Running Into Ourselves

  As he stood in a solemn courtroom, and the 26-year sentence was handed down, he made a profound statement: he admitted that he ran right into the very thing he was so afraid of, the thing he had hoped would never happen. He'd always wanted to give his sons a stable family life. He'd always wanted to be a good husband, to be a good man, to protect those he loved. And yet, his often extreme attempts to do this led him to prison. Now, his sons would grow up without their father. He watched his worst fears become reality. He had created the very thing he wanted to avoid.

  How often this is true for us. We fear something so greatly that we end up having to face it all the same.We create the very things we want to avoid. We end up running into ourselves. We try to flee from IT, only to see IT come back to haunt us. The avoidance of what we do not wish to occur often makes the blow much greater. 

   Just maybe...if we could cease trying to escape, if we could tolerate our own misery for awhile, if we could hear past the pounding of our troubled hearts, we would hear the gentle whisper of God. We would experience the Grace that can heal. But we are "too busy," we say. Indeed, we are. Too busy running from ourselves...right into ourselves. I often wonder, though, what might change in us for the better if we didn't.