What a crazy week. What a crazy life. This week is pretty huge in my life. This week has been really hard emotionally. There have been a lot of decisions that I have had to make in the last week and I am just barely hitting the consequences of those decisions now. The metaphor I would chose to use about all this is that I'm currently in the state where the Titanic is aware that it is going to hit an iceberg and there is absolutely nothing it can do to change it.
I know things are about to blow up in someway, I just don't know how it will end, and I can't stop it, even if I tried. And also, like the titanic, I will be the captain that goes down with the ship if it were to sink.
It's a weird place to be in mentally. It has showed me a lot about humility, and how sometimes I have absolutely none of that. Sometimes I am extremely prideful, and the last week has shown me that pride gets me nowhere.
Another thing I am really coming to terms with recently is the difference between weakness and vulnerability. These two things do not go hand in hand. Not at all. And this is something I have struggled with my entire life. Showing someone that I trust that I am vulnerable in situations is sometimes a good thing, and shows strength, not weakness. It is real. I was always taught to think that anything less than perfection and total control and strength was sub-par. That it would only turn people away from me and make them see me in a negative light. This has been something that God and my loved ones have really challenged in the last six months.
And now to the good news, the good stuff. Tomorrow will be exactly a year to the day that I gave my life to Jesus. It has been a year. I can't believe that. In the last year I have seen more change in me, in my heart, in my character than I can even begin to process. A year and a few weeks ago, I was really close to getting into a relationship that would have turned out disastrous for my emotions and well being. I was dealing with a lot of suicide within my work (paramedicine) and in my personal life - friends were struggling, and I had very little to turn to, to get me through the days. I also was really struggling with the pain from my past, and the pain from the stuff going on within my family. In the moment, I thought I was doing fine. but looking back, I was going down the wrong road, at breakneck speeds and was going to crash and crash hard if I didn't get my act together. God stepped in, and I collided. In the aftermath, I found a hope, a strength and a peace that I didn't know existed.
I found grace. Wow. Grace. What an extraordinary concept. Grace. Just the word feels good. Even without knowing the biblical definition of it, its a word that brings about good feelings in your heart and soul. I have heard it said that grace is the last good word. I would agree with this entirely. Grace. What would a person feel if suddenly their greatest debt, their greatest trespass in this world was lifted? They would be ecstatic. Now what if that forgiven debt was paid in full by the person that it was owed to? Not only did that person lose the money that you owe them, they also lose the money to pay it back. Its a two-fold loss for them. And that is what grace is. It cost the recipient nothing, and costs the giver everything. Wow. That is Jesus. That is what saved me from the road that I was on. Grace.
What a crazy world. What a crazy life. In the moments recently where I feel totally broken by the world around me, one thought of the grace and love I have found brings me up out of that dark and broken place, into the place where I can handle anything thrown at me. Because I am not alone. And this I know with my entire heart.
Above all the grace and the gifts that Christ gives to his beloved is that of overcoming self -Francis of Assisi
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