The surreal life.

Originally posted May 26, 2008

There is something incredibly surreal for me when I come home. Even more so when I come to my mom's house. Mom lives in the area that I grew up. It never seems to fail that some things will be different. A new building or house that has been built somewhere. A store closed or a restaurant revamped or opened. Tomorrow I might be bold enough to make the trek to my childhood home. It was sold last year. For some reason there is an utter sadness in me that I don't quite understand. It's like the time that I sold my saxophone for money to pay my bills because I was that desperate. Up to the moment of the transaction I was fine. But as I handed my saxophone over I felt as though I had sold my memories. Even though I have lived 1100 miles away from my childhood home for going on two years now, there is something that is just strange about not being able to go to the house that was my bedroom. To go to my fishing hole in hopes of some bass or blue gale. To roam on the 80 acres that was once ours. To explore the buildings on the farm in search of "treasure".

God has been doing something in me I don't quite understand. It's as though everything from my past is coming up…maybe for me to deal with. Before I really met Jesus I was a shell. I didn't want to feel anything and I was completely delusional to my life. I hid from my past, that or locked it away, and pretended that it never happened. Coming back to my place of birth shouldn't be this hard, yet, it's as though I'm being confronted by my past and I don't know why. My eyes seem to be open wide to why I have some difficulties in my life. Things that were passed on from my parents. Things I don't want to pass onto my kids. I'm completely out of my comfort zone right now and I totally cannot feel God, nor do I feel worthy to be called His.

God has been working on my pride. I am like a two year old. I want to do everything on my own. "I can do it" is my attitude. I love helping other people, yet, I seem to struggle asking others for help. Sometimes I use the cover of not wanting to inconvenience them. Other times it's other excuses. I recently, within the past couple of weeks, was finally broken enough to admit that I am bipolar and I need help. Mental issues run in my family and I wasn't able to escape. I have been in denial for four year now. I am finally at the point where I can't control or manage it anymore. I can't hide it. My swings have gotten too bad. It makes me become this person I don't want to be. Maybe I'm in the downward depressed state at the moment. It usually seems that is when I'm most honest with myself. It is also when things overwhelm me the most. There are times, like right now, that I don't think I deserve to be called God's daughter. I seem to doubt my ability to connect with my Heavenly Father, maybe because I've lost connection with my own earthly father. I just want so badly to get to Heaven one day and for God to look at me and say well done good and faithful servant. People around say things alluding to the sense that I've got things together when I actually feel like I'm falling apart and only being held by a thread. I know that thread is Jesus. It amazes me that He doesn't let go. It's the only reason why I don't let go at times. I really just don't get God's love and mercy and grace. I desire to be all of these things. Yet I feel like I'm never going to get there. I feel like I'm not doing it right. Something isn't clicking. I feel like I am so far away from God right now. I feel lonely. Maybe I just feel too much. I know that God is right with me. David talked about it in Psalm 23. I don't know what God is doing right now in me, and even though it hurts, I don't want Him to give up on me. I just want to know Jesus and the Father and know the whisper of the Holy Spirit.

There are so many things I don't understand about life, faith, God. I want to. James 1:5 says to ask God for wisdom and He will give it to you accordingly. I have asked God over and over again for wisdom. I think part of my problem is that I want things now. I want the place where I will be in 20 more year of walking with Jesus now, without having to go through the other 19 years. Yet I know the other 19 are important and I can't skip them otherwise I wouldn't be where I will be in 20 years. I just want this cluttered fog to lift from me so I can see God clearly. I want to know who the God of the bible really is, not the false idol that I followed for all of those years. I want to know who Jesus really is, not the Jesus I made him to be for my own selfish desires. I want to know it is the Holy Spirit whispering to my soul guiding me through all things, not my voice of doubt and despair. I want that relationship with God before anyone else. I don't even want a husband until I can have that relationship with God. I don't want to forsake God for a man. For the here and now. I want to live out the purpose that God created me for. It's hard, when I barely know what it is, when I barely know my Father, when I have a screwed view of the Man who saved my soul from what it deserved. But do know that one day I will get there, not by my own doing, but, by the grace of God alone.

In these times, when I feel alone, I go back to one of only a few fond childhood memories. The memories of as a little girl singing, "Jesus loves me this I know. For the Bible tells me so. Little ones to Him belong. They are weak but He is strong. Yes Jesus loves me. Yes Jesus loves me. Yes Jesus loves me, the bible tells me so." It is upon this promise that my faith will rest and rely. I know that this storm shall too pass. Even though I do not feel God, it is not by feeling alone that I am grounded. My faith stands in trusting the Word of God. There are a lot of things I don't know that it says, but there are some important things that I do know. One of those is the Jesus loves and one day He will come back for me and there will no longer be tears of sadness. Until that day, I want to learn more of He who saved me. In Him my hope relies, and how can I rely on someone I barely know, or think I know but really don't. The answer is simple. Call upon His name and find refuge in His word.

~Steph