A few questions and thoughts

God, just a question or three this morning.

You can do anything You want to do, right?

You have the Power to change water into wine, to part the seas, to turn the storms, and so much more.

Right?

Me, just being me, I don’t understand.

I think my humanity is in the way.

I often wonder why You allow things to happen.

And since You are allowing things – why does it feel so much like it is undoing me, raveling me to this blob of ick and goo?

I take these pieces of my life, this brokenness, and turn them over and over again –

in my mind, my heart, my soul, and my hands –

wondering.

Have I misheard You?

Did I misread Your Word?

Did I misunderstand You?

Have I misplaced You somewhere between the breaking and the breath I am trying to breathe?

Then, comes this soft whisper – like a mist above the wreckage of my life:

If God has allowed it, then God can and will use it.

For my good.

For His Glory.

God, I don’t know how, or when.

And I certainly do not see how.

But God.

I know You.

Through the years, the different scenes of our lives, and of my own life.

And God, if You are somehow using it, or going to use it –

Then, You are in it.

Just as surely as You were there in the fiery furnace with the 3 Hebrew boys – the 4^th Man –

You are not standing far off from me now.

You are not observing all that is going on from some safe distance.

You are not waiting for me to “get over this”.

No.

You are IN IT, with me.

In the ashes.

In the silences.

In the loneliness.

In the brokenness.

In all of the not-knowings.

You are here when I cannot sleep at night,

and when I don’t want to wake up in the mornings.

You are here for the questions I ask,

and those I am scared to death to ask –

because I think I already know the answers.

You are here for all my frayed knots –

and my ‘fraid nots’.

You are that Hope I hold on to.

That You see me struggling to just not drown.

Maybe not swim,

Maybe not win this round.

But, just not drown.

And God, if You are in it –

Then, somehow, already, You have Your Hands on all of this.

You are somehow moving quietly beneath the surface of it all.

You are somehow unfolding like this dawn I watch out the window this morning.

Slow, soft, and sure – even when all I can see is the darkness and a shadow or two.

But God.

Just being honest here, I still feel the weight of what I have lost.

And the missing is almost more than I can bear.

The hollow places that grief has carved deep into me are more empty today than it seems they have ever been.

In this rawness and realness God, I say again –

I don’t understand.

I know I cannot walk this way without You, and I refuse to even think about trying.

Perhaps that is where Faith becomes deeper than the answers.

When all I have left - is to trust YOU.

The God Who steps into the fire with me.

The God Who has a way of resurrecting Hope.

The God Who will not waste a wound.

God, since You have allowed this –

Then use it.

And since You are using it –

I know You are in it.

And since You are in it –

I know this is not the end of the story.

No matter how ending and final it feels in this moment.

God, somehow You are unfolding Goodness, Grace and Mercy.

You always have been.

I know You have been with me through it all –

And You will stay.

Through every tear, and every tremor of faith.

Through it all –

You have been here, and You will stay.

Working.

And not one moment is wasted.

I can hear Rick reminding me –

“We do not live by feeling or fear. We live by Faith.”

Faith is choosing to believe.

When I am afraid, Lord, I trust in You.