[repeat]

Do I just keep saying the same things over and over? I think I am repeating myself repeating myself, but only because I'm trying to approach this new way of seeing me, my will, my choices, God, and love from so many different angles. It's big stuff, and I'm trying to integrate myself into it in daily ways. I'm trying to feel it out with my heart and my mind, examining it and retelling this story multiple ways so I can comprehend it.

This is life stuff.

This is the stuff of Shakespeare, Milton, Steinbeck, Hemingway, O'Connor, Helprin, and Robinson. You can't understand it in one life, it's too big. You can't understand it in one way, it's too incredible. It's too big for mathematics or chemistry or religious rules or painting alone, it needs story. Each element of the story is only important as it fits into the whole.

I like books that start out with a line or a paragraph from another book. I like that idea of a good idea drawn out and sparking another great idea. We keep doing that, because nothing is ever enough. No sentence is so final that other sentences don't need to be written. Fiction sparks a renewed look at the past, poetry sparks novels, a line from a song changes the course of history. I like the interconnectivity of it all - it's the only way we can fill hearts and make sense and grow.

When Jesus said, "It is finished," he didn't just end something, he began an entirely new way of understanding God, life, people, creation, and hope. It was surprising then as it is surprising now. [For more info about covenant renewal, I'd recommend What St. Paul Really Said. Fascinating, and there was really only one short section that required all my effort to understand.]

So I repeat myself: I am learning something new. It is difficult. It is not a new religion or anything that I have to do on my own. It is simply growing to understand what is always next to me: LOVE. There is no greater power on the planet than self-sacrificial love. [boyd 40]

Love beats in every step of my thoughtful heart.

In every repeated beat, I learn something new (or remember something old, in this moment which makes it entirely new, because this moment is all I've got.)

I think I know it all a little better than I used to, but I know that I'm just building on my past. And what I write down now, I'll stand on next year, with changed circumstances and another layer of lessons. This is the part of the 'figuring out life' process that I'll never complete. When I say I understand love better than I used to, it doesn't negate the love I've given in the past. It means I know more this moment. And I give that more-love in this moment.

And this.

Repeating myself, but entirely new, completely now.

And so I'll build on my repeats.