A Certain Strangling

      I have lost my voice. Spiritually, I mean. I intended to spend 2013 writing and contemplating voice, in order to regain the part of my own voice that has weakened and been lost.  This did not happen, however, and I can’t say why, though I can talk a little about what has happened to it. When I was younger, in my first few years of college, those truly, purely idealistic years, I took a risk. At the time, I believed that God wanted me to take my voice to the ends of the earth, and to recount his story of love to those who had never heard it. But when I tried to do this, when I embarked on a big, scary overseas adventure, I found that the journey was too hard, the task too large, and I failed. I discovered that I lacked the courage to live boldly every day.

            Since that time, that tragic moment of epic failure, over seven years ago, I have been walking under a sky of shame, and the weather does not change. This is important in our conversation about voice, because it was shame that silenced me. It hushed the part of my voice that spoke boldly, that took risks and chose adventure. I am trying now, after all this time, to release some of that feeling of shame. It is hard, sometimes, for me to be gracious with myself. But God is gracious, more gracious than I understand.

            I was recently describing my feelings of condemnation toward myself, and the judgment I feel emanating from God, when someone wise spoke to me and said, “No, God is kinder than this.” And, “You need to show yourself more grace.” She doesn’t know, of course, that I desperately want to feel permitted to show myself more grace. I want to be kinder to myself, but I feel that I don’t deserve it. Such kindness is unwarranted, unearned. But that is the point of grace, isn’t it? It is never about what is deserved; grace gives, lavishly, what is most needed.

            I need to feel this grace extended to me, from me, because God’s grace in this same matter is already given. Sometimes, I can see the light of grace falling from his open hands: little golden daffodils of grace wholly gratuitous. I’m going to climb inside one of those glowing yellow cups and sit a while.

            Essentially, to regain my voice, I need to remove my hands from around my own neck, until my face is no longer blue and my eyes sink back into their sockets.  

“And the ransomed of the LORD shall

            return

     and come to Zion with singing;

everlasting joy shall be upon their heads;

     they shall obtain gladness and joy,

     and sorrow and sighing shall flee

             away.”