Brokenness and fragility...

I did not go out today.  No blood work.  Really, no blood work for a whole week now.  I have three to go before my next appointment, so I was waiting until my friend left and then I was waiting until I girded my loins.  I am now thinking that, perhaps, girded loins might be too much to ask to leave the house.

Writing on the new blog has been hard. Hard, but I think good.  I hope.  But, in a way, it is making leaving the house, even to go to the lab where I have not particularly felt uncomfortable, difficult.  Things shake me, rattle me, tip the balance the slightest bit, and I worry that even a car suddenly changing lanes would tip me over into wanting to merely hide, rather than slowly try to face down this and that, one small choice at a time.  One small choice ... one large battle ... in a very long, very exhausting war.

This is what is left over after making and consuming the Baked Mustard Lime Chicken for my lunch. Oh, how tasty I find this dish to be!  So, rather than let Amos eat all this—which he wanted most fervently to do—I made rice and flavored it with the sauce for my dinner.  I made enough rice for the left over sauce from the other Baked Mustard Lime Chicken waiting for me in the refrigerator.  Both the chicken, which tasted just as good as the first time, and the mustard lime rice obscured the reality that I have more failures in the kitchen than successes.  Struggling with conflicting emotions and emotions themselves, I thought I would just top off my culinary day by making the Apple Praline Bread.  You know, my now go-to dish if ever I do somehow become other than a wallflower hermit and get invited to things such as dinner parties or pot lucks.  It was an utter, completely, colossal failure.  This was not like when my friend was here and it was a bit off.  It was a brick with a huge divot on top.  I went ahead and made the praline topping, hoping it would be edible in some fashion, but I somehow managed to burn the topping.  It wouldn't have mattered because the break was a soggy mess inside.

I wept.
I despaired of ever gaining ground anywhere in my life.
And I deliberately ate two pieces of generously topped cinnamon toast.

I drank two glasses of milk, but I am certain a blood sugar crash is in my future.  I have avoided toast with jelly or cinnamon toast, along with other things I know trigger those frightening dips in my well-being.  But I am highly skilled at making cinnamon toast and I wanted success and something sweet.

One of my favorite bloggers is Pastor Eric Brown, whom I have linked to before.  To me, he doesn't write near often enough.  But when he does he always gives me food for thought and always centers on the Gospel if faith or doctrine is involved.  Recently he wrote about brokenness ... after a fashion.  He was writing about popular music.  In the post he noted: Too many Christians can't stand the idea of things being broken and messy and wrong.  But that's part and parcel of the Christian faith.

I agree with him about the broken and messy and wrong observation.  I mean, so much of mainline evangelical popular Christian Bible Studies/ Devotionals are about how to make your life better, make your faith better, make your relationship to God better, closer, deeper, holier.  This is odd, if you think about it, since those closest to Jesus when He walked the earth were not all that good at improving their faith.  They were concerned with their own health and well-being, their own wealth, their own standing.  They abandoned Him and denied Him and doubted Him.  It is good that faith is received, and our relationship to God is one created by Him, as the One who created us, the One who Redeemed us, and the One who sanctifies us.

It is not that I do not want to be a better Christian. In fact, I would rather be a better human being.  And it is not that I do not despair of my sin and seek forgiveness.  I spent time in God's Word and in the pure doctrine. I  pray ... a lot.  But my focus is not ... well ... I yearn for my focus not to be on myself or what I am doing.  That just leads to such spiritual anxiousness and despair I can hardly breathe or move.  When I look at what I am not yet doing, what I fall back into doing, what I think and feel, what I trust and fail to trust ... there is no hope and certainly no life.

I like to hear about broken and messy and wrong things.  Not that I wish for others to struggle, but I wish to not be alone in my own struggles.  I wish to hear about those things and then have them followed by Jesus.  By Christ crucified.  By Christ crucified for the broken, messy, and wrong folk who would rather not be so but are broken, are messy, and are wrong.

I really do not want to hear about the things I need to do in order to have a better relationship.  It just discourages me.  Frightens me.

I went looking for a Bible study sample and happened upon this:  God is in the Laundry Room.  The description reads:

There's more to life than daily task lists and repetitive chores. There has to be...right?
Begin to see purpose and significance wherever you are in your day. Inspired by the words of Jeremiah 29:13, God Is in the Laundry Room is a reminder that when we seek the Lord with our whole heart, we find Him everywhere...even in the laundry room. This Bible study takes you beyond merely filling in the right answers. Instead, it challenges you to dig a little deeper, explore a little further, and make personal application of the passages to your life. As you do, you’ll be drawn closer to the Savior, who washes away our sins.

