Three steps forwards, two steps back, and songs of redemption…

The status updates tell the story. Whispered honesty into cyberspace. "Three steps forwards and two steps back today." And through the cyber lines, encouragement whispered back…"right there with you! Praying for you!" My love/hate relationship with Facebook has suddenly turned to an intense like of the platform. Without it, I find myself wondering what my last week would have looked like. (And for those curious, most of my posts on the blog here lately were pre-written before baby arrived and published as I get a chance to look them over.) A few blogging friends and I managed to deliver with in hours or days of each other. On Facebook we suffered the vagaries of late term pregnancy together (the late nights, the heartburn, the pain, the false contractions). We all watched with bated breath for the birth announcements posted by husbands, and then, as this week has come on, we've prayed each other through grandmas and help leaving and husbands going back to work as we transition into a new "normal". It has been my lifeline, this collection of bits and bytes on a server somewhere…this near real-time connection to other walking the journey with me. Without them, I would not remember to go slowly and be patient with myself.

I've gone back and forth over the last three years of blogging about the whole idea of the internet community. At times I've struggled with what I realized to be an addiction- spending hours in front of the screen, shooing my children from the keyboard, absolutely absorbed in others lives when I should have been living my own. I've known the love of this community as prayers and emails poured in after I lost a baby last year- I had no idea how many people out there cared, how many were listening. I've watched drama unfold between bloggers over things that had no business being aired over the internet in the first place. I realize now that it is truly a balancing act.

Yet, I cannot deny what a gift this community is. As I've worked on the Cardboard Testimony project, I've dwelt with the stories of my spiritual brothers and sisters at Grace- messy, redeeming stories that seem to spill out just as the paint covers my hands, leaving a mark on my soul.  Their stories of redemption have become a part of me. So it is too with this blogging and internet community, from High Calling to Facebook. Community, fellowship, and support in a medium unheard of even ten years ago. Stories of loss, stories of triumph, stories of grace…what was once just electronic impulses have turned into songs of redemption whispered through- and I hear them. I hope you hear them too. 

Needless to say, I've entered into a new time in my life, a time of transition yet again. I don't know what this means for my blogging here. I might post a lot. I might post very little. I do know that I'll keep listening to the whispered songs. 

This is my tiny little song, whispering thanks and love, grace and peace.

—-

Related:

The Friday Five (Andrea @ The Flourishing Mother)

Thoughts from Recovery (Aimee @ Living, Learning, and Loving Simply)

Read the Writing on The Wall (Ann @ Holy Experience)~ Isn't this what we do as a community? Stitching together grace in the midst of devastation?