Second-guessing...

I started second-guessing my "post" yesterday. But, on the first day I did this "blog thing," I decided I would be completely honest with myself (and with whoever should stumble across it).

I've spent too many years sitting on church pews pretending I was OK. What I now know is that, had I gotten to know all those other OK-looking people, I would have discovered they were probably a lot like me--just trying to be a normal-looking person on a normal-looking pew in a normal-looking church. But, as we've already established, there's really no such thing as NORMAL.

So, I didn't edit yesterday's post.

I help lead this Bible study on Thursdays. It's a group of women who are all at different stages on this pilgrimage through this upside-down Kingdom. (They each teach me something every week.) Since August, we've been looking at this HUGE thing called "Covenant." What has blown me away is how completely dysfunctional God's chosen people were (and still are). It's actually very comforting.

Even the guy we've been taught to hold up as a giant of faith, Abraham, actually had quite a stumbling-kind-of-faith at times--not trusting God to provide during a drought...which led to lying about his wife (twice), not trusting God to provide the promised child...which led to sleeping with his wife's slave girl...which led to the child named Ishmael...which led to problems that fill our headlines today...but which are part of God's unfolding story. As my friend M pointed out, "Nothing disqualifies us from God's love." God even used Abraham's "biggest" failures as part of Abraham's personal story and as part of God's BIG story.

I'm sure Abraham could have related to these words by C.S. Lewis, which bring me comfort every time I read them:
"No amount of falls will really undo us if we keep on picking ourselves up each time. We shall of course be very muddy and tattered children by the time we reach home, but the bathrooms are all ready, the towels put out, and the clean clothes in the airing cupboard. The only fatal thing is to lose one's temper and give it up. It is when we notice the dirt that God is most present in us: it is the very sign of His presence." (C. S. Lewis, "The Business of Heaven, Readings for the Year")