My sermon this week is based on the 2nd and 3rd chapters of Genesis or the second story of creation and eventual fall of humanity. As I began thinking of adam, the earth creature, my train of thought went to my blog (Hebrew nerds out there may understand that train of thought better than others) and how I've neglected it and then, in a full circle kind of way, began to think of my own utter earthiness.
In the first creation story in Genesis we hear about how humans were created in the likeness or image of God and in the second we hear about how we have been created out of mud, dust, dirt...you know the thing everyone wants to be created out of.
In my own life I wish that I could find more of those moments of being in the image of God. Those moments of creativity, light, life, and joy. But lately, I certainly feel much more like that woman created from the mud and dirt and grime. I say this not as the girl who loves to feel deeply rooted in creation, to feel the mud between my toes; that being who feels richly connected with God when out in the created world. No, I say this as a girl who feels disconnected, dirty, broken, cast out.
You see, I have a lot of moments where I feel like a terrible mom. I know this is not a new feeling for many but I feel its full weight lately. My house is never clean. I don't spend as much time with my family as I would like because I work full time. Being a pastor, I never get to sit with my family during church and get to share in the richness of holding a hymnal open and snuggling during the sermon and passing this beautiful tradition on to my daughter. I often lose my temper when my two year old is pushing boundaries and then feel guilty that I wasn't more patient. I get angry or grumpy or irritated with people that I love. And lately with a two year old who doesn't like to go to bed, who wants to climb in and sleep next to us, who gets up at 4am, I am so tired and I try and try to set boundaries so that we all can get better sleep but it takes time and energy and I don't know when to hold those boundaries firmly to create consistency and when to let them bend or break to keep the peace and foster rest and love and comfort. I feel as though I am always at a loss, like I am one step away from getting and doing and saying everything wrong. I feel like a creature built of the mud, whose cracks are starting to show as she gets dried out.
And as I type this, I cry. I cry because I know it is true and I know it is silly and I know that many others have or do feel all these things and more. I cry because we live and a world made of people who are also made of mud, who constantly get things wrong and do and say things that hurt one another; that we have to be worried about pain and violence and suffering not only in the world but in our own lives. I cry because I don't know how to do the one thing that I want so badly to do: to fix it; suddenly turning into someone who always gets and does and says the right things, someone who has more patience and can work full time, keep a clean house and spend glorious joy-filled moments with her family. And I cry because I know that that perfection is not possible, no matter how much I wish it were.
Today I feel like this earth creature, created out of mud and dust and dirt and a giant part of me wanted to leave this post as a lament, filled with those deep feelings of inadequacy and brokenness but that other part of me, maybe it's the pastor part, maybe it's the part that was created in the image of God, maybe it's both, just couldn't leave this post there. Because underneath all of this is hope, hope for those moments of light and life and joy and creativity, moments of love and peace, moments of snuggles on the couch and whispered "I Love You"s, moments of laughter. I have the hope of being someone created of more than just mud and dirt and grime, the hope of being someone lovingly crafted in the image of God, of the very canvas that God used to create all the beauty around me. It doesn't mean that I feel it every day, but it is my hope to feel it just a little more in each of those moments when I feel at my worst; to be reminded in those moments of frustration and anger that I was created out of more than just dirt and grime. So I guess, I will hold on to hope. I will hold on to the first creation story, the reminder that even I, in all my earthy glory, was created in the image of God.
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