Faith does not need to push the river because it is able to trust that there is a river. The river is flowing. We are in it.

Richard Rohr

When I lost my job in May, I thought I would lose everything else right along with it. Instead, I found what I had been missing.

Security and stability were yanked from under my feet with one phone call. Suddenly the ground beneath me was no longer firm and the control I so desperately needed was taken away and I was tossed into a raging river. In exchange for security and stability, I was given fear and worry. I railed against the current pulling me away from what I thought I knew I wanted. Eventually though, that fear and worry gave way to something that felt a little bit like acquiescing and a little bit like apathy. Then, almost just as suddenly as everything was taken away, I found that I was given so much more than I had lost and so much more than I consciously asked for.

In fact, I never asked for the things I deeply longed for. I only asked for the things I thought were reasonable, almost as a barter, as if these things were just a little too much for the God of the universe to deem worthy enough to fulfill. I asked for things I would be content with, but not for things I’d be happy with, all the while feeling my heart ache at the thought of a compromise. Again. I even chased the things I’d be content with. I chased them diligently, too, hoping my willingness to be content would not go overlooked. Praying that my willingness to “settle” would be honored. Mercifully, my heart was seen and heard without my having to do much at all except release my hold of the things that held me so tightly captive.

In time, tenacity and something that felt a little like courage replaced my apathy and willingness to settle and, almost as a last resort, I started asking for the things I really wanted. No other way was working, so I reluctantly gave in and released my grip. Months of hostage negotiation can really wear a person down. Exhausted, and with tears streaming down my face, I wrote an email that has changed my life.

I was spent and what I found in that space was there was no need to negotiate and there never had been. There was only a need to ask. My heart had been completely seen and heard in spite of my best efforts to hide it, and it terrified me. My heart was running rampant, frolicking around, being exactly who I was meant to be and I was too exhausted to chase it. I was constantly braced for impact, waiting for the all too familiar moment of being just a bit too much. But that moment never came. Instead, there came an unconditional invitation to the table, offered to the realest parts of myself that I had spent the last months trying desperately to push aside. My heart had been completely seen and heard and what I found was, not only contentment, but happiness.

I was asked lately how I like being on our staff, and it struck me as odd because I feel as though I’ve always been a part of them. It’s as though I was always supposed to end up here, and that every closed door I spent too much time trying to open or wrong way I followed for too long only served to break down the pieces of me that stood in the way.

This way was not without struggle. Or pain. Or heartache. But it was also not without grace. This grace had always been there, but it was waiting for me to take it, because that’s what grace does.

Peace be the journey.

All human nature vigorously resists grace because grace changes us and the change is painful.

Flannery O’Connor