When the city was just beginning to reopen again, a friend and I decided to go on a hike along one of the city’s urban trails. Lush aging trees and sprouting grass awakening from the spring season’s arrival enveloped the trail, while the ravine gently flows along the path. It was a trail underneath one of the busiest roads connecting the downtown core to suburbia. But the thing that I remember most are the ruins that were once part of an unknown structure. Pieces of concrete blocks scattered against the running water and around the beaten trail. Directly above it was a bridge. Though I couldn’t articulate it at first, it reminded me of a physical representation of how I experience healing. 

I started going to therapy about 4 years ago. I felt overwhelmed with a lot of transitions happening in different parts of my life. It was something that I felt I needed and something that continues to be a normal part of how I spend an hour of my life. During different seasons, sessions were more frequent than others and that was okay too. Therapy isn’t just what’s been depicted in pop culture. The practitioner may not even ask you, “And how do you feel about that?” Nonetheless, I’ve grown to see therapy similar to how you would use a shovel. When circumstances happen and you’re left with broken pieces, it’s the perfect time to create. The time to take out the shovel, dig deeper and lay down a more solid foundation. And you know what? Using broken concrete blocks is not a bad way to start because God has the power to pulverize the blocks into cement powder before transforming it with His living water into something far stronger than what it could ever be. Who we could ever be.  

Reading the book of Jeremiah can be disheartening between the prophecies of Babylonian conquest and the repeated stubbornness of the Israelites to follow their own judgment of what they saw was right. Idolatry, adultery, famine, slavery, imprisonment, and bloodshed continued for years. Even so, Jeremiah’s prophecies included God’s promise of restoration beyond all of the destruction. Truthfully, I kept asking why He continues to give us grace? We have been, and are stubborn hard-hearted people.  

Because despite our brokenness, imperfections, mistakes, and poor judgment, God sees us worthy of His love. 

We may not feel worthy right now, and some days I lose sight of it myself. But as children created from His image, we can find our worthiness in Him. We can always count on Him to accept us with open arms because He gave us a bridge to walk on through Jesus Christ. Although, that’s not a reason to run across the bridge back and forth, between His will and what we [society] think is right. As Christians, our path may not be linear or smooth. In fact, in more ways than one, we may live lives that are against the mainstream. And that’s okay because when we try our best to walk in step with the Spirit, the journey home will still be joyful and filled with gratitude.

¹³ You, my brothers and sisters, were called to be free. But do not use your freedom to indulge the flesh; rather, serve one another humbly in love. ¹⁴ For the entire law is fulfilled in keeping this one command: “Love your neighbour as yourself.”

¹⁶ So I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh. ¹⁷ For the flesh desires what is contrary to the Spirit, and the Spirit what is contrary to the flesh. They are in conflict with each other, so that you are not to do whatever you want. ¹⁸ But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under the law.

²² But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, ²³ gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law.

Galatians 5: 13, 14, 16-18, 22, 23 (NIV)

Always, 

K

P.S.

‘Frank! Frank!’ she cried in a voice that made the whole wood ring. ‘Look at me. Look at me. What are you doing with that great ugly doll? Let go of the chain. Send it away… ‘ Merriment danced in her eyes. She was sharing a joke with the Dwarf, right over the head of the Tragedian. Something not at all unlike a smile struggled to appear on the Dwarf’s face. For he was looking at her now. Her laughter was past his first defences. He was struggling hard to keep it out, but already with imperfect success…

The Great Divorce, C.S. Lewis, pg. 126-127