the expectation gap...

So last week I shared a bit with you about how we were willing to face multiple layers of disaster in the name of obedience in relation to our housing situation. And the elation we felt when the situation worked itself out in our favor; even though the results weren’t exactly what we were hoping for.

But that sense of elation only lasted a short while before reality crashed back in. Not so much that I was unhappy about staying in our house, but more like feeling that God promised me one thing and delivered something else.

And here I am, staring down a gigantic chasm. A chasm spanning the gap between my God honoring expectation, and the reality of my life experience.

So what then? What happens when you go out a limb and dare to believe that God has made you a specific promise, and you pray circles around that promise, attacking it from each side, just so you make sure that you really understand all the ramifications that come with it. And it’s not all some fantastic daydream that your entitled suburban heart just wants to believe.

And it isn’t indigestion either.

What happens when you’re embarrassed when your friends ask about it, and praying about it is too hard. So you just pretend that you’re still elated. But really you’re confused, and tempted to think that God is the world’s biggest scam artist.

This isn’t the place where you throw some well worn cliché like everything happens for a reason. Because that’s just dumb. And it doesn’t fix anything.

This is the place where you make a decision.

Is my faith strong enough to get through this little quandary, or is this God thing some sort of elaborate joke.

I think God drops these circumstances on us just to see what we'll do. To see if we really mean it when we say we're in this relationship, no matter what.

 Or if we really just came to Him for a handout.

 If He sends us away empty handed the first time, will we have the faith to come back again. Will we come back a second, third or millionth time without a guarantee that we'll get what He promised us in the beginning.

And even if we never get what we originally wanted, will we still love Him anyway.

So I don’t know what is in store for our family in the future. I don’t know if we’ll decide to pursue a new house in the spring, or hold off for another year or two.

What does matter is that I’ve breached the expectation gap with my faith intact. And if I’ve done it once I can do it twice. I can continue to ask for things and know that the world isn’t ending when I don’t get them.

Staring down Tsunamis

You may or may not have been following the housing saga that our family embarked in last summer. If not, let me just summarize by saying it was three months full of wave after wave of the uncertainty of transition.

Leading up to the anticlimactic day that we decided to take our house off the market. But even after we made that decision, God had one last crushing wave to drop on us, just to see how we would respond.

Two weeks after we made that decision we received a very respectable offer. Two weeks after we decided the promise of transition was no longer worth the emotional uncertainty. Two weeks after we said ain’t nobody got time for this amount of crazy.

Two weeks after school started and fall activities caused my schedule to implode. And there was nothing on the market we wanted to look at, which meant that accepting the offer might have led our family into a season of homelessness; a season of perpetual transition without a clear finish line.

But in my heart, refusing the offer would have been an act of disobedience.

Saying yes = homelessness. Saying no = disobedience.

So here I am, staring down this wall of water that is going to crush me no matter what I do. If I stay, I get soaked. If I run, I get soaked. Either way, something bad about to happen.

So we accepted the offer. Accepted the fact that Jesus might want us to celebrate Christmas in a hotel room. Accepted the fact that our special needs child might be out of school for a month and therefore a hot mess-screaming disaster for at least two months. And even better, that our special little boy who spent 7 years of his life being homeless was about to be homeless again. If this is where our obedience leads us, so be it. SO BE IT.

We marched right up to that tsunami of potential disaster and laughed in the face of its threats. Oh yes we did.

And then the annoying buyer backed out.

I have never been so thrilled to not get what I wanted.

Death to perfectionism. Don't tell my realtor.

God has been showing me so much as we’ve been in the transition to a different house these last few months.

A big part of the moving process is making your house presentable enough for other families to come and look at it. To see how they would live their lives in your space. Which presents interesting challenges when your family obviously does not fit in the space they’re confined to. And you have a special needs child who doesn’t have the slightest clue about how the process works.

So a challenge was thrown down. The challenge to find the balance between maintaining show ready perfection and the reality that we are real people living real lives. That balance is going to be different for everyone, but when I prayed over the quandary this is the answer I got.

 Let people into your imperfect house. Not because they’re going to buy it, but because it’s ok to call perfectionism a trap. I don’t need your house to be perfect to sell it, so just trust Me on this one.

Ugh. That was a hard pill to swallow. Laughing in the face of the natural inclination towards perfectionism. Choosing to be above having a perfect house, when every fiber of my being screamed that my rational was insane and demented. Intentionally leaving those tiny Legos in the crevices of my house because God said I could. Such a rebel. I know. Don’t tell my realtor.

So from the home owner who’s probably a bit too far on the “anti show ready” end of the spectrum. Well. What can I say,

Besides screw you people who made fun of the Lego’s on my floor.

Ok, that was mean. Maybe what I want to say is I would prefer not to manipulate you into thinking that we are perfect people living perfect lives with children who never touch anything. Thank you for not noticing the stray Legos that are EVERYWHERE. We’ll take them with us when we leave, but until you put in an offer, it’s really not worth it to try to get every single one off the floor. So there. God bless.

the rest of the mower story

So last time I told you the mower story. A story about how I almost gave up on life because I couldn’t start the stupid mower.

Which wasn’t so much a story about having a tidy yard as much as it was a testament to the fact that God uses funny things to show us the Truth.

But in the days that followed that little showdown, in the moments where the tears came back each time I considered what had really happened that sunny summer morning on my driveway, I had to wonder why.

