Not The End

I'm starting a new blog venture. One that doesn't revolve as much around my children and their development. I love writing and using that as a means of processing and understanding and sometimes just cleansing.

I won't make any grand promises of eloquent and inspiring speeches. I won't presume to be able to offer any wisdom you've never heard before. There's really nothing new under the sun, and this blog will be no exception. But what I will offer is a transparent look at the person I was, the person I am, and the person I'm becoming: The lessons I am learning in life, the truths I encounter, and the daily process of change and growth and transformation.

I'm currently reading (for the second time) a book called The Meaning of Marriage by Tim Keller. It has had an unbelievable impact on my view of myself, my husband, my marriage, and my God, and I highly recommend it to EVERYONE (even single people). One section, in particular, struck a note with me and I think kind of initiated the idea for this new blog pursuit. Keller says:

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Have you ever traveled to a mountainous part of the world when it was cloudy and rainy? You look out your windows and you can see almost nothing but the ground. Then the rain stops and the clouds part and you catch your breath because there, towering right over you, is this magnificent peak. But a couple of hours later the clouds roll in and it has vanished, and you don't see it again for a good while. That is what it is like to get to know a Christian. You have an old self and a new self (Ephesians 4:24). The old self is crippled with anxieties, the need to prove yourself, bad habits you can't break, and many besetting sins and entrenched character flaws. The new self is always a work in progress, and sometimes the clouds of the old self make it almost completely invisible. But sometimes the clouds really part, and you see the wisdom, courage, and love of which you are capable. It is a glimpse of where you are going.

So that's kind of my purpose here. This person I am today is not the end; just like the person I was 15 years ago was not the end. And the person I will potentially be 20 years from now won't be the end either. I am a process, a work in continual progress.

That's somewhat frustrating for the perfectionist in me. I'd really just like to put a checkmark next to the transformation process and call it done.

•           Finish the laundry... Check
•           Clean the garage out... Check
•           Become perfected in Christ... Check
  
  
  
  
•           Wash the dishes

But that isn't how it works, and it wouldn't really make for a great or interesting story anyway. So while the process is slow, wavering, and sometimes very painful, it's still a good and worthwhile and sometimes very lovely process, making me (and all of us) into something I could never create myself. As C.S. Lewis puts it in Mere Christianity :

If we let Him... He will make the feeblest and filthiest of us into a god or goddess, a dazzling, radiant, immortal creature, pulsating all through with such energy and joy and wisdom and love as we cannot now imagine, a bright stainless mirror which reflects back to God perfectly (though, of course, on a smaller scale) His own boundless power and delight and goodness. The process will be long and in parts very painful; but that is what we are in for. Nothing less.

So that is what I'm setting out to do here; to sort of chronicle those moments and seasons of change, to put into words some portion of that process, and hopefully to encourage and uplift others along the way as we all struggle through our own transformations. This is Not the end...

And we all, with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into His same image from one degree of glory to another.
2 Corinthians 3:18