Happy New Year
I got up early and watched the sunrise this morning. I haven't done that in such a long time. I've seen the dawn many times this last year, but it was always at the end of a night of no sleep and never at the beginning of my day. It was special in that sense.
We have a tall water tank tower in our back yard. I climbed up there and hugged my knees to my chest. The surnise was kind of melodramatic--it never is really spectacular in summer, but there was this soft breeze. It brushed across my cheeks and around my neck and carried with it the innocent smell of morning.
I thought about the candle and as I did I remembered this one thing I read once. A lady who had recently found out she had a chronic illness wrote about how she had at first really struggled with not being able to do what she had managed quite easily to do before she got sick. She shared how, in the process of accepting her limitations, she would get out a candle and light it.
She said she'd think of one thing she wished she could still do, tell herself she was thankful for the time she was able to do it, and then reaching forward, she said she'd blow out the candle. She said it was the one thing that really liberated her. She was admitting her limitations and in blowing out the candle she was saying goodbye to the hold they might still hold on her.
I realize that in blowing out my candle I'm in an essence having to say goodbye, too. I'm having to say goodbye to the rage and fear and hurts. I'm having to say they are over and not going to come back--I'm having to say, "Here Abba, they're yours."
There's another Rich Mullins song I've thought a lot about lately. One line from the song goes, "I can't see how You're leading me unless You've led me here to where I'm lost enough to let myself be led." I realize now that's where I came to last year. I had to be screaming, lost in the dark completly before I could give up all that I thought I had a right to. To surrender I had to say goodbye to all that was and, in turning my back on them, raise my eyes to rest only on my Saviour.
I prayed for a long while sitting up there on the water tank stand. I revisited with God all that has happened in the last year. I went over the tears, the anger, and the fear. I felt the soft, warm kiss of the sun on my face as I thanked Him for never giving up on me. I gave him last year; I gave him this year.
Then, taking a deep breath of the fresh smell of morning--I blew out the candle.
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