My oh my, where has the time gone since the last time I blogged. Minutes turned into days, and days turned into months. As the saying goes... things just happened. In my case, life just happened. At the beginning of the new year I wrote in my journal, "Most of all there is more of Jesus, and that’s what I want to find this year."
I have found Jesus. But not just in the days bursting with beauty but in the days buried in ashes. For those close to me you know the road my life has been driving down the past couple months, and when I say driving I mean one hand on the steering wheel and the other on the arm handle... hanging on for dear life.
Addiction is no stranger to my family, it's more of a "oh you again" kind of thing at this point. I won't go into details, because that's not my story to tell but I do believe one day that this certain story will be told. All pointing back to one thing: Jesus.
For those of you who don't anything about addiction, I can describe it in one word: darkness.
Night filled with tears, tossing and turning, and the phrase over and over being muttered into the night, "Jesus, please just do something." But it was in those nights where every part of me was exhausted, tired, weary, that I would blast Kim Walker's song, "I still believe," and with everything it took in me I would grab a pen and scratch those words into my journal. A journal that was empty for weeks at a time, but a little phrase was all the it needed. A phrase of hope, of trust, and of faith. I still believe.
That's what Jesus has been teaching me lately. That is doesn't matter if you feel like the ashes are going to burn you alive, Jesus will do all the work. He will make all things new. Our only job.... have faith. have hope, trust Him. But because Jesus is so set apart, even when don't have the faith, He still comes through. So in those night when you just don't want to believe, when you just don't feel like you can, believe MORE. Trust more.
"Blessed is the one who trusts you." [Psalm 84:12]
Thankfully Jesus gives us people in our lives to step in and believe alongside with us, to sprinkle hope over your life when you seemed consumed with hopelessness. I had just come off one of the hardest weeks of my life and I was sitting at a counter with a woman, in mid conversation her eyes filled with tears and she says, "I just had a vision of you running to your dad." Silent tears streamed downed my face. Here I was so exhausted, and Jesus used her to speak so clearly to me. Just run. Just run to me as you would run to you father. Just as you would in the vision she just saw. Run to me.
"As they pass through the Valley of Baka, they make it a place of springs; the autumn rains also cover it with pools. They go from strength to strength." [Psalm 84:6]
Baka is translated in weeping. You aren't meant to stay in the valley of weeping. You are just passing through. You make it. You make it to a place of springs. You go from strength to strength. I didn't pass through the Valley of Baka, I ran through the valley. Keeping my eyes on Jesus the whole time. Sometimes screaming, "I still believe,' and sometimes barely whispering it. But it didn't/doesn't matter how I said it, as long as I said it.
I am learning that I am not entitled to anything, and I am certainly not entitled to an easy life. But I am also continuously praying that Jesus would breathe a spirit of gratitude into me, and somehow help me find something to be thankful for no matter the circumstance. So thats my encouragement to you, in the darkest of days try to find something to be thankful for. By no means am I trying to make everyone think my life is 1000 times harder than anyone else. I would never do that. This post was to suppose to serve as a: I get it. I get how hard it is to keep believing for God to show up. I get how hard it is to accept the life and the things Jesus has called you to.
[But I know if your suffering is greater than most, then your ministry will be deeper than most. Think of Jesus, He suffered far greater than any of us ever will and His ministry is the greatest ministry there will ever be.]
I get that even after so much pain, pain still comes. But that doesn't mean Jesus still isn't there, that He still isn't near. Hard days always come, and they are going to keep coming. But Jesus can still be found. Trust me.
"There's a name I will remember. There's a name I will proclaim. Let it be Jesus." -Christy Nockels
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