Love

I clasp my hands around yours

and offer you the only thing I have to give:

my testimony.

It may not seem like much

and you certainly need much more

but I hope it can help you

take a first step.

Because the truth is

its my greatest blessing--

my most treasured and precious possession.

It breathes life and meaning into all my other blessings.

It keeps my grounded

when I might otherwise be swept away

and balanced

when I might otherwise lose my head.

Hope and joy are eternal and constant.

They never go away,

we simply lose sight of them.

And sometimes

we feel the mist pressing down on us

and we start to let one hand

then the other

slip off the rod,

until before we know it

and not entirely sure how it happened,

we're wandering in strange paths,

groping desperately in the dark,

unable to see the rod

and starting to doubt its even there anymore--

starting to think

that perhaps the memories of ever grasping it are an illusion,

becoming more and more certain

that we can never find our way back,

if there's even a "back"

to find our way to.

And we can't do it on our own.

We've wandered too far away

to reach it ourselves,

too far out of sight to find it on our own.

And so He sends us helpers--

ones who love us,

who may be terribly flawed,

perhaps sometimes impatient

or angry

or nervous,

but whose hand is still grasping firmly to the rod.

They stretch out a hand to take yours

to guide you back,

to promise that the rod,

with all its hope and joy,

is still there,

to hold you up

until you are ready to grasp it again yourself.

So take the hand that is offered to you.

Because men are that they might have joy.