Words from the Dirt: When You've Face Planted....Again

Doing stuff is hard.  It's hard for me, at least.  Some arenas of 'stuff' flow out of me like music and seem to get done in a flow of motion that does require effort but ease accompanies it.  That stuff is just as significant as the stuff that comes out of you only by surrendering to the process of pain.  Stuff coming out of you and stuff coming out of me matters.  Whether you feel like you are producing significance within the walls of your life or not, you are.  I am.

That is because He is always producing.  And He is in you.  I guess that's a theological question we have to ponder first.  Do you believe He is in you? Christ in me.  If I do, then the issue of significance has to first be checked against His existence and His nature.  If He is alive, moving, breathing, creating AND He is in me....then I am alive, moving, breathing, creating.  You can let anything that feels otherwise inside of you take a hike.  There is a time for all things.  There is a time to listen intently to the feelings and there is a time to bind them up - acknowledge that the story they are telling you is a lie - and move the blank on.

Recently my face has been in the dirt.  Like a movie scene where two people are fighting and the seemingly stronger opponent, in a swift move, shoves the other's face down to the ground.  The grounded one tastes the dirt, feels the immense pressure, senses the weight of anti-momentum, and for a moment relishes the relief of giving up.

In my story, it all freaking centers around the release of words.  Who knew the amount of drama and resistance writing would stir up?  Not I.  It's a journey I've been in for about two years.  Sisters and brothers - all this wrestle is around writing for me.  If that doesn't stir up a good eye roll in you, I'm not sure what will.  Unless of course, you've wrestled to step into something that calls your name as well.  Something that calls your name but requires you to face your demons, to look your fears in the eye and wrestle them.  He is a wrestler, it turns out.  He has no fear of the wrestle.  Huh.  So unlike me.

Your life is a story.  My life is a story.  And there are two writers who would like to pen the story. One is ultimate truth which leads to a freedom that feels like the brightest air in your lungs.  The other is the one who wants oppression for you - from the time you're little until the time you're done.

Over the two years I've been invited to journey into the land of wrestle, so much has been won as I've surrendered to the wrestle.  I am not the same Abi.  THANK THE LORD!!!!!!!! Truly.  But in the journey, there are layers of the process.  He takes you through one layer, He wins the wrestle with you and for you and in you, and then He lets you rest.  Then comes the next layer.  And somehow the next layer always shocks me.  Errr single time.  Shocked Abi.  Maybe I should look into that domain name.

So the next layer of wrestle found me and here I've been....face in the dirt.  There's something about repeatedly tasting dirt.  It's both strength building and disarmingly scary.  Scary because the vulnerability you feel seems louder and stronger each time.  Your walls are thinner and weaker...which is ultimately good.  But you feel the throw down to the ground more acutely.  And the thought that rains down on you is, 'I'm not sure strength will win this time. Perhaps this is the time my weaknesses, my gaps, my familiar and crippling untrue beliefs will have the final say.' Here's the wrestle.  This is the ground at stake, isn't it?

But we do not wrestle alone.

As much as I care about this ground and these questions...HE is ardent about them.  What? Doesn't that make your mind hurt as you try to comprehend it? How could He possibly care more than I do? How could He be more concerned about the outcome of the journey than I am? But He shows His ardent care by provoking the wrestle when it's time.  Head scratcher.  He cares enough to get me one layer closer to conclusion.  If He were to snap His all-creating fingers and pop me over the wrestle to the other side....I would have no muscle, skill or capacity to carrying the new Abi.  It would be like someone gave me finely crafted, totally customized armor to wear....but I had never worn armor.  It's heavy.  It's essential for the other side, this armor.  It's what enables us to thrive and survive the new land but you have to have the muscle mass to not be taken down by the weight of the armor.  You have to train to fight.

I try to listen hard when my face is in the dirt.  Because He is always faithful to send me voices of truth.  This week, Carol told me to create from the place of brokenness...to lead from weakness and a broken-heart moment...that it would be the thing that caused huge waves.  I hadn't told her the depth of my face-in-the-dirtedness.  Zion looked me firmly in the eyes and told me he believed in me.  That I would break through and that I was almost there.  He let me borrow his belief.  And then He whispers over me.  This time I felt Him inviting me to embrace the darkness and the brokenness....to move forward while being face planted.  So here we are.  Exposing the fragility without shame. Welcoming the wrestle and the feelings of weakness and saying - let's allow this to produce something instead of letting it tell me its endless story of oppression.

Weakness and brokenness can be the open doors to truth.  They don't have to hold us down with a label of being stuck.  They can simply be part of the wrestle and part of being human and part of overcoming.

Thank you for reading.














Much love,

Honest Abi