Body Blow

It was a bright, beautiful Sunday. I had gone straight from church to a baby shower and was finally home. My heart was full, and my head was spinning. 

I shoved on my running shoes and bolted out of the door. My daughter followed me out the door, struggling to keep up with me, on the way to play in a neighbor's yard.

There were things swirling in my that could only be processed with some serious pavement pounding and deep communion with God.

The day swirled over me - hurtful words, unintended and intended - longing - pain - fatigue - despair. 

I had spent the day in that place where all strength seeps out of the bottom of me, twirling like the water leaving the bathtub, taking hope with it too.

Even the smallest thing - teasing at the baby shower - "Amy, don't you want more children? Just one more baby?" and my daughter's words bursting forth, "Yes! We do!" and my uncomfortable shift in my chair under the surprised stream of my in-laws' gaze.

"Oh, well, we... I mean, I... oh she just would love a sister but we..."

Thankfully the conversation had moved on. 

Just one thing would be easy to handle. 

Pile upon pile, thing upon thing had sent me scrambling for the pavement. For the place where I can find Him most easily. Under the sun, under the clouds, breathing the air, feeling the hardness of the earth and the brush of the breeze. 

The place where I can breathe.

I rounded the corner, feeling the sounds of childrens' laughter and the nearby train. Seeing the sun. Watching the pavement slide under my feet.

I heard my name above it all.

My sweet friend waved me over, her smile warm and kind.

We stood in her drive way, chatting. I was hyper aware of everything around me. This, my usual response to being over stimulated and over stressed. Focusing on her words and at the same time, noticing how the hem of her tank top had unraveled, the string was swinging in the breeze. Hearing the kids spinning around us on bikes and scooters. It felt like that globe of death from the circus. One swerve and she and I would topple, victims of a drive by scooter accident. 

I focused on her words, feeling thankful for something to focus on outside of myself. 

She was describing her son's arm. It had been hurting. The one he had broken earlier. She was afraid it was broken again.

"It can't break in the same place, once it's been broken," she continued, touching absentmindedly her arm in the place where her son had broken his. "The doctor said that once a bone breaks, it heals stronger than before, almost like extra bone forms around the break. It can't ever break again..."

She continued on, but my world slowed. My eyes drifted to the side of the house where the shade of the leaves were dancing in light of the sun. The kids' voices faded and I focused back on her.

"What did you say?"

She paused, and said, "It can't be broken again. You know once it heals. I mean it can in another part bone..."

She continued, but I was lost again.

It can't be broken again.

She noticed that I was thinking, lost from the moment. 

I couldn't help it.

"There have to be spiritual implications there, right? I mean, is that the same with God and us?"

Bless her. 

She doesn't know me that well. She's not familiar with me and my quick right hand turns. My tendency to spiritualize everything. To overthink at a moment's notice. 

She grinned, and I honestly don't remember what her response was. But I felt her kindness with each of my overstimulated senses. It was both cool and refreshing and warm and comforting all at the same time. 

"I have to go. I am so sorry..."

I turned and fled the comfort of her driveway, her kindness more than I could bear.

"Get a grip," I chided myself. 

I took a deep breath and said to God with a quavering voice, "So once you get through breaking me, I won't break again? Do You promise?"

I spent time in arcades when I was a kid. I was an only child, and it was one place my step dad could take me where we would both have something to do. I loved watching him play "Punch Out." The announcer would yell "Body Blow!" over and over again.

That phrase came to me then, again and again. It made me smile, in spite of the truth of it. I could still see the computer animated boxer hiding behind his gloves, dancing, waiting on the next blow.

And hear the announcer yelling, "Body blow! Body blow!"

As I replayed the day, I heard him yelling it again, with each occurrence "Body blow!"

And me finally yelling, "Enough!"

How silly.

But.

Once You've broken me here, I won't break again.

Right?

Than is it worth it?

To be broken this way?

If the guarantee is that I won't break again?

"The bone can break in other places..."

Am I that fragile? That I can break in other places? Not strong? Not rooted in Him and His Word?

James says that I must "...let steadfastness have its full effect, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing."

I'm sure that "steadfastness" can't be broken.

Or can it?

I felt much like the next passage:

"...for the one that doubts is like a wave of the sea that is driven and tossed by the wind. For that person must not suppose that the will receive anything from the Lord; he is a double-minded man, unstable in all his ways."

Tossed by the wind and waves.

I hate that.

I pounded the pavement and poured it all out before Him.

"Fine. I need you. I'm fully dependent on you. I know I can't do this. I know it. I can't. I can't..."

And Paul.

I've been studying him.

His words floated to me on the breeze and settled firmly on me and haven't moved since:

"But He said to me, 'My grace is sufficient for you, for My power is made perfect in weakness.'"

Perfect in brokenness.