The winds of change have blown in.
This always seems to happen. Spring's wind drifts in new.
New beginnings, new perspectives, new hearts.
Welcoming the season's change from winter's dreary days into brighter mornings and longer sunsets, I find weariness in my heart.
As a young girl wading through many different grammar schools, spring often brought a time of sadness and uncertainty.
While everything outside was new,
fresh and turning beautiful the life within the many walls I occupied were not so.
Home was fine along with academics and sports but certain friendships would change.
For what ever reason,
I would often find myself alone in want. Perhaps that was the beginning of the root in which I found my own beauty and happiness among nature, writing and pretend. It wasn't until my fifth grade year that God brought me a true honest good girl to become, even today, my best friend. Her name is Bella (pronounced Bayah) from Honduras. She was in fourth grade and I in fifth when our paths crossed.
From that moment on, we would become inseparable until the day came that I had to move away.
Today: I a mama of three and an "almost" published writer, she a loving nurse and devoted sister. I pale and blond, she tan and brunette. Two different hearts became one. Forevermore. I believe Heaven has a special playground with a pool, preferably, for us to run around about!
Keeping in touch always, we would, but the precious memories of all our summers spent at the pool playing mermaid and attempting to become the next Olympic Gold swimmers. All those evenings after dinner at the river or park. Climbing the cliffs. Burying our memory box only to dig it back up a month later because time was so painfully slow. Sitting at the table with beans and tortillas on the white porcelain plate. Watching Spanish soap operas. Trying to understand Zoila when she would speak only Spanish to me who only spoke English. Spending our Sunday's at the little church singing songs of praise and giggling as we would notice her father asleep in the pew. Jogging up and down the Sunland hill. Dancing, dancing and dancing to music, now turned nostalgia songs of my heart.
"Good memories are the best gift childhood can offer."
It was such a sweet childhood friendship and I am grateful though states apart our friendship is still as strong.
Through the years of this friendship I learned the importance of a sweet spirited woman. Like a honeycomb. Confident in the trust that bonds you together.
Thankful for God's loving mercy and grace having a friend who was true during times of hardship. When days were spent in anguish because of the ones who scorned and hurt the timid. Quiet was I, yet never enough to escape the wrath of mean spirited girls.
Even today unable to escape am I. God has been allowing me to endure mean spirited women from as young as eight years old until today. I don't understand what preparation God may indeed be prepping my heart for. For years I have been trying to figure out the purpose of having to be subject to lies and stories fabricated for their own gain and my demolish.
This Spring morning was the first day I'd faced the one's who seemingly cleave close the very one who spreads lies and stench through out the walls I once occupied. Thoughts swarmed my head as I wrestled with wasteful questions such as "what had she and he said to them? How can I prove to them I am not what has been painted?" Ignoring that dark voice, I pause and listen...I can hear the soft voice of reason gently leading me away from their wrath. Besides, what does it matter anyway? People who protect the guilty are the people of the lie. Surround yourself with love and love is what you will find.
While I am not the only woman to succumb to another's deceit, painful is it still. But that he wants me to bring my hurt, disgust and sadness to Him. He wipes away my tears as my integrity has been tarnished. He softens my heart as my ego has been bruised. He lifts my head as my mind suffers through his and her lies.
Grateful for His love.
Grateful for His everlasting friendship.
Perhaps Bella was my first real glimpse of the true and loving friendship I would soon discover in Jesus.
Perhaps through the lips of the wicked I am brought in direct accordance to His hand out stretched reaching for mine. To soften the pain of their words, He has given me a gift of a new friendship. Someone who holds my heart in his hands and promises to never let go. I love you Joe.
It hurts having been lied about. It hurts to see faces you once loved looking back at you with such uncertainty. You want to understand. What is the gain? What is the motive behind deliberately tarnishing someone's credibility and integrity with hate spoken through spite, bruised pride?
Forgiving my enemies has to be done seventy times seventy by seventy. Seeing the wicked dressed in white through the eyes of He who loves them as well, can enable my heart. Believing He will keep the innocent in His palms and rebuke the destroyers.
I want to love those enemies. Understanding their ways is something that requires letting go and releasing it to Him. I sit here praying and typing, praying and typing. Fervently trying to get through the hurt which keeps landing on my lap. I rest in His Psalms that whisper directly to my heart. His promises, His grace.
My refuge.
As I wade and relish through the passages of the Psalms, He teaches me to take hold and never let go. He shows me His footsteps in the sand and they are His alone. He carries me through the valleys, up those high green hills and plants me on the peaks top. Plants me to take root and bloom among all the others. Whether they are still climbing or pushing back the foliage of the valley, they are there and I here. Here to pass on the secrets of His love. His words becoming permanent in the depths of my heart. Ready to share. Ready to listen. Ready to work. Willing to live.
When I am faced with she and he who calls on the blind to walk down her path of wickedness, I will be ready. Ready with the emotional strength to ignore the scorns. He will be right there with me as I step through the doors.
The Seasons of change are blowing in. A mother reassures there will be a time of healing. This is my Spring of Psalms.
