Expectant Waiting

A couple years ago, we took on the massive task of trimming the tree and putting up Christmas decorations. It pains me to even speak that sentence, for fear of sounding so completely bah humbug that you all write me off as a total party pooper. Don't get me wrong, I LOVE having decorated for Christmas. The twinkling lights. The red and green. The smell of a fresh cut tree. But the actual process of decorating? It really isn't my thing. I struggle with change and perhaps could be accused of being “a little too practical,” so the idea of pulling tubs down from the garage rafter, changing out throw pillows and dishes, and re-doing the mantle for just a 4-week period every year sometimes feels not worth the effort.

In so many ways, I have loosened up over the years. Like for instance, this year I’m referring to, when I agreed to run off to McLendon's Hardware at 6:30 PM to select our Christmas tree under the cover of pitch darkness. We could see next to nothing beyond the height of the tree options before us and I honestly didn't have the energy to care. I think we took home the third tree we touched. Short, sweet and simple. Those three adjectives are rarely used together to describe my typical process of accomplishing things. More often, my perfectionist tendencies weave a gnarly web of high expectations and a desire for things to be just so. It makes me a tough cookie to live with, this I know. 

Going back to my story… by the time we got the tree home and in the stand, it was far too late in the evening to begin the process of decking it, so my husband suggested that we wait until the morning and have a "nice relaxing breakfast together" with tree decorating to follow. The only trouble with this plan was that we also had family pictures scheduled at 11 AM that, after our "relaxing" time trimming the tree, we would need to rush off to, all dressed and beautiful. I bet you can guess where there is going. As it turns out, I don't really do "nice and relaxing" followed by "dressed and beautiful" within the same 2-hour window. I summarized our morning at that time on social media as follows:

"Ok all you people with kids, let's keep this Christmas decorating thing real. Despite any beautiful pictures we might post of a glowing tree or lovely mantle, let's remember that, behind the scenes, decorations were flying out of boxes in all directions, ornaments were shattering, breakfast dishes were still on the table, only 1 of our strands of lights were 100% functional, and we ended up Scotch-taping our star to the top of the tree. And all the while, mom was standing by having a panic attack in the corner."

So yeah. This whole changing out seasonal decorations thing? It's not really my jam. But as I began to ponder it all, I realized so many things are not enjoyable in the process. I don't enjoy decorating, but I love having decorated. I don't always enjoy running but I love having run. Heaven knows I don't always enjoy parenting, but I love having parented. Are you catching my drift?

The process is typically messy and confusing and even painful. It can be tempting to throw our hands up and concede - to say darn it all to the tree this year, or to slow our run to a walk or to surrender to yelling at our kids instead of finding another way. The process. It's the nit and grit. It's the part that’s excruciating.

Last week, I was asked to share some words at my Bible study’s Christmas celebration.  My first thought was, I’ve never been one to win any awards for my positivity and I worried what I had to say might bring people down. Any regular readers know I tend to be a deep thinker and that I ponder hard things – just the message everyone wants to hear at Christmas! I considered asking for a different date, maybe sometime in the spring we aren’t assumed to be full of “holiday cheer.”

But as I began to pray through what the Lord might have for me to share, it was clear that this was exactly the time of year that He wanted me to speak. And that, during this season of Advent, where we remember and anticipate the arrival of our Savior into the world, I was to speak about the idea of expectant waiting.

I began thinking about how each one of us, no matter where we are in our lives right now, have an area of deep longing, a place where we are waiting for movement with bated breath. It’s that painful part of us that we like to pretend isn’t there. Perhaps we’ve shoved that longing into hiding in hopes that it will just go away. For others of us, we wear that longing like we do our very own skin. We couldn’t hide it, even if we tried because the havoc it has wreaked on our hearts is so blatant. These longings are uncomfortable, and they bring out our “ugly.” When we spend any length of time considering the void left by our longing, we often come away with more questions than answers. We begin to wonder if perhaps our God truly is as faithful and good as He claims to be.

So, I would pose the same question here that I asked last week during my talk - what is it that you are longing for today? Where are you filled with a sense of expectant waiting? Is it for a next step or calling, a clear sense of purpose? Is it for children? Has infertility been your gaping hole? For those who are single, is it a longing for a spouse? And for those married, is it a profound sense of loneliness despite the ring on your finger? Is there a part of you that feels broken? Are you longing for healing, for yourself or for others? Are you longing for connection, to finally feel like you are welcome and that you truly belong? 

