Just a warning,
What follows is raw and real and straight from my journal. Unedited. The prayer that the Lord so comfortingly gave me at the end is from Psalm 31. I’d still be crying if it weren’t for his comfort and those words.
Oh Daddy,
It’s midnight on May 20th after spring retreat and I’m crying so hard. It just hit me this weekend at spring retreat, especially last night during the Agape celebration how scared I am and more than that how I don’t want to leave Davis and college. I’m not ready to move on, to leave these relationships. Crusade is what I know and what is familiar. I know how to exist and serve and lead in Crusade at Davis. I know where to go and who to turn to when I need a shoulder to cry on or someone to pray for me.
Daddy it’s not that I’m not excited about the future. I know it’s Your will and I know I will build lifelong friendships next year, have the opportunity to pray with someone to receive Christ and to speak truth and life into broken people, but I just don’t want THIS- the now- to end.
I keep thinking that if I just withdrew or “checked out” of ministry and Davis that this would be easier. But no matter how much it hurts and how hard it is I want to be in the here and now to soak up the last few weeks of this phase of my life. I won’t numb myself to it!
And I’m angry. Angry that this is all getting taken away from me! That I will be spending the summer alone, without this solid community you’ve given me here, probably working with people who don’t support me and maybe don’t even believe in you. I’m angry and so hurt that this STUPID summer job is keeping me from the last Crusade Real Life meeting of my time in college. Angry that in the midst of this pain I have to finish a 35 page paper when all I want to do is spend time with people that I may never see again.
Daddy most of all I’m so thankful so unbelievable grateful for these last 4 years. You’ve given me so much that I don’t deserve. You’ve redeemed me daily and entrusted me with your beautiful children. Daddy I just don’t deserve any of this: to be saved, redeemed and used by You.
God I just give this to you right now. I’m hurting, but by faith alone I fall knowing that You are there to catch me, even when I can’t see You!
In You, O Lord, I have taken refuge;
Let me never be ashamed; In your righteousness deliver me.
Incline your ear to me, rescue me QUICKLY.
Be to me a rock of strength, A stronghold to save me.
You are my rock and my fortress. For Your name’s sake You will lead me and guide me. For You are my strength. Into Your hand I commit my spirit; You have ransomed me, O Lord, God of truth.
Be Gracious to me, O Lord, for I am in distress; my eye is wasted away from grief, my soul and my body also.
But as for me, I trust in You, O Lord, I say, “YOU ARE MY GOD.” And my times are in your hand.
AMEN.
