Psalm 112:4 NLT
This Spring was so very slow in coming! The cold and the dark hung on like the tentacles of some dark many-armed monster and like those long nights when you can't fall asleep that seem interminable, I wondered if the cold of winter would ever pass or if we were under the curse of the White Witch as they were in Narnia before Aslan came - "always winter and never Christmas...."
My heart sometimes feels that way, that there is only more darkness around each corner, that evil is prevailing, that what I've known is only the tip of the iceberg and that there's no getting around this polar glacier. But then I soak myself in the Psalms and I claim with David the comfort of our forever faithful and victorious God.
I recently read this insightful quote by one of the characters in Jamie Langston Turner's By the Light of a Thousand Stars: "Maybe, she thought, the test of grief for a Christian was whether you stuck by what you knew was right even when you didn't feel like it in your heart yet. Maybe talking publicly about "God's will" and His "perfect plan" and the "assurance of His love" was okay even though your heart was aching so badly you hardly knew what you were saying. Maybe going through the motions of faith in a time of sorrow wasn't as bad as she had imagined....
… the habit of trusting God--could there be such a thing? Could such a habit be a lifeline when tribulation swept over you? Could you hang onto it during the worst of the storm without seeing any evidence that it was real? And then when the strongest waves and winds of sorrow had passed, could you realize that what you had held in your hands all along was genuine, and that it was your means of rescue?
Light moves faster than sound... Faith moves faster than feeling... no, that wasn't right...
No, it wasn't a matter of the speed of faith so much as its power and permanence that was it -- faith outlasted sorrow. Grief might knock you off your high wire, but faith was your safety net."
I just started reading The Broken Way by Ann Voskamp and think I will weep through it! These quotes are from the first chapter: "...maybe you can live a full and beautiful life in spite of the great and terrible moments that will happen right inside of you. Actually--maybe you get to become more abundant because of those moments. Maybe--I don't know how, but somehow?--maybe our hearts are made to be broken. Broken open. Broken free. Maybe the deepest wounds birth deepest wisdom." and …"'Never be afraid of being a broken thing.' I don't--I don't even know what that means. I am afraid. And I think this journey, this way, will not spare any of us. But maybe--this is the way to freedom? I've got to remember to just keep breathing--keep believing.
In Christ--no matter the way, the storm, the story--we always know the outcome,
Our Savior--surrounds.
Our future--secure.
Our joy--certain.
When we know Christ, we always know how things are going to go--always for our good and always for His glory.
Somehow love can lodge light into wounds.
"Maybe the deepest wounds birth deepest wisdom."
So, in my pain, I open my hands to receive His wisdom....
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