Let My Life Song Sing Part 2

Part One

Last night, I dreamed it again.  I was in a sloppy sweatshirt and some pair of stretchy pants walking down my driveway.  I was lost, or at least I felt like I was lost, and I was looking for Favorite.  I kept saying his name and sobbing because I couldn't find him.  And then I was aware of a suffocating emptiness. 

When I wake up, I know it's not a dream.  I can relay the emotions of that day and the days before with alarming clarity.  I don't necessarily remember events in sequence, but I haven't forgotten the way it felt.  In short:  suffocation.

The real days that followed might as well have been a dream--hazy, undecipherable nonsense.  I cried and learned, for the first time, that not all tears are satisfying.  They came in unpredicable, seizured outbursts--a response to pain I couldn't identify or treat.  If I could've spent them like currency, I would've bankrupted myself in the first few hours with the hope of washing my hands.  Finished.  But they budgeted themselves.  And even now, they demand to be used as payment when I believe the account to be empty.

My prayers were wordless sobs.

Then there was the antagonistic swirling in my mind.

If I shouldn't fear and if I belonged to Him, why did this happen?  He could've stopped it.  Almighty God holds dominion over death; therefore, this situation didn't need to exist.

Since it does, what now, God?  What do I do now?

Then there was that story:  the disciples were on the water; Jesus was sleeping.  There was a huge storm.  Waves swept over the boat.  In a panic, the men woke Jesus and (I imagine) yelled, "Lord, save us! We’re going to drown!" (Matt 8:25).

On the black and white pages of scripture, my prayer existed.  We were drowning.

I whispered that prayer before laying my head on my pillow.  I whispered it when I got up in the morning and when I brushed my teeth.  I whispered it on the drive to work, when I turned off the ignition or took another breath before walking into my classroom.  I whispered it before every church service and after every song.  It was every inhalation and exhalation of my body.

Lord.  Save us.  We're going to drown.

One evening, when the tears were spent for the time being, I opened the Word to read my life verse.  I needed reassurances because I was drowning in grief.  Instead of starting in verse one, my eyes drifted to verse two of Isaiah 43:

When you pass through the waters,
I will be with you;
and when you pass through the rivers,
they will not sweep over you.
When you walk through the fire,
you will not be burned;
the flames will not set you ablaze.

I prayed, "Lord, we're drowning.  Save us from drowning."

He responded, "I'm here.  I see the water.  But you're not going to drown."

Those moments are replete with an intense needing.  I can remember the water and the waves and I dream about the suffocation and the needing and the desperation. 

Some days I think about those waves and how scared I was when we were just trying to keep the boat afloat.  I think about His direct response to a specific prayer and I wonder why I don't spend more time in the river laying my heart bare in front of Him.

"We didn't count on suffering
We didn't count on pain
But if the blessing's in the valley
Then in the river I will wait"

                                                            --Delirious, "Find Me in the River"

I'm waiting here.  For You.