In these past few months of spring, I have been blessed with the opportunity to finally begin to rediscover the art of being communally involved/maturing again. Over the past four years, I have been very active in serving those available to me, but after having my passions/heart crushed last fall, I crawled under a rock, and never wanted to come back out. The months of being uninvolved and self- focused were torture, I found that everything in my life began to suffer... my focus, my studies, my faith, my relationships... all my bitterness toward those who had hurt me, bled into a self-focused, unhappy, unfulfilled, monster! Lol! Sure, that may all sound funny, but there is a truth behind those words. Because I allowed my heart, passions, character, faith, and being to be compromised, because of someone else's selfish choices, I became one of them too. :/
On an especially low day, I read a quote on Facebook that began to trickle light of hope and perspective back into my heart. It said, "When you feel like your life is falling apart, go out and serve someone who's life really is." Suddenly I began to think of Haiti, and all the people I had met there. I saw the children, their horrible everyday reality seeping through the pores of my blind mind... my supposed reality was truly theirs, and yet I was the one hiding?... I was the one pouting??... I was the one believing my life was over? How selfish of me, how cruel!
From that moment on, I began to search for ways that I could re-enter service to my community, but this time, I was going for a different approach. I wanted to serve the hurting, the scared, the lonely, and the lost. I wanted to seek out those who had been forgotten, because I now knew what it felt like to feel like you are facing life's brutality alone. I wanted to find these people, hold them in my arms, and tell them, "You are not alone. You never have been, you never will be, and I want to show you why, because I love you." You see, these broken people were not always broken. For all we know, maybe they too had their own selfish antagonist... maybe they too forgot what it was like to be loved. Through my experience, I truly believe, that no matter how many humans "love" you, you will never have known what love is, until you have met and walked with Christ. His love is so vast, so complex, and so unconditional, that there truly is no earthly word to describe its power, and the way it sweeps over an aching soul, who no longer feels worthy of the air it breathes. Someone beat spiritually, and emotionally, to a pulp.... someone who's face has been rubbed with dirt... someone who knows the full force of hate, and its results... someone treated like a 'something'. There is no feeling like it in the world, but all I can imagine is myself, at the bottom of a giant dirt pit, bleeding and grimy from the scum that has been thrown my way. My shoulders are hunched, I'm on my knees, and my entire body quakes with fear and disgust... Suddenly, a light appears at the opening to my pit. A hand is extended, and a kind voice says to me; "Come and hurt no more, for you are beautifully, and wonderfully made. You are my child, a princess among thieves, and the pain you have endured for my name has not gone forgotten. Come, let me heal your wounds, wash your tears, and make you new. Come, let me love you." No matter my situation, that is the image I see, and I wonder how I could be worthy of a love like that, when I am so filthy, and forgotten. I praise the God who loved me enough to die for me, and who lives on to become my everlasting Father. I am a humbled princess at His feet, after the internship of life has broken me.
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