Everthing

There's this song by Lifehouse called "Everything" that I cherish deeply. Not because of the skit that every church from one side of the world to the other has silently acted out while the song plays in the background (truth be told: I've never actually seen it...). The first time I remember hearing it was after my freshman year of college at Camp Sooner in Oklahoma when I was on camp teams for the school. It was the first week of what would be a long summer. I was young, self-conscious, and in such a spiritually dry place at this time that I just felt useless. At the time there was unrest in my heart about a boy I thought I was falling in love with, who could never love me back. God was silent and had been silent for so long that I thought he had given up on me. This emptiness that pervaded my heart was almost unbearable. It felt like I was drowning and there was no one who knew how to save me.

The band played that song for worship one night and I just stopped. Life stilled around me as the words of the song chipped away at the anchor that was dragging me down. Every word they were singing sounded like it came from the words my soul didn't even know how to speak. "How can I stand here and not be moved by you?" My heart was beating again. For but a fleeting moment God tapped me on the shoulder to show me that he had been walking behind me the whole time, just waiting for me to turn around.

Literally every time I hear that song I feel like I'm 19 again and in a world of hurt. I can still feel the war that waged inside of me. It's such a bitter moment in my life but remembering it is sweet. I still have these dry seasons because I can still convince myself that I can rely on my strength alone. How soon I forget all that I've been through, all the lessons I've learned, and who I've needed most through it all.