Friend, can I tell you this, without a clever anecdote or remarkable prose? Just truth from my heart to yours, as Ann says, “preaching Gospel to myself”?

You are not alone.

Although you might be lonely, you are not alone.

Although responsibility might overwhelm you until you think you might break, you’re not alone.

Although this battle might feel as though it’s solely on your shoulders, you are not alone.

Although you may wonder how you landed up in this pit one more time, you’re not alone.

For many years, a sheet of notebook paper hung on my fridge, on it, hand-written in red ink were the words my heart needed to hear until they were committed to memory:

When you go through deep waters, I will be with you.
When you go through rivers of difficulty, you will not drown.
When you walk through the fire of oppression, you will not be burned up; the flames will not consume you.
(Isaiah 43:2)

And what I needed to hear was that, when no one else could or would journey with me through the hard hard things, the creator of the universe had not left me alone. Despite myself. Despite my circumstances. There was this beautiful Grace that would not leave me to go forward alone.

It’s not if, but when, friend. Circumstances overwhelm. Life moves fast and threatens to take us down if we can’t keep up. Relationships combust and life gets harder than we ever thought possible.

At some point, somewhere, whether we ever tell anyone else, we all go through them, sometimes walking, sometimes crawling, but we do make it through.

We’re in this together. And you’re not alone.

Ellen