The Last Transmission: An Epitaph of Scandalous Mercy

At the time of this writing, I’m in the waiting room at the Kent County Jail. I’m sitting on the floor in the corner of a concrete room, next to an empty vending machine. I’m waiting for my friend, Brad… soon to be released after I post his bond. I first met Brad a few years ago, on the streets of Grand Rapids, while he was on the run toward an addiction that would almost take his life. The last time I saw him, he had needles in his arm, under a bridge on Division Avenue. 

But today, I’m picking him up upon his release… and I’m bringing him directly to the Forge Recovery Center where he will spend the next nine months rebuilding his life. I’m here, sitting on the floor in the corner, surrounded by cold concrete in December, because I love this guy. 

I’m also here, because I do not suffer from short term memory loss. After much introspection, EMDR Therapy, and trusted counsel - I’ve returned to the source of my own self-inflicted trauma. The buzz of doors, brown jackets, cold concrete, and … all of this triggers my worst scar tissues to reopen.

I do not suffer from short-term memory loss. I remember it all so well, and the shame that sets in like a polar vortex to be chased away by the solace of the electric blanket of God’s grace. Inhaling grace, exhaling gratitude. For three hours, I wait for Brad’s release. While I wait, I reflect on the friends who have stood in the furnace with me over the years, and the evidence of the scandalous mercy of which I have been a recipient. And now, I’ve dedicated the rest of my life to the redistribution of the same radical hospitality and scandalous mercy…

These days, I spend my hours with the least of these. I’m forever hunting the outcasts and the banished, the excommunicated and the ecclesiastically homeless. I find solidarity with the refugees sleeping outside, under bridges to evade the downpour. I walk the streets looking for Alex and Timmy and Rick and I’ll never forget Happy and the suicide note he left. My heart is permanently scarred from the needles and bullets and the bottles and the application at Pine Rest Mental Hospital: “Are you feeling hopeless or helpless?”

Hope is my favorite word. 

I’ve done my own research on the validity of ancient testimonies… (I suggest you do the same). The human hurricane
who suffered and died, inexplicably reappeared to incalculable eyewitness who gave public testimony to their experience. I’ve chosen to invest every inch of my story in the continuation of this revolutionary message of… hope. The tomb is empty. Hope. The future has already been restored. Hope. Jesus killed death. Hope. Love will write the epitaph of my story.

Love will have the last word. Your story isn’t finished. Love will paint a portrait of your failures and triumphs; a mosaic of art to be interpreted through the lens of a great cloud of witnesses. Love is the invitation, the rising action, the climax, the falling action, and the resolution. Love, only love.

- Jay DePoy

who am I AM who

forgive me if you've heard this before

a chorus unending behind a bridge burning

knuckles bleeding on the open door

knees unbending before the false prophet's warning

unity on division, unorthodox decisions 

and i regret to inform, my opinion's reborn

in a counterfeit smile, but in the window

hands are raised in praise to the grace

now the whore has been wed, and the table is spread

the blood has been shed and the body now broken

all the these feelings awoken by prayers unspoken

and ruben says, they all love you

but the signal was lost in the elevator to the basement

while i'm held captive to the epiphany 

that apparently there IS something i can do about it...

[you're not allowed to come around here anymore.]

however lonely is this stage

and the weight of interior combustion

and a thousand allies in a world of no goodbyes

there's a holocaust and no good guys

there's a winter frost and the mourning sun melts the shame

like a hero plunged into sudden fame

through an exit wound and bloodless veins

ignore me if the mirror is shattered

by a self-help manual from barnes & noble

and i've become unrecognizable from a savage scar

proving it doesn't matter who i am,

it only matters who You are.

Would You Rather...

"I did my own research on you." He said, from across the table

a body broken and the cup of wine, for the forgiveness of original sin

and I know a guy who heard from his coworker, who read something on the internet (so it MuSt be true)

the authority of anonymity and snipers on every roof

gatekeepers of the kingdom of [dis]grace; you wait for a response

while I'm sitting with my daughter on a Saturdate, over cinnamon rolls and hot cocoa. She wants to play the "Would You Rather..." game. 

So we commence:

Would you rather be celebrated for something you are not, or hated for something you are? 

Would you rather approach each new friendship with a disclaimer, or bury the past under the blood of Christ? 

Would you rather sit in the back row, contemplating the apocalypse, or snatch the microphone and preach about scandalous mercy? 

