The escape plan

I was sitting at a red light so I quickly clicked on my notifications to see what I might be missing or need to know. Out of the corner of my eye I noticed the light turn green so I took my foot off the brake to slowly roll forward while I clicked my phone off and put it away. After all, I don’t text and drive, don’t ya know. Only when I’m at a red light. “Whoooop Whooop” rang in my ear, a quick blip of a siren. I looked in my rear-view mirror and realized to my dismay, it was intended for me. I sighed and my shoulders slumped as I pressed on the gas, turned through the light and pulled over noting the time. Yep, my son will be late to school today. And then began the pleasant conversation one has with a cop after being pulled over. You know, the one where he asks what business you had on your phone that you needed to do it while behind the wheel of a vehicle in drive. Ugh. Nothing important and it was just plain stupid. And I pulled away with an extra piece of paper when we were done. No tears spilled, although they were close, but my ego took a big hit. All day I’ve been contemplating this experience that started off this fine, sunny, beautiful Thursday. I dropped Ely off at school, jumped back in the car (feeling a bit grouchy about it all) and drove home. I pull up to a red light. I sit there for a moment. Geez, it’s quiet. Automatically my hand reaches for my phone! Like it seriously did it all by itself! I caught myself just before turning it on and threw it back in my bag. What the heck, Bekah?!

I had to drive that same exact trek 6 times today. Once to school and back for drop off. Then to school and back for pick up. Then to Ely’s occupational therapy and back (which is just down the road from his school). You’d better believe my phone stayed put inside my purse, but my mind went crazy. I made a couple phone calls on one of the trips (using hands free bluetooth of course!), the others I would turn on the radio. And I started to worry about my inability to sit in the quiet. The quiet can be a little bit scary for me. The undistracted can be an emotional abyss that looks dark and looming. So I look for an escape plan. One that takes me someplace artificial so I don’t have to deal in the real and vulnerable. And it’s become a bit obsessive. It doesn’t always look like Facebook, texts or phone calls. It could be a fictional book. Or food. Or TV. We all have our list.

In all my driving today, on my final trip home, it hit me. I’ve been looking for an escape plan through all this because my mind is pleading for a break. It’s begging to run from pain. My nervous system is operating at maximum sensitivity levels and it doesn’t take much to push me over the edge. This is my daily struggle. The one where I’ve become really good at pushing back the emotions because they might make me or someone else uncomfortable. Choosing the superficial and surface escape route is much easier. Oh how I grow tired of it. Even when I’m caught up in the act of distraction, my heart grows weary of it and yet I don’t stop. What might be on the other side if I do?

It’s the season of lent. The season where we pull back, we sacrifice, we take away, we re-evaluate, we pray more, we become aware of ourselves and our need for God. We stop turning to our own escape plans and turn our full attention and focus on THE escape plan. The one where God sent his son Jesus to this earth to sacrifice his life in order to save ours. That escape plan.

So what will I find on the other side of distraction and faulty escape plans?

I will find a God who heals. And, yes, while I believe God can heal physically, well, the truth is, that hasn’t been my personal experience. I’ve watched so much death happen. Even right here in my living room. But I have to be a person who is willing to remember! Remember how He has carried and continues to carry me through. To remember the fullness of life experienced right smack in the middle of the most broken of times. To allow the healing work he is doing in me to sink into my soul and be a healing balm to my wounds… ones that I will carry with me for the rest of my life.

My eyes tear up when I see another family with needs like our own. And that distraction tugs. The uncomfortable sensor goes off like a siren! But I want to say, so what? That reaction is God’s heart in me. Let it be.

I feel the jerk of my heart beating like it’s reminding me how very alive I am and how gone from this earth my son is. There is that sensor! Distract! Distract! But I want to say, so what? That is a momma’s heart, each heartbeat is a heart-bleed because I loved and still love big. But instead of clotting off that heart-bleed with distraction, I must let it run. For it is his blood that first ran to give us freedom in His love and grace. It is his broken body that made us whole. And it is my broken heart, bleeding all red and love that is finding healing.

My healing doesn’t look pretty. You should hear me in my therapy sessions when I start crying. I choke things out, sometimes my breath comes into my lungs super constricted and wheezy. But I am reminded that in Jesus’s most broken state, all things were made new and He was beautiful. He did not distract from His mission. A mission to rescue his most dearly beloved… you and me.

So…

I’m going to put down the phone, yes even at red lights. I’m going to get comfortable with silence. I’m going to cry when I feel like crying. I’m going to hug someone when I feel like they need it. I’m going to walk into brokenness knowing I’ll want to run. And I’ll run to Him.  And I know I’ll be able to do it because it is HIS strength in me, reminding me that all is not lost or broken. And in fact, redemption is here and it is for all. Because that was His ultimate escape plan for us. 

Thanks for listening…

Bekah