God is Bigger Than Your Shit

melancholy
is a bad word
must be shaved from one’s soul
like the ragged bits of pencil that keep the lead from working.

crazy
is a bad word
must be shaved from one’s life
like the straggling bits of hair that keep the face from being seen.

but my frame
was steeped in a melancholy
amniotic tea
bitter
and left too long
and crazy
was the air that filled my lungs
at my first wail

bad
hurtful
counterproductive
but if i shave them away what is left?
where am i?
will i be nothing more
than a pile of flakes
upon the floor?

oh
(people will say)
somebody
clean that up, please.

What would you say if you witnessed a teacher screaming at a child with Down Syndrome because he or she could not work a problem in AP calculus? What would you do if you saw a coach berating a runner, standing over them and hurling epithets, because they could not get up and run after falling and breaking both legs?

These are simple answers; we would so something. We would step in and defend the victim, or at least get help. Maybe punch the teacher or coach right in the nose for being such an asshole. Yeah, that would feel good. Because who on earth would behave in such a callous, evil, deranged way? Who on earth would expect such impossible things? Only callous, evil, and deranged people. It’s ridiculous to even think about. We expect different things from handicapped people, we alter our expectations, we do not hold it against them and deride them, we do not accuse them of being unwilling, or stupid, or unmotivated. We do not believe the handicap is somehow their fault.

Yet we are all born handicapped. And we do exactly the above to one another, and to ourselves.

We are born handicapped in invisible ways, and hopelessly crippled. This is not our fault, any more than the Down Syndrome child is at fault for his or her genetic abnormality. Again, I assert this is not our fault.  We didn’t ask to be born this way. We didn’t choose it. Heck, we didn’t even ask to be born at all, much less birthed onto such a terrifying planet!

But because we judge and sneer at one another and ourselves, we believe God to be doing the same. Because we try to make sense out of our twisted limbs and drag ourselves along the racetrack until we are bloody, we believe this is what God wants from us. Because we demand that He give us what we need so that we may run the race smoothly, and we don’t get it, we believe He is a deranged school teacher, beating us with a celestial ruler for being so hopeless, demanding that we try harder. And we teach this to our children, and we expect it from our leaders. We strap on prosthetics of works and clothe ourselves with self-righteousness so no one will know how badly we are failing. Yet all the while, we leave a trail of blood wherever we go.

He is not that merciless coach. He looks upon us with pity, with compassion. He grieves that we are so crippled, so broken, and that we don’t even realize it, but continue to try to run on bloody stumps. All He has ever wanted was for us to acknowledge our inability and turn to Him. All He wants is for us to turn to Him. And not because He has some divine ego that demands satisfaction, but for the simple reason that he holds the answer. He has the cure. He provided the way. He did everything that needed doing. When He sees us wallowing in our humanity, He does not despise us! He loves us. In fact, the only reason He continues to allow people to populate the earth is because He just can’t get enough of us. He delights in us, His creation. He loves us. He simply loves people.

Let me say that again.

God. Loves. People.

I don’t know if it’s just me, but this is a big deal. Because somewhere in my crippled brain I always felt that God had something of a sadistic streak. Like the Roman and Greek gods and goddesses, He was simply moving the important pieces about like pawns for His own amusement, callous to our suffering and indifferent to our pain. Some people, the really good ones, He used for His purposes. The rest of us, well, not so much. Maybe He saw us, maybe He didn’t. Maybe He cared, maybe He didn’t. Otherwise, why did He allow such genetic messes to exist? Why else would He make me, to get right down to brass tacks, when He knew what I was up against on this mortal, broken sphere? Why did He make my mind so flawed, my emotions so grotesquely large, my soul so unstable, if not to watch, and laugh with scorn as I try my best to work with what I have? My opinion just depended on the day, my state of mind, the current horrors on the news, and probably, to some extent, the seasons.

