And so I sit here at the beginning of 2010, seeing things with my eyes but my heart is afraid to believe. I'll quit being so vague and give you some specifics. It's about a boy.
It actually all started in 1998. I was living in Indiana, had moved there to do God's work. In the process of living that life, a guy came and tempted me to follow my own desires. That selfishness on my part ended very destructively, and from my perspective hurt a lot of people. I was hurt. I had given in yet again. So as I moved back to Lubbock, I asked God to turn me inside out. I didn't want to disappoint Him again. Despite myself, I believed that God asked me for 10 more years of being single. That would have been in the Spring of 1999. It was a hard choice. I somehow knew that by saying yes, it meant watching my younger brothers get married and have kids before me, which did happen. I felt it was penance. God's way of punishing my indiscretions.
It wasn't until the end of 2008 that I really began to see that God's character is not one that would punish, but send out an invitation to deeper intimacy. He wanted 10 more years of just me and Him. Quality time. I certainly needed it. Character building, maturity, etc. But the invitation to intimacy was missed. So these last couple of years I half-heartedly grabbed at every chance I could to have deeper intimacy with God and half-heartedly counted the hours and minutes until the 10 years of punishment was finished.
Spring of 2009 came and went, and in the last 6 months of the year some remarkable things happened. I realized that God is enough and if I truly believed that marriage was a promise, then I no longer had to perform to achieve the good merits to win the reward. Likewise, whether you call it dumb luck or coincidence or fate, I was given a wedding dress that is a perfect fit.
So I sat and finished out a year, a year prophesied to give birth to a promise. I sat and watched the year come to an end and felt incredibly disappointed. I felt betrayed and forgotten.
Then out of nowhere, I remembered a call from the middle of October from a guy that I have liked for quite sometime. That call was an invitation that was met with scheduling conflicts, identity crisis', and ultimately disregard. In January, I returned the call and we went to lunch. I was classically over eager and feared that I scared him away again. But he called me back and now another lunch date has been arranged.
I am excited but I am also afraid. To believe that we can be truly loved despite our imperfections is a major thing to overcome. He is an amazing man. I feel small in his presence. I see Him, in him and I am daunted. Grace, is bittersweet, i don't care what they say.
There are moments in my life when I can look around and see the stars lining up. It's as if all of the cosmos are coming into order. I feel that sensation now, that things I have prayed for and dreamed of for a long time are coming into order in ways that I will not be able to adequately describe the amount of happiness or joy I am faced with.
When I have the shrinking back feelings like I am feeling now, I try to remember the words Nelson Mandela quoted at his inauguration,
“Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous? Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won't feel insecure around you. We are all meant to shine, as children do. We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It's not just in some of us; it's in everyone. And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others.”
