One Year

We miss you. I miss you.

Here where we are it has been so much learning, so much knowing God.

There? There, too, it has been so much learning, so much knowing God.

You know joy as never before. And peace. 

That is comfort.

The Separation of Church and State

A book lay on the table between us.

His friend had been carting it around all day from room to room, opening it when the teachers weren't paying attention and reading hungrily. I knew that his friend wanted the words, but I didn't know he did, too. 

It is always startling when someone's soul looks out his eyes. He must've known it, because he turned and faced the window. 

"We'd run out of milk." 

It took two minutes of silent crying before he continued, looking up again. 

His mom's boyfriend made him use water in his cereal. Soggy, waterlogged rice crispies. When he said he didn't want them, the boyfriend took a strap to him. 

The words ricocheted quietly around the room, wall to wall to wall.

Abba, Abba, Abba.

The wounds that day after day have been buried deep were uncovered, exposed.

"They woke me and my sister up at 3:00 in the morning and dragged me off the top bunk to clean up their pot mess. I hit my head. They were all high, and they made us clean up after them."

"Me and my sister told him we didn't have school that day, but he dropped us off anyway. We sat outside on the curb for three hours."

These two--three when the third came in late--they want truth, and they want Bibles, and they want church inside these public school walls. 

They want You.