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Joyless

 

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I feel joyless.  Theologically speaking, I know that I possess joy.  But the sadness overwhelming me has buried it so deep there is no chance it will surface, at least not today.    There is nothing easy about hard times. There is nothing small about great loss. I know that justice does not serve my timeline, and I know that the final chapter has not yet materialized.  I know that God is sovereign and I know about His love, but knowledge does not lessen my pain.

 

In the pain I wonder.  I wonder how to press into Him when life is pressing me down.  I wonder how to look up, when nothing else is looking up. I wonder how long it will be before I look back and see that yes, His grace was sufficient, even for this.

 

In the pain I wait.  I wait for the dawn to rise, for light to appear.  I wait for the waiting to become less uncomfortable/  In the pain I cry. Tears over what I do not understand, tears of disappointment, tears of heartache.  Joy will come in the morning, we just do not know which morning that will be.

 

There are moments to redeem and there are moments to get through.  In these moments we trust God to redeem, because no one else can. In these moments Heaven rallys, we are shaped, and God is glorified.  

 

There is nothing to see where faith has not yet been made sight.  Let us remember that as much as we long for joy, we cannot create it.  We are the created, not the Creator. It is not ours to create joy, or even figure out how to unbury it.  Buried underneath the dirt, where no one sees and there is nothing but darkness, seeds grow. You know what the seed does?  It stays. In the darkness. And it grows. No one sees it growing, not yet anyway. Even the seed does not know what it is becoming.  

 

I am unable to describe even a glimpse of the glory of God.  I do know this, that the most beautiful field of flowers is scarcely a foretaste of it.  No one wants to be a seed, buried in the darkness. Everyone should want to be part of the splendor of the field.  Joyless will not last. In the meantime, the darkness may. Pain runs deep, grace runs deeper. It reaches the joyless.

 

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“In my distress I called upon the LORD; to my God I cried for help.  From his temple he heard my voice, and my cry to him reached his ears.”  Psalm 18:6 (ESV)

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