New eyes for someday

Tuesday morning and I’m running late. The weight of worry takes its familiar place on my back as I skim over my mental list of prayer requests. Ugh. It’s so heavy today I don’t want to leave home and face the need I know waits for me at work.


I wring my hands as I wait for the microwave to finish heating my oatmeal. Sometimes life is just so blah I want to scream. I gripe inside and pray for more gratitude.

---But thankful or not the truth is that I can’t shake the longing for a more than figurative resurrection and new birth. I don’t want to “be healed” in a way that means I am still anxious, low, and obsessive. I don’t want to preach about freedom and be stuck watching people I love suffer one more day. In this flurry of worry I think of the verse in Romans chapter 8 that always stands out to me when I catch myself groaning for deeper freedom for all creation:

I consider that our present sufferings are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us. The creation waits in eager expectation for the sons of God to be revealed. For the creation was subjected to frustration, not by its own choice, but by the will of the one who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself will be liberated from its bondage to decay and brought into the glorious freedom of the children of God.

Romans 8:18-21

I so want to see this freedom—the glorious freedom of the children of God One manifest in creation. Right now we have promises. We all see miracles happen sometimes, but we all also die. We have prayed and prayed and

• he still died
• they never conceived
• she continued to suffer
• he refused to get the help he needs
• our friend just got sicker and sicker.
• we remained broken

Right now too often the miracle we long for in the moment is not the miracle we receive. So Life forces the honest soul to admit, “this is not the script I would have written.” For our faith to stand in this unpredictable and short life it must be found in a resurrecting King--- who promises that death is not our ultimate end.

I can imagine the conversations we will have with each other someday —sitting at a great party, swapping stories of how Christ intervened in history to save us:

• Peter will tell of how even after he betrayed Jesus his Rabbi took him back.
• Paul will share of the Blinding Light on the Damascus road.
• A mother will tell of her worries for a wayward son and how in desperation she turned to Christ who comforted her in her grief.
• One will tell of a life-controlling addiction and Jesus’ intervention.
• Another of growing up in church and the day she fell in love with the Savior she had been taught about all her life.
• I believe that at this table will be my sisters who still struggle in the grip of Anorexia—finally free--- telling of how the Father still received them, even after they rejected themselves.
• I believe at this table will be the women I serve as a companion for--- finally healed--- telling of how despite the inexpressible suffering they experienced, Jesus never, never, never left them.

And on and on the stories will stretch--- resurrected testimonies of God’s glory[… I get chill bumps just thinking of what it will be like.] I so want sit beside my friends who right now hurt so much and know that finally the full healing we prayed and prayed for is here. The hurting is over. We can all finally see how Jesus has the final word in the suffering that it tore us up to watch.

I find tremendous encouragement in knowing that despite all my failures my life will be among the testimonies of His power. My small, unexpected, often difficult story in light of Jesus is likewise miraculous, and glorious. I am surrendered to a process of being made new and will not be God’s first failure--- This promise is what gives me hope when life continues to detour from my girlhood dreams for sharing Christ. It may not make sense right now how small and hidden service is the way I can most fully show His love but I know I am given fully to him. So this is good—a beautiful part of whole I will understand someday.