Creativity, Confession, Friendship

A dear friend came and stayed with me this weekend. We’ve known each other since high school and our lives have crossed paths ever since. We are in utterly different places in life and have gone through extremely different things, and yet there was so much common ground, so much to talk about and process together.

As we sat on the dock and shared the things that have happened, the journey that brought us both to exactly where we are, we both teared up. So much life. We both nodded in recognition at pieces of our stories, our own particular journeys through the years. There were parts we both could relate to, secrets, prayers, dreams shattered and rebuilt. And of course, there were things that belong to the self, that although we shared them, there’s something so private and sacred they only belong to our own person.

I was surprised at my willingness and open-heartedness to bear so much of my story to this old friend. But there I was, talking away, telling her things I’d locked up, so deeply ashamed of.  As the hours passed and we went deeper and deeper into our personal narratives, the shame and confusion began to slip away, memories climbed their way to the forefront, and certain things that had long been forgotten lay uncovered before me, and life made more sense for a moment.

It’s true there is a certain healing that comes from the telling. There is release in the sacred mystery of confession – whatever that looks like to you. It wasn’t that I felt my friend could absolve me or justify me … but she could hear and listen and nod in understanding.

At the crux of our conversation I confessed what it is I think I’m really, truly discovering about life. I believe with all my heart that God is all about redemption. That God is creatively redeeming all things.

I used to be afraid that if I didn’t do things the right way, I’d be wrong. And wrong meant beyond the pale, out of order, lost … I don’t see it like this anymore.

In the conversations with my friend, we both have regrets, those if-only-I-had-done-this, or if-only-I-had-done-it-better or sooner, things would have been easier. But that doesn’t honor anyone. Regret only traps us in the past. We have to move forward. 

Faith in the creativity of God is where our hope lies …. That God is able to weave it all together and make all things new. In time. And also outside of time. That this isn’t the end of anyone’s story … there is still more to be revealed, more to be uncovered, and God is making it good, somehow. What moves me to tears and seems utterly lost and hopeless is maybe the one thing that will set the narrative free to become the plot-point the story could not do without. I choose to believe this, by faith. I choose to believe that my sorrow and sadness, my lost and shattered dreams, my hopes and disappointments aren’t lost on God.

There’s one other thing I choose to remember: God loves me. Always. God is good and he absolutely loves me. Delights in me. 

I remember God’s love because it’s what anchors me into today and what strings my yesterdays into tomorrow. God is love. He loves the girl who went to summer camp many years ago and kneeled down into the sand and offered her future up into the invisible hands of the All Faithful One, believing she would make a difference in the world … and God loves the woman who collapsed onto the dirt in South America, despairing of life, because the world seemed to be making its differences in her and all seemed lost … and God loves the woman today who is still trying to find the hem of His garment because she needs his power, she needs His tender touch that restores order to her world and bring light to dark places ….

We tell our stories to one another because by telling them, we are reminded God is there …. even in the bits and pieces where God seems absent. As I look back in reflection, in the telling, what seemed absent then, now seems only quiet, and tenderly patient.

I would like to say my go-to belief is that God loves me just as I am, unconditionally. But it’s not. I have to choose to pause and remember that LOVE is God’s nature and character.

One of the things my friend and I talked a lot about had to do with choices we’ve made and whether or not they were good choices, whether they were the right choices. We look back and judge ourselves from the point we are at now, instead of having compassion on the young woman who made that choice, then. In the end, this is futile.

We need to be kind to ourselves and remember that we are but dust. God loves us and is weaving our stories, ever and always redeeming them.