Beautifully Awkward
I remember when I was in my twenties; I walked out of the church and for absolutely no apparent reason fell flat on my face. It felt like I was in one of those cartoons and I was going down in slow motion. When I hit the ground, all I could think of was–Did anyone see me! Let’s face it—I was never given the gift of grace in a physical sense at least.
Years later, I was running with some friends and as I went to kick a rock, I missed the rock, went flying into the air and twisted my ankle, again—not very graceful. My friends pulled me aside into a pile of leaves while they went to get the car, little did they know they left me in a bed of ants.
Oh, my stories are endless.
Unfortunately the humor eventually began to fade. These past few years when I began to have more and more car accidents (fender benders mostly), my family just assumed it was my typical lack of grace. We laughed it off initially. But in time, my husband began to get concerned and he started probing into my stories, just not too deep. I think he was afraid of what he might find. And I was not going to tell him. I’m not sure I could.
One night a show came on called Intervention. It was about drug-addicts and helping them come clean. The husband on the show discussed how many car accidents his wife had recently had and how he believed her stories in the beginning. She tried to pass the accidents off as being distracted with the children. For a while, he bought into her stories.
My husband watched the show intently. I… Held…My… Breath.
I will never forget the look on my husband’s face. I knew then he knew. It wasn’t long after that before everything about my nightmarish life came bursting forth from the darkness (Eph. 5:8-14). And I have never seen such a horrendous obsession destroy someone –who had everything– in such an unbelievable force and swiftness. It left me breathless.
And I was down for the count. I had fallen from grace. I was as awkward as the day I fell in front of hundreds at church .
And now, I wondered—did anyone see me fall!
And then as I was as low as I could go, I looked up, and there were these beautiful hands reaching for me…And I heard Him whisper– Beautifully Awkward –you are my daughter.
Given a new grace…I have come to love myself so that I may now love you.
Beautifully Awkward
Her Broken wing 
April 28, 2010 at 11:26 pm
I think of you as I come back to a truth beautifully illuminated to me this morning: God already loves us. We don’t have to do anything to earn it. He loved Adam and Eve, even as they plunged humanity into darkness. We can’t do anything to make Him love us any less!
1 The desert and the parched land will be glad;
the wilderness will rejoice and blossom.
Like the crocus, 2 it will burst into bloom;
it will rejoice greatly and shout for joy.
The glory of Lebanon will be given to it,
the splendor of Carmel and Sharon;
they will see the glory of the LORD,
the splendor of our God.
3 Strengthen the feeble hands,
steady the knees that give way;
4 say to those with fearful hearts,
“Be strong, do not fear;
your God will come,
he will come with vengeance;
with divine retribution
he will come to save you.”
5 Then will the eyes of the blind be opened
and the ears of the deaf unstopped.
6 Then will the lame leap like a deer,
and the mute tongue shout for joy.
Water will gush forth in the wilderness
and streams in the desert.
7 The burning sand will become a pool,
the thirsty ground bubbling springs.
In the haunts where jackals once lay,
grass and reeds and papyrus will grow.
Isaiah 35:1-7