Would you rather be outside their circle, or the centerpiece of psychoanalysis? 

Would you rather respond to each rumor, or give a fist bump to the anonymous cowards?

Would you rather be a cracked pot beholding glory, or a white-washed tomb of self-righteousness?

 

She doesn't want to play this game anymore, and neither do I. Neither do I, Love Bug. 

.

The Untold Chapters

 He stirred his coffee and said, "the grace of God is inexhaustible." 

And then I wept and told him about my childhood years and isolation; homeschooling and remnant theology and the rapture and the y'all come choir and just as i am without one plea

and playboy magazines and treeforts and wrath and repentance and recycling patterns of confessions to 'Thee and Thee Alone!', while clutching fig leaves behind bushes hiding serpents breathing questions about commandments and fruit and trees and 

east of eden I limped toward a promised land, full of milk and honey and power and money. You put out a sign on 28th street and invited me to join your circle until two people made their discomfort known. 

The next morning, the text message read: "After further thought... I've done my own research on you. There are pieces of your story that you conveniently omitted. Therefore, you. are. not. welcome. here."

Untold pieces? I dropped my phone and stared at the fence surrounding the back yard. Unsure, exactly, which pieces he referenced... 

Maybe it's the story behind the scars, and the boundaries crossed and the security lost. Maybe it is the truth of the blood stains on my hands, and the death of an innocent man on the execution stake of Crosspoint Baptist Church. Or the one room schoolhouse in Montague, and the desecration of Holy Art, and the legendary pastor had a hidden violence and a hidden bottle and the Holy Lands separating the church from the parsonage held a thousand secrets of which we do not speak. 

Or maybe it's the loss of love and discovery of unforgiveness. Maybe it's the epiphany of pleading guilty with sincerity and owning my sin and suffocating under the weight of anonymous comments. Maybe it's the revision of historical accounts, from another perspective - like conflicting witness reports of a fatal car accident, from the east and from the west like the sin that God promised to remove. 

Maybe I forgot to include the details of blood and lust and rage and murder and sex and drugs and recovery and redemption and blood and lust and rage and murder and sex and drugs and the ongoing chatter of movies we've seen before and plotlines that have been regurgitated by hushed whispers and a homeless rabbi is writing in the dirt, and from the oldest to the youngest they all dropped their stones. 

If I've omitted pieces of my story during our 1.5 hour coffee chat, I'm sorry. I should have led with picture of boy holding a King James Bible and cheeky smile, having chosen to actually believe that Jesus meant what He said. I should have told you about false accusations and spiritual abuse, about faith to start again and again and again and the gentle whisper in the middle of the night and the love of a Good Good Father who still invites me to walk in the calling of my true identity. 

Last night my counselor asked, "What is it that you are looking for? What are you hoping for?" 

After much consideration I've realized the answer: I want to experience the feeling of sincere forgiveness. Healing, restoration, and an ocean of tears waiting to be released. Like the prodigal melting into the arms of his father, at the end of the driveway. 

.

a hug on pause

 when i was twenty five years old i got lost in the manistee national forest in the middle of a snowstorm, i had a walkman with headphones and a cassette tape of jack hyles preaching a sermon from the old testament called "I Did Know Thee In the Wilderness" and i wandered down to the water's edge and fell asleep in the snowbank and i knew that my heart had been strangely warmed by the charcoal fire and the relentless invitation of my rabbi to come and die. 

remember when saturday nights were littt with atomic optimism as we broke break and studied the apostles teachings and dimmed the lights and sang our hearts out to delirious and the happy song and the tambourine didn't fall into the rhythm of the guitar but joel was spirit filled and jacob had his hands raised and mariah was an infant and we knew that the ceiling was glass and heaven was invading earth.

when i was in jail a thief stole my shoes. when i confronted him, he spit in my face. a crowd swarmed around and a fight was immanent. surely, this is my rock bottom. (what is yours?). but then a stranger approached the thief and interrupted the conflict. he said, "i remember jerry depoy jr, he once picked me up when i was hitchhiking and took me to the store and bought me food." and in that moment i recognized him as angel that i had unwittingly entertained a few months prior. 

when i was out on work release, i remember standing in the check-out lane at meijer. i was carrying a bag full of boxer shorts that i had planned to layer and smuggle back into the jail to distribute to my new friends whom had been wearing the same underwear since the day of their incarceration. while was standing in line i heard whispers and in my peripheral vision i could see the pointed fingers in my direction. bowing my head in toxic shame, i tried to avoid eye contact. when the cashier took my credit card she read the name. "Jerry DePoy Jr.? I remember you. You once came to us after our house had burned down and you took up an offering to collect resources for my children." she then walked around from behind the counter and gave me a hug. the kind of hug that kicks the bloody hell out of shame. 

