For you,

I feel like I have always been conscious of you.  I have never even considered that perhaps you don’t even exist. I just cannot fathom it. You have been more real to me than even the tangible world around me.  I think that the immediate suffering launched upon me at my very conception was an absolute gift.  It is as if the pain of the act that brought me life and the world awaiting me forced me to connect with you.  You must have gifted me with that knowing for it would give me purpose to live.  Knowing you were there, with me, in the darkness, was everything. It was enough.  I am not sure why you chose to reveal yourself to me so young, why you spoke to me in dreams, but I do know, that I know, that I know, you have always been there, you are with me now, and you will never leave me. When I die, I will be with you.  Who I am, cannot exist apart from you.  My very identity is weaved from your person.  And here is where I lament the life I have lived. Despite all the conviction, I still chose to live a life in rebellion. I chose to give my body to please men. I chose to become angry and bitter. I chose to hurt so many people I said I loved. I chose to pursue pleasure and sex over allowing your love to be enough for me.  I can make excuses and say that part of this is because of my incredible brokenness, which is true, but most of it, were clear choices I made.  It was one choice after another that led me further and further away from you.  It started with the pornography, and the sex, the cursing, the anger, the unforgiveness. The hole became deeper and deeper and deeper, until I couldn’t find you anymore.  I hid from your eyes, as Eve hid from you in the garden.  The deep comfort and intimacy of walking with you in obedience and faithfulness was replaced with the temporary satisfaction of fulfilling my wicked desires.  When I closed my eyes, instead of relishing your presence as I prayed, all I could do was beg for forgiveness over and over and not because I was sorry, but because I was terrified of hell.  That once confident child and teenager was a cowering and filthy mess.  Yet, you did not stop talking to me.  It is something that has taken me so long to understand. That relentless pursuit of what belongs to you! You still spoke to me in dreams. Through songs. I still felt you pull my heart to you.  I wanted to come to you so badly but I felt so unworthy.  But you kept calling to me.  You allowed me to break more. You allowed me to suffer more. But you did not leave me.  I didn’t always see the signs then, but when I look back now, they were everywhere.  How you love is not like how we love.  I have lived that reality.  I see you. In all of it.  Your whispering in my ear.  I ran away from the only love in my life that was ever pure.  You loved my soul, the very essence of me. Not my body, or my face, or my personality.  You loved me.  I failed to love you and yet you continued to love me.  And here we are after much healing and mush repentance, and much growth.  I think about you more and more the way I used to.  There is this aching desire to have deep intimacy with you. To walk with you.  To live my life bowed down to you. To feel your presence and hear your voice speaking to me.  I am just ready. I have already tasted this world’s offerings, and it is garbage.  Even the wonderful things do not satisfy fully. They leave a nagging emptiness.  What has satisfied my soul, is the only one who loves it, and that is you.  I long for things I know seem ridiculous to outsiders, like seeing you when I die.  I long to touch your hands. I long to worship at your feet and to sing to you. I long to talk to you and ask you questions about everything. I just want to look at you and contemplate every facet of your being.  I know when I look into your eye that I will be complete. That your work will be done. That you will be glorified.  Everything will make sense.  Until then, let us meet together. Everyday.  I will tell everyone of what you show me, what you say, and I will go where you lead me and do what you ask me to do.  This is surrender.  Only to you, lover of my soul.

-Sophia