The Adventure of Becoming Real

Writing out in the open has been life-changing. It has grown and challenged me and I hope it  will continue to. It keeps me constantly leaning into Him and reaching for His strength because I am not enough. Falling is becoming a way of life and I am learning not to fear it.

Learning… but still I am impatient with myself. Doubt speaks loudly in these moments but in the middle of this mess that I am… He speaks truth. He is so faithful in showing Himself and speaking to me gently about my misconceptions and insecurities.

(Grace for where you are. You are growing and getting stronger. Just rest in me and walk. Let me carry your burdens. Let go of your fears)

I was blessed by a weekend away at a women’s retreat. The theme was “From Fear to Freedom” So I faced my fear of falling by participating in both a giant swing and a high-ropes course that ended with a zip-line.

I wanted to take the power out of my fear by facing it and God showed up.  I came away changed deeply with a security and trust in God I didn’t know I was missing. A real trust…An anchored trust in the One who holds me. A trust I don’t understand but feel deeply.

Count it all joy, my brothers, when you meet trials of various kinds, for you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness. And let steadfastness have its full effect, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing. –James 1:2-4 (ESV)

Each encounter with God, and testing of faith results in a little more spiritual maturity. Every trial or struggle grows me, even if it leaves scars. He sees beyond my scars to my heart. He sees me as He created me. I am loved.

I surrender into abundant love. I relax into my Father and trust the fall.

He shows me where and who I was a year ago…The difference is greater than I thought.

I have changed. My reactions are not the same, my thought processes are different and I am more okay with myself and all my oddities. I see the traps I fall into and sometimes recognize the danger before I am caught. I see someone who has more scars and experience, but is stronger and more resistant to being off-balance. Not perfect, but learning. I see someone with more perspective. Someone who is loved and knows it.

There is more freedom here. And joy.

I am grateful and amazed at what He can do and how He led me here.

I want to go deeper.

I want to be fully who He created me to be.

To continue to trust His love. To grow and mature.

and I have scars from the battle with myself and this life.

My Savior holds scars from my battle with myself and life too.

He chose me anyway.

“Lord I don’t understand but I accept your Grace and sacrifice. Teach me to be who you created me to be. Teach me to walk in purpose for you. Keep me broken so I will always know I need you”

I want to share a story with you.

The Velveteen Rabbit, One of my favorites. I read it until it fell apart. Something about it drew me in. It still does but now it’s deeper. It is really a beautiful story. Read the full text here.

…He was naturally shy, and being only made of velveteen, some of the more expensive toys quite snubbed him. The mechanical toys were very superior, and looked down upon every one else; they were full of modern ideas, and pretended they were real. The model boat, who had lived through two seasons and lost most of his paint, caught the tone from them and never missed an opportunity of referring to his rigging in technical terms. The Rabbit could not claim to be a model of anything, for he didn’t know that real rabbits existed; he thought they were all stuffed with sawdust like himself, and he understood that sawdust was quite out-of-date and should never be mentioned in modern circles. Even Timothy, the jointed wooden lion, who was made by the disabled soldiers, and should have had broader views, put on airs and pretended he was connected with Government. Between them all the poor little Rabbit was made to feel himself very insignificant and commonplace, and the only person who was kind to him at all was the Skin Horse.

The Skin Horse had lived longer in the nursery than any of the others. He was so old that his brown coat was bald in patches and showed the seams underneath, and most of the hairs in his tail had been pulled out to string bead necklaces. He was wise, for he had seen a long succession of mechanical toys arrive to boast and swagger, and by-and-by break their mainsprings and pass away, and he knew that they were only toys, and would never turn into anything else. For nursery magic is very strange and wonderful, and only those playthings that are old and wise and experienced like the Skin Horse understand all about it.

“What is REAL?” asked the Rabbit one day, when they were lying side by side near the nursery fender, before Nana came to tidy the room. “Does it mean having things that buzz inside you and a stick-out handle?”

“Real isn’t how you are made,” said the Skin Horse. “It’s a thing that happens to you. When a child loves you for a long, long time, not just to play with, but REALLY loves you, then you become Real.”

“Does it hurt?” asked the Rabbit.

“Sometimes,” said the Skin Horse, for he was always truthful. “When you are Real you don’t mind being hurt.”