[my givashitter broke three weeks ago]. 

Let's Make This Crystal Clear...

Et abierunt per laborem interpretandi haec verba cruciatibus demum in Latinam, quod vitam sunt, sic obsessed per quam absolute quid me oportet facere, vel cogitandi. (Quod est mirabile mihi quidam repellentes, qui mecum sunt, qui sequimini me, et sermo omnis actio!)

Sic ergo patet quod in hoc quod luto: ego sum stultus. Ego sum peccator. Sum infirma. Perditus sum. Ego addicta est. EGO sum indignus. Ego certe ipso. Ego reprobus efficiar. Tanto sum exosus. Ego sum fugienda est. Ego odio. Ego foris circulus amoris tui.

Tu potes cogitare in corde meo extinguere?

Motus quiescat vox milia tu putas?

Tu potes cogitare fugiat redemptionem quæ est detonating procellam excitemus in venis?

Tu potes cogitare resurgendi abstrusum nuntium - hae cum illis visibilis cicatrices et vulnera et flammeum illud apertum et lingua Bibliae et patentibus venis in collum est iens ut erumpat, quia et vidistis me, et non est inanis Iesu sepulcrum?

Cur quaerere inter mortuos pro vivis?

Et longe a cella venio comitatus Muskegon carcere, Ego sum ostium pulsat conscendens in tecto et ego sum iter inimicitiae rasis parietibus circa portas nudis pedibus incedens, et ego post tergum tuum denominatio hominis et flammam gladii ...

De revolutionibus progrediendo non televised. Erit necessario consequitur mutatum vitae testimoniis alopecian heroine Addicts receptaque Stumblers impetu pectus Domini bittersweet lacrimis congredi ad prunas et infirma mundi ut confundat sapientes et infirma mundi confundat fortia.

I am the prodigal.

Verum tu, frater senior, stantes in driveway habens ingenium tantrum, quod occiso vitulo, et calefaciebant cohortem et hoc paratus est mensa coram hostibus meis. 

.

will the circle be unbroken?

the memorial service will be held in the backyard where the tree line meets the rolling credits over a life unfinished and forecast does not look promising

what am i supposed to say? (i was never good at eulogies)

clutching rosary beads with unmet needs to fill the void in my stomach there’s addictions to feed like a concrete door and knuckles that bleed and there goes jay again jumping off another ledge because the silence only drove a wedge between the progress of a pilgrimage and the breakfast at the water’s edge 

do you love me? do you love me? do you love me?

.

the great cloud of witnesses

from the back row of the the little white church on the corner where the sign says 'Jesus saves', i disassemble the offering envelope and draw a picture of redemption with red ink like the words bleeding through the pages of the new testament, the great cloud of witnesses surround me now with a violent yawn and the rocks in the pockets begin to cry out like the trees clapping their hands and the heavens reopened to rewrite the ending from the beginning (i was fearfully and wonderfully made).

lake effect snow buried our tent at pj hoffmaster state park, and dad awoke early to stoke the fire and these anthrakia coals have turned to ice as i'm interrogated thrice, of a professed love that is unpossessed. so i point to the beloved and say 'what about him!?', only to be beckoned to follow the Way of an upside down cross...

so i walk into the room and stare at the whispers hushed and wait to see who blinks first. because i'm staring through your powerpoint presentation like an MRI exposing a primal hypocrisy. 

you are loved and there's nothing you can do about it. 

Where Are(n’t) You?

Three thousand miles deep into the heart of nowhere, I’ve searched for a sign of Your presence. The ever-present absence is the one constant chorus in a song with no bridge, and the harmony sounds like thunder falling from the stairway to heaven where Jacob climbed and fell and wrestled and prevailed. Still You remain a memory, a tragedy, a rumor of eyewitness and the echo of golgothic cries... ‘Why have you forsaken me!?”

