Me Again.

I woke up this morning and the first thing I did was thank God for one more day.  Three days ago, I was turning out the light asking Him why He wants me to keep going, when I fall so often.   Today, I am thankful.  I am hopeful.

I texted my best friend today saying, Thank you so much for never giving up on me.  I feel so much better.  I pull a Psalm 88 and God still saves me.  My heart has been smashed into so many pieces and I didn't think I'd ever work right again.  I feel like me again, before he left, before she died.

I flash back to my last winter in Minnesota, 3 years ago.  I'm sitting in the TreeHouse van with Marie, clearly upset.  It's a week before Christmas, and holidays have always been tough on me.  One of the things we did as we would pick kids up is play BarlowGirl and talk about life.  I told her I felt like Humpty Dumpty.  I'd been getting better, but then something would knock me down.  Marie didn't say a word, and put on the song Porcelain Heart.

As I sat there, I felt the tears stream down my face.  I had felt exactly like that!  I remember June of 2010 having to hand my heart back to God, smashed in pieces.   I spent the next six or seven months withdrawn, hurting, bleeding, angry, asking God why my heart has to break so much.  It was in those first few months though, that I became so close to God.  I was baptized, and I would spend hours in my Bible.  

I flash forward to this June, holding my Grandma as she passed away.  I see myself laying in the hotel bed that night, tossing and turning, wondering why He had to take someone I loved so much?  Why did He have to break me again, when I was just starting to do so well.  I see myself turning on my iPod and Never Let Go starts playing.   "Oh Lord, You never let go, through the calm and through the storm.  Lord You never let go of me....  There is a light that is coming for the heart that holds on..."

About a month ago, I found out my ex cheated on me more than 5 times.   I went running away from God.   I stopped going to church.  I stopped reading as much.  I was too angry.  And I felt like I had been back to almost 2 summers ago.  Hurting and pissed and upset and broken.

Three days ago, I asked God why.  Three days later, I feel like I'm having my new start.  I feel like I'm me again.  The one before he left and before she died and everything it seems went so wrong.  I feel like I honestly want to live.  I want to go to classes and learn and work my butt off at my minimum wage paying job, because God has placed me here for a reason!  I feel purpose and life flowing in my dry bones.  He's taking my dry bones and breathing life into them!  I'm not a desert anymore.  I don't want to hide and not let people in.

I want to live.

I just realized something.   I have never felt this good, ever.  Even my last year of high school, which was, without a doubt, one of the best I have had, I still had a huge relapse and overdosed and was sent to the hospital for 3 days.  This isn't me going back, this is me moving forward!   I'm new.  I'm healing.  I'm living.  I want to live, oh God, I want to live!  And if living is messy, and if living means having You break my heart a time or two, then break it.  Break my heart for what breaks Yours.  I love you so much, Lord.