For Rachel, With Wonder

It is a busy time right now, so I have dropped, temporarily, down to one post a week.

Today I wanted to share a poem I wrote for my beloved Rachel. My first marriage was very hard, though it lasted over 25 years. However, the problems we had ended up by breaking me and in my broken state I did some bad things. Even after we separated, I didn’t get better, though I tried. Unfortunately, I made some bad decisions in my quest for health and ended up in a very bad place indeed.

God, though, is gracious above all. He made there a place and time for me to return to Him. A time of retreat and re-building. A time of re-discovery and forgiveness.

Then I returned home to England. I knew I was forgiven and right with God, but there was still this millstone around my neck and I didn’t know how people would accept me, and especially whether I would ever be able to be in a relationship again. That is, until I met Rachel. I knew early on there was an attraction and interest between us, but there was also my past. So, before we began “dating” I took her out for dinner and, in a small, deserted restaurant, laid out all of my most shameful secrets.

I feared not so much that she would get angry or walk out–I already knew her well enough to know she would not do that–but that she would simply decide I was too much danger or work and that she would end any hope of anything more than friendship. She didn’t. She accepted all that I told her, shared some of her own painful story, and we have since enjoyed four years of the most amazing bliss!

Not long after that meal, I wrote this poem for her. It is still just as true today as it was then, if not more so. Who knew life could be so very wonderful. God has given back far more than I could have asked or than I deserve!

Note: For those who do not know, Rachel means “lamb”, which explains one of the lines.

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In the quiet of our aloneness,

In fear and trepidation,

I opened up my treasury and offered you a gift

Of my darkness, my shame, and my sin.

 

Yet graciously you accepted them,

Taking them in loving hands,

And in the crucible of your heart

You transformed them, miraculously,

Into something precious.

 

What wondrous alchemy is this,

That transforms not only the gift, but the giver?

For I am, indeed, changed:

Set free from chains I hardly knew,

Soaring now in giddy flight!

 

But not for long.

For no sooner am I freed by your grace

Than I am captured again

By your love.

Yet how different is this captivity!

Trapped in the softness of your web

I could lie forever,

Contented.

 

You are magic and magician,

A pure lamb,

So small, yet so strong.

Beautiful to look at,

Yet more beautiful still within.

 

I marvel at the Grace that has brought me here,

And I know that I can never repay

A debt so great…

 

But I will die trying.