Knowing Trouble

Lately,

I have been remembering a time of learning,

in a desk

in a classroom

in a college.

It was a favorite professor that day

who looked at his young students

to say,

Trouble will come to you. I promise.

In your lifetime you will see it.

You will not finish life without it.

I thought and thought

two different thoughts.

One of starry-eyed disbelief:

My life is calm and steady.

I'm sure I will live out my days

in no big ups or downs

and be happy forever and always.

And another of hopeless horror:
What terrible thing will happen to me?

When? Will the pain be forever?

How terrible will it be?

And in my mind now I see that student

who both doubted and feared

the pains of living

and could only carry on in

a known temporary happiness

And all the while

secretly bracing for impact.

And now years later,
I find in myself

a different kind of a learning.

Not of

desks or

classrooms or

colleges.

But as one tiny student

whose eyes have gained just a little

of this unwanted wisdom.

Trouble comes and

people want to say,

"Poor him," or

"Poor you,"

but right or wrong

I can't help but think:

You are not immune to this sort of thing.

Trouble comes.

It just does.

And it feels like fire in your skin

and it won't let you sleep

or eat

or breathe

And your body shakes at night

and you lose all of your words

and thoughts

and the ability to walk about in the world.

But I must say,

there is something about fire.

Something about the heat,

the intensity,

the relentlessness of it

that feels very, very necessary.

I'm reminded of how

babies are birthed,

and how pearls come to exist,

each in distress,

but all the while being navigated

by the complete naturalness of it all.

He knows.

He knows.

He knows it all very, very well.

And once the fire has given its all ,

and something physical

has been changed or destroyed,

then we come out to view the ashes.

We come out of hiding,

Shedding those rigid layers we

had believed we needed to endure.

And we see, yes there were things here before

that are not here now.

Yes, something very terrible has happened.

But, here I stand.

Here I stand.

I did not die from the pain.

And what did die away has been taken care of

by one strong and gentle Savior

who covered the work of even the worst of fires

on a cross

on a hill

so that our unconquerable parts

might know peace forever and ever

and ever.

Tired

I want to be good
and strong
and humble.
I wish I was okay
with the hurt
and never chose
distractions
over hearing His voice.
I want to be obedient
and healthy
and trusting.
Just not today
and maybe not tomorrow.

Someday.

Rock of Ages

There are memories I have, so visceral and painful, that have etched themselves so deeply in my heart that I know their remembrances will never go far from me. When I think of the visual representation of it I see a land wide with rock and, without any permission given by me, a chisel ravaged that land with deep trenches. This was not our asking. It was a violent and vicious attack that has left us changed forever.
In the process, someone was stolen from us and we are left in his absence to try and wrap our minds around having just witnessed the ugly progression of life turning into death. In reality, my mind gets it. In my mind I know that we are all going to die one day, that physical life always ends in death, and that disease is not always survivable. I understand these things with my mind. But my heart...my heart screams, "WHAT?" My heart stops me in the middle of my daily tasks and thinks, "Wait, what just happened here?" My heart silently wonders, "He's really gone?"
There is something inconceivable about it all and because I am tiny and human, my heart can only contain so much of it at once. So when one layer gets worked through, another layer appears to remind me of the reality of it all over again. And I sit, bewildered in those trenches that have been dug in my heart, just as if they are places I've never seen before.

BUT...

I also know that deep calls to deep. Where deep trenches have been dug, there also lies the potential for deep waters of healing to be invited in, causing dry earth to be watered and new buds to spring to life. Where ashes sit in heaps, therein lies the potential for the Spirit to come as He does and turn them into such beauty that the world wonders, "How?" He is bounty, He is solid, He is the Rock of Ages. His Word speaks it and so I raise my eyes from the trenches to grasp it. And looking back, I see how faithful He was to begin wooing me just before everything really began to unravel. His Love rings true forever, so faithful is His loving kindness. Lean into that tiny voice. Fear nothing, for not even death can quench his Love. Fear nothing, fear nothing, fear nothing. Sit at his feet and minister to His heart with your unfaltering trust. Let him lift your chin in order to see more clearly and let all heavy, heaving sadness be laid to rest with the victorious Man of Sorrows.

Note To Self

Go visit this place.