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words of wisdom from Oma

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My Norwegian Grandma was quite the writer. I just had the privilege of reading one of her diary entries. She was so young but so mature. In one of the entries she told about the day my grandpa asked her to marry him, she was 15. The war in Germany had just ended. When they decided to get married they knew that life would be tough. Her and my Opa had absolutely nothing to begin with. They started out living in a single room, separated from their neighbours only by a hanging curtain, amid the ruins of Cologne. Yet she said she never regretted her choice to get married anyway. Here’s something she wrote (translated from German): “Shared sorrows are half the sorrow and shared joys are double the joy.” – I love that, it’s so true.

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fog

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Surrender

This month has been a painful and humbling journey for me but now looking back I can't stop praising God for it. I need to write it down.
I spent the last few weeks feeling stuck under a sea of fog… it was weighing down on me till I felt I couldn’t go on anymore. I couldn’t understand it. I was crying out to God but I couldn’t seem to get out. Last year was such a high point in my journey with Christ. Daily He showed me something new about Himself and I felt Him walking by my side into school… at work… at home. Everywhere I looked I could see His beautiful fingerprints.
Then at the beginning of this year… the fog set in. I was at a place where I’d begun to think I could see the puzzle of my life come together the way I had hoped it would. Everything seemed to be falling into place. Suddenly my ideal design started to fall apart. I couldn’t imagine why God was pulling out the one piece that seemed to fit so perfectly… the one I cared most about. I just wanted to scream: “No leave it! Don’t take that…. That belongs.” I wanted to hang on to it with all my might. I cried to God… begging Him to take anything away except that. I felt so broken… I just wanted to complain to Him… so, that’s how I came to be stuck in the fog. But what an awesome God we have… He’s promised never to leave us in that place. Days went by and I couldn’t handle being in that gloom anymore… I just cried out to God. At first I thought he was being silent… the only thing that had really jumped out at me, while reading my bible, were these words, in Psalm 119: “With my whole heart” It repeats them over and over. (With my whole heart….will I serve You, seek You, call on You). Then in Proverbs 23:26 it says: “My son, give me your heart.” I finally realize God was asking me to fully surrender that piece I loved to Him. He wanted to have my whole heart. God deserves the first place in our hearts. In my head I’d said: ‘It’s all Yours God’… but inside I wasn’t totally willing to surrender that piece of my life. I was reminded of Abraham… when God asked him to put his son on the altar. I really didn’t want to do that. It was so hard… but I knew I would never get out of the fog doing things my way…I wanted to follow Christ whatever the cost… so I asked God to take over. When I honestly gave that piece of my life to Him… it was like I had wings again… all the weight of the fog was gone and my worried tormented heart was so restful. I wanted to sing at the top of my lungs…. to know I belong to Christ and He is mine… truly is more than enough for me.
Funny… the fog was also very literal… all of Vancouver has been in this gray damp mist for days… it’s still outside my window even now. It doesn’t matter anymore if it’s foggy… I know that whether I can see or not makes no difference… because I don’t have to put the pieces together… my life is in Gods hands.
But that’s not how the story ends… I still can hardly believe what has happened… After giving God the first place in my heart and in every part of my life, as he should have had all along… he surprised me by placing that piece back into my puzzle… this time where He wanted it. I am still speechless!!!


Praise God from whom all blessings flow!