not well-enough alone.

Matt's mama was sick the whole time she was with us for Thanksgiving, and Matt got it hard the morning she left. Dear man has been out for the count this week...which didn't work as well as needed with so many things on the church calendar. A few he missed, a few he pushed and a few he preached (including just a powerful and sacred funeral!), and the Lord met us. 

As the whole family participated in different parts of the Madison Christmas Parade in the cold this morning, representing Wellspring Church and Jesus, the Lord reminded me that our weakness isn't to be avoided, despised or skipped.  It's often where He shows up...it's often where He is WAITING. 

If He's waiting in our hard places, I'm trying to stop avoiding them.  I'm trying to simply meet Jesus there.

There have been some hard anniversaries this season. Sometimes they hit you without you even expecting them, don't they? You're not even THINKING about the date and suddenly painful memories of it years past hit you...or memories of sweet things no more. One of them just about physically hit me in the face this morning, so clear I had to laugh out loud at the Lord, always working to redeem and heal our circumstances...never leaving well-enough alone like I wish He would.

Mind your business, I tried to tell Him.

I am, He reminded me better.

He's not after our well-enough, is He?

Our God isn't content with our shoved-down, our buried, our hidden bruises, our tiny seeds of bitterness or lack of forgiveness, our broken anniversaries, our markers of loss.

He wants to make them new. He wants to make them sweet. He wants to back-flow His redemption into these days, these places. HOWEVER broken or dead or gone.

If it's still painful, or fearful, or bitter, or sarcastic, or stabbing...it's not well-enough. And it is His grace and tender mercy that won't leave it alone. 

I'm thankful. 

This past Wednesday in Bible study, Matt taught on my mom's favorite end-of-life chapter of the Bible, Isaiah 40.  Ah, she read it SO many times those last weeks.  Often out loud. Often to my bitterness as I watched her suffer and fade and her skin peel to pieces and her cry out in agony all the while joyfully announcing renewed strength and eagle's wings.

It wasn't until she was long gone that I realized I was the one misunderstanding...not her.  She knew exactly what she was believing in, the Lord strong and mighty, strong in power. She waited on the Lord and He met her and the truth of Isaiah 40 she lives fully in.

When I got to pray for our church family after the study, I couldn't help but share the preciousness of this chapter to me.  And I know to some, my tears as I shared probably seemed like something must be unresolved, or still stabbing, or that I miss her. 

And of course I do. But I grinned with my tears as I shared because He has truly TAUGHT me there, God has MET me there...in that place...that little incubated hospital room that once made me shudder and now has a heavenly glow in my mind and memory and calendar. He's met me in that room so many times the last 20 years...healing, unpacking, reframing, replaying, restoring. Redeeming. Backwards.

I can go there now and full see Him. I can grin with good tears because He met my mama there forever and meets me there still. 

There are more places in my story I wish weren't a part of it.  Maybe you too. Maybe especially around Christmas it hits you extra heavy.

May He MEET us there, may we be brave enough to meet Him there...and take what was dark and cold and weary and thrill His HOPE into it.

I love you friends.