Psalm 40:1-3 says “I waited patiently for the Lord; he turned to me and heard my cry. He lifted me out of the slimy pit, out of the mud and mire; he set my feet on a rock and gave me a firm place to stand. He put a new song in my mouth, a hymn of praise to our God. Many will see and fear and put their trust in the Lord.”

How can we possibly reconcile our areas of profound pain and hurt and longing with the goodness of our God?

God has had me on a journey in recent years that I would describe as a total unraveling. The image that comes to mind is that of a carefully-crocheted blanket. It’s a beautiful sight to behold, gorgeous color, an intricate pattern, and even stitching throughout. It seems perfectly fine from all outward appearances. Why would it require unraveling?

The trouble is this: it was stitched together on all the wrong premises – lies overtaking the truth, a belief that my worth is based on what I accomplish. I have valued image over authenticity, justice before grace, and focused on achievement, success, hard work, people-pleasing, and rule-following. The stitches were, to put it bluntly, far too tight.

All the lies I’ve internalized for so long have needed to be undone before God could begin the great work of re-stitching together my blanket, this time founded on truth. The process has been so painful. There are parts of my story that don’t make sense. At times it feels as if no part of my life has been left untouched – my marriage, my kids, my work, my family. I have had to face so many of my demons. Just when it seems like there couldn’t possibly be any more yarn left to unravel, I realize there is yet another row of stitching that needs to come undone.

In these moments of unraveling, when I am sitting in the middle of the floor, surrounded by a mess of tangled yarn, I have spent a lot of timing crying out “Why, God!? I followed the rules! I thought I was doing what you asked of me! Why is this the result? Why must I endure the heartache? THIS. ISN’T. FAIR.”

The reality, it seems, is that God wants to start anew in my life. He has a totally different pattern in mind for me. He desires to loosen the stitching a little. He is assigning me new attributes: loved, cherished, worthy, deserving. The resulting blanket will be softer, less stiff, imperfect yet wholly, undeniably accepted. Beloved. He has loving, healing work that he wants to do.

And do you know what else he is teaching me? My deep pain, my longing is FOR something. It is being used for good. Whether it is to encourage another or cause me to cling to God in times when I otherwise might be tempted to give him the cold shoulder, or whether it is to keep me fighting for healing, this process has a purpose.

Brene Brown writes, “Owning our story can be hard but not nearly as difficult as spending our lives running from it. Embracing our vulnerabilities is risky but not nearly as dangerous as giving up on love and belonging and joy—the experiences that make us the most vulnerable. Only when we are brave enough to explore the darkness will we discover the infinite power of our light.”

Were it not for these hardships, I would never have had a reason to cling to Christ in the way I have in this most recent season. I had always been so self-sufficient; I was doing just fine on my own. Until I wasn’t.

Words like these became my sustenance: “He will cover you will his feathers and under his wings you will find refuge; his faithfulness will be your shield and rampart.” Psalm 91:4

So, while I wait expectantly and hold on to hope for continued healing in the broken areas of my life, will I choose to trust His hand?

Author Rebekah Lyons, in her book, You Are Free, writes, “Joy is not the absence of darkness. Joy is the confidence that the darkness will lift.”

I’ll be honest. There have been so many points in my own process where have been filled with doubt. I remember sitting in my therapist’s office one night, overwhelmed and undone, feeling hope slip through my fingers. It all felt too hard. I didn’t think healing would ever come. At that time, my therapist said something that has meant so much to me. She asked for permission to hold onto to hope for me, when I no longer felt I could, to be a buoy to help keep me afloat until I had the strength to continue swimming.

God’s answer to our longings, the things for which we are expectantly waiting, may never be one we have been dreaming of, the one we feel is best. But what I can say with full confidence is that he is with us in the waiting and he is using our circumstances to draw us nearer to himself.

Lyons writes, “You straddle promise and doubt, feebly holding onto the hope of promise. Keep holding on. You may not know the outcome, but you can rest in the tension of the waiting. It’s in the tension that the music is made.” Isn’t that beautiful?

Later she goes on to say, “There will come a moment in your waiting when God says, ‘It’s time.’ Waiting is a critical part of your anointing. It prepares you, strengthens you, equips and trains you to step up when the moment comes.”

The process often makes us question the endeavor but, it is worth it.  Romans 8:24 says, “But hope that is seen is not hope at all. Who hopes for what they already have? But if we hope for what we do not yet have, we wait for it patiently.”

So, in the same way that we wait for the coming of our Savior to earth at Christmas, may we also wait with great expectation for Christ, the Ultimate Buoy to meet each of us, right where we are at, even in our areas of deepest longing.




