i am the beloveds and he is mine

One of my best friends posted this excerpt from "The Life of the Beloveds" by Henri Nouwen on her blog and it resonated very deep within me. I kept thinking of all the people in my life who don't realize just how precious they are and how much I would give to simply allow this to be truth that they claim. Yet, deeper within me, the longing for this to be truth that I claim within the deepest parts of my own heart cried out even more.

"Aren't you, like me, hoping that some person, thing, or event will come along to give you that final feeling of inner well-being you desire? Don't you often hope: 'May this book, idea, course, trip, job, country, or relationship fulfill my deepest desire.' But as long as you are waiting for that mysterious moment you will go on running helter-skelter, always anxious and restless, always lustful and angry, never fully satisfied. You know that this is the compulsiveness that keeps us going and busy, but at the same time makes us wonder whether we are getting anywhere in the long run. This is the way to spiritual exhaustion and burn-out. This is the way to spiritual death.Well, you and I don't have to kill ourselves. We are the Beloved. We are intimately loved long before our parents, teachers, spouses, children, and friends loved or wounded us. That's the truth of our lives. That's the truth I want you to claim for yourself. That's the truth spoken by the voice that says, 'You are my Beloved.'Listening to that voice with great inner attentiveness, I hear at my center words that say: 'I have called you by name, from the very beginning. You are mine and I am yours. You are my Beloved, on you my favor rests. I have molded you in the depths of the earth and knitted you together in your mother's womb. I have carved you in the palms of my hands and hidden you in the shadow of my embrace. I look at you with infinite tenderness and care for you with a care more intimate that that of a mother for her child. I have counted every hair on your head and guided you at every step. Wherever you go, I go with you, and wherever you rest, I keep watch. I will give you food that will satisfy all your hunger and drink that will quench all your thirst. I will not hide my face from you. You know me as your own as I know you as my own. You belong to me. I am your father, your mother, your brother, your sister, your lover, and your spouse... yes, even your child... wherever you are I will be. Nothing will ever separate us. We are one.'"

May we live as the beloved.
May we, even when we feel as if all sainity and control has been lost in the midst of "life", know that we are known as his own.
May we, even when that relationship fails us, or we don't make the grade or the standard we set for ourselves, kbow that nothing will ever seperate us
We are one.