Yesterday

Yesterday was sort of an anniversary for me.







Every year, around the beginning of February, I start to feel a little numb.







It's like Novocaine in my soul.







I simply cease to feel for about a week.







Yesterday was February 8th. I could say that it was 6 years since I tried to kill myself.







But I look back and can fully see that yesterday was 6 years since I encountered the rescuing hands of Jesus.







It's not just that he rescued me from a physical death, although he did.







It's more that he rescued me from the death of my spirit and of my heart.







So, now that the day has passed, and my numbness with it, I am looking back with gratitude.







If I had had my way, seeing only what I could see, I would have missed out on so much beauty and joy.







If the darkness of that time had won, I would have missed the brilliant light of the life that came after.







The Spirit of God picked me up out of the valley of the shadow of death and set me on a road paved with hope.







Let me just say that my life has been hard since that day; it's not that things got magically happier. I didn't just bounce away from attempted suicide with a smile on my face.







And even after I got married and had babies, it's not that I never felt sadness or hopelessness again.







But, because of the powerful hands of God, touching by body and searing my heart, I am free.







The painful sense of being lost, that had followed me my whole life, disappeared on February 8th.







In it's place came the tangible presence of God.







This brings me back to my last post.







"You are blessed when you are at the end of your rope. With less of you there is more of God and his rule."







I want to think that when Jesus spoke those words for the first time he was looking right into my eyes.







Since God is outside of time and space, I want to imagine that time melted away and in that moment, he was placing his hands on me, speaking straight to my burning heart.







I'm sure that there are millions of human beings who want to believe the same thing.







And I am also sure that we all can.





Maybe yesterday was more than an anniversary.




Maybe yesterday was my reminder to live.




To hope.




To love.




And to surrender.

Maybe yesterday was my own Passover.

My own reminder of my own Exodus.