Faithful vs. Cruel.

It all started one year in a collection of dorm rooms that happened to be in the same hall way.
It was something sacred, holy, I would say magical if I believed in that. Ordained? No doubt. I have a hard time describing it to people because it’s more than just “We all became great friends.” No. As Anne of Green Gables would say, “That doesn’t go far enough.” It was more than that. More than us just liking each other.
I know it sounds kind of corny, but if your soul could be linked to another, it happened.
There in that one year, at that college, in that hall way, for some of us girls. And we were girls—then.
It was the beginning of lives that will never again not know each other.
God connected people. For his glory, for our edification.
Oh sure, some of us remain closer to some than others, but that fact doesn’t negate what happened then. The time and space those relationships inhabited have changed all of my other times and spaces, does that make sense? Regardless of if a particular relationship proceeds through all time and space or not. What the relationship was prevails in us whether the relationship continues. There is a beauty even in things that aren’t permanent.
We came away changed women. Changed by all of the others, ourselves being the change in some. Iron had sharpened iron.

Isn’t it a beautiful thing, what the Lord can do between two people? Like, he can make you forget yourself for the benefit of the other.

Jealousy is gone, there is no envy, coveting. You want what his best for them is.
Which means that when they cry, I have cried with them.
When I need to talk, they have listened.
We have gone through losing parents, relatives, relationships, jobs, dreams, plans.
But it also means that when God is faithful to them, I feel his faithfulness in me.

I was blessed to spend some time with some of these beautiful creatures this weekend. We no longer live close to each other, but there are some things you make effort to get to.

Also curious is how a triggered sense can bring back memories and emotions and all that once was.

For me this weekend it was a perfume.
I was at one of my dearest friends’ houses and I was chatting at her as she was putting her makeup on when she sprayed her perfume—the same perfume she wore all those years ago.

In an instant, without my consent, everything that once was in a most special time and space all those years ago flooded back, and that coupled with what I was looking at in the present told nothing other than God’s faithfulness.

All of those years ago this—her current reality—was the dream: she was finally getting what she had desired and prayed for for so long.

And with the past crowding my senses, coupled with seeing this miracle taking place in front of me, in the same instant I realized that life had come full circle; He had fulfilled what He had promised.
And I was crying.
Not one moved to tears much, I love it when I know there is still some softness left in me. The world hasn’t beaten it all out of me.
Viewing God’s goodness to her stirred in me the memories of his goodness to me.

And then it happened again later in the weekend, with a different beautiful friend.
She is in her first year of marriage and her honesty is refreshing.
“Well, do you still like him?” I asked kind of joking like.
“I really, really love him, yes; but some days I don’t like him as much.”
We laughed. We both knew she was being serious.
It’s truth, though.

And she moved me to tears, too. Here before me sat a girl I knew all those years ago, a woman now, who has gone through some of life’s worst pain at an age too young. She has known the searing loss.

But again, her life displays God’s faithfulness.

And she said the most poignant thing. She helps out with a ministry to college-age women who always want to know about married life. But she gets the opinion that they want to hear all of the sappy stuff. They don’t seem to be so interested in the nitty-gritty. You know, the hard parts that you have to work on and overcome and get through? The parts worth fighting for.

“Our marriage works,” she tells them, “Because our marriage is centered on Christ. And Jesus fought for you and fights for you every day, which is why we fight for our marriage, because nothing good comes without fighting for it.”

Good.

That is good.
And it is also a profound truth I need to know more.

Like I said, I am not one given to crying much. Also not one given to sappy romantic stuff, but when she, the friend who in my estimation deserves (if one could deserve good) blessing and happiness and joy after what she has gone through, said to me, “Sometimes it scares me how much I love my husband. And there are times when he looks at me, and it scares me how much I know he loves me.”

Wow.

Their fighting is paying off.

How can I not be elated over the happiness of a friend? But it’s not even just the happiness, it’s the sacredness of what her life is centered around. Her faithfulness towards a faithful God.

That’s what makes me cry.

As I was on my travels home I realized that my faith is built when I see God’s work in the lives of those I am linked to.

And I found myself praying, “Lord, forgive me that I forget you are faithful. Forgive me that I don’t trust in that.”
Because it’s hard for me to believe sometimes. Or…no…I think it’s hard to believe. Maybe I am still shocked by it, and think it’s too good to be true.
The truth, though, is that He is so true he is good. Which is the only thing worth trusting.

I was reading in Proverbs the other day and I came across a verse which caught my attention. In context it is about The Adulteress. “Keep to a path far from her, do not go near the door of her house, lest you give...your years to one who is cruel.” (Proverbs 5:8-9)

I’ve said it once, I will say it again: Sin is a cruel mistress. She robs you of your best, and here it says she robs you of your years.

How devastating.
But you know what?
God is not cruel with our years.

Isn’t that so good to know?!!?

Our years, which in the scope of eternity are nothing, to him are not nothing. And these connections we make with people, how God changes the lives of people, individuals, even though they are not even a drop in the ocean in comparison to world populations, they are not nothing. To him they are something. Something enough for him to take care with our years. To not let them go unseen.

If sin is a Cruel Mistress, he is a Grand Master.

Remember that, Wolfies. She will take from you; she does not give what she claims to offer. Or actually, she might. But what she offers, is not what you want. Don’t think it is. You will be sorely mistaken. And in the process she will take your years with cruelty and without remorse.

But God is faithful. Faithful through the days, to the individuals, in all times and spaces. He is not cruel with our years. With care and grace he leads us through our years towards the holy, because that is who He is. And because it’s in the redeemed things which are being made holy that sometimes we see Him the most clearly. And wherever we see him clearly is where he wants us.