Enter In

Relationships can be the greatest blessing and they can take a lot of work. People are just that way. They can give us a sense of connectedness or a harsh dose of rejection. Relationships can go in seasons and some can end. For as hard as that might be at times, I think I'm okay with that as long as we didn't leave unfinished business hanging open.

If we take on the picture of community that we find in Scripture, we will be engaged with others and not isolated. We build relationships of trust where we can let people in. Hospitality in its greatest sense is letting people in to the real places in our life. Come by our house on any given day and you'll find real life being lived here. You might find us working hard or taking a day off. The house might be well tidied or well lived in. We might be enjoying each other's company or getting on each other's nerves. Laughing, fighting, striving, playing, happy, mellow, grouchy. Real emotions, real life, actively present.

I want to be in relationships where we can be real. I want the kind of community where we give up pretending to have all the answers. I want to be free to say I'm struggling or I'm hurting, where we come alongside each other in those valleys. I want others to be able to say the same hard, but honest, words to me.

More often, I find that we're too busy or too distracted or too afraid to really engage. We might think something, or wonder about our questions, but we don't have the guts to say it. Instead of sharing our heart or being vulnerable, we withdraw. Anything that feels like getting real, being open, or saying what we feel is too confrontational. We avoid it like a plague because it is too uncomfortable. We glaze over it or set it aside.

I think an amazing thing would happen if we'd engage in authentic relationships with open hearts. We'd all be healthier and working towards being whole. What happens instead is that we tell people to get over it or move on. Maybe not in so many words, but dismissive and devaluing all the same. We try so hard to comfort or to fix that we miss the point of what is on someone's heart in the first place. Or perhaps we just give space until the thing passes because we don't really want to enter in.

We become people who stuff down our hurts or our questions where they fester and wound. Time really doesn't heal all wounds. God can heal through time, but only if we will let Him in. If we don't face our need, our questions, our longing, our frustrations, our wounds and deal with them, they will continue to affect us profoundly. We might not like the results when they decide to rear their ugly head later on.

Imagine if we could keep current in our hearts by dealing with what we are facing today, and not having a pile up of our past. Sounds wonderfully ideal, doesn't it? It doesn't happen when we just insist today is a brand new day. That it is, but what have we got going on beneath the surface? To try to wipe a slate clean by our own effort might be as effective as leaving left-overs to mold in the frig. They won't be forgotten forever -- they will grow ugly, green and fuzzy over time.

God's mercies are new every morning, and today is a new day. But to get current with today's stuff might take some work first. It involves going back and getting rid of the pile -- not hiding it in the closet or saying it isn't there. For many it might begin with asking God where those broken places are in the first place. Maybe we've denied them so long we don't even know how to expose them anymore. We can walk wholeness as we give Christ full access to every aching, frustrating part of our hearts. He wants to bring healing there. He wants us to walk in freedom.