I have been putting this conversation off for one year.
For one year I have refused to sit down and do this.
My last words were "Here is to 2014, may I spend more time in Your arms."
And I have tried, for one year, to avoid acknowledging that I got all too much of what I asked for.
I am sitting at the sunny table of a New York City coffee shop, listening to a 10 hour YouTube video of rain to try to drown out the chaos around me; though truthfully, I am hoping it will drown out the chaos in me too. But here, just on the other side of that hopeful 2014- I find myself wishing for the days where God met me on something as simple as the ground of a running track.
I hate to do this to you, but if you haven't, go ahead and re read my last blog, you will need some of the context to make sense of what's next.
OK
If 2013 was a year, I don't even want to know what 2014 was. Words that come to mind are: painful, heartbreaking, tired, angry, sad, disappointed, hopeful, fearful, vulnerable, healing, long, full, home, away...all in no particular order.
I don't want to re trace my steps. And honestly, I don't feel the need to process, confess, or bare my soul concerning much of what the last year has looked like. What I want to do, is acknowledge God.
In my last blog I referenced this metaphor of being on a track. Running, failing, falling, and God's grace that swept in during those moments of despair....
"But this is grace. That these hands, time after time after time, reach out, and they don’t ask for you to be able to pull it together just enough, or to use as much of your own strength as you can, these arms say in your total and complete weakness, I will extend to you my total and complete strength. I will not only bring you comfort in the things that surround you on this ground, I will carry you AND them off this track and into a place where we can just be, the way we were meant to. Forget a water cup, I will pour out my love, hope, grace, comfort, peace, joy, and strength like a waterfall over you. And when you forget all of this, when you forget these moments and find yourself busily trying to get down the track, with all of your stuff. When you trip-trip-crash again, and feel like there is nothing left, like there is no way you can go on, I will be there. I will meet you EXACTLY there with 2 arms ready for holding."As I sit here and re read these words I am so comforted by how true God has been to them. By how gently I had experienced this in the last few years, and yet how far from them things have seemed since.
Sometime in the last year, God and I had a similar moment. There came a moment where every ounce of pain and every looming fear were standing straight in front of me. Or were surrounding me. Or ere sitting on top of me. Or some combination of those. There was one moment where I found myself totally defeated, on the ground, completely helpless; except instead of being on the cyclical track of 2013, I found myself in a some sort of apocalyptic wreckage.
I looked around me and saw the demolished buildings that once seemed impenetrable the widespread shrapnel of unexpected and inconvenient torpedos, the simultaneous chaos and detachment of other's who wander around the wreckage unsure of what comes next, and the faintest glimpse of help seeming just far enough away that there was no point to gather oneself to attempt to get it's attention.
On the track, the struggle seemed to be the external circumstances piling up; there was an unending load of people, places, and things, that I simply could not manage.
In the wreckage, I knew, the struggle was nothing external. This was all within the depths of my own heart, and I knew, that no amount of proper management or "better"could remedy the damage done.
I remember surveying this state of my heart, and thinking- God I want to surrender. I know there is nothing I can do here- and I KNOW there is so much you CAN do here- but God, I can't bring myself to it.
From my, admittedly, self indulgent journal (no date, because apparently, I thought it not important):
"I looked down and saw the white flag. It was massive, it' s beam more than I could wrap my hands around. No one understands how difficult this is to raise, how substantial! How much I have to overcome within myself to just get it off the ground."And as those words crossed my mind, I was reminded of those two arms.
But this time, they did not pick me up.
"They reached around my arms, 2 hands, next to my hands, over my hands. They gripped the wooden beam my fidgety and indecisive hands fiddled on, and heaved the white flag at it's end into the air.
"Take heart, I have overcome the world".
These hands didn't simply get the flag off the ground, they waved it viciously over the wreckage. But they didn't make it look easy, I saw every wince, groan, and heave their member took to cover this destruction."
I feel silly writing this. It all seems so dramatic. Gosh was the last year really so bad? calm down woman!
But it was.
It was awful.
There was so much good in it, I don't want to forget that.
I had a victory week this year!
All in one week, I finished school and graduated with my BA, ran and completed my first race, and celebrated my 27th birthday (which isn't much of a victory- but whatever).
There was also just so much pain.
And I can not allow myself to slam the door on the last year and pretend it didn't happen.
Neither the bad nor the good.
God was good, even in the pain, He is good, even in the loss.
And He stands, Victorious, over it all.
What powerful word's Jesus spoke to His disciples-
"...In this world, you will have trouble.But take heart. I have overcome the world" (John 16:33)I can't think of a single instance where victory occurs without opposition. Opposition breeds casualty. Thus victory must have some correlation to loss.
There is no better example of this than that of Jesus Himself. It was only through His loss that we could experience the glory of His victory.
And He promises us that if we will do the same, He will be faithful to do just that-
"Whoever finds his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it." (Matthew 10: 39)I see those arms bearing the load of that flag and I know that they know great pain. They know loss. They know disappointment, anger, loneliness, rejection, and the hope that soon those things would lose their power.
And I know. I KNOW, and I cling to promise and hope that through those arms, those things DID lose their power.
2014 was a year of great pain and great loss.
I want to commit it to the Lord as a year of greater victory.
With every loss and sqaure inch of wreckage I will remember the hands of my savior viciously claiming victory over that which the world see's only as loss.
2014 was a year of great pain and loss.
God has defeated sin and death.
2014 was a year of great pain and loss.
God. is. Victorious.
I wanted to end there. I think, in terms of writing prowess, it's quite a good ending.
But I can not end without making specific mention of one thing.
Sean Trank.
Oh Sean-
I didn't want to do this here, but I already crying in this coffee shop, so I may as well.
Sean-
You were a stand up man.
You were a godly and faithful man.
You were a great friend.
You were kind, generous, honest, and humble and you endured a level of pain and suffering, nothing in this petty blog compared to with grace, joy, and strength.
At some point before you went home I told myself, "If Sean can sit in that hospital bed with a smile on his face, then I better be able to put a smile on mine".
You inspired me, you challenged me, and you encouraged me.
You made me laugh (sometimes not in a good way ;-) ).
You made me think.
I have a handful of memories with you from the last year that I will always treasure.
This is my favorite:
It is the last time I saw you
You and Sarah had just moved into the house and you were still getting your selves situated.
I was in my room and heard clamoring around so I came out to see what was going on.
You were standing in the door way with your oxygen mask on, and one hand on your air tank -you were so thin.
Your other hand, and the rest of your body, was up under the HUGE couch you were, vertically, trying to push through the doorway.
"Do you need help?"
And Sean, in the most Seaney way he could, looked at the couch then looked back at me and nodded "Yea!"
Sean- you were ridiculous.
Thank you for faithful life that shouts for Social Media around the world:
2014 was a year of great pain and loss.
God. is. Victorious.
