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FIRST PERSON: 'I love God with all the ways I can love'

By Mirna Mortada

Special to the Independent Tribune

Published: February 6, 2009

You make me weak in the strongest way; you raise me up when I am in the lowest gutters of life.
I love how you make me feel so invincible, so powerful, like I am experiencing the strongest form of ecstasy on earth.
I love you as much as a mortal can love.
You are the only one who hears my pain, without me saying a word, and feels my tears streaming down my heart like a water fall. And, yet, you keep sending me your angels to bless me, to keep me company and assure me that the blessing is the struggle.
Your untouchable presence leaves me numb, so emotionally and physically paralyzed with the strongest feeling of hope.
They ask me how can you love Him if you cannot see Him, or touch Him, but the faith that you have put in my heart is so great that it can take down the greatest empires of misery, pain, war, hate and racism.
To thank you is impossible, because nothing I may offer is enough to show you my gratitude.
I love how you make me feel the rush of this life after I've seen the bitterness of it. I love how the words of your support whispers in my ear, so beautiful that Mozart failed to compose such beauty of melody.
I am not perfect, I know, but for you, I strive to be. You are where I can fall back, the only one I can trust. It's funny how we turn to mortals like us and hope to find ourselves, when we forget the Lord who made us, created us from dust, can complete us.
Seeing you around me, feeling the tears of your skies, sensing the power in your oceans, brings me peace of mind.
Seeing you in the trees makes me fall on my knees and bow in amazement. They ask me what do you see. I tell them I see beauty, peace, serenity, forgiveness and love. I see you everywhere.
I am sure you all have an idea about how I feel now.
When you're alone in a room full of people, when your heart is screaming and pounding so loud, yet no one can hear you.
When you feel like you're the only one feeling this way, do you start wondering what is wrong with you? You become a prisoner in your our own jail that you've created.
With bars of excruciating pain, the disease of disbelief starts to take over you, you feel the only cure is to run away. You know by running away, you are just postponing your problems, but you still run, anyway.
Hopeless is the feeling you have, struggling through the day to reach your night, so you can flee, becoming a fugitive from this cold world you have created around you.
You sleep to numb your pain, hoping it will go away.
You keep going alone, down this road, and you realize that it's your choice.
You either can sentence yourself to life in prison or wake up stronger, with stronger faith in God.
Hopefully, you will realize beauty of this life is all around you, and all you have to do is look around and believe.
I know it gets hard at times. Things can be unbearable; always remember, "God does not burden a soul with more than it can carry."
I love God with all the ways I can love.
I love God for giving me His blessing to see, love, live, breath, think, dream, believe and believe He is my Lord and is the most beautiful, pristine and real Lord.
I thank God for giving me the power to see that love lies behind hate, serenity is right behind misery. It's my choice to believe it is there.
Sometimes you can't see certain things, but you know they do exist. It's just like the wind. You can feel it, but you cannot see it or touch it.
One thing you can be sure of, without a doubt: It does exist.
• Mirna Mortada is a 18-year-old college student, majoring in architecture, and a native of Beiruit, Lebanon. Contact her at mirnazzzz@hotmail.com

Editor's note
• This column is the first in an occasional series from readers on what their spirtuality means to them. To submit an essay for publication, keep it less than 600 words and e-mail it to Managing Editor James Bennett at jbennett@independenttribune.com.