kickball

One day.  That's all it takes to change direction.  Almost everything I've been planning for these past few months has fallen through within the last 24 hours.  A trip to see a much-missed friend.  Moving in with a sweet sister.  Summer missions.  A summer internship.  All of it falling through, leaving me disappointed. Yet I am so gently reminded of the past.  I'm reminded of times and places and people that make me thankful that God never gives me what I think I need.

I've been talking to some sweet friends lately, and reconnecting with people from my past.  And there seems to be this theme of feeling stuck.  All different people in different voices, saying the same thing:

What do you do when it feels like God has forgotten about your adventure?

If you were sitting next to me, I'd tell you about church a couple of weeks ago.  Somehow I always end up late for church, sneaking in the back doors and smuggling hugs as I go.  To talk about church is like only seeing a preview of a movie- it's a longer part of a different story, a story about people who taught me how to love.  Maybe another story for another day.

So I slip into an empty row right in the middle of a song, and catch a glimpse of the woman doing sign language on the side of the stage.  Her motions are fluid and beautiful.  It takes my mind a minute to process the motions but my heart catches on right away.  Running.  Grace.  Freedom.  Joy.  A Remedy.  I sit in awe and watch the story come to life.  Redemption.

Sometimes it's easy to talk about what God has done once it's finished.  It's so much harder to be in the middle of a season with loose ends and rough edges and proclaim His goodness.  And yet, if you sit long enough in the silence, there's a sweetness there.  There's a reason why birds head south for the winter, and why spring follows winter like an encore follows a song.  That's the story in between the sign language.

Our promise-maker is a promise keeper.

That's what I'm resting in, today.