You may be thinking to yourself right now “wow, she really does not understand grace.” And I will tell you that no, I didn’t, and I still don’t feel that I do, not completely. In fact, I believe with all my heart that most people calling themselves Christians in this present age understand grace in an extremely crooked way, if they grasp it at all. I don’t believe that most of us with really get it on this side of heaven. Even if we spit out the words “unmerited favor!” as though we are on a game show with the winning answer, what the hell do we know about that? Do we really know what that means? More importantly, do we behave as though we know what it means?

Most people “know” the definition of grace, but they move and breathe and run and work as though His unmerited favor is so very, very merited. As though it must be won, again and again, on a daily basis. His mercies are only new every morning for those who earn them. What? Tell me that you don’t believe that. More importantly, tell me that you don’t behave like that. I am at least brave enough to own up to it.

But it occured to me the other day that God loves us, and it was suddenly different. For a moment, I believed in His love as more than theoretical, or theological. It blew my mind clean away. The possibilities were all changed. The conclusions were fundamentally altered.

Because suddenly I believed that GOD LOVES US not with an existential sort of detatched benevolence, but with a burning, passionate, horrible, heartbreaking, saving love. The kind of love that stoops down and lifts us from the bloody puddle we wallow in and gives us His own legs to run on. His strength. His life. His mind. Yet we accuse Him of perverse behavior towards us because we persist in slapping His hand away, shouting that we can do it ourselves, telling Him we don’t need any help, that His business was in directing us to the racetrack, not in actually helping us to run the race. We complain that He has something against us because it is so hard for us, that He plays favorites because so-and-so runs with such beautiful strides while we hobble and fall, and then we make fun of so-and-so and believe they are simply hiding a better grade of prosthetics beneath their clothing.

The only thing those beautiful runners have is more of His grace. More of His help. And why? Because they didn’t slap His hand away. They recognized their need, they didn’t stay buried under the weight of their pride and sensibilities, and they wake each day with a determination to do one thing only, and that’s lean on Him.

Lean on Him? Pshaw. What a bunch of wussies, I’ll do this myself, thankyouverymuch.

And that right there is my problem. Maybe it’s yours too. Yet, from the very beginning, God was not interested in pointing out our incapabilites for the sake of deriding us, but so that we might turn to Him. He is no sadist. He is not asking us to run the race with shattered legs. He is not asking us to do the calculus with scrambled brains. He does not scorn, but weeps with sympathy, because He felt the weight of flesh and knows exactly how many cards we have stacked against us.

In fact, we have the whole deck stacked against us, save the King of Hearts. And He waits and watches, not for the day that He can gleefully toss us into the fires of hell, but for the day that we will shed the works we clothe ourselves with and allow Him to clothe us with His grace. It doesn’t really matter if I understand it completely, He gives it completely. If I will admit that works aren’t getting me anywhere, He will show me the way to run. If I can grasp just a glimpse of the breathtaking love He holds for me, I will stop working and start worshiping.

And finally, run my race to win.

psalm 103:13
1 John 4:18-20
Heb. 13:1-2

You are swimming across a vast, dark lake. You are not a particularly strong swimmer. Not especially coordinated. Not going to be a lifeguard anytime soon. Struggle, struggle, pant, pant, struggle, flail, pant. Keep that head above water, at all costs. Keep air in your lungs. Look good, no matter what. Make it look easy above water, even if below you are kicking and dog paddling and treading like your life depends on it. Because it does.

All you want to see is the other side, to reach it, and rest; to rest from the struggle and be free from the dark water that drags and pulls at you all the time. Strangely enough, however, as long as you cannot see the other side, you can just keep struggling, thinking that at any minute, it will appear. Flagging always, but always summoning the strength to keep going. You were told–promised even–that there was another side to get to, so you choose to believe it.

Around you are other swimmers. Oh, they are beautiful. They push ahead, always ahead of you, sailing by with a beautiful backstroke, plunging along in a breaststroke, flashing past you freestyle. Occasionally someone floats peacefully past you on their back, and comments on how lovely the day is, and how blue is the sky. They don’t notice your frantic kicking. Or maybe they just don’t care. Maybe it embarasses them. In any case, you envy them. Whoever their instructor was, he was far better than yours. You feel profoundly deficient.

