Month: March 2017

Highway Miles

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It has a name, of course. Everything has a name these days. Most of us have experienced it, some more than others. You leave work, get in your car and head home. However many minutes later, you pull up to your house and realize you don’t remember any part of the journey. You remember putting your keys in the ignition and putting it in drive, but everything after that is a blur.

Are you now wondering what the name is for this phenomenon? It’s called Highway Hypnosis. Evidently, your brain has the ability to focus on the subconscious and the conscious at the exact same time, causing you to be able to arrive somewhere, without giving much thought to the process to which you got there. 

Saturday morning I woke up, checked my phone and looked at the date. I stared at it for a couple minutes trying to remember why it looked familiar. With the life we lead, I went through my mental checklist. Was there something planned for Ev, soccer, the play, an appointment? Was it Jim? Something at church or work? Did I have a party to go to, did I have something to plan? I couldn’t put my finger on what I was supposed to remember about that day, until later on that evening when a friend asked me how I was doing, considering it was the 25th.

It was the 25th. For 13 months, the 25th rolled in like a wave. The first nine months or so, more like a tsunami. As the months have progressed though, the waves have become less violent and now, I stand ankle deep in a tide that is somewhat steady.

As I thought about my inability to remember the significance of that day, I wondered how I had arrived here. Much like a ride home that remains a mystery, my journey along this road of healing still catches me by surprise at times.   

The birds are chirping this morning, something I couldn’t hear last March.

Laughter fills my home again. Genuine laughter, not the nervous, awkward kind that becomes normal when what you’re saying and what you’re thinking are so vastly different, you can do nothing more than giggle uncomfortably.

I’m falling for my husband all over again. Not that there was ever a time in the last year that I didn’t love him, but survival mode often leaves you clinging to what is safe and secure. Clinging is bad. It creates a dependency on a person, a human being, with flaws. God created us to love and share life with others, but He also created us to be dependent on Him, and Him alone. As I loosened my grip on Jim, I was able to watch our relationship grow again. Releasing my hold allowed essential nutrients to flow from our source, the Lord.

Again though, these changes happened over the course of this last year without me really recognizing the process. And there are countless others.

I heard a song the other day that I didn’t agree with (big surprise). The lyrics had something to do with God giving us a new heart when ours gets broken. God gives us a new heart one time, when we confess our sins and acknowledge our need for a Savior. Ezekiel says God puts a new heart and a new Spirit in us (His Spirit). But a broken heart, that does not get replaced, it gets repaired.  God will bind your broken pieces, if you allow Him, and almost always it will take longer than you want it to. I am beginning to see some of the restoration, some of the mended pieces of this broken heart, being sealed back together. God is faithful and He is trustworthy.

This is in no way saying that our hearts are fully restored. Jim and I will often look at each other and ask the obvious questions, why us, why are we living this life? We may still have more bad days than good ones and reality sinks a little deeper each time we hear her beautiful name, but God has never left our sides.

One of my all-time favorite verses comes out of Deuteronomy 31. Moses is speaking to the people about Joshua taking his place. Moses says “Be strong and courageous. Do not be afraid or terrified, for the Lord your God goes with you; He will never leave you or forsake you.”

Even though there are parts of this road to restoration that I don’t remember, aspects that remain a mystery, I know who is leading me, and in His mighty hands, I will rest.

Highway Miles

Professor

sighs and goodbyes1 Comment

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It’s like sitting in a college class you never signed up for. As you look around, every other student looks just as bewildered and unsure as you. Some look more beat-up and battle wearied, while others look put together, almost normal, but somehow you can see it in their eyes. The eyes don’t lie. They didn’t sign up for this class either, they never asked to sit in these seats, they never wanted this professor.

As he approaches the front of the room, you hear deep sighs released from a student in the back, you see tears streaming down the face of a grown man in the front row, and all the while you’re wondering what twist of fate, what plan of God landed you here, a pupil in this class.

Complete silence falls over the room as he begins the lesson.

“My name is Grief. Some of you have just joined my class for the very first time and some of your faces I have seen for years. As we begin today’s lesson, please know, weeping, wailing, fits of anger, rage or confusion, moments of laughter, sneak peeks of joy, and smiles, brought on by memories that flash before your eyes, are not only welcome, but encouraged. Everything you feel today, tomorrow and forever, has been felt and will be felt by countless others.

You Are Not Alone.

You are not alone when you feel guilty for having fun.

You are not alone when your heart hurts so badly, you can feel the physical pain in your bones.

You are not alone when you feel that your very identity was buried with your loved one.

You are not alone when you count the days your eyes have remained dry.

You are not alone when you get angry for allowing tears to fall in front of people.

You are not alone when you lay awake at night wondering how this happened.

You are not alone when you wish you wouldn’t wake up in the morning.

You Are Not Alone.

Before I begin today’s lesson, please stand up and walk over to someone you don’t know and tell them your story, and listen, with painful ease, to their story. Transparency will be your strength in the coming days, months and years. Hear their pain, share your own. Allow your broken heart to find unity with other broken hearts. Wrap your trembling arms around their trembling frames and remind them that they are not alone.

Class, you will forever be my students. You don’t graduate from my class. One day you will look back and see how far you’ve come. You will be able to speak of memories without your eyes welling with tears. You will wonder how you made it through what could only be described as the very fires of hell, but you will make it. Allow each lesson to teach you something about yourself. Allow me to change you. Become more compassionate. Become full of mercy and full of love. Don’t shut yourself off to those that haven’t filled seats in this class. They might not understand your pain, but God can use them to carry your burdens.

We will cover every topic you could ever imagine in this class, because I will affect every area of your life, but who you become as you learn, will be entirely up to you. You can allow this experience to make you bitter and resentful, or you can allow it to shape you into someone that’s cloaked in empathy and peace.

We will now tackle today’s lesson, one that I know you will need to hear more than once. One that will make you lay awake in your beds at night, when sleep seems as far away as the soul you long for.

Today, our lesson is titled…

Why?

Let’s begin.”

 

Professor