Belinda sat down on the couch and rubbed her head. Why, why, why she wondered, did she still have a headache? She had sleeped well, ate well, studied not to much, and had just had a peaceful walk home. She stubbornly pushed aside the thought that she might be coming down with something. It would go away. It had to go away. Life already felt too out of control, a few days in bed when she should be sorting things out would send it all over the edge.
Not that she hadn't had a wonderful day. That was the thing about Belinda. Despite headaches and frustration and the spinning sensation caused by so many thoughts- she almost always had good days. Greek, the dragon of first term- if not vanquished- was at the very least sulking in its cave. The classes were interesting, chapel had been the most entertaining of the year (go Benny!), and relationships were good. In fact on the relationships scales-nearly every day there had been a subtle shift as people moved from the side of aquantance to the side of friend.
But still there was uncertainty and Belinda for the most part hated uncertainty. The terms work still didn't fit in neat little columns in her mind- and every so often she had horrible preminitions of late nights trying to summarise books she hadn't had time to read. But it was the end of term four that really worried her. Almost everyday someone would ask- what are you doing next year? Continuing to study? And Belinda would smile a smile that only expressed a pinch of her real frustration and would say "Not sure really, sorry"
Every so often Belinda would think back to those conversations she has had- millions and trillions of conversations she had had with Christian women about uncertainty. Almost every women she had discipled had once heard it- because there is something about being a women and struggling with uncertainty. And Belinda would say the phrase that she loves because its true and she came up with it "God is as much in control when we know what's going to happen as when we don't".
And as she thought back to those conversations-she would try to take it on board, not because she should practice what she preaches, but because it's true. And then she would pray that God would help her trust him, trust him with her spinning heads and her work and her relationships and her headache and her future and her uncertainty. And she would ask his forgiveness for her lack of faith in his goodness and grace. How often she asked for this! And how comforting to know that there was never any such thing as too often!
Belinda smiled to herself, got off the couch and picked up her next assignment of the term. She began to read...
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