I am learning that when I hide myself in Christ like a child in his mother’s shoulder, He fights for me and gives me the courage to say and do things I might otherwise feel unworthy or incapable of doing. With Him holding me, I can be truly fearless, because I know the full weight of His love stands with me.

I don’t think everyone struggles in the way some of us do, the way that makes us do things like marry someone we know will be unkind because we don’t think we deserve kindness (which in a way is true but that’s an entirely different post). Many people struggle to see others as equally valuable; my dad posted a challenge on Facebook to view people as as one views oneself instead of objects in the world. I imagine many people have difficulty seeing others as whole, entire beings unto themselves.

People like me are not immune to valuing people too little; I’ve had moments of total horror looking back and realizing I had no clue who served me at the drive thru window or, worse, let my mom go home from watching Littlefoot without making eye contact with her even once. I can be selfish; I’m not saying that people who struggle in the particular way that I do aren’t selfish. We are, but our selfishness comes out differently.

My selfishness may come out in staying up late to help my friend edit her school paper, because I can’t be “that person” who promises to do something and doesn’t do it. I selfishly withhold constructive criticism because I fear rejection. I selfishly give my time, effort, and energy to others instead of doing the real work of giving it to God. A person might look at my life and see a giving person, but I can look at my heart and see a person so utterly selfish. That is why I turned to Christ in the beginning.

When I was a teenager, I was the model student and obedient child. I don’t think anyone would have looked at me and been able to point out a sin. The attempts one brave boy at my high school made to walk me through the ten commandments proved a total failure. He tried to “get me” with the commandment to “have no other gods before Me”, but since I claimed no god he couldn’t even catch me with that one. I know so much better now than I did then what those commandments really mean and, Lord help me, I’ve broken more than I’ve kept in my life — even and especially that first one.

But I didn’t turn to God because I saw that I was doing anything wrong. I turned to God because I knew in my heart that I was exhausted from trying to do everything right. I came to God seeking relief, because I knew I was selfishly doing all the good I could to be good, but no matter how hard I tried, I was never good enough.

God has been so very gracious to me, from that first day sitting on my futon-bed with the book of John open on my lap from a Bible lent to me from the church I started attending out of an almost irreverent curiosity.

In some ways I feel like that moment of accepting Christ as Lord was not even close to the high point of my Christian experience. I don’t look back at the moment as “the day everything made sense” or “the moment I found a love I would never forget” or any of that. The further down the narrow road I walk, the more I see that moment as a child must view his own birth, if he could ever remember it. My birth in Christ did not complete me; it only began the completion that I will one day see in glory.

And a large part of the work God has done in me to is to relentlessly show me my worth. He knows what we need, so much more than we do. For years I thought I needed to be more holy (and I do), but He was so much more concerned with making sure I knew He loved me. He was so intent on this that He worked all my attempts at righteous living into one huge refuse pile only good for one thing: lighting ablaze and walking away.

It is easy to use romantic language and make it all sound so desirable, to just “light it up and walk away” as if anything in life involving fire is less than devastatingly destructive. I don’t recommend my path to anyone. Avoid it, if you can. But to deny that God made beauty rise out of ashes is to forget the very nature and character of God.

So, I’m learning that my worth comes from God. And I’m learning that when I find my worth in Him, I don’t have to worry about how others treat me. And I find that I am brave enough tell someone when they’ve hurt me. But I am still learning, because I still fret over how I communicated something recently; was I too harsh? Should I not have been hurt? If left to myself, I would conclude that nothing should hurt me because I should have no “self” to hurt. What nonsense is that!

God alone gives me the correct perspective: while He alone deserves all the honor, glory, and praise, yet He is the “lifter of my head” and He “rejoices over me with singing” and He loves me.

He loves me, He loves me, He loves me.

Sandra J. would be so proud.

Very true quote 🙂

Isn’t it funny how one little article can bring up emotions that just yesterday seemed dead and gone for good (finally)?

Isn’t it funny how things that happened years ago can be recalled with more clarity than they were lived?

It takes more courage than people realize for a person to admit they were abused. A person will do anything she can to avoid saying those words, “I let someone treat me like their own personal pet.” Because we know, we don’t doubt for a minute, that we let it happen. We blame ourselves, because a person with any conscience at all just can’t fathom that anyone would treat someone so poorly with no provocation whatsoever. I must have done something to earn this, we think. Abusers don’t go after people who refuse to internalize other people’s bullshit.

