A Severe Mercy

(I am crrrushing the Alps now)

I just finished this book. It was a bit of an awkward read considering I got to the death part on a very public train in the Alps. No hiding any tears for me. But this book is a really good thing. It is no secret that I am not doing well these days. The break up still isn't easy for me. It's not easy being away from home and it's definitely not easy being single and 28 and 6'2" and other ever growing numbers as well...In a foreign country. No matter how you slice it. Yes, I get to do awesome things, sure I get to be with awesome people, and see awesome sights. But I know that life is made up of more than that. It has taken me awhile to put these words on paper because I am so embarrassed to keep thinking them, let alone say them. It's where I am. I can't help it. I am a mess. A river of red-hot emotion runs beneath my work and surfacy-conversational exterior. Dear, sweet, Heather poked at it last week and got that river spilled on her in a prayer session in my room.

So with that said let me tell you the hope I have. I have hope that God can indeed be trusted. I have really no reason to not think so. Sheldon VanAuken, lost his dearest love in this book and after his horrible loss, and grief, he still trusts that the events that took place were for his good. Amazing. She died surrounded by friends, loved ones, and rather gently went to the Father. He figures, for many reasons that it wouldn't make sense to explain here, that God has done the most loving act, the most Severe Mercy by writing their story this way. That is a trust I do not at this moment have. But I hope I can have it. It seems solid and true, and real and completely independent of human perspectives on what ought to be, of their thoughts, feelings and wants.

I have spent the better part of a couple of years wondering if God is really moving toward me with love and not anger. If he really can look at me and my life and not be dissappointed in my many shortcomings. I hope that Grace, is indeed, all that it is cracked up to be. It's free. I'll say it again. It's free. It is not cheap... but it is Free. The hope I have is that God doesn't need me. He doesn't need my works, my deeds, my anything. He only needs me to be with him. Which I just have an awful time doing. Nothing is free. No one just enjoys people for no reason. Humans are conditional beings. "I will love you if 'dot dot dot'" God isn't. Can that POSSIBLY be the case? That love from this well is free and flows constantly? The light that shines is always on you even if your eyes are closed? The music is always playing even if you have your fingers jammed into your ears; LA LA LA, I wont hear you." I wont see you, I don't forgive myself. You have no business forgiving me, I don't even forgive me.

"My dearest, your ways are not my ways."

"But, But, But..."

"Sorry, I love you. Yes you are a mess, but I will carry you. It's kinda what I do. ?"

"Really?"

"C'mon remember the poem? The one in the sand?"

"Ja-Ja?"

"Ja-Ja.

The first thing God did IMMEDIATELY after Adam and Eve sinned in the garden, was become their tailor. He made them garments to cover the shame they shouldn't have known. Covered the shame that was THEIR fault! He cared for them because he IS just that way. He is gracious. He is made of jealous love for us. For me.

And he will use severe measures to make my eyes open. He will deal me hands that no one else gets dealt, because he knows what I need. He will not give me the drug I want to numb myself. He will not. He will not grant the fake idol that only seeks to destroy me. I am not sure I want the path He will make for me, it's certain to suck in a very real way, but the alternative would be unthinkable (and impossible, I think, given that I am under his care and not walking on my own two giant feet).

Speaking of which, on a lighter note, from the "Lindsey-you-are-and-always-will-be-a-giant-freak-file," we went ice-skating this past weekend, and upon getting up to the rental counter the woman didn't speak much English, and I didn't know my shoe size in the European world. So I guessed at some numbers I thought would correspond to my ski-boot size in cm, and they looked WAY too small. So I guessed at another, and it looked small too. Someone finally suggested I look at the tongue of my sneaker to see if it had a key and it did. I hiked my foot onto the counter and showed the lady the number and she went "Wooo" and went the opposite direction in search of giantic skates. My co-workers were all ROLLING. Mondo hockey skates were plopped up on the counter; skates that, since they had no toe-pick, caused me later to fall FLAT on my stomach by way of my knee-cap when trying to do a spin. So I fashioned knee pads out of a friends pair of ski-gloves. See below.

Went to Zermatt. Where the Matterhorn is. It's amazing. Switzerland is amazing. Seeing folks see mountains like this for the first time is amazing.

God who made them and who is writing my story is also, must be, amazing. So that is also hope that I have.

Work, is the least of my worries, it's going well. People are happy. I was told "we need three Lindsey's". That is nice to hear. Now that my personal life is in shambles, it's nice to keep the work end up with some sort of even-ness that I didn't used to possess.

I was also told "Lindsey, you should just fashion a guy out of three Singaporeans stacked on top of each other... then when you get sick of the top one, just swap him out." That is always nice to hear also.

Love you all. I'm coming home.