TIM E HOLDER

Spouting Horn Beach Park, near Poipu, on the south shore of Kauai, is a blowhole that can, depending on the tide and surf conditions, shoot a ferocious spout of water as much as 50 feet into the air. This impressive, completely natural ocean attraction can be viewed from the top of a hill, with guardrails and warning signs offering protection to keep tourists from wandering too close to the perilous spouting water and subsequent mighty, surge of equally dangerous water as it swirls back through the hole into the ocean below.

When I was there, however, the “ENTER AT YOUR OWN RISK” sign was nothing more than a “green light” to me. A “welcome” mat. Honestly, I don’t even know why they put up offers of advice like that when I’m around. It’s like a dare. I don’t walk around looking for adventure like that. But, if it’s put right in front of me, what am I supposed to do?

At this particular time of day the tide was low and the ocean level was way below the rim of the lava shelf. So, down the hill my friend Tricia and I trotted, I, sporting my 4-hour old flip-flops and straw gardener’s hat.

No waves were flowing over the top of the shelf to wash us close to the blowhole. And I knew I could back up far enough from the geyser when it blew to miss the churning, foaming maelstrom of water as it receded back down the hole.

Trish and I were between the blowhole and the ocean, exploring the sharp, serrated, ancient lava formations when I glanced up and saw fellow tourists waving at us from atop the hill. I thought it a kind gesture from folks I didn’t know, so I did a body builder pose, suspecting they were taking pictures of us, when I noticed more than one of them were not waving, but instead, pointing behind us.

I turned just in time to see a massive wave, much taller than the lava shelf bearing down, a mere handful of seconds from us. It must have been a freak mini-tsunami from some earthquake off the coast of Tasmania.

I screamed for Tricia to hold on to anything. I laid back on the lave floor, planted my feet as firmly as I could against a small incline in the shelf, slammed my eyes shut, took in a deep breath and waited.

The wave hit full force at the same time water gushed up the blowhole no more than 15 feet from me. As the wave subsided, the rushing and groaning sounds from the torrent being sucked back down the blowhole began and I found myself being pulled along with it. I felt my feet come off the ground, out of my flip-flops and I dug in as hard as I could. I have a distinct memory of some bouncy shrieking going on. I have decided to remember it as concerned sightseers atop the hill.

When the water finally slowed down, enough for me to know I wasn’t going to go down with it, I was less than a foot from the hole, pretty much straddling it, watching my brand new gardener’s hat whirlpool out of sight. I actually started to grab for it before I heard Tricia yell, “LEAVE IT!” I never knew what happened to my flip-flops, but I have my suspicions. All I know is that my feet were cut to shreds by the dried lava and the rest of my stay on this beautiful island was a little severely sensitive.

I’ve been told the blowhole is actually a sort of safety valve, much like the old steam engines that release steam if the equipment gets too hot or pressurized. This safety valve keeps the equipment from exploding or causing damage to the machines or injury to people around it.

If the blowhole were not there to release energy, the constant pounding of ocean water underneath the dried lava would have slowly disintegrated the shelf, causing it to break apart and fall into the boiling ocean below.

So, the safety valve itself became the attraction.

A couple of weeks ago, I was listening to some praise music.It was Kare Jobe singing, “Forever.”

“One final breath he gave As heaven looked away The son of God was laid in darkness. A battle in the grave. The war on death was waged. The power of hell forever broken. The ground began to shake. The stone was rolled away. His perfect love could not be overcome. Now death where is your sting? Our resurrected King has rendered you defeated. Forever, He is glorified Forever, He is lifted high. Forever, He is risen. He is alive, He is alive.”

And then that old, beautiful, familiar feeling took over. It has become almost a motor response for me when I experience something that draws me closer to what I truly believe heaven will be. When my body becomes responsive to an encounter with Jesus that can only be experienced because I know His Holy Spirit resides in my heart.

The closest earthly event I can compare it to is being in the front car of a roller coaster as it reaches the pinnacle of it’s slow, rhythmic, clickity-clack climb. I always try to position myself in line so that I am in the first car. And that moment just before I hear the release of the brake and the car begins it’s insane plunge back to earth.

In that moment, the rush of adrenaline is at it’s peak. The exhilaration and anticipation tightens in my chest and moves up into my face. I, through sheer determination, let go the safety bar and raise my hands into the air and take in the deepest breath I can manage because I know that at this point, there is not one single thing I can do to get out of whatever happens next. The only thing I can do is enjoy the ride.

The car slowly crests the hill, I look down at the curved track far below. I inhale again…and scream.

