Commitment

You show up.

It could be work. It might be a date with a friend. Maybe it's your kids or family.

There were a thousand other things you could have put in that spot. Maybe a hundred other things you would have rather done at that moment. It took all your resolve to get there. You had to muscle through a thousand negative feelings. You mentally fought through the weariness, the dread, or the despair. It's not even that you don't want to be there for that person or your job; it's just that you're not there: Your mind, your heart, your body, your emotions - everything is being held hostage elsewhere.

But you show up.

You're just about to pat yourself on the back for your efforts. This isn't so bad. You chasten yourself. Of course, you can do this. Straighten that backbone, you tell yourself -

And that's usually when it happens.

Your coworker strolls in and hands you an insult, on the sly. Just a little tidbit from the other coworker down the hall they 'thought you should know', but your heart sinks.

Your child says they 'hate' you because you didn't get the thing they wanted the moment they wanted it. It's going to be a rough night.

Your friend suddenly admits that they sort of resent you. They've been mad at you - you hear - while you've merely been trying to survive.

Your pastor smartly assesses all of your surface level 'issues', as you stand (proverbially) naked wondering if he ever knew you at all.

This is hard.

Someone or something is getting your all. Your ALL. The very best of you. All your loyalty, all your hope, all your vision, all your efforts, all your empathy, energy, and work. Where is your sanctuary? Where are those who promised to give 'all' for you?

You'd settle for someone who just didn't further injure or insult you on the bad days - the days you had nothing leftover to give.

Commitment? Promise? Loyalty? Those are big words. Painfully, they will demand just as much from you when you're flat broke as when you're feeling high in the kites. Regrettably, your own struggle to show up will be hidden from their view. And, it seems, when you are most in need of comfort or help on the deepest of levels, they will betray instead...

Your dearest friends will fall asleep in the garden of faithfulness and deny they knew you in the courtyard of trial...

There will even be times to cry out, "Abba!", and wonder why even your Maker has gone silent. Times when the wind does not blow. Times when you'd give anything to hear his footsteps again in the garden.

Commitment.

It is always a two-way street, so let's continue to show up.