2015 In the Rearview

"When you pass through the waters, I will be with you;

and through the rivers, they shall not overwhelm you;

when you walk through fire you shall not be burned,

and the flame shall not consume you." Isaiah 43:2

Just over a year ago, I believed I knew exactly where God was taking my family.  Loren was in his eleventh year of vocational ministry with just over a year left until he had his Master's in Biblical Theology.  It was a life that was not always easy, sometimes overwhelming, filled with joy and laughter, people I dearly loved, tears, heartache, and ultimately, thanksgiving.  I loved my life.  And it was beautiful.

Then, my life changed.  The change was nothing as dramatic as a middle-of-the-night phone call or the police knocking on my door.  It quietly came in the form of my husband walking through the door of my workplace, a short nod that our doubts had been confirmed, and a hug that stretched into eternity.  With that, I walked into everything I feared.

This year has been God answering the questions that keep you awake at night, the questions that your subconscious has a way of entertaining even as you fight against the idea that they could ever become reality.  How would our family cope with the loss of the ministry we loved?  How would we tell our children that their father would no longer be working at the church we'd been a part of for eight years, that he would no longer be youth pastor to two of them?  What would it look like to say goodbye to all of the people we loved so deeply, who loved us so selflessly for nearly a decade?  What if I were to be thrust into the role of primary provider for our family?  How would our children cope with a radical shift in the very rhythm of our family, with their mom working full time and their dad working evenings and weekends, largely absent from the devotions and weekend activities that used to make up the pulse of our time together?  In the face of loss upon loss upon loss, would any one of us come out with our faith intact?

This year, this gut wrenching, terrifying, agonizing year, has been the Lord answering each of those questions, though not necessarily in our timing or how we would have scripted our story.  It was a God providing full-time employment for me and providing a job for Loren after so many years out of the secular workforce.  It was a year of quiet tears and long hugs when a too-familiar worship song overwhelmed one of us with memories.  It was a year of pouring the grief and doubt into pages of journals and late night conversations instead of public blog posts.  It was a year of staring at boxes piled in our dining room until, one evening as a family, we breathlessly opened them and unpacked Loren's office onto bookshelves in our home, smiling through tears at dusty mementos of a life past.  It was getting out of bed for 365 days, and whispering through our disbelief, "I trust you, Lord."

I trust you.

I trust you.

I trust you.

And at the end of the year, we are breathing.  Each of us is still healing, in our own ways, at our own pace.  We still cry at familiar worship songs that bring those that we said goodbye to close enough to touch.  I can't say the future is any more clear than it was a year ago.  Most days still find me grieving my old life.  

And yet, it also has me slowly growing to accept this life.  It is a life that is not always easy, sometimes overwhelming, filled with joy and laughter, people I dearly love, tears, heartache, and ultimately, thanksgiving.  I love my life.  And it is beautiful.