Hurt and Hope

The defining moments of my life are always negative.

Seriously. And it makes me sad... that whenever I think of the biggest, most life changing things, it seems to be the sad things.

Should I try harder, maybe, to let the good things stick instead of the bad things?
Should I try to forget the hard things, and throw myself into the happy things?
It seems like the right thing to do, for a moment..

But then I realize most of those painful things are things that don't hurt me anymore. They are just stories, stories that remind me of how far I've come. Stories that prove what I was rescued out of.

They have become the beautiful things.

And every time I accomplish a deed I am sure I will spend every second of my remaining days regretting, redemption surprises me once again, turning a broken cry into a song. Sewing up a broken heart with threads of beauty and purpose.

And then I think, how can I feel bad that my life is woven through a series of painful events? Because though pain may be at the beginning of everything memorable, beauty comes out the victor at the end of every battle, wiping a slate wrought and muddled with desolation clean, and painting a delicate symbol of life across the top.

Hurt is the roots. Hope is the flower.

And every memory is beautiful.

Knowing that You'll save me

"And this is how I choose to live, as if I'm jumping off a cliff, knowing that You'll save me, knowing that You'll save me, and after all the stupid things I did there's nothing left there to forgive, cause You already forgave me, You already forgave me."

Yes I have broken through, yes I have felt the recent downpoor, the lifting of the sorrow I bore in my desert season, yes I have had the privilege of not reaching a point of despair...

but this is what I have found in my heart this week.
bitterness.

And lots of questions why... why does it always take me taking the long road, why does it always take sacrifice... why do the things that please Him seem to pain me so much? And why can He not give me an answer?

And I find my relationship so defined by revelations other than my own.

And this is the most difficult thing of all, because when I try to approach Him, when I try to read His word, or worship, or anything else... I find before His voice reaches my ears, before His touch can quicken my heart, before I can grasp His presence with my spirit... I am met with a thousand other opinions and speculations and angles, all from outside sources... messages I have heard, books I have read...

not that those things are bad, but I think I am getting to a deeper place with it. I think I am down to the foundations now. I am realizing the cracks in it. I am seeing the need to fill them.

With His voice. With His revelation to MY heart. With my trusting HIM instead of trusting what I have been told or taught about Him.

And I have stayed away, because I don't want more pain. I don't want Him to ask me to give up anything else.

But I can't stand being apart from Him any longer.

So tonight I am going to fight.
Tonight I am going to jump.
Tonight I am going to trust.
Tonight I am going to cry.
Tonight I am going to sing.
Tonight I will be romanced again.
Destroyed
made new
and ultimately set free.

I fling wide my arms, He will fling wide His gates, and so will be the embrace I have long closed myself to.


<3

All we are, we are

I'm so tired, but so restless. I keep thinking of this idea I've had for a poem for months, but every time I try to write it, it becomes a huge mess and I scribble it out and toss aside my notebook in frustration. I think my revelation on it must not be full enough for me to write it yet. So instead of attempting again right now, I am pondering the skeleton, the basis, the foundation - the idea around which I attempt to weave the words to paint the picture that lives in my heart. And I was reminded of a blog I wrote back when I was 18, on my myspace, right before my first year in master's commission. A blog I've gone back and re-read a few times. A blog that reminds me... that anchors me once again. And I thought I'd repost it..

How many times have I lived in the past, wishing to make things different, pining after things I couldn't have, dwelling on my regrets? Or how many times have I thought about how if I could just make it through a certain moment and into the future, everything would be so much better? Why do I live like that? Why is it so hard for me to live in the present and enjoy every moment of it? The past is just that; the past. Over and done with. And the future is the future, I'll make it there eventually. But these are the moments when every part of my life is shaped. Why do I choose to let them slip by so often?

People say its what you do that defines you; I used to agree with that. But recently someone told me its not what I do that defines me - I have been defined from the beginning and all I have to do is allow God to make me into what He designed me for in the first place. So all those times in the past that I've been hurt in and haven't been able to put behind me - those will be the scars I'll be the most thankful for. The mistakes I've made and hated myself for - they will become my greatest strengths. The future Ive longed for to escape the present - it's huge and boundless and waiting for me. And this is now. This is where I wanna live. Through this moment while my heart breaks thinking of having to leave those I love so much. Through the tears and smiles, the light and darkness. Through the good times and the bad. By laying it all down and letting God break me out of this shell and mold me. These are the moments I'll cherish. I won't forget where I came from and I won't worry about where I'm going. I wanna be open. Free. Vulnerable. I wanna feel alive again.

So here I go.

This got me thinking to a book I love, called Hope for the Flowers. In it a caterpillar learns about becoming a butterfly and as she begins cautiously to spin a cocoon, she thinks to herself "if I have inside me the stuff to make cocoons, maybe the stuff of butterflies is there too."

I think right now I am seeing again, just as I began to see when I was 18, that I am who I am. All I was and am going to be is curled up somewhere inside of me, waiting for a reason to burst through my skin and become present. But it takes risk, it takes risk to live in the present. It takes courage. It takes a yielding of your will, to be who you are.

"Right now we are here, and nothing can mar our perfection"

-The Time Traveler's Wife