Yes, I know. It has been a very long time since I've written here. Not that I think anyone is listening that I return. It is only to have a place to organize my struggles and glimpses of victory that I even write now.
It has been a very long and very dry season. Although the word "dry" doesn't begin to express the pain and struggle. Dry somehow seems too clean. It has been a down-bogging, sloppy, messy and ugly time. Dealing with "family business" had drained and buried and defeated me to the point of not wanting to share or talk about it. My brilliant solution was to ignore it?? Deny it? While I didn't deny or ignore the situation, I so wanted to deny my total helplessness to remedy anything or to improve the state of things..
You see, in all this pain and lostness and hurt, God has commanded one thing of me...."Be Still" And I'm the first to tell you that I am not a good "be-stiller"...not even close. I want to DO something!! But when Abba calls me to be still, I have to listen and strive with my whole being to obey. And it is the most difficult thing He has ever asked of me. Why? Shouldn't being still be restful and peaceful? I guess it is SUPPOSED to be but in my experience...in my heart...it is like asking me to swim across the ocean. I don't think I have what it takes.
He let me know the reason at least. Whatever the outcome of this long-term, ever painful struggle...He wanted His fingerprints and His fingerprints ONLY to be seen on every happening along the way. Others involved in the mess don't see it at all. They only see my faults and my struggles as weaknesses to be exploited and ridiculed. I've never felt so alone and misunderstood and misrepresented.
The long hard slog back up to glimpses of daylight has produced many bruises and many gashes in my emotional and spiritual being. At times I have so wanted to DO and not BE that I have checked with Him again and again just to see if the command still holds. And there it is, from many different sources and many different directions, the same still small but very strong Voice..."Be Still"
I see hurt and injustice and I want to DO. Someone lashes out at me and every fiber of my flesh wants to lash back! I've spent way too much of my emotional energy devising what I could possibly do to change things...change my life...change other people. I think, "If only I did THIS or THAT" but no sooner do those plans and options leave my aching heart...there it is...that same Voice, whispering with almost a pleading...."Be Still"
In the past during this many year struggle, I have not listened well. I have jumped in and done things my way. Always with the DOING of things. I realize now that I was only trying to show Him that my way would work! Well, you don't need a blog to let you know how well THAT went.All it did was greatly delay His plan while I tried to make it all happen NOW. But the delay is over. How many things would already be better if I had just stayed out of the way...just "Been Still"?
Relationships torn apart, hearts shattered into a million little crumbs. And all the time the underlying fear that it will all be gone...forever. I'm so tired of crying. So tired of being sad and afraid. So tired of even caring. So wishing that I could just run away and forget it all...leave it all behind.
But for some reason, Abba has required that I remain. I've given up asking why (well... most days I have) because the only answer wrung from heaven is the same..."Be Still"
Yes, I've taken a few baby steps in this "new life" of lost ones and gone ones. Some days I'm even excited about this "new life" but mostly just staggering to find the next baby step along the way. I'm not at all sure even what this "new life" will look like or how I will respond to anything or anyone. It is a whole new vista opening up little by little. I am indeed a stranger in a strange land.
But He is showing me, baby step by baby step. I'm learning to trust him...deeply and without reservation. Please notice that I say "learning" not "have learned". I am so aware of the long distance to go yet. I cling to His promises to me with the determination of a drowning soul in a vast ocean clinging to a single circle that floats.
My joy and my thanks to Him for His patience with me, His understanding of my aching and fearful heart, His provision to me of a faithful husband and faithful friends. I so often wonder if they grow weary of even seeing my name on the caller ID. It has consumed me for too long now.
I'm seeking to move on in whatever that might mean. But I'm moving while I "Be Still"
I have no answers, I have no claims of triumph. I have no grand statements of insight or understanding. All I have is a loving and kind Father who loves me unconditionally and has plans for me sometime...somewhere.
To all of you (or any of you if anyone even reads this) who have walked beside me in this journey, often times even carrying me on your shoulders of prayer, I pray Abba's richest blessings on you all. You have my undying gratitude.
So I close my ramblings for today. It's a selfish exercise really. I don't write this to help anyone or point the way or shine a light. I do it because it helps me somehow to put it into written words. My own declaration of obedience even through the pain and loneliness and loss.