And then, suddenly, the other side comes into view. Lush, green, welcoming, it beckons. On the one hand, you are relieved that it exists at all. On the other hand, it’s farther away than you ever could have imagined. Realizing how much more effort it is going to take to reach it nearly sinks you right then and there. You were tired before; now you are exhausted. Frankly, what is the point? Giving up would be easier; embracing the cold dark water and sinking into oblivion takes on a new and frightening appeal.

It’s tiring, swimming like that.

It’s tiring, living like that.

Just last year, at the ripe old age of 44, the chaos and turmoil in my brain was named. The dark fear, the restless prowling loneliness, the unexplainable sorrow, the startling rage…all of it had a name. I was not alone, as I had so long believed. I was not the only one pretending to know how to swim. The other side came into view.

And it’s oh, so very far away. So much farther away than I expected. As long as I couldn’t see how much work it would take to get there, I could keep hoping that each morning I might wake up and just be different. Just be healed. Just be free. Just be…better. Chaos would be replaced by peace. Fury would be replaced with serenity. Sorrow replaced by joy. Loneliness replaced by…whatever replaces loneliness.

Turns out, there is a solution. There is a way to become a better swimmer, a way to make it to that distant shore, a way to struggle less, a way to even enjoy the journey, as all those better swimmers seem to be. It requires nothing but agony. Digging at sores that are imperfectly healed. Fractures that knitted together long ago into twisted and crippled forms need to be rebroken in order to be set properly. Opening dark places to peer inside, to face skeletal ghouls and drag them out into the light of day where they can explode and evaporate.

God, it hurts.

I don’t want to do it. I want to just keep crawling, dragging, and floundering along on my broken limbs because it is less painful than the healing will be. Why dig? Why plow up the past and release all the accumulated pus of long-gone ages of hurt? Why must I?

I don’t have to. I can ignore the process of healing, fume at God for not simply making it disappear, complain about the unfairness of it all, shake my fist at the heavens and rail. I could just decide to sink into delicious oblivion. I am terrified, and the sorrow threatens to overwhelm. I am desperate for courage.

And then, I hear it. The cheering. Faintly, but undeniably, there are shouts of encouragement on the air. Coming from the other side. They bolster my resolve, and I kick once more.

And then, a friendly voice beside me, exhorting me to endure. An arm around my chest in lifeguard fashion, turning me so that I can be carried for just a moment. Around me are better, stronger swimmers, and they are stopping their race in order to support and instruct. I take a breath, relax my weary muscles, and let them take the weight. It’s also hard, this letting go, this admitting that I’m not going to make it, that I need help. It chafes. I have to restrain myself from shaking them off and angrily sending them away. How dare they see my imperfections?

But I don’t. I listen. I try to copy their motions, to learn from them. They had better lessons. They can teach me. Maybe it doesn’t have to be all struggle. Maybe I too can catch a glimpse of sky now and then, and realize that there are birds singing and dragonflies buzzing. Maybe it can be something beautiful, this swimming.

Maybe I can learn to float, to gather strength for each new push forward.

And I recognize that God’s healing isn’t so much in a flash of explosive drama, but in the sending of help. He wants us to need each other. He wants us to reach out. He wants us to stop crushing one another in the eager stampede to reach the finish line and instead bend down to lift the trampled and injured. Reaching the other side first is not the goal. This race has room for more than one winner. In fact, I suspect that those who climb onto that other shore with glowing good looks and triumphant strength because their first concern was themselves will be told to take a number rather than a trophy.

Those who come, however, bedraggled and half-drowned, in twos and threes and fours, weary and waterlogged, groups of friends who refused to let one another sink…there will be hands there, raising them to their feet. There will be claps on the back and warm blankets and hot cocoa and feasting. And tears. So many tears of gratitude and joy for victory over hurts long endured.

