Simple Journey

I want to know a song can rise from the ashes of a broken life... --Mike Donehey, 10th Ave. N.

Thursday, February 23, 2012

Leftovers


"And when they were filled, he saith unto his disciples, Gather up the broken pieces which remain over, that nothing be lost." John 6:12 (ASV)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2_vrpMrQ--0

Nothing is lost on the breath of God,
nothing is lost for ever;
God's breath is love, and that love will remain,
holding the world for ever.
No feather too light, no hair too fine,
no flower too brief in its glory;
no drop in the ocean, no dust in the air,
but is counted and told in God's story.

Nothing is lost to the eyes of God,
nothing is lost for ever;
God sees with love and that love will remain,
holding the world for ever.
No journey too far, no distance too great,
no valley of darkness too blinding;
no creature too humble, no child too small
for God to be seeking, and finding.

Nothing is lost to the heart of God,
nothing is lost for ever;
God's heart is love, and that love will remain,
holding the world for ever.
No impulse of love, no office of care,
no moment of life in its fulness;
no beginning too late, no ending too soon,
but is gathered and known in God's goodness.

(Colin Gibson, 1994)


It's been a year.

Recently I had the opportunity to sift through my life's pieces, because I moved. This move was not by choice, but ordered by the Court, as I divorced my husband of 30 years. If you've ever done anything like it, you will know the place from which this comes today.

As I sorted my sewing room paraphenalia (spelled incorrectly in the dictionary, but that's another story), I separated my quilt scraps by color. However, there were several pieces that defied sorting, as they were made of several different colors. No one color could be said to be the dominant theme, so I put them in a drawer marked "multi".

This morning, as I meditated on my unconventional life of 52 years, I got the feeling I am myself a similar kind of "multi", un-categorize-able, in-between, neither this nor that, undefinable, defying pigeon-holing, paint spatter strewn across life's canvas, an un-corral-able wild, messy, chaos of a human being.

Whereas the fabric fits neatly in the organizer drawers in color categories I chose, except for this "multi" fabric, I don't fit neatly anywhere in the world. Colors slop over the sides of any activity I choose to attend. Threads of red stick out of the green school settings. Frayed edges of blue won't hide under the yellow folds of jobs I attempt to hold down. Black mixes with the white, and makes grey days. And I don't know which to concentrate on clarifying first.

This isn't only my personality. Equipped with an extremely creative frame of mind, the world itself is not clearly one thing or another to me. Growing up in it hasn't helped me at all. Add to that the kind of partner I chose at 17, a direct opposite of myself, and you have quite the dichotomy constantly percolating underneath. Time, then, wreaks havoc and causes the fabric to wear very thin. Add to that mix the most chaotic family circumstances, and voila! "Multi"!

Where on earth do you put this life?? If I were a letter, would the post office have a slot for me? If I were a laundry item, would there be instructions for my handling? What if I were a car? On which corporation's lot would you find me? Would I be a "Smart Car", or a Cadillac, or an SUV, or a mini-van, or perhaps a station wagon? Perhaps I'm a dish in the cupboard. Which cupboard? The fine china closet, or the kitchen shelf?

The problem is I have capabilities in all categories, traits that lend themselves to each. And since you wondered, I'm so introspective because I am way too complicated for my own mind, and so have never found a home. I thought I had one, years ago, in college. But afterward, I could not find one for all the tea in China, and a lot of money and hours spent thinking about it. So I had children. But the children are (mostly) grown, and one has flown the coop and the other is extremely troubled, flies the coop inside himself these days.

So I've come to this place in life, where I look back and see chaos, and look forward and see more of the same - unless I lasso one of the whirling thoughts and put it to work. Thus this blog, thus this piece, thus this image of a "multi" piece of fabric, me.

Can such a scrap be useful at last?

I notice something else about my little correlation: the scraps are leftovers, cut from the whole cloth. I am a leftover too, cut by my own hands, severed from the whole as distinctly as if I'd taken a pair of shears and cut a swath, which indeed I did. I, with my own hands, cut a gash through our family that is unrepairable. I, even I, a daughter of the King who is all about wholeness, in my journey toward wholeness for myself and my children, created these "broken pieces" of a family, of which I am one. A "leftover". Like the bread Jesus prayed into being in the passage from which the verse above is excerpted, I am extra and broken and not needed today.

But I am "gathered", and saved, that I might not be "lost". Maybe that's just where I belong, in a disciple's basket, awaiting another feeding event, ready to be used, to be devoured by hungry children or adults. Or perhaps waiting to be remade into another dish, a casserole at a church potluck (my favorite version of the heavenly feast on earth). Or a quilt scrap, waiting for the right place in a quilt that will cover a homeless child someday.

Jesus Himself noticed me, waiting in the wings, lying on the floor all dejected and waiting to be swept up into the garbage, and saw the colors, and said, "Gather her up, that she might not be lost."

So I ride in the LGPC** basket, for now.

I'll take it.

Simply gathered,
Patty



**Lake Grove Presbyterian Church in Lake Oswego, Oregon