And he's been waiting on my return to load the shingles with icing and guard the doors with candy canes.

It takes a thick stew of Guts & Grace to describe the way my footsteps took to falling as I walked away from God.

As I slammed the door. As I crumbled & crawled & kept my head down so that He would not see me go. Mumbled words of hesitation beneath my breath, "Please don't follow. Just let me go."

It's a dance we've done for ages and He knows my footwork well. Knows that I bruise so easy. Knows that I frustrate when I cannot see His plans & all the things He has for me.

And if you ask me one question about this God & I, I will tell you true: God has always had to pour out big ol' carafes of assurance out upon me. Assurance that I am His. That I am loved. That I am needed. Of all things, I have doubted these the most--that He would create me with purpose. That He could love me vastly, openly, always. Always. Always.

We construct God out of the things we know to be true of humans.

So He becomes a conditional lover. He becomes a gossip among angels. He strikes tallies against us on chalkboard in the sky. He rips the winged petals of daisies off, "I love you, I LOVE YOU NOT..."

We dumb Him down. We dress Him in doubt. We cloak Godly shoulders with an accent of judgment and we depict an Angry Being perched in the clouds, throwing down thunderbolts and clomping all over the bar scene yelling, "SINNNNERRRRSSSSSSS."

He's the dude that ruins the party. He thinks less of us already. He holds his measuring stick high to our chins and whispers, "Just try, if you want. You've already fallen from grace in my eyes."

He is the wrath of Leviticus. And some angry Triton of a merman that commands floods to the nations. And He points fingers & names names. And we throw up hands & curl in corners & fold head in hands because this God never fit us. & this God failed the already failed ones.

Hitchhiking. That's what we do.

We pack up and flee away from truth. Away from light. And we say ourselves to be "searching." To be figuring things out. To be in a quiet state of limbo where we ask Big Questions as we seek a more peaceful, more easygoing God. One who fits in our back pockets. And is always singing. And has no real power because surely we feel the need to govern all of that. We've given up that control before and we don't plan to do it again. For we steer better. We own our dreams better. We are better keepers of the emptiness. We have known this emptiness within us all the days of our lives and we'd rather be the keepers. The keepers & the key keepers.

And as I guard the emptiness, a verse unravels the edges of me. Like fray sunk deep in the blue of my jeans. "Be still. Be still. Be still. And know that I am God."

A verse so overdone. A verse gone word vomit to the Christian soul. A verse that has brought millions of dollars into the coffee cup & bookmark industry. A verse that never stilled me to be still until now. & and I lift up my hands and shoot back, "You got anything better God? Anything better than that?"

My God, he speaks like licorice. Like gumdrops. Like adornments to a house He built me on yesterday. & He has been waiting on my return to Him to load the shingles with icing & guard the doors with candy canes:

"Be still. Don't move. Stay quiet. Lay like the dead ones.  Let go, let go, let go. Of your worry. Your hesitation. Your little thoughts of me. Your desperation. The tears you clung to yesterday. Your loathing in the little mirror. Put them down. Walk away. Calm your spirit.

And know that I am God. And that you've gotten me all wrong. And you've listened to too many. And you've judged me & labeled me & sized up too small. And all of it is fine because I love you tenfold to the love I gave you yesterday.

But know me... Not what your brother said of me. Not what your mama quoted. But of what you learn and find of me when you travel back to the place we used to stand. I'll meet you there. I never left. With your hands in your pockets and your feet fidgeting, I'll tell you what I've told you since the moment I claimed you as my own. I love you. I love you. And it has always been my plan, for all the days of your intricate little life, to get you to believe me. Believe me, and nothing else."