Keeping It All Together

I juggle a lot.

Sometimes, ok frequently, I struggle to keep it all together.

When I last spent time in Job, God spoke to me about stormy seasons. He opened my eyes to the fact that He speaks through the storms in our lives.

Useful to me because as a foster parent I am no stranger to storms. To be honest, foster care is one giant hurricane to begin with. The last few years in paticular have been especially brutal. I have struggled to navigate the trauma of loving kids from hard places and all the yuck it dredges up within me. I have struggled to balance aiding the hurting towards healing while protecting & shielding my babies on the front lines of sin stained suffering. I have felt like I'm not exactly the best option for kids who need us. Just barely acceptable for the ones that find their way here. Lies roar in my mind seeking to destroy and devour the plan God has for me.

I’ve been earnestly seeking to hear God amid all these storms.
To really hear what He has for me.
To learn and to grow.

These attempts to seek to hear what God is trying to teach me through said storms have been drowned out by the cacophony of insults that I hurl at myself in my own mind.

It's hard to hear that still small voice when you're constantly ruminating all the ways you fall short and fail to be Jesus.

Spoiler alert: I miss the mark a lot.

I recently revisited Job for the first time in a while. God's instructions to Job to ‘gird up his loins’ really jumped out at me. To gird one's loins commonly means to prepare oneself for something difficult or challenging, which totally fits and applies, but God took me in a different direction. Literally, it means to wrap a belt around your waist so your clothes don't flop around and fall down.

Hard stop.

Wouldn't you know, there happens to be a belt in the spiritual armor God instructs us to put on each day.

“Stand firm then, with the belt of truth buckled around your waist.”

In the storms of life, God reminds me to put my belt on.

If I try to keep it all together on my own I am going to crash and burn every time. To keep it all together I need the truth of who God is and who I am not. 

He is the Savior.
Not me.

Without being grounded in Him I just flop around in the storm looking a fool with my pants down around my ankles, trying to do all the things that I can't, and wasn't ever even asked to. 

I've been flopping,

 insecure,

disheveled,

embarrassed,

fallen on my face.

A hot mess.

I've not been secure in truth.

I don't want to live this way any longer.
 
I don't have to.

I will stand strong and secure in who God is. Who God has called me to be. No more embarrasing flopping around in this raging storm called life.

No more listening to the lies that seek to kill & destroy.

I will stand secure in the truth of who He is.

When the liar tries to hurl my failures in my face I immediately lay them at the feet of Jesus.

Learning to take every thought captive, as soon as an accusation enters my mind, I immediately whisper to Him, "I lay it at your feet Lord."

When I make a mistake I immediately lay it at the feet of Jesus, thanking him for covering it all, even this, no matter what this is, right now.

I don’t have to have it all together.

He already has me.

I just need to keep showing up each morning and put my dang belt on.

If you feel a little embarrassed this morning because you’re struggling to keep it together,

Put on the belt of truth.

If you're trying to hold it all together on your own, dropping balls left and right, unable to keep everything from derailing, don't despair.

Just cling to who He is.

To what HE says about you.

To all He can be for you.

You don’t have to do anything.

He already has.

Just cling to Him.

He is Truth after all.