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Undone-ness

I read the following words this morning:

“I’ve been a list maker since I was a kid; that’s when it started, I realize now. I never appreciated what I accomplished each day, I only felt frustrated by what was left undone. Undone of course being the perfect work for my mental state related to my list-making habit. I am constantly undone by being undone…Our lives – as a couple, as a family – have always been governed by my dissatisfaction implosions. The lists were simply an attempt to supply answers to my endless questions: Was this my life? What was my next move? Why is this house so small? Is this all there is?”

They were published in a random book I grabbed off the shelf at the library, entitled “Amateur Hour: Motherhood in Essays and Swear Words,” by Kimberly Harrington. At first it was the book’s aqua cover and picture of a cute pink contraption spewing hearts skyward that drew me. (My husband informs me the cute pink thing is a grenade; I thought it was a perfume bottle. Nevertheless.) But let’s be honest, it was the catchy title that made me toss the book in my bag. I’m feeling angsty in my mothering life of late and it seemed right to read the words of someone who, at least in title, wasn’t about to mince words.

I don’t know this author from Adam and so, the last thing I was expecting was for her words to crack me open this morning. Suddenly, it felt like someone had been spying on my life and taking notes and now I was reading back to me what they saw. I didn’t like her critical attitude. It hit too close to home. And her descriptive use of “dissatisfaction implosions” left an especially personal sting.

I am a Type One on the Enneagram and my hunch is that the author of this book is too. (PSA: Have you heard of the Enneagram? This is a brash oversimplification but it’s an ancient personality typing model of sorts - if you haven’t yet explored it, be prepared to fall into a wonderful black hole of information). Type Ones are also known as “Reformers” and, according to The Enneagram Institute (https://www.enneagraminstitute.com), they are “conscientious and ethical, with a strong sense of right and wrong. They are teachers, crusaders, and advocates for change: always striving to improve things, but afraid of making a mistake. Well-organized, orderly, and fastidious, they try to maintain high standards, but can slip into being critical and perfectionistic. They typically have problems with resentment and impatience.”

That’s a lot of words for saying I have constant eyes for how things could be improved – which can be both a rich blessing and extreme curse.

The site goes on to say that when Ones are at their healthiest, they are said to be capable of becoming “extraordinarily wise and discerning, inspiring, and hopeful. Their sense of responsibility, personal integrity, and of having a higher purpose often make them teachers and witnesses to the truth.” I would summarize that to say they are truth-tellers.

Beautiful!

When they are unhealthy, Ones are dissatisfied with reality, they become idealists, “feeling that it is up to them to improve everything. They become orderly and well-organized, but impersonal, puritanical, emotionally constricted, rigidly keeping their feelings and impulses in check. Highly critical both of self and others: picky, judgmental, perfectionistic. Impatient, never satisfied with anything unless it is done according to their prescriptions.”

Ouch! Hit home much? Dissatisfaction implosions.

There have been times recently when I have felt like I hit some of the healthier points of my personality potential. Like last week for instance. I was working on a talk I will be giving to my Bible study group in December about expectant waiting. My plan was to talk about our areas of deep longings and places of hurt, those places where we are waiting for Christ to move and provide healing and reconciliation and redemption. I was piecing together bits of my own journey through hard times and painful seasons and I felt inspired and excited and, wait for it, even hopeful, with what God gave me to share. I was going to teach! I was going to be a truth-teller!

My word for this year has been “hope.” There have been so many moments where I have felt “Hey. I think I might be getting somewhere. Maybe I’m healing!” After a long season of waiting, I was more than ready to box up some of my broken bits and catalog them on a shelf with a “no longer an issue” stamp across the front.

Yet inevitably, it seems, these hopeful moments are quickly followed by long stretches of discouragement and frustration. One week I am gripping the cheeks of my husband saying, “DO NOT GIVE UP HOPE FOR CHANGE,” and the next week I’m sob-praying as I run through the neighborhood, “I don’t think change is possible. I feel no difference. I’m getting nowhere. I give up!” Like the author of my book, I feel undone but the undone-ness.

On the tails of preparing my talk on waiting with hope, all I feel is slashed with discouragement, overwhelmed by my feelings of deep sadness. I’m back to screaming “WHERE ARE YOU GOD IN ALL THIS? Why am I still hurting? Why don’t I feel more hopeful?”

If I’m taking all my pills and exercising for endorphins, why am I still depressed?

If I’m working on viewing myself as fearfully and wonderfully made, why do I still loathe my body so?

If we’re doing all this hard work in our marriage, why do I still feel lonely?

If I’m working so hard on my thought life, why do I so often find myself at the bottom of a shame spiral?

Are my expectations too high? Is this just life? Is what I’m feeling yet another “dissatisfaction implosion”?

