Reflection #1

I've always shied away from new year's resolutions, especially those that require me to commit to do something every day for a year. I know myself well enough to know that I can't or won't do it every day, and knowing that it will be imperfect before I start is enough to keep me from starting. But, I'm tired of missing out on the experiences that could be had if I overcame the desire for that elusive (and impossibly) perfection and just reveled in the process. That's what life is, after all. A process. It doesn't end until it ends, and I can't just check out when its looks a little messy (or a lot messy).

So, before I get lost in too many metaphors here, let me say that my goal this year is, indeed, to write a blog post a day. I've been realizing that I really do need an outlet - a place to reflect, a place to share - and perhaps this will work. My intention is not to copy anyone, although I'm sure there are plenty of people out there who are planning to write daily updates as well. I just want to spend a little time every day reflecting on how I spent the hours I was given, who I connected with, who connected with me, what I enjoyed, what I accomplished -- but most importantly, how all of the tiny details of my daily life are held together and being transformed into future glory by the grace of God.

This past year has been a year of trial. I have faced challenges of an intensity I have never experienced before: building a life from scratch in a foreign country, losing my grandmother while abroad and watching her funeral via Skype, feeling physically ill more often than feeling physically healthy for the first time in my life, watching most of my social networks disintegrate or evolve into something I didn't recognize, experiencing a relapse of OCD combined with culture shock and post-trip depression, coming home to feel emotionally assaulted and betrayed in multiple relationships, and enduring a semester of mental and emotional instability. I had felt like the puzzle pieces in my life were starting to take shape, little by little, when I left. But when I returned to the States, I felt like I was looking at a totally different puzzle, and I was the puzzle piece that didn’t fit. I have never felt that way on so many different levels: spiritually, emotionally, relationally, physically.

I’m not ashamed to admit that it’s taken a whole semester of prayerful trial and error and Christian psychiatry to bring me to a better frame of mind. My physical and mental chemistry are challenging to live with, but I’m learning. And I think I’m finally coming to a more stable place, where I can be “okay” with learning. And from this more stable place, I am learning to see this past year through the lens of Scripture, namely 1 Peter 1:3-9, Romans 5:1-5, and Hebrews 5:8.

1 Peter 1
3 Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! In his great mercy he has given us new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, 4 and into an inheritance that can never perish, spoil or fade. This inheritance is kept in heaven for you, 5 who through faith are shielded by God’s power until the coming of the salvation that is ready to be revealed in the last time. 6 In all this you greatly rejoice, though now for a little while you may have had to suffer grief in all kinds of trials. 7 These have come so that the proven genuineness of your faith—of greater worth than gold, which perishes even though refined by fire—may result in praise, glory and honor when Jesus Christ is revealed. 8 Though you have not seen him, you love him; and even though you do not see him now, you believe in him and are filled with an inexpressible and glorious joy, 9 for you are receiving the end result of your faith, the salvation of your souls.

Romans 5
1 Therefore, since we have been justified through faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, 2 through whom we have gained access by faith into this grace in which we now stand. And we boast in the hope of the glory of God. 3 Not only so, but we also glory in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; 4 perseverance, character; and character, hope. 5 And hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured out into our hearts through the Holy Spirit, who has been given to us.

Hebrews 5
8 Son though He was, He learned obedience from what He suffered...

The trials I have experienced have not been “bad luck,” nor have they necessarily been punishment for something I did. These trials have been a refining fire used to purify me and to strengthen my faith, to produce perseverance and Christ-like character, just as fire is used to burn away the dross and produce pure gold. It’s a seemingly perfect comparison, except that God says my faith and my character are *more* valuable than gold. He places such high value on my character and faith that He would allow trials, and pain, and suffering to purify it. Even Jesus was not exempt from suffering; rather, he embraced it and He learned obedience from it. When He became subject to the intense refining fire of suffering, what came out of His heart? “Into Your hands I commit my Spirit.” “Not my will but Yours be done.” “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.” “It is finished.” Holiness. That’s what came from his heart in the heat of the moment. What came from mine when the fires of unfairness, of pain, of grief and loneliness raged? Tears. Questions. Like Jesus, cries of "Why have you forsaken me?" It felt like He had, although I knew He'd promised He wouldn't. It wasn't until a few weeks ago that I realized why God forsook Jesus on the cross. It was so that He would never have to forsake ME. When the dross of pride, gossip, deceitfulness, discontent, lust, unforgiveness, and selfishness rose to the surface of my heart during the trials of this past year, He didn't have to turn away. He lovingly burned them away in holy fire -- because He is re-making my character to be like Christ’s. Praise be to my God and Father and to my Lord Jesus Christ for this unspeakable mercy.

I sense in my spirit that trials and persecutions more difficult than this are coming. But I thank God that I can cling to the “living hope” of His inheritance, of future glory. We all can. His promises never fade, even in the darkest of nights -- or even in the darkest of years. We truly can live with "inexpressible and glorious joy" as we are being refined and made ready for the day when Jesus Christ is revealed!