Look around. We’re everywhere. The drowing, the struggling, the aching and sinking ones. Are you whole, and healed? If you are, you were not given such wholeness to enable you to fly past and arrive first.

To those who stop, and assist, and extend oh, so much grace! You know who you are. You keep me going. You give me hope. You model Christ. And you teach me to float, to hear the birds, to see the blue.

Thank you for showing me the sky.

 Hebrews 12:1-2
1 Thessalonians 5:14

A few weeks ago, I took my brood to the park. Park = FUN, and this bright spring day was no different. Then, too soon (as usual), it was time to leave. I aways expect a moderate amount of moaning and groaning when that announcement is made, but most of my children are old enough to grasp the concept of time and are reasonable enough to understand that goodbye doesn’t mean forever, and that the park will, in fact, remain where it is until such time as they can return.

Not so on this day.

On this day, the almost-four-year-old was not having any of it. With a ferocity welling up from the depths of his tunnel-vision, he could not be reasoned with. It was getting late. We had no food with us. He was filthy and needed a bath. He was tired. Sleeping on the ground in the dark was highly overrated. Trust me, child. Trust me! It’s time to go!

Buckled into his car seat and desperately unhappy, he flung epithets at me all the way home:

“I do NOT love you!”

“I want a new mommy!”

“I want to live in different house! Not with you!”

“I will NEVER love you!”

Etc.

I am not the mother of an enormous brood for nothing. I have earned my stripes through many battles that have torn at my soul. I have been in the trenches and lived to tell the tale. Normally, this tirade would have made me roll my eyes and sigh, knowing that it would pass in time and reason would return (as much reason as can be expected from such an age, anyway). This incident, however, struck me as uniquely unfair.

I had just taken him to the park, for pete’s sake! I didn’t have to do it, I could have sat at home and read a book! I could have sedated him with dvds and never shown him the brightness of the clear blue sky and the joy of a slick plastic slide! Instead of being thanked for my generosity, I was being maligned for my cruelty.

Arriving at home, I unstrapped him from his seat and carried him under my arm to his bed. There I told him he could sit until he (I) calmed down. He was still crying. He was still mad. But as I sat quietly with him, suddenly his manner changed. Perhaps it was sheer exhaustion. He looked at me through his tear-filled eyes and said with no small amount of desperation Mommy! I don’t want to be bad anymore!

And that’s when I saw myself.

Raging against God for taking away things that had come from Him in the first place. Angry that I hadn’t had enough time with them. Unable to trust that He knows best. Incapable of believing that His timing is always perfect. Refusing to accept that He has a better plan. Clapping my hands over my ears as He said let Me feed you, let Me clean you up, let Me give you rest; trust Me. I love you. I will make all things beautiful in their time. Trust Me!

I am the child, not quite four years old. I have flung epithets at God. I have raged against the restraints He has placed on me to keep me safe.

And I will probably do it time and again until I reach Home and can be safely set free.

Sitting with my child, I felt enormous pity welling up inside of me. He could not control himself; he didn’t have the power at that moment. Instead of being mad, I was able to respond with mercy. He wanted to be good, he truly did. Raging is so exhausting. He longed for peace and didn’t know how to get it.

So I gave it to him. I took him in my arms and forgave him. I told him I loved him with an everlasting love, no matter how many times he rejected me. That there was nothing he could do that would make me hate him back. That he could yell and scream but it didn’t change the fact that I was his mommy and he was my child and I would give my life for him.

And that’s when I saw God.

My response to my son was a mere shadow of His response to His crippled creation. If I felt sorrow for my son’s helplessness, how much more does He look on us? Not in condemnation, not in consternation, not in judgement or wrath, but with a pity and compassion so all-encompassing that we can only grope around the edges of it. He knows we are dust. And when we ourselves grasp the depths of our own dustiness, God counts it among our greatest victories.

Because it is only then that we can extend that same mercy and grace to others.

