Blessed

Lately, the rain in my life has been a torrential downpour. Floods of water cascade over my hopes and dreams, and threaten to wash them away in mere moments.

I’ve been experiencing winter for so long that sometimes I start to forget what spring feels like. I try to recall what renewal, re-birth, and resurrection feel like, but I can’t. I’d love to experience running into marvelous light, but I’m not there yet either.

And then, song lyrics pop into my head.

“You give and take away,
You give and take away,
But my heart will choose to say
Blessed be the name of the Lord
Blessed be the glorious name of the Lord”

I can’t change my feelings or my disappointment, but I can choose how to respond and how to move forward. I can’t numb the pain or make it fade more quickly, but I can trust in the blessed name of the Lord to hold my hand. And one day, when I’m ready, he’ll walk with me into spring. I can’t wait for that day.

Upon My Knees

Letting go is often a messy business. As I sat on my bedroom floor on Sunday night, and cried out to God with tears streaming down my face, I was not the picture of perfect Christianity or unwavering faith. I was the person who finally put aside my fear of God not meeting me, not being real, and not allowing me to feel him. With faith the size of a mustard seed, I trusted that he would not forsake me. In that moment, he didn’t.

He led me to Hebrews 5:7.

“During the days of Jesus’ life on earth, he offered up prayers and petitions with loud cries and tears to the one who could save him from death, and he was heard because of his reverent submission.”

As I thought of my Heavenly Father experiencing a similar state of vulnerability during his lifetime, the tears subsided. I was suddenly reminded that God is in this with me, and he is in our confusion, struggles, hurts, disappointments, and pain every single day. He does not leave our side, or throw us into situations and then sit back and see if we make it.

He walks beside us, and holds our hands. He pursues us even when we shut him out or rebuild obstacles that he has just torn down. He is love, and he loves us in a way that I have no conception for. Yet, his love is perfect, and it is good. I can rest in that truth.

let go, jump in

Sometimes, I think I’m afraid to slow down. I think I equate “smelling the roses” with letting my guard down. With opening up. And if I’m open, then I might be emotional. And I’ve always secretly felt that emotions are a sign of weakness.

So I don’t stop. I kill myself doing things and staying busy so I don’t lose momentum. I go through empty motions and do empty things without passion. I numb myself because it’s easier to be numb than to be still. Being still means thinking. Thinking means feeling. Feeling means realizing that something is missing.

I’d like to break this empty cycle. I’d like to know that there is something more. To be honest, I desperately want to live differently. I want to know that God is real and that he loves me and to never question that again in my life. I want to know that he has plans to bring me hope and a future.

But to know all that, I might have to let go of how I’m living now. And I’m scared of letting go.

Surrender

“If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me. For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for me saves it. What good is it for a man to gain the whole world, and yet lose or forfeit his very soul?” -Luke 9:23-25

Denying oneself. Dying to yourself. Giving up your rights.

Is it worth it? I’d rather save my soul than have the whole world but still feel like I was missing something.

“There’s an emptiness inside her
And she’ll do anything to fill it in
But all the colors mix together – to grey
And it breaks her heart.” -Dave Matthews Band, Grey Street

Let’s fill our souls up with love, with joy, with patience, and with selflessness. Let’s look less at what our rights are or what we feel people owe us, and more at how we can bless the people who are in our lives. Let’s start realizing that life is not “all about us” and deny ourselves. The world would be transformed if we all lived out unfailing love.

Surpassing Understanding

“And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding,
will guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.” – Eph. 4:7

A peace that is independent of answers, closure, understanding, clarity and wisdom. A peace that just is because God is love. That is my prayer.

Persistence

My life with God sometimes reminds me of when my dad and I spent hours laboring over algebra homework in junior high.

He was endlessly patient with me as I begged him to tell me the answer. Yet, he always resisted my demands and my longings to take the easy way out. Instead, he lovingly and patiently waited for me to put my selfishness aside, and then walked me through the problem step-by-step. Why? Because he wanted me to understand how to solve the problem and find the answer. He wanted me to learn. He wanted me to grow.

God does the same thing with me. When the only thing I want in the world is clarity about the end result of something, he says no. No, you can’t just find out what the destination is without making the journey. No, I won’t hand you what you want without you growing. No, because I love you too much to give you the answer and allow you to miss the lesson.

I’m learning that God loves me, and I’m learning that he loves me too much to give me everything I want or think I need. But, he loves me so much that he gives me enough. And, that’s all I really need.

Fill Our Souls Up

Fill our souls up. A line from a favorite Dave Matthews song (Crush), it seems that we are all trying to fill our souls up with something, yet we often fail to fill it with something that can truly satisfy us.

I just walked on the beach, which is one of my favorite things to do when I’m trying to make sense of life. I had my usual encounter with God…I raged at him in my head (honestly), tried to bribe him (honestly), and then ultimately surrendered.

As I walked along the beach, I saw scattered sand dollar halves. That isn’t very unusual, but these were purple, meaning that they were still alive.

It struck me that I am like the broken sand dollar. My imperfections and sin causes my soul to shatter in two. However, as I try to fill the void up with empty things, I die a little inside, and turn grey, like the sand dollar as it dies.

One of the most challenging quotes on our separation from God (sin) is from John Piper’s book, Desiring God. “Sin is like spiritual leprosy. It deadens your senses so you rip your soul to shreds and don’t even feel it.”

I wonder what our lives would look like if we stopped trying to cover up our imperfections and hide our shortcomings. If we were honest about asking for help, and if we offered authentic love and grace to one another.

I’m convinced that we would be living more like God intended. Why would he ever want us to be numb?

Crushed

Things I’ve learned or realized lately…

I don’t know if I’ve ever internalized or experienced the foundational things I’ve believed for most of my life, like that God loves me.

I want to know that I’m worth “it.” Worth loving, worth pursuing, worth getting to know.

I want the pain to stop, and I thought that if I tried to do 5,000 things at once, it would. But it hasn’t stopped. Being busy hasn’t numbed me to a place where I’m immune to it, and hasn’t caused me to forget about it. The pain creeps in at the worst possible moments; like at 1 am when I should be sleeping.

I want joy. I want peace. I want love. I want something real. And I want to be reminded that the Christian life is worth it, because sometimes I’m not so sure that it is.

I want the blanket of disappointment and discouragement to be replaced by the lightness of hope and grace.