rest for the weary

Exactly one year ago to the day, I started working in a lab at my school. One day, during my quiet time, I had written a verse on a scrap paper and taped it to my desk as a reminder to get myself through some tough situations in life at the time. Refiner's fire was the heart cry and every time I looked up or sat down, I would see the note and be reminded by the Father that it would all be worth it. 

When I came back that following school semester, however, my space had been cleared and the notes I had stuck to my walls and desk (including this one) had been removed. I didn’t think much of it and assumed they had been scrapped, as desks were constantly arranged in my lab and people were often coming in and out.

Fast forward months and months later. School was out. Junior year was over. I hadn’t planned on coming back to work in this lab, but sometime around the last few days of the semester, my professor had asked me to come in during the summer. I had agreed begrudgingly. He gave me three weeks after school before having to come in.

In those three weeks, I found myself everywhere with places to be and faces to see. A few of us trekked back down to Maryland for our annual camping trip as one last hurrah before we all disbanded to our respective places for the summer (new school, out-of-state internships, and different countries for missions and studying abroad). Those familiar faces that I miss so much were gone even before I felt I could adequately say my goodbyes. The crew disbanded--one currently in another state pursuing an internship, another studying abroad in France, another closing the undergraduate chapter of his life and leaving for graduate school and still another and myself leaving the country in just a few weeks time. My heart still has trouble wrapping around it all. 

The week following the camping trip, I found myself on the train between home and school nearly every day, coming down almost every other day for church-related things or just crashing on a friend's bed. I wanted to be home to rest and process but things kept on moving. There was no time. On the last week I was home, I spent most of it going to doctor appointments and prepping for a weekend retreat that I came back from last week, exhausted and drained.

No rest for the weary, they say.

While it was fun catching up with friends outside of the responsibilities of school, I was tired. There was seldom time for me to collect my thoughts and mull over situations that kept passing by. Everything felt so... fast. Too fast. 

Yesterday morning, I managed to squeeze all my life's belongings into a suitcase and duffel and lug it all into my new apartment where I would be calling home for the next month or two. After all the hustle and bustle of settling in and after my mother had triple checked and was seemingly satisfied that I had everything I needed to survive a zombie apocalypse, I sat down on my bed in the middle of my empty room and realized it was the first time I was alone in a long time. 

An hour or so later, I spontaneously caught the next train into the city and spent the rest of the day meandering up and down lower east side and midtown. Disappearing in a sea of faces was somewhat comforting. It was nice to escape my thoughts even for a few hours before having to come home to a silent apartment and drown in whatever circumstances awaited me. 

The truth was, I didn’t want to be back here. Too many memories associated with being on campus and working in the laboratory from last summer had left somewhat of a mark and it all scared me. Being alone with my own thoughts scared me. I felt unprepared going into the summer. So much had happened junior year and I didn't even know how to start sorting through it all. One year ago, I had asked the Father to grow me and mold me into more of His image. And...He had. But just not in the way I had expected. 

There had been a lot of painful growing this year. There had been the forming of beautiful new friendships, the strengthening of old ones and the closing of others. Deep joy and pain intermingled—sometimes one more than the other. Being in the same environment didn’t help much either. The fact was that everything was the same and nothing was the same. 

This morning, I asked Him to accompany me as I walked into lab bright and early ready for my first day. I asked Him to be near. As I arranged my things on my new desk, my eyes suddenly fell onto a small piece of scrap paper taped to the table. I immediately recognized the chicken scratch handwriting. It was my note—the very same note I had written to myself nearly one year ago with the verse that still speaks so loudly to my heart even now. I felt a stab reading it again. It was the fact that everything about it was the same and yet nothing was the same. The girl who had written that note a year ago was a different girl reading it now. And somehow my note and His words were still relevant today.

"6 In all this you greatly rejoice, though now for a little while you may have had to suffer grief in all kinds of trials. 7 These have come so that the proven genuineness of your faith—of greater worth than gold, which perishes even though refined by fire—may result in praise, glory and honor when Jesus Christ is revealed. 8 Though you have not seen him, you love him; and even though you do not see him now, you believe in him and are filled with an inexpressible and glorious joy, 9 for you are receiving the end result of your faith, the salvation of your souls.” 1 Peter 1:6-9

How true this verse rings to me! Though I do not see Him, I love Him. And though I do not see Him now, I believe in Him and am filled with an inexpressible and glorious joy. To God be the glory for everything He has done and will do.