For Such a Time as This…..

I’ve read the news calling out our PM for initiating an unnecessary election at the worst possible time…during a pandemic, while half the country is burning up and the Taliban is sadistically taking over Afghanistan.  The 20th anniversary of 9/11 bringing all those conspiracy theories back to the forefront. The natural disasters happening all over the world, all credited to global warming…I mean, climate change. The whole residential school debacle. Trying to stay connected to loved ones when there are differing COVID factions involved. Naturally occurring problems on the home front. Even my own purpose and career in question.  It all makes me want to crawl into my own bubble and stay there until the end of the world.  True story – I have actually prayed, at times, that God would open up a crack in the earth and I would fall in never to be seen again.  True story – That would be the easy way out. 

 I would love to be holed up on some tropical island with some books and embroidery and paints, feeling the sand between my toes and the warmth of the sun on my skin.  Listening to the waves crash against the shore as I forage for sea shells.  A million little twinkle lights dancing in the trees at dusk.  On a sailboat by day and a lounger by night – studying the moon and the stars – sipping a Starbucks beverage.  Hey, it’s my dream, I can have Starbucks if I want. It’s my escape.

But then, His voice breaks into my imaginings and reminds me, ‘you are here for such a time as this’.  What does that even mean?  I do not like this whole ‘with knowledge comes responsibility’ thing.  I much prefer ‘ignorance is bliss’. (I can think of many in high power I could ascribe that to). I am reminded that I am on this planet, at this specific moment in history, for a reason.  It’s no accident.  I wasn’t born into the wrong era as I so often like to believe.  This IS my era.  All the things I lived through – difficult or easy, good or bad, real or surreal – All meant for me.  Not so I could close myself off in a bubble but so I could reach out and save someone else from falling or drowning or fading into oblivion. I could do this because I have survived.  I have survived my worst which has brought me to ‘such as time as this”.  

So many things I wish I’d done differently.  So many things I wish I didn’t know about. So many words I wish I could take back, so many words I wish I had said. So much fear I wish I hadn’t manifested. So much courage I wish I would have bolstered. So many lies I’ve believed. So many truths, I didn’t. So much heartache I wish I hadn’t witnessed, experienced or inflicted. So much injustice I wish I could do something about.  So much selfishness I wish I didn’t have.  Yet, here I am “for such a time as this’.  The words of that old spiritual come to mind “nobody knows the trouble I’ve seen – Nobody knows but Jesus”.  Not that I’ve seen more trouble than others because I certainly have not.  Just that, nobody knows what troubles I have personally experienced. And that’s fine.  But my past paralyzed me sometimes. I often get caught up in “well  HE allowed that to happen so what else is HE going to allow to happen”  that’s going to be painful and difficult and scary.  But HE also said He would never leave or forsake us…ever.  We are not in this alone. And I breathe a sigh of peace.

So whatever HE wants me to do “for such a time as this”.  I am up for the task.  I’m not going to say ‘Bring it on” but I am starting to feel braver and more intentional about doing what I am here for.  Maybe I am doing what I am here for but for some reason I am not recognizing it.  Maybe I don’t see it for what it is because I am not done.  But this I know for sure, I am meant to be right here, right now, for such a time as this.