Unraveling

There is something to be said for patterns. Lines, shapes, and colors all woven together into a thing of beautiful symmetry. But there's also something to be said for the unraveling. When it all comes apart and the deep things get pulled out. When everything is spilled out in all it's raw unadulterated glory and everything hidden is now seen.

In church recently they talked about tilling a garden. How sometimes you've got to get in deep and get to the root of things before they will produce any fruit. How the process of tilling and turning is beauty in itself because it breaks off the things that tried to stay in there for good. Jonathan Turner says the only reason you break ground is because the harvest is in season. You break ground because it's time.

There comes a point in time when you come to the end of yourself. There have been counterfeit points of time when you think you have come to the end of yourself. But when you finally reach the end of yourself, you know. There's no mistaking it.

The human mind is a powerful thing. We reason, we justify, we condone, we placate, we overlook, we understand, we accept, we suppress, and we block out. Then there comes a time when you have to come face to face with your greatest fear. I never would have recognized or acknowledged this, but my greatest fear is becoming my mother. And through a series of life circumstances, I became her. At least a part of her. The part of her I could understand. At my lowest point, I came across a manilla envelope of my mother's writings. One in particular read:

I feel such an ache within me. A lonely feeling - an empty soul. My heart isn't where it should be. I'm alone in the world. Just me - and silence. Where there should be someone, there is only darkness. A quiet calm feeling settles. Sudden, deep, relieving peace. An almost touchable warmth. Death has taken it's toll.

When you read something written a generation before you and it resonates so deep within you, you realize that the cycle has continued. The things that tormented your mother now torment you. And you become just as crazy as she was.

But God.

Through the circumstances that led me into a state of severe emotional imbalance that I am still letting God work me out of, I literally became my mother. It was as clear as glass. I finally understood the torment she felt within her because I felt it in myself. I finally understood the fact that she acted crazy because I acted pretty crazy recently. I got in my flesh and came awfully close to destroying all the things God had restored to me. Because I just couldn't get it together. Because I was looking with natural eyes and striving to see supernatural things. I hurt people and made their already rough circumstances a whole lot rougher because of my crazy.

But God.

We go to an AWA event in Somerset and I'm left feeling confused because of what a lovely woman said as she was praying for me - little did I know what God was about to do. Unforgiveness is a terrible thing - especially when you do not know you were carrying it.

Through becoming my mother, God let me see that I hadn't forgiven my mother for the things she did to me and the way she treated me. You see, my mother didn't know Jesus like I know Jesus. She never could figure Him out. She never thought He could love someone like her. Through becoming my mother, God let me come dangerously close to destroying every good thing He had restored to me because I couldn't get it together. But in His grace and in His mercy and in His love, becoming my mother helped me to know the love of a Father who will chase you down until He gets through to you. He is relentless in His pursuit of me....and of you. Receiving forgiveness and love and acceptance when I didn't deserve it after being so awful helped me to truly forgive the person who was holding me back from really becoming who God was trying to make me into. Seeing with my natural eyes that people were going to hold onto me and love me and accept me despite all my junk that had violently unraveled right in front of them. Realizing for the first time in my life the true love of a Father through His people.....who leaves the 99 just to chase down the one that won't give in and break.

Becoming my mother - coming face to face with my greatest fear - gave me my greatest liberty. So I'm thankful for the unraveling. I'm thankful for the disorder. I'm thankful for the chaos. I'm thankful that everything looks a mess. I'm thankful that I don't know how it's all going to work out. I'm thankful I don't have everything figured out. Because in the unraveling, I found the One who my soul loves. And in the chaos, I'm slowly learning to dance. That's the freedom of the unraveling - the freedom to dance and sway and move in perfect tandem to the heartbeat of the Father. It's a great adventure. The most beautiful dance.