This is it.
To stand in the midst of your life and be unraveled by the beauty of grace contrasted with the ruins of despair.
To fall on your knees because you are totally undone by the truth of the Gospel that the Lord so graciously fills life with.
To see how in the midst of so much hopelessness and despair, the truth remained unwavering and the love stood fast.
I am undone.
2016 taught me something. The year began with all my plans chalked up to perfection, knit so tightly, just like when we were kids and my sister was learning to knit and she knit her yarn so tightly it became impossible to work with.
I had plans, they were shiny and new. But just like old cars, they began to rust and they began to break down.
The weavings of my tapestry began to fray. The binding of my book desperately needed rebound. It was a year that taught me that no matter how well you bind your life together, we were not made for that. We were not made for self-imposed binding and self-wound bandages.
It's a cycle. A cycle of falling apart and quickly trying to piece myself back together. Because maybe, if I am whole despite this broken world, things will be okay. Maybe if I am whole, the presentation of myself will be stellar. How painfully circular this pattern where I break and I bleed and sew up the seams for the tears so no one can see the hurt. Where has that gotten me?
2016 was a lesson in vulnerability. There was this gracious invitation at the beginning of the year. An invitation to be with someone else when they fell apart. And for the first time I threw my Christian bandaids in the trash and saw the beauty that comes in broken vulnerability and I observed as Christ did his work in messy hearts. Watching my friend fall apart shook me to my core. But as she invited me into that journey it was rewarding.
It was a year of learning in the stumbling. Because my heart hurt as I watched others hurt. My heart ached as I listened to the command to just be rather than clumsily try to mend a broken heart.
And in the process, I learned what it means to allow my heart to be broken and messy. I experienced the healing ointment of friendship and the cooling balm of Christ in me.
2016 undid me. Maybe it was a continual process of what God had already begun in me and continues to do in me. But if one year, through brokenness and hurt and messiness I can be one step closer to knowing my God-
Then God? I want to continue to be undone, because as long as You undo me, I can stand in awe. Being undone is evidence of what You have done in my life. Evidence of the truth that saturates every pore of my being and the hope, that when let in, will overcome my hurt.
This might be what it looks like to come undone.
The other day I stood in the Christian bookstore surrounded by a sea of self-help books with a Christian mask. They had cheesy titles like "Wild and Free," "It's going to be Okay," and "Too Blessed to Be Stressed." It was then when it hit me. These authors, though meaning well, were trying to take away the pain rather than see the beauty within the pain. Because I am wild, but I am not always free. I am blessed but surely, I am stressed. And maybe, just maybe it won't be okay. And maybe that is the perfect place to be.
And as I left the store, processing my life and all that plans I thought I had in order and the hurts. And as I sit with my friends on a couch and we express our helplessness and for the first time, we let it be. I wonder how much more beautiful it will be if I continue on this journey.
Because I am messy. I am broken. And I am undone.
In the midst of this messy, broken, unexpected year. I have come undone.
My prayer for 2017 is that God would continue to undo me because I want to be known by him in all my messy, broken pieces. I want deep, intimate and real relationships.
Lord, here is my dangerous prayer.
Undo me, Lord. Show me beauty in the unmaking. Teach me how to love in the broken. Let me see fraying hearts and unbound seams. Guide me to step behind those masks. And in that place, undo me.
To stand in the midst of your life and be unraveled by the beauty of grace contrasted with the ruins of despair.
To fall on your knees because you are totally undone by the truth of the Gospel that the Lord so graciously fills life with.
To see how in the midst of so much hopelessness and despair, the truth remained unwavering and the love stood fast.
I am undone.
2016 taught me something. The year began with all my plans chalked up to perfection, knit so tightly, just like when we were kids and my sister was learning to knit and she knit her yarn so tightly it became impossible to work with.
I had plans, they were shiny and new. But just like old cars, they began to rust and they began to break down.
The weavings of my tapestry began to fray. The binding of my book desperately needed rebound. It was a year that taught me that no matter how well you bind your life together, we were not made for that. We were not made for self-imposed binding and self-wound bandages.
It's a cycle. A cycle of falling apart and quickly trying to piece myself back together. Because maybe, if I am whole despite this broken world, things will be okay. Maybe if I am whole, the presentation of myself will be stellar. How painfully circular this pattern where I break and I bleed and sew up the seams for the tears so no one can see the hurt. Where has that gotten me?
2016 was a lesson in vulnerability. There was this gracious invitation at the beginning of the year. An invitation to be with someone else when they fell apart. And for the first time I threw my Christian bandaids in the trash and saw the beauty that comes in broken vulnerability and I observed as Christ did his work in messy hearts. Watching my friend fall apart shook me to my core. But as she invited me into that journey it was rewarding.
It was a year of learning in the stumbling. Because my heart hurt as I watched others hurt. My heart ached as I listened to the command to just be rather than clumsily try to mend a broken heart.
And in the process, I learned what it means to allow my heart to be broken and messy. I experienced the healing ointment of friendship and the cooling balm of Christ in me.
2016 undid me. Maybe it was a continual process of what God had already begun in me and continues to do in me. But if one year, through brokenness and hurt and messiness I can be one step closer to knowing my God-
Then God? I want to continue to be undone, because as long as You undo me, I can stand in awe. Being undone is evidence of what You have done in my life. Evidence of the truth that saturates every pore of my being and the hope, that when let in, will overcome my hurt.
This might be what it looks like to come undone.
The other day I stood in the Christian bookstore surrounded by a sea of self-help books with a Christian mask. They had cheesy titles like "Wild and Free," "It's going to be Okay," and "Too Blessed to Be Stressed." It was then when it hit me. These authors, though meaning well, were trying to take away the pain rather than see the beauty within the pain. Because I am wild, but I am not always free. I am blessed but surely, I am stressed. And maybe, just maybe it won't be okay. And maybe that is the perfect place to be.
And as I left the store, processing my life and all that plans I thought I had in order and the hurts. And as I sit with my friends on a couch and we express our helplessness and for the first time, we let it be. I wonder how much more beautiful it will be if I continue on this journey.
Because I am messy. I am broken. And I am undone.
In the midst of this messy, broken, unexpected year. I have come undone.
My prayer for 2017 is that God would continue to undo me because I want to be known by him in all my messy, broken pieces. I want deep, intimate and real relationships.
Lord, here is my dangerous prayer.
Undo me, Lord. Show me beauty in the unmaking. Teach me how to love in the broken. Let me see fraying hearts and unbound seams. Guide me to step behind those masks. And in that place, undo me.
No comments:
Post a Comment