the inner crazy

There is a voice that the Holy Spirit--by His grace--has started to make me more aware of.

The inner crazy.

NOT the crazy that comes out when Nora and Ben decorated my bathroom with various shades of nail polish. Not the crazy of vacuuming with Ben on one leg and the cat brings in a live bird and releases it. Not the crazy that is homeschooling Sofie on the skeletal system while she does cartwheels and back flips to point out all the God-given hinges she has, or the crazy of all the pre-teen emotions at our house, or the crazy of Matt being gone so frequently, or the crazy of running 15 places in 15 directions. 

It's the crazy that doesn't come out often--but comes out of nowhere, and consistently, and loud--that I've got to start paying attention to for His glory.

The last two years, I'm realizing that powerful wave of unexpected emotions and strong, Gollum-type voices that come out every time we are so anxious to get home to Haiti, and the way is blocked or complicated.

At first, I try to blame that emotional phenomenon on other sources.

Perhaps Emmaus, who is our family and who loves us deeply, is blocking out those dates because they don't want us there? Perhaps Haiti is too dangerous, and instead of trusting Him I should be afraid and nervous and careful, careful at all costs, careful on all pedestals. The service and Christ-oriented missionary airline we love and trust suddenly doesn't have dates available because they are so inflexible and obviously don't want to make a way. Sharon, who loves us and loves to go home with us, keeps wisely mentioning additional possible complications because she doesn't love us and doesn't want us to go home? Our friends and family we've been anxious to see don't care if they see us or not? The encouragement and prayer and help we had hoped to carry isn't needed and doesn't make any difference, anyway?

Put a few hurdles in front of home, and suddenly, I am unloved, homeless, annoying to all those around me, and nothing but a burden.

HOW IN THE WORLD does Satan work so quickly to use the struggles of the day to turn all my truths into lies? All my insecurities into chains? All my good desires into panic, frustration, and tears?  All His good gifts into doubt?

This time, this time, the Holy Spirit has stopped my inner crazy short with His firm and gracious hand in my chest.

What is this REALLY about?

It is not really about Haiti, is it! As increased challenges in Haiti and in the whole covid situation and global travel grow, there are going to be more and more hoops to work through to travel. I get that. He's still the God who opens and closes doors and I still want to be RIGHT where He has me and I trust Him!...I'm ok with that.

So this time, as I've found myself overwhelmed with the process and the unexpected lies and emotions, the Lord's been helping me to see why I turn into a crazy person every time roadblocks raise around Haiti.

It's not about Haiti...it's about home. 

I have a home issue.

It is why I feared and then mourned my dad's sale of our childhood home truly, with wailing and gnashing of teeth and sleepless nights and such a long, weary battle. It's why Matt's parent's selling their home, Aunt Sharon and Uncle Martin selling theirs, has taken my breath away and turned into a huge thing I've gotta work through...even when no one else finds it hard!

The feeling of being being blocked from home and family unglues me. It makes me feel like my whole world is being unravelled, it makes me feel like I'm going to crawl out of my skin. 

It allows all the lies to come out: I have no home, I have no family, I have no roots, I have no place. 

I truly thought I had worked through all this when my dad sold our childhood home, the home we brought all three girls home to from the hospital, the home I spent my whole life with my mom in. The Lord graciously, painfully and slowly brought me to a place where I realized that HE WOULD BE MY HOME.  That Jesus, too, had had no place to lay Head, and that the Father had been his food that no one knew about, his family that would never fail, his home that would last forever. 

I got there, I did! He was my home, take it all. I was grounded in Him and Him alone.

And yet somehow along the way, little by little, I transferred bits and pieces of that need for home from Ohio to Him to Haiti. 

Home, a beautiful thing in itself, is still a high place I need to break down, a  place that the enemy can place his foot...my happy-to-cling-to more than Him...the stronghold I let remain. I'm sure my home issue is molded by the losing-mom-before-20 issue and who knows all my issues...but the Lord's been using this upcoming trip "home" to show me...and bring me closer to freedom in Him. 

I don't know where the whole home issue comes from, but I do know this: the thing I have not yet fully abandoned to Him is the the thing that brings out all the inner crazy when it's threatened.  

I'm sharing this humbling realization because I'm always asking Him to show me places He wants me to grow, and I'm realizing that patterns of things that make us unexpectedly, uncharacteristically crazy or angry or sad or insecure in our lives are truly an indicator of idols...ones I often miss because I can point fingers of blame to >not< the real issue.

Dear ones, what brings out your crazy?  How does it quickly feed lies? What are we believing that isn't true? Who/what/where/when are we blaming that isn't the real problem? What does He want to heal and help and free that we are still holding on to? 

Lord, what is this really about?

Meet us RIGHT THERE today. Give us what nothing can take away. Sustain us with water that never runs dry. Be the place we rest our heads, our peace, our joy, our hope, our home, forever.