so very precious...

I see something so very precious in front of me, slipping away so fast.

I try to grab it, to hold it together, but it shifts and changes and, what I once knew it as, is gone.

We've been so close, spent so much time together... birthdays, parties, weekly gatherings.

Homes were opened to each other.

Meals were shared.

Hearts were opened to each other.

Tears and laughter were shared.

Now it's a new stage, a new place.

One unfamiliar.

The shape has changed and morphed over the years as it's needed to, slowly growing or shrinking to accommodate its members. Now it's changing again, but suddenly, at least more than ever before.

Still family.

But different.

Hurts and tears still there.

Hugs and comfort still there too.

But its all changed and changing.

What it was, what we were, is slipping away

lost in the past,

but what we are is yet unknown, other than

we are family.

God's changing us and breaking us out of the mold we have been in. We are all tired and need to stretch and straighten and work out the kinks come from being in one place for too long. But we still need each other, just differently.

It comes as a shock, seeing what I feared becoming reality.

But somehow, I know God is in it. He is doing something for all of us, and in all of us.

So something very dear and precious to me is slipping away.

But I know that God replaces good with better, and better with best. Always improving it. Always moving us upward and inward to His "best" He has for us.

So do we hang onto what we know, to what is familiar, or do we let go of this thing that has become so precious to us, and instead, grab onto God and make HIM the most precious thing to us?

Submitting to Him. Surrendering my plans. Letting go of what I love.

Then I can love Him more.

Then I can find Him to be my very all in all.

Then He becomes so very precious

- that when I grab on -

He doesn't ever slip away and disappear.