While I (obviously) don’t have the answer to all these hard and tender questions, I was made aware of one, blaring, gaping, painful hole in my faith life. Recently, when posed with the question, “When have you been especially aware of the love Christ has for you?” I came up empty. I literally could not identify a time where I felt completely, entirely, wholly accepted and loved by God. Though I would preach God’s incredible love to everyone around me until the cows come home, I haven’t been able to fully accept it for myself. I know my ugly. I see my mess. I track my failures. And I’m ashamed. And so, I have been disqualifying myself. I’ve erected a buffer around myself in self-protection. Because I fail to meet my own bar (perfection), I opt myself out of fully receiving the relentless, never-ending, totally-covering love God has for me.

Those are some tough words to type and even tougher words to swallow. But here is what I know: until I can truly accept Christ’s deep love for me, His grace for my ugly, complete healing cannot happen. And so, even in my undone-ness and pain, I am choosing to meditate on His unfailing love.

I will end with these beautiful words from Zephaniah 3:17:

“The Lord your God is with you,

the Mighty Warrior who saves.

He will take great delight in you;

in his love he will no longer rebuke you,

but will rejoice over you with singing.”

The thrill of hope

Two thousand seventeen was most definitely a Growth Year (okay fine, and so was 2016). We found ourselves being stretched in unexpected ways. As a family, we were presented with multiple new diagnoses, some expected and others, less so. Although it felt good to have answers, on other days, these diagnoses felt like labels, overwhelming and painful to swallow. We passed a lot of hours at appointments of all kinds, seeking wholeness and wellness mentally, physically and spiritually for all our members. It was trying, and I shed my fair share of tears. The journey is far from over, but I know we are all the better for it. Even though 2017 felt brutal, I hope 2018 is a Growth Year as well. I for one am praying for gentler growth in 2018 (no more growth spurts though, pretty please!), but I do want to continue to be stretched. It’s been amid all this growing that I’ve felt the nearness of my Savior like never before.

Through the encouragement of some wise friends, I have adopted the tradition of choosing a word as my theme for each year. More than anything, the word becomes my prayer over what I hope the year will hold for me. As one year comes to a close, I begin to ponder my word for the year that will follow. Last year, I chose the word “free”. 

What began as a year of letting go transitioned slowly into a year of releasing and I believe there is an important differentiation between the two. Letting go can occur against one’s will. An object might be torn from one’s grasp or one might fall and be forced to let go of the precipice that previously served as a support. But releasing, it’s an active choice. It involves conscious surrender. The dictionary says it means to allow or enable to escape from confinement; set free. That sounds like a pretty accurate description of 2017 to me. There was a lot of work put toward releasing concern over what people thought of me. Releasing insecurities. Releasing a past version of myself that had threads of shame and guilt woven throughout. Releasing achievable expectations. This leaning in toward freedom even required releasing some of my dreams. Or at least making peace with where I am currently in the process of pursuing them.

Most of the time it felt like “All pain, no gain,” rather than the other way around. I would peer closely, looking for that flickering pilot light of hope, the tiny little flame that told me one day things wouldn’t be this hard. It grew dim on countless occasions. I lost sight of it completely a few times. I didn’t feel much progress and I worried those around me would tire of me asking for their very-necessary support. (Spoiler alert: they didn’t! I have some truly amazing people in my life who have helped carry me).

But praise God for the tremendous ways He has been at work. He continues to meet me in my dark places and remind me of his presence time after time after time. I no longer find myself on knees, flashlight in hand, searching desperately for that pilot light. I know it is there, some days dimmer than others, but there nonetheless. There is much hard work still ahead, but my word for this year is

hope.

“….we also exult in our tribulations, knowing that tribulation brings about perseverance; and perseverance, proven character; and proven character, HOPE; and HOPE does not disappoint, because the love of God has been poured out within our hearts through the Holy Spirit who was given to us.” Romans 5:3-5

This past year was all about loosening my grip on that which I was clinging to. It was all about ripping off the bandaid covering some pretty deep wounds. But 2018? I have HOPE that it will be a year of healing. I find myself profoundly grateful for this hard and crazy journey because it brought me to a place where I can I say and actually mean it “He’s a good, good Father.” His provision is perfect. And at times so totally unexpected in it’s timing and presentation.

So in 2018, I’m holding fast to the one true source of HOPE I have and the promise that “He who began a good work in you will carry it on until completion until the day of Christ Jesus” (Philippians 1:6). I know the days ahead will be wrought with challenges, but I am beginning this new year hemmed in by the nearness of my Savior (Psalm 139:5).     

Happy New Year!