It gets really annoying.
Sometimes I just want to flit and float around and pretend like nothing is wrong with anyone. I just want to feel light and free. However, often times I feel exactly the opposite. But it is who the Lord made me so I continue to embrace it and figure out how to use it and when I can't figure it out I just pray through it all.
This morning I prayed for the Lord to continue to show me how to have a joyful AND grieving heart. Seems impossible to me. It's been hard for me to figure out lately; it's a confusing things longing to be joyful, yet carrying around so much sadness for others.
This afternoon he gave me a little reminder via Ann Voskamp's Advent book, The Greatest Gift.
"In the press of a dark world, laughter comes to the Sarahs (see Genesis 21:1-7) and the sufferers and the stressed as the reliever and then the reminder - that ache is not the last word for those who believe in God. Jesus is. Jesus is the last word, and we rejoice and rejoice again and re-joy again because grace is our oxygen now."
Ache is not the last word for those who believe in God.
Beautiful.
We must remember what our end goal is. Who our end goal is. We must trudge forward and bring the joy of the Lord to all who surround us. Even with a grieving heart we can laugh and share the joy of a Savior that came in the form of a teensie little baby. We need not be fake about our emotional state. We must cry when we want to cry and laugh when we want to laugh, and rejoice in the fact that Jesus is the last word.
Last week I cried almost everyday. We are nearing the end, friends. Only about 5 weeks left until the 1 year anniversary of sweet Richard's death. I am so ready for the one year to be over, but I continue to pray for a joyful, grieving heart.
Sarah said, “God has brought me laughter, and everyone who hears about this will laugh with me.” And she added, “Who would have said to Abraham that Sarah would nurse children? Yet I have borne him a son in his old age.”
-Genesis 21:6-7
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