I’ve come full circle to this geographic assignment. Maybe it was romantic nostalgia - this assumption that You would meet me here on the porch of this rustic cabin outside Yellowstone. When I was here fifteen years ago You arrested me with Your grace and suffocated me with a chokehold of Your agape love. But that was a long time ago... a lot has happened since. I fell down the stairs a few times and bloodied my faith and my stamina has faded. My spiritual gas tank is fuming, and there is no exit on this beaten path.

The rain is an unexpected knock on the door of my heart. I wake up late, confused. Boiling water for French press coffee, and stumbling outside to the porch. I sit sheltered from the storm and look back to the future of my life.

From this vantage point, through the steam and beyond the Grand Teton Mountains, I see Immanuel - my bunk mate in jail. I realize now that he. was. You. A visitation turned habitation, the ever-constant Presence. I see my sedan crashing on the highway, rolling several times across the median on US 31, and landing upside down facing oncoming traffic. No seatbelt. I walked away without visible wounds. Externally purified/internally traumatized. The first eyewitness vomited at the site of what appeared to be obvious fatality. When I emerged, barefoot (!?), he asked, “Do you believe in God?”

I see Skot, Brad, and Matt running toward the pariah that exposed me as indecent and unholy. Matt said, “You can run from this, but wherever you go - there you are.” I see Dan with arms raised singing about a grace that I can’t comprehend. I see hugs and a holy kiss followed by shrugs and a hundred fists. I see my aging father limping on reconstructed knees and an aching mother who has achieved sainthood through selflessness and I see the horror on my Mariah’s face the day I left Asheville forever (for now), and Ambria’s acceptance of circumstances she can’t control, and Ashlyn’s runaway tear as she sits in the plastic kiddie pool in the driveway as I turn away. I see the state border sign come and go and I have to pull over because I’m crying too hard. I see a screwdriver and a bloody wrist and they say objects in the rear view mirror may appear closer than they actually are.

I see an Awakening and a love from which there’s no escape. I see social media as image management and forbidden fruit hanging low in the form of questions from a serpent to challenge the mandates of Shalom. I look in the mirror and I see Eve shifting the blame and scrambling for fig leaves. I see the Grand Haven pier and dial 1-800-273-8255. I hear the voice of God on the other line, asking me about the names and ages of my daughters. I see Teresa walking along the edge of the north shoreline, toward me in a white dress.

When Jesus cried out from the cross, He was quoting the Hebrew Psalm, chapter 22. “My God... My God, why have You forsaken me!?” This has been the crescendo of the last 15 years. A lot has transpired since I’ve come full circle to this cabin in the mountains. And as I’ve wondered aloud these questions have haunted me. Where are You?

Psalm 22 bleeds into the beloved Psalm 23. The psalmist looks in the rear view mirror and sees God as Immanuel, walking beside the streams of water, and cooking breakfast beside a charcoal fire (in the presence of my enemies) and exhales, “You are with me!”

He was with me the whole time. He was there on the stage and in the cage. He was there in the spotlight and in the furnace. He was there beside the fire with a thrice repeated question... Do you love me?

As I write these words, I’m looking out at the falling rain beneath storm clouds over a rustic cabin outside Yellowstone National Park. I’ve come full circle to a love with no beginning and no ending.

The Story Behind Your Scars

Beneath the surface of this bruise is a vein of backfiring blood running toward a resolution. You see only the external evidence of an internal eruption, but time will prove that bruises fade and scars become the everlasting witness of yesterday's choices.

Behind each scar is a story. Every inch of the journey has been recorded on the canvas of mortal flesh; Skinned knees, amputated appendages, and knuckles bleeding from the incessant knocking on the door of heaven, for mercy.

Hidden in the filter of your photoshopped existence is the Truth of bridges of torched by broken promises. The contract was conceived in distrust, but the covenant remains eternal. The smoke of Sinai still hovers over the commitment; the faithfulness of the I Am, when i am not.

Scars are tattoos with better stories. They are narratives written in blood, and the last chapter is still being written. Your story is unfinished. Do not let regret shame you into silence, because the hour is late and the time is now.

Own your story. It's the one thing they can't take away.

