Last Thursday was my final day at my job. My final day of living daily life with the people who have been my second family over the past 2 years, my home away from home. I wanted to share with you the journey I’ve been on since I said goodbye, and the thoughts I’ve had as I’ve processed that journey.
I don’t know if my heart has ever broken like that before. The pain was so real, so raw, so physically present. There was no room for renewal that night (Thursday). There was only pain. Pain that I had to sit in. I wanted it to go away so bad. It hurt so much. I couldn’t breathe. I didn’t know what to do. I was in complete agony. But I knew if I didn’t sit in it, with my Father God, it could never be fully restored. So I sat in the unbearable pain and just wept loudly. I wept while writhing in physical pain, for hours. I eventually made it home that night and eventually fell asleep.
The next morning felt very surreal, almost like I couldn’t believe I had been in that much pain the night before. Going through that much pain seemed unimaginable. But I had the open wound to prove I had. My heart felt like a wound in which the bleeding from the original break had slowed but had left me like a whimpering puppy. It was not outright pain anymore. More of a subdued pain. But it was still there. A fresh wound.
I felt the anger start to come. Anger for having to go through this. Anger of not wanting to meet my World Race team because I didn’t want to give up my current family for a new one. But through it all I begged God to sit with me and steer my emotions in the right direction. Because only He could.
Throughout that next day, the moments of sharp pain came and went. Different things reminded my heart of what it had lost. Yet other things slowly gave glimpses of renewal.
Through this journey, I have come to understand the immense courage it takes to go through the pain. To sit in it and feel it without putting up any blockers. It takes courage because it hurts so much. It would be immensely easier to block the pain and not have to go through the agony, to ignore it all. But when we do that, we give way to bitterness, anger, fear, and depression.
When we do not allow ourselves to sit in the pain with our Father, we do not give Him the opportunity to bring new life from the pain, to renew what was broken, to turn the pain into gratefulness. When we deny God of that opportunity, there’s only room for the fear, anger, bitterness, and depression.
I find this as yet another way we live in Christ’s likeness. He had to sit in and feel the pain of the cross, of all of our sins. But had He not sat in it with the Father, had He not bore our burdens, the new life that came from the cross would never have been accomplished.
So whatever pain you find yourself in, whether big or small, now or later, I pray you will look to the Father for the strength to be courageous and engage the pain. Because when you do that, God does amazing things.
All of that being said and turning the page, tomorrow I leave for training camp. A whole new journey in which I know God will continue to remind my heart why it longs to follow Him on this new path. A new journey in which I know my heart will be all in once it begins, because thats who I am. I love deeply and I grieve deeply. So I would like to ask that you pray for a couple things:
- The start of new relationships
- That my team and I would be open to what God wants to teach us in these next 10 days
- And for safe travels for all of us to and from Georgia.
