Read, Write, Love, Repeat

I gathered with my women’s small group a few weeks ago, chatting about life over a Bible study, and one of these warrior women shared a story that I had to pass on. (This is an actual time when a friend shared a story, by the way, not me deflecting and saying “my friend” had this experience to hide my own mess. Not that I would ever do that. My garage is actually way messier than hers, I’m sure.)

A certain relative was visiting my friend who is a gal who keeps a neat and tidy home, often filling it with friends and family for celebrations. She thrives on this.  This relative, at one such recent celebration, seemed to take great joy in pointing out to one and all that my friend had a pile of things in her garage, a pile that she’d set aside to take to Goodwill, calling attention to a “huge mess” in the garage. “Ugh! Who lives like this? What a mess!” My friend was taken aback to say the least, knowing for fact that this particular relative’s home remained in a condition verging on hoarder mess/needing to be condemned.  And yet. Here he was, pointing out one small (and temporary) mess in this woman’s garage, making sure all concerned knew it was there.

Why, my friend asked us, would anyone do that? Is it just to make himself feel better?

And the answer is yes, of course, yes, it is.

Human nature, you see, doesn’t change.

And we all rush to point out the speck of sawdust in the eye of our neighbor while navigating life with a giant Sequoia sticking out of our own eye.  Because if we acknowledge our own mess, we might have to do something about it. We might need to be responsible and change things.

So we deflect. We direct attention elsewhere. We tell everyone else the how and why of how to make their lives better. And how quickly they need to make that happen.

That way we don’t look at our own garages of our hearts. We don’t peek inside the dark mess in our own laundry rooms of the soul. Until we do. And we can be overwhelmed by what we see. Unable to dig our way out. So we choose to look elsewhere.

May we be courageous enough to stare our own mess dead in the eye and know we have Someone who will help us sort through, throw out, and organize what’s wrong, down to scrubbing our baseboards. May we love each other through that journey. And may we see others who level criticism at us through this lens, knowing the fear and avoidance that fuel this have little to do with us, and everything to do with where they are.