They can suffocate your dreams, revoke your license, and disqualify your ordination. They can pull the plug on your breathing machine, and spin the narrative into clean categories of black and white and us and them and right and wrong and pure and polluted. They lock you up in a prison of toxic shame, and write your epitaph with permanent markers. They can start the prayer chain and gatekeepers can sound the alarm of an enemy wolf among innocent sheep. The revisionists can deconstruct your His/Story and you can choose to allow them, [or]

You can let your scars become the evidence of a scandalous mercy that screams of a Creator who uses the foolish things of the world to shame the wise, and the weak things of the world to shame the strong. Don't hide your scars from your children. Reveal the ashes and reconstruct a better tomorrow. Lean into the dis-ease, and be vulnerable enough
to wake up, rise up, take up your bed and walk.

Regret and Gratitude

The other day I was sitting at a table with recovering addicts, listening to the exchange of life stories and mountains climbed. After hearing one man share about all of the bridges he's burned on his way toward sobriety, he stated emphatically, "... and if I could do it all over, I wouldn't have changed a thing! The life lessons have shaped who I am today!" Others around the table nodded, as if to agree.

But I could not.

Because the reality is that I live with an ocean of regret. It is like an albatross chained to my memory, haunting me in my sleep. It's like a reoccurring dream of bridges built and crossed and then burned to ashes by my indifference, neglect, and selfishness. I have sketched the blueprints of a hedonistic empire and chiseled at a foundation of meticulously broken promises.

I carry this weight in my heart, and it slows my pace. My heart beats faster than I can walk, and I'm slowly falling behind and the sun is setting and the hour is late and the course is unfinished and the faith has not been kept.

As I write this, the late winter rains have caused the river behind my house to overflow the banks. The Grand River is expected to continue to rise until water will invade my living room. Yesterday I lifted all of our valuable possessions, including photo albums full of memories. On the kitchen table there are pictures of a cocky teenager who was hellbent on self-destruction. I hate that kid! I want grab him by the throat and get his attention! I wish I could return to Muskegon and tell him to let go of the egocentric aggression, and the narcissistic self-absorption. If I could write an open letter to my younger self, I would emphasize a cautionary dis-trust of choices made with emotion.

There are two dominant streams in my life: Regret and Gratitude.

Regret is the monster hiding beneath the bed of shame. I regret the way I treated my teachers in high school. I regret the way I relentlessly teased Jeremy Leffring. I regret the way I disrespected the different girlfriends of my youth, and the way I pursued attention for vain glory. I regret the way I manipulated conversations to solicit false affirmation, and I regret trusting the promises of a thousand amens. I regret all of the lies that I told, in my efforts to maintain an empire of delusion.

I don't feel like God is angry with me. But I feel like He is disappointed. I don't expect lightning bolts of His wrath, but I have come to expect the icy chill of His silent treatment. The distance is tangible, and the indifference is palpable. I feel reinstated to His Table, but not necessarily to His Triumph.

But on the other side of this ocean of regret, is an oasis of gratitude. We are born with two lungs, and if I inhale from the lung of regret, then I exhale from the lung of gratitude. Because after all of the self-destruction and humiliation, I am still here. It is indeed a miracle!

Several years ago I was involved in a  horrifying car crash that should have ended my life. I was traveling northbound on US 31 near Lake Michigan when I mistakenly took my eyes off the highway. The construction ahead had slowed the traffic to a standstill, and I had no time to stop! I tried to swerve from hitting the last car stopped ahead of me, but clipped the corner of his bumper. My sedan shot fifteen feet into the air, rotating endoverendoverendoverend several times, landing upside down in the opposite direction of travel (across the median)! I was not wearing a safety belt, and my entire vehicle was shattered into a thousand pieces. One witness heard the sound of the crash and saw my vehicle flying through the air, inducing immediate vomit all of the interior of her own vehicle. Such was the disturbance in the atmosphere.

I remember bracing at the time of the collision, curling into the fetal position and waiting for death. I closed my eyes and braced for the darkness. "This is how it ends", I thought. But with each roll and spin and flip, I remained conscious. When I had come to a final stop (upside down), I crawled out of the passenger window and walked away without a scratch. I was barefoot because somehow my shoes went flying with the rest of the car. I just kept shaking my head thinking, "I can't believe I'm alive. I can't. Believe. I'm alive."

