splish splash (i was takin' a bath)

I’m sitting in the bathtub with Cherry Blossom bubbles and I’m wearing my glasses that I don’t actually need. I’m wearing them anyways, because they make me feel scholarly and maybe even a little bit cuter than normal. Vain, yes, but maybe in some recess of my mind, I hope that feeling scholarly means that my brain will come up with something great. I’m wearing them as I sit in the bathtub with my computer; I disassembled my do-it-yourself shelf and made a make-shift “desk” of sorts that sits on the edges of my bathtub. My computer is sitting on it, hovering over the water, which makes me nervous because I know how stupid I would feel if I had to tell anybody that my computer fell in the bathtub simply because I felt like it was really important to write this while attaining the highest level of relaxation. I’ve got peppermint tea and Jon Foreman is singing peace into my heart, about how we’re broken from the start, and it’s not the happiest of songs, but even still, I’m glad he’s singing it because for five minutes and thirty-eight seconds, I feel like somebody gets what I’m feeling.

I wrote something yesterday. Pages and pages of words, and I wrote it and it was honest and made me feel all too vulnerable, like you, whoever is reading this, knew all too much about me in a few pages, a few thousand words. As if a few thousand words could truly let you know me. Maybe you wouldn’t know all about me—I didn’t talk about my favorite color or favorite book or song or artist or pastime. I didn’t talk about pet peeves or funny memories or flowers and ferris wheels. I didn’t talk about my deepest desires and the dreams I have for the future. But I wrote and wrote and wrote, just to talk, to put a voice to my present reality.

My heart feels weird these days. Happy and hopeful. I can see in so many ways that YHWH has intervened in the last few months, from bringing me back to San Diego to my rooming situation, and even the way my schedule has worked out—four classes so that my soul can rest and fight for peace, four classes to give myself a break. But my heart feels weird, oddly heavy, because that’s exactly what I’m doing: fighting for peace, and needing a break.

Exodus: YHWH says, “I will fight for you, you need only be still.”

So now I’m in the bathtub and the anxiety has subsided, at least for a few hours. It’s left my body, but not my mind. I wish that I worried about my grades or finances or even my future. Unfortunately, grades have never really been a problem and by the grace of God, my dad’s work has been steady, and graduate school is providing the perfect opportunity to put off deciding on a career. No, no, my fight has taken a different form. I wish that I could say that the fight has just begun, but if I’m being honest with myself, this battle has been raging since…as far back as my memory allows.

And I wish that YHWH would take it all away. I wish that He would make everything new again.

Two theology classes are a relief—I can learn about the Character of YHWH, the Creativity of YHWH, the Love of YHWH, the Power of YHWH; I can learn about humans in relationship with Him and humans in relationship with humans as He so intended; I can study it and meditate on it and give it some sort of intellectual foundation in my mind for the times when my anxious heart can’t discern His voice, for the times when my heart wants to give up, to give in, to resign.

My homework for last week was to read Genesis. Creation. When YHWH intimately breathed His breathe into our nostrils and brought us into our humanity, into our need of Him, with an intimate kiss; when Creation spoke one giant “I love you;” when Creation was one magnificent display of Power and Glory and Goodness.

There is a life and breath that I was given, and for now, that life feels trapped, and my breathing feels short and shallow. The anxiety is there for a reason, so now I’m discovering why. I am traveling back in time, and digging to the root—investigating my childhood and my parents and relationships and experiences and, in the process, I’m unearthing layers upon layers of pain and frustration and confusion and irrational fear after irrational fear that seem to have followed me. I’m uncovering wounds for which healing was never sought and deep pits of insecurity in my heart for this reason and that reason. It makes me sad and angry and hopeful and tired.

I wonder if this is part of the fight; I wonder if YHWH wants me to know what He is taking away, though I hesitate to predict what He will do.

I’m not bright and shiny like I always hoped I would be. I don’t have a bright and shiny family or a bright and shiny history. But this life has made me real. This is real, and this is why I need Jesus. I’m irrational and insecure and scared and there doesn’t seem to be much room for YHWH inside of this tangled web, except that He made me and formed my very being and knows my heart and every anxious thought. And so there must be room. Above anything, there must be room for Him.

I don’t feel bright and shiny, but Jesus says that I am clean. So there is a spring of hope bubbling up inside me. I want to collect its waters in a jar and carry it around my neck. I want to sing and dance and twirl round and round in a dress that rises and falls with every spin.

I don’t always feel capable of love, or worthy of grace, or, you know, any of those other things that sometimes come up. With God, or with humans. But this is where I am right now, and YHWH promises His comfort and His presence, and so I know. I know that peace and redemption will flood my heart. I know that He has hold of me. He is my shepherd, and His rod and staff comfort me.

It’s slow, contrary to my racing heart; and He is hope in the midst of the darkness of the anxiety itself, even though, more often than not, I don’t feel it. I want the songs to be true. I want to overcome by the blood of the Lamb and the word of my testimony. I want to shout unto God with a voice of triumph and a voice of praise. I would like to enter the city of the Living God. I would like to join in the chorus of thousands upon thousands of angels singing Alleluia.

I would like to enter the courts of YHWH. I would like to stand, barefoot, as a child before Him and experience the Living God. Peace that grips me. Happy that has a hold on my heart. Humbled.