Did I let it happen? Maybe. Was it my fault? No. I’m so far past that internal conflict. I don’t worry about what it says about me that I let someone walk all over me for three years and then discard me when I was starving myself to death, insane with grief and guilt. There’s an entire story behind the guilt I bore that doesn’t belong right here, right now, but it’s pertinent to say that the guilt I bore was not without grounds.

What haunts me is the memories, because while I lived those moments I was so far removed from my own self that I didn’t really feel it. I have tried to forget a lot of it. But, one little article and the stinging rebuke I received when I was wrestling with whether or not my marriage could be saved, from the pastor that performed the wedding with my ex, comes rushing back. The article is right: if a person is in an abusive relationship, they don’t need couples counseling; they need healing from the abuse. Couples counseling will only reinforce the message they get loud and clear from their spouse: my feelings matter; you’re just as guilty; I’m just trying to make this work. And of course the pastor who performed the wedding was a pastor of my ex’s, quick to defend him and even more quick to dismiss my concerns as an attempt to blameshift. “Remember your vow,” he told me as I sat in the car I had to finance since my ex drove off with ours, tears streaming down my face and absolute terror coming over me as I contemplated a future with the person who had done things to me that I can’t even talk about.

But the memories are clear now, and I don’t want to forget that I spent three years sleeping with my hands clenched in fists so tight that I woke up with nail imprints in my palms every morning. I don’t want to forget that I dreaded weekends. I don’t want to forget that I rehomed, not one, but two pets (one whom I loved dearly since I was twelve) because I believed they deserved a better home — but I didn’t believe I deserved as much as I was willing to give those animals.

. . .

I have a puppy now, and I look at him and know that I’ll never doubt if he has a good enough home. I will never doubt that my children have enough love. I may face hardship and Love and I may disagree or have dry spells, but I can look into his eyes and know that I will never have terror or dread at the thought of a future with him. That may not sound like much, but when I remember those years I’d like to forget it sounds pretty amazing to me that I’ll never doubt my puppy has a good home.

Toddler momentarily pacified by resting on my hip, I pulled my cart to the conveyor belt. A kind lady saw my cart full of groceries and asked if I needed any help. Reflexively I replied, “No thank you,” and cheerfully went about unloading my cart one item at a time, swaying my hips as though dancing to keep Littlefoot entertained.

This wasn’t a particularly memorable event for me, except for the song that came on the radio during our short drive home: I want to live every day as though it’s the last day of my life. (I can’t find the song online; if I do I’ll come back and link it.)

I’m driving, barely pacified toddler in the backseat, thinking about how this morning might look differently if it were my last day. And that tiny moment in time stood stark in my memory. What would it have costed me to accept a little bit of help? How was I helping her by denying her the ability to help? How would this moment in time be eulogized?

And I realized during my drive home from the grocery store today that I don’t want to be eulogized as the woman who never asked for help. Taking pride in the fact that I don’t need anyone’s help is foolish at best, more likely rebellious.

Maybe next time someone asks if they can help, the more Christian answer would be, “Yes please, that would be a tremendous blessing to me.”

Lord help me have that answer ready next time. Starting with You.

Parents…. we ask our kids to slow down, to grow a slower, please, don’t you know you’re breaking my heart?

Kids… they can’t slow down. They don’t know how.

But we can. Let the washing wait, take that sick day, get off your phone.

Slow. Down.

If I don’t write about this I am going to explode.

For we know that the Law is spiritual, but I am of flesh, sold into bondage to sin. For what I am doing, I do not understand; for I am not practicing what I would like to do, but I am doing the very thing I hate. But if I do the very thing I do not want to do, I agree with the Law, confessing that the Law is good. So now, no longer am I the one doing it, but sin which dwells in me. For I know that nothing good dwells in me, that is, in my flesh; for the willing is present in me, but the doing of the good is not. For the good that I want, I do not do, but I practice the very evil that I do not want. But if I am doing the very thing I do not want, I am no longer the one doing it, but sin which dwells in me.