I am grateful. I am thankful that despite the crash and burn and fire and smoke and vomit and wonder - there is a Table spread before me in the presence of my enemies. I am grateful. I am thankful that despite my unworthiness, there is the love of a woman, the faith of a mother, and the laughter of three daughters who seal me in this promise of redemption. I am grateful. I am thankful that I have friends like Mitch Schultz, and John Smith, Ken and Bonnie Jane Greene, Dustin Price and Sulkiro Song, AJ Sherrill and Cam Speer, voices of truth in a world of counterfeit. I am grateful. I am thankful for a place to belong, a promise to believe, and a purpose to become. I am grateful. I am thankful for the invitation of the Mercy King to a Table of broken bread and wine in abundance.

Regret < Gratitude

Conversations in the Mirror

Your best days are in the rearview mirror. 

Remember that one time when it was New Year's Eve and you were in the middle of the circle listening to your favorite band with your favorite people and it was snowing and your stomach hurt from laughing so hard at the stolen thunder and you stood with your back against the wall and watched the frozen pipes burst through the ceiling and you said it was a sign from heaven?

Remember when they found her laying in the street - she was talking about the end of the world and the neighbors called the police and now the Social Workers are involved and we want someone to blame because the ultrasound was inconclusive. But I came from Grand Rapids to sit by your hospital bed to hold your hand and tell you that the DePoy's stick together, and everything will be ok and no this is not "God's Plan..." But maybe mental illness runs our bloodline because

I remember the time I stood on the roof of Holland Community Hospital and the voices encouraged me to jump but it was not the voice of my Abba, and I knew that this was a spiritual war, and I had embraced the cold porcelain toilet hurling up the truth about the rest of the story and the unwritten chapters of love lost and found and swinging in the dark at the inevitable resignation of the exodus lovelution.

But what if Brene Brown is right? What if this is all just a narrative that I've created to appear as the victim in a violent crime? What if the other side of the story was much more loving and less complicated and we could make sense of the pipes bursting from the record cold temperatures in the harbor theatre? And what if the doctor was actually good, and not trying to harm you? And what if being bipolar doesn't mean you lose your soul? And what if the story I've been telling myself is fiction?

Because your best days are still ahead of you. And love still wins. And children still laugh. And after New Year's Eve comes a New Beginning, and after the frozen pipes thaw and the demolition removes the ashes, reconstruction comes around Easter and the tomb is empty and Teresa believes in mercy and my value and worth are sealed until the day of redemption.

"...It's a Cold and Broken, Hallelujah."

The carpet felt more like concrete, as I collapsed beneath the table and erupted into a violent explosion of salty tears and self-hatred. The world I had known was forever changed in the unraveling of my shame, finding a shattered mirror and a fist and a whisper, "wherever you go, there you are."

Find me here, inconsolable and unrecognizable. A blanket of suicidal thoughts and imaginary voices calling me to run run run from the truth, and hide hide hide from the runaway tongues. I called Jennifer, Janelle, and Jonathan to say, "I love you." But this felt like the end of a long journey and
I was coming home.

From the carpet beneath the table, I was physically lifted and carried by an angel with tattoos and blue jeans. He drove me home when I was -less, and became my feet when I could not walk. There were no words, only the sound of choppy breathing and hyperventilating and the crushing weight of anxiety as I began to devise a plan for my escape. It was early in the afternoon, and rain had set in while the mountains of Asheville had begun to shake off the frostbite of late winter.

Cam laid me on the couch in his living room, and I rolled over to continue sobbing. These groans were immodest and explicit, and my hands had begun to tingle from the lack of circulation. It seemed my heart had stopped beating, and I was not getting enough oxygen. I cried bitterly, as the rooster crowed thrice. I trembled violently, as my fists became numb. There were no words spoken, only the sound of uninterpretable tongues toward heaven, have mercy.

I don't know how long I slept there on that couch. It seemed like days, but when I stirred I was confused. Where was I? What happened? My eyes opened slowly and began to adjust to the falling daylight. It must have been dusk, and only the fading natural light remained to illuminate through the windows. I was paralyzed in the aftermath of all things unholy; the ashes no longer provided heat - only the evidence that a fire once burned.

And there, beside the couch, sat my friend. He was unmoved and focused, watching me quietly from his chair beside me. To this day, I don't know how long he had been sitting there praying for me. All I do know is that in his provision of a non-anxious presence, he was delivering a powerful sermon.

[Intercession is the intersection between failing faith and saving grace.]

