Dark Days

So today is the brightest Saturday morning. Sun is streaming in every window and doorway. We have our blinds up to the highest and our window just had fresh spring air blowing through here. My darlin husband has seriously been working hard all morning cleaning...and I mean DEEP CLEANING our bathrooms. I have been sitting here in our kitchen, reading Psalms and texting a sweet gal and thinking about some of the harder days.

I just read some beautiful, REAL and AUTHENTIC words from my emo/artist/kindred spirit David in Psalm 13....

How long will you forget me?

How long must I struggle with anguish in my soul...

with sorrow in my heart every day?

Turn and answer me, O Lord my God!

Restore the light to my eyes, or I will die.

And I can honestly say that the whole year of 2013 was one of the hardest and toughest years to struggle through. Yes, I was engaged. Yes, I was in love. But I was losing a church I loved. If you know me, church has always been a topic of my heart. Even back in high school, I chatted for hours with friends about the flaws and my hopes for what church "was intended to be". And in Bible school, I defended the "CHURCH" to all my friends filled with angst and bitterness of how the church had "hurt" them. Through my adult single years, I watched a church just utterly defeat our family. I watched my Mom and Dad be pummeled....thats the only way I can describe it...by people they had literally poured their hearts and souls into. I walked away from a church that had "loved and cared for me" from the age of 10 all through my teen age years and into my 20s. I left behind people I thought would be at my wedding. I thought it would be different then that. I reluctantly attended the "it" church that most of the people my age had been attending for the past few years. I left before the last song, and sat with my sister every week. I didn't connect, nor did I want to. After a few years, I joined a small group. I started to belong. I started to really get to know people, and it wasn't easy, but it was family. It took me a few more years, but God gave me a passion for Sunday School so I started to do that and loved every second. I started dating Danny, and we were scared for our "first Sunday sitting together"...but we attended this church all through our dating days and when we were engaged, it was announced from the front. We were loved and blessed by people who noticed us and celebrated with us at our wedding. 

But almost from the moment we were engaged, this church came between Danny and I. We fought, discussed and talked for hours about what was happening. And I don't want to rehash nor do I want to act like it didn't happen...because it did. It still affects me, but gratefully, I feel like I am healing. 

So after much prayer, discussion and watching what it was doing to US. We left our church. We started fresh in a new one. Its not easy nor is it perfect. But we can and we see that God is leading us and we want to be where God wants us.

All of this to say, DARK DAYS. It still creeps in on me. I still hate that I lost my church. I still feel bitterness and unforgiveness and anger. But God is so close to me that I can hardly even allow it to simmer before I pray and allow God to wash over me. I just ache to be filled with the Holy Spirit and allow all those good fruits to be in my heart...not the other ones (hostility, anger, divisions, bitterness...etc.)

All of this to say that this PSALM does not disregard those feelings. It does not say. Do not ever feel sorrow. Do not ever be negative.....but what it does say and the redemption of the Psalms is that although those feelings are acknowledged....almost all psalms end with a praise to God...such as this one:

But........

I TRUST IN YOUR UNFAILING LOVE

I WILL REJOICE BECAUSE YOU HAVE RESCUED ME

I WILL SING TO THE LORD

BECAUSE HE HAS BEEN SO GOOD TO ME

So this morning, as all those feelings washed over me. 

I was reminded again that God's unfailing LOVE has been with me. Through all the hard days in the past. Those HARD days of being single and watching your friends fall in love, plan weddings, start a family. Those HARD days of being in the middle of your church splitting. Those HARD days of trying to understand where our new loyalties lie as newlyweds even though we have our ties to our own families, we have forged a new one together.  

And today on this sunny bright spring day, in my clean house. Sitting with Indie Dance music playing loud and in the peace of being able to write and read my Bible. Knowing I am loved from the top of my head to the bottom of my toes by my best friend who is cleaning my shower....Knowing that I have so many blessings living here at 46 Hilltop Drive. Knowing that both of our families are close and we all love each other. Knowing that we have a church that we can start building new friendships and connections in, and knowing that my heart is still connected with my old church through prayers and making intentional connections.  I know that God has rescued me from dark days, and they will come again---no doubt...but HE HAS BEEN SO GOOD TO ME. I am so grateful for this reminder today.