Sweetness of Suffering: My Heart

I have been wanting to write this blog for a while now, I know the words are there, as usual, I am not sure how they will end up looking on this page. I have been feeling a tug lately to share more of my heart. I already do share some pretty deep things that go on in my soul, but there is a little part of my heart that is locked up. When I locked that part of my heart up, I thought I would be able to throw out the key and never look back, and that is just what I did. I know that on my own, I would never again find that part of my soul, as far as I was concerned, that part of me died, and I would be able to live without it. I truly believe that whoever has been deeply wounded, no matter the cause, shares in this experience with me. I will write from my heart as best as I can, I will most likely cry very much as I write this (which is something I very rarely will ever do in front of anyone). This is just me, my heart, and a blank page.

First I need to say this is not easy for me, not even a little bit, my heart aches just thinking about opening it up. Perhaps it is hard for all of us to open up old wounds. I truly and deeply want Jesus to heal me, I am learning that in order to do that I need to reopen the old wounds, wounds that in my mind, I had already healed. I fight between wanting them to be healed, and not wanting to open them up again, I am sure you can relate. I will admit, it is not easy, but it comes down to this; open up and be healed, or keep it locked up and miss out some of the most beautiful parts of life. I honestly feel sometimes like the wounds are so deep that it would just be better to miss out on those things in life. I think God gives us the choice, to be healed, or to not be. Just like he gives us the choice to either love Him, or not love Him. He has granted us with the Gift of Free will.

I am trying to reach deep in my heart as I write, I find a moment when a tear glistens in my eye and I get close to opening up the locked door, but before the tears can fall on my cheeks I again throw the key away. I really and truly want to love, I want to love so deeply and passionately that the world didn't know what hit them. I want to go to those places that people tell me “you can't make a difference” and show the lost a love so deep, so true, so pure that it could only be from the Lord. The only way for me to do this is to let the Lord into my heart, so that he can show me this love, the love that is more incredible that we can possibly imagine. How do I know this exists? Because I have felt moments of it, it is a love so amazing that I can barely handle how joyous it is, I actually close my heart up and hide from it. It is more than I have ever felt and it scares me that kind of love is actually does exist, it doesn't seem real.

Women, do you remember when you were a little girl, did you used to twirl around in your pretty dress or did you dream of it? Did you hope your prince charming would come rescue you? Men, did you desire to be strong, sword and shield, able to face any battle to rescue your princess? So what happens? I don't even want to think about twirling in my little dress (which I certainly did do when I was young), because the world I have known up until how has certainly not shown me that being restful, twirling, and waiting for my prince charming is real.

I can't seem to open up my heart, maybe I'll just start with a name, Jen Simpson ( tears now glisten my cheek at just typing the name). My dear friend, teammate, I have written so much about you, yet no matter how many words I write the loss of your life on this earth has deeply effected my soul for the rest of my existence here. You are a wound that may never completely heal, your beauty that came from deep within your soul still shines in my mind.

I can't write this. I am crying and I do have tears, I was hoping to open up my heart but right now, I just can't, I don't think I'm ready.

I pray that you will be able to open up your wounds one day, let Jesus heal them, and live life to the fullest. I pray this for me also.

I have a feeling this is to be continued...
Amen