Trisha Mugo

Real Grace. For Real Life.

The Dark Side of Idealism

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Photo by David Woo via Creative Commons
Photo by David Woo via Creative Commons

I came undone there on the floor of the downstairs bathroom, all sobs and chest heaving for air.

“Did someone die?” my husband asks through the crack in the door.

No death except the quiet passing away of my idealism. Those cruel visions of my better self melted right there on the tile floor.

It was the kind of weeping that had been building up for months, maybe even years, and it erupted like Mt. St. Helen.

“You’re scaring the kids,” he says about 15 minutes later.

“Just keep them upstairs,” I muster. “I’ll be up to put them to bed in a minute.”

One minute turned into another 15 as I realized I couldn’t hold back the tears, nor should I.

I wept for my inability to be a better mother, a more accomplished writer, a better equipped tutor or more caring friend.

I wept for my lack.

Like Robert E. Lee at Appomattox Courthouse I surrendered my idealism. I waved my white flag to God right there beside the toilet.

Some days our biggest enemy doesn’t prowl around like a roaring lion, it stares at us in the mirror.

It’s in the giving up of our goals and plans and our self-imposed deadlines that we can embrace God’s plans for us.

Creative Commons
Creative Commons

When we receive His grace each day, we take in His power, His perplexing strength to overcome our weaknesses.

I know these God paradoxes well.

It’s in the bending down to serve when we are lifted high.

It’s the open, empty hands God fills.

When we are weak, we’re really strong because His strength is made perfect in OUR weakness.

But these upside-down kingdom principles are only beautiful to a mind that’s been renewed. To all else, God’s ways are nonsensical, utter foolishness.

Despite knowing God’s grace is sufficient for me, I often try to perfect myself.

I want to be strong and flawless. I tire of being that earthen vessel the glory of God shines through. How about you? Do you long for God remove your weaknesses?

Asking for help is not my strong suit, but I’m learning to ask for help from people—and God.

But I’m relearning how to surrender each hour, each moment to God. And it’s in this place where our lives intersect with the abundant life Christ died to give us.

Giving up is the first step to abiding with Christ. Walking in the Spirit happens when we trade our comfortable pace to keep step with His Spirit.

Matthew Henry’s words I read earlier this week keep coming back, reminding me to keep seeking the Living Water.

“Sometimes He keeps the cistern empty; that He may bring us to Himself, the Fountain.”

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When Work Doesn’t Feel Like Worship

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Photo by Mark Spearman, via Creative Commons.
Photo by Mark Spearman, via Creative Commons.

Mom kept the gritty green soap by the sink for dad to scrub the grease out of the creases of his hands. Tractor grime and machine oil made a home in his fingernails.

As a child, I would watch his pocket knife scrape the black from underneath his nails. They never stayed clean for long. Roads needed grading, cattle were hungry, and fences never mended themselves.

Those dirty, work-worn hands held me and tucked me in at night.

While some men punched out blue collar jobs with disdain, my father arrested each day with joy.

I still glimpse that joy in him today. As he drives a bailer through wind-swept, Oklahoma fields, he brags about his view from the cabin, as if to say, can you believe I get to do this all day long?

Interrupt him and you’ll hear the same maxim, “We’re burning daylight.”

Although dad’s no armchair theologian, he understands as well as Adam the outcome of man’s fall: dusty earth and sweat on his brow. But dad has never seen work as a curse.

Dad’s habits teach a message of faithfulness in the way he wakes up every day to welcome work as a reward.

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Photo by David Brossard via Creative Commons
Photo by David Brossard via Creative Commons

dadphoto

As a child, dad didn’t believe in church, and I wasn’t sure if he believed in God. If he prayed, it was while he chopped wood or sowed fields by the last light of day.

He hasn’t memorized much Scripture but can preach about how an open heart can find joy in the mundane, and how a sharp mind can find interest in almost anything. And he can talk for days about agriculture if you let him.

His life speaks about finding purpose in labor, how to toil well without trading peace for grumbling.

Isn’t there always room to gripe about our lot in life?

But dad’s learned the expense of complaining isn’t worth the return. A paycheck-to-paycheck life teaches thankfulness in a way that having more than you need never will.

I can’t recall a day his hands haven’t found something to do. Maybe that’s just life on a farm.

Or maybe it’s because he doesn’t see work as a burden. He chooses to see work as life-giving instead of soul-draining.

Today my father’s fingernails still attract dirt from every direction. He often jokes that he gets to play in the dirt with his favorite toy, a mini bulldozer. As he clears pastures and levels earth to make ponds and houses, you would never know he’s working.

He tells me he’s made his peace with the One who never stops working on our behalf.

I think work can lead us all to worship if we’ll let it.

 

This post is a part of The High Calling’s community link-up. Anyone can share stories. Check it out here.

 

Brossard Photo Credit

Spearman Photo Credit