Wounds healing

I had the most interesting experience today. I was asked to be the lector at Daily Mass. As a person who just absolutely despises public speaking, it was something that I was really not excited to do. In fact, when Father walked out and I realized that Mass was starting and I hadn’t found anyone to pass the job off to, well… I panicked.
But God is faithful. Shortly after I actually got up there, I was amazed to find that the reading was actually of one of my favorite passages. Talking about God’s love usually lights me up, and I relaxed into it, and eventually got over my embarrassment by the second to last stanza of the responsorial psalm.

Anyways, I physically cringed when it was all over and sat down, beet red. Bleh.
Nevertheless, I tried to just move on, retain what God was speaking to me on this feast of St Martha, and go ahead and just enjoy mass. Which I succeeded at.
So imagine my surprise when after mass, the little old ladies who I just LOVE congregated around me and expressed how much they had enjoyed the reading.
“You really brought the Word to life for me,” said one, and then later, when I recounted the tale to a couple of friends at our talk, they said something similar.
I should never be surprised when God uses those terrifying moments of sinfulness (because what is my fear of failure at reading or speaking publicly other than pride and probably vanity?) to really teach us something deep.

In fact, later, when I was on the phone with a dear Christian friend, Robin, who I had not spoken with since returning to Catholicism and who I owed a great deal of explanation to…. And well…there it was. She reminded me of the privilege I have as a Child of God who Knows and loves His Word.
Because unlike what I dare to bet would be eighty percent or so of the people in the pews, I have a personal relationship with a very real Savior who speaks to me daily through His Word! What an honor, to be able to bear that Word to the people of God who don’t get it anywhere else!

This officially begins the phase of my spiritual walk where I have an appreciation for my journey. Where I recognize that it WAS God who took me through the entire last eleven years. Up until now, I’ve felt so frustrated and angry with everyone who pulled me away from Catholicism-- I have felt like the last eleven years of my life were time lost. But the reality is that I have been right where I was supposed to be that entire time. In faith. Walking daily led by the Lord. And ultimately, that’s the only place I ever want to be. I can be grateful then, for the work that God was doing in me through the various churches, because just as individual people were instrumental in helping me get to where I am, so were the individual bodies of believers. Together. Pointing me towards something. If I had not left the RCC when I did, in the Catholic environment I was in, I’m not sure I would have developed such a deep reliance on God. I’m not sure I would have learned to live for Him the way I did, or that I would have been able to receive the great gift of Faith that He wanted to give me.

Ultimately, I’m starting to see the footprints of God alongside mine again… recognizing yet again (when will I stop learning this lesson and actually just GET IT??) that NO ONE knows but me what God is really doing in my life, and that I don’t have to explain it to everyone for it to be real, and that I don’t have to even necessarily understand it myself, so long as, in faith, I’m going forward.

I was so happy to talk to Robin tonight… she had lots of exciting news for me, and I was able to share with her her part in my Carmelite formation… how many times she-- even as a protestant-- had poured a very Carmelite dose of prayer into me, an understanding of what prayer was and how much it mattered to form my life around it. It was a beautiful moment to rejoice with her in what God is doing everywhere-- saving us, making us holy, loving us. I love the gift we are given. I love the Giver more.