Path Forward - 24. I am Still Becoming

I Am Still Becoming

By Brandon Haines

I walk forward, but some days
I feel like I’m made of echoes —
pieces of who I was,
pieces of who I lost,
pieces of who I’m trying to be
all pulling in different directions.

There are mornings I wake up
and don’t recognize the man in the mirror.
Grief changed my reflection,
and identity became something
I had to rebuild from memory
and mercy.

But even when I’m lost,
He walks ahead of me —
steady, patient, clearing the path
I’m too afraid to take.

And when the questions rise,
the ones that whisper,
“Who am I now without you?”
and
“Where do I belong?”
and
“Why does the silence hurt so much?”
God folds His hand over the ache
and says,
“I’ve got this covered.
My child you don’t have to know everything yet.”

Still…
there are nights when the wondering wins.
Nights when the room feels too quiet,
and the memories feel too loud.
Nights when I miss the people
who shaped me,
and I ache for the version of myself
I might have been
if life hadn’t broken so many pieces.

Identity is a long road —
part faith,
part grief,
part wandering,
part becoming.

I am learning that I don’t have to be whole
to be held.
I don’t have to be certain
to be guided.
I don’t have to be finished
to be loved.

I am still becoming —
through the faith that walks ahead of me,
through the God who covers what I can’t carry,
and through the wondering
that teaches me who I am
one quiet night at a time.

The midnight river runs deep and wild,
and the questions still thrash against the shore.
I may still wonder, standing at the edge,
but I am no longer sinking.
For beneath the current of my heaviest grief,
His grace stretches out like a quiet bridge,
easing my mind,
holding my weight,
as we cross over into the morning