Fruit Doesn’t Grow on the Trunk

"Sometimes our fate resembles a fruit tree in winter.  Who would think that those branches would turn green again and blossom, but we hope it, we know it."

- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

Six weeks ago, I started on a journey that will possibly - likely - change my life.  Most of the people I know, who know about my decision, have been skeptical and something less then supportive.  Initially, I was so hurt that the people I love and who love me would be so pessimistic.  Initially I wondered if their reluctance was a sign from God that I should pay attention to.  But the peace that I feel whenever I pray over this, confirms for me that I’m doing the right thing.  I don’t know what will happen, how this will end…but I know that I’m doing what God would have me do and I know there is something to be learned and/or accomplished from this experience.  So even if it doesn’t go the way I would prefer, I will be happy – and content – because I know I followed God.

Two years ago, I dated a man I wanted to marry.  Our break-up darn near killed me and exposed traits in me I didn’t even know I had.  The experience taught me that I cannot say, “I would never do that” – because you just never know(!).  The months after our relationship ended, the months that I spent piecing my life back together, taught me much about God’s sovereignty, our own free will, trust and also forgiveness.

I used to call him MSO – My Special One, more special than any one I’d known before.  Which is, to me, a gold star example of the sovereignty of God’s plan.  The man I knew then was slightly flawed but perfect for me as far as I was concerned.  And now, two years later, he’s better than I ever could have imagined.  Seeing this change in him, the skepticism from my loved ones hurts me.  But I’m trying to remember that these loved ones who know we’re communicating again, have less information to work with, then I do.  They haven’t talked to him countless times daily, every day for six weeks.  They haven’t had the opportunity to see the changes in this man.  They haven’t prayed for guidance and felt the complete sense of peace.  They just know that they love me and that I loved him.  And that he hurt me…so they don’t love him.

But I hope that they will cautiously give him another chance, the same way I have.  Because regardless of how this journey will end, I can see that God is in it.  The person I am called to be through this journey is a truer, deeper Christian then I have been before.  Because the question in this experience really isn’t whether or not to let this man back into my life, whether or not he will hurt me again.  It’s whether or not to trust that God has a plan for me.  Whether or not to believe that even if this experience doesn’t end the way I would hope, that it has come to me for a reason.  To exercise my belief that all things work together for the good of those who love the Lord.

I don’t know how this will end.  I’m praying and seeking, diligently holding fast to my plan to move back to DC for myself.  And I’m trying to be open and aware of the new things God is showing me and the new ways God is growing me, and that perhaps he is using this very special person for a purpose.  For 17 years I’ve trusted in Him.  Taking one small step and then another and another, more and more boldly each time.  I never want to lose that.  I never want to lose the promise that when I take a leap of faith, God will be there to catch me.  And as if to affirm that desire, this morning my pastor spoke directly to me from the stage, when he said, “Fruit doesn’t grow on the trunk, friends – to get the good stuff, you’ve got to go out on a limb.”

Love y’all!
~M~