I watched her eyes lit up when he told her how important she is to him. I watched him smile as she told him she’ll be there until the end. Words spoken so sweet and sincere.
Time teased them, time pretended to be their friend. Now time deserted them and I watch in silence as they struggle to keep their words to each other – one refusing to break, one refusing to look back.
This is not a sad story.
She loved and lost and loved and lost and loved and lost… and I began to wonder if she has any idea what she’s doing with her life. I watched her stare at the night sky as tears roll down her cheeks, thinking to myself, does she ever get tired of wishing on the stars? Or, the stars, what do they think of her wishes? Could their twinkle be laughter or tears for her loss?
She opened her heart each time, scarred as it already was, to vulnerability – trusting, hoping, breaking. Does she really know what she’s doing? How stupid! And I heard all the promises made to her, all the words she has kept in her heart and believed in. I listened and wondered how she can be so naïve to believe in forever, in always. To overlook the lies and the excuses and to believe in the best of people. I wanted her to be mad, to be really mad at the world, at the lies, yet she sat there by the sea, hoping in silence, healing I suppose. I heard the breaking of her heart in to pieces, yet she stayed there staring at the waves, refusing to break herself.
And I heard her mutter, “one more time” and I thought to myself, she must be really crazy! One more what? Heartache, hurt, pain, one more time to be tossed aside like the sea shells on the sand? One more what? Does she plan to cry tears as much as the ocean? Then her heart whispered, “yes… again. Love. Until we get it right.”
Sadness is temporary, but to have loved is eternal.
love deeply
love truly
love bravely
even if…
even when…
it will hurt
you will cry
it will change you
and you will find …
yourself
©️ debbie (debijkl)
Father, let me be the girl who trusts you so much that no matter how I feel and what my circumstances are I know You are there. Let my faith be steadfast and grounded in Your Love. Help me and strengthen me for I am too weak and always remind me to focus on You lest I speak and hurt others in my weakness.
Help me to hold my tongue and help me to conquer my insecurities with Your love. I am unworthy yet You love me. May I conquer with Your love and stop the devil’s attack with Your truth – that I am forgiven, loved and important in Your eyes.
October 19, 2018. Needed this then, need this now. Need this all the time.
This Lent has been about crucifying and crucifying – my affections, my weaknesses, offering them to God. I wasn’t always there, doing it right, yet God is patient and is keeping me.
On the drive, what I thought was people leaving me and people making life hard for me was simply my wanting to please people and my affection making things hard for me and that God do really keep people away from me not because they’re not good or that I wasn’t good but simply because God wants me to learn what it means that HE IS ENOUGH, and to understand how relationship works, that I do not need people to like me or talk to me to validate who I am or my worth because my worth is found in Him alone – something that I know yet fails to live by.
When I live in this worth, of being found in Christ, there is peace and joy. Admittedly at times I still falter and wish for affirmation, validation, confirmation from other people – habits are hard to break. Yet I pray that slowly God will help me overcome all these affection that I may love fully and find love also in full.
The overwhelming love of God for an unworthy being – me. He initiated the love, and in response, what have I done? I run towards it, and then shrink away from it with my sins. I plunge into its amazingness and then withdraw and drown in my own misery. It’s like that scene in Tangled where Rapunzel was finally out of the tower and she was celebrating her freedom one moment then feeling bad another moment. Yet for me it’s celebrating how God has freed me and then going back to sinning then feeling bad for sinning. And all the time, God looks at me with love and mercy, waiting for me to realise what I’ve been doing and return to Him. That immeasurable patience God has for me, I have no words.
If only letting go and letting God is easily done as it is being said (in a span of few seconds). Experience has taught me, and most would agree, that it is not the case. I happened to read on this verse from Romans 3:23-25 last night and dived into the grace of God. I knew that grace is God’s gift – God’s mercy, my salvation and the promise of eternal life. Amazing, amazing grace. However, last night led me deeper into what grace is and I encountered these words telling me to guard this grace, to use it wisely and make it increase. How?
(more…)No regrets.
There are moments that sometimes challenge me, showing me the things that could have been, should have been, if only, what if’s … shoulda, woulda, coulda… yet, I wouldn’t trade anything for this path I have treaded.