UGH.  We do NOT make personal application of the Living Word ... this is the work of the Holy Spirit.  Period.  The Bible teaches this.  The pure doctrine teaches us this.  So why all the chasing after life application lessons?

Here is a link to a glimpse inside.  I searched high and low and couldn't find the Holy Spirit.  Instead, I found a wardrobe choices as metaphorical representation to a life of faith.  SIGH.  I found studying the character, leadership, choices, and behaviors of men, then a bit about Jesus dying for us, and then about what we are to do.  Make better wardrobe choices.  Whitewashed tombs came to mind.  But that is harsh, I know.  Still, I was searching in the sample lesson for something of the Christian Book of Concord, something of the pure doctrine, and I couldn't really find it ... other than Jesus died for you.

Of course, God is also, apparently, in make-up tips.  You can read how here.  Or you can:  "As a way to visualize God's cleansing power of forgiveness, put on some lipstick and then watch yourself in the mirror as you wife off its color.  Thank God that He can remove the stain of messy speech from your lips.  Here or in your journal, record your feelings about God's forgiveness." (p. 23)  SIGH.

A friend pointed out that this stuff sells. That even synodical publishing companies are all about marketing trends and following the money. But, to me, this is the stuff that the Church at large markets, the stuff it sells. It is as if I go clean up my act by this, that or the other, I will be better. But I can become Mother Theresa 2.0 and be no better. I want to hear about Jesus. I want to hear about doctrine. I want to hear about what our triune God does throughout the Bible. I don't want to focus on character and leadership or lack thereof and model my behavior on better choices.

It would be easier, though, to what want sells. If I just wanted those things, I could follow my steps and check off my lists and be better.  Whole.  Clean.  Right.

I am not.  I am not whole. I am not clean. I am not right. I am those things by and with and through and beneath the cross—Christ be praised!—but I am also a sinner who is deeply struggling with facing her past and facing her failing body and facing the fragility of her current existence.

Fragility in body.
Fragility in mind.
Fragility in spirit.

Tomorrow, a dearth of Gatorade means I must go out.  Not the blood work or the other test waiting.  Not even the paint for the door.  Milk.  Gatorade.  I can exist on just about anything else in the house, but not without Milk and not without Gatorade.  Perhaps Dr Pepper.  Though ... [you might want to sit down] ... I have been so caught up in trying to write on the other blog and trying not to hope too much about whatever telemetry the heart monitor is capturing (or not capturing) and trying to work down a list of practical things, such as choosing which if the 4 drugs that are not covered by Medicare that I am going to keep taking since I do not see how I can keep taking them all that I have actually had two days in the past five where I forgot to drink the one Dr Pepper I allow myself to savor each day.

I struggle with trusting God to care for the morrow and yet being a good steward of the little I have. I struggle with the charge to look more at my quality of life, to treat myself better, to say that I am worth better, and the cost of doing so.

Saturday.  Saturday I will be going to the symphony for the first time in 20 years.  Back then, I bought myself season tickets with the oodles of extra scholarship money I had when working on my master's degree.  I drove myself from one city to another for a season. I sat in a symphony hall all by myself and lost myself in the beauty of live classical music.  I wore the same black dress each month.  Here, well, I don't think the men's lounge pants and hoodies in which I live will be appropriate, nor my flowy skirts and leather boots (with a hoodie).  I am trying not to think about going (all those people) and what I could possibly wear in the going.

Saturday was my first choice about quality of life.  Saturday.  The first cookware set in my entire life (I've used my grandmother's stuff since college), though I ended up getting it free.  Chairs so that folk can sit at my table (so that I can sit at my table)  [My chairs, circa 1850's, have broken down completely in the 26 years I have had them after generations of my family used them--original fabric and seats that I cannot afford to replace and repair.  I thought about contacting the local historical society to see if it might want to preserve them.]  And a polarizing filter.

But another choice is the nauseating cost of making a concerted attempt to chase down the problems I am having with my heart, to see if they really are Dysautonomia related or something else.  And to see the Integrative Medicine specialist (whenever that appointment comes).  And to write about the effects of sexual abuse so that others might better understand the whys and wherefores of the 25% of women in America who are in many ways like me.

I took this over five years ago, not knowing how important pinecones would become to me, to my well-being.  I just loved the texture, not knowing that that texture would both help me remain present in the moment when needful and to escape the moment when helpful.

Somewhere.  There just has to be somewhere nearby where I can go and soak up the good gifts of this created world.  I miss Huntley Meadows, 1500 acres of wetland preserve set in the heart of the metropolitan DC area and a mere 5 minutes from my old home.  Unless a plane flew overhead, once inside, you could forget the concrete jungle and marvel at the beauty and complexity of this world.

I can get lost in moss.

I miss it.


I am Yours, Lord.  Save me!