Looking back, I didn’t see You then . . . but I see You now.
I saw You now when you saved me from death as my throat closed up and I couldn’t breathe and I felt like I was suffocating . . . before I even knew I had a life threatening allergy. I saw You when I couldn’t swim, yet I jumped in that pool and couldn’t come back up. When I almost drowned, it was Your hand that lifted me out of the water. I saw You when I collapsed at work, life draining from me as I peacefully knew my end had come. It was You who brought me around and woke me up to a flurry of activity that saved my life.
I saw You now when You held me up through each miscarriage and loss, as my heart broke and my mind healed and I missed the ones that were not meant to be. I saw You when You gently pushed me to overcome those tragedies and try again. I saw You when You gifted me two amazing kids who try my last nerve, yet give me so much joy. Ones I struggled to raise as my choices in partners were less than stellar.
I saw You now when You paid each bill that I could not. When You gave me money when I had none. When You came through though I saw no way. I saw You when You relocated me and kept everyone away. I saw You love me so much, You isolated me from everyone so I had no choice but to focus on You.
I saw You now when You took him swiftly and completely away and showed me so many things that I needed to know so as not to pine for him and wallow in him and miss him. I saw You keep him at bay all of those years and years leading up to his removal from our lives so when he was gone, our house did not reek of him, no memories were left of him ever being there, and the loss of him was not mourned. I saw You remove the need to reminisce about him because I saw You keep him far far away.
I saw You now when You picked me up off my cold bathroom floor as I cried tears of regret for the years I lost waiting and praying for a man who didn’t pray for me alone. I saw You lean over me and console me on that bathroom floor as You ignored the anger I had in me towards You for keeping me in the dark about the darkness I was living in. I saw You forgive me when I pointed at You and yelled at You for letting me waste so many many years of my young life and not cluing me in. I saw You give me energy when I couldn’t eat a morsal and not even water passed my lips.
I saw You now when You saved my home from foreclosure. I saw You when You sent human angels to preoccupy me and call me and pray with me and support me and drink some adult beverages with me and tell me this too shall pass, even when I didn’t see how. I saw You replace my broken down car and my kids’ busted basketball hoop and our dead computer when I couldn’t see past woe is me. I saw You point out each thing I needed to remove from my house so no lingering elements of him remained in a home that was now the Lord’s.
I saw You now in the midst of it all. I saw You lift my head off my pillow everyday as You sent me out to face the world against my will. I saw You carry me when I couldn’t carry anything but a heavy heart full of loss for the life I thought I was living and a future that was never meant to be. I saw You in the brilliant blue sky littered with birds and cotton-like clouds and I saw You in the moon surrounded by sparkling stars as I vomited my woes to You. I saw You as You listened.
I saw You now. Oh, how I saw You now in the midst of it all back then. I see You now. Clearly and beautifully I see You now. When I look back at how far You and I have come, I see You now more than I’ve ever seen You before. You were there the entire time and I didn’t even know it. You were always, always there. I saw You now.