True, there are times I wished life could have been kinder to me, wished that I could have avoided all the tears and heart aches, betrayals and battles, yet those were exactly the things that shaped me, events that put me to the test of faith. I cannot say I’ve always emerged victorious when it comes to that test – of faith. Like Peter, I would lose my focus on Jesus and gaze at the waves surrounding me and sink. Yet by God’s grace, I made it through each storm, and I continue to weather through the storm through His grace. Not without sinking in tears, not without bending from the wind, not without gasping for air through the waves, yet time and again, He reminds me whenever I call out to Him – trust Me, I got you and I got this.
The future will always scare me, even if when I think I had it figured out. For one, I know no human can have it all figured out. Secondly, I’m not someone who really plans so far ahead and I only have this simple vision of a future that I desire. It still scares me because the simple future I mention requires so much humility and obedience to achieve. And the devil clearly knows this, when what you desire is contrary to his, he attacks the more. I read in a book by C. S. Lewis that it is exactly in making you think of the future that the devil will put fear in your heart, for one it is because no one knows the future – not him, not you, so he can suggest to you all scary outcome to attack your peace until fear turns to doubt and chaos. We all fall prey to this. Nothing wrong with daydreaming, with wishing for a future, with desiring this future, yet when it starts to scare us, when it starts to scare me – learn to run to the One who has it all figured out and who holds our future.
So looking back, I will still take this road because back then this was the uncertain future that I didn’t expect and it played out beyond what I could imagine. Though life is hard, it is beautiful. And what’s next in this wonderful journey, I take it moment by moment with prayer in my heart, entrusting the future I know not and the desires I have to the One who loves me.
“I know not what my future holds, but I know who hold my future” ~ Homer
Life throws events in haphazardly and kinda expect you to figure it out and survive it. Often it seems like that. And to find myself in a situation I never imagined is truly a blow in my I-know-what-I’m-getting-into stance in life. I have often heard and being told to step out of my comfort zone, to step into the waves and move from the shore – well, HELLO WAVES! I, myself, am surprised with the things that I’ve done for the past weeks, months, and surprised as well to how I’ve handled situations – sometimes poorly, other times I think I did okay.
One thing I am certain is, I do not regret anything – stepping out of the comfort zone, going for something my heart wants, jumping into the middle of the waves – no regrets. It was definitely scary, and it still is, yet I also see in all this how God has been faithfully keeping me from drowning and how patiently He waits for me to act. Sometimes I struggle with His timing, His time frame, His idea of love and sacrifice yet He is ever-present and reminding me to trust, to wait, to hope and to obey. Well, the last one is the toughest one for me, because I have a stubborn heart. If you can get away with something, won’t you? But He has been patiently reminding me, forgiving me, His patience for me, I HAVE NO WORDS!
I am writing this down for the reason that I haven’t written anything recently here as my thoughts are lately too personal for sharing. And at the same time, writing this down to share and pray for other people who might be going through the same as I am – take courage, stay steadfast, He is in the waiting, (as the song goes…). Definitely, God is in the waiting.
And I need also to be reminded of His Word.
Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways submit to him, and he will make your paths straight. ~ Proverbs 3:5-6
We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ. ~ 2 Corinthians 10:5
We speak about the cross, about carrying our crosses, about laying down our worries at the feet of the cross. The cross – the symbol of His infinite and unfailing love.
I stand beneath Your cross and I look up, I see Love, my sins, my unworthiness, and my redemption. And then I look at the empty tomb – Love fulfilled. The tomb of my sins washed clean. The tomb of my failures, gone. Your resurrection is my Hope fulfilled.
The cross, Your Love. The empty tomb, Your victory.
The cross, my salvation. The empty tomb, my Hope.
The cross, a reminder of the life in this world. The empty tomb, a reminder of heaven.
Beneath Your feet my tears fall, outside your empty tomb my heart rejoices. Lord Jesus, my God, unworthy as I am, Your Love overtakes me. There is nothing more than I want than to rejoice in Your victory.
Help me.
1144 06.18.2018
Pixies & Stardust 