It has been a very long and very dry season. Although the word "dry" doesn't begin to express the pain and struggle. Dry somehow seems too clean. It has been a down-bogging, sloppy, messy and ugly time. Dealing with "family business" had drained and buried and defeated me to the point of not wanting to share or talk about it. My brilliant solution was to ignore it?? Deny it? While I didn't deny or ignore the situation, I so wanted to deny my total helplessness to remedy anything or to improve the state of things..
You see, in all this pain and lostness and hurt, God has commanded one thing of me...."Be Still" And I'm the first to tell you that I am not a good "be-stiller"...not even close. I want to DO something!! But when Abba calls me to be still, I have to listen and strive with my whole being to obey. And it is the most difficult thing He has ever asked of me. Why? Shouldn't being still be restful and peaceful? I guess it is SUPPOSED to be but in my experience...in my heart...it is like asking me to swim across the ocean. I don't think I have what it takes.
He let me know the reason at least. Whatever the outcome of this long-term, ever painful struggle...He wanted His fingerprints and His fingerprints ONLY to be seen on every happening along the way. Others involved in the mess don't see it at all. They only see my faults and my struggles as weaknesses to be exploited and ridiculed. I've never felt so alone and misunderstood and misrepresented.
The long hard slog back up to glimpses of daylight has produced many bruises and many gashes in my emotional and spiritual being. At times I have so wanted to DO and not BE that I have checked with Him again and again just to see if the command still holds. And there it is, from many different sources and many different directions, the same still small but very strong Voice..."Be Still"
I see hurt and injustice and I want to DO. Someone lashes out at me and every fiber of my flesh wants to lash back! I've spent way too much of my emotional energy devising what I could possibly do to change things...change my life...change other people. I think, "If only I did THIS or THAT" but no sooner do those plans and options leave my aching heart...there it is...that same Voice, whispering with almost a pleading...."Be Still"
In the past during this many year struggle, I have not listened well. I have jumped in and done things my way. Always with the DOING of things. I realize now that I was only trying to show Him that my way would work! Well, you don't need a blog to let you know how well THAT went.All it did was greatly delay His plan while I tried to make it all happen NOW. But the delay is over. How many things would already be better if I had just stayed out of the way...just "Been Still"?
Relationships torn apart, hearts shattered into a million little crumbs. And all the time the underlying fear that it will all be gone...forever. I'm so tired of crying. So tired of being sad and afraid. So tired of even caring. So wishing that I could just run away and forget it all...leave it all behind.
But for some reason, Abba has required that I remain. I've given up asking why (well... most days I have) because the only answer wrung from heaven is the same..."Be Still"
Yes, I've taken a few baby steps in this "new life" of lost ones and gone ones. Some days I'm even excited about this "new life" but mostly just staggering to find the next baby step along the way. I'm not at all sure even what this "new life" will look like or how I will respond to anything or anyone. It is a whole new vista opening up little by little. I am indeed a stranger in a strange land.
But He is showing me, baby step by baby step. I'm learning to trust him...deeply and without reservation. Please notice that I say "learning" not "have learned". I am so aware of the long distance to go yet. I cling to His promises to me with the determination of a drowning soul in a vast ocean clinging to a single circle that floats.
My joy and my thanks to Him for His patience with me, His understanding of my aching and fearful heart, His provision to me of a faithful husband and faithful friends. I so often wonder if they grow weary of even seeing my name on the caller ID. It has consumed me for too long now.
I'm seeking to move on in whatever that might mean. But I'm moving while I "Be Still"
I have no answers, I have no claims of triumph. I have no grand statements of insight or understanding. All I have is a loving and kind Father who loves me unconditionally and has plans for me sometime...somewhere.
To all of you (or any of you if anyone even reads this) who have walked beside me in this journey, often times even carrying me on your shoulders of prayer, I pray Abba's richest blessings on you all. You have my undying gratitude.
So I close my ramblings for today. It's a selfish exercise really. I don't write this to help anyone or point the way or shine a light. I do it because it helps me somehow to put it into written words. My own declaration of obedience even through the pain and loneliness and loss.
