We sat Thursday night puzzling over his impossible words, angry almost at the leap he made into the fire, a leap we didn't know how to make ourselves and we sat there recounting the struggle, the suffering and it was easier then to list the hard things than it was to try the leaping.  It was hard to think about who He is in the midst of those moments and it was even harder to read Paul's response-- to see the word rejoice next to sufferings and death.

But how?

And now he is speaking to me here- now it is Saturday morning and the world is softer on a Saturday morning and I am ready, maybe.  Now he is firm and fierce teaching-- this is how to leap.  This is how to love Him in those moments:

But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining towards what is ahead, I press on... Our citizenship is in heaven and we eagerly await a Savior from there."  The Apostle Paul

Rejoice.