“Trust God from the bottom of your heart;
don’t try to figure out everything on your own.
Listen for God’s voice in everything you do, everywhere you go;
[God] is the one who will keep you on track.”
(Proverbs 3:5-6, The Message)
While she was away, Sarah learned to crochet…and has become a bit of a blanket-making machine! “Everyone’s getting a blanket for Christmas this year!” So as not to be left out of the fun, I asked her if she would teach me. What you see in the picture above was my first attempt! Not bad, right? She’s a good teacher.
But what you don’t see is the fact that it was becoming narrower and narrower–I couldn’t seem to figure out how to keep the edges straight. What a mess! If I kept going, it was clearly going to end up in the shape of a triangle, rather than the more “traditional” rectangular shape of most blankets! So I pulled it all out so that I might start again. Yes, really….
I quickly got the first part of the yarn rolled up without too much trouble…but then the process came to a screeching halt. Talk about a mess! I had a neat-looking ball of yarn on one side and a big, tangled mess on the other….
Knots, knots, and more knots. If I pulled too hard, the knots only got harder to untangle. If I tried to go too fast, the mess only got worse…. I had to go slowly, be patient, and take my time…not to mention lots of deep breaths! Slowly but surely, the knots got undone and the mess grew smaller….
And finally, after several hours and many deep breaths (and only a few curses muttered under my breath!), voila! Done! Untangled! No more mess! Ahhh… Ready to start over with a new project.
Perhaps with help?…Did you notice the little foot, and whiskers, at the very top??… Meet Winston, one of our cats. Always ready to “help”!
It struck me, in the midst of that process, that there were some similarities between it and what we’re all living through in this season. A year ago at this time, things were moving along, not perfectly for sure but in a way that seemed at least recognizable, sort of like me crocheting my blanket. And then, somewhere between January and March, things began to unravel. We weren’t doing the unraveling on purpose, certainly, but it happened just the same. And we were all left with a big, tangled mess.
A big, tangled mess that we are still in the middle of and that we all want desperately to untangle, so that we can start moving forward again, with a “new project,” if you will. Or even just get back to what we were doing before. And like with my mess of yarn, sometimes it seems that the more we pull, the more knotted it all becomes. And the faster we try to go, the worse it seems to get….
Perhaps some of the same strategies I used in untangling my mess of yarn can be helpful as we try to–or at least want to–untangle the mess we continue to find ourselves in. This is nothing new, of course, but I for one benefit from an occasional reminder! Perhaps, in this ninth month of COVID restrictions, we can benefit from some renewed patience…some regular deep breaths…and maybe even a few curses muttered under the breath (or shouted out loud?!)….
And additionally, as people of faith, perhaps we can also benefit from remembering, as the wise author of Proverbs reminds us, to trust God from the bottom of our hearts, knowing that we don’t have to–in fact, we can’t–figure out everything on our own. Perhaps, as people of faith, we can remember to listen for God’s voice, trusting that God is the one who will keep us on track. Easier said than done, for sure. But worth a continued effort.
Being patient will help, yes. Breathing deeply will help, absolutely. And in my experience, there’s a definite place for the occasional, appropriately expressed outburst(!). But I would suggest that the most critical piece in getting to the other side of this big, tangled mess in which we continue to find ourselves–and it’s perhaps also the most difficult piece for us high-achieving, do-it-yourself-ers–is trusting God.
Be patient–and trust God.
Breathe deeply–and trust God.
Shake your fist, shout at the heavens, curse a blue streak–and keep trusting God.
And we will get to the other side of this big, tangled mess, with God at our side, ready for whatever new project awaits us….
Thanks be to God!
Deb