Cathedrals of Deep Need

Have you ever walked into a space that made you feel so small? Not because someone was cruel to you or belittled you. But because the space is so big and glorious and in it you realize how small and weak you are. In a humbling and beautiful way.

Life is full of moments like this. But not always because we are in a big, glorious, beautiful space. Sometimes it is because we are put in a very lowly, needy place. 

A place so humbling, where you realize you have no control at all. 

Places like being stuck in the bathroom, gripping your stomach and staring blankly at the tile floor. You have no choice but to sit still and pray. Letting your body do what it will as it reacts to a new allergy you have acquired to something in your favorite birthday meal. 

Or standing outside in the smoke. With your chest tightening and your head feeling light. There is no choice but to focus on your breath. And you realize that at any moment you could simply stop breathing. And that song about every breath being from God becomes a little more real when you realize that breath is a gift that could disappear from you at any moment. 

And you take out your inhaler. You shake it up and you take in a slow breath as you push down the button. You do it again. Two puffs. And you have no idea if it will actually do anything, because your asthma has decreased significantly since you were a child, and you haven’t exactly stopped breathing. It has just become more difficult and strange to breath with the smoke and you recognize you don’t have control over it. You take the inhaler, and you keep walking, trusting God will give you the breath. 

Or when you are on your period. Men, I recognize this doesn’t exactly apply to you (in case you didn't know). But for all my ladies, you know that sometimes on that not so fabulous week, you are stuck with a pain you can do nothing about. And you know it is for a beautiful purpose. You are able to carry and nurture a child. But right now you hurt so bad. Maybe you are in a class and while others discuss the book you haven’t read, you slowly fold your head on the table, willing the pain to stop. You focus on breathing and you swear in fury in your head. You tell yourself over and over “I love being a woman," but externally you hold back tears. Maybe you take ibuprofen. But really, you don’t know if that will help. You have no control over the pain in your body. Over the discomfort. Over the hormones that make you want to scream and cry and panic. 

It’s these moments. When I lose control of my body, I find myself in that same place of being small. Feeling small--but realizing God is so so big. He is greater than that big, beautiful, glorious cathedral. He is the source of any breath or peace or stability I have ever felt. And He is there while I sit helpless in the bathroom trying not to hate my body and it’s frustrating new allergies. He is there as I struggle to breathe in the smoke as the choir sings with ease in the distance. He is there as I struggle through class with the pain of my period. He is there in the loss and the lack, the broken and the bitter. He sits with us in it. And we are reminded for a moment just how much we need Him. That every breath is His.

He invites us to sit in glorious cathedrals of our deep needs, where we see the ornate beauty of God's grace revealed in our lack.

It's so hard sometimes. But it can be beautiful.  

Sincerely, 

Sophi