It’s been months since I have used this space. I guess I can only focus my writing on one thing at a time, and for a season it has been towards a book. I’m still chipping away at that book, but in light of recent events I need a space to be real. A space to be honest and to grow, right along with anyone out there who needs these words as much as I do. I’m skipping the fancy edits and the pretty colors. I’m hijacking my own space to just put down the words, much like everything else has been hijacked. Seems fitting for now.
I was able to articulate two things yesterday and as I began to journal about them I was struck by the sense these realizations might not be just for me. As I wrote out all the thoughts longhand, I became more and more aware of how much someone else might need these words, too. Maybe I’m not the only one who has taken weeks to articulate a fraction of what I am feeling.
My two words that have risen to the surface?
Insecure
Unloved
Am I alone in this? I don’t think so. The plush rug of security has been pulled right out from under ALL of us and for me, it has taken root in my heart. As the foundations of our society have crumbled right before my eyes I have not known what to feel. The whole event has left me feeling surreal most of the time and unable to sit with God and find peace. I have worried…a lot. Everything routine took a pause, including my time with God. I found myself picking up my phone before my Bible, checking for the latest news, drawn in wondering if today is worse. Wondering, when will it get better? Is today more of the same aimless wandering that I did yesterday? I became untethered. Just like Peter on the water, I took my eyes off of Jesus. The insecurity began to grow. No person to person contact for a extravert causes “security dehydration” very quickly. I begin to wonder is anyone thinking about me at all? So, I turn to my people, the ones I am sheltering-in-place with. Will you be my friend? Will you play with me? Have I literally turned into a 5 year old? It appears so.
If it wasn’t bad enough the one outlet I felt like we still had was getting outside and being active…6 feet away of course. But as we tried to do this last Sunday, I managed to have one humiliating moment as a snow machine became the boss of me and sent me tumbling to the ground IN THE DRIVEWAY! I don’t have a riveting story to tell. I was just turning the machine around and instead it turned me around. I ended up with a bad sprain to the hip. Walking is now a luxury I take much slower.
Now, not only was I insecure in my surroundings, and my people, I was insecure in myself and my abilities. The discouragement deepened and the sense that I was unloved spread. A debilitating injury? Now? Really, Lord?! I am not the only one to have an accident during this time. I know of three others right now, two of which were horrific, and I know there are countless more. I feel for them. I grieve with them. So grateful that mine was not worse, but why was theirs? in a time of global pandemic why would God allow more horrific things to happen?
All my doubts spiraled. I expected those that are closest to me to fill all those empty, insecure places when all along there is only ONE who can. Only ONE who holds the answers, but often He asks us to simply trust. The answers do not come. They are not for us. “Trust Me,” He says, and nothing else.
I wrote these words in my journal today: “I’m on a mission for some quality time today.” This was after spelling out how I was going to confiscate all the phones and essentially make people talk to me!
…and then it happened…the shift…
A whisper in my spirit…What about quality time with my GOD? Might it be true that if I spend more quality time with my God that HE will fill those places that only HE can fill?
Since this thing started I have thrown phrases at him, pleas for help but I haven’t spent quality time with Him. I’ve been too busy trying to stay busy and stave off the grief of this whole thing. I keep crying because I think I don’t actually let myself process through it. I just sit IN it instead.
So what if today I just sit here and talk to him, tell him all about it?
And what if he leads me to Romans 8:31-39 where he reminds me of his eternal love for me, that He is for me, and that nothing on this earth or anywhere else will ever separate me form that love…and all in one little moment of quality time, He comes in and deals with my two words at once.
What if…