Yesterday I stood in church, worshipping, one hand extended as tears welled up in my eyes and felt totally and completely alone. I find it so interesting that Sundays at church are often the moments in which I find myself feeling the most acutely aware of my “aloneness” if you will. Perhaps it is because in that space of honesty and exposed vulnerability the walls and boundaries I put up to protect myself come down and I fall on my face in gratitude before Jesus. Or perhaps it is because I look around and see what I ultimately want in a husband or children, what I have longed for and prayed for, what I ache for and still do not have. Or maybe it is that I actually have an extensive community and yet I seem to be on my own, feeling a bit forgotten rather than wanted or prioritized in a place where I want to feel cherished and beloved more than any other. I have been wrestling with the Lord in this regard for quite some time. I have wonderful friends, a deep and profoundly beautiful community full of extraordinary men and women who lean in and pour wisdom into my life, we walk closely together and have weathered many storms. Yet that community isn’t necessarily present on Sunday mornings. I go to a big church and it is easy to be another face in the crowd. I do a lot of smiling and waving and give the occasional hug here and there, but fairly often I sit alone. I am involved and invested, I am even known at EvFree and yet, I find myself navigating the aisles and preparing to meet the Lord by myself. Being alone isn’t intrinsically a negative, but in this season that has been marked by deep loneliness, Sunday mornings make it feel so abundantly obvious and as I kneel at the cross, it is tangible. I often find myself reaching for my phone to text Anna - I know she’ll be sitting in church at Gateway and every part of me aches to be there too. I love EvFree and worship is one of my favorite times of the week and yet my heart seems to be screaming. As I worshipped and prayed yesterday I kept thinking You alone are enough, You are fulfillment and hope. In You we can be content in all circumstances. I know all these things to be true and have prayed them repeatedly throughout the past few years. Isn’t it frustrating and nonsensical that our hearts cannot seem to catch up with our minds. Why can’t our feelings just match what we KNOW and claim? I can resolve my mind and yet the tears still seem to come. Even though I am completely certain in those moments that it is good, maybe even best for it to be just me and the Lord, I want so much to be given the comfort of a friend or the hope of a forever with someone versus staring at the current picture He has provided - sitting and savoring the richness of just me and my Savior and being totally and completely filled by Him.
And so today I am wildly aware of my desperate need to return to the foot of the cross every single day. To give my heart wholly to Him and ask Him to give me the faith of a child. To trust Him to be my Father and to guide and direct me because His way is best and I want His plan, which is undoubtedly far better than the one I will come up with on my own. Oh Lord that You would remind me to be small that You might be BIG and please, oh PLEASE help my heart to catch up…
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