I live in an average house in an average neighborhood.
And in this house and the ones before that. Painting. In love with it even.
Walls, ceilings, trim, cabinets, chairs, tables, even the kids, they would laugh, if they got in my way. Ladder and roller and paint can full. Music turned loud. Coloring my world. Racing the clock to return normal, as a gift, to my family at the end of the day.
And to me, in the doing, average is transformed.
My eye simply delighting in painting the front door of our white two story a deep shade of teal blue. Such a glorious hue and, frankly, the talk of the neighbors before getting the color just right. Having to repaint. Tone down just a bit. Carried away as I was with the vibrant joyous hues of Jamaican doors. The ones that seem to shout "beauty" and "come in" and "love" all at once. Thrilling me.
I was also born into average. In a small town.
My having arrived years too late to be included in the one "family portrait" but filling the old empty house with childhood again. Messes and projects strewn across the floor and the tables and my bed in those growing up years.
Decoupage on old bottles and dolls from yarn. Felt ornaments and cloth mice with whiskers. A newspaper with stories and ads in handwritten font. Clothes made for trolls and dolls. And cardboard houses with exquisite detail.
Imagination running wild.
And I remember how much I loved those cloth mice with whiskers.
Having painstakingly sewn them freehand. Stuffed with cotton.
And they looked like it.
Without a plan. Crude and ugly.
But to me. The wild pursuit of creating something. Thrilling me.
Just scraps from the sewing chest. Becoming mice.
Then. Just doing what made my heart sing.
For there are no critics in childhood.
Freewheeling and full of abandon.
But, slowly, over the years, something is lost.
We listen to the voices. The culture.
Comparisons falling hard and being pushed around by fear.
Seeking permission even. To be ourselves. Shame showing up.
And it is ugly. Uglier than the mice and the thrill disappearing.
The beauty slipping away.
For life is beautiful. Even in the ugly. Even in the broken.
But I wasn't seeing it.
Because for a time I tried to hide. The striving and the measuring up exhausting me. Exhausting others. And always with a paint brush. Painting too many rooms at once. And too many projects. And moving the furniture again. The quest for perfection loud in my ear. My eye never satisfied. Just ask my husband.
Teetering on something dangerous here. I admit. The wild chasing.
Nothing wrong with painting.
So glad to have taupe covering my walls. Proud even of my work.
But it's the thing driving it - for years. Obsession.
The being driven. Not attractive. Doesn't feel good.
And I finally saw myself. And stopped.
It was not a screech of the brakes but more of a slow pulling over to the side.
Searching through the roadmaps.
And asking myself.
How do I really want to travel?
The wild hanging on filling with excitement.
But now. Running on empty. Something broken.
And I have found that it is in acknowledging my own brokenness.
The being fearlessly honest about myself. With God.
Understanding heartache, shame, bewilderment and regret.
And He in the business of rescuing. Redeeming.
His deep compassion bringing wholeness of soul.
Goodbye endless striving. I'm moving on without you.
Not necessarily the cessation of activity but an attitude of the heart.
A relaxing into what is and into being vulnerable.
Accepting myself. My own brokenness and that of others.
Into which we are all born.
And I am a child. Once more. At His feet.
Full of delight.
So that I no longer need to hide who I am and what I am called to do.
The wild pursuit quieting and grace transforming.
This, my average life.
Creating something beautiful out of the ugly.
Coloring all the edges gold of this life sometimes so difficult.
My husband so relieved. For his average girl and our teal blue door.
Doing now what makes my heart sing.
In the unfrantic and the unhurry.
Freewheeling and full of abandon.
Where average is transformed into the good-enough.
And glory is left to the Glory-Maker.
And we. Throwing open that Jamaican-toned-down door.
Sharing lives. Being real.
Around a table and on a keyboard and behind a camera.
Simply delighting. In Him.
Just get over yourself!
I wrote these words, laughing, on the big kitchen chalkboard.
Finally, after the tension, laughing; me and my husband. My best friend.
For I had asked him. Again.
Asked others.
Read my own words - back to myself.
Desperate for answers. This new season. This life I have.
Not content being me. Needing to be more.
Never enough.
And I have to tell you.
The veil parted.
This time.
I got it.
After endless searching. The asking. The deep sorrowing.
Looking for truth. The mirror up. Seeing the ugly.
Exasperated.
With myself.
With others.
How in the world to do it all?
Just get over yourself!
How easy to say. How easy to laugh.
But how readily the inward groan when these words do not resonate.
To feel not enough. To wonder the whys.
Expectations from childhood high and unattainable.
Cries from a pulpit resonating deep.
Opportunities round the globe. Ministry.
Endless needs.
And my heart shuts down.
In the fear. In the striving.
Expectations. Of others. Of myself.
Where to start? What to do?
Tired. Overwhelmed.
Trying hard to meet.
Sometimes only in my head.
To do what is required, what is asked, again and again.
But the striving to be what you are not; a dangerous road.
And in the studying and in the doing and in the asking.
Weariness and joy-gone and exasperation.
Shame. Inverted pride.
Not the pretty. Nothing pleasing about it.
For anyone.
So one last time. Asking.
The words hanging in the air, coming between us.
Almost.
My man and me.
And then I hear.
The words gushing forth like a runaway garden hose.
Filling the air with sound and gesture; hilarious.
But serious truth.
Impassioned. Eloquent. Humorous. Unscripted.
Raw feelings expressed in the ordinary.
Getting my attention.
And to sum it up. What he says.
Hear me good. You are enough.
Do you think you have to save the world?
Get over yourself!
And I.
