Friday, July 24, 2009

i am.


i am alive.


my story, every line that i write, is indicative of the most amazing thing that happened throughout the last year of my life...


i lived.


my heart limped, my car somersaulted, my body failed, my soul ached, my resolve wavered, and my faith fell.


but i lived.


my God seemed indifferent, my disease all-powerful, my friends distant, my family defeated, and my future uncertain. 


and i lived.


i was a body of bones and skin. drained of life and purpose and hope.


when friends called i pressed ignore because i was too tired to paint a lie that i was ok. as morning dawned my night weary eyes strained to read the frantic letters i typed on my keyboard-- intelligible words about a hope i strained to grasp and a recovery i didn't believe in. days became weeks became months in a hospital that started to smell like home and taste like defeat. i dreamed thought to which songs would be played at my funeral rather than my college graduation.


this may sound morbid. really, it is, morbid. because honestly.. what is lifeless living but walking death.


and still, i lived.


i came home expecting to return to valley forge in the fall of '08.. sicker, that semester began and my hospitalization continued. my sights set on january, my body and my mind resolved to make it that far. for the fall, i entered the world and lived beyond the hospital. i returned to the forge for vacation and believed for more. then december came and i was confined to a wheelchair rolling past the twinkling lights of the 8th floor christmas tree. the constant tears in my eyes making the holiday colors bleed together and wash away what hope i held for spring. 


my new years resolution was to stay out of the hospital for the year: i made it six days. 


i stopped making promises. i could keep going but the next 6 months played out very similarly, save a passed nursing certification and a catastrophic car crash. 


all that, and i lived.


i believe people can be desperate for God because they cultivate a desire to know Him and continually fuel that until it becomes all consuming. i also believe desperation can stem from necessity. often times, the latter is a firecracker that explodes and dies. it's been that way for me before.


i think my experience is somewhat of a union of the two.


i'm not going back to valley forge. at this point, i'm going to say i don't think i ever will. obviously, God can radically change things as He's shown in the last year and a half. but for now He's doing something in me i can't remember experiencing.


because He didn't make me to be living dead. He created me for life.


i come alive when i stand in front of 300 kids and play a character that brings the words of the bible to action. i come alive when i am surrounded by over a thousand college age students passionately worshiping and growing. but most importantly, i am learning to come alive through talking. and listening. and laying back in arms far stronger than mine. i came to colorado springs last april broken. i attended a church without knowing a soul and without being involved for the first time in my life. i watched. i folded my arms and avoided eye contact. and then in a service at the june desperation service i sat and listened to a man tell me of an orphan mentality that i clearly held. i folded my arms and rolled my eyes as he told me i was a daughter.


that night, during worship God unfolded my arms and i stretched them high. 

i wanted immediate healing. i was "ready" for it. but perhaps the days and weeks since then have showed me even more about the single sermon that wrecked my world.


i am not an orphan. but i am learning to be a daughter. but that's another subject for another time.


for now: i'm alive. i once was dead but now i'm alive. 


i am alive.

 

**this is just the beginning. i'm starting a new story and i'm excited to see where the next year takes me. i know greater things are going to come of all of this and i will be happy to share what i'm learning and how i'm growing and how i'm falling in love with God along the way. please join me. i welcome what you have to say.

2 comments:

Ashley said...

I love you so much and thanks for sharing. I am sorry if I have I have not always been the friend you needed. It is just hard when you feel so distant. You are a tough girl and I admire you!

Victoria said...

Hey Mandie,
I haven't talked to you in a long time, but stumbled across your blog. So powerful, and your honesty is refreshing. Please keep blogging. Your writing fills me with hope, and I pray that God will continue to reveal himself to you so that you can reveal Him to others through your life. I am so inspired by you!
Love,
Victoria Pies