(Just to give fair warning... This post has hardly been edited. I just typed it straight out of my head and threw it on the blog before I had a chance to chicken out!!!)
My life has always been neatly sorted into little boxes, organized on shelves to be opened when convenient and "safe". One box for Hubby and Kids. One box for church. One box for extended family. One box for incessantly smiling and chatting to anyone on the street who crosses my path. One box for each of the many aspects of my past. One box for my health and body. One box for my emotions. Different boxes for various friends. One box for Facebook (hahahah!!). No, really. One box for Facebook. Maybe even another for this sadly forsaken blog. One box for God. No. Not one box for God. He moves freely throughout the boxes in which I have given Him reign. However, there are spaces in my soul that I have managed to stash into well-sealed packages, neatly stored in the deep recesses of my soul on a dusty shelf where even I forget about them sometimes. These are places that God has prodded with gentle nudges, telling me that He would like to shine His light on these hidden things. But they are not so pleasant and, being prone to ostrichness (sticking my head in the sand), I have generally shied away from His hints that these things would be better off opened up and dealt with once and for all. But seriously, the vulnerability of considering such things is unfathomable to me.And so it has been a rather disconcerting thing, finding myself in the middle of such a mess. The mess being the fact that as of late my boxes have been, spontaneously and of their own accord, exploding. Exploding wide open and then attempting to enmesh themselves with each other. This I find disturbing. Very disturbing. And what I find most shocking is the fact that God seems to be well-pleased with this occurance and appears to be setting up these explosions in increasing measure. What is the plan here? What is the idea, merging my worlds so that I am uncomfortably accountable for more than one compartment at a time? But I guess moving forward, maturing and growing wasn't supposed to be comfortable, was it? This exploding and merging is requiring vulnerability on my part. I don't like that. I tend to run from vulnerability.
Here is an example. Two years ago I ended up with a high fever and landed myself in the hospital. Did I call my family? No. Did I call my friends and ask them to pray? No. I did get up the nerve to call my pastor, but asked him not to tell anyone else. And yes, my Hubby knew! (Duh!) But my boxes -- friends, family, church, and health -- remained intact, separate from each other. I recovered, and although it took about a month to get back to normal, few people knew this happened. I didn't even call home until well after the fact. (Funny thing about me, I don't usually mind telling people things in past tense, such as, "Guess what happened to me last month...")
Well, guess what happened to me last month? No really, something happened and I know it's past tense, but its relatively recent, so consider yourself fortunate to be privvy to such information...
I ended up with a fever and landed myself in the hospital. The thing about this was, my boxes pretty much exploded this time. First of all, let me tell you, being in the hospital is an extremely unnerving and vulnerable experience. If you have ever been admitted to hospital, you will know that they ask you everything. E-v-e-r-y-t-h-i-n-g. Not only that, they ask you loudly and both their questions and your whispered answers somehow manage to echo and reverberate down the hallways and into other patients' rooms. (I know this because I heard the echos of other patients being admitted. So, fellow patients... I know all about you and you know all about me. Let's keep these things to ourselves, shall we?!?) Anyways... So, I was rather taken aback by the fact that even my... ummm... digestive system was thoroughly discussed. In fact, the nurses seemed fixated on that particular system, which by day three had me completely disgruntled, as this is not something I am willing to discuss with anybody, let alone complete strangers. (As a side note I asked my Hubby, who happens to be a nurse, if the nurses where he worked are as obsessed with bodily functions. Apparently so, because he gave me a blank stare and said, "Uhhhhh, yeah." I'm thinking he could have given me fair warning before my hospital stay, but unfortunately he has become so desensitized to such things that it didn't even occur to him.) Yeah, anyways. Vulernability. Yes. Very very vulnerable. And then, to make matters worse, some of the hospital staff looked familiar. You can't really escape this fact in a small town. Yet another merging of my worlds. Eeeeeekkk!
So, we went to a new church on Sunday. And guess who was there? People who work at the hospital. One lady approaches me and says, "Hi Stephanie." It took me a moment before I realized who she was. Then I almost fell over! My first thought was, "I think its time to move." My second thought (and you can insert incredulous laughter here) was "At least it wasn't my doctor." But no. God knows my limits. He's not going to push me in this box-exploding thing further than I can handle. Right, God? At the moment, I'm thinking its time for a little break, but I have a sneaking suspicion that there's more coming. So, I'm bracing myself for the next explosion. If I was to be completely honest with myself, I can see God's light starting to peek into those hidden places and maybe there is a point to this. I just don't quite get it yet. Does this post even make sense???
