I’ve heard it said, taught, laughed-at and cried over, that a girl’s most intrinsic desire is to ‘know’ she is beautiful, though have found just a few rare gems who actually do. You can tell her of such truths all day long, but it’s the reception that’s the challenge. Or gift. And I’m grateful to have rubbed such brilliance this morning. I went to Mama Lucy’s church, which provided me, yet again, with a really good Church experience. Maybe you’re surprised—no probably not—but I am dumbfounded by the health of the Church over here. Granted, there’s always a comparable amount of unhealth, but I would say relative to what I know in the States, Africa needs to be sending missionaries to us.

By accident, really, I’d actually visited Mama Lucy’s church before. I passed it on a recent evening, intrigued by its open doors, octagon shape and shadowing light toward a simple, but really striking stain-glass cross. I decided to walk in and sit for a bit, but actually entered in on a group of about thirty people doing a Bible Study. I gladly stayed until then end and later retold the story to Mama Lucy, who proudly affirmed that was her church and I must come visit one Sunday. So I did.

It wasn’t even something particular that stood-out in the 2.5 hour service, just an overall feeling of rightness and Spirit-filled presence. As I stood there locking arms with Mama Lucy, singing unharmonized sounds of purity, tears streamed from our eyes and adoration spilled from our hearts. Clad in a long black dress, which accounts for half of her wardrobe, and dark black skin, etched with marks of wisdom, I was beyond honored to stand beside Mama Lucy. She was radiant—one of the most beautiful beings I’d ever laid eyes on. I was plain-faced with damp hair, wearing Chacos and attire that hadn’t been changed in days, but somehow felt beautiful, too. Or more than that, really—it was this overwhelming sense of ‘knowing’ an actual part of my being as beautiful. Even writing that statement feels odd, or too weighty for words, admittance, or something. Especially for the female readership though, I know you will see the breakthrough here, and importance of these moments. There was something beyond the physical about them that I can only know as a wholeness, or poise, and ascribe as from the Lord. I could feel the radiance beaming from Mama Lucy and me and it was as though, for an instant, when we looked at each other, both knew of the beauty we were chanced, choosing, or graced, to behold.

‘How beautiful you are, My darling. How very beautiful!’ Song of Solomon 1.15

***

Tea With Buddha and Jesus.
(For a lengthier, but still short, fictionalization of this, “The Lotus and the Cross,” by Ravi Zacharias is a quite interesting read.)

Tonya is one of my roommates. She’s from the UK, worked in Uganda last summer, spent the year in Rwanda and is now back visiting for a few weeks. She’s a beautiful girl with aged dreads, spiritual tattoos and a heart of toughened gold. We spent the better part of the afternoon over tea, conversation and a robust thunderstorm. Most of it revolved around the challenges of love and how to do so most presently and fully. Tonya lives from a Buddhist perspective, and with my undergrad focusing on Eastern Religion and a fascination with religion overall, you can imagine we get along quite well.

Tonya sews her days by a strand of philosophy saying: “It’s better to love and to lose, than to not love at all.” She walked me through the ripples of this, ranging from extraordinary places of met and shattered dreams (not in that order), to myriads of exposure with drugs, relationships, theory and theology. For Tonya, the pursuit and capture of love requires a depth willing to lose, just as much, and oftentimes more, as its willingness to gain. Such a profession is unmistakably clear when you see her embrace a child, embark a topic of interest, or hear the words of a friend. If I met Tonya five years, or five months ago, my guess is I would’ve agreed with her perspectives. But my surety is that I would’ve understood them far more inspirationally, than actually.

In subtle, and from the outside absent, ways, I’ve seen myself pulling away from the babies. From the Mamas. From here. Part of this is a gift of defense, I presume, but more of it has intrigued me as a fear of love. Though still weeks from my departure, the end is within view. The emptiness of waking thousands of miles from this land is within sight’s reach. And I don’t want to face it. I don’t want to get hurt. I don’t want to feel the pain of losing. But it’s too late. As tight as its guard tries to seal, too much of their love, and my love, and His love, has escaped. And I’m gonna hurt. My fear in these final weeks though, as I see tendencies to seal tighter and suppress a more riveting emotion than I want feel, is to give in. And I don’t want to. I want to love. I want to love wholly and richly and painfully and unashamedly. I want to love until it hurts. Until I have no choice ‘but’ to lose. To lie awake affected, grieving, prayerful and marked by souls for whom I chose to lose myself. For then, I think, I might have really loved.

“No one has greater love than this, that he would lay down his life for his friends.”—Jesus