Impossible things

“Impossible things can heal here.”

I scribbled those words in my journal a month or so ago. My reminder to my often doubting heart to keep asking; to bleed my pen onto the pages of my journal as a battle cry to a God who still moves, in spite of me.

Yesterday we went on a short hike, to the falls nearby. We deeply inhaled the earthy scents of the dirt and moss and trees. We sunk our toes into the cold mountain water. The kids flipped rocks looking for salamanders and crawdads, in their own competition of who could find the most. There was laughter there. And quiet, too. As I stretched my head toward the pocket of light above us, I watched as a purple butterfly, with dusk catching on its wings, flutter alone in the sky high above. I watched him for a long time.

Year after year, this is the place where my people laugh and flip rocks and marvel at creation. It’s the space where I often feel and find Jesus: where I find myself imagining my parents in the fluttering wings of butterflies; and where I long to believe that sunbeams are sent straight to us from heaven.

All of it: the smell of the earth, the misty, cool spray of water from the falls, the creeks bursting with hidden life, the way fractured light pierces into the shadows...all of it feels like tangible reminders of truth when my heart forgets.

If He tends to the trees and pierces the darkness of the hidden woods with light; if He faithfully refreshes this tucked away corner of the earth every spring and commands the butterfly to fly, even if for His eyes only, then how much more does He care for human hearts that keep seeking?

My pen bleeds ink that laments and hopes. It helps me remember the nearness and faithfulness of God in all the seasons—but most especially in the painful, disorienting ones.

I am convinced, more than I have ever been, that His love for us is beyond anything we can comprehend. But also, I find that I need to remind myself of who He is, when lament is easy and hope is hard. There is tension in the knowing that God is able and in the reality that we live in a world where things will break our hearts.

The way my eyes lingered on that tiny butterfly in the middle of all that sky?

It reminded me that His eyes rest unflinchingly on us, too. On this day, hope that smells like spring gives testimony without words. My exhale carries with it the assurance that I am never where He is not. In the belly of the woods, I am encouraged that for as far as my eyes can see, there is evidence of life on the heels of painful death. There are glimmers of glory above my head-and they simply are, whether I look up, or not. In the same way, He is good and present and merciful, even if—or maybe especially when—our hard things remain hard.

If you, too, are struggling with laying the same things down and feeling like God is far away, I hope you will find the courage to do it anyway. There’s something about the naming of what breaks our hearts and letting it be loud and messy, over and over, in front of Him that somehow makes way for a different kind of healing

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