i wrote quite a long blog on this, but decided to save it for later - it would be best served to be prefaced by a testimony, because often a story conveys much more than logical words ever could.
i wrote this in the spring of my first year at uva - february 1st, 2007 - following my first trip to honduras with the missioners of christ. i will post it here, and then try to forget that i've done so - it's exceedingly personal, but i put it here for you, because i believe that when i get down to the core of who i am, it's remarkably similar to the core of who you are - and if that's true, then God needs to speak to you just as He spoke to me.
remember that this is over two and a half years ago, and i have changed and grown since then- but in order to understand who i am and thus connect with anything further i can say, i think one must understand where i'm from - and so i post this. it was titled, "there is something beautiful here."
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i remember that night, and yet i don't… day after day of traveling through the village, experiencing the love and the grace of the people of Honduras… night after night, kneeling in front of the Blessed Sacrament, becoming increasingly aware of how utterly unworthy i was to be there, to receive such grace, but it came relentlessly, it filled my heart to the point of breaking and it was torment, wonderful, terrible… night after night of empty words flowing from my mind – i thought i was praying, i was praying in the only way i knew how, telling the Lord to please take my life, just take it… i was out of my league, uncomfortable, i didn't know how to deal with… with everything. with church every morning, with prayer every evening, with that chapel in the center of the house with no walls and no roof, all-encompassing and ever-present, a constant reminder of God. i had prayed before, i believed that i had given my life to God, but suddenly God was everywhere, in every minute, every person, every word… i was overwhelmed, and confused, and… distant.
distant.
who was i?
i didn't care.
who are you?
i could laugh with you, sit down and joke around and be crazy and talk your ear off… but when you left, you were gone. i didn't give a damn if you were upset or sad or frustrated. i was too impatient to care. i had found the solution, i had found the escape – my heart betrayed me, it hurt me. so i left it behind. i was "taking myself less seriously." if i don't take myself seriously, then when i start to feel sad, i can discard it. throw it away. it becomes nothing. it has no power over me. i thought this made me free. now i could flirt freely without danger of breaking my heart, i wasn't too shy or scared to meet new people, because people couldn't hurt me anymore. they couldn't touch me. and that made me powerful.
but i was still missing something. there was an emptiness, and i became agitated and irritated that there was something that could still make me feel empty. well then, i probably just need some friends… maybe a guy too. i'm reasonably intelligent; i know what qualities people find attractive in others. so i started to construct myself: funny, outgoing, nice, generous, spontaneous, dry humor, witty, confident. well, i say that i "started"… in fact it had been a work in progress for years, without me ever fully realizing what was happening. but now, here at college, with so many people to experiment my personality on, it exploded and grew exponentially. oh, and it seemed to be working. i became "friends" with dozens of people instantly, i was learning how to catch a guy's eye… i would become more and more energetic around my friends, and they would respond likewise, and i would get an emotional high, and that was the closest i got to filling the emptiness.
and the night would come, with its lonely silence… and i would sneer at myself with contempt for my melodramatic tendencies, and pack up and go to a friend's suite and stay in the light and noise until i fell asleep on their floor or couch, then make my way back to my room hours later and fall asleep before i could be left alone with myself.
this new me was fun to be around… i had every right to be fun, didn't i? i saw it almost like something noble – to resolutely have a smile on my face despite hardships that came my way.
but kneeling there, in the chapel, the silence pressed in. i knew that something deep within me loved this God i was praying to. the first few days, praying was pure bliss… losing myself in His Presence.
and then He started to stretch me. praying became stressful and exhausting. prayer in the morning, the afternoon, the evening, and talking about God in between. i felt heavy, tired, weighed down. i started to think that maybe i got more than i bargained for when i told God to "take my life."
but God, God wasn't taking anything. God never takes anything. He says, "you must give it. and not by cheap words or a quick prayer. We mean, you must truly *give* it, actively, actively, in every moment of every day, you must give your life to Us, if that is what you desire."
so if God wasn't taking my life, why did i feel so… drained?
He looked at me, and perhaps He knew that there was a seed of sincerity in my prayer, as naïve and simple though it was, and as He listened to my prayers He eventually had mercy and He whispered, "my child, my child, how can you give Us yourself… when you have lost yourself? What is there left for you to give?"
but my mind was filled with tumult and noise, and i didn't hear the whisper.
and yet still, He had mercy.
i remember that night, and yet i don't… there i was, i was kneeling…..
and suddenly it was like a… a tidal wave. or something. just… slammed into me. my whole self-construction… my delicately arranged personality, my ideal person, my idol… just… blasted away.
gone.
and i knelt there. and I was afraid… horrified. what have You done?! my beautiful… my beautiful work of art, so painstakingly constructed… in ruins. can't i keep any of it?! it was beautiful, wasn't it? please, please, can i keep any of it?
no.
but… that took years! and… doesn't it enable me to spread Your Word to more people, i can reach out to more people when i'm not afraid of them? i can be a better servant to You if i keep this, can't i?
but there was silence. nothing beyond that first, resonating, no.
something inside was screaming like a child throwing a tantrum, furious, panicked, helpless.
and then…
fine.
i was sad, heavy. the water from the tidal wave hissed away, leaving muddy puddles and broken debris. But beneath it all, i felt a needle of shock – recognition. it was as though i recognized myself for the first time in years, myself as i used to be, a long time ago, someone that i hadn't even realized had faded away, or who i'd thought had died with my childhood.
there was no joy in the recognition; just sadness and weight, and a quiet murmur of acceptance of this person that had found no place in the fast world i am living in, someone who did not adapt and who was not fit to survive. there was something sad, almost sullen about the reunion. but apparently this was what God wanted… for reasons unbeknownst to me, God destroyed my glorious construction and wanted me to repossess this homely, quiet, unexciting and un-glorified self.
i should have been collapsed in my gratitude for the restoration of self, but all i could do was lament the loss of my creation and think about how much more attractive it was than God's creation.
but the fact remains that God is good and merciful, and despite my lack of gratitude He did not rescind His gift.
and so i slowly grew into myself again, convinced that it meant the sacrifice of every attractive quality i had developed. i dreaded coming back from
and then: a miracle.
i got it all back.
my cheery smile, my dry sense of humor, my ability to strike up a conversation with anyone… all of these things i had tried to make for myself. before, they had been a part of my construction, and i thought they had been destroyed. but now, they emanated from my heart, more Real and genuine and loving than ever before, and i see now that every quality I tried to cultivate in myself was just a shadow, a poor imitation, of the True Qualities… like a child who hacks away at a block of wood, trying to imitate the grace and beauty of the Sculptor's work.
and that heart, that heart that He gave me back, it is beautiful.
There are still remnants of my old self here, and I feel that He probably has many more layers of Self to strip away from me before I am the person He intends me to be. it's a bit terrifying, knowing that He will annihilate the person that i am right now… that i, as i know myself, will cease to exist eventually.
but i see what He has done, i see the treasure He has restored to me like a diamond among rocks… and I know that a cut diamond does not belong among rocks, that the imperfect must be cleared away so that the perfect may exist in quiet splendor… and i am imperfect, and i must be cleared away… this is what they mean when they say that you must die to self.
but in my own annihilation, i will not cease to exist. by some miracle, this diamond within me… is still me. in some ways, it is more "me" than all the rest of me put together. i, as i know myself, will be destroyed. but in the restoration, through God, i will become more Myself than i could possibly imagine. and that is the beautiful sacrifice.
And it is in dying that we are born to eternal life…
peace,
meg
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