Hmmm. It's kind of hard to know where to begin! I want to write, for Kaela and Ben, what God's doing right now. At the same time, I'm struggling. It's hard to be upbeat all the time, even though I know my joy doesn't come from my circumstances. Hmm. I guess I'll just tell it.

In the past few weeks, I've had my world rocked. The kind of rocked where you feel it happening, and you know in the seemingly slow-motioned unfurling of events that THIS is going to be one of those defining times. It's the time when things changed. Before the world was rocked, then after the world was rocked. In my own life, I've had several. When my dad died suddenly and left my mom with 5 babies. When my sister nearly died in college. When the neurologist told us that Neeny's EEG was flat. The summer my brothers moved away. When my parents nearly divorced.

There's this awful, "been spun around 50 times while blindfolded in the pitch black then dropped into the middle of a desert in the middle of the winter at night" kind of lost feeling that ensues. Reaching blindly, trying to get a foothold somewhere. Anywhere. So, so many times, my grandmother was the one who offered the rope. She's gone now. She did a good job, though, because she taught me where to go looking for the rope on my own. I've learned through those prior storms, and I know this time that I'm not really lost. Just in a holding pattern for awhile until God reveals the next step.

I learned to trust Him years ago. I learned that the sun still comes up in the morning, even on the days when I think it shouldn't. The other day while we were on the beaches of a nature preserve in Georgia, I was reminded through the continuity and relentlessness of the crashing waves that He doesn't forget. He's in charge, constantly, always and ever, using the circumstances to form and shape and fulfill His purpose.
I'm even past the point where I need to SEE His purpose. I don't. I know that God is not only Sovereign--but He is also good. Always good. I don't need to know WHY the bad things happen. I know why these things have happened. Sin. Sin that people thought they could keep secret and it wouldn't hurt anyone. They were just plain deceived, and everyone's hurt after all. Boo.

It's just figuring out, now, how to be obedient when I'm angry. I don't feel like being obedient. I feel like throwing a fit. I don't know how to love someone in a way that will help restore, help point him to the Light--when he doesn't want to be restored or brought into the light. Daggonit.
I forget how mired I was myself at one time. Not wanting to be restored. Not wanting to be brought into the light.

So, Kaela and Ben, that's where I am in this mess. Hurt, but not despairing. Angry, but with my feet planted. Waiting....
And always, always, always praying for the mercy that none of us deserves, but that all of us need. I love him in spite of the world. God loves him. He isn't surprised by any of this or unequipped to deal with even the worst of this. He's already overcome it. We are just waiting for him to provide enough light to see the next step, and praying for the faith to take it.