Teacher, which of us will be the greatest?

There was a time, a little over two years ago, that I found myself driving up to Nashville in a van that didn't belong to me.  I didn't have any CDs with me, and my iPod's battery was dead.  I looked in between the seats and see a CD.  I put it in, and for the next three-and-a-half hours later, I listened to it on repeat all the way from Atlanta to Nashville.

That CD was by a band called As Cities Burn, and every song had me thinking about things.  The first song, in particular, talks about humility.  About what it means to give God our heart and try to steal it back and lay it at the feet of men.  It talks about reputation, surrender, and pain.

Every time I listen to that CD, I always think back to driving up 24-W and feeling the wind blow my face.  I think about the warmth of the air and the anticipation I had in my nerves.  I think about a simpler time where I knew what I wanted out of life.  I couldn't think past playing music. Everything was music.  

I feel like I've grown up so much since then.

Dreams are dead.  Emotion is only a balance between laughing sometimes and feeling empty most of the time.  Money is hard to come by.  Honesty is a memory.  Smiles are for hiding the pain instead of revealing a genuine feeling.

But, you know?  I've been thinking.  All this "growing up" has done me good.  I've realized that life isn't about solitary moments, during warm summer nights, driving from Atlanta through the mountains.  Life isn't about old dreams.  Life is about living.  And, by God, I'm alive!   

No matter how much I convince myself that things used to be better or that things will be better, there's no greater reality than to know that God loves me right now.  He loves me just as much as He did when I thought everything was perfect.  He loves me at my darkest.  

It is a joy to get a glimpse of the love of God.  It's the joy that makes me want to smile (and dance and love and sing and cry and serve...).  I love that God is not done working in me.  I don't care how much money I'll ever have or how hot my spouse will be... it truly is the love of God that pulls me into the direction of living.

A year after discovering As Cities Burn, the band I play with was able to tour with them for an entire month.  We would open for them, pack up, and I would sit and watch their set every night. 

Thank you, Lord.  You are good to me.