where did the rug go?

I like to describe myself as a planner. I enjoy the process of getting organized and arranging my day just as much as I relish the routine and structure I can create through carefully laid plans. I strongly prefer being ready for anything to being caught off guard, so I often develop contingency plans for my original plans – just in case something were to go wrong. Some people might call this a “small” control issue. I choose to call it “being prepared.”

Lately, I’ve frequently found myself caught up in a frenzy of trying to be prepared. Life as I’ve known it for the last four years – with all it’s wonderfully comforting and terribly annoying routines – will cease to exist in a few months. I’ll move to a new home, graduate from school, launch out into a new career with a new job, develop a new social circle, and most importantly, take serious steps forward in a budding relationship progressing towards marriage… a fresh start in almost every way possible. In the face of absolute uncertainty as to the specifics of what these new starts would include, I started making plans. They sounded a bit like this: Plan A means living here and working at this place. Plan B would involve moving farther away and working in another location. Plan C entails a third living arrangement and a drastically different job opportunity. I factored in the possibility of moving to another state. I even imagined the worst-case-scenario and developed a plan for that situation.

I thought that I had figured out all the possibilities for the future and for this relationship. I prayed and asked God to show me which of these plans for me and my boyfriend was His plan.

But that’s when the rug disappeared.

The phrase to pull the rug out from under you means that someone or something upset your plans. Someone or something made your plans fall through. Someone or something caught you by surprise… leaving you confused, disoriented, and metaphorically laying on your back, staring at the ceiling, wondering what happened.

That’s what happened to me. My “rug” disappeared because it got pulled out from underneath me. God’s answer was that none of those plans were His plan. His plan is much different and does not include that man or that relationship in any way. Bewilderment and confusion washed over me for three weeks before I was able to start to verbalize my swirling emotions. They included sadness… anger… hurt… frustration… fear… anxiety… despair.

I went for a walk tonight, because I wasn’t really sure what else to do with myself. I’m exhausted. I want to start planning again and pick myself up and start moving, but I have no direction. Everything I thought was possible – and that I genuinely wanted with all my heart – was smashed to pieces.

As I walked, I thought about how God promises us in the Bible that he has a good plan for his children – a plan to give us hope and a future (Jeremiah 29:11). HE has a plan. HE has a GOOD plan. I don’t have to have the plan. His plan is infinitely better than any of my plans.

The problem with my plans was just that – they were my plans. I tinkered with my limited vision of an uncertain future, and asked God to tell me which option was good. The answer was that none of them were good compared to the awesome plan that he has for me. I wholeheartedly believe this is true. Time after time in the Bible, in the lives of my friends and family, and in my own life, God has worked out situations and circumstances with amazing perfection to bring about his glory and our good. I feel a little silly for sitting with my plans and asking God which one was the best – like he was limited to only the options I could think of.

I trust that his highest and best for me is beyond anything I could imagine. I know that the struggle will ease with time. I know that his grace will heal my broken heart. But from where I am sitting tonight, I don’t see the good. I don’t see the hope. I don’t see the future. I don’t feel the healing. I feel the excruciating pain. I don’t see the new path. All I can see tonight are the closed doors, the paths that God does not want me to travel. I’m living in the in-between.

So what are you supposed to do when the rug disappears?

To be honest, I don’t have a deep theological answer. I think you just tell Jesus. I think you run to him with your broken heart, shattered plans, and your confusion. I think you say, I have no idea what you are doing but I know that you are doing something that in the long run is good. I think you say, I was silly to think you were limited to what I could imagine for the future. I think you say, my heart aches and this stinks and I don’t like this. I think you say, Jesus I love you and I want to follow you and experience everything that you have for me, and I feel like the path is just really tough right now. And I think you let Jesus wrap his mighty arms around you and hold you until you are ready to get up off the floor, knowing that he understands your pain, understands your questions, and loves you unconditionally through it all. And I think once you are up off the floor, you take one step at a time into the amazing future God has designed for your life.

You, Lord, are forgiving and good,
    abounding in love to all who call to you.
Hear my prayer, Lord;
    listen to my cry for mercy.
When I am in distress, I call to you,
    because you answer me.

~ Psalm 86:5-7

You are enough.

God,

Here I sit tonight, in the beauty of your creation. I hear the babbling brook, I smell the dew soaked grass, I see the stars sparkle like diamonds in the sky. And it is easier to have peace here. I feel something stirring in my heart this weekend, and I know that the only way I’ll understand what is emerging is by sitting still here with you.

I feel weary. I feel so tired. Lonely. Frustrated. Angry. Exhausted. Pain. Sadness. Confusion. I want to rest – to be alone – because all the noise and bustle of people exhausts me. I want to be with people – when I sit here alone the loneliness becomes so painful my heart aches. I am a living mixture of contradictions. I don’t know what to do. I don’t know how to move forward. I don’t know how to fix the brokenness that exists in my heart. I can’t see beyond this moment – to where this is going – to what you are doing.

So I say these truths tonight, and pray that they become rooted in my heart that I might believe.

