Read, Write, Love, Repeat

Normal. What a lovely word. Such a reassuring, comforting idea, the everyday and commonplace. The expected. But seeing something as normal can be dangerous.

It is dangerous, for example, for me to see my life as normal when it is anything but. As I wrote last week, I’m six months into my new “normal” life, healed completely and miraculously from years of chronic pain and fatigue as I struggled with fibromyalgia.

I don’t want to become complacent about the miracle. But it’s far too easy to slip into the “this is just normal” mind-set when I’m walking, care-free and brisk-paced, walking cane-less like a regular person, from point A to point B.

I don’t want to forget those years. That pain that forged me into someone new. The incredible goodness of God in each part.

Remind me, Lord.

Remind me of the years when my couch was my world, when my pain was my constant companion. I want to remember where I’ve been, where You’ve brought me. How You healed me and strengthened by body after the years of strengthening my heart, my soul, the years of growing me to fill the empty spaces left by what I could no longer be or do.

Remind me of the place and stillness You provided for me to meet with You, to confront my own selfishness and self-sufficiency.

Remind me how you brought growth and contentment from silence and solitude, areas alien and scary to me.

Remind me so I will honor You and praise You more. So I will point to Your goodness again and again. So I will remind those around me.

May I NEVER be complacent. May I always thrill at a brisk pace of pain-free walking. May I be always filled with wonder and gratitude for the miracle of restored health and with expectancy at what YOU will do with it.

It’s dangerous, truly, to confine the results of a God-sized miracle in the tiny box of “normal.” Because it’s not. Because He did it and He did it here and now for a purpose. “Normal” doesn’t even begin to cover His purposes.

Remind me to say what You’ve done. To write. To sit in the presence of Your goodness.

Every. Day.

May I fill pages with my gratitude.