20 January 2011

Running from and falling into - Joy

I spent the first eighty percent of my life wild, blind in the world
driven by passions, confused, misdirected, all self,
all need ever growing, demanding satisfaction
without knowing what would fill that void.
What would bring happiness and what would happiness bring?

As year piled onto year
the highs grew unattractive, always followed by shattering lows.
My heart responded to the beckoning lie of the flatline - "It is safer here."
While I might have hoped for the best I lived in expectation of much less.

When I met the One Who had been waiting, I learned much.
How joy prevails, even in the absence of happiness.
What the mind conceives, however, has a long ongoing journey to reach the heart
and the disapointed parts of me practiced the running from joy
weary of the sadness that might follow.

Yet He holds me still. 
He asks me to surrender, my fear, my brokeness, my bitter forecasts.
As I run from who I thought I was I fall into Who He Is.
What greater love!
What greater joy!



I'm jamming with Bonnie today at Faith Barista


and also joining my broken pieces with others at Emily's In the Hush of the Moon

10 comments:

Helen said...

"How joy prevails, even in the absence of happiness."

I think you just successfully summed up my first Christmas without my mom! :-) Because seriously, now that she is in heaven, I miss her, but I couldn't very well wish anything different for her either!

Brian Miller said...

and he still fills us with that bit of wild...only this time its for him...run on...

Sheryl said...

I, too, love the line Helen singled out. I also loved the idea of living in the world of flatline---and rejecting it.

Thanks for writing this!

Loni said...

This is so precious . . . love how He fills us . . . knows the voids and fills them when we allow him.

Melinda Lancaster said...

"Joy prevailing in the absence of happiness." I like that.

Monica Sharman said...

"and the disapointed parts of me practiced the running from joy
weary of the sadness that might follow."

I think I've operated like that, too.

Bonnie Gray said...

I loved how this is the pendulum between our humanity & our spirituality. This is real and there is joy knowing we can end up in this place of joy that He brings us to, eventho I'd love to get there myself! :) LOL. Thank you so much!

Carrie Van Horn said...

"As I run from who I thought I was I fall into who He is"....i love this! :-)

Mommy Emily said...

As I run from who I thought I was I fall into Who He Is.

i know carrie already highlighted this line, but i can't help but say how much i am going to cling to this... a beautiful, beautiful piece, friend... such a testimony to his grace. thank you for linking. xo

Sandra Heska King said...

So many quotables. But yes, this grabbed me:

As I run from who I thought I was I fall into Who He Is.