i will live today

Ken arrived this morning as I was showering. He said he would wait, and when I came out fifteen minutes later, we went to church. That was the start. I cannot think of a better one to anyone’s day.

I rode my thoughts as he drove. I thought about the week and all the things lost and this very, even if the most fragile, thing gained. As I type, there are two things taped to my monitor. One tells me not to “curl up with my fear.” Another says that “I will live today.” There is a third at the top of the bathroom mirror: “I am beautiful.” This is not to elevate myself to the pomposity of narcissism, but a devaluation of the fear that would rather assume my identity. As he drove us to church, I wondered how this story I was living might continue. No answers came while enroute to church. It was there I found them, there in church, as ever so is the case.

As soon as I could, before most others arrived, I was on the pew at the front, eyes closed, hands folded. God answers what is not asked. He needs no prompts. But here I was, in genuine silence with him. What was it I would ask? Could ask? Or should? Kate came hurriedly to mind. I hugged that thought. Yes, Kate would be my grace. But if it was her I asked for, then what would that mean for me? No, I should not ask for Kate, because she would not be the holistic wellness that every fiber of my ill soul needs. I would ask for something more lasting. I would ask for … courage. Courage would enable me to anything, any task. If I had courage, then I could … courage to what? I should ask God for courage. The heart is so deep and so uncertain. It needs a light to maintain a balance with the dark. Courage perhaps. But courage would only show me how truly deep this dark heart goes. I would stand and fight but would only be fighting that engulfing dark and might grow strained of it eventually. I would not be unlike the cowardly lion, who, while fighting the shadows, is delaying that moment when he must stand up to an enemy far more consuming. So I would ask God for wisdom, or strength to endure the fight, or temperance. I could ask God for any of these, and he may grant them; but would my soul participate?

What I would ask God for, in this moment of silence with Him, would be His grace to relieve me of my many fears. Grace would be the currency to purchase any of those other things I could have asked for. Because God’s grace endures; its limits are God’s limits, which are endless. In this moment, I asked God to be there and to love me and to always love me. But it is a fascinating request when considering that had I never asked, God would never have failed me in it anyway. I asked, I think, because God wanted me to ask.

And I am a wonderful human being because I can continue. Because I am loved by God and therefore have the courage to love myself. Because I am produced out of God’s care and therefore have the wisdom to discover all the beauty God has planted in this world and in myself. Because I am small and fatigable and God rises to the occasion within me and therefore have strength to overwhelm the fear. Because God endures and therefore I have all the temperance I need to keep me from a consuming dark.

There is an old saying that God hands us no more than we are capable of dealing with. In that moment this theory is most tested, the burden seems significantly overwhelming and our bodies and minds seem to be perishing from the effort. God gives us his grace, and therefore we are capable of what we never guessed we could be.

I will live today and I will not curl up with my fear.

And, because God is, I am beautiful.

John.