The more I remain alive, the more I come to believe that there is a Higher Power out there. Up there? Around here? Ok, well, everywhere…that does listen…that does care. Yes, suffering happens. And I hate it. Oh, how I hate all the suffering from the pain I go through every day. I don’t know why God allows it nor do I know how to move beyond it. I wish I had the answers to both, but what I do know is that while I may not have felt God’s presence within me for a very long time, I continue to be reminded in strange ways that He’s still there.
Let me preface this by saying people often unfairly judge me. They think they know me. They believe what they see from their brief moments with me and label me with words I don’t think they’d ever want to be labeled by themselves. Words that feel like swords, always reminding me of my childhood where I constantly felt there was nothing I could do to be accepted and loved…by anyone. If people only knew how their words and their judgments impacted other souls when they flew from their mouths, maybe they might not send them outward. I’ve felt the impact of my own words, time and time and time again, enough to know now that words create tremendous pain and suffering, which brings me to where I was the other night.
Laying in my guest bedroom, I found myself sobbing and fearful, feeling abandoned by friends I thought who cared, and listening to all that craziness that sometimes exists up in our heads that tells us the worst of things. In my case, it was that no one truly cares about me and loves me unconditionally…that it would be better if I was dead. I’ve had those thoughts for most of my life, but God seems to provide me reminders from time to time that tell me how much that is a lie, especially when I least expect it.
So, as I lay there in the fetal position, living in all my self-doubt and self-shaming, loathing my existence, I suddenly received a text. It’s 11:30pm! Who the heck is texting me this late I thought? I look down at my phone and saw it was from one of my sponsees from my 12 Step recovery work. As I looked closer at the message, I began thinking they might need help, hence the late contact. I was wrong.
On my phone was a single sentence.
“Andrew, I just want you to know you are loved and I am so thankful for you…”
Mind blown.
It’s in moments like this where I really know that God is real. That message could have come in any other time and I would have just discounted it. Responded with a simple thanks. And moved on.
I often think I don’t feel God’s presence because of how high my pain levels are on most days. Maybe that’s why God keeps giving me those occasional strange reminders of His presence from others because He knows the pain is preventing me from feeling Him within me. Regardless, it doesn’t matter, as I’m here to tell you today that while we all may be frustrated at the constant pain and suffering in our world these days, that there is Something listening, watching, caring, and doing things we usually don’t understand. And they often come in the oddest of ways. Truly, even in my darkest of moments, when my best (or worst) of thinking tells me I don’t matter or that I should just check out, something comes shining into my life, always reminding me, don’t give up, you are loved.
I wanted to share this today because I know so many of us are doubting right now. Doubting God. Doubting ourselves. Doubting if life matters. Doubting if our life matters. Life sure is messy at times, painful, and frustrating as well, but through all of it, please know these words today, they’re coming from my heart, because my soul was moved, all by an action that I know came from God through another.
Hopefully my words today can help bring you a little of God’s presence as I finish by saying…
I love you…
Peace, love, light, and joy,
Andrew Arthur Dawson
