An Incredible Machine

Blue is my favorite color (which shouldn’t be a surprise to anyone) but perhaps it should be black and blue. On any given day you can generally find a handful of bruises somewhere on me, most of which I have no idea how I got them. What I often don’t show are the bruised and broken places on the inside. Most of those… I know how I got them. I usually inflict them on myself in one way or another. I’m a sucker for self-torture and self-sabotage.

I wish I were different. I am working on being different, but I haven’t been completely transformed yet. I’m pretty sure God has me in the LOTS OF WORK TO BE DONE pile. Yet, I know He hasn’t given up on me. Finding my way out of one extreme and not swinging to the other hasn’t been mastered yet. Finding the balance in the middle takes me a long time. Things that take a long time get easily frustrating and often left behind.

I’ve made some unwise choices lately; choices that have changed me and distanced me from God. Maybe it’s fairer to say I allowed myself to be distant and as a result my heart was deceived into believing a pack of lies, even though my head knew better. I wish I could say I was sorry for those choices, but for now I am not. I am only sorry for the fallout. I am sorry for putting someone I love deeply in an impossible middle. And for myself knowing that no matter what I am the one who loses out on the most.

If you dig a hole so deep and then willingly jump right in, pulling anyone around you down with you, is it possible to climb out and move forward without that gaping hole always between you?

I’ve held something close to my heart for many months now. Its permanent home was there, resting its weight above a beating heart that sang, “I’m loved. I’m loved. I’m loved.” Yesterday, I sacrificially removed it for a time. I thought it was a small symbolic gesture. I wasn’t prepared for feeling like there was a hole in my chest that anyone looking could see right through. A cold emptiness emanating from a heart beating “I hurt. I hurt. I hurt.”

A heart that beats, an Incredible Machine
Made of blood and love and hope and lust and steam

(Sugarland - Incredible Machine)

It’s a reminder of how dangerous love is both in its power for joy and sorrow. Open yourself up to it and creates unlimited space to be filled and abundance to pour out. But at times, the emptiness of that limitless space feels like death. What then? When the love feels dark and lost and the silence and space threaten to swallow you, what then? How do you wait in that space calling to God without losing faith? These are the questions I am asking.

This is the place my heart is wrestling, wondering how severe the limp I am left with will be this time.

And… I'm not leaving until I get the blessing.