Ashes To Ashes

About a month ago my brother was in a car accident. He went off the road and hit a tree. I was studying for my art history exam when my mother called me. I was in the library. I almost didn’t answer her call because I needed to study and I was pretty sure I’d have a bad phone connection since I was in the basement. I still answered the phone. My mother’s voice sounded frail when she told me my brother had been in a car accident. Now this is a shocking sentence for anyone but you don’t know me and my brother. My brother, my only living #1 true best friend. I pushed my papers to the floor and stuggled to gather them. Within moments I was on my feet dashing toward the door. My mother told me he was in the hospital but that they didn’t know how bad he was hurt. I was scared. I really didn’t want to loose my brother.

One thing led to another and eventually I was able to see him. He looked, well, like he’d been in a car accident. His face was hurt on one side and there was glass in his hair. He had dried blood on him. I felt my heart hurt seeing him like that. I knew he was alive but I was still sad. Later I saw his car and the crash site and only then did I realize how close I really was to loosing my brother. In fact, I was so overwhelmed that it almost felt like I did loose him. All I wanted was to stick to his side like glue. If anything bad was going to happen to him it was going to happen to me also, but that didn’t work. I’ve tried to see him but he still hurts in ways I can’t simulate.

I’ve been struggling with God all my life. I never accepted him when I was younger. Even when I believed he existed I didn’t love him. I’ve been hurting about my past for so long that I became obsessed with myself. With my grief. I never stopped to think that God was making me into someone better. I never liked what happened and I will never like it but I’m happy that God made me who he has. He’s made me this way and that makes me happy. Because of everything I can appreciate life. I understand the pain of life and the sting of being a sinner. I know what it’s like to hate God so I know how others feel now. I don’t know what other’s lives have been like but I know anyone who does not love and accept God must have felt hurt by him at some point in their life. If that is not the case than I want to know what has made them refuse God.

That being said, I am on a roller coaster ride in my faith. I feel high highs and low lows and I don’t really know what to do but to just stay on the ride and try to enjoy the wind in my hair. When I heard my brother was hurt I felt a low low but when I heard he was ok I felt a high high. Once, a while ago, someone said to think about what we hold higher than God in our lives. Well, I tried to think there was nothing I held higher than God but then the person said this. What would you hate God for talking away from you? Without a stutter I thought of my brother. The one who has been by my side through all of my troubles and knows all of my secrets. The one who is the other half of all of my inside jokes. The one who led me to God.