Ask for it

How are you? Really? I care. Honest, I do.

I know life is hard.

Somedays you wake up and you wonder if it’s worth getting out of bed. Somedays you wonder if you can.

Can you put one foot in front of the other? Just get through the day?

Can you find a bandage big enough to hide that wound? Can you keep from picking at it? Just picking at the edges or even digging in and making yourself feel worse? Why can’t you leave it alone long enough for it to heal?

Worse yet, is someone else picking at it? Keeping it raw and open?

Can you find sunglasses big enough to hide your puffy eyes?

Can you believe, just hang on and believe that if you get through today tomorrow might be better? And if not, at least you will get to sleep and forget it about it, at least till tomorrow morning, when you wonder if it's worth getting out of bed...

Do you have moments where you realize life feels normal again? And that feeling alone is a trigger, reminding you that you aren't normal and why, and then you are back into your wounded spirit again, after a brief time of normalcy?

Do you fall apart at the simplest acts of kindness? Simply being woke up by a kiss on the cheek or getting an email from a long distance friend who says they'd love to sit down for coffee and chat face to face? These simple, normal everyday events move you to tears?

And then.

You realize you have crossed through the valley and you are on the other side. There are no bruises or open wounds. There are scars, raised and purple from the deep wounds. There are scars, thin and white from the surface wounds. And there are the internal scars, internal wounds, that are being held together with stitches, lovingly sewn by Jesus. Not dissolvable stitches, because you are going to need them for the rest of your life to hold those wounds closed.

And.

You know that you are stronger because he has healed you.

Because by HIS wounds we are healed. Because our sin was put on him, he was pierced, crushed, punished so we could be healed. You are stronger because Jesus healed from a place of pain. From deep wounds inflicted by our sins. He gets it. He's been there. Isaiah 53:5

You are healed by a love that has no boundaries. A love so wide and long and high and deep that it went to the cross for you. A love that goes beyond knowledge. A love that fills us, a love that can do more than we can ask or imagine. A love that is powerful and is at work in us. Ephesians 3:17-20

So go ahead. Ask for healing. Ask for normal.

And.

Imagine. The. Impossible.

And.

Ask for it.