Coming to the tail end of "A Grief Unveiled" written by Gregory Floyd, I am filled with a sense of hope and peace for the very first time. Not a kind of hope that I force myself to believe, just to place a band-aid on a broken bone, but a hope that is deep and true. Hope that I will see my mother again. Hope that Jesus is working in the deepest parts of my heart—in ways that I can't see, but know are happening nonetheless. I know I am being called to surrender. Surrender parts of my mother and the attachment I have to her, at His feet. I cannot do this alone. I think this is evident in the decline of my mental state beginning earlier this year. Feeling as though a wave is consistently crashing over me, with no break in between. Although I've never heard God's voice distinctly, I believe He speaks to me through the people I surround myself with. The ones that choose to get to know my heart; brokenness and all. They remind me that I am not alone in my suffering. That I am welcome to share these parts of my heart with them. That they are not a weakness that I have trained myself to believe, but a part of the human experience. These friends that strive to know me more deeply have also shown me that the only way my suffering can be redeemed, is through the One that suffered and died on the Cross. They always point me back to Him. Reiterating the truth that I cannot survive this on my own strength, but His alone. I find that this is a constant choice. He is not a God that forces Himself on us, but lowers Himself to our level, ready to embrace and shoulder our sufferings when we are ready. I am ready. I no longer want to experience the constant exhaustion of being someone I am not. I hurt. I suffer. I experience pain. And this is OK. However, I want to use this pain and this hurt to refine my soul and my heart in the ways Jesus is calling me to do. I want to allow myself to be loved. Allow my heart to be mended. To experience a kind of joy that I know only He can provide. Although I lost my mother 7 years ago, my journey with grief is only beginning. While this idea riddled me with anxiety a couple of months back, and even a short couple of weeks ago, I choose to rest in the belief that God is sovereign and faithful. That these stirrings within the depths of my heart, are Him calling me out onto the water with Him. To take one step at a time, following wherever He leads me. I believe that in these past years God has been slowly preparing me for the journey set ahead. Although there are moments, even right now as I type this, where I doubt and wonder if my heart can be consoled and transformed, I am remembered of the scene in Mel Gibsons' famous film 'Passion of the Christ." As Jesus bears under the weight of the Cross that He will inevitably hang on, for the future of my soul, He looks up at His mother and so simply states, "See, Mother, I make all things new." This is one that has profoundly struck my heart and is a promise I cling to with all my might. Constantly reminding me that God can, and currently is, making me new. However, I have to allow Him to enter into the parts that I, with great ease, keep barricaded. It is with this vulnerability, I am starting to see Jesus slowly chip away at the hardness of my heart and be consumed with the love that He so desperately wants to pour out over me. It is through His unceasing love, I have complete hope and trust in Him and His ways.