“Does it happen all at once, like being wound up,” he asked, “or bit by bit?”

“It doesn’t happen all at once,” said the Skin Horse. “You become. It takes a long time. That’s why it doesn’t happen often to people who break easily, or have sharp edges, or who have to be carefully kept.

Generally, by the time you are Real, most of your hair has been loved off, and your eyes drop out and you get loose in the joints and very shabby. But these things don’t matter at all, because once you are Real you can’t be ugly, except to people who don’t understand.”

“I suppose you are real?” said the Rabbit. And then he wished he had not said it, for he thought the Skin Horse might be sensitive. But the

Skin Horse only smiled.

Our culture tells us we need to be modern and act a certain way. So I try and keep up.

I catch myself trying to be what everyone will accept. To live up to the expectations of the people I admire. I try and be the boat and use the right words and do things the right way. Being inauthentically me doesn’t fool anyone.

I try to be the lion and brag about where I’ve come from and what I’ve accomplished. These things do not hold true worth. I will always be truing to convince someone if I am seeking value on earth because there will always be something or someone more valuable than me.

I can be the rabbit; I am certainly stuffed with all sorts of selfishness and out-dated, immature ideas.

Like the rabbit, I want to be Real.

I seek Christ and His lessons and wisdom; I seek the lessons and life that will grow and change me.

And the Skin Horse is right…it will hurt a little. I don’t mind. It means I am changing. Growing pains right?

The Skin Horse holds wisdom I didn’t understand. When I wasn’t seeking God I was fragile in my strength and hurtful words broke me easily.

When I was defensive about everything and responded sharply…I couldn’t be corrected or counseled.

When I was overly-sensitive and carried a victim mentality, I thought everyone should be more careful with what they said to me…I wasn’t being responsible for my own actions and couldn’t accept the truth.

I have not overcome any of life’s trials completely on my own or without a mark. This adventure that is growing me is leaving a mark. This physical body holds the scars of mistakes, experience, sickness, danger and harm done. My mind and emotions hold the wounds and scars of words and rejection. Some healed up by my savior and healer. Some I haven’t even discovered exist.

The Rabbit sighed. He thought it would be a long time before this magic called Real happened to him. He longed to become Real, to know what it felt like; and yet the idea of growing shabby and losing his eyes and whiskers was rather sad. He wished that he could become it without these uncomfortable things happening to him.

Each experience holds the potential to break me or require me to lean on Christ and mature. To become Real.To become mature in Christ is to die to myself. I know how the Rabbit feels. Giving up control to trust God in all things is very uncomfortable. It might require sacrifice; irreversible change. It might leave scars and require the sacrifice of self.

It will.

The Skin Horse friends in my life know this and just smile lovingly as I struggle with the uncomfortableness of it all.

“Fancy all that fuss for a toy!”

The Boy sat up in bed and stretched out his hands.

“Give me my Bunny!” he said. “You mustn’t say that. He isn’t a toy. He’s REAL!”

“Lord all that fuss for me? I am broken and full of sawdust. I don’t even function the way I really should. The rabbit doesn’t have legs and I don’t have the understanding  or the strength to do what you’ve called me to do”

(You are my carefully and lovingly and created daughter. I know you aren’t what you will be. I’m still working in you and I won’t give up on you. I am replacing the sawdust a little at a time. I am giving you the freedom to move and grow. Your scars are a mark of your journey and they show you where you have come from. As long as you seek and you allow me to work and guide you… we will journey together. I will defend you and call you “Mine” when the world says otherwise. I will repeat your value and how treasured you are every time you don’t fit in; every time you doubt. I am patient. I will protect you from the cruel words that others speak by speaking truth into you. If you will trust and lean and walk. If you will teach others that come after you and allow your scars and weaknesses to reflect my strength then you will be Real.)

I am overwhelmed by this compassion and love so deep. I have experienced its truth. I know His voice.

I cannot make myself Real. I cannot truly surrender without sacrifice. These scars though? They are making me Real. The death of self results in freedom in Christ. The freedom is breathtaking and more genuine than anything I have experienced

So no matter what I look like to these fellow toys…

My scars are a beautiful mark of this daughter’s healing, growth, change and remaking.

Her journey to becoming Real.