*video description: me singing to "I Don't Deserve Your Love for Me" by Ben Laine in the bathroom, showing off the new hoodie I bought from his small business, the Mindful Creative*
I have never met a single person who hasn't experienced low lows and high highs in their walk with Jesus. As his created beings living in a fallen world, we don't have consistency as he does. However, in my opinion, this only can serve as a catalyst in the process of stretching our faith and trust in him.
Last year was a low low for me. Standing here, I see his handprints everywhere, and I can point at specific moments where I was keenly aware of His goodness and faithfulness. But last year, when I was in the middle of it all, I would have had a really difficult time genuinely believing that there was good and that he was there.
There were days where it was just "too hard". Ask my parents. There was this one night I called them at 2:30 AM (US time) bawling my eyes out, begging them to come and take me home. I think even asked my dad if my thoughts about dropping out were valid. It was a lot. Changes in my lifestyle that I wasn't prepared for or used to.
One of the things I remember most from last year and that crazy rollercoaster of emotions was that I had this desire to pursue Jesus and yet somehow thought I could do so while outrunning his love.
If you read that you would pick up on just how contradictory my thought process was.
In almost everything I did, I tried to pursue him while also evading the love he so freely kept extending to me.
Why?
Why was I running?
The only possible explanations I could possibly drum up now are that I thought that not allowing his love in was a way to get back at him for things I was still mad at him for. Things like premature evacuation from home, losing Daniel, leaving my parents to pursue higher education, transition and culture shock, and even my diagnosis with Type 1 (as I was beginning to become keenly aware of how terribly structured the average college experience is for someone with no pancreas).
Fast forward to a few Sundays ago, I was attending Catacombs outside by the Bell and we began to sing a song I hadn't heard of before.
"I'm running to the secret place,
where you are, where you are,
I sing to you of all the ways
you stole my heart, you stole my heart,
better is a moment that I spend with you,
than a million other days away,
I'm running, I'm running,
I'm running to the secret place"
- The Secret Place by Phil Wickham and Madison Cuningham
That was when that freight train hit me.
The pieces fit together and I consciously decided that I needed to let that love in for once. And it was incredible.
Guys, the "Let Love Sink In" series on my Instagram was written just as much for me as it was for you. Jesus' love is incredible, and even though we don't deserve it he freely gives it to us.
After being lost in a love like that, there is no need to run away from it.
If you are running away from his love and you don't really know why, or you're too afraid to come back, find people in your life who can support you as you run back to him.
He never left you once, and he never stopped pouring out his love on you.
You can never outrun his love for you.
<3
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