I remember that moment, being stirred back to reality. The pain was real, and it wasn't just a bad dream. The wounds would leave a visible scar on my reputation, and my children would bear the brunt of explaining that their dad (however flawed) still walked on water. Still, no words spoken. He just looked at me with inexplicable grace. His lips slowly formed to a slight smile, as if to say, "I know. It hurts. I love you. And I 'like' you. I am not going anywhere. Go back to sleep."

We locked eyes for a moment, and I will never forget the blanket of comfort that covered me as I experienced agape love. I felt the love and acceptance of God, embodied in a friend - embracing my cold and broken hallelujah.

- Jay DePoy

[S]easonal [A]ffective [D]isorder

there’s a few things i’ll always remember

like the uncomfortable quiet of november

and the way happy chases the ever after

like a kite without anchor in a natural disaster

all contacts deleted like a chorus repeated

advice gone unheeded, and the champion defeated

there’s a few things i’ll always remember

like the frozen burn of late december

when the leaves have turned from red to white

releasing the clutch, letting go and holding tight

at least the most is a friendship on fire

intimacy born in a furnace of desire

there’s a few things i’ll always remember

like the train tracks leading to always and never

turn your attention from the knife-wielding judas

disguised as cheek-kissing, traveling buddhist

at last the first is a step toward denial

so we crawl toward the altar down a blood-stained isle.

Life and Death

I can still hear the doctor's voice, repeated in my head. "If your biopsy returns with evidence of cancer, you may have anywhere from two to ten years to live."

A few days later, I received a voicemail from the doctor's office requesting me to come in for a consultation. I didn't get the message until the office had closed, and I listened again to the message.

I've had two panic attacks in my life. 

The first time I ever had a panic attack, I was delivered some crushing news by four men whom I had once considered to be my closest friends. I began to hyperventilate, and stumbled outside and fell into a snowbank, unable to breathe. I thought I was having a heart attack, but I realize now that it was just an emotional bomb detonating in my brain.

The second time was in 2014, when I received an email that a "storm was coming..." and that my life was about to change forever, followed by a series of accusations against my character. Some of the grenades were full of smoke, false alarms. Others were time bombs with fire and shrapnel and unconfessed sin. My sin was about to be exposed, and my whole world was about to cave in.

The panic attacks were not false alarms. They were real threats resulting in concrete pain. All of the things I once held dear had become eviscerated in a slow unraveling of my deepest shame. I could blame no-one, and collapsed into a plea of guilt.

It has taken three years to rebuild the foundation of my life. The infrastructure of the first half of my life had been shattered, and like pieces of a puzzle coming together - grace has been recapitulating a story that is still being written.

I'm finding grace in unexpected places. In a vintage typewriter with errors in ink; whiteout. In a criminal record with sins exposed; expunged. In divorce and remarriage with baggage in blood; forgiveness. It's true, grace sneaks up on us from behind, and in the dark.

So when I heard the recent announcement that I might have cancer, I presented an attitude of fearless indifference. But that night I could not sleep. I tossed and turned for hours. Two to ten years? 

"Dear God, "I thought. "I am not even close to being ready to prepare for my death." I began to think about all of the things that I have yet to accomplish. I want to walk my daughters down the aisle. I want to see their children grow strong and proud. I want to give them a last name that they can be proud of, not defined by google or Siri or MLive - but by the saturation of redemption! I ache for the reconciliation of relationships, and the restoration of my spiritual gifts. I miss the local church. I miss the Lakeshore Revolution of Love. I miss the eXodus. I miss singing in a circle with my best friends. I miss studying the Text in community. I miss preaching. I miss dreaming. I miss hope and wonder and resurrection and free hugs and love winning and river baptisms and colored chalk on the sidewalk and homeless hallelujahs.

To be reminded of your mortality is a sobering thing.

In his book, The Holy Longing, Ronald Rohlheiser writes about a restlessness at the epicenter of the human heart, aching for a revolution. This "fundamental dis-ease" strikes us like eternity in our hearts (Ec. 3:11), and our ability to channel this energy into a focused purpose is directly related to the health of our spirituality.

Rohlheiser says there are three phases of our spiritual journeys:

The 1st phase is the struggle to get our lives together.

The 2nd phase is the struggle to give our lives away.

The 3rd phase is the struggle to give our deaths away.

I pray that God will give me the opportunity to collect the pieces of my first phase, and with His grace create a mosaic of art and beauty. I pray that my life will be an offering, and my death will be a sweet-smelling aroma offered to my loved ones.

To those who knew me best, and loved me anyway. 

