Cling to Jesus

Nighttimes are the loneliest. When the world slows down and my mind has time to think about what I've lost, that's when my heart hurts the most. It is when I want to fall asleep and not wake up until life is okay again, but I don't know when that will be. It is when I miss my friends the most and being able to go to Jessica's on a moment's notice if I need to. It is when I remember texting Nick and having him keep me company, if only through a cellphone.

I lost my best friend, my comforter, my lover, my future, hopes, and dreams. All in one instance. And I don't know what God is doing, but I do know that it hurts.

However, today at church a man came up to me who has known me since I was a child. He told me that he had prayed for me just as the service ended, asking God to bless me. God answered him as though He were actually in the room and told Richard, "You have no idea how greatly I am going to bless her." My heart has trouble believing that this pain is a blessing and that this time of searching and questioning is going to bear fruit. But all I have left is God and I must realize that He is sufficient from moment to moment. I do not know where this dark path leads, but I do know that it will take me to light someday. Therefore, all I can do now is press into Jesus and cling to Him.

Dr. Michael Pahl, former professor of New Testament at Prairie and now a pastor at Lendrum MB in Edmonton, wrote in his address to the junior/senior students at Prairie this year the following excerpt:

"...when suffering hits you hard, walk with Jesus.

Life doesn't just throw curveballs, soemtimes it pitches right at your head. And you can't always duck out of the way, then get up and dust yourself off to face another pitch. Sometimes you writhe around in pain on the playing field of life, and sometimes you have to be carried off in a stretcher.

At those times, there is no vocational skill that will make sense of any of this for you; but neigther is there any theology that will share the pain searing your soul; there is no philosophy that will come alongside you and wrap you in its arms; there is no biblical exegesis that will weep with you and sit with you in silence. But Jesus will, and your Jesus friends will, and you will do this for your friends, being Jesus to them even as they are Jesus to you. This is God's answer to your suffering: he weeps with you, wraps you in his arms, he absorbs your pain into himself, he enters into your suffering as he has already entered into the suffering of the world in Jesus.

So when suffering hits you hard, walk with Jesus."

I will probably post more from his address later on, but if you want to read the entirety of it for yourself (it's amazing, by the by), here is the link:

http://michaelpahl.wordpress.com/2010/04/18/cling-to-jesus/#comment-102

Well, I have some cover letters to finish so that I can fax some resumes tomorrow. If anyone is actually reading this, then please pray that I will be able to find a job quickly. I am rather nervous but God is faithful and He provides.

-Elisa.