Hello my friends.
I've been MIA for a few weeks. Life's been tough and I couldn't seem to find any words worth sharing. When I deal with hard things...I tend to hide so that I don't bring that hurt on anyone else. I've been realizing...that's a really bad idea. Because, if in my faking that I'm ok... I'm encouraging you to fake that you're ok and we're both hanging out, both miserable, but pretending we're ok...feeling more miserable as we keep up the masquerade. And, well...that's just stupid. This morning I woke up at 4 am looking in the face the tough situations I've been finding myself in and prayer didn't seem to be shaking off the pain that I felt in my heart. I cried out over and over for comfort...didn't get it...I begged for sleep...didn't get it. So, I gave up on sleep and grabbed my Bible and desperately read needing truth to pierce my heart. This post is me moving forward rather than getting lost in my pain and wallowing.
I've been so shocked lately. Every day it becomes more and more of a reality that faith is painful physically. That hope doesn't come naturally. That being faithful is more of a battle than any war. My family has been through a lot of shit lately and so has my heart. It hasn't been pretty. I've questioned what true obedience looks like and what true love is. I've been confronted with the dilemma and pain that happen when you love someone and that love isn't returned...what does it look like to continue to love that person in pure, holy love? Wow, it's hard.
Reading my Bible this morning in the wee hours I realized how absolutely unnatural the commands and advice that Jesus gave us are. The absolutely absurdity of loving someone who hates you. The obnoxious vulnerability of not retracting your love from someone out of spite when they turn their back on you...it's absolutely impossible. But, yet...it's the only thing that makes sense. It's the only action that is worth it. It's the only option that doesn't leave us feeling like a cheater...I'm tired of cheating...I don't know about you. It's in those situations that we have a chance to rise above the physical and truly live like we believe there is a spiritual and that it matters and dictates our physical.
Somehow....in our pain...through the rough crap...that's where we get refined, that's where we learn character. I found myself rather annoyed with that truth today...that suffering and pain is a tool used to bring us closer to God. I tried to convince him over the past weeks that I could learn just as much if my life were easy, if my heart wasn't bleeding...He just listened as His quiet peace eventually reminded me that He knows best. I don't want to misguide you and tell you that peace comes instantly and I feel all warm inside and know that everything will be ok. Sometimes I have to wait hours, sometimes I don't feel much relief from my raw heart...but eventually, it comes. I think sometimes we put our instantaneous gratification culture on God...but God doesn't work like that. Sometimes, being in the darkness for a bit shapes us into appreciating and seeing light better...
I don't want to be so scared of hurting, that I minimize the trial...and lose the lesson to be learned. I found myself struggling with the beatitudes in Matt. 5. "Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted. Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth" (I like the message version which says "You are blessed when you are at the end of your rope, for that is when God has room to work". I don't get why God works like this...it just seems like He does. I don't get how my broken heart isn't something to be feared...but something that as I work through is a blessing...it sure doesn't feel like that! I found myself truly struggling with these verses today...struggling with what it means to be faithful and trusting, while also not fake that everything in my life is just peachy and I couldn't be happier.
Lots of people don't want to be around someone when they're sad, hurting, depressed. So, we fake it and say we're "ok" when we're not, because we don't know what the other person would do if they knew what was going on inside of us anyways. This week, I've been reminded of what it looks like to have a true friend, who even when I'm crying, calls me up and takes me somewhere just to sit with me and to be with me. That sounds small, but it has changed my life. I want to be the person that people don't have to fake it around. If we were honest....what a beautiful dimension that would add to our relationships instead of trying to fake that we're happy or joyful. I have joy, deep down, and I have hope, but some days...are tough days...some months feel a bit like purgatory....and it's in those moments I need to not be alone. And, the freeing part is....when I'm not all smiley...that doesn't mean I love Jesus any less in that moment. It doesn't mean I've lost my way.
I need someone who is my friend when I'm not very much fun. Someone who exemplifies the true love that proves to me that they've got Jesus. We can be in a room full of people who claim to have the joy of the Lord, are hyped up on Jesus...and get lost. We can be lost by being the person who just doesn't feel that way and is going through hard shit...or we can be the person who gets lost by not noticing those who feel on the fringes and need some practical, real, everyday love...a hug, a tough conversation.
To my friend who will never read this...but has changed my life...thank you for not missing the boat.