The results of the biopsy came back negative. But the voltage to my heart has awoken me to a spiritual war that I am willing to engage, again. I am unfinished. The last chapter is still being written. My autopsy will reveal a heart that refused to quit, even after the resignation of my mind and body.


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Lost and Found

Several months ago I began meeting with men who are in recovery from addiction(s). At a local city Rescue Mission, we gather in a circle and talk about hope and faith and brokenness. My own experience with rock bottom has given me a greater platform of authority than my degrees. I have been there. I know what it's like to curl up in the backseat of a car and pray for death. I have acquired a taste for self-hatred, and I know the bittersweet warmth of destruction.

But I've also seen the sunrise from an abandoned truck stop in South Carolina. I have watched the tide roll in and out and in again from a thousand beaches and I know that a mild sunburn is good for the soul. I know that gratitude begins where entitlement ends. I have forgiven and sought forgiveness. I am still learning to forgive myself. I am one beggar telling another beggar where I've found bread.

It is in a circle of hope at Guiding Light Mission, where we gather around our stories and reach for resurrection and life. We pray for each other, and laugh and cry and surrender and repeat. Recycling repentance like a squeaky bicycle chain needing the oil of mercy.

I met "Steven" on a cold, Sunday night in February. He was one of three men who openly shared stories of accumulation and loss. He opened up about addiction and recovery and relapse and spiritual bankruptcy. He had a wealth of information from years of experience. Steven was faithful to attend our meetings, and brought his amplified bible with cross references. He showed signs of fruitfulness and hope.

We became good friends. I used to give Steve a ride to work after our meetings. He would be dressed up in his work uniform, carrying a sack lunch for his midnight shift. We exchanged encouraging texts throughout the week, and I found solidarity in his admitted propensity to wander...

Steven shared with me of his dream of opening a non-profit organization that could serve as a safe place for people to overcome their addictions. His own history with drugs had given him a heart for others who were hellbent on self-destruction. I gave him money and time and encouragement. He gave me friendship, and gratitude.

And then, without warning, Steven disappeared.

He stopped coming to meetings and did not return my phone calls. I asked the leaders of the mission if they had seen him, and they were equally concerned. Steven had refused a drug test, and packed his bags... He left the shelter and returned to the streets.

When I heard the news, I stayed awake all night tossing and turning. I prayed aggressively believing that intercession would be the intersection between failing faith and saving grace. The next few days I spent driving up and down Division Street through downtown Grand Rapids. I looked for Steven on every corner - in the eyes of strangers and cops and robbers and shopkeepers. I searched for him on social media, leaving messages for him at every turn.

Why do I care so much about Steven? There are a thousand other distractions that I could exhaust my energy with. Should I just leave the light on and hope he returns like a prodigal to the front porch? Or should I leave the 99 and go hunt down the 1 missing?

Here's why.  Because I've been in Steven's shoes. I have run away to hide in my shame. I have covered my scars with the fig leaves of religion. I have quoted scripture in one sentence and cursed God in the next. I have violently defended the Name of my Savior, and then betrayed that name before the break of dawn.

And I have walked through the valley of the shadow of death. But I was hunted down by goodness and mercy, followed by the Rescuer. I have known what it is like to be lost, and I have experienced the humbling grace of being found. I love much because I have been forgiven much.

I am still looking for Steven. And when I find him, I am going to give him a hug. And I'm not going to ask any questions, or for an explanation. I am not interested in a religious inquisition. I have no desire to extract from him the details of absence. I just want to find him, and then drag him to the Table, and break off a piece of bread and pass him a cup and ask him to do the same for me.

Post Script: I have always been attracted to the margins. The streets. Those whom have been made to feel unwelcome in the American Church.

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let me be found in You

as a drop of water is lost in the ocean
so is the flight of the alone to the Alone

take from me these november thoughts
of never enough and endless thirst
replace these tears with the solace of Your Presence

if it was all over tomorrow
i've been nothing without You
if these lungs inhaled the sudden conclusion
the rapture from this world to the next is a mystery
resolved in the paradox of justice and mercy

let me be found in You.


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This Little Light - Jay DePoy

When my dad was a little boy, he used to wet the bed. One day he came home from school and the bus stopped in front of his house, and all of kids on the bus looked out the window and saw soiled bedsheets hanging from the clothesline, drying in the breeze.

This is my story. Click HERE.