challenged

Life has been hard for us since 2013 dawned, it is not my story to tell, but most days leave us with more questions than answers.  The hunt for beauty, the declaration of joy, the words to pour out thankfulness are sparse.  I know that I am supposed to be thankful in all things, but the actual doing of that seems impossible.  It seems impossible to be thankful when you see someone you love more than life itself struggling and there is nothing you can do to fix it.  To be thankful even when I and others have prayed for God to just show up mightily, and as of yet He has only show Himself in quiet ways, enough to let me know that He is here with me through the darkest of days, but as of yet He has chosen not to obliterate the dark days altogether.  To be thankful even when you know beyond a shadow of a doubt that He holds the answers and could give them right now, could reveal and heal the problem, and as of yet, in all of His wisdom, in all of His glory, and in all of His goodness He has chosen not to do that.

The battle to accept where I am, where my family finds themselves right now, especially when it is so very far from where we want to be...I am not sure how exactly to dress that neatly in words. 

In this struggle though some truth has become solid and unbending, enough so to anchor my thoughts in...

First truth:

No matter what we go through, no matter how good or how bad things get, He is with us.  He may not show up with all of the fanfare that we had hoped, but He is there. 

It is the resting in His presence, not His action that challenges me.


Second truth is this :

He is my comfort, but that isn't always comfortable.

Growing up and even into my early married days I thought that if I believed enough, spoke His Word over a circumstance enough, and prayed enough that God would change things so I could be comfortable, secure, and happy.  It never really occurred to me that He was more interested in molding me into what He wants me to be than He is in how comfortable I am along the way. 

With each truth that I have clung to, in each way that He has revealed Himself to me, I have more clearly seen where my challenge to walk with Him lies.  I am not the same person I was this time last year, yet I am not the person I still hope to be. 

It has taken me over an hour to write this post...I started and stopped, deleted all that I had typed only to rewrite something else entirely.  In that time, the grey of dawn has stretched across our front window, pushing back the darkness that clung to every corner when I first padded into the kitchen this morning to fix my coffee.  I know what sits across the street, I see it multiple times a day, so much so that I can close my eyes and see it, in great detail, even now, when shadows still cling to cars and trees alike.  I am again reminded just because you cannot see something, does not mean it doesn't exist.  Some day the darkness will be rolled back and the beautiful dawn will stretch forth and nothing will impede our view of the One we have hoped for, the One that we have waited for.