I have not posted a
single blog entry since I got my job and moved to Illinois. I could say that
this is because transitioning is stressful and I was adjusting to a lot of new
life experiences at once, but I moved here over nine months ago, so I think
that excuse has expired. I could also say that my life is now so full with my
job and my friends that I don’t have enough free time to post anymore, but I
think the amount of time I spend watching television refutes that argument
pretty well. No, if I’m honest with myself, I’ve let myself stagnate and I
haven’t written anything because there hasn’t been anything for me to write.
Don’t get me wrong –
I’ve been through a lot in the last nine months and I’ve certainly had to grow
in many ways as I’ve taken further steps into adulthood. And I’ve loved almost
every minute of it. My life has overflowed with many blessings and I’m so
thankful for that.
But here’s the thing
about blessings: they’re dangerous.
Last year, while I was
still greatly struggling and waiting for God to direct my life, I posted this
to my blog:
I’m afraid that if God gives me comfort, if he
gives me a job and money and an apartment and friends, I will wander away from
him again. I won’t feel the same desperate need of him, and look to him for
every meal. I’ll forget what it’s like to be incapable of making it through a
single day without his help.
Re-reading those words –
my own words – is painfully convicting, because that’s exactly what’s happened.
My prayers for a job were answered, and I’ve wandered away. I’ve coasted. I’ve
gotten comfortable.
The problem is that a
life full of blessing starts to feel like a life of self-sufficiency. I have
grown to believe that I have everything under control. Don’t worry, God, I’ve got this now. As if he isn’t the one who
gave me my steady paycheck and my incredibly supportive group of friends! As if
he is not still the one who gives me every meal, every breath that I breathe
in!
I don’t want to push God
into taking away the security crutches I’ve so carefully propped up around my
life. I don’t want to hold out my hand for his blessings, and then promptly
spin on my heel and walk away, forgetting where I received them. I wrote that
first blog entry during my unemployment because I wanted to remember. I wanted to remember God’s faithfulness, and I wanted to
remember my own dependency. I wanted never to turn away from the one who is
truly holding me up.
I do want to thank God
for the many, many blessings he’s heaped on me this past year. He’s given me
all I asked for and more. And I pray that he will remind me daily that he is
the one sustaining me with these good things that could just as easily be taken
away. I’m grateful for them, and I hope I can use them to bless others. But
strangely, I thank him most of all for that time when I didn’t have as many
blessings, when my own worldly need was so great, so strong and painful and
potent that I could not rest in
anything but him. It felt like I was walking on thin air and somehow not
falling. I miss that feeling, and I would never give up that experience,
because it’s through that I now understand, so well, the only thing I truly
need to continue to live. May I never forget.
