Equate this!

I just traveled across the land to be right here-in this bed-snug in the hills of Pennsylvania. I woke up this morning with a cramp in my lower back. It had nothing to do with driving home today but everything to do with a math test that decides if I will graduate or not. It was wake up, pack the car, take the test, and then drive home. While I was cramming the last bit of formulas into my non-absorbent mind, all I could do was pray that God implanted the multiple choice answers into my brain instead of those wary formulas and percentages that kept eluding me. A, B, C, C, D, A, I can remember. But a-bx=34y to the tenth power is something that doesn't quite stick to my brain cells the way letters do... Regardless, I felt like I bombed the test. Each of the ten hours driving from the Springs to good ol' PA were like stepping out of a chilly day into a warm one... like walking across the pages of a boring book and right into those of my favorite book ever. Maybe it was 11 hours to get home (because I had to go the speed limit because I don't have a license... but that's another story all together), all the while I was claiming God as my God, my strength in my weakness. You know that feeling when you're nearing home. I get it every single time. The stores start to look familiar. The roads and turns are an imprint in your head, and for all the messed up stuff that can happen in a life... for all the confusion that goes with growing up, at least your home town is the same old same old... at least there is some kind of truth there. I really felt that tonight. Driving past the ball field across from our neighborhood pizza joint, meandering up my driveway; it all felt so good. So good I can't imagine a test score every dragging me down. Ah, home. I don't think I'll wake up with a knot in my back here.

to the limit

Today I finally finished intermediate Algebra. It sounds so lame, I know, but it took me MONTHS to get here. Tomorrow is the grand finale. THE TEST. Dear God, help me to knock this one out of the ball park.

Girl with the Red Balloon

Check out my new and upcoming site, Girl with the Red Balloon at http://blog.crystalcheatham.com
As soon as I get the page up and running it'll be my new home. Check it out and let me know what you think peoples.

God of the Angel Armies, do you hear us?

For those of you who don't know I work for a Baptist church as their music minister. The title sounds larger than the job, it's just me and Jane (my guitar). Yesterday on the way to the gym I got a phone call. The pastor's wife was in tears. She is a spirited woman, at first I didn't think it would be such an impacting call. It didn't take long for me to register her tones as inflections of grief. And the words that then followed have in fact followed me all day long.

There is a little boy. And Sunday we all giggled inside at his innocence as he scrambled like a wee little soldier up and down the isles on his belly, clutching crayons and peaking out from underneath the pews as we all sat respectfully trying not to ignore the pastor. But it wasn't too hard even for the the Pastor and we all started watching that little boy.

Tuesday night he was tucked into his bed. For some reason he got up, put his shoes on, and slipped out the front door. That precious little boy was hit by a truck and killed. And I think, why? How? Where did THAT come from?

I'm singing at his funeral on Sabbath. He was only three. His family was always at church. And all I can say, as I pout about my life and my needs is why, how, and where did that come from.

My, Faith

My creativity is a worn and dotted line. It’s been stretched out across my life span.
And although it’s been drawn poorly I still aim to use it—possibly to tie up some running shoes; the kind that win marathons and scale tall buildings in leaps so clean and tidy. I aim to use it as a rope; a strong climbers rope snaked through a pulley and hoisting all that weight in muscle and bone. I aim to use it as a wire run across a land so vast no eye has yet to see both coasts; a wire used to communicate messages to far off other lives and lands and worlds and places.
And yet, through all this aiming my wire is still a thin and dotted weakling; a spattering of line and blank page. But I cannot bother with that truth. Because as soon as I start to bother with it another truth is thrust up against it so crisp and towering-huge. This truth gives my faith leave to grow. Because when He is the dot and the stretch between my weakly spattered line, then my line becomes His line. And His line is not a line at all but a lace, a rope, and a wire.

the summer

this sumer

Oh Gravity

There's that song by Switchfoot. Actually they dedicated an entire album to it. "Oh, Gravity!"
They sing, "Why this tragedy? Why can't we seem to keep it together?
Oh! Gravity. Why can't we we seem to pull it together?"
In my haste to grow up I forgot the main ingredient in forming the adult version of my dreams. I most surely forgot to include reality. Reality is hard. But when you're free falling from the hype of a dream, the knowing that reality would come up quick and smack me in the face would have been a lot more comforting than the not knowing.
"In the fallout, the fallout. We found out the hype won't get you through. We're connected, connected. I meant it, the hype won't get you through."
I think that without reality we are subject to the tricks our ego's play on us. How do we bloom? How do we grow, of we are constantly being fed on the sugar substance of our ego's and not the whole wheatey-ness of reality?
"Oh gravity, Why can't week seem to keep it together?"
I was born a dreamer. I'm good at dreaming, at believing in the impossible. But all of that hasn't really gotten me where I want to be. I guess now it's time to be an expert at the hard and gritty stuff of life. Now it's time to work myself out of this mess I got into. It's ok. I'm not losing myself. I'm finding where my feet meet earth, so I can run and jump and not tumble on the moon. I guess gravity is a good thing... Oh gravity...

