A Mirror

He was tired. Bone-deep, soul weary. We didn't know it then, but he was only a month away from meeting Jesus face-to-face. He would say, "This old tent is fading, Ab." The scriptural reference poured out of his mouth as a matter of fact declaration, but he was feeling it in his body. Yet, he sat across the table from me. Pouring, investing his fading-tent-self into me. I, the heartbroken, lost daughter...he, the physically broken but joyfully and deeply secure father. That year we went on so many father-daughter dates, but this would be our last as I tried to capture memories and grasp at fleeting moments. 

When I think of lavish love, I think of that night. He was in so much pain, but he sat and listened to me and so tenderly responded to my heart. He could have allowed himself to be consumed by his reality...the intense pain of cancer, the unknown of the death to come, concern over the family he was leaving behind. He just listened, though, as his teenage daughter rambled and poured out her heart. In his gift of presence, he loved me so well...and gave me a picture of the tender but fierce love of God. 

Sometimes I long for that earthly picture of love...for the tight embrace, the soft words of encouragement, and the intentional togetherness. I remind myself that for now I only "see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part, then I shall know fully, even as I have been fully known" (1Corinthians 13:12). 

Have you ever been fully known? Deeply, intimately, known? Do you long for that? Even the tender, lavish love my dad poured out on me as he took the time and space to KNOW my heart...even that was but a dim reflection of the kind of deep, all-knowing and yet fiercely protecting kind of love God has for you and for me. While I sometimes wish for the earthly picture, I LONG for the day when I will be FULLY KNOWN and FULLY LOVED. We all long for that, don't we?! To be bare and exposed but loved anyway. 

On days when I wish so much that I could be wrapped up in the kind of love my dad gave me a glimpse of, I press into the uncomfortableness of this reality we live in...the in-between, the gap from now to then. I try to look into the dim mirror, and I tell Jesus just how much I long for the day when that mirror will be shattered and I will KNOW fully and be bare, exposed, and fully KNOWN before my tender hearted, fiercely loving God. It is coming, friends. And what a day that will be.