You are enough.

Even if my heart never heals in this life – you are enough.

Even if the scars from yesterday continue to haunt my dreams – you are enough.

Even if my depression never goes away – you are enough.

Even if my anxiety continues to reappear – you are enough.

Even if my family remains broken and distant – you are enough.

Even if my friends leave me behind – you are enough.

Even if my school work never ends – you are enough.

Even if I never “get it all together” – you are enough.

Even if I never go on another date again – you are enough.

Even if I never get to have my own family – you are enough.

You are enough. Dear sweet Jesus, please be enough.

a letter from God

Yesterday was a hard day. I know I’m not supposed to sound so negative, but I’m going to be honest because I know that many of you are right there, too. Or have been there. Or will be there. Any “single” person out there knows all too well the pain I’m talking about. You meet a special someone. You wonder at the possibility of a romantic relationship. You ask, oh Lord, is this it? Is THIS the spouse you have for me?! You excitedly pour yourself into the relationship. Hours, or days, or weeks, or months, or even years go by. You get to know them. You invest your heart in them. But eventually, you reach a point where you realize the answer to your question is simply no. Not this person. Not this time. Not this season. No.

And that’s where I found myself yesterday. Sitting in my car in the middle of an unfamiliar city, listening to a sovereign and divine “no” fill my head and penetrate my heart. Not this person. Not this time. Not this season. No.

writing a psalm of redemption

Three years ago, I  was challenged to write a psalm to God as a reaction to my journey studying the story of the Exodus in a bible study. I stumbled across it again today while I was unpacking and wanted to share:

God, you are the God who brought me out of Egypt. I didn’t even realize I was a slave. I have spent so many years believing lies about who you are, about who I am, and about the weight of my sin. I have allowed normal desires for love and acceptance to grow into monsters. I have lived to earn the approval of the people around me and worked to make other people like me. The monsters have grown with the depth of my sin, and I’ve come to find my identity and my worth in how well or how poorly I measure up to human expectations. Instead of running to you when I sin, I’ve tried to pay off my debt with better behaviors and self punishment. God forgive me. Now I can see just how strong of a hold Egypt has on my heart.

I’ve believed for a long time that if I didn’t talk about something, it meant it wasn’t true. Now I can see that it only meant the grip it had on me was tighter than I ever could have imagined. It has prevented me from fully healing from wounds of the past and from fully experiencing your beautiful and freeing forgiveness myself and from sharing it with others. Please help me to live daily in the shadow of the cross an the knowledge of the precious grace and mercy you offer to me. Please remind me of your love.

I know you say “Fear not, for I have redeemed you, I have summoned you by name, you are mine.” You tell me that I am “precious and honored in your sight and because you love me, you gave Christ in exchange for my life.” You say that I am more than my choices, more than all of my past sins, more than the problems I create, that you’ve renewed and remade me. You say that my identity is found in you. You say that my worth is in who you say I am. And even though I know all of this, I can still hear the lies that the enemy whispers, the half-truths that fill me with shame. Please silence the whispers and help me to know in the depths of my soul that my sin and my shame do not define me and that there is no more condemnation.

Please hold tight to me when life gets hard, when I can’t see where we are going, and I don’t understand what you are doing. It is so sad to realize just how much of an Israelite I am. Even after seeing the enormity of your power to save me and change me, I still struggle to trust you with everything and I doubt the good you have planned for me. I run to other things and other people for comfort and control. When I trade your truth for these lies, I only hurt you and everyone around me, and find myself more empty than when I started. Forgive me and teach me how to be completely satisfied in you. Show me how to be content where you have me, and to believe that the live you have for me is better than the life I could create myself. Thank you for your love, your grace, and your compassion. Thank you for saving me before I even knew I needed to be saved. Thank you for the healing you are working out in my life. Thank you for your patience, forgiveness, and gentle correction. Please help me to walk in the freedom you have given me.

what’s going on lately

I wish that I could say the past 6 months have been so exciting and full of awesomeness that they made me forget that I have a blog. The truth is, the past 6 months have been perhaps the toughest ones I’ve ever faced in my life. I haven’t forgotten about this blog – I just haven’t had anything positive to say.

I still don’t know how to describe what’s been going on, other than to say that I’m a great perfectionist, emotion-stuffer, people-pleaser, and a situational minimizer and that all my efforts to sweep away and ignore the hard things in life all caught up to me at once. I’ve spent the past few months falling apart in ways I didn’t know were possible.

Even now I don’t really know what to say. Life is difficult. It’s even more difficult when you pretend that it’s not difficult and you ignore the parts of you that are trying to tell you that it is difficult. Abuse is bad. It’s bad because it is hurtful and degrading and it’s bad because it damages you at a soul level. Healing is hard. It takes time. It takes energy. Sometimes it takes re-living things from the past because you’ve never acknowledged how hurtful they were, and proper healing doesn’t happen if you don’t admit you are hurt.

I guess that’s all for now. I’m hoping that writing and honestly sharing some of the things on my mind will help with the healing process.