schooled.

I've been prayed for by email. By telephone. By text. In tongues, and in English. In shouts, and in whispers. Hands on me, hands off of me. In church, in coffee shops, in homes. And now, in parking lots.

The memory is sweet, and I'm smiling because God has been so gracious to me.

After four months of what has been intense trial, I feel fully alive again. I've learned some things along the way.

I can't do faith alone.

As I stood in the parking lot with my friends Steve and Mona, they prayed, and I smiled. Earlier that week, a dear friend of mine (one with whom I'm not always so careful to be dear), took me for chicken noodle soup, and stepped into the situation to help. On Friday, I resumed my volunteering--it has never felt so good to spend a few hours with a group of people before, ever. A few days before, I sought out some wisdom from a couple of Christian woman whom I very much respect. And all of that together brought new life into the despair that I had been feeling. Allowing people that opportunity to pray for me, to know the truth about how dark things had become, changed the situation entirely, and convinced me that I cannot do faith alone. He never intended for me to do so. I'm so grateful for the chance to rebuild the people around me, and to step back into the community of wonderfully faith-filled, and wise believers who minister to me.

There is such a thing as spiritual darkness.

I am generally the first person to turn a funny face to the suggestion of "spiritual warfare" or "evil," but I've learned that those things are real. And they're not generally like the movies. I wonder now if one of the ways that Satan propagates darkness is in letting people think that evil is just all of the spookiness, and gore of big-box horror movies, and television dramas. Because I have no seen any blood in the last four months, but I had been taken into something darker than I've ever known. It wasn't depression. It wasn't like anything I've ever known. But it was dark, and heavy, and poisonous. I let it grow, and it affected everything about me--the way I treat other people, the way I treat myself, the way I understand faith and God. It was real. And in its absence, I sense that reality all the more.

Obedience is everything.

I've never been a fan of the idea of obedience. I was educated to be "free-thinking," and exploratory. My perception of the term "obedience" was framed by psych experiments in which people did terrible things to other people, all in the name of authority. I missed the finer points of what it looks like to be obedient to something benevolent, all-knowing, perfectly wise, entirely sufficient in grace, peace, and compassion--the finer points of surrender to Christ. So my responses to God have often been things like, "Maybe," or "If it seems to work out..." or "When I get things figured out." But I'm learning that faith and obedience are friends. Faith is built when obedience to God displays His power to engage the impossible and the mundane alike. From that faith comes hope. And obedience becomes easier as the cycle turns. But it all comes to a screeching halt when we refuse to step out, to say yes, to be trusted with little that we might be trusted with much.

I'm grateful to be learning. I'm humbled by my complete inability to pull myself out of the dark I've been in. I'm seeing my faith grow as He shows me His mercy. Sleepless nights, and stomach cramps are not the ways I would choose to be refined, but He is faithful, and He is good, and our closeness now makes the whole of it well worth the pain.

I will most likely forget that particular lesson during the next trial, so if you think of it, pray for me via blog comment.