Consumed

There has been something that has been nagging me for the past few days.

This feeling that won't go away.

I have been walking around in this lethargic state. Tired. Worn out.

Life can do that to you. 

I'm not unhappy. Just here. And not fully in touch with any one thing around me.

It has left me restless and unsure. 

I could use a lot of things as excuses and point to any number of them as the reason behind my present state of being.

But none of that makes it okay, or an acceptable state for my life.

For the last year God has been in the process of breaking me. Slowly.

It hasn't felt slow, but I know that He could have done it so much swifter and with a greater degree of pain. So I have become okay with the process..... thankful for it even.

Two years ago I asked God to break me, remove the things that were getting in His way, and make me hungry for Him.

I had no idea what I was really praying for or the reality of what the answer might entail.

Someone asked me, upon sharing it with them, what I was thinking? "You know what that means right?"

I thought I did as I confidently affirmed my decision.

What ensued over the next two years would change my life. And completely destroy it.

I have felt called to do this. This thing that I do. Some call it writing, others may call it something entirely different. 

I believe that it is a living testament of God in my life. My ongoing story. My testimony. 

And something that I feel God has asked me to do.

I am not perfect. Far from it. And being obedient in this is not always easy.

Most days it is tough.

I am flawed and marred. I bear the scars of my past life, and of the one I am currently living.

But I am being transformed day by day, and being loved by a God so good that I believe that it will take my whole life to fully grasp just how good He is.

I don't understand Him all the time but I am trying to scoot closer and closer, my hope being that some day that I will be right at His feet. Able to reach out and touch Him.

I want to be consumed by Him. Just saying it scares me. It is a vulnerable thing to admit.

It feels like laying on your back in a swimming pool. Treading water and moving your arms back and forth. You can't see under you and you can't really look side to side. The only direction you can see clearly is up.

That's what I want. What I have been crawling toward.

And it has required all of me.

Just when I think I have given it all, He wants more.

I realize that He wouldn't ask if I didn't have it to give. It isn't the good parts of me either, but the things that I have shoved in my closet. The things that have been pressing on the door and bulging at the seams.

Those are the things that He has been asking for. They are the things that I want to be kept hidden. Away from Him and prying eyes.

I have tried to satisfy Him with the "little" things. Reaching in and grabbing the easiest ones first. 

A year ago, He gently moved me out of the way and opened the door.

Everything came crashing out. Surrounding me and Him.

I wasn't happy about it. I was mad. I asked Him to help me not destroy me. I have come to realize that in order for me to be who He has created me to be, I have to allow Him to undo the mess I have created. Undo me and build me back up. From my foundation.

I feel as though I only have a frame to my structure, and I daily get frustrated with myself that the process isn't going faster. 

I want the state of the art Christianity.

I want to be all decked out, immaculate, and perfect.

I have a long way to go.

But the hands that I feel on me, piecing me together and restructuring, are loving and gentle.

Tender.

And when I stray even in my thought processes I can feel the pull and the draw. The tension that comes when you have gone away from the thing that is holding you to it.

So I let myself be pulled back. Sometimes gladly and at other times with a huge sigh.

Day by day. Bit by bit.

And my prayer is that pretty soon I hope that what I see will be different than what I was.

Only a glimmer of who I used to be.

Stronger and more settled. No longer unsure of who I am or of the God I profess to love.

....until another tomorrow.

~m.

"Come, let us return to the Lord. For He has torn us, but He will heal us; He has wounded us, but He will bandage us. He will revive us after two days; He will raise us up on the third day, That we may live before Him. "So let us know, let us press on to know the Lord. His going forth is as certain as the dawn; And He will come to us like the rain, Like the spring rain watering the earth."  Hosea 6:1-3