My hands drift softly over the keyboard and sing their siren song, a sweep whisper which lulls me to wakefulness, holding my eyes open as if with sharp-nailed fingers.  My eyes burn softly, a familiar sensation, and I measure my breathing to keep from waking my roommate on the other side of the room.  I miss this, this ability to close my eyes and just let my fingers flow outward, effortlessly weaving a tapestry of words.  Sometimes I wonder why I stopped writing, and I think it was hubris.  I lost myself in my eyes, and I lost sight of the rest of me, of the rest of the world as I stared like Narcissus into soft orbs of dark brown which glowed of their own accord, entrancing me.  But this time I need to close my eyes.  This time around, I need to see.

            That was something that came to me the other day, which I have been meaning to put into words so that I could share it.  I was in church, and the pastor began praying.  Of course, the entire congregation closed their eyes, closed themselves off to the outside world, lulled into a sense of religious passion by the low lights and soft music and warm lullaby of Mark’s voice.  They closed their eyes, and I left mine open.  Or, maybe I closed them and then opened them back up.  I guess that I’m less susceptible to low lights and soft music, or maybe I’m just more jaded.  The reason doesn’t matter, but my thoughts do.

            I looked around, and I whispered in my mind, “All these people, sitting around with their eyes closed, staring into darkness, blind to the world around them.  They are closed off and unseeing, and here I sit, observing them.  Here I sit, seeing when they are blind.”  And, yet, something didn’t feel right.  The contrary point wiggled into my head.  “But they do see, dear friend,” it cooed gently and lovingly.  “They see something that you don’t, something so beautiful, and it’s right there, on the backs of their eyelids.  Close your eyes, child, and see if you can see it, too, on the back of your own eyelids.”  And I did.  And I did.

            You see, that’s why we close our eyes, I realised.  When we pray, we close out the world, and there, in the darkness, we see so much light, so much beauty.  It’s like fireworks on our eyelids and in our hearts, warming us and keeping us warm, and in those moments, we know that only from Him can peace come, can grace come, can love truly come.  Speaking of those abstracts, I should speak of another matter which has been often on my heart as of late.  There is a man, his name is John or JK, and I want anyone who reads this to pray for him.  He is a college evangelist, and I have seen him here at FSU a number of times since the beginning of the academic year last semester.  He was my first encounter with such people, and I saw him again today.

            The thing about John is that he is an honest man, a good man, a Godly man.  I need only look into his eyes to see a peculiar light, which I know to be the light of God within him, and it confuses me, I guess.  This man is very kind and warm when you are a Christian and are kind to him, but when he is surrounded by a crowd of what he sees as heathen enemies, he becomes dark and angry, screaming at them about God’s hatred.  It is not that he is wrong; God will condemn those who abuse the gift that is their life and do not wholly and truly repent.  However, his message should be that of James in 1 James, that God is love, and that we, as Christians, are love.  He claimed that Christ’s message was to love merely other Christians, which, so far as I can tell through textual parallels, is not the case, and yet how can I show these parallels to this man who will not listen?  And, yet, how can I not rise up against him, who is, in some ways, a friend?  He is mislead, I believe, but he wishes to do right.  And, furthermore, he will not listen, so what am I to do?

            I know what Christ tells me.  I am to love him and to pray for him and to teach him if I can.  And I do, and I am.  Perhaps I was led to this man for a reason; perhaps I can show him the side of God that is love so that I may temper him.  Perhaps many things will happen, but I must be driven to movement first.  And, thus, pray for me, too.  Pray that I may be the Lord’s instrument in Guatemala, that I may dig out the infection like a sharp-bladed scalpel guided by the skilled hand of a physician, or, in this case, a Physician.  Funny how we capitalise regular words when they apply to God, eh?  Well, at least I think it’s funny.

            I love any who reads this.  I don’t care who they are.  I pray to the Lord that He may show me my path.