and my heart turns violently inside of my chest

"Give me your forever, please your forever. Not a day less will do, from you."

~"Forever" by Ben Harper

I have been thinking a lot about the past. My brain often moves more quickly than I can efficiently process, but it seems lately it has been going double time. Memories that I have thought of every day since their occurrence as well as ones I did not realize existed have been finding life outside of my subconscious. There have been some joyous, others awkward, and still others sad.

Two nights ago as I was driving I grew tired of flipping through radio stations and decided to see what was in the CD player. A familiar song began to wash over me and I stepped back in time to a moment I felt most loved...

I was sitting in my apartment probably staring aimlessly at my computer screen trying to stifle the war that had been raging within me for what felt like ages, but may have only been weeks. I had just told the man who would someday become my husband that I couldn't be with him anymore. My heart ached but I bit past the pain because I knew that I may never heal fully, that I could never be "sane", that I could never be worth giving someone my forever. Not only that, I stopped believing that love was something that lasts and that people were something I had the strength to invest in.

I think it is one of life's most viciously formative milestones when a child (even if they are no longer a child) realizes their parents are imperfect. It's as if their world crashes. And just before that moment, mine had.

My cell phone began to ring and I hesitantly picked it up. With few words I was asked to pull up a myspace page and listen to one of the songs. I did as my future husband asked and sat quietly listening.

"...I'll be waiting here for you, so come out and take my hand. Come out, I'll help you understand. I know it hurts, I know you cry, well you cry, you cry. Just come out and take my hand..."

I set down the phone and stepped outside to fall into the arms that were waiting patiently outside my door to catch me. These arms that would later be there to catch me over and over again. The arms that would link in mine as we ran up the isle, that would hug me and say "I love you" in the midst of a nasty argument, the arms that will one day toss my giggling children in the air, and that I will hold as we wobble our slowly failing bodies through Wal-Mart.

I didn't have to hear the whole song to know. Nor did I look out the window before running out to meet him. I had no doubt that he would be there: waiting. loving.

I realize that many of my posts have been based around pain, around the dirt of life, and around the brokenness that humanity wrestles with. Part of me feels like I should apologize, like maybe I should write something full of humor to offset the gloominess. And there will be days when God inspires that. But in my life I have learned that it is in the ashes that God's beauty stands out in stark brilliance. So I will boast in my weakness and in my suffering because I have known God's heart most deeply in these moments.

It is unfortunate that people fail us. That childhood innocence is so quickly lost, and often repeatedly. But in this, I stand and rejoice, for without the Grace of God where would we be? Whoa! How He loves us!

My husband is truly an amazing man of God. He has loved me in a way that has given me a glimpse of how Jesus must love his people. Mercifully, and without merit.

But no one can love like our Father. David Crowder recently released a song that puts this thought into words better than I will ever be gifted to. I encourage you to read them, to listen to them and soak in their truth. To see that you are loved and the places where God has reminded you of that in your brokenness...

and then, to believe Him when He says He is good.

He is jealous for me,
Loves like a hurricane, I am a tree,
Bending beneath the weight of his wind and mercy.
When all of a sudden,
I am unaware of these afflictions eclipsed by glory,
And I realize just how beautiful You are,
And how great Your affections are for me.

And oh, how He loves us so,
Oh how He loves us,
How He loves us all

We are His portion and He is our prize,
Drawn to redemption by the grace in His eyes,
If His grace is an ocean, we’re all sinking.
So Heaven meets earth like an unforeseen kiss,
And my heart turns violently inside of my chest,
I don’t have time to maintain these regrets,
When I think about, the way…

He loves us,
Oh how He loves us,
Oh how He loves us,
Oh how He loves.
Yeah, He loves us,
Oh how He loves us,
Oh how He loves us,
Oh how He loves.

"How He loves" by David Crowder

http://www.myspace.com/davidcrowderband