On This Holy Thursday

At the beginning of 2016, I picked a word to focus on for the whole year. The word was discipline, because heaven knows I need more of it. But slowly over the last three months, a new word has been whispering at the back of my mind.

When I first moved here to the Tri, I hated it. I hated everything about it. I spent a year avoiding the place that was supposed to be home for good, or so was the plan. And then, I decided I needed to work on contentment, which is defined as "a state of happiness." For a time, I believed I had found it. In fact, I was so happy that I prayed to God, "Please don't let me lose faith when it all falls apart." A well timed prayer, to be sure, because two weeks later, all of it did. 

Now, a change dawns, a different place, a different life, and a different word for the year: acceptance. 

In retrospect, much of my time here has been about acceptance:

Accept that this place isn't what you thought.

Accept that the people here aren't who you thought.

Accept that your job isn't what you thought.

Accept that the man was everything you denied he could be. 

Accept that the future you could have now comes at a cost, like the remainder of the friendships you have. Maybe they survive on social media, maybe not. 

Accept the fact that not many will go out of their way for you. 

I accept. I see this time for what it has been - a lesson in humility and humiliation. In frustration, and anger, and regret. In countless hours spent awake, crying out to the dark, "What was it all for? Why does it matter?"

I've received many a pep talk from well meaning individuals in the last several months. "Think of all the relationships you've formed, the things you've learned, the way you've grown." I get a bitter taste in my mouth every time I hear it. Not because they're wrong, but because they say it like somehow that's going to magically make everything better. They might as well be saying "Think of  everything you tried to accomplish and build that is now void. Think of all of your time spent waiting and surviving, just barely at times, for it to end up like this." 

But, I am not without great optimism for the future. I accept the void, and I leave it to the past. I step forward into uncertainty, but I would rather live in this state for a time, than merely survive in the broken ruins of what never came to fruition. 

My dear friend said to me a few days ago, "The Lord gives, and He takes away.

Bless Him all the same."

Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, or of disappointment, or of disillusionment, I will not fear. What God has made crooked, who can make straight?

Bless His name. 

Forgive as Forgiven

I'm not very good at it. I've written about it before. I'm not the "forgive and forget" type. I'm the "forgive and never let you forget" type.

This past weekend, I found myself in a most ironic situation. There I sat, in the living room of my friends house, holding a phone to my ear and listening to the sounds of my own heart being ripped out, for the second time in less than a year. 

When the phone call was ended, and the damage done, I sat in the darkened room with my friend, who had heard most of what happened - an angry voice over the telephone and me, sobbing uncontrollably. 

We all know what it is to be hurt. Sometimes the cuts are so deep, we are sure they will never heal. Sometimes the scars are so numerous, we can't remember what we were like without them. Sometimes the wound is so raw that even the slightest provocation will tear it open again. Sometimes forgiveness seems impossible. 

She looked at me, my friend did, and offered me words of peace and calm. She's known me a long time, and always has had a knack for tempering my impulse to instantly and foolishly react. 

There is irony in having such an event happen as I sat in her living room, because if she hadn't forgiven me when I asked, I wouldn't have been there at all. Indeed, such a phone call never would have existed, and neither would many of the happy moments of the last five months. A year ago, I made a phone call of my own and I asked for her forgiveness for something I had done wrong three years prior. She didn't even hesitate. She said, "I have been waiting for this phone call for three years."

With open arms, I was accepted. Much was forgiven of me, by her and by her family, without retribution. Without judgement. Without paying a price again and again and again. That's exactly what forgiveness is. The price has already been paid, the blood shed, and we can walk freely into the arms of Someone who didn't deserve to pay it, but who gladly did for our sake. 

Because of Him, I can forgive much, because I am forgiven.