Stained Glass Hearts

There is no grace in perfection, no need for mercy in a goody-two shoes gospel.  It has never been our flawlessness that makes us attractive to the world.  Yet, all too often, we get caught up in the lie and end up wasting our days trying to live a ‘pretty’ life because we think it is what the world wants to see.  We forget it was our desperate need to be seen and to be loved inside our imperfection that drove us to grace and mercy in the first place.   And I believe if we listen with our hearts to the unspoken dialogue in the world today, this is what we'd hear:

We are caught up in this storm between the lightning and the thunder

Stuck out in the cold, looking in at you, we wonder

Are you guys for real? Do you feel the things we feel?

And if we cut you, would you bleed from your stained glass hearts?

Drinking my coffee, paying the bills, 

clock is tick ticking, grinding the gears

of life in the balance between living and not

a shadowed existence that keeps keeping on

I can’t make it stop

If you take time to listen, if you have time to waste, 

and you hear a life dripping an empty refrain

That’s just an echo, the hollow repeating,

Oh my heart is still beating, but it’s hopelessly broken these days

Broken, because you hungered for perfection,

tried to run from our rejection,

hiding all your imperfections and the sins

that just like us, have left you shattered,

living lives so bruised and battered,

when that’s not what really matters in the end

You’re not perfect anymore

But you are beautiful,

with your stained glass heart

I answer the phone and smile right on cue, 

go through the routine and not give a clue

that behind the façade, inside of this shell, 

hangs a life in the balance between heaven and hell

and these days just living

Feels like pure hell

You can have this heart God, ‘cause ghosts don’t need them, 

and blind eyes can’t see, and 

I just can’t keep on this way anymore.

Sure, my heart’s beating, but it’s hopelessly broken these days

Broken - because you loved without condition? 

Because you loved without ambition

and without the inhibition of your fears?

You have poured out oil of gladness,

given joy and taken sadness,

let your brokenness shine through the pain and tears,

Sure, you’re not perfect anymore

But that makes you beautiful,

with your stained glass heart

Broken scarlet letters in your life is what we read

Black and blue, cling to the bruises that you thought we’d never see

Gold and glowing, in the fire, like a swiftly burning sheet

of flames – we’re glad that you aren’t perfect anymore

because now you’re touchable

Now you’re reachable

Now you’re beautiful – with your stained glass heart.