blenders & clay

life is a strange and funny thing.

and lately i've realized how much i don't remember. 

i've realized how much time has passed in my life,

how many days and moments have come and gone,

and how many of those days i don't remember at all.

even though i don't remember each and every moment {not even close},

they all got blended together inside of this flesh and blood and made me who i am on this day right now.

there are plenty of parts and pieces that are shaped by things outside of my control too. 

moments in which i acted, moments in which actions were outside of me.

but i think sometimes we mix up what we can and cannot control.

the pendulum swings from my thinking i have a lot of control over all of the things - you know, the part of me that fell with the eating of the fruit and mistakenly thinks i'm "like God" - to thinking that i have no agency to act on my own life at all. that i cannot speak up or make a difference or have any effect whatsoever on my own life.

both sides of this coin are total b.s. it's counterfeit currency no matter which way you flip it.

the truth is somewhere in the middle {as per usual}. 

the truth is that God is in control.

AND that we have agency to act and make choices that affect our lives.

AND that we are responsible for the choices that we make even though he painted the big picture.

{yes, painted. because it is finished.}

paradoxical? 

yes, of course. 

the clay doesn't understand the work of the potter.

but the potter has a purpose for that hunk of clay. 

we may be in the part of the process where it feels like we're getting beaten up,

but maybe {maybe} it's because he's really softening us up to shape us into something more beautiful than we can picture in the state we're in right now.

{sidenote: just because God uses the crud of our lives to help shape us despite it being crud does not mean that it isn't crud, or that he condones the crud itself.}

in the midst of all of the paradoxes of life i go back to the words of a wise friend of mine: "we don't know what the future holds, but we know who holds it." 

psalm 119:105 tells us that the Lord is a lamp unto our feet and a light for our path. 

there is no implication from this that we can see the big picture, or understand it in the minutiae of our everyday lives. 

but he is faithful to show us the next step.

he

is

faithful.

i hope and pray that we each draw closer to the one who holds the future each and every day.

and as we throw more days into the blender of our lives that we incrementally look more and more like Jesus. 

that we take comfort in the fact that it is already written.

that it is already finished.

and that we can rest in him.

that we can trust him with the future that he already holds.

xoxo