I pull out my journal to write on its last page as I sit there among friends, at once alone. The end of another flimsy book of checklists, new words, recipes, directions, personal musings.
I am in paradise. I sit in wonder for a moment, breathe, then turn to the blank page in front of me.
I try to thank God for all the beauty of His creation, for all the sweet people He's given me, for the means to adventure through a foreign land by bus, but I stop short as I realize that my words are just...words. My heart is far from Him. I am totally empty.
How is this fair? A lump forms in my throat as I consider how ridiculous my misery is. I should be able to enjoy life, right? ...RIGHT?! Why is my soul downcast within me? I give myself a pep talk, telling myself I just have PMS and am being selfish and need to pull myself together. This should be one of the greatest times of my life. But I just want to go home. I just want to know joy again.
I say His name out loud once all the others have gone up to bed. "Yahweh." It floats from my lips to the sky, and I feel nothing. Where are you, Lord?
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Only in retrospect do I see. And even now, I see only dimly as in a mirror. What I see is pride, wanderlust, and the desire for complete independence. I see myself giving God a ton of lip service while saying in my heart, "My kingdom come, my will be done," ever so subtly and over time. I see my avoidance of the Holy Spirit's tender voice and the Cross of Christ and the Father's rejoicing over me because of His Son, and the way I became hardened and numb because of the deceitfulness of sin and the lack of fellowship with the Body.
I was gaining the whole world and forfeiting my soul during that era of quiet rebellion. Somehow, He kept me. But the scars from the trenches are still sensitive.
He will use every bit of that "dark night of the soul" of mine, because He is the great Weaver of all threads and His grace abounds far more than sin; but how much sweeter it is to stay near Him rather than to have to be "curbed with bit and bridle" (Ps. 32:9), like a horse or a mule. I guess horses have to be broken before they can be used.
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As I think and pray about where to go after program ends in May, it is so important for me to remember that only in His presence is fullness of joy and meaning, only life for Him and with Him is one worth living. We were made for Him, and our chief end as His children is simply this: to glorify Him and enjoy Him...forever.
He is the Alpha and the Omega. He is our great End, the Prize at the end of the race, and our first and long-suffering Love, not some sort of genie to help us reach other goals.
So, my heart burns for mission and maybe He will have me abroad in the coming year, but were I to be sweeping streets or working in front of another computer or studying in a library from dust-laden theology books, my identity would remain the same: I am a great sinner in need of Jesus, the great Savior, I am just a beggar trying to lead other beggars to Bread, I am poor and weak and lowly, and I have been blessed with every spiritual blessing in Christ, that I might be a blessing. I have confidence to enter the presence of God through the blood of Christ. I have been crucified with Him. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. O Lord, help me not even attempt to steal your glory or to thwart your unthwartable plans. With Moses, I ask,
“If your presence will not go with me, do not bring us up from here. For how shall it be known that I have found favor in your sight, I and your people? Is it not in your going with us, so that we are distinct, I and your people, from every other people on the face of the earth?”The joy of the LORD is our strength. Maranatha. Come, Lord Jesus.
(Exodus 33:15-16)
...for not by their own sword did they win the land, nor did their own arm save them, but your right hand and your arm, and the light of your face, for you delighted in them. You are my King, O God.
-Psalm 44:3-4
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