Re-Reading

I've always used writing as a way to understand what I think, even long before Naru Hodo existed.. Some of what I've written I have stored away in various folders and crates. And it is very interesting to me to go back and re-read occasionally, to review internal places I've been. Often it helps me to understand where I am right now, and helps me to understand my life as having a continuity, a flow of God's purposeful activity in my life.

I came across something just recently that I wrote in reflecting on my relationship with my father. The paper was undated, but it came from the late 1990s. Reading it made me happy, because I find that what I've experienced over the last year or so has been the incarnation, the fulfillment (as penultimate as any fulfillment on earth ever is) of the desires expressed as struggles, especially in the closing paragraph:

"It's the blood of Christ, the power of the Holy Spirit, and the love of my heavenly Father which has allowed me to change from the hate-filled child I once was. I am still struggling to live in the Father Love of God; re-learning this stuff as an adult is no easy task. But I know that I often form ideas in my mind about what God thinks about me, what He expects of me, what He's willing to bless me with. I forget all the time that my ideas are my ideas. So much of what I do in my spiritual life is in response to this figment of my imagination: God My Father as I Think He Is. I'm reminded to go to His heart to find out who He really is. Maybe I'm used to being scared that I'll be "too much for Him to handle." But really, I get the inkling that I'm scared of the overwhelming power of His love. Scared to find out that I really don't have to go through life a love-beggar. The He really does love me. Abba, Abba. Help me know."

 And thank you, Lord, for your steady work in my life to teach me, lead me, guide me, heal me -- to love me!