I am wanting to start writing again, both here on my blog and the creative writing I’ve let sit for far too long. This is an admission of the push I’m trying to make to get out of the gray fog that seems to have settled over me with our recent move. I say recent, but looking at the calendar, it has been a little over six months since we moved away from Texas to our new home near Washington, D.C. Wow. It doesn’t feel like it’s been that long.
Back to the gray fog, I don’t know any other way to describe it, and part of the whole mess of it is a big sense of guilt when I try to put my finger on my malaise. I don’t have any real reason to be depressed. Not really. But there is just this sense of flatness, for lack of a better term, that I don’t know how to explain which descends sometimes. I’m not sad, but I just don’t have energy to truly enjoy things, sometimes, either. I told someone once when trying to explain, I KNOW what is true, I run to the Word and prayer, I embrace the Bible, and when I’m in this grayness that’s where I find the real life line and a resilient joy that is settled and resides there deep underneath it all, but at the same time there’s this physical inertia that settles sometimes that no matter how much I preach the truth to myself, it just takes time for my emotions to catch up. But I know enough not to spiral into it, and eventually the fog lifts. It is at times like this when we have major life changes - a difficult move, leaving behind truly beloved friends, community, and church (y’all, I miss my church family from Texas and I miss the friends I could call and say, “Hey, we need to do lunch!”), our second son starting his first year of college and going through all those heart-wrenching emotions of leaving him and his older brother back in Texas for school and knowing they are spreading those wings and flying (this is good, and it’s right, and I love seeing them grow and succeed as they are, but it’s also HARD to be all the way across the country, so far away from them), helping our youngest to adjust to the move and her brothers being away making her almost an only child as far as new friends here know, and as I said before this move, the energy that’s required to start over again here is not always an easy expense.
BUT GOD has provided a wonderful church here in our new city where we are slowly beginning to feel like we are home. I chose not to spiral into the gray darkness, but to plug in - first in the choir and an Adult Bible Fellowship (I still call it Sunday School), joining the church as members, and starting in January, joining a women’s Bible study. In our Wednesday women’s study we are looking at Romans, and it has been a breath of fresh air to join with the sweet ladies in our group and fellowship over the Word together. I have missed this. It was probably a mistake when I decided to take last semester off and just get used to living here. I really needed this. And the clouds are beginning to lift. I find that all of a sudden I’m not feeling quite so flat and gray. So much so, that the reason I wrote out all that too honest and depressing stuff is because I wanted to share something that happened recently.
A couple of Sundays ago, the choir was singing and as we sang this one line in one of the songs, all of sudden I kind of woke up and thought, this is for me. The line was, “From this darkness, You will lead us, and forever we will say, You’re the Lord our God.” All of a sudden the thought flooded in, “He will lead me from THIS darkness, this gray, flat, inertia….one day all will be made new, no more tears, no more flat and gray weeks, and even today, a glimpse of His glory in the midst of the gray today.” And then we sang “Is He Worthy,” and the part that says,
“Does the Father truly love us?
(He does)
Does the Spirit move among us?
(He does)
And does Jesus, our Messiah hold forever those He loves?
(He does)
Does our God intend to dwell again with us?
(He does).”
Again, I found myself filled with joy that bubbled up to the surface as we sang those words. And after we sang, we got to be immersed in a biblically sound and encouraging message from God’s Word. Jesus overcomes the grayness. He is the Light of the World, and He holds forever those who are His. His mercy is more - more than my sin, more than my gray flatness, MORE. I am so thankful for the Body of Christ and corporate worship. What a kindness God has done in allowing us the grace of weekly gathering with believers to join in expressing our love for Him and to be taught and encouraged with Psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs and the opening of His Word together.
I am so very thankful.
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