action movies

One of my favorite conversations I ever had with Emmett occurred just a few months into our marriage.    We were poor newlyweds, and he was in graduate school, so date nights usually consisted of watching a movie at home with dinner.  Emmett was in charge of picking out the movie, so after a few weeks of bringing home romantic comedies, he finally asked if I had any preferences.  I said something along the lines of, "Can you please get an action movie?  I don't think I can watch another romantic comedy.  I might shoot myself."  If Emmett hadn't already been in love with me before that comment, he certainly was after that comment.  The look in his eyes was priceless, and his voice trembled slightly as he asked, "I was getting romantic comedies because I thought you liked them.  You  mean, you like action movies?"  Being the sweet wife I was, I'm sure I responded with something like, "How could you not know that I don't like romantic comedies, we've only been dating for five years?"  Date nights after that were much more fun.

I was reminded of that conversation this morning at the Y while watching some random action movie while working out.  I process while I write, so in thinking about last night's post, I felt I didn't capture the weightiness of God pressing down on me in quite the right light.  In the sweet time I had with some friends the other night, they were asking what they could do to help, and I realized that I am not communicating well what it means to have burdens upon burdens heaped on your shoulders by God.  Isn't he supposed to relieve our burdens?  Isn't the yoke of Christ easy and his burden light?

Yes.

But.

When God clearly calls me to a life that is a life I can barely handle even when stripped of all details like cleaning and grocery shopping, when he opens my eyes to the warfare that sin is raging with my soul and the destruction sin causes in my life, when God heaps failure upon failure on my head until I feel tiny and worthless - in these things God is being very intentional to sanctify me.  And all the meals and sweet notes and "bless your heart" comments are nice, but I am exactly where God wants me to be, and I can honestly say I wouldn't choose to be anywhere else.  No matter how hard it gets.  I'm finally understanding Hebrews 11:

All these people were still living by faith when they died. They did not receive the things promised; they only saw them and welcomed them from a distance, admitting that they were foreigners and strangers on earth. People who say such things show that they are looking for a country of their own. If they had been thinking of the country they had left, they would have had opportunity to return. Instead, they were longing for a better country—a heavenly one. Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God, for he has prepared a city for them.

So I guess I fell like my life is an action movie.  You cannot really see the blood and gunfire and wrestling and running and car chases in my soul, but the intensity is there with all the wonderful emotional and physical drama to boot.  Maybe that is why I love a good action movie because it feels like my life.  And I kind of want to go chase something or jump out of a plane right now.  But only kind of.