Linking up with Five Minute Friday today. The word is:

Let me tell you a story.

Once there was this girl. She had a pretty good life. She had just bought her own house. She had a great job. She was young and in love. She even had an awesome dog, Norman, who was her soul mate with fur on.

And she really did think life was good. She went to Europe. Three times. She went white river rafting. Only once on that one. She volunteered and learned how to bake creme brulee and had fabulous parties and owned a shocking amount of really cute shoes.

She was set.

Every once in a while, however, the girl would wake up, around three in the morning, with a feeling of dread so cold in her chest that she thought she might just die. The dread sat on her chest. She would swallow and stare up at the ceiling. And then, following the dread came the really bad part:

She would feel empty.

It was a feeling like when you find a favorite old record, put it on, and wait for the music – that moment of waiting right before the sweet music fills the room. Except that the music never starts.

It was like that moment on the thrill ride right before the seat drops out from under you.

Like when you knock at a door of an old lover, hoping, yearning, leaning in to the desperate wish that he might answer the door.

And he doesn’t.

It was the deepest cold I have ever felt.

Oh yes, the girl was me.

And the longing at three am was Jesus knocking at my door. And waiting.

And waiting some more.

He waited 28 long years.

When I was a teenager I loved a song by U2 called “I Will Follow.” The angsty lyrics told us,

I was on the outside when you said
You said you needed me
I was looking at myself
I was blind, I could not see.

I like to listen to stuff like this now and transform the lyrics into a faith thing. I do that with nearly every song I know. It’s amazing when you can take “Yeah it’s pretty clear, I ain’t no size two, but I can shake it, shake it like I’m supposed to do,” into something about my walk with God, but I will try.

At any rate, that U2 song made me think of my ceiling, and me staring at it, at three a.m., while drowning. And then knowing that Christ followed. And followed. And was always willing to follow some more, even as I chose to walk away.

I was on the inside
When they pulled the four walls down
I was looking through the window
I was lost, I am found.

I am found. Thank You for following.