The Hard Stuff

I just spent an hour sitting on the hood of my car in the dark, trying to put it all together. I was having an imaginary conversation with a confidant, I was imagining “him” appearing at the end of my drive, I was waiting for a shooting star to confirm my entire existence. My entire existence was not confirmed, and the only mark I left, the only proof that a sad girl was sitting on the hood of her car while strangers drove down the neighboring street or girls walked and laughed together, was a wrinkled and wet tissue that was thrown away. 

And that tissue will end up in the bin at the end of the drive, and that bin will end up in the back of a garbage truck, and my proof of existence will be stacked amongst piles of all of these other marks of existence, and then it will disintegrate.

I spent the majority of my childhood looking forward to now, only to be disappointed that in order to get to now, someone had to cheat on me, or lie to me, or forget me, and I had to make mistakes, and lose my words, and cut off my hair, and lose my cat, and so-and-so had to die…I had to break in order to be mended, and broken again to be taught, and broken again to learn the meaning of love and forgiveness. 

And as long as I believed, “everything has a purpose. Everything happens for a reason,” I allowed the breaking and mending, and the “happenings” in quiet contentment of some kind. Because I believe in a higher power, a hand bigger than mine, and an existence that gives it all purpose.

 And 2 hours ago, that belief, already fragile, was shattered. 

Because, as much as I believe in a loving God, I don’t know how apart of anything He really is.  

And I’m not supposed to say that. I’m supposed to have the right answers, and I’m supposed to be a light on top of a hill, and I’m supposed to make your hearts lighter and not heavier. But, I don’t understand “it” and by “it” I mean everything. “Everything” leads me back to God, and I have to face every Christian’s biggest nightmare, and that is doubt. Because a doubting faith, seems to be synonymous with a wavering faith. But my faith is not waivered, my confidence is.  

I’m not sitting on an alphabet rug in Sunday school any more. The easy stuff is over. God, Jesus, the Holy ghost. Noah and the ark. Jonah and the fish. The blind man healed by mud, the woman who touched His robe, the dreams, the manna, the locust, the fire from heaven… 

Now, is the hard stuff.  If everything has a purpose, He’s hurting me on purpose. If some things happen outside of God, why didn’t He save me from it, especially when I prayed for guidance? If my petty world can’t fit in His hands, where else can it fit?  

The truth is I don’t have any answers. I don’t know right now.  

I want to believe He loves me, and that he guards me and protects me, and that He’s moving me in the best direction. But when I can’t learn from an event, and I can’t understand it, and it means nothing, it connects to nothing, and the only thing it is produces is pain…It makes it that much harder to have that childlike faith that I so easily had at one time.

I guess I said all of that to say, I don't know where God fits anymore. And if I don't know where God fits, I don't know where I fit. Where life fits. Where anything fits. Life becomes harder and uglier.

 

ps. I wrote this in pure honesty, which is mostly due to the fact that I'm not posting it, and I've deleated my facebook account...giving me a feeling of freedome.