Weakness

The past week has had its moments and I concluded that I was in serious avoidance of some key issues in my spirit regarding the Lord. My week ended with a trip to see my son and daughter-in-law overnight Friday. I found myself in a confusion of feelings, of remembrances of past heartaches, of sharp reminders of current pain, and of hard truths about who I have been and who I am today. I found myself extremely detached from my own soul; yet oddly driven by my desire to survive and show myself to be in control and on top of life’s present challenges.

As I drove the two hours home on Saturday, my heart broke open. As I wept tears and snot at 70 miles per hour, I realized two things. The first is how deeply I was robbed as an infant, small child and young girl of any concept of my femininity, of any sense of protection, of knowing I was safe when I was weak. Much of who God intended me to be was ripped away by abuse, fear, abandonment, and violence. The upshot of it all was that I spoke lies to myself that I had to be strong to survive, strong and almost masculine in order to defend my heart from being hurt and defend my body from ever being purely feminine and beautiful as I was...and am.

The second is that I am created to be weak in a good sense; created to acknowledge my Heavenly Father as my strength. The truth is, I am weak now - incredibly so - unable to carry much of this load, exhausted, afraid, trembling in the dark at 3 a.m. while trying to convince myself that my mistakes and misjudgments won’t be used by the Father I adore to harm me down the road. And yet, God has created my weakness to magnify and glorify Him; created me to be at peace and at rest in Him. I am completely broken and completely whole in my weakness before the Lord. I am safer in my weakness than I have ever been in my so-called strength.

So I surrendered it all to Him, all the shit, all the shame, all the darkness that whispers that I am not and never will be enough – enough for Him to love me, enough for any man to ever look at me again in love, enough for Jesus just as I am. I know that I will not be able to fix what is broken in my life and the lives of my children. I know I will be able to be weak, to cry, to ask for help from friends, to not have the answers that I forever told myself I had to have to be safe. It is enough that God is my Dad and the Dad of my children; that He sees me and loves me as He created me: feminine, weak, beautiful, funny and loving.

I lay on my bed this afternoon tired beyond belief from another bout of 4 a.m. wakefulness; I closed my eyes and knew without hesitation that I am fat woman who is loved and adored by God. It is in this place of truth-telling that I believe God is able to speak into why I eat, why I feel so empty. There is peace in this place.

My plan this week is to create more margins in my life where His joy and Spirit seep into my soul and revives the weak, small, feminine little girl who simply and deeply desires to be filled up by His presence. My plan is to keep saying “no” – to busy schedules, to fear, to being strong, to voices that seek to kill off my soul: and to keep saying “yes” to the tears, sorrow and grief that I have stuffed away for a lifetime. I think as I let them out there will be room to not work so hard at keeping it all contained; room for my body and soul to be weak and at peace.