I love it here. I love everything about being here. I love our house, the kid's school, the church we've been going to, the community, the fact that people on the highway actually move over for you when you're trying to merge. :-) I love it here, but some days I feel very alone. I've cried on 3 out of a total of 8 Sundays that we've been here because those are the days that seem to remind me the most that this doesn't always feel like "home" yet. I long for the beginning of just one dear friendship with a woman here, and sometimes let my fear that there won't be one person who needs or desires a friendship as much as I do get the best of me. I rationally know that this kind of friendship takes time, and it took time before, but I also know the blessing of true, deep friendship with other women and it makes me miss it all the more not having it here yet. Maybe, if I'm honest, it's not the "beginning" of that friendship that I long for...because in truth, maybe the beginnng of the friendship I'm speaking of has already, well, begun. :-) If I'm really honest, what I long for is that already established friendship. The one where your past is known and accepted, your dreams for the future are shared and supported. After being in one place for a number of years it's almost overwhelming to think of where to begin in friendships. I'm so used to being around people who know everything about me and there's no need for explaining when you're known so well, you're just understood. My impatience in this area definitely tells me I was maybe too comfortable where I was...too comfortable to notice someone who might be in the place where I am today...
Unfortunately, it is many times my husband who bears the brunt of this fear of loneliness. I look to him to know me perfectly because I feel so "unknown" everywhere else. There are days when I overlook the blessing of getting to live with my best friend everyday and expect him instead to fill the role that only God was meant to fill. Only God can ever know me so perfectly inside and out that He can know my every need, hurt and desire intimately and completely before I've even formed a concise thought about it. There is a blessing though, even in this loneliness. I definitely feel myself more drawn to Christ and His word as a way to be reminded that He does know me perfectly and intimately. It was easy in the midst of great friends and community to not depend on Christ as much and to grow lazy in my own getting to know Him as He knows me. Maybe he wants to use this time to remind me how well He knows me and that it can be enough in this season...
The position I find myself in these days is one of great vulnerability and it's not always a very "safe" feeling kind of place. I definitely desire to continue to put myself out there and feel like I might as well put "all of me" out there because how else will I ever be known? And when I am known, I want it to be the real me, not a cleaned up, "in-public" version...but it definitely leaves me then to wonder, uh-oh...that was the real me I just put out there, what if they don't like me? Maybe I've felt this way before and it's just been so long since I've been the new person that I've forgotten what's completely normal. It's a deep longing that I have that wonders when and if we'll ever make it past the feeling "welcome" stage to feeling like we belong...
It's interesting contrasting the "high" of planning for a transition for so long and being so sure and excited about it with the "low" of the natural time it takes to really feel at home somewhere. It's with this thought that I am reminded how before the move God gave us such a peace about it that it seemed the usual stresses and sadness of a move were muted in a way, because it was easy to trust where He was leading. That same peace on this side of the move is available to me when I stop stressing over the timing and details of everything and just live each day as He gives it, taking each opportunity as He gives it...
I will FOREVER be mindful of how grateful I am for God's timing in all of this...when I think of how long ago God planted the desire in Matt's heart for the move here and how opposed I was to it for so many years, I am so thankful that I can honestly love everything about being HERE, now. Even amidst the loneliness that sometimes sneaks in around me when I am focused on the ways God blessed me in friendship in the past, I can't even imagine what it would feel like to be despairing about one's geographical location while also feeling alone. I am reminded anew of how God cares for me and knows me perfectly, the God of the universe has inscribed me on the palms of His hands! (Isaiah 49:16) How could I for too long wallow in the despair of being unknown when I belong to Him? He is a faithful and true friend and has Himself longed for me to recognize Him as such. "Greater love has no one than this, that one lay down his life for his friends." (John 15:13)
"Therefore the Lord longs to be gracious to you, And therefore He waits on high to have compassion on you. For the Lord is a God of justice; how blessed are all those who long for Him." (Isaiah 30:18)
...May my longing be to first seek the One who longs for me...
(This picture was taken 1 year ago...we had stopped in Lynchburg on our way back from vacationing in Tennessee and hiked up to the LU monogram to watch the sunset. While up there we looked down on Lynchburg and tried to imagine what it would be like if we lived here...who could have imagined it would only be one year later when we would call this place home? Be careful what you imagine...:-))
Johanna - Thanks so much for sharing your heart. What you have written echoes strongly in my heart. I am still working at these areas too. I know God will reward your seeking heart and praying that He will continue to supply all you need and the friends to come alongside. ~ Victoria
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