Hopelessness and Redemption

I was just painting and I heard a song by Katie Melua on my iTunes that reminds me of where I was spiritually about a year ago. This is the part of that really stood out to me.
"How can I think I'm standing strong,
Yet feel the air beneath my feet?
How can happiness feel so wrong?
How can misery feel so sweet?"
I remember so vividly when I heard this song for the first time and how I could really identify with those words. It made me cry then for very complicated reasons and it makes me tear up now because I remember just how hopeless I felt then (when I could relate). And what is so sweet about it now it that right after that song played on iTunes, it shuffled to the next song with was "O Love That Will Not Let Me Go." I think the title says enough right there. These two songs show me how much I have hope where I did not have it before. Really the whole hymn is so profound and great but here is just one poignant verse:
"O Joy that seekest me through pain,
I cannot close my heart to thee;
I trace the rainbow through the rain,
And feel the promise is not vain,
That morn shall tearless be."
Only God can redeem something so wretched and turned it around so we can see His love.

Pray that I don't crack

Moving out of my apartment caused me to review the year that I spent living there. I'm very thankful for what I have learned about myself and more importantly what I have learned about God during the past year. Most of what I've learned about God has just been in the past few months. I thought I knew Him before, but now I am just amazed and baffled and realize that I don't have anything figured out. All I know is this: God is going to love and extend His grace to me whether or not I want Him too. He has picked me up out of the dirt even while I was still contemplating rolling around in the mud. On Sunday, Pastor Hal described it as feeling the tears of the Father on my sinful neck. It is something that is pretty hard to describe.

What I was originally thinking about when I started writing this post was that I feel like I'm in a pressure cooker right now. With moving out, finishing my Maymester class, working out the new living situation and thinking about job interviews...I feel like the pressure is just building and building. Last night, as I laid down on my air mattress to go to sleep, I cried for a few minutes just to release the pressure. I kind of thought of it like a steam valve that needed opening so I wouldn't explode. So I'm pretty stressed and that's ok because these are stressful things I am dealing with. I just keep praying that I don't crack. I haven't so far, I've pretty much held it together without the aid of any chemical substances (well...there has been a good amount of caffeine involved). So I know that the help must be from above. I have been praying and praying that God will give me the strength, energy and focus to be able to get all of these things done without a major breakdown. I have to trust Him because I feel like there is no other choice. Especially with the job and living issues because I did not initiate those things this week. He brought forth opportunities in both of those areas on Monday and it was not my doing. So I'm not getting anxious about them just yet. It's all going to be fine.