Loneliness

There is an old man who sits at my doorstep. I know him by the name of Loneliness. He sauntered onto my stoop one day and I’ve watched him from my window since. I sit, with a warm drink by my knee on the sill and let my keen eye wonder over his solitude. He sits quite comfortably over there between the brick of the step and the weeds of the flowerbed. I am most attentive as he picks at the scab by his elbow. I lean in closely as he rummages through the contents of his many, filth stained bags. I ache to know the contents of those bags. I watch this greedy man who goes by the name of Loneliness, and I never shew him away. When neighbors come to knock on my door, bubbling over with stories, news, and the happenings of life, Loneliness greets them. And I watch from beyond my window, shades lightly drawn, and peak between the blinds, as friend and foe interface. He guards his bags as if they were to take them. Although I’m sure my visitors would never try to touch those disgusting things. And after the new comer has scarcely a chance to grace the wood of my door with the skins of their knuckles, Loneliness stands in the way with his glassy eyed gaze, and oil slicked hair, turning a cold shoulder to their warmth. My eyes grow big because I ache for my friends to push past Loneliness, come in, and tell me what’s on their mind. But it is Loneliness who tells them to go away. I want for them to try just a little harder, but it’s Loneliness whom they’ve encountered. Having been spurned by his brute manner they hurry off to appointments less vexing than me and my smelly door man. I do not yell for their return. My hand does not leave the handle of my warm mug to bang fervently against the window pain. I do not rush towards the door to shew away the vagrant—this loitering lunatic—to call back my retreating friend. No. Instead my eyes flit from their departing steps. My senses are filled once again with the rustle of Loneliness rummaging through his bags. I watch as he picks at his scab, as he plays with a weed by his shin, as he turns lazily to grin with a broken smile at me with my legs drawn up and my warm cup of tea in my window seat.

just go

"Goodness. What do we have here?” she said as she gazed across the water. “Looks like I might be pointed and headed in a direction. All the discussions sound about right. The feeling is promising. The motives are properly supported... All I need now, is time."
She licked her finger, sliding it upwards into the clear blue sky. "I see the wind is nice and strong, for the sails. How convenient that it's pointing towards my planned destination. I have provisions enough for the trip. I believe all I need now is to commit and see it through..."

Withdrawing her hand from the sky she slipped it into the drawstring of her bag, gingerly stepped off the swaying dock and into the gently bobbing boat. "Are you afraid?" Her heart asked her mind. "No," the mind replied, "Father is with us.

Oh 24

It takes courage to be the person God wants you to be. It takes more than words can sum up. I've been around some 23 years. I'm knocking on the 24th. I'm disgusted. A little let down. But not disheartened to say that I'm not the best me I could be. I haven't given my all. I could try harder. It just takes courage. Oh 24. It's time to try again.

Family

They see stars

Mothers do

And some Brothers too

Like Father’s were taught to do

They see higher than mundane

They reach farther than Naysayers claim

They see stars

And the stars are written in their pours and framed in their lashes.

They are hopers they are dreamers. They are free and dance between the gravity.

They are ambitionists and willers and the stars are what come out when they pray

And time is no adversary

Failure is merrily an aid

They are super-dupers with the world laid out at their finger tips

Ah they see stars.

And those without stars upon thars

Those Naysayers and What-if Maybe-ers

Are probably right in their on right

But the reality of the matter is caught up in dreams

For they are firm in a foundation of a higher Reality

And their belly buttons are on cloud nine

And their minds are at one with the stars

They simply cannot fight the urge to strive

And see color where Naysayers see grey

For it is written in the constellations and beyond

That those mothers and brothers and lost fathers and daughters will dream and shine and reach and glow

You cannot stop them

It will always be true

That they see stars when they look out. And stars when they look back.

They see stars

homin shpringin

Ah Spring BREAK!
It always surprises me how great it feels to be home.

