getting thanks...

Life has been interesting lately, then again when isn't it?

I was just driving home today and remembered to take a moment and let the thankfulness in

The thankfulness which so often, stomps out many of my bad attitudes... My bitterness, selfishness, and judgements from a foolish heart. I remembered that i need to learn thankfulness each day, over and over again-i need to sit and reflect on the beauty being out on my life.
As I drove, I reflected on today, on the past few days.

And simply, presently, most deeply, i am thankful just that it is OK to be human.

Ok to cry, to cry out, to love, to hurt, to hope, to not understand. It is okay to walk in the dark sometimes, stumbling, stubbing your toe, falling over yourself and barely unsuredly making out the next step. It is okay to dream, to read fairytales, to long for a day when this story will be clearer. And it's okay to sometimes get a little lost in the details and then take a step back to see that all those small things that scared you, were really okay all along. It is okay to not have the most up to date map. Perhaps it is better and maybe some of those detours were really the sweetest part of the journey. And perhaps they were the only way you would get to love the destination so dearly.

For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weakness

but in ever way

at every moment

in every life's stage...

he understood,

he felt it, he lived it, he cried out about it...

our very God put on flesh

and the cloud of witnesses...they know-the walked this road too...they are beside us, cheering us...calling us froward on the race...the race, sometime, in the dark

and it's okay to let yourself need Him, need them...to need the body of Christ around you

and that brings me to the second thing, i am most thankful for

with this,

in this, the midst of all this mess and muck, these dross and diamonds, misunderstandings and pain,

i

am

most

thankful for

the power of love. that love, is greater than our darkness...our pain, and able to transform us, to transform our lives...

His love. His love in what He has done, His love in who He is,

His love being who He has made us to be

His love breathes through the love of those around us...

today, a dear friend called just as i was stepping away from work for a break...

ten minutes...and love, love from her heart to mine, encouragement, grace, joy spoken, from one endeared heart to another....i return to work, empowered by His love, by her love...

how does that work? How is it that love is the fuel that feeds our lives, that makes our lives worth living, that makes us who we were meant to be...

i returned to work, reminded of who i am because of who she is, because of who He is

I don't mean to be trite about love. I don't think it's just a cushy, empty good feeling...

no-it's something much deeper, greater, more fierce than that. and i think we all know this at the core of our being, of who we are. we all long, thirst and ache for this. and i have not yet learned to express it as i long to, but i see icons all around me, calling me to it...expressing the inexpressible...

love in motion, love in beauty, love in life.

and he came to give us life, and life more abundant than we could

ask

or imagine...