Jesus and me. We’re like this. Thick as thieves. So why on earth did He let the failure chatter get so thick that I was ready to give up over something so silly? Where were the warning lights? Caution tape? A quick “hey lady you’re being silly. Stop it.” would have gone a long way.

So a few days after that little stunt I was standing in my new “sanctuary” (aka that spot on my driveway where that stupid mower finally started up) trying to get a sense of why things had gone down the way they had and got a moment of revelation.

Satan had permission to call me a failure until I hit my breaking point so that Jesus could show me that I wasn’t. End of story.

Working mowers don’t lie. A freshly mown lawn is proof that everyone can see. A flashing beacon if you know the story behind it. Jesus was here. Satan is dumb. Don’t believe him.

the infamous mower story

Over the last couple weeks I’ve been sharing with you about how the transition to a new house has affected me and the things that I’ve learned from the process. I hope in some odd way you’ve found a way to connect to our situation. Or at least laugh about it.

So this last one is a bit personal. The kind of personal that makes me guard it fiercely because I don’t want to be that vulnerable with you. But those are the best stories. Am I right?

So here we go. Eek.

Our house has been on the market for 4 months. 4 agonizing months. Which is normal. I know. But for some reason I thought we’d be special and get an offer in the first 3-5 days. Which we did, but then they walked away. Long story.

So 4 months in to the process I’m feeling rather vulnerable and angry that this isn’t what I signed up for, because I’m the mother of a special boy and I’m ENTITLED to an easy transition. So GIVE ME WHAT I WANT. OR ELSE.

Ha ha, I know. I’ll give you a moment to get your chuckling under control.

Ok, so that’s where my little heart is, all angry and frustrated about the slowness of the transition. And I’m vulnerable with a capital V.

When Satan tries to tell me that this is my fault because I’m a failure.

This little “I’m a failure” bubble followed me around for at least a week. Subtle at first, but the more I listened to it the more I heard it. I’m a failure at moving. I’m a failure at special needs parenting. I’m a failure at… fill in the blank with your own topic, because I fail at everything.

Which sounds funny to you, because you aren’t the one who was vulnerable.

So this is the storm that’s raging in my head and I refuse to tell anyone about it and I’m just trying to breathe in and out (because I obviously am not a failure at breathing) and I go out to mow the grass.

 And can’t get the mower to start.

And the world's biggest liar whispers in my ear: See I told you that you were a failure. You can’t even mow. Just sit down and accept your failure.

Cut to the image of the girl crumpled up on the driveway this close to admitting defeat. This close to believing a life crippling lie once and for all.

When truth whispers. “Wait! Wait! One. More. Just try one more time.”

So with a face soaked in tears, and a heart full of doubt, I give the stupid thing one more yank (pulling a muscle in my shoulder, thank you very much).

And the mower starts.

These are the things that only happen in the movies. Am I right?

Let’s just sit a spell and let the glory settle. The stupid mower started. But only after I chose to listen to the Truth. Even though I thought it was a really dumb idea. And I sort of only did it so that I could call the Truth a Lie. No joke.

And I have a strained muscle in my shoulder. Not because I yanked too hard on that stupid mower, but because I had an arm wrestling match with Satan. And I won. Which is a bit predictable when you think about it. But it didn’t seem like it at the time.

So then, what can I say, besides let my perfectly mowed lawn stand as a tribute to the Truth. Every time you drive past it (this week because surely I’ll just have to mow it again before too much longer) you’ll praise your God because He started that mower when I wanted to quit.

And each time the failure chatter starts again I just go stand in my yard. In that little spot where my arm wrestling match took place.  And I look at the grass. It’s a nice spot, really, right up by the road. You should come stand there sometimes too.

Jesus is in the boxes

We’re talking about transition these days. We’re elbow deep in cardboard boxes, eager to find our way to the next house that God has for our family.

But the reality of this move is that it’s not so much about having more space as it is about having the guts to laugh at the uncertainty of it all. It’s easy to believe in God when things are going good. When people leave awesomely encouraging feedback about my cute kitchen (that’s sadly in the wrong part of town for their family).

But what happens when the chips are down. When no one is coming to see what we’re selling. When the timeline isn’t going according to plan and I probably won’t be done with the transition in order to start school in the new house.

The house that has our names written all over it, but someone else is probably going to snatch up before we can put an offer on it because no one will buy the house we’re in. And it would be stupid to try to own both, even for a tiny little while.

Then I have the worst day ever and my special boy is a complete monster and someone asks if they can have a showing in an hour and a half. And then those stupid last minute people don’t even write an offer. Probably because my house is a hot dirty mess. Just like I am. For real people.

This is where Jesus really is. Where Jesus really wanted me to go. Where I’m gritty and dirty and raw. And fed up with the senselessness of it because this house isn’t really that bad. And whose idea was this anyway.

Where I still choose to believe that this is all a part of the plan. Even though I feel like I’m either crazy or brilliant because I continue to cling to a plan that’s so insane that I’m not even sure I can pull it off. But frankly I’m just a bit too defiant to give in just yet. Because God does funny stuff like this all the time.

When God leads you well past your breaking point just so you can laugh at what a wimp you were on the other side of that barrier.  

And He shows you that all of this really has nothing to do with the house anyway.

That is where Jesus is.

And it makes me wonder why we pray for God to make things easy. When things are so much more interesting out where Jesus is. The stories are so much more fun to read out here. And way more fun to write for that matter. Because if you’re going to go through the insanity, you might as well come through it with an interesting story to tell on the other side, am I right about that?