This morning I walked out onto the back porch & faced the sun beams streaming through the trees. I quieted my heart, asking God what the day might hold. I breathed in the summer air, not yet touched by the humidity promised in the lingering haze. I stretched & smiled because I know each morning, each day is another chance.
I had been brooding over my future, pondering my past & considering my purpose as I often do. I closed my eyes to pray & asked the Holy Spirit to wrap around me like the gentle wind.
Suddenly, I heard a tapping behind me at the slider door. It was my 14-month old baby boy smiling at me with his new teeth & knocking on the glass with a drool soaked toy. My peace & solitude was broken but it was okay. I smiled and simpered “Hey sweet boy!” before crouching down to press my forehead to the slider door. My heart jolted back in time, reminding me of a photo that I took with my oldest daughter.
We were on the opposite end of the house, pressing hands & kisses on the front door’s glass. She was just a little older than my boy is now. A happy, chubby-cheeked baby girl with big blue eyes like his. But that photo was taken at the lowest point in my entire life. I can barely stand to look at it because the pain in my eyes is excruciatingly captured. It churns my stomach think of that time in my life when my world had been shaken. My heart was broken, my faith was dead, my family had crumbled. The pain was raw & daily life was a struggle. Hopeless, scared, sad & alone.
But this morning, over a decade later, I stood on the other side. Not just the other end of my home but on the other side of this whole mess. Married, stable, happy, rooted in faith, aware of the ways I am radically loved. Dreams coming true that I couldn’t have imagined when I was just trying to survive. What a true 180°.
What a true transformation that only God could orchestrate. What a beautiful mosaic he has made out of this shattered life. Thanks to God alone I can say I made it through & now all I want is for my shards to reflect his glory, to help his light reach a world in need & to live my life in praise of Love itself.
💓Cait