Wednesday, February 07, 2007

A New Lease on Life

Yesterday I had reached a low point as far as my motivation for anything. I was tired, there was one particular phone call I couldn't make myself make, and I was even to the point of talking to someone at work about how much personal leave time I had. It wasn't talking to the person I was dreading, but the process of finding the person that I dreaded (OK, I know this is vague, but it's confidential junk).

I gave up and went to lie down for a half hour, after which I had a meeting. And that's where God did a little thing that was a big thing? Guess who I ran into? You guessed it, "Dreaded Phone Call Person." And I talked to the person and it was done. Just like that.

Then last night I read The Unlit Path. Yup, the whole book -- all 260 plus pages of it straight through. It was a story so much harder than ours but with so many similarities that I couldn't put it down. The author did a great job of explaining the emotions that went with each step.

But there was one paragraph in the book that for me pulled everything together. It was at a point where the author was wondering if the ten years she had invested in a couple of her kids had made any difference at all. Her thoughts were a description of a conversation Bart and I have repeatedly had.

For those of you who don't share my faith, I'm sorry, but this was so powerful to me personally, that I need to share it.

In the dream, Jesus was telling her about his crucifixion. He said to her,

"Simon from Cyrene helped me carry this cross. HIs gift was no less valuable because our journey still ended at [the cross] or because he couldn't change what was about to happen. His gift was his gift, and it bore its own purpose. Your gift is only your gift, and even though the outcome is no different, the journey was."


The story was horrible in the sense that it was so unfair what these people had to go through. But the book was so wonderful in that it showed how people can survive and forgive.

I don't want to give it away, but if you aren't going to read it let me know and I will send you a quote that made my cry for a long time.

No comments: