PERSIST ALL THE WAY THROUGH THE CHAOS

I'm writing for Five Minute Friday and today's prompt is PERSIST.  

I am surrounded by mess at the moment.  I'm in the process of tidying up all my books that I'm hoping to sell.  I've been collecting books for years but I had to put the selling of them on hold because of various family and health crises.   Thankfully I'm able to move forward now, but first I have to sort out several hundred books into the right categories and store them in the correct tubs.  In the meantime, they're creating chaos in my front loungeroom and in my headspace.

I need to persist with this onerous task if I'm going to conquer this mess, which at times is visually and mentally overwhelming.    Sometimes I just sit and look at it and wonder what to do next.      

And sometimes it looks worse because I'm pulling books out of hidden tubs and have to leave them lying about for days till I can get back to it.   

It reminds me that I need to persist with the other chaos in my life because it is clogging up my capacity for peace and fruitfulness.  I'm sorely tempted to give up.  This heart mess isn't visible except when it explodes out of my mouth when I'm under pressure.    That pressure of raw wounds and broken relationships and parenting and homeschooling and not enough sleep and too much to learn and too much to manage.  

But if I give up, I may as well not have bothered at all.   

I need to persist on the healing journey He has me on.   

I need to persist in creating new routines that lead to better health.

I need to persist in my weekly efforts to read and respond to other FMF blog posts (where do the days go?).   

I need to persist in forgiving stuff that feels impossible to forgive.

I need to persist in loving people who push every raw wound I still have, and even some of the healed ones.   

I need to persist in tense relationships.

I need to persist in learning new skills and conquering previous 'failures'.

I need to persist in parenting and homeschooling, even when the children resist it with every fibre of their beings.  

I need to persist in renewing my mind with His truth, displacing long-held lies and pulling down strongholds.  

I need to persist in prayer and worship, even when I feel nothing, hear nothing. 

I just need to persist and in time, those new habits, new skills and new mindsets that are so exhausting now, will become easier perhaps.   Perhaps I'll just get stronger and better at them, and notice it less.  

It reminds me of something I wrote many years ago, when my order girls were little.  I remember teaching one of them that you have to turn the tap off  ALL THE WAY, and so you have to persist until it stops dripping.   She was strong enough, just not persistent enough.   It was one of the girls whose motto was often 'near enough is good enough' (not the oldest).  

But it's not enough to turn it off halfway.   Because even if it's better than it was after a little effort, if it's not off ALL THE WAY, then you will eventually drain that tank.   When you're on a farm, dripping taps are a serious problem. 

So, I have to persist all the way to the finish line, and He decides where that is, not me.   I'd like to decide that but it's better that I don't.   If I got to decide, I would have given up long ago and would not now be enjoying the blessings of pushing through the chaos thus far.   

He sees the end from the beginning and He gives grace for every step.

I will bring the blind by a way they did not know; I will lead them in paths they have not known. I will make darkness light before them, and crooked places straight. These things I will do for them, and not forsake them.   Isa 42:16

I haven't been this way before so it's hard to persist and hard to believe it's worth it, just like the child who hadn't learn to turn a tap off ALL THE WAY before.   It IS worth it, even on the hardest, messiest days.    I'm grateful for His leading, and His empowering, for His light in the shadows, for His ability to make the crooked places straight, for His promises to do all of that and more.   

Bring on heaven, I say, but in the meantime:

I press on to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of me.......................Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus.  Phil 3:12-14  

This song has become one of my favourites lately.   It's a lovely, quiet declaration when you don't have the energy to belt out a praise song, 'cause persisting through chaos is exhausting.   

You're the light, You're my path

You're the Shepherd of my soul

All I am, all I have

Holy Spirit, lead me on

Oh, You're the light

You're my path

You're the shepherd of my soul

All I am, all I have

Holy Spirit, lead me on

Holy Spirit, lead me onward

Walking through the great unknown

Trusting, leaning, holding, clinging

Till the day You lead me home