No One

Anxiety rises up like bile in the back of my throat. It is going to be one of those nights again; one of those nights when the fears threaten to overtake sleep.  Haven’t had many of those nights lately. They seemed to come frequently in my other life-you know, the life where I was a very important person.

It sounds funny-humiliating in its vanity-to think how important I thought I was. People depended on me every day. They were subject to my whims. My idiosyncrasies could change a pleasant day into one where things were not so pleasant. People’s jobs depended on how I felt about them. Yeah, me?!?

Time is different now. I have absolutely no influence on peoples’ jobs. There are only a handful of people who are impacted by my idiosyncrasies which are infinitely more manageable these days. I have gone from being a very important person to being …no one.

Except I’m not. Now, more than ever, I feel the burden of living differently. While my job does not impact giant numbers of people, it has great impact. As I fade further into the background, I am more and more able to reflect something so much greater than myself. The funniest part is that as much as I feel like I’m disappearing into something bigger than myself, I find that I am more me than I have ever been.  This dichotomy of Christianity keeps me busy for hours. I am the most important person in the whole universe to God and He doesn’t need me at all. I am all important and utterly unimportant. It is only through my relationship with Jesus that I become someone worth knowing. My relationship with Jesus has shown me that God, the Creator of the Universe, adores me. Because I am so loved, I am able to reach out to others and help them understand that they are the most important person in the universe.

The anxiety that threatens to rise in the back of my throat dissolves into shouts of exaltation.  Because He lives, I can face tomorrow. Because He lives, all fear is gone. He will finish what He has started in me and He will give me a new heart.  And I will fade into the background. I will become one of the great cloud of witnesses-nameless but beloved beyond measure-celebrating each lost sheep’s return and each saint’s victory. Living to serve because of His great love. Freely bound to my savior.