sometimes, susan

sometimes things are just really awful timing. Just truly wretched. But sometimes, those things are the best things. Like having friends come in town while you have to work. Or like reuniting with someone at the end of a summer. Or having a really fun night the night before someone leaves. It's the bittersweet antithesis of precious moments in light of impending goodbyes. The original "KK" who mentored me in high school loved to say to me, "God is NEVER late. He may come in at 11:59 when the deadline's twelve, but he's never late. His timing is perfect." I have lived in questioning anguish over timing. I've walked that road well, I've worn it down to the point where its just dirt. Why now? Why couldn't it wait? Why isn't the rescue here, now. Sometimes these things aren't the best things. Those things that come out of nowhere, at awful times, and are themselves horrifically awful things. I've encountered a lot of those. But this summer? lots of horrible timing, with wonderful, wonderful things. blessings, I would even say. And it's the precarious balance of those things, these unforeseen, unwarranted blessings. They have me catching my breath, holding back sobs, smiling with JOY. God loves to show us grace in the practical things sometimes. In the day-to-day, mundane, sometimes He likes to surprise us.  So it's in these moments when I thought timing was awful, because it didn't fit my self-centered, ordinary, human schedule...God gave me some pretty cool gifts. Gifts of time with sweet people. gifts of having relationships healed. gifts of small steps of things I have wanted and prayed for. It's like when you go camping (c'mon ya'll...keep up) and it storms all night and you don't sleep alot and you wonder why you even went camping or expected it to be better...and you walk outside in the morning, and it's quiet. The weather is perfect. Nothing is moving. It's that feeling. The intensity of the storm followed by the quiet of the morning after. It's that release. That relief. Hallelujah, ya'll.

Matt Chandler said this on Sunday "How is God sovereign over suffering? By being enough on those dark days." And it seems also by how He surprises us in the midst of those dark days. How faithful. How much grace.

go forth and live, ya'll!
xoxo Lyd