outWORD by Matte Downey

Moving... I am now sitting in my new home office filled with 11 brown boxes, 4 bare beige walls, a red clock to let me know I am probably late for something, and a great view of the woods. From my perspective, moving is a good thing and should be embarked upon every few years. It makes you sort through everything you own and re-evaluate whether or not it is still pertinent to your life, plus it forces one to clean all those hidden, underneath, never seen places – ugh! I hate cleaning. Show me a person who likes cleaning and I will ask them to come to my house and find all the joy they want. Not that I am a filthy person, no no, I do my weekly cleaning and keep things fairly tidy, but it is a chore. Dust is a result of sin, the decaying of our bodies, the reminder that we live with death every day as speck by speck cells that used to carry life fall around us (90% of dust is dead skin). And I just don’t like the fact that hours of my week are spent removing filth and dirt and remi...

I am reading through Leviticus these days and though the book can get tedious to a modern Western mind (like mine) that can’t comprehend why all these regulations and stipulations for worship and sacrifices are necessary, if you remember that this is a holy God communicating a way of doing things in order that people can approach him and not die (for we humans seem to have a certain propensity towards death and sin instead of life and righteousness, and God has an unfaltering desire to bring humankind near to him)…well, it all makes a lot more sense. One of the things that struck me about the difference between Levitical law then and our law now is how we have divorced the consequences from any sinful or illegal act. Any crime, no matter what it is, is punishable by jail time (or some restriction of freedom such as house arrest or parole) or a payment of money. The very heart of God screams, “Restore! Repair! Redeem!” in order that relationships and communities might become whole a...

Things I cannot do: I cannot make someone love me. I cannot foresee what one simple action will set into motion. I cannot get rid of my loneliness - totally. I cannot hide the way I really feel about someone or something. I cannot tell a lie well. I cannot make pain go away when I see it in someone’s eyes. I cannot trade my life for someone else’s, be it out of envy or sympathy. I cannot do everything I want to in a day. I cannot grow any taller. I cannot get younger. Things I can do: I can love someone, more than one someone, even it if makes me look silly – people in love don’t mind looking silly. I can do a simple thing like listen, or talk to someone, or buy someone a drink, or touch someone who is feeling untouchable…instead of criticizing, ignoring, or judging. I can be a friend – everyone could use a friend. I can lead with my heart, making transparency and integrity my constant companions – not ashamed to be seen for who I really am. I can tell the truth and do it with love – ...