I’m sitting on my bed, finally able to connect to the internet at home. The lights are low to make the most of the lit candles scattered all over my new home, the smell of cinnamon and pine fill the air (God bless potpourri!!) and Passion worship plays on the cd.

I’m lovin’ my new place. I’m lovin’ everything about it. It’s just big enough for me and small enough to be cozy. Its between work and church, just near enough to shopping to be convenient but far enough away to avoid the noise and traffic. My commute is good. My job is good. My life is good. God is good.

Its been a long, long, hard haul the last two years. Its not over. Not by any stretch. Life happens and its in the happening, I’m learning, that Life is found. Real Life. Not existing, but really, truly living.

Then he said to me: "Son of man, these bones are the whole house of
Israel. They say, ‘Our bones are dried up and our hope is gone; we are
cut off.’  Therefore prophesy and say
to them: ‘This is what the Sovereign LORD says: O my people, I am going
to open your graves and bring you up from them; I will bring you back
to the land of Israel.  Then you, my people, will know that I am the LORD, when I open your graves and bring you up from them.
I will put my Spirit in you and you will live, and I will settle you in
your own land. Then you will know that I the LORD have spoken, and I
have done it, declares the LORD.’ " — Ezekiel 37:11-14

If I had to name a life verse, this would be it. In 1998 God led me to this verse when I cried out to Him, desperate for I-didn’t-know-what, only knowing that I needed and begging Him to fill the need. I read the cry of Isreal and said, "Yes, Jesus! That’s me! My bones are dried up and my hope is gone!!"  I can’t tell you how many times since then my heart has cried out those same words. It seems dry bones take years upon years to heal.

But every day since that October day God has done exactly as He promised. Sometimes it’s been a joyful inhaling and exhaling of crisp clean air. Sometimes, oftentimes, its been the pain of sinew and bone knitting together. Each day I become more alive, feeling things I’ve not felt for a long time, if ever, and experiencing taste and smell and touch and spirit in unimaginable ways. And each day I become more convinced of God’s intimate, passionate, unending love for me. Together we have scaled mountains I never believed I could and endured depths I thought would kill me.

I still have so far to go.

We are just beginning a journey of healing that may take many years, may take the rest of my life. I so badly want to know how it will all turn out. I want to know so many things I do not yet know. I don’t know if I will ever know them in this life. It is frustrating. The healing process is agonizingly slow and I struggle daily to understand myself, understand the world around me and how our interactions impact the present and future based on our pasts.

Yet…. This moment, this place, this space and time right here and now, this is good. This is meditate-on-it-savor-it-suck-the-marrow-out-of-it good. Not because of my job, not because of my new home, not because of my church or my small group or my friends — though all those things don’t hurt. This moment is good because God is in it. This moment is good because He and I are together. We have proven we will stay even when life sucks so hard that I want to die, beg to die. He has proven it; I have proven it. Not to Him — I’m sure He knew I would stay with Him. I proved it to me. And I proved it to satan. Life sucked hard. I begged to die. God said no. And I stayed. I stand on the other side of that particular storm, knowing another one is upon me, and I know. I know who I am and what I’m made of.

I dance in the misty rain of my Life, drenched by God and convinced of my own resolve. The taste of Life is sweet, and fulfilling on a level no food, no person, no vice — nothing — can ever reach. I think I understand the depth of God’s contentment with each pronouncement of "it is good."

    I love you, O LORD, my strength.

       The LORD is my rock, my fortress and my deliverer;
       my God is my rock, in whom I take refuge.
       He is my shield and the horn ^[a] of my salvation, my stronghold.

        I call to the LORD, who is worthy of praise,
       and I am saved from my enemies.

He reached down from on high and took hold of me;
       he drew me out of deep waters.

       He rescued me from my powerful enemy,
       from my foes, who were too strong for me.

       They confronted me in the day of my disaster,
       but the LORD was my support.

Therefore I will praise you among the nations, O LORD;
       I will sing praises to your name.

–Psalm 18