April 3, 2012

     I'm finally at rest from the self-loathing I really put myself through the past week and a half and I'm starting to see again that it's just me and the Lord living my life and I'm okay with that again.  I mean who knew that so many emotional issues are brought up and dealt with just because you're trying to stop a life of self-destruction.  I mean I thought I was just going to stop drinking and learn how to be a good friend and a good sister and a good granddaughter and daughter and aunt and just do it a little at a time and then reach what Jay calls some quantitative, measurable reward for all my hard work, and I knew it wouldn't really happen that way, but I didn't know what it would look like when it really never does happen that way.
     Really, when you're trying desperately to learn new ways to live your life, you learn that it's going much slower than you thought it would and what you were medicating all this time was this intense lonesomeness where it feels like every social force is against you, choking you and keeping you from having love or friends because there's something wrong with you and you deserve to be alone.  Surely your deserve it, it's happening, you're alone and nobody wants to be your friend, there's the proof right there.  Medicate THAT.  Numb that, it's too much to deal with, and these people don't want to be your friend now, anyway, you may as well not deal with it.  When the morning comes, whether or not you got drunk, you'll still be alone.  May as well do whatever you can to make yourself happy, because you don't have anyone to help.
     That is the sick voice I heard and continue to hear, that is what tempts me every day, that is the voice that can be told to go away if I remember to tell it to, in the name of Jesus, every single day, while our good Lord comes in and fills in the pieces and holes that are remaining.  That is the actual process and I think if there's a goal, it's that it only gets easier with time, and it gets easier if I don't feed the wrong dog, as that old YoungLife sermon analogy goes.
     There are good things, actual new things cropping up, like all the rosebuds outside.  I am remembering scripture.  Forever it was so hard, I would forget it the minute i read it but now it's starting to have a place on my heart, because now I'm starting to see just how specifically God can meet me, and he is crazy.  Last night we talked about stopping the secret sins before they become public and I learned a new way to read Hebrews 12:5-7 where it says:  "And you have forgotten that word of encouragement that addresses you as sons:  'My son, do not make light of the Lord's discipline, and do not lose heart when he rebukes you, because the Lord disciplines those he loves, and he punishes everyone he accepts as a son.'  Endure hardship as discipline.  God is treating you as sons.  For what son is not disciplined by his father?"  And it tells me and reminds me that I am a friend and a beloved to Jesus; I must be, he must think of me that way, and this all must be discipline, what else would it be?  What else could I be?  I am absolutely in love with that idea, and it becoming my identity in Christ.  Jesus' friend who, make no mistake, WILL be disciplined but has a place that also will not be compromised. And if that is the case, I don't really care what happens.