Why me?

Since I was a very, very young girl, I remember thinking to myself that there was more to life than most people realize. Long before I was a believer, I felt in my soul that people were missing something and I did not want to be one of those people.

As I grew older, I began to find glimpses of this something more--of humanity's true potential--in the books I read. I became addicted to the stories that could transport me to another world. I identified with so many of the characters, especially their failings. Some books I would read over and over with again, praying that that character's strengths would somehow leak into my soul. I saw myself as a heroine. Indeed, for a long time, I could picture my life as some dramatic quest. Ordinary challenges like tough math tests or angry teammates were transformed into cosmic battles with ferocious dragons or clever ghouls. The trials I faced in this heroic journey were numerous and deadly, but always, I was sustained by a greater power and always, victory was reached at last.

More and more, I am beginning to feel that books like the Lord of the Rings, Chronicles of Narnia and A Voice in the Wind are so moving to me because there is more than a little truth to them. I believe that there is a great battle of good and evil that is going on all around us, though most of us are so unaware. In fact, this battle is even more important than the battle for Middle Earth or for Narnia. This battle is for the very souls of humankind. There are some people are indeed rising up to wage war against the enemy, but most like the hobbits of Tolkien's Lord of the Rings, would rather pretend or disbelieve the reality of the presence of this battle. And oddly enough, I feel like Frodo when he said to Gandalf
"I wish it need not have happened in my time,"
"So do I, and so do all who live to see such times. But that is not for them to decide. All we have to decide is what to do with the time that has been given us.

That is how I feel--that I am living in such dark times, where the battle around us in more intense than ever before because the enemy knows his end is near. But as this battle rages, I feel like I have been entrusted with something few have been entrusted with and I don't understand why. I think Frodo captures my cry when he said to Gandalf,

"Why did it come to me? Why was I chosen?"
"Such questions cannot be answered. You may be sure that it was not for any merit that others do not possess: not for power or wisdom, at any rate. But you have been chosen, and you must therefore use such strength and heart and wits that you have."

Oddly enough, Gandalf's remarks remind me of our Lord when declares that He chose us rather than we choosing Him and that He has chosen the foolish of the world to shame the wise and the weak to shame the strong. But unlike Frodo Baggins of the Shire, I can have the peace of knowing the end of the great battle in which I now fight.