It's been way too long...

I think it's safe to say that my life has been, at best, tumultuous for the past few months. God has asked for my obedience and devoted trust in some scary areas. I have stayed working with teenagers because last semester He made it clear to me that I'm supposed to be ministering to them for now. He hasn't made the later part clear, just the now part. It's one of the scariest things I've ever done and plays on my insecurities like none other. He also asked for my obedience in seeking healing. He made it very clear that I have reached a road block and He is choosing to take me around it through counseling. So I signed myself up all but kicking and screaming (on the inside, of course, because I have to be put together on the outside) and I have hated it since I started.

The funny thing about counseling is that it's not someone else telling you what your problems are. It's another person facilitating your thought processes as you work through the madness of the past. It's one of the best things I have ever done because it has brought so much clarity into so much chaos.

But it's scary. It's scary to uncover what I tried so hard to hide even from myself. It's scary to have emotions that I have run from for years resurfacing, because the last time I felt them I was completely alone.

On top of counseling, I have been reading Beth Moore's "So Long, Insecurity". I just got through the chapter on the multiple root causes of insecurity that women carry because life happens and people are fallen. At the end of the chapter, Moore quoted her daughter when a particularly challenging experience came up for the two of them:

"He knows it's scary to be us."

I couldn't move on to the next sentence before my eyes got blurry with tears. I've had such a hard time wrapping my mind around the fact that God is love and He is sovereign, but He still lets things that hurt us happen. I have had a hard time reconciling my faith and my pain. But that statement, so full of truth, delivered God's compassion to my hurting heart. He knows it's scary to be us. He knows the insecurity I carry because of my mistakes, He knows the insecurity I carry because of other's mistakes. He knows the insecurity I carry because life is unpredictable, and He knows I walk around with a shield waiting for the next blow, not being able to enjoy the moment for fear of the next, which could turn out to be earth-shattering.

He knows.

He knows because He walks with us. He knows because at every scarring moment He was right there with me. He knows because His love won't let Him turn away. He knew what was happening and He knows what will happen, but that doesn't change Him or His nature or His love or His ability to redeem, and it doesn't change His capacity to offer compassion and to walk through the pain with me. He knows how scared I feel right now. He knows that I fear being alone. He knows that it is scary to be human and to face the uncertainty of tomorrow. But He is always, always there to walk with us and to offer Himself in our time of need.