i'm thankful that i'm stuck here. i'm thankful that i'm half way across the world with no way to get home until i've finished what i signed up to do. i'm thankful that there's no way out. for that matter, i'm thankful for the past ten months of my life, that i've been stuck in the circumstances with no way out. i've been thinking about that alot this past year because i've made alot of decisions that in hindsight i wouldn't have the strength to make again. i'm thankful that in God's mercy He doesn't always show me the full reality of what i'm choosing when i choose it. because i am too weak to choose the hard things when i know how hard they are really going to be. i'm learning to see how it's a way of God showing me His grace...when He leads me into things before showing me completely where He's leading. i think He does that alot...He leads His people one step at a time. i've always been taught and believed that mostly that was because He wanted to increase our faith, because He wants us to have to look to him for direction at every step. and i think sometimes that is the case, but i think sometimes the reason, at least in my life, is in some ways the opposite of that. i think alot of times it's because i don't have enough faith to follow when i know what i'm getting into. i think in His grace, He looks at me in my weakness and realizes that there are something He must reveal to me one step at a time because i can't handle knowing all at once. i think sometimes God uses making decisons to increase faith, but for me i think my faith grows more in the season after the decision has been made. i think that in the season of decision making sometimes God says, you know what, i really am calling you to make this particular decision and right now in this moment what i really care about is that you make the decision, i'm not so concerned about how much faith it takes for you to make the decision, the faith part will come-don't you worry about that. so in His grace, He spares me the details and He makes the decision easier for me to make. and then the season after the decision is made is where the true change happens. i need God to make me stuck. i am too weak to choose suffering...i need Him to put me in the middle of it with no way out, but to walk through it. i've seen Him do this alot for me over the past year of my life and i am learning to be incredibly thankful for it.
the first time this happened was exactly this time last year when derek found out he got accepted into teach for america in jacksonville. it sounded like such an exciting adventure and one we obviously couldn't turn down. God was so clearly in the details of working things out as we prepared for that season. but then the day finally came when derek actually had to leave to go half way across the country without me. and it was another one of those instances where the idea was alot different than reality. the idea sounded great. sounded like the kind of adventurous story i wanted to be living. but the reality was incredibly difficult. i remember going home to an empty house the first night after i dropped him off at the airport and asking God what in the world we had gotten ourselves into. i was certain that there was no way i could handle what we had just started, but i was also fully aware that there was no way out. when we made the decision for derek to go, i cognitively knew it was going to be really difficult, but if i had known the feelings i would have that first night in a lonely house, there is no way i could have choosen it. i'm not strong enough i choose that extent of pain.
i began feeling really claustrophobic in this season....not in physical spaces, but in circumstances. i felt so stuck. i made decisions, not being fully aware of what i was choosing, and then i was stuck to live with the decision that i choose. i remember derek telling me a story about his roommate paul who was a runner. he said every night before a race he would find paul pacing around the house looking miserable. one time he asked paul what he was thinking and paul said he was just thinking about the pain he was about to put himself through the next morning. derek asked him why he did that to himself and paul said because it was worth it , because it made him alive. i have felt alot like paul in this past year. miserable at the thought of the pain that i have chosen, but hopefully believing that it is worth it.
No comments:
Post a Comment