My Soul’s Weave
Drone photography of Isle of Iona, Scotland
For Christmas Tina gifted me a devotional book called “Prayers of Iona”, which is a book of common prayers we had seen in a gift shop on the Isle of Iona in Scotland. Iona, possibly the original missional beachhead for the expansion of Christianity into Western Europe early in the first millennium, still had a monastic community of faith present, albeit fairly modernized.
I’ve always been drawn to and fascinated by Celtic Christianity. In many ways it contains all the things we long for that are missing in our current American cultural Christian experience. But that’s a ramble for another day. The book of prayers was a collection of authentic Celtic prayers, almost lost to the modern world if not for the research and efforts of the now spiritual head of that Iona community. They are simple, rooted in deep love for Christ, reverence for His creation, a hunger for compassion and social justice, and relentless commitment to authentic Christian community.
One of those prayers has this poetic turn on a familiar phrase from Psalm 139:
“You shaped my soul and set its weave;
You formed my body and gave it breath”
Another gift I received from Tina was a speciality macro lens for my iPhone (one of my nerdy photog interests). Tina has a prayer blanket that was knit for her by a close friend that was meant to not only warm her, which it does incredibly well, but to also remind her that she is enclosed in the prayers of a deeply connected friend. I used my new macro lens to capture a “close-up” of the details of that weave. It’s amazing what we don’t see until magnified. The many differently textured and colored threads tightly interwoven - and this by the hands of someone extremely skillful, with deeply loving intent.
That poetic phrase came to life. “You shaped my soul and set its weave”.
So much of what we experience in life - the good and the bad, the triumphant and the demoralizing, the calming and the painful - it’s part of an intentional “weave” that is forming who we are. I believe the weave of our soul was not only set at the moment of our creation, but I believe it is an ongoing creation the Spirit of the Lord is doing as He shapes us into what He envisions for us. This means the pain has purpose - whether we see it or not. The losses, setbacks, grief and heartache - dark hued as those strands appear - are essential to the weave that forms us and recreates us more and more in Christ’s image.
While I didn’t have these specific words to express that during our caregiving journey, there was a conviction deep down that even in the darkest moments, and even in the lingering unresolve we still experience, there is a purpose. Much of what God was up to in the weaving of those experiences into our soul is yet unknown, and may remain unknown until the other side of eternity.
This is part of what we are learning to come to peace with - the reality that there is much in our journey we are unable to understand and much that feels difficult to reconcile. But we know that as we trust in God’s faithfulness, and “lean not on our own understanding”, He meets us in the empty space and redeems moments in life we feel we’ve lost to the ravages of our circumstances, and even our failures.
Amanda Cook’s music has lately been ministering deeply to my soul. Her song “Edens” carries a beautiful reminder of God’s tendency to surprise us with unexpected redemptive miracles. To hear it for yourself, check out this link:
Edens by Amanda Cook: Amanda Cook - Edens (Live Ambient Video)
In the spirit of Celtic Christianity, let me close this thought out with another prayer from Iona. It seems fitting…
O loving Christ
who died upon the tree
Each day and each night I remember your love.
In my lying down and in my rising up
In life and in death
you are my health and my peace.
