Kites, Strings, and God.

Here's my problem.....
let me re-phrase that....
Here's one of my many problems:
I like to look like I have my act together. In fact. I really like to look like I have my act together.
I like to be pretty, to have perfect hair, I like to be skinny, and look like I have self-control, I like people to think I'm disciplined and smart and funny and a good mom, I like to have my Christian "act" together too.
The problem lies in the fact that I'm not really any of those things.
I may be a little bit of some of them at times, but it's kind of like buying a new barbie in a shiny package at the toy store, only to get her home and realize she has cellulite, bags under her eyes, and borders on paranoia in many instances.
I've been in this weird funk in life where I'm feeling totally apathetic and stagnant, even in my relationship with God. I've been praying everyday that if there is something I need to do, something I need to know, something I need to change, God should let me know. I'm willing.
But nothing.
It even seemed like silence.
Then one morning, it started clicking.
Here's what I read:
"In him you were also circumcised, in the putting off of the sinful nature, not with a circumcision done by the hands of men but with the circumcision done by Christ, having been buried with him in baptism and raised with him through your faith in the power of God, who raised him from the dead.
When you were dead in your sins and in the uncircumcision of your sinful nature, God made you alive with Christ. He forgave us all our sins, having canceled the written code, with its regulations, that was against us and that stood opposed to us; he took it away, nailing it to the cross. And having disarmed the powers and authorities, he made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them by the cross." Colossians 2:11-15
So let's play a game....read above passage and notice one thing that is up to us to do.
You are correct! There are none.
I picture this like in the Jetsons where George is getting ready for work, and the machine is brushing his teeth, plopping him in the shower, brushing his hair, slipping him into his clothes, etc. God does it all.
In just these verses alone, we learn that He's the one who: circumcises our hearts, raises us from the dead, makes us alive, forgives our sins, cancels the written code, and disarms the powers that stand against us.
He does everything, He saves us, He keeps us, we are His and He does the work.
Do you know how refreshing, how liberating that was to me?
To know that it is not up to me to do great spiritual things, to be pretty, skinny, smart and holy and put together? To conjure up these great feelings of spiritual fervor? I get to just be...and be used by God.
Then he gave me the most perfect, beautiful object lesson later that day that brought it full circle for me.
Linc is really into kites. He always talks about flying one. So I decided we would make a kite together.
Now....I do not pretend to have any skills whatsoever in this area. I taped together some straws, and string, and a garbage bag, and Linc thought it was one of the blue angels.
The whole time I'm making it...I'm praying "Lord, if you could just make this pathetic thing fly, that would be great. It would just rock his world if you made this thing fly."
So Linc is out in the yard, running back and forth at full speed, dragging behind him a piece of thread with this mangled, heap of garbage bag and straws and tape on the ground and it dawns on me.
I've been doing that very thing for a week.
Running back and forth, on my own, dragging my sickly looking little garbage bag kite, wondering why it wouldn't fly....the whole time completely refusing to accept that it is the wind...in my case God...who makes it fly.
Without the wind....the kite is pathetic.
Without God working through me...I'm just this sorry excuse pretending to know what I'm doing and obsessing over my hair.
I was talking to John this morning about how "so and so" seem to have such a good marriage and have their act together and I told him "Honey, we're all in the same soup...some of us just fake it better than others."
It's true. I like to fake it, I like to try and work my way into this cookie mold of a wonderful Christian woman....but really I'm just running around like a fool dragging my kite on the ground.