Our little homeschool sat outside in and around the flower and herb gardens for an observation lesson recently, the entire time we sat there a nearby chickadee nest was all astir with tiny and continuous baby-bird chirping. I can still hear it even now as I write you, it’s like a river of a different kind, a river of little cries, rolling on and on. And I wonder if that’s what we sound like, or how we could sound like anything different, in the hearing of the Eternal?


We are this continual stream of sound: song and violence, sweetness and screeches, prayers and petitions, pantings and pleadings, praising tongues and pounding hearts, what a roaring ruckus!

And in the midst of it all we have this string of words singing back to us. I can see it like a ribbon streaming through the air of our world over and around us, through and to us.

I know it as Torah, though I still feel odd writing it out loud as so, because of my Christian background as well as present. I am a Christian who for the past 23 years has studied the roots of my faith, the language, the history and geography, the people from whom we received it through by design—the Jews. None of this should feel odd, but it is a bit still isn’t it? And there, I’ve joined all that ruckus again haven’t I?



But I can still see it, undeterred, unperturbed, soaring higher, not in spite of my ramblings…but even fueled by them. What a wonder to find ourselves in a world where we are free. What a wonder to exist and consider that the very Creator who “lights us with the light of life” may even desire, want, need our own river of little cries rolling on and on. To consider that the Eternal One created all our harmony and disharmony alike to connect to, project to, as well as receive from Him, like a million little streams that He brings into unity, because He IS unity…it all at once makes my heart ache and hope!

I ache over the mess and pain of it all. I hope because I can see a Holy King, a calm, patient, and kind Father presiding over it all. And not just a Father, but a Mother, like Jesus, “like a hen who wanted to gather her brood under her wings”(Luke 13), and then I ache again, remembering how He said, “…you would not have it!”…and I know it’s me. It’s me going here and there, busy, and “productive” and busy and completely ignorant of the beautiful Torah ribbon dancing above me, around me, through and to me…

So I cry out my need and I pant like a deer for water and I content myself like a weaned child, I trust, I taste and see. And here I am again, listening to the tiny chickadees wondering if that’s what we sound like, or how we could sound like anything different, in the hearing of the Eternal? And I feel wanted, and I know you are too.

“Sometimes we wish the world would could cry and tell us about that which made it pregnant with fear-filling grandeur. Sometimes we wish our own heart would speak of that which made it heavy with wonder.”
-Abraham Joshua Heschel, Man is Not Alone

Read what’s next in this series: Deep Cuts, Part One (Love, Part 10)

Hello! I’m Raynna, and I’m glad you’re here. Please share this post with anyone you think might feel a little lonely today? It’s like good news from a far county to all our aching hearts to remember: we’re never alone.

The bio pic is of me taking photos in the weeds and savoring every single moment of it 🙂 as well as treasuring all of my days while I get to homeschool my six children (between the ages of 17 and 7) in the staggeringly gorgeous Pacific Northwest.  If you subscribe to receive my posts in your inbox, and I’ll also send you one of my poems to say hello and thank you and I’ll show up about once-a-week at most.

To have a companion in prayer, check out my book, Pray, Like a Woman in Labor here. Read Love (Part 1) here.