Lately I've tried to get creative when it comes to relaxing. Here's a
photo of Macho snuggling with me on a couch cushion on my lap. I'll write more
about that later, but for now I just wanted to post a photo that would be
decent enough to show up on people's Facebook newsfeeds. (Because I have
another photo on this post that's pretty gross.)
"Then one of the seraphim flew to me, having in his hand a live
coal which he had taken with the tongs from the altar. And he touched my mouth
with it, and said: 'Behold, this has touched your lips; your iniquity is taken
away, and your sin is purged.' Also I heard the voice of the Lord, saying:
'Whom shall I send, and who will go for Us?' Then I said, 'Here am I! Send me.'
" (Isaiah 6:6-8)
I love how lately God has been eroding away some really strange
paradigms that I've developed during my walk with Him. I'm not saying that He
was teaching me some weird stuff to begin with -- I'm saying that we Christians
can just have some really strange ideas. I think often we can take one or two
really cool nuggets in the Bible out of context and then run with them, and we
may never dig deeply enough to see the complete picture of what's going on. We
may only see one or two sides of God and His character... and then crazy stuff
happens to us in life, and we don't know what to do with it.
Take the famous "Here I am; send me!" passage from Isaiah 6. Aww.
Warm fuzzies and a rush to the altar at a missions conference, right?
Well, I recently reread the rest of the chapter, and I was shocked at
the change in tone.
"And He said, 'Go, and tell this people: 'Keep on hearing, but do
not understand; keep on seeing, but do not perceive.' Make the heart of this
people dull, and their ears heavy... " (Isaiah 6:9-10a)
Um, what? All this time, was God really saying, "Whom shall I send...
to deliver My sarcastic message to a stubborn people who I'm really ticked off
at right now"? Hmm. Well, as I'm slowly chewing my way through Isaiah, I
am seeing how it seems to balance out God's healing/mercy/grace with His judgment/discipline/correction.
Lately, I've found myself mindlessly scrolling Facebook to pass the
time (when I'm lonely or bored); and there's nothing wrong with that per se,
but it's kind of like shopping for groceries at a candy store. "Hey, um,
where is your produce section? All I see are jellybeans and Jolly Ranchers. So,
um, do you sell milk or bread? I see plenty of chocolate, but there's nothing I
can really sink my teeth into for breakfast, lunch, or dinner." In my
opinion, if you want to really grow in your Christian walk, social media might
not be the best place for that. Most of Christian social media is a vast sea of
platitudes.
I don't think there's any real substitute for 1) digging into the Word
for yourself, 2) hanging around other Christians who are trying to figure out
how to live life in the same way you are, accidentally offending them, and
working through it, and 3) hanging out with God and letting Him show you sides
of Himself that you never really dreamed existed.
Check out another traditionally warm-and-fuzzy verse from Isaiah:
"But now, O Lord, You are our Father; we are the clay, and You our
potter; and all we are the work of Your hand." (Isaiah 64:8)
I'm not sure where this mentality comes from, but we tend to have this
idea that when God the Potter forms and molds you on His wheel, He spins you
around and squishes you into shape for a little while, and then voila, He's
done.
Have you ever seen a potter work? The work of creating a vessel doesn't
usually end at the wheel. From what I understand about pottery, after you take
the beautifully formed piece of clay off the wheel, the clay needs to dry. The
new design needs to be baked into the clay. And then sometimes the potter
decides to paint the new vessel a beautiful color.
What if you change your mind about a certain vessel? You'd have to
break it and start over with a brand-new lump of clay.
But that's pretty much where I am in certain parts of my life -- God
has shown me that I've been formed on the potter's wheel, but the design needs
to bake in. It needs some time to set. So, I'm waiting.
Some interesting things can happen during the painfully long waiting
process.
Regarding that photo I shared at the beginning of this post -- the one
of my cat snuggling close to me -- the reason I've been making myself more
comfortable at home is because my wrists started hurting some time ago. They're
better now, but it was scary for a while. I don't think the pain is really
work-related, because it usually comes if I overdo it with manual labor at
home (e.g., laundry). The first time I felt it was when I moved into my
apartment a few years ago. Then I started watching a lot of YouTube videos on
my smartphone a few months ago, and I guess I'm still green about using that
thing; the way I was gripping my phone was hurting me, but I discovered that if
I rest my phone on my suede cushions, I won't have to use my wrists at all.
But I haven't been able to play my guitar lately. I don't know if it's
arthritis or tendonitis or old age or what, but lately every time I've tried to
play a bar chord, it hurts my wrist. A lot.
So, I spent some time wrestling with this. The platitude brand of
Christianity that you'll find on Facebook will tell you that you can fix it,
voila, with some prayer. Yes, of course I pray. Why wouldn't I pray?
Well, you know me. I wouldn't have been satisfied with fixing this with
a prayer request. I'm called to be a worship pastor someday. What good is a
worship pastor who doesn't know how to play a musical instrument? So, I
tearfully snuggled up on my Daddy's lap and tried to see what I needed to do.
"You can play anything," He replied.
I remembered my years of piano training. I remembered the 4-string tenor
guitar (no bar chords required) that I have stored away in my closet. I remembered
that lots of worship pastors just sing without playing an instrument. And I
realized that there are zillions of instruments that exist on this earth. If I were
to sprint onto the worship platform and lead a worship set with a tissue paper
and comb, if God comes and hangs out with His people for a little while, it
would be mission accomplished.
I'm going to be OK.
And maybe I'll wait a little while longer before I try to play any more
bar chords during my "quiet time."
OK, here's the gross photo. Earlier this year, after Macho came home
from his surgical procedure at the vet, I noticed that he had developed some
huge, disgusting scabs on his belly. I showed this mystery rash to the vet, and
he prescribed some anti-fungal and anti-infection stuff for it, but I couldn't
get a real diagnosis for it. The vet even suspected an autoimmune condition. But then Macho's scabs started coming
off, and the rash stopped spreading. (Which means that it was probably a
temporary infection. I honestly think it might have been stress-related.) This
is a picture of a scab that recently came off by itself... after it had been
stuck to his belly for several months.
Macho has one giant scab left. (Don't worry; I won't show you THAT
photo.) It has fur growing through it and everything. But I'm not going to force
it off because I don't want to hurt him. The scab will come off when it's ready
to come off... even if I have to wait several more months for that to happen.
(Merry Christmas to me?)
So, the God who adopted me, takes care of me, and has a relationship with
me that's deeper than any other relationship I'll ever have -- not the
Facebook-platitude God -- doesn't have a problem waiting for my heart to heal.
Very recently, He dug down deeply and unearthed some wounds that I didn't
know I had. He directed my attention to some feelings that I had had for a guy
a very long time ago -- a guy that I had already gotten over. But He found some
pain that I hadn't grieved over yet. I thought I was done grieving over that
jerk, but I guess I wasn't after all. It bothered me that one guy could have
such an ongoing effect on my emotional health.
But God knew it, and He took care of it.
I don't know why He waited so long to fix it, and I don't even know why
He allowed the wounds to stay buried so deeply for so long, but He knows what
He's doing.
I don't think He's a God who stays in some neat little box where we can
study Him and figure Him all out like some lab specimen. He's a real, living
Being who has feelings, nuances, and infinite layers upon layers of awesomeness
that are waiting to be discovered. Sometimes you gotta crawl up on your Daddy's
lap, cry into it for a while, and find out what He's like for yourself. He may
show you a different side of Himself that you didn't know was there.
