Valentines Day finally comes!

 Valentines Day came today, Saturday Feb 18th.  I woke up in a state of pure bliss for some reason. My discovery  of the word “perichoresis” (to dance around) may have had a part in this unexpected gift. Perichoresis I quote "...has been called the 'divine dance,' that profound union of Father, Son and Holy Spirit that has gone on since eternity past, goes on now, and will go on forever, except that the dance of eternity will have a select audience—those whom the Father has foreknown, the Son has redeemed, and the Spirit has enlivened and sanctified. Perichoresis is a fellowship of three co-equal beings perfectly embraced in love and harmony and expressing an intimacy that no one can humanly comprehend. The Father loves the Son by means of the Spirit’s procession and the Son loves the Father by the same means. The Spirit loves both the Father and the Son and eternally proceeds from the Father and Son.” 


I was so excited about this divine dance that my heart was skipping like a lamb, joy nearing ecstasy. As I made breakfast for the kids, I asked myself, "Where have you felt like this before?" Surprisingly I discovered that my life has been filled with memories that contained this level of happiness. The earliest memory was traveling on Highway 28 to Old Mesilla on the back of a motorcycle, thanksgiving in a cabin in Cloudcroft,  traveling to Grand Junction with my new bridegroom, traveling through Tucson and the red rocks, camping in Idaho with my new man, going to Pasadena to go to grad school...leaving YWAM for the great unknown, wondering if  life existed outside of YWAM, moving into Oxford. All of them in some degree had this traveling component to them. My missionary heart already being revealed in the mundane. 


My heart was so entwined in my new gift from God, Hans,  that it could be said we were doing the perichoresis dance ourselves. So love starved were we, that we were nearly inseparable for the five years of our married life. And there was my Valentine's Day gift! The memory of a wondrous gift of companionship, equality, and an apostolic call were all part of God's great plan for me. Hans is in such awe inspiring company now—Paul, Thomas, Philip and John, all among the great cloud of witnesses, the communion of the saints. 


But in the last two years, I had forgotten that my life had been filled with such joys.  Perhaps it was the presence of  dark shadows and longings, like a cloud obscuring the sun.  Stay, Oh Sun, stay. Today I am like the disciples on the road to Emmaus who gingerly reached out to the Redeemer saying,  "The day is late, won't you stay with me a while..."