I can’t really keep track of how many times I’ve ended up in tears on the train. It isn’t this cascade of water pouring out of my eyes–it is these little moments of little tears that come from me recognizing something I haven’t realized. It’s me being broken in some way by the book or passage I’m reading in that moment.
Graduating college was not what I expected. It would have helped if I had actually expected something. I didn’t find that necessary due to past lessons in life that have just made me face each day as they come. It’s over. It’s a six year chapter in my life that is finished. One afternoon I realized that I wasn’t just graduating from NIU–I was finishing a six year endeavor that had taken me to four different schools, in three different states. This endeavor I never thought was going to end, in the best way possible. But it’s over. Suddenly I’m in the “real world.”
My sister is a wife now. So is one of my best friends. Another dear woman in my life is now a mother. I’m done with college. This all happened in May. April was a month that did not seem like it would end, thanks to the roughest couple of weeks I’d ever had in college. Pretty sure I burst into legit tears every few days. But then again, I took way too many design classes at once. Through God’s strength and the encouragement of others, I finished. Then May happened. Birthdays, weddings, babies, graduation, accepting an internship, quitting my coffee dream job. Now June is almost passed. This new season I thought would be one of rest and reflection. In some ways it is.
During my 3.5-4 hour daily commute, I suddenly have all this down time on my hands that I haven’t experienced since...childhood...scary. In the mornings I spend time in God’s word. Then I get to the afternoon. Suddenly my brain is my worst enemy. This isn’t a season of rest. This is a season of deep reflection that God is using to tear apart my heart. Tear it apart. Not for my own purposes, but for His. Which brings me back to getting tears on the train.
I’ve been a Christian since I was in fifth grade. As in: I accepted that Jesus died for my sins on the cross and I wanted to live my life for Him. Over time, I’ve begun to gradually understand bits and pieces of what it really means. My college season was a huge growing time in my faith. Because it didn’t go how I expected, or even how I wanted for that matter, I really had to look at my life and who I was living it for. Even now.
Lately God has been chipping away at the part of my heart that is still hard towards others. The people I don’t understand, the people who aren’t like me, the people who stand on the streets in Chicago asking for money, the people who are in prison, the people looking so lonely. One of my life verses is from John 3:30, “He must become greater; I must become less.” But what does that really mean for my life? It means sacrificial love and grace towards me from God, and then a sacrificial life on my part to glorify God through all I do. Following His commands, even the difficult ones. Then a tear forms in the corner of my eye. And it’s a beautiful tear. It’s not from hurt or anger. It’s from joy that only comes from being broken by God.
It’s a season of God breaking up the fallow ground of my heart.