Psalm 103:13 & 14
Psalm 46:10

“For My people have committed two evils: They have forsaken Me, The fountain of living waters, To hew for themselves cisterns, Broken cisterns That can hold no water.” Jeremiah 2:13

Oh, the grief God feels for me. He offers me His fresh and sparkling living water as it burbles up joyfully from the fountain of Life…He stretches out His hand to invite me to come, drink great draughts from it, and I am so, so very thirsty. My mouth is dry and dusty from breathing the air of this world. I have been running the race, running so hard, trying with all my strength to do everything right. I come close…I look at His outstretched hand, His tender eyes imploring me…and then…

I turn away.

I turn to another cistern, cracked and leaking, a cistern that is not connected with His life, that has never been connected to Him, but was enlarged by my own hands, years and years ago. There is no fresh, bubbling water there. There is a sludge of dark putrescence at the bottom, a few flies buzz around, mosquito larva swims in the murky stillness. It stinks. It repels.

But I bend..and I drink.

I drink the dregs of pride, and fear, and regret. I drink abuse, and guilt, and shame. It hurts and does not go down easy, it sticks in my throat and leaves a bitter aftertaste, but I persist.

And the Father…my Father…He weeps over me as I do. He bends low and speaks His words of love in my ear, His words of peace, and promise, and life, but they are muffled by the sound of my own gulping and gasping. Sure and swift, death comes. Death to hope, death to joy, death to vision, and hearing, and grace, and I collapse inward, a black hole of need and loss.

I give up.

But the story does not end.

It does not end because deep within I still hear Him calling. He stands over me, singing. His tears fall on me as I lay, inert and exhausted. He binds my wounds. He speaks peace to the storm in my own mind. His grief penetrates my heart. Oh child, He whispers. Choose life. Choose life! Choose Me. Leave the poisoned wells in the past. Trust Me to make all things new. I take the water from His hand, and it purifies what has been poisoned.

Though it feels like a vicious cycle that will never end, there is redemption here. The glory-to-glory is here, in the black hole of need, in the gutter of abandonment and rescue, in the hurt and the healing, that is when I am slowly shaped into His image. It feels all wrong; it doesn’t feel like victory, but with God all is topsy-turvy, and failure becomes His triumph as I learn to turn. Learn to choose.

Learn to live.

Deuteronomy 30:19
John 4: 10-14

Sometimes the enemy, he wins a round.

Almost always, I am sitting quietly, enjoying the view from my mountaintop, wondering why more people don’t choose this bliss, when the lies begin.

Slowly at first, sliding down around me softly as I whistle a happy tune, I don’t even notice them.

real change is impossible, you know they whisper. you’re never going to get where you want to be.

Oblivious, I swat at them absentmindedly, little buzzing flies.

your past…it is full of error. you’ll never change, you can’t. God doesn’t really plan to use you.

Larger, and faster they pelt me, weighing me down before I realize what is happening.

you’re really kind of a failure they taunt. what do you have to feel so good about? Look around! Nothing you have done really matters.

Suddenly it’s a full-scale avalanche.

THERE IS NO USE TO ANYTHING. GIVE UP, GIVE UP NOW. BEFORE YOU MAKE THINGS WORSE.

The boulders bounce, calculated to crush and destroy.

HYPOCRITE. FAILURE. IDIOT. HOPELESS. DELUSIONAL. FOOL. GOD IS NOT BIGGER, HE IS NOT BIGGER, HE IS BIGGER FOR EVERYONE ELSE BUT YOU, YOU ARE THE EXCEPTION, YOU ARE THE ONE HE CANNOT HEAL, YOU ARE THE ONE HE CANNOT DO ANYTHING WITH. THE ONE. THE ONLY ONE. AND IT’S ALL YOUR FAULT. IT’S ALL, ALL, ALL YOUR FAULT. ALL OF IT. 

And just like that, I am buried.

AND IT MAKES ME SO ANGRY, BECAUSE THE LIES, THEY ARE NOT JUST LIES, THEY ARE COMPLETE AND UTTER BULLSHIT.

