It's Ok to Not Want to Show Up for Your Life

Alternate Title: Merry Waiting and A Happy Not-So-New-Year
*Disclaimer: This post doesn’t end with me saying God will ‘show up.’

Our life is beautiful. There’s vibrancy in the grief; redemption in the pain; joy in the waiting. But I don’t want to show up; I’m tired.

My appointments start back up on Friday, the first of 2019. It might seem like the extra waiting, the in-between, is a burden, but it’s usually a welcome reprieve. For nearly a year and a half we’ve been living our life with doctor appointments as our markers of time passing (and Judah’s birth, Praise Jesus for that Ebenezer). Waiting is our normal.
In less than a month we’ll travel to another city to meet with a new specialist, the ninth doctor (not including my midwife or chiropractor). I feel like we’re being carried over a new threshold, somewhat unwillingly.

Lately I’ve been wishing all of these health problems, my neuromuscular illness...whatever it is, as we still lack a diagnosis, would just evaporate. Listen, we’re hopeful, we have joy, and I know that ultimately He’s using this and going to use this in miraculous ways. But right now, I’m really angry. 

There’s vernacular circulating around, especially in the Church about showing up. It’s become the penultimate praise. Praises for those that ‘show up’ to their life, their reality, the chaos, the pain. 
But what happens when you no longer want to show up? When nothing is changing, months are turning into years, your daughter is naturally starting to grasp more about the reality of your poor health, and your faith feels so absolutely low, that thank goodness gravity is keeping you from throwing your hands up in the air in frustration out in public because you just. feel. done.

Not wanting to show up doesn’t mean you love your people any less, have poor work ethic, or any other adjectives attached to you that are synonymous with what the world deems as weakness. It just means life is HARD. 

And it’s ok to not want to show up. 

And it’s ok to not want to feel anymore. 

This isn’t an anthem for numbing yourself out, or escaping. As a former addict, you’ll never see me waving that banner. But read this- it’s ok to be tired – to be uncertain and not have gusto about your life. It’s ok to not be strong, after all we were never created to be strong nor hold it all together.

Pain is exhausting. And it’s even more exhausting when it’s relentless; whether physical, emotional, spiritual, or all at the same time. And while grief is healthy, as is the wide range of emotions we were designed to experience, it’s ok to not want to show up to the valley, especially when the mountains are in a foreign, unforeseen land.

So we’re coming out of a season that celebrates and remembers waiting (Advent), and the new year hardly feels new. Our faces are chapped from our tears, our voices raw from crying, our words muffled from fear. 

And God isn’t going to show up.

Because He already did. He’s already here.
Chapped face, raw voice, muffled words...pierced hands. He showed up so that you would never have to show up. To prove yourself, act strong, or put on a show. To seem perfect, conceal emotions or grief, hide your pain. 

It’s ok to not want to show up for your life. And read this: I’m completely preaching to myself here because I’m weary and worn. You don’t have to show up anymore, because He already did. He took on the worst reality so that we would never, ever have to face our reality on our own...alone. We don’t have to wait for Him to show up. He already has, and He’s never leaving.

God with us. Immanuel. 

Cheers to not showing up for 2019 🌼