Recently my sister gave me one of her Netflix logins. Unfortunately, because I am a tv/movie junkie and borderline hermit, this has become a huge problem. Case in point: I started watching the first season of "Once Upon a Time" and from the opening credits, I was hooked. 22 episodes. I was obsessed. I watched late into the night. All weekend long. Every spare minute, I was glued to my computer. The show is about a town, Storybrook, where all the fairytale characters live together, in modern times, under the evil queen's curse. But the thing is, they don't remember anything - not the past, not about magic, not even who they really are. They have forgotten their true identity.
I love this show for lots of reasons but the single idea of the forgotten identity has completely wrecked me...because in so many ways, I think its also the curse of our modern world. We go through our days, drinking our morning coffee, heading to our jobs, answering emails and phone calls or driving our trucks or taking care of our kids, we pay bills, we plan for the next calendar event (birthday, wedding, dentist appointment), we watch our sitcoms then fall asleep at night with a nagging sense of something more, some greater meaning or purpose...but its just out of the periphery. We have a fuzzy sense of it but most of the time, it feels just beyond our reach...foggy...surreal. We have moments of clarity when we hear a great message or God interrupts us with something miraculous or wonderful and we're reminded of it when the skies get dark and our hearts get broken by death or loss or general numbness.
I'm not smart enough, or articulate enough, to bring it into focus entirely but I can try and explain what I know in this moment. We were created. We were formed. We were designed. We were dreamed up. By a God capable of creating mountains and oceans and trees and giraffes and sunrises and flowers and snow and horses and stars and Hawaii. And that's the short list. And of all he ever created, only we were made in His own image.
Only we were chosen.
Adopted.
Loved.
Saved.
I struggle with trusting God. I always know he's able to do whatever I'm asking but sometimes I wonder if he's willing. If he's paying attention. If he cares about my small requests or my temporary happiness. And I know in my head that he knows best and his ways are good and his timing is perfect. But that doesn't change anything about how it feels to be stuck in a situation where he doesn't seem to see me or care about my hurt or worry or fear.
I want to have great faith. But I get worn out sometimes from believing and not seeing. From clinging to truth while this world batters me with lies. Sometimes it just gets to be too hard and just like a toddler, I want to just have a complete fit. Sometimes I do. Literally. Sometimes I go into a cave of self-pity and just stay there waiting for a rescue I really don't deserve.
But my God is a God of rescue. He always pursues me. He helps me remember who I am. Whose I am. He helps me remember that if he loved me enough to create me and choose me and adopt me and love me and save me...of course he cares about the details of my life. If he knows the number of hairs on my head, of course he knows about the desires of my heart. Of course he cares. Of course he will move heaven and earth for me. Of course. Of course.
And just like that, even if only for a moment, the curse is broken. I remember.
Let all that I am praise the LORD; may I never forget the good things he does
for me. Psalm 103:2
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