AND I WILL SAY IT AGAIN BECAUSE IT IS THE TRUTH, THE TRUTH, THE GOD-HONEST TRUTH, EVEN IF IT IS MYSELF ALONE WHO NEEDS TO HEAR IT: THEY ARE BULLSHIT.

BULLSHIT.

BULLSHIT, SATAN. BULLSHIT. I CALL YOUR BLUFF.

And because God the Father knows I am dust and has compassion on me in my frailty and is mighty to save, because He takes great delight in me, He quiets me with His love, even under the rockslide of BULLSHIT. Even though I sat there and let it bury me. Even though so much of my life is failure, day in and day out, He loves me. He has a plan.

Even when everything around me is shaking with the force of the enemy’s wrath, even when all seems lost and nothing seems worthwhile, He is up to something.

Even when all hell breaks loose.

It breaks loose so I can break free.

Because He is good, though the battle is lost, the victory is mine.

Habakkuk 3:17-19
Psalm 103:13&14
John 8:44

Navigating this life can be hard.

Hazards lie all around, like land mines; the path is riddled with them. My five senses find no end of ways to sin, to descend into the depressions to the left and to the right. Many of these pits are labelled clearly: anger! lust! apathy! fear! self-pity! Their bright carnival signs, flashing lights, and enticing music bely their grim titles. There is a stench of death and decay coming from their depths.

Nevertheless, I often leap into them. Sometimes with narrowed eyes and set jaw, I dive in, determined to satisfy the clamor of my soul. Sometimes I walk slowly, considering the cost and knowing the consequences. Other times I am simply looking the other way and I stumble heavily, finding myself at the bottom quite suddenly.

And sometimes, I am thrown in.

Sometimes…I am pushed.

Sometimes the shit in my past, shit that happened when I was small and helpless and unprotected, looms up large and terrifying and hits me like a 350 pound linebacker, and I go down hard.

I am sitting at the bottom of the pit, in the stench and vileness, and I hurt. I am the lamb bleating in pain and fear, and it is not fair.

IT IS NOT FAIR.

We all suffer from the wounds inflicted upon us that were not our fault; the battles that were fought around us that we did not participate in but which hurt us nonetheless because the shrapnel flew fast and far and buried itself deeply in our flesh. We tried to run, but we didn’t make it far enough, fast enough. And the scars, they are ugly, and they still open and bleed. Usually when we least expect it.

But there is good news.

GOD IS BIGGER.

He knows about not-fair. Purity…hanging on a cross with nails severing muscle and nerve, flesh opened and bleeding from countless whips, He lived and died the not-fair.

And because He did, He is uniquely qualified to lift you up.

He is bigger than the shit that hit you when you were not the one throwing it.

He weeps with you in the not fair of it all. He holds you close. And He will make all things new.

Because to Him, all pits are pits, and regardless of the means by which we were brought low, His ability to lift us up remains unchanged. He stretches out His hand, He opens up the door, and we walk out again. He is the ladder, and He is the way out of all pits, of all kinds, for all time.

Though the path be riddled, and the storms be strong, He holds me by the hand (Psalm 73:23). He makes my path straight (Proverbs 3:6). He speaks calm to the confusion (Mark 4:39) . When I am guided by Him, He will not let my foot slip into destruction (Psalm 94:13).

Though I am tempted to think that the best way, the most logical way, to avoid the pits is to look about myself constantly, keep my eyes on my feet, move slowly and cautiously…quite the opposite is true. The only way to avoid the falling is to keep my eyes riveted to the One who begins and ends every day of my life. The One who hems me in before and behind.

When I keep my eyes fixed on Him, I need not worry about the pits at all, nor the scars, nor the shrapnel. The linebackers skulk away.

And I walk in safety.

Psalm 139:4-6

Sometimes I get tired.

I get tired of fighting the good fight. I get tired of taking every thought captive. I get tired of putting on the armor of God. I get tired of taking up the Sword of the Spirit. I get tired of reading, and seeking, and knocking, and asking, and waiting.

