awesoming - a contemplation

being confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus.
Philippians 1:6

I think God comes to me in books sometimes. Sometimes they just come in the mail from a friend or are recommended to me for someone else and I read a few chapters and find out it is actually for me. I need these books – the ones I would never choose on my own that say, “Sit down, shut up and breathe.”

Breathe in all the goodness of grace and of God. All that is not me and all that I can freely enjoy. One would think that the breathing in and finding pleasure in the goodness of life would be innate – something like sneezing that no culture, no matter how corrupt, could steal from God's children. But it's not. And I find myself graceless and this is like a punch in the gut of life. I quench the unmerited favor of God every time I step on the rat wheel of earning and measuring and doing to BE. But God already is – and God has forgiven, and therefore I am. Perhaps that is what it means to be made in the image of God – to be present in this world – and know that “it is good.”

But I am not about the process – I am ALL about the arrival. My friend Lyndsey and I - on my recent visit, half drown in babies and child rearing, ministry and family, talked continually of women we know who are “awesome”. We spoke of older women who read. Women who are generous with their time and resources. Women who remain calm in the face of fiasco. Women who raised six kids, held two jobs, have beautiful teenagers and clean houses. We are sure they potty trained their little ones without one melt down – because they are “awesome”. And we think we are not. We KNOW we are not. And we joked one another and said, “one day we will be awesome – maybe even the next time we see one another - if we give it a decade or so.” But we are confident that our awesome day is coming. But today, we are convinced is NOT it. Today we wallow in our “not awesomeness”.

But then I read a paragraph – a paragraph in a book about being a pickle. It takes time to turn cucumbers into pickles – they have to sit there for weeks “pickling” to perfection. And it would be ridiculous to expect anything else – anything but time and process – to make a pickle. So maybe, Lyndsey, today we are not awesome – but we are “awesoming” - it is a process – and somedays it feels more like drowning. But it isn't. It is being submerged in the narrative of God's love and goodness and grace in spite of ourselves. And perhaps if we'd spend less time trying to escape the “awesoming” process or figure out what we are doing wrong and just enjoy the submergedness of the daily experience – and soak in all the goodness – we'd see it in our own lives like we can see it in the lives of each other. The “pickling” – the “awesoming” - is a beautiful thing – it just may taste a little like vinegar at times. And if nothing else it at least gives me a good chuckle to picture myself as a pickle with a little Amanda face screaming, “help, help, get me out of this jar.”
Oh - and P.S. We are hoping the end result of our process will be a little more complex than that of a pickle so we could be stuck here for a good long while :)
I love you my “awesoming” Lyndsey – thanks for letting me process with you for a few days.