My Daughter Got Married Today

I tip-toed, easily dodging where the wood floor complains rheumatic and, I think, a tad dramatic, too. I know this aging floor like the back of my hand; and morning feet bare, except for the gold sparkley nail polish I brushed on yesterday even though no one would see my toes because they would be in festive and all-about-fun stiletto pumps covered in bright floral patterns, know the way to the cheery red coffee pot without waking the floor boards.

Coffee slurps and gurgles brew. I stack my Bible, journal, pad of paper, and iPhone. I balance my full cup of coffee on the stack, tuck iPhone under my chin so it doesn't slide off the top, and sort of two-step back to the bedroom, across bathroom tiles, and into my closet. I close the door and lean back into the chair wedged between a shoe rack and hanging clothes. "Here I am, God!"

God's love dances in the halo of His own light; and He invites me to dance with Him; in the arms of Love Himself.

His everlasting arms support me. He cradles the back of my head in His hand and I look up long. He cradles the back of my head in His left hand and wraps His right arm around me and I lean back and look up. He supports the lean. He supports my head; my neck doesn't fatigue. And looking up, supported like this, He whispers, "When you fill My arms, you feel My fullness."

It's what I need to hear, because sometimes I feel the full become empty. Or maybe just less full.

He knows my daughter. My first daughter.

She's getting married today and it's joyful and oh, so beautiful. It's full and, well, also a little empty and a little teary, too. But this God of mine knows her and knows me and knows us, and knew in the wee hours this morning that I would need to feel His fullness because last night I hugged my daughter at the foot of her bed and that was the last good-night hug in her bedroom.

She will fill her husband's arms and I know that his arms will support her so she may lean far back to look up long and see the halo of love in his eyes and she'll just dance in the halo.

Is there anything more full than love? The thought awes me

"Love fills the empty." It's a God thought, and He's sharing this thought with me.

"Sometimes empty feels, well, empty. And uncomfortable. And too quiet." I confess what I feel to Him.

"Look up," He says. "I've got you supported, so look up long."

So that's what I do. I look up and think thoughts of abundance. I do, because in His arms I can.

"Lord?"

"Hm-m?" He answers content because maybe He just likes to hold me this way.

"I like a full moon and a halo around it." It's an abundance kind of a thought.

He knows what I'm not saying; and answers it, "The full round grows from the empty."

He's not really talking about the phases of the moon. I get it. The new moon isn't lit up, and my little universe of a home isn't as lit up full as it was when four children burned a hole in the electric bill.

"But I desire abundance," I say. "Well, maybe not an abundant electric bill."

"You." God tilts my head and there's adoration in His eyes. "You desire abundance and abundance is holding you."

He speaks with double meaning. He's saying, "I Am abundance. I am holding you. Don't be held by any other abundance."

Ah. He is the God who fills the empty. He filled the void with light, land, sky, rivers, oceans, seas, vegetation all alive; and then with man and woman.

Man and woman. Made in His image. With the same desire for abundance that He and His Son and His Spirit have.

Maybe the desire for abundance doesn't mean there's no place for empty. Maybe desiring abundance doesn't mean there's no desire for empty, because maybe empty and full aren't opposites, but parts of the same thing. Maybe the desire for abundance isn't just about fullness, but is also about what's beautiful and necessary about empty.

"Even You," I amaze with newness, "couldn't have full before there was empty."

"I gave My Son. My Son moved out and I was an empty-nester."

"And," I'm relating to this Father, "You couldn't give just-because hugs to Your Son, because He was embracing His bride."

"Hm-m, and gathering the church into His arms;" He continues. "And His bride will fill My home with so many children that I've been making plans and drawing up blue-prints for a holy city!"

"I've been thinking about down-sizing, myself," I respond. And I am thinking about down-sizing because I'm about to be down three children!

My daughter's going to get married today.

The wedding wasn't big; it was full.

Full of family. Full with grandparents, aunts, uncles cousins, siblings, and a few close friends.

Full of tender love that just spilt down groom cheeks when his bride came into view. Full of laughter that spilt joyous love straight out from bride heart as she repeated her vows and her eyes were misty, too.

"Thank You," I breathe tonight.

"Thank You for this morning." My feet survived the stilettos and I'm bare foot on the patio.

"Thank You," I look up long into the night. I'm grateful He is Father. Parent. He knows what I'm feeling. He knows what it's like to feel full and empty, and empty and full at the same time.

I think abundant thoughts as I look up. I think, Big and Little Dippers must scoop into the heavens and ladle out streams of stars.  I think, Great hunter Orion, must search out the empty spaces black between stars, and tip his arrow with star dust, pull the bow back taut, and ignite the night with star birth and blaze.

