broken

It is amazing to me that we are fast approaching the week. So many things have happened in the last few hours that I find myself remembering will not occur again until Copeland is born. It's somewhat surreal, and at the same time, almost so heavy and solid in its reality that it hurts to think we'll be back at home in less than a week, with or without our precious girl.

I wanted to let you all know that we are making it. We are remarkably at peace... the Lord has heard the abundant prayers that I know are going up for us continually and we are feeling the impact of your supplications. Recently I heard of a family who lost a beautiful 2 year-old; keeping up with them via their own blog and reading how the Lord is responding daily to the prayers of the saints surrounding them is truly one thing that encourages me not to grow weary as I lift them up to the Father. So I assure you: I am feeling the fullness of the love and support you're pouring out on our family and I would not be where I am, walking with any sort of sanity or joy, if it weren't for you. Conor and I thank you and pray, even now, that as you go to the Father on our behalf, He would respond to the needs and anxieties in your own life and bless you.

We met with our pastor at church last week and it was an unexpected, but much needed, gift. I had thought I might not go; I felt that something else involving the details about Copeland's life and probable death would be too much. But as I dropped Sellers off at school, the Lord prompted me to drive that way. It seems He knew it would be better for me to sit and weep with my husband in a church office than in a parking lot alone. I find that revealing my emotion is much easier on this computer screen than in person. Crying in front of anyone is somewhat uncomfortable. But it's necessary and I know that in the days to come there will be a lot of emotions on display that a few months ago I might have found totally embarrassing. I pray that if you happen to witness the tears, you won't feel totally ill-at-ease yourself. Please know that my weeping - and that of my family - is simply an extension of the weight of our hearts. Both joy and grief have a fullness. "My cup overfloweth..."

The Lord used the pastor we met with to reveal some things about Conor and I that I think we probably knew but hadn't connected to this situation. I realize He is shaping and changing me, but I hadn't thought that perhaps part of this is about breaking some of the chains from around my heart and sweeping clean the corners of my soul that I have for so long left unattended. Apparently I am quite legalistic. I laugh at the word 'apparently'; I spend the majority of my time feeling massively guilty about something, so much so that not feeling guilty elicits a sort of discontentedness in me, almost like lethargy. Guilt is for me what liquor is to an alcoholic; while I know it's wrong to indulge, obviously un-Biblical, I find it's almost necessary for me to operate at full-function. It sounds odd, but perhaps it's because guilt facilitates opportunities for work, ways for me to feel useful and important in my own salvation, or even just my own well-being. If I feel guilty about something I've eaten, after all, the quickest and most satisfying antidote is to go to the gym. We live in a society that tells us we can 'fix' the stuff about ourselves that we most loathe - or are supposed to loathe - if we try hard enough or dig deep enough. If it weren't true we wouldn't be buying self-help books in a monstrous continuum.

I hadn't considered - or at least not long enough for it to prompt me in any other direction - that God isn't concerned with what my idea of personally "fully-functioning" is. I hadn't considered that He might, in fact, want to blow that idea to smithereens.

I'd like to hang onto my 'works-based' religion, if I could. Like I said, without guilt, I lose the opportunity to earn forgiveness. WIthout a bought excuse, I lose what is unfortunately my most powerful motivation for doing good things. And without doing good things, I really can't figure out why Jesus loves me if I don't believe in grace. And sometimes the only way to receive grace, and to really understand what you're accepting (that you are responsible for exactly 0% of what God fully accomplished in saving you), is to be broken. Broken enough that you can't hold onto anything except Jesus' hand when He stretches it out.

This season has broken me. It breaks me daily. Someone recently told me that going through an experience like this will leave you with a "limp" - that I can expect to never feel totally "put together" again. They weren't referring to emotions, I don't think. They didn't mean I'd be a constant wreck for years to come. I think they simply meant that the Lord will allow me to incur a wound that, while He may heal it, will leave a scar I will never be able to forget - certainly not cover up. I know the Father uses the weak; the stories of Jesus healing the crippled in the New Testament reveal, over and over again, God's heart for the lame. Irregardless, I don't want to be included in that demographic; I'd rather be 'whole' in the eyes of the world, whole by the standards that I know to be real here in this life. And so Jesus understood - knew from the beginning of time - that I'd need to be reminded that in my weakness, He is made strong. It is in the things the world calls foolish and insignificant that He reveals His glpry. May His strength swallow up my frailty, His joy my sorrow.