Step Seventy-Two: When Everything Comes Undone

Dear Readers,

Every once in a while, everything seems to come undone. Like all the events in your life have randomly collided in this exact moment of time to create an explosion. When you're standing in the middle of it, it burns. You're heart feels overwhelmed, you're wondering how you could ever make it out. The pain is excruciating.

There is an unseen beauty in that pain. When everything comes undone, we see the raw power of God. We watch as He orchestrates each flame. And we also find ourselves in a place of absolute dependence. A place of desperation.

I can honestly say that I hate this place. It is contrary to my entire nature. It means being incapable of depending on myself. It means being forced to rely on some one else. I can also honestly say that there is no place I love more than being entirely dependent on God. It is, after all, in the furnace that God's hands wrap themselves around our entire being. It is nestled here in the palms of the Lord Almighty I remember everything I am, everything I am created to be.

I have a friend whom I love dearly. A friend who is struggling and for whom I would give the entire world. A friend who I have sacrificed much for. I prayers have interceded on His behalf many times. I have lifted him up, asking for blessings and peace. That my friend may come to know the Lord intimately and depend on the Lord ultimately. I have ached for my friend, shed many tears on his behalf, found myself weeping and broken. I have begged the Lord to spare him such pain.

This prayer has to change. If my friend is ever going to come to know the Lord, my friend must hurt. His life must collide and he must find himself driven to his knees. He must become desperate. I desperately wanted to protect him from his pain but the truth is, he is in pain. The only hope for his pain, the only balm to soothe aching hearts is the Lord's love.

This is my prayer for him:

That he may fall apart. That he would allow his pain to burden his heart. That he would become so broken he finds his knees kneeling upon the rug of the weeping before the awesome redeemer. I pray that he gets desperate so that he may find himself in the palms of one who loves him far more than I ever could. I pray that everything comes undone so that when he looks back he realizes this was his beginning.