Saturday, June 12, 2010

I'm Changing In The Closet

   I'm not who I was...because of  my closet. It has changed my life. I used to never want to go into my closet because it was cluttered and unorganized and filled with stuff I needed to get rid of. If I did go in it I would do what I had to do so I could hurry out, I had so many other things that I needed to get done. I knew that the job of cleaning it would always be waiting on me, so I would put it off for as long as I could. But then, I would from time to time, spend a day of guilt cleaning to reconcile myself back with my closet. Then for several days after that I would keep it tidy and in order but assuredly I would gradually give in to my old laxidaisical ways and let it go.   
  
   Yeah...I was a closet owner, but I would go for days and not even talk to God. Of course, I would open The Word at church but not much at home. Busy you know. Church had become only a once a week visit, much different from my usual 3 times a week. Work clutter, family piles of responsibility, and life in general hanging everywhere had me discombobulated with my closet to match. But the day came that I got VERY tired of getting what my hand was producing. I had to resolve to make myself clean my closet. It was painful, I had to try on a lot of my favorite things only to discover that they didn't fit any longer, I had to let them go. Some things were dug up from the bottom of a pile, that I totally forgot I even had, I wasn't even using it. And there was the hard, cold fact that I had put far too much stuff in there and was overrun with useless things that took up valuable real estate. Yes, my solitary place had become a shambles.

    My closet is a place where I go in and bare myself and see the real me. I don't like seeing my thighs of frustration and my rear-end of self hatred, my flabby faith, and my dimply wounds of disappointment. That's why I would stay away from my closet as much as I could, only to do what was necessary to stay fake. But as time has marched on, and I have continued to get what I get, and I was tired of getting what I got, I have relented and willingly made the choice to purposely go into the closet and change.

   Worship changes me, not changes God. Prayer changes me, not changes God. Obedience changes me, not changes God. His Words change me, not changes Him. Fasting things move me, not moves Him.While I'm in there changing, I discard the old things that keep me where I am and not progressing, or cause me to make the same kind of mistakes over and over. I also begin using again, gifts and talents that I dropped on the floor and they got covered up and forgotten. I decide to stop bringing in useless crap that takes up my space/time and prioritize what's important.

   In my closet, as I bare myself, I am transformed, I am changed and I emerge not resembling the way I was. Isn't that what you do in a closet? In my physical life I go in, prep and change and get all dressed up. My husband says, "You don't look like the same woman I woke up with this morning." In my spiritual life, if I go in and let God transform the soulish part of me and change me, people will be saying, "You don't look like the same person I knew."

   I'm not mourning the loss of who I was, not any more than I would mourn the loss of 10 pounds. I needed to change my clothes of being stiff-necked and unyielding, and doing it the way I wanted it, when I wanted it, and how I wanted it, and having an I'll-let-You-know-when-I-need-You attitude. No...the more I got in my closet, the more I wanted to get into it and get it in order and keep it in order and just let God have my junk. I did not need the polyester suit with the wide lapels of unforgiveness and shoulder pads of past hurts any longer, they were old and had to go. So in my closet I threw my shoes...that's a whole story in itself...later. And out I have come again and again, different and more different.

    Let me tell you, God did not 'twinkle-poof' me with a fairy wand and whoop! there it was...it was going into the closet time upon time upon time...changing...changing...changing...throwing out skeletons, boxing up scars, and tossing lies I believed to be truth. And today, I am who I am because I clothed myself with His goodness, dressed myself in His mercy, I wear His right-standing on my feet, His necklace of grace is around my neck and His ring of royalty is on my finger. I'm worth it, not because Loreal' says I am, but because Jesus thought I was worth dying for so I could go and bare myself and change in my closet.

   You see, the Savior part was taken care of when I got born again, but the Lord part has to be taken care of in the closet day by day. You do know that I mean by closet, right? It's alone time with God. Taking off your facades and being au naturel with your Maker and not being able to be a faker. Be for real now...how many hours do you fellowship with the TV? Has it changed you in any way? Fellowshipping with food shows up, fellowshipping with self interest and preoccupation with busyness will reveal the price later.

   The closet experience will revolutionize your life. Unless of course you don't want to be revolutionized. Then I would suggest doing absolutely nothing...and next year, you'll still have the same old clothes and same old attitudes and the same old relationship with God, same old results. If you're up for rearranging your closet, I encourage you stay with it and not back off, here a little...there a little and when someone hollers, "Hey...where are you?", you holler back, "I'm in the closet changing!".

2 comments:

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  2. Probably one of your best blog posts yet, Jeanna! I'm in my closet a I type this...gotta do some changing and purging! I've put it off too long...and it piles up and overwhelms! Jesus is also in my closet with me...pointing out what needs to go! There are still some items that I want to hang onto, but He says, "Let it go! It's so old and it doesn't fit you anymore!" So I trust Him! Amen.

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