Oceans

 I'm in a seemingly impossible environment of change that feels suffocating. It feels freeing and it feels equally overwhelming. There's minimal in between. The stark contrast of leaving or staying both come with unbearable consequences. Ones I knew were coming but felt, and still feel, ill equipped to navigate. I'm in this in between of launching into what I believe to be where I'm supposed to be without having certainty because the consequences and fall out of that is astronomical. How can something that bring such peace internally wreak such havoc on the outside? Shouldn't the right thing come without consequences? Am I missing something here? Am I making things up and totally grasping for straws to fit a narrative that I believe in more than just about anything else? If I turn out to be correct I promise you that I will weep endlessly because I've walked through a life that's been overwhelming and confusing, and also excellent, to end up at a point of pure brokenness. Not from the usual depression or anxiety, but of just feeling done. Dead inside. Without much life or encouragement that what I'm doing and how I live and the things I love are good, right, and worth doing. 

What if my identity has been so clouded by the striving, doing, being, needing and so on that the Lord is using this season to draw me to Him in a new way that's everlasting? That my gifts and talents aren't just for making things happen and growing things into something new but that ultimately, all along, I've been brought to THIS moment as a sum for every thing I've endured in my life to see people imitate the purest love of Christ I can imagine. Genuine greatness from good people who have their own lives to live and yet they take the time to pour into me. What a tangible example to know that we serve a God that misses nothing. He's saddened for us because we're His. We're His before we're anyone else's. I am chosen because our God Most High says I am and I can try all day long to manage perceptions but I've forgotten to consider the impression I make.

Am I living a life that people would look and say that I love Jesus and am not just a selfless, moral person? There's lots of people who are selfless and moral. They don't participate in illegal behavior and seek to give back to the community. I think because of common grace this is possible and can be done apart from a relationship with Christ. But I want to be set apart because the Bible says I am (Deuteronomy 14:2 -for you are a people holy to the Lord your God. Out of all the peoples on the face of the earth, the Lord has chosen you to be his treasured possession.) The Bible says a lot about who I am and I'm astounded at how much I've kept that at bay because I knew the condition of my heart and all my sins and shortcomings that it felt so impossible that He could love me for ME. And there's a lot of me And there's all of me He died for. The silly and the sad-the overwhelmed and the encouraging. 

I'm grossly unaware of what the rest of my days will look like-and I assure you they're so much different than I anticipated. But that's irrelevant now because whether or not my expectations were met, it comes as no surprise to the Lord. He knew I'd be here in this moment with these people. He knew the posture of my heart and how broken I'd be. He knew I needed Him and that one day I'd come to connect head to heart in that. And it's with that mentality that I step out and trust that whatever is going to happen I am worth being loved and that love isn't circumstantial or with conditions. Just me, only me, especially me, is worth loving. And what a profound statement that is. Because it's true and it always has been. And always will be.