in the morning...

I'm 3 days into the 15-week semester and I already feel the breakdown coming. With a full time job and 16 hours of graduate classes, I'm in for it. I'll be honest, I was kinda sorta hoping that the break would be the time to deal with heartache and come back joyful, refreshed, and ready to take on the spring.

I was thinking today while driving, which is where I do most of my processing (yes - sometimes audibly), and I imagined someone going up to me to ask me how I was doing, to which I would respond with a soft smile: "I'm doing great - life is hard but God is good and I'm really experiencing his presence" and continuing to calmly engage with this hypothetical person. The fact is though, this just is not the case. Rather than a smile I'd probably give an eye roll and a sarcastic smirk, I would fumble over my words because I'm to anxious recently to do anything but babble, and then I would admit that I know that God is good and I know that God is there, but it's been a few days since I've experienced his presence.

I asked in a previous post what it meant for a Christian to walk through the "valleys" of life. I've found myself on my knees begging for that exact answer and I read through the Psalms:

"Have mercy on me, O Lord, for I am weak; O Lord, heal me, for my bones are troubled (6:2). I am weary with my groaning; All night I make my bed swim; I drench my couch with my tears. My eye wastes away because of grief (6:6-7). I am poured out like water, And all My bones are out of joint; My heart is like wax; It has melted within Me. My strength is dried up like a potsherd, And My tongue clings to My jaws; You have brought Me to the dust of death (22:14-15). But You, O Lord, do not be far from Me; O My Strength, hasten to help Me! (22:19). Redeem me and be merciful to me (26:11b). Do not hid your face from me (27:9)."

and then I read...

"For His anger is but for a moment, His favor is for life; Weeping may endure for a night, But joy comes in the morning (30:5)."

I can't help but wonder, when is the "morning?" How long O Lord?

Anybody that knows me remotely well is familiar with my constant struggle with anxiety. Usually a good night sleep will do the trick, but this week I have found my mornings to be characterized by a racing heart and racing thoughts. Lord give me rest. So much for joy this morning, but maybe tomorrow. This, too, shall pass.

Patience is a funny thing. Waiting. Time - the one thing we can't even kinda sorta control. Lack of control is what compels us to trust, and in God's sovereignty is where we place that trust. Hind-sight is 20-20 and it is usually from this vantage point that we affirm God's sovereignty, but what about hope? The hope that God is being sovereign NOW and we will be better able to see it in hind-sight perhaps? In Romans 8:24-25 we read that "hope that is seen is no hope at all. Who hopes for what they already have? But if we hope for what we do not yet have, we wait for it patiently."

Patience. Trust. Hope.

Feebly taking Paul's life-giving words to the church in Corinth to heart as I pray to grasp the perspective that he offers.

"Therefore we do not lost heart. Though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day. For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all. So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen, since what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal." 2 Corinthians 4:15-17.