I've been MIA for a few weeks. Life's been tough and I couldn't seem to find any words worth sharing. When I deal with hard things...I tend to hide so that I don't bring that hurt on anyone else. I've been realizing...that's a really bad idea. Because, if in my faking that I'm ok... I'm encouraging you to fake that you're ok and we're both hanging out, both miserable, but pretending we're ok...feeling more miserable as we keep up the masquerade. And, well...that's just stupid. This morning I woke up at 4 am looking in the face the tough situations I've been finding myself in and prayer didn't seem to be shaking off the pain that I felt in my heart. I cried out over and over for comfort...didn't get it...I begged for sleep...didn't get it. So, I gave up on sleep and grabbed my Bible and desperately read needing truth to pierce my heart. This post is me moving forward rather than getting lost in my pain and wallowing.
I've been so shocked lately. Every day it becomes more and more of a reality that faith is painful physically. That hope doesn't come naturally. That being faithful is more of a battle than any war. My family has been through a lot of shit lately and so has my heart. It hasn't been pretty. I've questioned what true obedience looks like and what true love is. I've been confronted with the dilemma and pain that happen when you love someone and that love isn't returned...what does it look like to continue to love that person in pure, holy love? Wow, it's hard.
Reading my Bible this morning in the wee hours I realized how absolutely unnatural the commands and advice that Jesus gave us are. The absolutely absurdity of loving someone who hates you. The obnoxious vulnerability of not retracting your love from someone out of spite when they turn their back on you...it's absolutely impossible. But, yet...it's the only thing that makes sense. It's the only action that is worth it. It's the only option that doesn't leave us feeling like a cheater...I'm tired of cheating...I don't know about you. It's in those situations that we have a chance to rise above the physical and truly live like we believe there is a spiritual and that it matters and dictates our physical.
Somehow....in our pain...through the rough crap...that's where we get refined, that's where we learn character. I found myself rather annoyed with that truth today...that suffering and pain is a tool used to bring us closer to God. I tried to convince him over the past weeks that I could learn just as much if my life were easy, if my heart wasn't bleeding...He just listened as His quiet peace eventually reminded me that He knows best. I don't want to misguide you and tell you that peace comes instantly and I feel all warm inside and know that everything will be ok. Sometimes I have to wait hours, sometimes I don't feel much relief from my raw heart...but eventually, it comes. I think sometimes we put our instantaneous gratification culture on God...but God doesn't work like that. Sometimes, being in the darkness for a bit shapes us into appreciating and seeing light better...
"Experienced mountaineers have a quiet, regular, short step- on the level it looks petty; but then this step they keep up, on and on as they ascend, whilst the inexperienced townsman hurries along, and soon has to stop, dead beat with the climb...Such an expert mountaineer, when the thick mists come, halts and camps out under some slight cover brough with him, quietly smoking his pipe, and moving on only when the mist has cleared away...You want to grow in virture, to serve God, to love Christ? Well, you will grow in and attain to these things if you will make them a slow and sure, an utterly real, a mountain stepplod and ascent, willing to have to camp for weeks or months in spiritual desloation, darkness and emptiness at diferent stages in your march and growth. All demand for constant light, for ever the best--the best to your own feeling, all attempt at eliminating or minimizing the cross and trial, is so much soft folly and puerile trifling." -Baron Friedrich von Hugel
I don't want to be so scared of hurting, that I minimize the trial...and lose the lesson to be learned. I found myself struggling with the beatitudes in Matt. 5. "Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted. Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth" (I like the message version which says "You are blessed when you are at the end of your rope, for that is when God has room to work". I don't get why God works like this...it just seems like He does. I don't get how my broken heart isn't something to be feared...but something that as I work through is a blessing...it sure doesn't feel like that! I found myself truly struggling with these verses today...struggling with what it means to be faithful and trusting, while also not fake that everything in my life is just peachy and I couldn't be happier.
Lots of people don't want to be around someone when they're sad, hurting, depressed. So, we fake it and say we're "ok" when we're not, because we don't know what the other person would do if they knew what was going on inside of us anyways. This week, I've been reminded of what it looks like to have a true friend, who even when I'm crying, calls me up and takes me somewhere just to sit with me and to be with me. That sounds small, but it has changed my life. I want to be the person that people don't have to fake it around. If we were honest....what a beautiful dimension that would add to our relationships instead of trying to fake that we're happy or joyful. I have joy, deep down, and I have hope, but some days...are tough days...some months feel a bit like purgatory....and it's in those moments I need to not be alone. And, the freeing part is....when I'm not all smiley...that doesn't mean I love Jesus any less in that moment. It doesn't mean I've lost my way.
I need someone who is my friend when I'm not very much fun. Someone who exemplifies the true love that proves to me that they've got Jesus. We can be in a room full of people who claim to have the joy of the Lord, are hyped up on Jesus...and get lost. We can be lost by being the person who just doesn't feel that way and is going through hard shit...or we can be the person who gets lost by not noticing those who feel on the fringes and need some practical, real, everyday love...a hug, a tough conversation.
To my friend who will never read this...but has changed my life...thank you for not missing the boat.
