Heavy metal thoughts

Those of you who know me well know that I get a little ecstatic over old broken down boats and rusty metal; I find both truly beautiful, and love to explore that beauty with my camera.

I think it has something to do with my awareness of God's all-embracing love: I take heart, I think, in my own positive response to the old, the rusty, the broken down, because some part of me feels that if I can love those things, God can love me when I am broken and tired.  If I can see the beauty in them, God can see the beauty in me.

Not that it's conscious or anything; I don't have to MAKE myself love these things -- there's something inside me that leaps with joy when I see them.  What's amazing is to think that I am not alone: this particular rusty tower is part of Seattle's Gasworks Park, which is basically a huge rolling green lawn littered with enormous rusty structures: someone -- many someones -- must have agreed that these ancient useless metal creations had value, and should be cherished.

Desmond Tutu's poem in my reading for today speaks to God's determination to cherish us all -- broken, ugly, useless, sinful... whatever we find irredeemable in ourselves or in others is never a deterrent to God.

"Why are you running, running, running?
Why are you hiding away?
You may think that what you have done is beyond my power to forgive.
You may think what you have said makes me shrug and turn away.
You may think that you are lost.
But you are not lost to me.
How could you ever be?
Where are you that I cannot go?
Where have you been that I have not been?
What did you see that I have not seen?
What did you do?
No, it cannot be undone,
The pain cannot be unmade,
The life cannot be un-lived,
The time will not run backward,
You cannot un-choose your choice.
But the pain can be healed,
Your choices can be redeemed,
Your life can be blessed,
And love can bring you home."

I find that all immensely reassuring.