover.
The Beloved One is enticed
by the fragrance of sacrifice.
He is drawn to the one
who has chosen to be like him,
to wear suffering deep in her heart.
He has been so alone on the mountain.
He has felt forsaken by all.
No one has journeyed to this place –
they were afraid of the heights, afraid of the pain.
The Beloved One is the only one
who has gone his way to
follow the will of the Father.

But now she wears the
bundle of myrrh between her breasts.
In the dark night of death
when her faith is tested,
each submission of her will,
though imperfect and weak,
still releases a tiny scent of suffering
and draws him to rest there.

-Kendra Barrow, 2/28/04

Myrrh II
This is my bottle of perfume,
this is my box of myrrh
that I throw at your feet to be broken open….
my desires, my grief, my lack, my incompleteness
(each day, over and over).

Rise! Rise up, Perfume of my Suffering!
Rise up to the face of
my Beloved.
O Myrrh – give my Beloved this message:
I am willing
to go my way to the mountain of death.

-Kendra Barrow, 2/29/04

Myrrh III
I’m the candle that is burning;
I’m the myrrh that has been crushed.
Even in my weakness,
The very Flame of God
has torched my impurities.
They’re burning away:
my selfishness, my pride, my
domineering spirit, my wants and my
needs.

Beautiful Flame, come and burn
away all my life that’s less
than glory.
Remove the impure so that
only love remains.
Remove the scent of my will so that
only myrrh remains.

-Kendra Barrow, 3/16/04

As I've written about before, I've been in a season of suffering. The suffering mostly comes from the pressure at work and how that affects my mental, emotional being and my marriage, my home, etc. I've also been trying to start seeds for my garden in the basement. As the Lord often does, he gave me a planting metaphor to apply to my current situation.

Some seeds require light to germinate, but some require darkness.

Interpretation: the seeds are the things that God wants to grow in my heart: maturity, patience, faithfulness, etc. Some of these seeds require God's presence, the Light, in big doses. As I am exposed to Him, I am awakened within, I experience new possibilities and am given inspiration that I never had before.

But some of these seeds, like patience, require trial and suffering. The seed requires darkness, the experience of feeling like God's presence is hidden from me, in order to produce an environment that really gives patience an opportunity to grow!

I was reading in "The Purpose Driven Life" this morning and it reinforced this same idea. Rick Warren says that "temptation provides the choice" to do the right thing and that God can develop the good seeds in us by allowing us to "experience circumstances in which [we're] tempted to express the exact opposite quality."

It is these glimpses of God's purpose, of the Truth, that make me commit in my heart to stay faithful in the moments of testing and to choose to praise Him.