Beauty for Ashes

The year I turned thirty was the single most difficult season of my life this side of heaven.  Drama and details aside, it was a time of utter dependence on God.  A God I had previously set on a shelf and didn’t even want to take down and dust off in the moment of desperation. 

I thought that I knew about dependence on him.  I travelled the globe as a single female.  I trusted him with my suitcases and passport, but I never really had to put my life in his hands.  And, to be completely frank, I wasn’t sure he’d come through.  I wasn’t even sure he was who he said he was.

I was in a place of mistrusting God.  I was out of questions.  I was full of fear and doubt. Like a rebel without a cause (literally), I turned my back on him and mustered up what I had in me to carry me through a firey seemingly barren wasteland. 

And I had resources to draw from.  Good supports.  Inner strength.  Health.  And a beautiful baby girl who alone gave me most of what I needed to carry through.  With chin up. Smiles on.

But, it wasn’t enough.  Me and my resources. 

I stopped praying.  Because, I no longer knew what to pray.

I stopped praising.  Because, I wasn’t sure there was someone to praise.

I stopped trusting.  Because, I felt very badly burned by life and the maker of it.

And what I did in response to my wasteland, was simply to freeze.

I didn’t run. 

I didn’t rebel.

I didn’t rage.

I simply froze.  Deer in headlights.  Overwhelmed and caught off guard by the oncoming high-way lights.

And then something hit me.  Dead on.  Hard.  I was thrown off the proverbial centre. Nursing my wounds on the side of the highway.  Bleeding. Alone. In my ashes.  Not asking or trying to hitch a ride.

It didn’t take long for the car behind to stop.  The click of the door shutting gently.  The soft footsteps on the gravel.  He knelt down.  Softly speaking.  Tending to my open sores.  “Can you get up?” And I couldn’t.  At least not alone.  So I leaned in, arms around his shoulder.  Him carrying my weight.  I felt relief. I suddenly recognized him, this man from before.  Thoughts of, there’s no place like home streamed through my head.

With days that past, as he reintroduced himself to me, I began trusting a little bit more.  Talking.  Praying.  Praising.

Years later, I open his word, and like a love letter from a friend, I read:

“…he will give beauty for ashes, joy instead of mourning, praise instead of despair.  For the Lord has planted them like strong and graceful oaks for his own glory.”~Isaiah 61:3

He rescued me that day and everyday.  He will rescue you too.  He can handle your questions.  Your seasons of doubt.  Your load.  Even when you can’t think he can, or can’t trust him with the task.  He loves you beyond measure.

“The Lord is close to the brokenhearted; he rescues those who are crushed in spirit.” ~Psalm 34:18

{Picture by Charlie Mackesy}