Like a good many bloggers I have taken quite a long break from writing. No excuses, just haven’t felt it. I’m back now. And to start off my “backness” I am posting this piece written on FaceBook by my close Friend, Ann. I will write a followup on my next post. There is a lot swirling in my mind and fingers about this beautifully written truth.
Enjoy.
Cate B
Ann Lehman
If you grew up “plain” like I did, you know that there were many forbidden colors. In our world, colors were not all created by God. There were many worldly, sinful colors. And very few holy colors. There was an extreme black and white view of God and scripture. The following is a verbal processing, if you will, of the dismantling of that system for me. It’s an unapologetic declaration of freedom. And I’m letting that freedom ring for whoever else needs to hear it.
All of my life I have been told
There’s a left and a right.
There’s a black and a white.
No brilliant colors, no gray.
Not all colors are equal.
Not all colors are legal.
And wearing all the colors
Is what the ungodly do.
Surely the color scarlet
Is the symbol of the harlot.
And purple mocks Jesus
The way the soldiers did.
White is only for Sundays
On the only days we are pure.
Only the dark, the somber,
The muted, the plain
Only these evidence the humility
Required from Gods chosen.
Wearing light, bright colors,
Surely show hearts, full
Of deadly pride and poison.
I tried to wear them
These black and white lenses
That religion required.
But they tripped me up.
I fell flat on my face
In the filthy muck
Of suffocating shame
Of never measuring up.
They blinded my eyes
To the crimson scandal
Of GRACE that flows wild
Over the black and white
And changes it all
To rainbows of living color.
There’s black and white, true.
No denying.
But there’s a million more hues
Created by the One who spoke
The universe into motion.
Exuberantly breathed to life
Every color under the sun
And declared in full confidence:
IT IS GOOD!
So why should I try
To paint over it all
With black and white
And distort the glory
And living colors
Of the greatest love story?
Religion, take back your distorted lenses!
I don’t need them anymore.
Love healed these blind eyes
Now I see GRACE, a scarlet tide
Now I live found in full color.
In breathtaking, swirling hues of
Extravagant Love that lives
And breathes and flows
Alive and well and restoring
The black places of my soul
Where religion stole
Color, beauty, and innocence.
So let the River flow
Until it is all returned
To the way You intended.
Let's Have Another Piece of Pie 