It is Well…
Finding the perfect words for this blog has been something that I have been mulling over for a few days. I realized that I should just sit and let the words flow. I don’t need to find the perfect words because what I need is to just share in the purest way possible.
It’s no secret that losing my dad shook me. I think that part of me will always feel that feeling about losing him. It still feels like it was all too soon…and I don’t think any of it will make sense on this side of heaven. I have learned that I have to be comfortable with that.
This season, this time in the hallway has been one of the most unstable, back and forth, mentally and emotionally draining seasons. It is has been a hard balance spiritually, but the one thing that I know for sure is from the time I left home to go to be with my dad to this moment (and I am sure moving forward) is that God has never left me.
There has been times in my life that I felt like He had. Where the quiet and the loss felt so deeply real that I thought the darkness would truly win. Don’t get me wrong, there has been some of the darkest days of my life since he has passed. Days that very few people know about. Days that I wasn’t sure if I could handle seeing another…
I knew He was in this fire with me. Unlike Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, people saw the fourth person and I felt like He wasn’t near enough to be seen. It felt like He made sure I knew His presence was there, but that it wasn’t so close that I didn’t have to turn to find it. I had to look, I had to seek and I had to make sure to say, “Are you there?”. Maybe that doesn't make sense completely, but I don’t know how else to explain that I knew He was with me, but it felt like intentional distance.
It felt frustrating a lot. To be in this hallway, in this space that I am still in. With doors and windows and memories…with triggers and broken moments that I have to walk through to find the next place…to feel like I was almost at the end, but it was a fake door and the one next to it was filled with “stuff”. And how could He be near yet in all of this emotional upheaval have me have to be the one to turn and check in…I wanted my footprints in the sand to disappear and I wanted Him to just carry me through it all…it felt and may sometimes still feel unfair to have to process this loss and all of the baggage that came with it and have to walk in the sand carrying it all when I know He could just release the burden and walk closer. Be RIGHT THERE. It didn't make sense…somedays it made me angry and feel more broken…and I could logically understand that we sometimes have to do all the work, but why couldn’t this be one of the times…
I have felt so much stuff since I got in the car to be with my dad until now…and searching and seeking and trying to heal and grow and allow the refinement and even as I have made strides…He still felt far.
A few days ago, Aaron and I woke up and started our drive to Zion. I woke feeling emotional…and it wasn’t long before the emotional became spiritual. There is something to be said going into His creation. We can find beauty in so many small things because what He created is beautiful.
In the Bible, Zion is used to describe a place appointed by the Lord where believers can live and serve Him. It is a place of refuge where the Lord protects His people from the evils in the world. As we drove into Zion, I was overcome with a Peace that only comes from Him. I was overwhelmed by His presence in a way that I don’t think I had been before and I have been on the floor in tears and worship because of that presence many times…but this, this was different. In the two days we spent there, I don’t think I have cried that much over beauty. Over the full knowledge that He was there. Not in a place where I had to turn to check, but if anyone looked into the fire, they would fully see that I wasn’t alone in it. His creation didn’t just cry out His majesty. His Glory. His absolute ability to bring forth something so beyond anything I could draw or imagine with just spoken words. His creation filled my whole being with a Peace that passes all understanding. With truth that this hallway is changing me, refining me and that all of the stuff is truly purpose filled. His creation shouted that He is who He says He is and that He will do all that He has promised…
I am His, before I am anything else in this world. I felt the overwhelming, never-ending, reckless love of God…Zion is more than just an incredible place. It is forever the place on earth that I fully found all that I needed to know about this hallway…this season…that I fully realized how deep, how wide His love really is.
As I stood before the Court of the Patriarchs, named for Abraham, Issac and Jacob…I understood that the journey may be long, and the road may be hard and the fire that is refining me may have to burn more than I like, but I am fully covered by the One who created me for purpose.
It is well…