I sigh. "I want to dance with You, God, in the halo of Your full light."

I do.

My daughter got married today.

I watched her dance in the circle of her husband's arms and delighted at the kisses they shared.

They danced in the halo of love for one another.

"Let's dance, then;' God invites me.

"Right here? On the patio?" I feel like bride.

"Hm-m," He laughs soft. "You. Come. Feel My fullness in My arms."

I do.

And I guess this is why I painted my toe nails gold sparkle last night. It wasn't for the wedding, but for this moment.

And, did I mention, my daughter got married today?


written by: Carolyn-Elizabeth Roehrig

A Morning Devotion-Get A Microscope,'cause He Is Magnificent!

"I will praise the name of God with a song, I will magnify Him with thanksgiving. This also shall please the Lord better than an ox or bull, which has horns and hooves" (Psalm 69:30-31).

May I meditate on the name of God, the name that calls Him who He is.

He is magnificent!

Heaven is in His name!

And yet, somehow, a song praising His name, and a word of thanks to Him, magnifies Him further. Is it because songs of praise and words of thanksgiving begin as meditation on His magnificence?

May I meditate on who God is with the curiosity and wonder of a child with a microscope and may I exclaim as child, "Wow! Cool! Look at this!" and then shove the microscope to anyone interested to share what I see with that child-like desire to say, "Look what I found!" and then, "Ok, your turn's over! Let me see it again! Go get your own microscope"? I may, and I am.

Me thinks this is music to His ears.

May I dissect His name? Just open up His name to see what's there? It's as easy as opening my Bible and reading what's there. Taking what's there at face value because I value face-to-face with God. I may, and I am.

And when I do, may I exclaim aloud, "Look at what I'm seeing! I never knew this is what  the cells of His character look like!" And "Look! Look at the nuclei of His love! His love is so big!" I may, and I am.

Me thinks this is music to His ears more pleasing than the holy hoopla of horns and trumpets, and hooves and sandaled feet gathered for the sacrificial slaughter of ox or bull in bloody dissection.

Call it dissection, or meditation. Meditation is a cleaner word. Both magnify. Either way, may I open up the name of God on the laboratory table in my heart. Could that be called an altar? I may, I am, and yeah, it's altar.

Praise God for the blood of Jesus Christ, the one true sacrifice.

Praise God that the only dissection pleasing to Him is-

To dissect His name,
And then to exclaim
The child-like "Wow!"
"Look what I've found!"

To magnify parts
Of God in my heart;
To open the Way
To further His praise.

And may I praise further?

What if I dissected God's heart, not my problems?

What if I saw up-close what's pressed between the spiritual viewing slides, what's pressed between His Spirit and mine, what's beneath spiritual microscope; not what presses me between a rock and a hard place because my problems are too, too up-close?

Well, I'd surely see the nuclei of His love, His joy, His peace, His presence. Magnified. Up-close and face to face; Spirit to spirit. And if my spirit has cells, then yeah, cell to cell.

And surely I'd sing as the song goes-

"Turn your eyes upon Jesus,
Look full in His wonderful face;
And the things of earth will grow strangely dim
In the light of His glory and grace."

I'd just personalize it.

It's music to His ears.


written by: Carolyn-Elizabeth Roehrig

A Morning Devotion-Eyes Like That!

Nearly every morning, if I look for it, I can see the slanting sun catch on sticky strand of spider web; and my thoughts dance happy on this grace, " The light of the Son shows the way to Heaven!"

See His light, and see the way.

May I cling to it, not by my strength, but by the grace that makes me to stick to it.

May I look for the light of the Son every morning until I see the strand to walk on with soul feet that cling all holy stick to it.

The way is impossibly narrow. No way can I see it, or walk it, or stick to it with spider-like feet all tenatious and sure as truth is true that every hunger and thirst will be provided on the narrow; except that Jesus is the Way, the Truth, and the Light.

                                                                                       Spider Web

I've never seen a spider fall off the web. It is created to walk a narrow that, many times, only it can see.

But, wonder of light! And wonder of being made a new woman, created with sticky soul feet and holy hope that everything I need for life today will be provided on the narrow; and created also with holy fear of falling off the narrow because to fall off means to die. And that can mean only one thing; that what was thought to be salvation from death and grace for life has been nothing other than tenatious pride that believes, as pride does, my strength is sufficient.

Thing is, pride comes before the fall.

May I be humble creation,with eight very sticky soul feet, and with eight eyes that, as spider eyes, can only detect light and dark.

I want eyes like that!



written by Carolyn-Elizabeth Roehrig