Shocked and grateful for the hearing.
Details eluding me already. The impact full.
Wishing I could replay.
To remember. The truth I hear.
Standing stark and naked between us.
Hitting my heart like a tsunami.
Flooding me with relief.
Freedom.
To be myself.
And then I laugh.
We laugh together.
Jesus came to save the world.
Not I.
Not even a little bit.
Remembering other words.
Reminding me again.
"Come to me."
"All you, who are weary and burdened."
Me.
Maybe you.
Needing to hear.
To be reminded.
"Come to me."
What our relational God desires.
For this we were created.
"Come to me all you, who are weary and burdened and I will give you rest."
When we get over ourselves, the road takes a turn.
Taking us down a different path.
A life consumed with God. Not self.
Not the measuring of the doing and the accomplishing; endless striving.
This time pleasing God.
But pleasing others; those mad-dash attempts to feel good about ourselves.
Nothing more than a dead end street.
"For I am gentle and humble in heart and you will find rest for your souls."
Someone that good, that merciful, that gentle with us.
And me so undeserving.
Bubbling up goodness from my heart in gratitude.
Living a life to please Him.
The answer.
The road to take.
Struggles constantly reminding.
"Come to me."
And it is good. So good.
Words on the blackboard.
In big letters. Laughing. Rejoicing.
Do I think I have anything good to offer to anyone before I get over myself first?
Probably not.
Know what can make you miserable. Hands down?
Ungrace.
Trying to win someone's approval. A feeling of not measuring up.
Coming from them. Coming from you.
And on the day it crashes. For you.
The ungrace - like shards of glass, broken sharp edges, around your feet.
Crazy scary. Unsettling.
Much to clean up. Carefully.
Because what happens.
Blaming and criticizing and ruminating - and it's in your head.
And it's all about you.
Not measuring up. Not meeting the standard. Failing.
Surely, in the Christian world, not an issue.
For the whole concept of faith is wrapped up in grace.
But do we get it?
The awe-inspiring, jaw-dropping incredible gift.
Grace.
And even for the humanists.
Those embracing man as the answer to life.
Doesn't life come crashing down? A seeking. There must be more.
Why don't we get it?
A chasing. A running after. To fill the empty.
The search for significance.
This lust - so pervasive in post-modern culture.
In the cinema, in the music, in the glossy covers.
Even our homes, our schools, our churches.
Culture everywhere. Striving.
And in the striving, the twisting of our lives into a charade.
The wearing of masks eventually.
Too painful, the real. For failing to meet the standard.
For just plain failing. Even in our own minds.
Falling short. Again and again.
And then failure even to try.
Ungrace.
Nothing more unattractive or painful.
The judgment, the guilt, the shame. Falling victim.
To perfectionism and striving.
Desperately trying to make a life count for something.
George MacDonald put it succinctly.
You need not be a Christian to build houses, feed the hungry, or heal the sick.
There is only one thing the world cannot do.
It cannot offer grace.
What the world needs.
Almost defying description.
So good the Gift.
And in accepting the Gift.
Something happens.
In place of the striving, the chasing after the wind.
In it's place.
A quiet strength with humility.
A joy from forgiveness.
A life of purpose; understanding intrinsic worth.
Restored relationship with God.
With ourselves.
Nothing to prove. Only to accept.
And the ungrace.
When it comes calling.
Something to discard, to run from; a destroyer.
Because no matter who you are or what you believe.
If extended Grace, you are grateful.
A powerful gift.
The only thing the world cannot offer.
I have an affinity for gates.
Tolkien writes, "Still round the corner there may wait, a new road or a secret gate."
And I am intrigued. The mystery. What lies beyond?
Beyond the gate in the book, The Secret Garden, for the children; a creeping awareness that perhaps one should not be there so with stealth and a bit of fear exploring the magnificent beauty that captivates. Risking danger of discovery.
Or through the wardrobe in The Chronicles Of Narnia, where, in a big, old, rambling English house providing shelter for four children during WWII, Lucy, the youngest, pushes aside the old coats and furs to enter an amazing world ruled by the white witch where for over 100 years; deep winter.
I look at the gate. A symbol for entering a garden, a place unknown; a new world.
Embracing a new country as did Peter and Susan and Edmund and Lucy. Taking a risk to walk through that wardrobe or through the gate. Perhaps even a new way of thinking and living and being.
I have been living in winter too long. I am taking a risk. I tug at the gate to enter.
And this is what I am discovering.
The telling that I struggle too. Expectations put on us by ourselves, by others; the difficulty of life rocking our world. And the constant striving. Attempting to make a world that is beautiful and meaningful but somehow always beyond the grasp. The letting go.
The taking off of the mask. Becoming real and vulnerable and transparent. Telling you things that scare me because maybe they scare you too.
Daring to enter a world where God is. To come to understand that what may not be politically correct may be a beautiful place to live because the key to the gate is humility. And by understanding my striving accomplishes nothing except pride or failure or perhaps both.
To celebrate brokenness. Because it leads to the gate where God is.
And there I can become the person God intended. The masks have to go. The striving unnecessary. For pride shuts grace down and grace is my emotional home. The vulnerability, the opportunity to be real, the authenticity; boldly trusting in how God sees us, deeply pleasing if we are in relationship with Him. A place of rest.
And so I never tire of returning home with my gate welcoming; the handle screeching a little as I turn it but always finding grace. Always grace with a God who is so much bigger and better than anything I could have imagined. And it is through the pain that I made the discovery. It is worth the search, the turning of a latch.
J.R.R. Tolkien, renown for his storytelling, understood this truth; redemptive living.
