It is simply this, I have neglected my first love. It is also this, I am wrestling terribly with disappointment and am finding that I come up so short in the department of courage to defy it. But let me tell you; I have a secret suspicion that I have not fed enough. These disappointments are relieving my heart. Somehow I knew that my own hopes and plans were still not sufficient to mark a life that mattered. These disappointments clear the fog, leaving no doubt, and I can see what God has been doing in the midst of my distraction.
I've thought a lot about that night on the beach in Hawaii and questioned my hope's safety in Him for how terrified I was of the next couple years being just like the last. Here is the powerful truth that I still cannot grasp in my human logic. God makes a very stern and loud promise that our happiness is not going to be in our pitiful circumstances. Life is not going to change. Satan is not going to let up. The world is still unjust, counterfeit, confining, hurtful and broken. But He will be just, real, freeing, healing and whole. "Come to Me and see what heavenly truths my Spirit will feed yours." I see that when life sucks it becomes so much easier to see the dire need for heaven. I see that when the decision to follow Him becomes more epic then simply sacrificing 7 months away from home, then the taste of Heaven will be that much more potent. And suddenly instead of just every day, we come to need our Savior every hour.
