peace restored...

you guys... lately i don't know what in the world is happening, but it feels like everyone is hurting.  

oh.my.stars.the.hurt.

nearly every day a tragedy or worrisome situation is whispered in my ear and causes me to clutch my heart in grief.  it feels as if the last christmas tree was taken down and with it went the last ounce of hope or joy for awhile.  i mean... there's joy in some places... there has to be... but lately it feels like it is eclipsed by a dark cloud.

kjaer and i have both been carrying home these stories in our hearts, like fragile pieces of glass; sharing them with each other and then praying over them at the dinner table.  but i have to admit, after what we've brought home to lift up over the past two weeks, i've gotten sucked into the dread.  

here's a little tidbit about me i bet you could've already guessed: i've been known to get a little worried from time to time. (!) i've experienced a few of my own tragedies in the last decade and it's often hard for me to separate myself from other people's situations.

so i became overcome with fear last week... more specifically jan 11 and jan 12.  it was very messy and borderline crazy-person-behavior.  i began to think that because other people were experiencing tragedy that my own was just around the bend.  this is a very dangerous place to be in your mind.  suddenly you are picturing the worst possible scenarios for every moment of your day.  it's all conjured and pretend... but you believe it could be true.  it's all very erratic and intoxicating... like you're drunk on grief and fear.  

so right about the time i was at my breaking point, i decided to pray (because, why do that first... am i right?  geez, when will i learn?) and take it to Jesus.  there was a lot of selfish whining and pleading (because fear and worry make you do that too) begging for the protection of those i love and requests for peace... LOTS of requests for peace.  when i removed myself from the pile of tears i was on the floor... i didn't feel more peaceful or less worried... just tired from all of the drama i had immersed myself in so selfishly.  so i asked for a sign and went to bed.

i feel ashamed to write this,  knowing the hurt that people i care about are in.  here they were H.U.R.T.I.N.G. - and here i was, perfectly unscathed, begging to stay that way.

it's in our nature i suppose.  but it doesn't make me feel better about it.

the next morning i was still feeling a little uneasy... like the roof might collapse on me or something.  i was eating breakfast with my beautiful children and decided to crack open their new devotion book.  i had gotten it for Christmas with the intention of reading one every day with them (seeing as how they are dated that way) but had already failed.  I'd made it to January 2 and it was January 13.

so i read january 3 to leif (why skip the days?  i'm not getting graded on this!) and he loved it.  we talked about the pictures and then he asked to read another one.  so we read another.

i was getting a little nervous that he was going to ask me to read 365 straight days of devotions to him.

but he didn't.  he did, however, ask for another and turned to two specific pages.  (i later went back and looked at the dates out of curiosity and they were, quite spectacularly, January 11 and 12.)  i closed the book and told him we could read those another day.  he opened the book, flipped through it back to those two days and demanded in his most bossy, almost-three year old way to read them to him.  the two titles read this way...

Jan 11... King of the Earth

"How awesome is the Lord Most High, the great King over all the earth!" Psalm 47:2

Jan 12... Don't Worry

"Don't worry about anything, but pray and ask God for everything you need." Phil 4:6

pregnant pause... inhaling peace.

there, staring me in the face, was my sign.

My dearest Monica,

I'M in charge of everything, don't worry... just talk to ME.
Love and kisses, GOD.

so here's the thing.  our world is broken.  we all experience pain, loss, sickness and grief during different seasons.  no one can hide from it.  none of us can ever have pain free lives.  BUT, our joy comes out of pain.  the tears we cry can heal our wounds and grow us into something more incredible than we were before.  

and like my aunt kathy said, when she took my scared little face in her hands this week so i would look her square in the eyes while i sobbed through terrified tears,

 "DO NOT LET FEAR ROB YOU OF YOUR JOY."

the heart?  it can be deceitful sometimes.  it can get us wound up tighter than a corkscrew over nothing but an idea... an IDEA.  no facts to go off of... just an idea that was whispered into your mind by fear.   and fear can make you do things that just make no sense at all... or NOT make you do things.  

i read an interesting fact the other day that an African impala can jump to a height of over 10 feet and cover a distance of greater than 30 feet.  However, in the zoo, they can be kept in an enclosure with a 3 foot wall.  They will not jump if they cannot see where they will land... fear. 

Faith is the ability to trust what we cannot see, and should we choose to live with faith, we are freed from the frail prisons that entice us with fear.

so today i'm giving the fear back, over and over again, to my Creator... the King of the Earth.  i choose faith.  i stayed home sick today and sent my kids to daycare because i wasn't feeling 100% and needed to rest.  when i was washed over with fear that something would happen to them, i laid flat on the floor like some crazy lady and said, "take it God... it's too big for me... take it.  don't let me yank it back." 

and then i decided, i'm going to bask in the joy of an empty home for a few hours... blog, nap, take care of myself.  tonight, when the energy and noise return with the arrival of my precious family, i'm going to bathe myself in the clatter and hum of our little brood.  it doesn't mean i'll never worry... knowing me, i'll worry all of the time.  but i'll do my best to lean on the One who told me not to worry about today.  i'll concern myself with how i can be the catalyst to those hurting around me with problems like brain tumors, homelessness, starving bellies, other peoples children who don't feel loved... and how i can possibly make a difference.  after all, i wasn't called to be on the earth to worry about myself... i was called to minister to the broken.  

today i'm choosing to take a leap and have a little more faith than yesterday.  today i choose to turn my back on fear and live with joy.

some of many moments of joy from 2014