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Tuesday, March 15, 2011

huh.

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I have been feeling a quiet urge all weekend to post something From the Archives, although I wasn't entirely sure what it should be. I heard a sermon on Sunday that pointed me in one direction - a post I had written a few years back on Jesus' instructions to get up and walk. But somehow, reading those thoughts today, they didn't really fit the feeling in my gut. What was I looking for? So I read down the list of titles on that old blog of mine, till I found it. A post I wrote 3 years ago today, called The Beauty. The date part of this posting was a genuine shock; I didn't know that today was the date that matched that date three years ago, until I looked it up just now. I suppose I shouldn't be too suprised; God is usually funny like that with me. It seems fitting in so many ways, that I should find these words today, on a really weird sort of anniversary.

I'll leave the actual subject matter a mystery (that vault was closed years ago), but I'm reposting my afterthoughts in their original form anyway. Reading through this just now, I experienced what felt like the cathartic healing of an old wound, and I also had a small epiphany (one I've had many times before) - that at the end of the day, this is why I write. I write to be reminded.




saturday, march 15, 2008
the beauty

as fast and as big as a thunderous passing train, the moment - first daunting, then normal - is gone. all of the build up and all of the praying and all of the questions add up to a very normal day. and so i am sitting here in the midst of all the normalcy; my pant legs still soaked bottom up from puddles and fragmented sand, my cheeks still freshly felt with tears of understanding. and i am realizing that this is a moment i chose; i chose to break my own heart. Today is here as a direct result of grace, and Grace has to be here because of the choices i made that led to it.

how amazing is it that such a great and powerful God could stoop so low to love us in the forefront of reality? it amazes me, really. not that i expect any less from Him; i know what He has said. but it amazes me because even when we are forced to understand things that we don't want to (even things that we knew already), He is gently there beside us, here to gently hold us; when we are spent, when we are at peace, when we have finally begun to realize that He has loved us unceasingly from the beginning. where else should i look?

i have said before that life comes at me in themes. well this time, i am creating my own theme. it's called, "ashley, stop hiding"... and so, with that decision made, i am going to stop hiding. although, it might take me awhile to get used to that... why do we hide? ...yes, i know why; i have been there in repetition. but again i ask: why do we hide? hiding can bring no good. when we hide our truest thoughts, or our greatest beauty, or our deepest spoken words, we end up in regret, or we end up saying things too late, and we end up like Today; in moments like this one, where we can only know that it was by choice we have landed here; understanding, but hurting a little bit all the same.

i can not pretend to know the Lord's plan in all of this. each time i pretend to know i end up...well...like today. but i do know this: He has seen the last four years; it was He who began them, He who led me through them, it was He who kept me in them, and kept me in them, and kept me in them. and He sees me now, just the same as always. this is the greatest mystery i have ever known; how He could lead us down a path that has no ending; to hold us to a point and at the end of everything, keep the questions answerless. i am in love with this God. and i am starting to realize that the beauty of not understanding is that we don't actually have to. so, hurting hearts or peaceful hearts or both, He knows.
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2 comments:

Mama said...

This is wonderful. Hard to find words. I'm so thankful God is there for my children.

Anonymous said...

beautiful.

-hj