The car comes to a screeching, abrupt stop. And my eyes fill with tears as I beg my fellow travelers to get back in line for one more turn. Pretty much what I did and do when listening to praise music. I fill completely up with the maximum amount of joy and anticipation and expectation my body can withstand until it can’t humanly hold any more and i begin to cry with the promise of heaven.

I have finally figured out that tears are our safety valve. I’m absolutely convinced that the Lord gave us this earthly escape mechanism because our bodies can’t contain the magnitude of eternity.

Paul pointed it out in 1 Corinthians 2. “No one’s ever seen or heard anything like this. Never so much as imagined anything quite like it—What God has arranged for those who love him. But you’ve seen and heard it because God by his Spirit has brought it all out into the open before you.”

I believe God created us to long for heaven and the release of our limited capability to physically praise him the way we so long to do.

I know for me, the day I was standing in my living room with my hands raised, screaming, “Forever He is risen, He is alive,” my heart was about to explode with sheer, crystal joy, and I didn’t want the thankfulness and love I felt for him in that moment to stop, and the final expression of my worship was with tears. It was a small reflection of eternity. The safety valve.

We weren’t made to experience here what we will experience there. Our bodies can’t contain it. So, he gave us tears.

One of the most moving pictures of this expression of the safety valve is in Luke 7. “One of the Pharisees asked him over for a meal. He went to the Pharisee’s house and sat down at the dinner table. Just then a woman of the village, the town harlot, having learned that Jesus was a guest in the home of the Pharisee, came with a bottle of very expensive perfume and stood at his feet, weeping, raining tears on his feet. Letting down her hair, she dried his feet, kissed them, and anointed them with the perfume. When the Pharisee who invited him saw this, he said to himself, “If this man was the prophet I thought he was, he would have known what kind of woman this is who is falling all over him.”

Jesus said to him, “Simon, I have something to tell you.”

“Oh? Tell me.”

“Two men were in debt to a banker. One owed five hundred silver pieces, the other fifty. Neither of them could pay up, and so the banker canceled both debts. Which of the two would be more grateful?”

Simon answered, “I suppose the one who was forgiven the most.”

“That’s right,” said Jesus.

Then turning to the woman, but speaking to Simon, he said, “Do you see this woman? I came to your home; you provided no water for my feet, but she rained tears on my feet and dried them with her hair. You gave me no greeting, but from the time I arrived she hasn’t quit kissing my feet. You provided nothing for freshening up, but she has soothed my feet with perfume. Impressive, isn’t it? She was forgiven many, many sins, and so she is very, very grateful. If the forgiveness is minimal, the gratitude is minimal.”

Then he spoke to her: “I forgive your sins.”

That set the dinner guests talking behind his back: “Who does he think he is, forgiving sins!”

He ignored them and said to the woman, “Your faith has saved you. Go in peace.”

The picture of the “sinful” woman’s even being in Simon’s house is worth noting. She came ready, prepared to see Jesus. If supper was to be at 7:00, she was there at 6:45. She brought the perfume with her. It was not a last minute decision. She knew who Jesus was. So, before this supper, she must have heard him speak healing and love to the hurting and forgotten. She probably followed him from a distance, fearing that he would shun her, as everyone with any amount of dignity and integrity would. She was not stalking a stranger. She withstood the scornful, “what are you doing here” looks from the others reclining at the table. Because it was tradition for the host of the party to have the guests feet washed and dried, she didn’t bring water or a towel. So, thinking she would finish the “welcome” by anointing his feet with oil, she might have been surprised when she saw his road weary feet. Covered with dust from his travels.

But, her heart was too full to allow this to stop her expression of thankfulness. As she knelt in front of this one, the only one who didn’t look down on her, and in fact, only showed compassion, all she could respond with was a full heart of gratefulness that her earthly body couldn’t possibly contain. Thankfulness that she would never be able to fully express the way she so wanted to. She never spoke a word. Her love poured out in the only way it could humanly respond,

Her safety valve became the attraction.

She wasn’t weeping tears on Jesus’ feet to make it clear how sinful she was or how wretched a person she knew herself to be. I believe her tears were from a body so filled with thankfulness and repentance and newly realized acceptance, a life filled with hope, maybe for the first time in her life, forgiveness, and a sense of self. No woman of her status would dare do what she did. Only a life filled with adventure in the kingdom of love.

I feel certain that one day, when she met Jesus in heaven, he gave her two gifts of her tears. He opened his great ledger, and pointed to a specific place and time in history where he recorded her tears on his behalf when no one else chose to even wash his feet. And second, a bottle, who knows, maybe made of alabaster, where he saved every single one of her tears, her safety valve, which she shed for His glory. And she was able to express her true heart with the realization that she was finally home.

And with the fullness of love and acceptance that would ring for all eternity, she was able to exclaim, “My beloved is mine. And I am His.”