Yesterday the skies were bright blue in London. It seemed like the first time in a long time that I actually saw the color of the sky, without hazy clouds dimming the brilliance of the blue. The warmth of the sun felt so good on my face. Spring.
I am so thankful for the changing of seasons -- in the world as well as in life. That even in the seemingly bleakest days of winters, we can hold on to the promise that things will change. Crocuses will push up through hard ground, daffodils will bloom, trees with sprout green leaves. It can be hard in the midst of winter’s grayness to remember this. But that doesn't make it any less true.
I can only imagine in Japan right now it seems almost impossible to believe that life will ever return to areas devastated by ruptured earth, waves and nuclear fears. And I doubt life will ever look exactly the same. But I have hope that life will return and believe in a God who is able to restore even the most broken things, to heal even the most ruptured lives.
Where to begin?
If you don’t mind awfully, I’ll just begin in the middle. Because, really, the last six months have been pretty uneventful. I did a little traveling. Saw family and friends. I kept my couch good company. I started a new job that was harder than my old job and left me in a bit of a daze until, well, now. And even now I struggle to find good work-life balance. But who doesn’t? Even now I struggle to sit down and meditate on life. Then again, usually when I start to do that, I get a bit depressed. I think too much. One of the downsides to being hyperanalytical.
But I don’t really feel like talking about all of that. What do I feel like talking about? Well, I’m glad you asked, actually. If you don’t mind, I’m just going to ramble for a bit. Mostly about God’s love and His faithfulness.
You see, I’ve been reading Psalm 78 this week and realized that I’m a bit like those Israelites in the desert. Wandering around this world of ours and even after God has gone and done great things in my life, abundantly providing for my every need, asking: “Can God prepare a table in the wilderness? Behold, He struck the rock so that waters gushed out, And streams were overflowing; Can He give bread also? Will He provide meat for His people?”
Maybe you, like me, when you read that, think “Duh. Come on people. He brought water out of a rock. What can’t He do? What is wrong with you?” Then I turn around and pretty much do the same thing, asking a God who has taken care of me every single day, every single minute of life, paying attention to every minute detail: “But God, what about this? How will I EVER get through such and such? Are you really there? Do you really love me?” Yep, pretty much the same thing. Brilliant.
The good news, as I was telling my friend Erin last night, is that God knows what He’s doing. It’s funny, isn’t it? How easy it is to believe these things for other people. To tell them: God is FOR you. He is NEAR you. He will NEVER fail you or forsake you. He LOVES you. He DELIGHTS in you. And to struggle to believe any of that in the areas of your life that are a bit of a thorn in your side.
This week, as I writing some of those encouragements to a dear friend of mine, I was reminded of one of my favorite bits in one of my favorite books, Frederick Buechner’s “A Room Called Remember.”:
“The final secret, I think, is this: that the words ‘You shall love the Lord your God’ become in the end less a command than a promise. And the promise is that, yes, on the weary feet of faith and the fragile wings of hope, we will come to love him at last as from the first he has love us -- loved us even in the wilderness, especially in the wilderness, because he has been in the wilderness with us. He has been in the wilderness for us. He has been acquainted with our grief. And, loving him, we will come at last to love each other too so that, in the end, the name taped on every door will be the name of the one we love.
“‘And these words which I command you this day shall be upon your heart; and you shall teach them diligently to your children, and you shall talk of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you rise.’
“And rise we shall, out of the wilderness, every last one of us, even as out of the wilderness Christ rose before us. That is the promise, and the greatest of all promises.”
And THAT is the promise. One we can count on. So, on these weary feet of faith, I will keep walking. And on those fragile wings of hope, I will continue to believe that, as Beth Moore taught me, God IS who He says He is. He CAN DO what He says HE can do. Even when I’m stuck in the middle. Especially when I’m stuck in the middle.