I find then the principle that evil is present in me, the one who wants to do good. For I joyfully concur with the law of God in the inner man, but I see a different law in the members of my body, waging war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin which is in my members. Wretched man that I am! Who will set me free from the body of this death? Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, on the one hand I myself with my mind am serving the law of God, but on the other, with my flesh the law of sin.

Therefore there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has set you free from the law of sin and of death. For what the Law could not do, weak as it was through the flesh, God did: sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and as an offering for sin, He condemned sin in the flesh, so that the requirement of the Law might be fulfilled in us, who do not walk according to the flesh but according to the Spirit. (x)

I’ve read Romans many times, but I confess I have not read it as one cohesive letter more than once or twice, and neither of those times did the context of Romans 8:1 jump out at me as it did this morning as I rushed to complete my Bible study lesson before tonight’s meeting.

We’ve been studying this letter for a few months now, and I think it’s the depth of study that has slowed me down enough to really grasp how Paul is building up to this great crescendo of Grace. And what verse in the Bible shows more grace than Romans 8:1? Therefore there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. Yet all these years, though I’ve loved that verse and held onto it when I felt myself slipping into the mire of guilt, I somehow always thought of it as coming after some exposition of our justification with God through faith.

This verse does not come after the gospel message at all — nowhere in the preceding verses does Paul talk about the miracle of our identification with Christ through His death, burial, and resurrection. The entirety of the preceding two paragraphs before this life-giving verse is all about our very real and practical battle with sin, and why it is now a battle and not our identity.

In essence, we know that we are no longer under condemnation because we struggle with sin! We can be assured of our salvation when we wrestle and fight and cry out to God: wretched man that I am!

And while this may seem like an argument in favor of living a defeated life, it is so far from that; rather, this is an argument for living a life that is constantly seeking death to the flesh that wars against our new desire to please Christ. May we never grow so comfortable in our sin that we stop thinking we are at war with it. And may God’s grace be so evident to us that we cry out with gratitude for Jesus winning that final war, giving us confidence that this battle will not go on into eternity.

And may we take heart that as we struggle, we are confirming this truth: there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.

There is a beautiful illustration that’s been around for ages about how life is like a tapestry, and on this side of Heaven we only get to see the underside — all the seams and strings. We don’t get to see the beautiful topside that God sees and is creating. It really is a beautiful idea, to think that where we see chaos, God sees what He’s making of it. It can be a relief to see all this as happening outside of our control, this big beautiful blanket woven around us.

But, what about those ugly seams we see and want to erase because Lord help me, that was me who cut that jagged piece? A tapestry is all God’s design, completely out of our hands, and while it’s comforting to think that we had no part in it, we see with painful clarity at times how untrue that is.

I’ve seen how painfully untrue that is for me. And as I consider the wounds I’ve inflicted and the damage I’ve caused, I feel like a child with dark crayon in hand — my clumsy, sweaty fingers grasping and pressing down as hard as I can. I let the wax build in dark, wide, ugly swatches. I seek to ruin; my heart is fixed on destruction. I don’t stop at paper’s edge; I mark the table, the chairs, the wall. I’ve done this in my life; I have left my angry mark on every last inch.

And it is easy to look on, after the emotion swell has receded, aghast at the ugliness I’ve made. It is easy to conclude that I have ruined it all, that my only hope is for God to wipe it all clean and start over, if that’s even possible. It is easy to drown in despair at the ruins, because there is no denying I did this.

This is where I found myself when I began to see the most beautiful thing. Instead of a tapestry — far above my head, out of reach, and untouchable — I saw Heaven come down to all that ugly mess I’d made. And I watched as out of the ugliest of streaks and blotches, He made art. Where I thought I had ruined everything, He used the tools only He has to shape and stretch and recolor marks made with anger and malice. He took the very things I used for destruction and made them beautiful.

But this is what struck me, as I stood there with dark crayon in hand, eyes wide and brimming with tears of awe, gratitude, and reverence. He did not take the crayon out of my hand. As He, humming joyfully, worked with the marks I swore I’d never make again, He nudged me to draw a little more, a little better this time, like this. He knew I would make these marks, even though it was not His decision. He was not surprised. And He was not upset with me for marking, only calling me to draw better.

