Yesterday I was driving to work, and it was a beautiful day. The sun was peeking out from behind the clouds, and the temperature was shockingingly warm for January in Southern Ontario.
I was car-pooling with my friend Melanie, and thinking of how summer usually feels like a mere dream when we are entrenched in the long dark coldness of winter, I remarked to her: "Today, I believe that summer is real."
She thought for a moment, and then said to me, "What do you think God is trying to tell you through that?"
"Uhhh... I don't know... what do you think?"
She smiled. "I think He's telling you that summer is real."
I rolled my eyes. "I thought you were going to come up with some deep truth from that."
"There is- I think He is reminding you that the 'spring' and 'summer' of life are real too, even when you are in the winter and don't feel like it's possible."
I ruminated on that for a while. I had been talking with her the evening before about how I feel like I am in a dark valley right now, and have been for a long time. There are many great things in my life that I am so thankful for- but underneath everything is a deep sadness. I told her that I have trouble believing that the valley will ever end.
The past 4 years have been tough ones, and through it all, God has taught me that He offers precious gifts in brokenness. I have found Him in my brokenness, and I wouldn't trade anything for that. I'm in a painful valley, but I know that there is firm ground underneath my feet. I know that God is with me. Sometimes He feels far away, like right now, but there is something even deeper than feelings- a certainty that He is good and He loves me.
Yesterday though, He reminded me, through a warm day and a good friend, that the valley is not all there is- or ever will be.
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2 comments:
You put it beautifully, Jen. Your second last paragraph pretty much sums up something I've become convinced is the biggest lesson God would like us to learn. If there was a scale to go by, that would be at the top of the mountain for me - to go through sorrow and suffering, and yet to still be convinced that God is ultimately good and that He loves you - incomprehensible to the childish mind. Only understood by those who can grasp that God operates by different standards than we do, has different values, higher thoughts, higher ways... though my flesh it be destroyed... yet will I praise Him.
I carry you around in a special little spot somewhere near my heart.
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