Dating: When We Are Weak God Is There

1998/1999 ish
names have been changed in this post 

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“I...I don’t know what to say…” I stammered, completely caught off guard by his coarse emotions and anger at me. It was like he wasn’t even willing to wait for me to gather up my thoughts so I could speak. He wasn’t willing to be patient for me to begin. And yet in that I didn’t even know where to begin. At what point? How I felt for him? Or should I begin with my past in high school? I had no idea. I was suddenly so very overwhelmed by how much I needed to tell him. It was enough to write a book. Where does a person even begin who has so much to reveal?

He gave me one last frustrated dark glance and went to his SUV, climbing behind the wheel. Flustered, I used my key to unlock my apartment door, and I went inside. I leaned against the door crying, completely frustrated at what had just transpired. It was all so unnecessary, I cried. Then there was a knock on the door. It was Jeremy. I opened it and he handed me a yellow balloon from the restaurant he’d taken for me earlier that evening. He handed it to me saying I’d forgotten it and I took it, letting the long white string rest between two fingers. Yet I mentally cursed the balloon. I didn’t give a shit about the balloon. I wanted him to calm down and communicate without barking at me. Jeremy looked at me under the dim porch light and seeing my water rimmed eyes, tear soaked face spoke, “Why are you crying?!” he asked, his tone more forceful than gentle questioning.

I shook my head unable at that point to speak. I began sobbing and just so completely disappointed in his behavior coupled with being frustrated and disappointed in my lacking abilities to having opened up to him about myself and my past, and not even knowing where on earth to begin, I refused to discuss it any further that night. If he would just calm down, I kept thinking. I wanted to tell him, “Jeremy, please come in and relax maybe we could talk….” but he was so impatient, so ready to flee the scene and I didn’t have the ability to keep him there. It was as if he’d already made up his mind it was all over. “Why are you crying?!” he asked again, this time louder and visibly angry at me. I wanted to run and just cover my hands over my head, bury my face in a pillow and pretend all of this wasn’t happening.

I shook my head and whispered “ Nothing,” I faltered, “I’m really upset.” I admitted to him. 

“Yeah! Me too! I can’t do this anymore!” he snapped and retreated to his vehicle. Getting in, he drove off into the now tapering rainfall, his tail lights never braking. I went inside, as if in a trance crossing the living room and walked to the couch where I sat down. Taking a seat on the edge of it, the moonlight streaming in through the slits in the mini blinds, I released the string to the yellow balloon in my small fingers and it sailed to the ceiling as I began sobbing uncontrollably. 

Oh My God, this wasn’t happening, I cried. I was losing him.

It was all over. He was gone. 


When we are dating and we have a past that we haven't addressed and dealt with there may be feelings of shame. If we haven't worked through the shame from our past and healed ourselves to a healthy place it is very difficult to move forward into a healthy relationship with someone. If we are dealing with residual issues from the past then they will likely creep into our present affecting our interaction with the one we are interested in. Perhaps we hold back. We don't give all of ourselves in sharing our past and life experiences. I don't believe it's impossible to move into a healthy relationship without addressing our past but it's definitely not without challenges. 

It requires an inordinate amount of patience from the other person in the relationship.  It also requires the person with the hidden past to feel as if they can open up to the other one. If we don't have both it may very well not work. 

But the truth is.... I beat myself up for years for not opening up during that time in my life. I had wanted that relationship to grow into something bigger. I felt certain it could have become something more beautiful. There were so many feelings and words left unsaid. The regret and self imposed resentment toward myself grew to enormous proportions. But as the years went by I began praying and praying about it and asked for peace, clarity and a healthy view of it. 

I finally got the clarity I needed. I had cursed myself for years for the weakness I had shown during that time and the shame from my past I had allowed to take over during that relationship. However, we can't expect perfection of ourselves. We falter, we mess up, we don't always handle everything as perhaps we would if there were no scars, speckled pasts and skeletons. It's nothing to be ashamed of. But regret can eat away at us like a poison and eventually we have to address it and heal from it. We just have to remember that we handled it the best we could based on where we were in our life progress at the time. We can hold our heads up and know our great worth and value in God's eyes. He has seen everything we have been through...the good, the bad and the disappointments. 

We can take great delight in knowing that God knows where we are right now. He sees the progress. When we look back and see moments of weakness it's nothing to be ashamed of. We can look to now and see the strength we have and rejoice that God is always beside us in our walk in life... in the weak moments, in our strength and everything in between. 


For when we are weak...

Then we are strong. 

© gps-gracepowerstrength.blogspot.com ~ 2013 

“For the sake of Christ, then, 
I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, 
persecutions, and calamities. 
For when I am weak, then I am strong.” 

 ~ 2 Corinthians 12:10 

He gives strength to the weary and increases the power of the weak 

- Isaiah 40:29 NIV 1984

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