And this is the beauty and the weight of this life, that we are constantly marking. We are drawing as we go, and we have a choice of how we draw. But this is not our drawing, it is God’s. And I used to think the best I could do is to tread lightly and shine brilliantly for God, but He did not create us for this. Creator God formed us in His image — and so we create. We draw. We mark. On His canvas. And He takes those marks we make and incorporates them into a drawing of which we can only see a tiny portion now. He picks up the bits and pieces we scratch out in our passion and the doodles of our absentmindedness, and He uses them.

Many times He so alters our work we cannot even pick it out from His greater design, and we thank Him in breathless wonder for His perfection, the way He knows so much better than we do. But ever so rarely, we draw in just the right shape and color, in  just the right spot. and we watch with awestruck humility as God uses our little doodle just as we drew it. One day, possibly long into eternity, when the canvas is complete and all the Saints gather round to see what God has done, I hope to hear God say, “And this is where my child drew, and it was just what I imagined should go there.”

How do I say this? For the first time in a long time, I am not dissuaded from writing by the realization that writing cannot be my refuge.

Writing has been a refuge for me for as long as I could write. I have turned to the blank page as my confidant and impartial listener. I’ve written prayers and plans. I’ve scribbled my life sucks in permanent marker and drawn hearts the next day. I’ve scratched out (terrible) poems and jotted random ideas. Made lists. Raged in a way that I think I know has scared people. The blank page has been the place I could go to sort out my feelings and understand myself a little better — for years. So many years. Years represented by books upon books filled with words upon words.

I’ve gone through so much that has pushed writing to the margins for me, made me doubt my own voice — a scary thing for someone who identifies as a “writer”. And I’ve even passed off my silence as spiritual. I can’t see why God would have me write. I’ve seen this process of tapping out words as selfish, self-indulgent, an escape. And maybe it has been at times. But it’s also a way to testify to this Christ who I forget so often is not real to so many people. In all I write, whether its theme is particularly spiritual or not, is this thread of grace.

I’m not ever going to be a Christian blogger. I don’t have my life together enough to hold up as any kind of example, and I’m not into handing out cute little life lessons packaged as blog posts. This type of writing is inspirational and I am an avid reader of these types of blogs. They are like a soulful oasis in a desert of snark and sass. But it’s not me. And maybe, I’m finally realizing, that’s okay.

Because writing is not my refuge, I can write from a place of refuge. There is freedom in placing my heart in the right hands. When I rush to the blank page in search of healing, I do find a shadow of that substance. Something vaguely resembling healing comes out of putting words to the jumble of feelings in my mind. But it’s a short-lived experience; I must come back again and again, rehash the same things over and over. When I run to Christ, He has a way of settling things.

And tonight, He has settled something that has left me unsettled for years: why to write at all.

On this day in 2011, I shared a song on Facebook that I was enjoying at the time. I hesitated clicking on that link. I have a lot of oppressive memories of that time in my life. Cringing when I heard the familiar gravel of a voice that used to intrigue me, I almost closed out of that window. But I hesitated, because the mellow guitar intro had somehow brought me back to a time before . . .

Before the disappointment swell, before the rock bottom, before the loss of purpose, before the loss of identity — long before. Those days when I was fighting sin with fire and force, when I breathlessly contemplated an entire life of self-sacrifice. I swear I got high on the thought that I could be like Mother Theresa, only to my family and friends — arguably a more noble sacrifice than giving to strangers.

I had moved my mom and best friend into a rental house on a better side of town and I had started college, and with a little extra from my students loans I bought a Mac. I had a corner desk unit that tucked nicely into the space at the foot of my bed, a futon I set on cinder blocks. I would slide the plastic accordion door closed to my basement bedroom and write for hours — posting on Livejournal, writing for school assignments, writing in whatever text editor program Mac had at the time.

And on that Mac, I had so much music. This is back when it was always better to download or burn music than to find it on Youtube and stream it. Remember buffering? Remember hitting the “pause” button and watching that little bar inch its way across the screen, trying to figure when it would be alright to push “play” so that it wouldn’t stop in the middle of the song? Remember when Netflix was a DVD service?

I’m old.

But I would sit there, typing stream of consciousness and making all these plans of how I was going to be this Better Person, and I would listen to Relient K and Third Day and Casting Crowns.

And this song I shared on Facebook back in 2011, just a year before I found myself doing the Worst Thing, it reminded me of this time three years earlier.

