The Valley

I shut the door quietly behind me as I slipped out into the night.

I’d heard the rumors that it would be clear. Looking up, I saw the soft white light and was glad.

“The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of his hands.”

I walked across the rocks and onto the grassy acreage, calling softly into the darkness.
Within moments, my dad appeared on the second story deck next door.
I hadn’t planned to meet my neighbor, but the stars were singing.
I knew I would find him.

I pulled the oversized borrowed wool cardigan tightly around my body and walked across the grass next door and up the tall staircase to find he had already unlocked the gate for me.
He was following Jupiter with his telescope, and immediately shifted so that I could see through the lens.

We spoke softly of the ages. Of the heavenly story unfolding. Of God’s promises. He spoke of Andromeda and the Pleiades, shifting the scope and pointing into the glittering darkness.

“And God said, “Let there be lights in the vault of the sky to separate the day from the night, and let them serve as signs to mark sacred times, and days and years…”

I soaked in the soft light of the stars, silently asking Jesus to lay out His plan for my life like a map in the sky.

My path has been muddy lately. I feel like a thirsty traveler, wandering just beside a washed out mountain trail that I would follow to still waters if I could only see it clearly.
My nights have been restless and my days have often felt aimless, and my prayers have been full of a desire to see some door open for my willing heart. My hungry spirit is chomping at the bit to be used, but willingness has never been the problem. My daily struggle has been with my traitorous flesh.

It has been 5 years since my diagnosis with a degenerative nerve disorder.
I wish my battle with a faulty immune system and intense, chronic pain had a solid resolution where a white flag was waved and that mountain was summited after the specialists and surgeons got a hold of me. The truth is – I’m still in the valley.

These past 5 years have been hard.
I’ve earned jobs and then lost jobs as the pain became too much, always telling myself that it’s ok, that I’d get over this bad bought with my body and then try again.
My busy scheduled lifestyle has become an empty planner, as planning ahead has become too difficult in my unpredictable skin.
My inbox has filled with my apologies for missed dates with friends.
My phone calls have become battles with insurance companies and I measure the passing of time by the distance from my last surgery, or the wait until the next one.

Now, as a new wife and freshly unemployed (again), I often find my heart heavy in the quiet hours of the day while the world keeps going.
My whole heart yearns to be an able bodied wife for my beautiful, active husband.
My mind is haunted by the dream of one day being able to keep up with little ones that have his green eyes and my unruly hair.
In the darkest hours I believe I am unworthy to be loved by someone so transparently full of exhilarating, breathtaking energy and life.

Yet in my heart, I know a few things to be true.
I am loved, not just by a Godly man but by God himself, and now – my heart has to be changed daily.
Sometimes hourly.
I have to let go of my own fears of inadequacy.
I have to stop dreaming of my healthier past.
I have to stop seeing this body as nothing more than a prison of painful skin holding me back.
Every sun that rises still holds infinite, beautiful possibility.
Every breath I take and every beat of my heart holds a decision that I can make to trust in His plan for a life down a road I didn’t expect.

I lifted my face to the perfect night sky, and closed my eyes as the coyotes began to sing to each other in the distance.
I breathed in the clean scent of pine trees, fresh churned earth and early spring flowers.

“I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.”

I have to stop waiting to reach that mountaintop.
I have to stop dwelling on the way things were before.
I have to stop waiting for the pain to lay down and surrender so that I can get on with my previous life.
This is my life.
And it is still good.

I can take my starry eyes from the blurry mountains in the distance.
I can still see God’s hand in the skies from the clear valley floor.
It is still beautiful.