It's been a hard few months. I lost my job in September, and I've lost a good friend. I'm tired of instability, I'm suddenly lonely, and I'm ashamed and afraid of the future. My pride is tattered, and I am thrust, at odd times, to the edge of a precipice overlooking a vast and vacant wilderness. Depression, fear, and loneliness send their howls and shrieks from its depths to chill and oppress me, and I am heartsore and weary with it all. I like to put on a good face and pretend (to myself as much as anyone else) that I am mature enough, that my coping skills are advanced enough, to manage my churning emotions, but the truth is, I'm just tired and scared and cold and I want this to be over. Now.
But lest my words ring hollow when I sit again at friendship's fire, warmed by laughter and encircled in security, let me tell out of this darkness who my God is when I am weak and childish and shivering. Look on my humiliation and see Him - who has chosen it for me - full of love strong enough to allow pain, and merciful. He is kind. I will say it now because it costs me admit it now. I don't always feel it to be true. I don't always feel that it even matters. But I always, always know it it true. I hear it as a steady drumbeat above the din of my clamouring emotion - His mercy endures forever. I will tell out of my weakness that God is wider than my wide wilderness, and deeper than its nether reaches. Even when I refuse to be comforted by that, I know it to be true. Beneath, above, around my bewilderment, I know with surety that God is kind. I cannot deny it, even when I would. I ask him, "Why?", and he holds out bleeding hands. He has been where I am. He has begged our Father to make another way for him.
Some day I will kiss his lovely feet. But today, I will tell who he is.