I just want to be done. Done with all this (picture me making a vague motion with my arms to indicate my present corporeal form). Can I just be done, God? I plead, like a child at summer camp. Can I just come home? I’m lonely. I’m sweaty. I’m tired of living in this tent. It’s falling apart. The other kids don’t always play nicely. Please?

And He answers: nope. Not time yet.

He is not done with me. For whatever reason, He wants me to stay here, at Earthcamp, where the bugs bite and the sun burns and the marshmallows fall into the fire and my enemies kick the shit out of me regularly.

Sometimes, when I feel rebellious, I decide that I just won’t play. Forget the program, I’m going to do my own thing. And my own thing is to sit here on a log and stare into space. Just pretty much quit everything. Because really, what difference does it make? Will anyone even notice? Can’t I just bide my time until the trumpet call that signals camp’s end?

I tell myself that there is something in-between being eaten up with zeal and consumed by zombies. Both options are just so…painful. Surely, if I sit on the sidelines, curl myself into the fetal position, protect my vital organs, then both God and zombie alike will pass by me, unnoticing. The race can be run by the strong–those who are born with better genes, happier pasts, more thorough educations–and the zombies can dine upon the foolish–those who run in circles, making lots of noise.

Me? I’ll just sit here quietly; I won’t make a sound. No one will see me or care. It is a strategy that served me well in childhood when battles raged and shrapnel flew.

The problem is that Earthcamp holds no neutral zone. There is no Switzerland in the realm of spiritual warfare.

Sure, I may experience a respite from attack when I do nothing, but that is only because the enemy of my soul knows full well that I am now doing his job for him. He can focus his efforts elsewhere; I have just made the battle easier. And the spreading numbness that takes over my heart when I sit and stare builds itself into a thick yellow callous of indifference.

Apathy and passivity…these are just other words for the truth: I am rebellious. And not in a good, Jesus-was-a-rebel kind of way. In an I-am-despising-His-offer-of-life-abundant kind of way. I am telling Him that He is not enough for the journey, that His Spirit cannot give me the strength I need, that His tools for victory are lacking. I am telling Him, basically, that He lied to me.

Yet God is not a man, that He should lie.

Fatigue is not a sin. He gives strength for the day, and for the battle. He gives weapons for the warfare. But it is up to me to choose to pick them up and use them. It is up to me to choose to wait upon Him, and have my strength renewed. But the renewal will not come if I am sulking and pouting.

His truth–His word–will not fill up my heart and mind when they are already full to overflowing with complaint and fretfulness.

Only in rebuking the lies and having confidence in His wisdom will I find the renewal I need. When I determine, once and for all, that God is always good, and I am always loved, I rise up with wings like an eagle, and soar.

Isaiah 30:15

Isaiah 40:31

“Blessed are You, Hashem, our G-d, King of the universe, Who formed man with wisdom and created within him many openings and many hollows (cavities). It is obvious and known before Your Throne of Glory that if but one of them were to be ruptured or if one of them were to be blocked it would be impossible to survive and to stand before You (even for a short period of time). Blessed are You, Hashem, Who heals all flesh and acts wonderously.”

Come to find out (thanks, Sarah!) that the Asher Yatzar is a Jewish blessing, found in the Talmud, that was written approximately 1600 year ago by a 4th century rabbi named Abayei.*

I thank God for a body that works properly; one which He has provided with ways to eliminate death and decay.

And how much more do I thank Him for the way He provided, through Jesus Christ, to eliminate the death and decay that seeks to claim my soul!

Romans 6:16-17

*article on the blessing here

Truly, our bodies are miraculous things. That’s just the truth. They have been phenomenally designed to carry on more processes in a single breath than we can count in that same inhalation.

Cell respiration, red blood cells whisking oxygen to fingertips and pinkie toes, neural pathways ablaze with messages to STOP, GO, BLINK, REACT…our heart beats without our express permission, our lungs discard CO2 without us signing any forms, our hand jerks away from a hot pan on the stove before we even know how to form the word “ouch”.

