The light at the end of the tunnel...

 

Have you ever heard the saying "There's a light at the end of the tunnel"? 

I have. Especially lately. Graduate School, International Adoption....people are so happy (and sincere) when they say "You're halfway there? Must be so nice to see the light at the end of the tunnel!" or "Home-study? That's awesome, guess you can see the light at the end of the tunnel now?" 

But truthfully, I have struggled with that.

Because from right in the middle of the tunnel? 

You can't see anything.

And because sometimes? It doesn't seem like a tunnel at all--- It seems like a forest.

I still have a year left of graduate school and at least a year left waiting for our child (Ha! You thought nine months was hard!!) and as a sometimes-pessimist ....er....realist, all I can see is how much tunnel, forest, mountain I have left to traverse. Sometimes? That alone gives me indigestion...er...well, actually it does!

But, for those of you full of encouragement and kind words? It's NOT your fault. This is my problem. And one I need to hand over.

Because MY GOD? says that he will be a lamp unto my feet and a light unto my path (Psalm 119:105). So even in the middle of tunnel. Even when I can no longer see the beginning and I certainly can't see the ending. Even when the brush and thorns are all that surround me, all that I know? 

 I can see my next step. Because God? Won't let me stumble through the darkness without hope, without strength, without grace. 

Sometimes we have forests to walk through in life. And if we are lucky? All we have to get through is a man-made tunnel--with no thorns and brush and scary shadows. But it's in those times that we have to trust God to light our next step. Because even when the END? seems so far away? 

God is walking with us.He never has. And he never will. Make you walk them out alone.

'Til I see the end of the tunnel.

Ashley