Christmas has sort of been a bit strange this year. It feels so different.. hard, perhaps. I feel like a lot of things have been hard as of late, and this has been no exception. It has been hard (and i dare say, I have failed) to have a loving spirit and it has been difficult to keep the spirit I do find from pouring from my lips. I'm tired of covering it up and i'm tired of telling lies. I realize that I may have been a bit cynical and I find sincerity hard. I feel separated from how I really feel. I have forgotten what this was like, but it comes back somehow as soon as I enter certain places. And I don't like myself when this side of me emerges like an ugly black beast that I find the inability to restrain.

So it seems that the tests keep coming. Tests of my faith. Tests of my humility. The question of "Are you okay with the reality of your failure, your smallness?" I just feel like this past year, really for the most part has been hard. Hard in joyful ways, hard in growing ways, but complicated and heavy and full. Full of the question, "Do you love me?" Full of the question, "Do you trust me?"

And I feel like in many ways I have failed the test. I answered yes with my mouth and no with my heart. And it is easy to want to check out at that point. Ignore it. Walk away. Its too hard, so I quit. I quit feeling and I start thinking.

And so I asked for humilty and am finding the answer. I am incapable of saving the world. I am no one's savior, hard as I try. So all i can do is just be the child that I am and obey the best I can, free from fear of mistake or stumbling. Stopping calculating and starting to trust. It feels like I have walked far from that place in the road. And someone has called me back.

This afternoon, we sat down to watch my sister's new "Chronicals of Naria" DVD, which I slept through most of, but I woke up for the battle at the end. The movie always touches me deeply as a stark reminder of what my life looks like in the kingdom, but the battle really struck me today. The camera zooms close to the face of the children as they prepare to march into battle against the White Witch and her army of strange animals and just thought to myself, these are kids. You look at their sweet faces and think of how incapable they are, but for some reason Aslan trusts them with his kingdom-- he gives it to them even. And I think of myself. All I am is a child. Yet he trusts me with his kingdom and he will not leave us stranded and alone to die.

He does not forsake me even when I fall hard. He isn't interested in me saving enough money and he isn't interested in me making sure I have all of my business taken care of well in advance and he certainly does not expect me to take on all of this pain and tangled mess of life alone. He will provide, as he has always been faithful. So, I'll take it as an opportunity to bare my face into his chest and hang on tight as he carries me through once again.