And let’s not forget poop.

Because really, what is better than pooping? I challenge you to describe to me a more blissful event than that of finally locating a toilet when the need has crossed the line between “urgent” and “one millisecond away from utter humiliation”. Ah, the relief.

At its most elementary explanation, pooping is the expulsion of waste. Stuff we don’t need. Our bodies, when operating at their miraculous optimum, extract all we need from the food we ingest. Stomach, duodenum, small intestine, large. All fulfill their purpose in taking that food and squeezing every bit of life from them, and the rest, a mass of mostly water, fiber, and bacteria, is eliminated. We don’t think about it, we just do it. We don’t give the order, our bodies decide when it shall take place, whether we are standing in line at Wal Mart, sitting in front of the fire at home, or at a huge company picnic eating questionable potato salad and looking uneasily at the porta-potties.

My point is, we take it for granted.

Until something goes wrong.

And then, well…what would be wrong with NOT pooping? I’m sure many people would be happy to do without the inconvenience entirely. But hold onto your poop and all kinds of nasty things can happen. Things with names like ”Intestinal obstruction”, “Anal Fissure”, and “Colon Cancer”…all of which can lead to death. Death! From not pooping!

Do I have a point? I’m sure you are asking. If you got this far, you are begging me to wrap this up, and there may be a hidden pun in there, I don’t know.

Yes, yes I do have a point.

If you hold onto your poop, clench hard enough, feed your one, unique, God-gifted body things like cheese puffs and twinkies, you’re choosing death by slow poisoning. SLOW. POISON. Hold onto that poop, and it festers in your gut. All the toxins that your body was helpfully trying to get rid of swiftly and effectively begin to leach back into your system and flow into all your organs. Bacteria flourishes, with no place to go but back into your body. Diverticula form, catching and holding more nastiness.

I’m having a hard time not getting on a dietary soapbox here, but BY GOLLY THAT WAS NOT MY INTENTION. I was trying to make a metaphor.

If you still haven’t grasped it, I’m saying, ya gotta POOP REGULARLY to be HEALTHY. Bodily, I mean.

And (drum roll please) ya gotta SHIT REGULARLY to be HEALTHY. Spiritually, I mean.

If you don’t let go of the shit…the pride, the fear, the unforgiveness, the misplaced anger, the vice, the fill-in-the-blank…if you clench and dance and deny that it’s there, your soul festers. Filth collects in the little pockets of error. Decay sets in. You are being slowly poisoned by your own stubbornness. That’s what I’m saying. Sometimes it gets so bad that by the time we come to Him, He has to administer a holy laxative through our clenched lips, and that is really not fun. Don’t ask me how I know.

What I am also saying that it’s not a once in a lifetime experience. God is not going to deliver you from all the sin that so easily entangles once and then release you to be a shining, glorious vision of perfection for all the world to admire. Sorry to break it to you (me). Daily, you will sit down before Him and He will strip you of all your shit, if you will let Him. You’ll feel clean, invigorated, lighter, pure…but please don’t despair when you wake up the next day and are a festering cesspit once again.

He’s in the cesspit, He’s got the shovel. He’s ready to go to work. He has the original “dirty job” and He’s not going to shrink back, no matter how many times you come. He’s the God of the mud, the God of the blood, the God of the manger and the God of the leper. He can handle you.

 But the pride that says I will take care of it keeps us away. Oh, how it keeps me away. I am the toddler demanding i do it myself!!!! while making the biggest mess possible. As soon as I get cleaned up, I think I have room to talk. Room to preach. Room to blog.

I don’t, really. I’ve been in a fairly dark place just in the past few days, if you must know. My victories are fleeting and my descents spectacular. I pick up the shovel and lose all sight of the Author and Finisher of my faith. What’s worse, I try to pick up other people’s shovels.

But that’s a whole ‘nuther blog post.

Isaiah 26:3