Numbers 6:24-26: “The Lord bless you and keep you; the Lord make his face shine on you and be gracious to you; the Lord turn his face toward you and give you peace”.
Sometimes I just want to listen to “The Blessing” by Elevation Worship on repeat. May his favor be upon you, for a thousand generations. And your family, and your children, and their children, and their children.
God that is my desire. If my heart could tell a story. That’s another song that speaks to me. One by Steffany Gretzinger. These songs of blessing and lament are things that I want to listen to in grief and in longing.
When I feel despair, or sad, or lonely, I want to be reminded that “in you alone, my joy is found”.
Music has a way of helping me believe that “His favor be upon you”. Sometimes I don’t feel it. But I want to feel it.
I have this love hate relationship with my feelings. What I have learned through emotional coaching is that I am a feeler. It’s funny because I was noted as an INTJ where the I stands for “introversion” and T stands for “thinker”. But then when I look at the INTJ scales my T is pretty interchangeable with the “F” which is feeling.
Can you grow in your emotional awareness and “become” more of a feeler? Because I believe the truth is that I’ve been a feeler, but I’ve suppressed those emotions so I wasn’t aware for way too long.
I went to my psychiatrist this morning and I spoke my mind more than I ever have. It resulted in emotion. The day before I talked to someone on staff at my church, and I spoke my mind more than I ever had before. I’m feeling brave, but with that comes emotional fragility, at least that’s how it feels.
I find myself wanting to go back to music that makes me feel seen and soothed. Which feels almost like I want to curl up in a ball and just have a good whiny cry.
It’s not a bad cry, but it’s a grieving cry. Grieving that my story was my story. I don’t believe that I “don’t want my story”. I think God is going to use me in ways that I would never imagine, because of my “weird” story. My “weird” story is God’s story.
But even still, I at times think back and hate some things that happened. I hate the way that I can’t resolve a belief that I once had, that it’s now basically gone but I don’t know what has replaced it.
What I do know is that whatever happened in my mental breakdown, that the psychiatrist told me was enough to label me as “bipolar ii”, I just don’t know what to think. I can’t think anymore. It was destructive, so should I feel more? Is that the alternative?
This is more a question for God. But I don’t know if he’ll answer. So, all I want to sing is “May Your Favor Be Upon Me For A Thousand Generations” and “No One Ever Cared For Me Like Jesus”.
When the world fails me, where do I turn? I can only turn to trust in Jesus, in those who are closest to me, that he has placed them there for my good. And for that, I am grateful. Dear Lord, “May Your Favor Be Upon Me For A Thousand Generations” and at the same time “No One Ever Cared for Me Like Jesus”.
Yes and amen.