Blessed Be Your Name

I grew up singing hymns in the pew. Flipping back and forth between “Glory and Praise”  and the “Catholic Book of Worship”.  Concentrating hard on the right page numbers and the correct verse to be followed.   Tracing music notes with my small fingers.  Up and down and down and up.  Rest and rest and start again.  A lady led us on organ.  My dad filed his already manicured nails.  There was one good singer in a rotation of many who came around about once per month, and when she did the sleepy congregation was recharged and revived.  Her voice poured out evidence of a heart filled with Jesus. She made my mother weep. She made me crave the donuts that were awaiting us in our Sunday school class.

I entered my first church as an adult in blue jeans.  I recalled too many fights over fancy shoes as a kid and I had one stipulation with God: I’d try out this church thing again, after many years, but I came with the blue jeans and he’d have to take it or leave it. I was done with pretenses and I was searching for the living authentic God who wasn’t concerned with fashion.   And, this time, I needed more than the donuts after the service. I needed him to take hold of my heart like a long lost lover, embrace me as his little girl, and never let me go.

He met me in that place the very first day.  Alas, there was no organ lady.  No angelic soprano.  No manicurist to my left.  But, a man, a guitar, and U2’s “I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For” blasting from the auditorium.  I had shivers run down my spine. He whispered in my ear in a personal and real way. I felt deeply blessed that he made himself known to me when I asked him to. And He has faithfully walked with me since.

My experience of worship has never since been the same. To have an outlet for the overflowing cup of blessings that are poured into my life, gives me an experience of being connected in an intimate way to my heavenly father. Rubbing shoulders with fellow believers who have been in or are in the trenches of life, yet who still come before him, palms up, voices lifted, thanking him for the gift alone of knowing him, is on it's own, a blessing.

Knowing there is an anchor despite life's ups and downs, and all arounds.  The blessings and the heartaches.  Teaches me to be less concerned with the results of my faith, and expectancies that life will somehow now go my way, but to bask in the beauty and mystery that I have a blessed redeemer who knows my name, hears my voice, and has my heart in the palm of his hands.  From this day forward.  For better or for worse. I am blessed.

 

 

“You give and take away.  You give and take away.  My heart will choose to say, Lord blessed be your name.  Blessed be the name of the Lord.  Blessed be your name.  Blessed be the name of the Lord.  Blessed be your glorious name”. ~ Lyrics "Blessed Be Your Name" by Matt Redman