For all the tasking and folding and washing and making and cleaning up that goes on around here, I find myself scratching my head at all that remains undone.
That drawer of 200 socks that someone dumped out 10 days ago.
Those two mountains of laundry I sorted last Friday and haven’t washed.
The mountain of my own clothes in the closet that has grown scary big and covered up every square inch of the floor.
The conversations that need to happen but where is the time in the midst of dishwasher-loading and oatmeal-making and homework-helping and kid-chauffering?
My wheels are spinning and my hands are laboring and my brain is whirring but you’d never know it by a quick glance at all the undone and unfixed around here.
It’s easy to zero in on all that still remains instead of resting in all that has been completed.
It’s my default to forge ahead and fixate on all that remains unanswered instead of bowing grateful for all that has been understood.
It’s tempting to worry and fear that certain messes may never be fully cleaned up in this life.
That certain consequences may never be escaped.
That certain wounds may never fully heal.
That certain dysfunctions and dispositions and diseases may never flee once and for all.
What’s an unfixed girl living an unfixed life to do with all of her unfinished business on a tired and uninspired Monday?
She gives thanks for the unfixable life because it points her to a fixed life still to come and the perfect Savior that she’ll never be.
An unfixable life frees her from worshipping this life.
If all was fine and beautiful and swoony each and every day, there’d be no need for hope. Nothing better to wait for. No impulse to run hard after Truth until she’s breathless. No reason to put her faith in anything but her own fixed self and her own fine life.
She sets her default on an awareness of all that’s been done already. She bathes in gratitude. She rests in the Father’s faithfulness.
She accepts that certain messes and scars and dysfunctions may remain but she brings it all into the light of Jesus. She’s speaks honestly in the light. She lies bare and exposed, wounded and messy, but warm and secure in the light and never-ending love of Christ.
She realizes there’s nothing to be gained by clinching and fretting and worrying over that which she cannot change. Nothing to be gained by hiding or pretending she’s fine either.
And so she chooses trust.
Reckless, wild, nonsensical trust.
And though nothing is really fixed, she is free.
Free to hope.
Free to worship.
Free to try and fail and get back up.
Free to carry her unanswered questions.
Free to disappoint and be disappointed.
Free to love the unlovely.
Free to give sacrificially.
Free to not be enough.
Free to mourn.
Free to receive the beautiful gifts that are such obvious grace.
And free receive the hard things…that are also grace.
Free to live her messy, unfixable days.
Because all is grace. Because she is loved. Because the Father holds all things. Because one day He will wipe away every tear.
She’s free to hope and trust and worship and give thanks through each unfixable day as she waits patiently for the perfect redemption yet to come.
julie says
A complete post bearing my tearful soul vanished.
And such is my world right now.
julie
Renee says
so beautiful. I love hearing you preach the Gospel here!
khull05 says
A-freaking-men
Asking God to build my faith bigger each day so I can live in the midst of all the “unfixed”.