refine me.

it has seemed as if many around me have begun relationships in the past semester. giddy thoughts toward a relationship that began quickly. late night conversations with a friend where questions are asked and thoughts pondered over her new relationship. so much is new. so much is unknown. so much is exciting and changing.

having never found myself in that exact place after twenty-one years - i sometimes dream, picture, and wonder what it may some day look like in my life.

a couple of weeks ago i was talking with a friend about this very thing. and something distinct and truthful she said stuck out to me. "savannah, there will never be another time in your life where you have as much freedom to go do and be as you do now in college, and shortly after college. the process started within you and being continued through you now in becoming a solid woman of God is exactly what your husband needs."

the refinement within is what my husband needs. a perspective i have never heard or thought about. refinement seems to be an unattractive process that we as people would rather avoid. painful and ugly is what we think of it most times. and yet it's what my husband needs?

beyond marriage relationships i think this truth stands on its own. the refining fire and continued denial of ourselves is what others need. lives lived transparently and wholeheartedly for something greater than ourselves so that others may see light in the midst of an over-whelming darkness. it's only then that we will love purely. deeply. and in abounds beyond ourselves.

refinement is not always for and about us. but in the midst of the hurt and stripping of ourselves that it calls for, we would rather deem ourselves to be a reckless mess or unattractive what-not.

teach me to delight in the fire.
teach me to see the beauty within.
that i may continue in a process of becoming a solid woman of God in order that others may be loved purely, as we have all been created to desire.