Emanuel

If God is love I assume that when we show love to one another we open a pathway for God to intercede in our lives. It is a bridge. A vein, however thin it might be, stretched between two solid beings. That's all he needs to be the blood pumping through and thus proving the world around that much more His than the Other Side's. God is love. Through our actions in the most dire situations we are vessels: we are creator's just like him in that we choose to create these veins. "Emanuel." That is what we call Him. "God with us."

we stray so far from eden

It's hard on your mind to believe that catastrophe is right around the corner.
What am I so afraid of?
I used to believe that doom was waiting for me, but I realize that I don't have to be afraid. It's just life. My only regret is that we don't get to live this twice. Only one time through so catch the peep show now. It's literally do or die.
So now that I'm set on doing instead of cowering... or measuring out my days with the relativity of time, I think I'm pealing off the layers of scared and stepping out my window legs and ass first. Or maybe shoulders and arms first. One never knows with these things. After all it's just life.

I used to think that I had to be farther along in my success by now, or that there was a special trick you had to pull to make it all come together. I used to think that success came with straining life through a purifier. But you can't strain life. You don't get to sift through it and find all the goodness and keep it for yourself. Life isn't a skittles bag... if it were I'd only eat red. But I guess it's all there. The success, the pain, the crappy beginnings (like living in BS town).

we stray so far from eden. i guess that's why he came back for us. so that we could put him in our pockets and carry him around. i think i'm ready. to carry him around. who'da thought it would all be so portable... haha...

whose a bean?

To my SupaDoopa,

Although I try to be a coffee bean... sometimes I feel like a carrot. And with other things I've often fought not to be an egg...
But what matters most is probably my inability to change the process of being boiled. Because life is doled out in seasons. It roles, it takes effect, and those chemical reactions are simply that; chemical.
I guess what I'm trying to say is
I understand the adversity will come. I know we each have our time. I believe that I'm in a valley, and might complain at the distance, the terrain, the lack of scenery, or just the length of time passing.
But as long as I have choice- which is the unconditional element in this chemical reaction -I can make my carrot faze or my egg-like haze
into coffeeee
strong, aromatic, coffee.

Thanks for the story. I almost didn't read it ;)

life in the raw

only yesterday i lived life in the hypothetical; life, if you will, in the assumed position.
today that all has stopped. i'm back to the center; the center, if you will, of my me
humbled to be level headed, again.
without extremes, if's, and's, but's, or supposedly so's.
just life in the raw.
my defenses were blown away.
what's left is fragile.
not quite up for the battle, but willing to see it through
it's good, life that is. it's good and some of it's bad
but that's ok too.
life in the hypothetical was yesterdays news
and now.
now i'm back to living.
just me and my me in the unassumed position.

ashes ashes

ring around the roses
pocket full of posies
ashes ashes
we all fall down

i'm a wimp

just happy

Have you ever felt like God gave you a gift? I feel that way. Like he set it up in my path ages ago and I've just come around to realizing I wanted it. I can't help thinking, "Ask and you shall receive. Knock and the door will open. Seek and you will find." I think that when God has put something in your path and he wants you to have it, you simply have to follow those three little steps. ask. seek. knock.
For the first time in my spiritual walk I can honestly say I connect with David on a new level. In the book of Psalms he's always going on and on about exalting God. He says even God's name is music to his ears. He loves to hear his name spoken.
I feel that way about God. Hearing other people say his name and their stories of trust in him makes me all tingly inside. It's like being in love. I've never experienced these feelings for God. But he's so beautiful to me. I love him. I really truly love him.
That love makes me think he can do anything with my life. Anything at all and I know I will be happy. He's in charge. I've never been so happy about not being in control.

live through this

Matthew 9:16-17
"No one sews a patch of unshrunk cloth on an old garment, for the patch will pull away from teh garment, making the tear worse. Neither do people pour new wine into old wineskins. If they do, the skins will burst; the wine will run out and the wineskins will be ruined. No, they pour new wine into new wineskins, and both are preserved."

the Stars
"Live through this, and you won't look back."
"When there's nothing left to burn, you have to set soul on fire."

Anne Sexton
"My faith is a thin wire"

Dido
"Have you got it in you?"

Anis
"Shake the dust."

Me
"To be movers and shakers, we have to light up the darkness."

little celebration

Today I learned that I might be getting a distribution deal for my CD. If everything goes smoothly If I Fall will be sold along with my devotional in ABC stores nationwide. Can I get an amen? It's as if a little beam of Son grabbed a machete and hacked it's way through those looming storm clouds hovering over my life. All I needed was a little mustard seed sized portion of Son to get me through. *Ah, I will get there.