Tonight...

A dear family friend is in the intensive care unit at a hospital in Raleigh as I type this. She suffered a ruptured brain aneurysm and the doctors are still in the testing phase of figuring out what is wrong.

Sometimes, I have this feeling as though the bottom is going to drop out of my life. Sometimes, I feel as though I am too blessed and surely some tragedies will strike to balance out the blessings. Sometimes, I feel as though God is going to realize how much He has given me and decide He needs to take some away to make it even for all the other mortals. I recognize these thoughts as irrational. We don't serve a God like that. We serve a God who desires to bless our lives, but I can't help but think that maybe I got too much of a serving in the blessings line.

Then, something like this can happen... a dear loved ones life can hang on by a thread of the Master Sewer and it can easily begin to feel as though the strike of difficulties and challenges is on its way. But, the truth is God doesn't work like that either. He does, however, have our final day on this Earth set before we even arrive. This frightens me to the core because I fear all the things I will miss here on this Earth. I know, bad Christian, I shouldn't admit that. But, God placed these amazing people in my life and I do fear the day I can no longer be alive on Earth with them. I know though, that He has something even more incredible awaiting me, but I can't seem to shake this selfish human desire to stay here with my loved ones sometimes.

The truth is the bottom of our lives is going to fall out. Many times. Repeatedly. It is going to hurt. It is going to feel as though we cannot venture on. It is going to make us writhe and cry out unto God. And then, inexplicably, we can feel His peace poured onto us like a dying, parched plant feeling the coolness of the storm and the quenching rains running through its roots. This life is meant to be a mix of blessings and hardships. One showing us there is a God and the other showing us there is a need for a God. There is something to be gained from both.

My prayer tonight...
"Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our troubles, so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves have received from God. For just as the sufferings of Christ flow over into our lives, so also through Christ our comfort overflows. If we are distressed, it is for your comfort and salvation; if we are comforted, it is for your comfort, which produces in you patient endurance of the same sufferings we suffer. And our hope for you is firm, because we know that just as you share in our sufferings, so also you share in our comfort." 2 Corinthians 1:3-7

-C.