This time when I was wounded but trying to figure things out, hadn’t written myself off yet, still thought that with the right influences I could be “good”. And I guess that part of it is really bittersweet, because if I could go back I would have to tell this girl that she’s not ever going to be the saint she daydreams about. I’d have to tell her that this song she likes, about how God has always loved her, says infinitely more about God than it does about her. And although I know she wouldn’t listen, I would have to tell her that if she keeps fighting to conform to this image she’s crafted for herself of the Ideal Woman, she will not only fail but she will burn a lot of people in the process.

And despite all this, the words still hold true:

Don’t you know I’ve always loved you,
even before there was time
Though you turn away I tell you still
Don’t you know I’ve always loved you
And I always will.

I keep telling myself I will devote a few minutes every evening to writing. Yet, after the 45-50 minute drive home amongst people who I’m fairly sure have malevolent intent and the bittersweet thirty minutes of time with my toddler and dinner and the cleanup after dinner I wonder how all these people manage to do it all — have a career and a family and not have piles of laundry and scary sinks and rooms that we just don’t go in because we’re not ready to face THAT, not yet, it’s too much.

Writing seems pretty self-indulgent when it’s 8pm and I’m realizing that I haven’t scrubbed toilets in about a month and I’m half-awake (don’t rub your eyes! yuck! dammit now you have to wash your face when you’re done too) working on chipping away at the layers of neglect.

I’ve been told that since I spend so much time away from home during the week, I should just do all my cleaning on the weekend. I can’t stand that thought. I relish sitting on the floor with Littlefoot on Saturday mornings after the grocery shopping is done and letting him run circles around me (do all toddlers do this?) as he giggles his head off.

The past few days I haven’t turned the TV on at all. Monday I don’t get home till 9pm because I have a Bible study in the evening, Tuesday I took my brother grocery shopping and scrubbed toilets to fill the time and I still got in bed before 10. Love kept asking me “is it bedtime?” which annoyed me because I struggle with wanting to just give up and go to bed. It’s like asking me if I want a plate or a bowl for dinner when I’m trying to have salad with my meal every night and the only way I will do that is if I have the salad on the plate with the meal. I need a plate, but thanks for the temptation to skip the salad, dear.

Anybody else have that problem? Certain things don’t bother me; you can offer me sweets all day when I’m trying to avoid them and I’ll be happy to turn them down. But these things I struggle with: eating that salad, staying awake past 9pm, I have a hard time with temptations. I don’t think I actively blame the other person but I feel this tension in gritted teeth and hunched shoulders as I either ignore the request or say “No” in a way that I hope isn’t as mean as it feels.

Anyway, there’s a bit of my life to chew on. Time to get back to this ridiculous 9-5.

I get stuck sometimes.

I think that’s a better word than “depressed”, because the word depressed connotes sadness, despair, a sea of blue in a void of black — drifting aimlessly. Sure depression can feel like that. It can be all those things our crazy culture gloms onto and tries to make relatable. (Did you know Depression Nap is a meme?)

Feeling like I feel right now, I’m not sad. I’m not feeling “woe is me”. I’m feeling stuck. Like a rat in a maze, I keep turning corners only to find there’s a wall there.

Maybe I could write a blog post.
Nobody will care what I write.

I should list what I’m grateful for.
And find out just how ungrateful I am.

I should get out of my head…
out of my head….
out of my head…
Anytime now would be great.

Maybe a little food.
Too much effort, I’m not worth it.

So here it is, 4:30pm on a Friday and even though I’ve made a list of what I’ve done today that’s longer than most other days this week it’s not enough to assuage the guilt. I’ve spent too much time on Facebook today. I took care of a personal errand for a friend during work hours. I felt like crap about my job; I spent the entire day not wanting to be here. I am lousy.

Stuck.

So to appease the kind person who suggested it, here’s my three things I’m grateful for:

1. Ironically, my job. It pays the bills and allows me to play with paper and spreadsheets.
2. Littlefoot and Love, for the way they smile at me in so much the same way I can’t think of one without thinking of the other.
3. Daycare that allows me to drop off Littlefoot for a day here and there without giving me any trouble about it, charges a reasonable price. Without them I’d be out of work today and miss the opportunity to do all those things I was able to do today.

And damn if I don’t feel at least a little bit better.