SPARRING WITH GOD
If we can understand that "making it" is never a stable place, a constant moving meter, a dynamic field, we can then understand, that the journey matters and not the destination. We can speak victory just before it comes, speak light in the darkest of places and further illuminate the path by honouring the present and reflecting on the past.
You see, I liken life to the game of chess. Chess, the art of strategy, foresight, vision and most importantly aim. It's the conversation of two people, face to face, in the throws of a game that can be overwhelming, blindsiding yet victoriously captivating. Move after move, decision after decision... Much like life
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What happens when hope seems to be choking the life out of you, deceiving you from reality, where do you draw the line between faith and delusion? It seems I can't trust myself anyway, I'm too aware of choices and their consequences. Before I could even realize it, fear of not making it and what seemed like failure was surrounding me. Taunting me, I mean it should make sense, you follow the curriculum, you ace the tests, past the grades, walk the line and yet I was nowhere close to my goal. It was there, the real war between me and Him, the man upstairs, yeh Him, intensified.
Have you ever sat in a religious service and asked yourself what dreamland are they speaking from? I mean, the dehiscence between scripture and reality is a gaping hole you find yourself climbing up and slipping right back down. Your faith begins to calcify and your heart becomes hardened. Recoiling from stories the text outlines that didn't seem relevant to my present, widened the gap. Like I am not asking for red seas to part, I'm asking for a night free from arguments and betrayal down the hall and witnessing love conquer all! I am not asking for Jericho walls to fall but for this dysfunction to form into some semblance of wholeness that everyone seems to have at home. I am not even asking to walk on water, just a night where my pillows are not soaked with tears of fear, anxiety and frustration! I am not asking to stop the rain, just to get into my master's program or even med school! Not asking for much, just want to see it be real for me. Not just singing God is good, but live and breathe that goodness.
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See right there, that very seat of frustration, the place of why me, and how come? It was the very breeding ground of His grace and His love for me to abound. We often do not realize what He is saving us from or holding back what we have not yet been groomed for. I could not differentiate between commas and periods nor have the foresight to see the beauty of pivoting and adapting. He was teaching me the importance of alignment and how to thrive during the season of waiting. What I had in mind was just a fraction of the bigger picture He was calling me to. God will always call you outside your realm of provision. This walk is about dependency and not sufficiency.
As the walls were caving in of hopelessness, brokenness and discouragement, I started to see it. He was separating me from the religious mould, He was calling me to the deep. He wanted proximity, to wash me with his overwhelming, endless love, love specific to me, Barbara, the 1 out of the 99. That, there is indeed no wall He won't kick down, no lie He won't tear down coming after me, there is no shadow he won't light up, no mountain He won't climb up coming after me.
" Checkmate...." are you serious".... You need to come up a little higher, boss up, you already have it in you, look at it again"
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Self awareness is one the greatest gift of mankind and it was the wisdom He presented me. Even when you do not see it or feel it, He is working. I am far too small and just a collection of dust to understand completely the mind and ways of God nor explain His processes and providence in action- but in knowing Him for myself with the veil removed from my eyes, I see more clearly now. I am not just some project, here by happenstance or some cosmic entity. I am a muse, His inspiration, His likeness, His strength meant to touch the world and navigate the darkness and bring what can be to light. I am a front runner, warrior, too distinct and too exceptional to live in limitations or of the status quo.
So I see now, He is sparring with me, readying me for the everyday wars and troubles. I am the exception not better than but different, breaking structures, moulded to be filled and poured out. With all my ambitious pursuits, I was still aiming lower than what He had called me to be. Comical, even with all that I had accomplished and done, I was still performing below standard according to how He saw me, the world was much bigger than what my lens was permitting me to see, so he adjusted my perspective, set the foundation and brought me on the stage, and within the blowing winds of life, I saw the depths and the vastness of everything I was meant to be, the beautiful gifts I was birthing out.
Like Jhene Aiko, I'll take some rain with my sunshine because God's Word never returns void, the process of relinquishing control, yeh...it's a process I would be lying if I said I have completely let go. Now,I know His character intimately, I know He knows my end from the beginning, I entrust in him the pen to write my story, to be my advocate and my loving Father.
