This past week has been stretching: in the physical sense and also the very metaphorical one. I’m noticing my belly button completely disappear at the same time as I’m being challenged to stand on Truth in different aspects of my life. I’m feeling the physical restriction of once-fitting clothing while on the same days being called to boldness and honesty and bravery in new ways. It’s fascinating, the parallels that come in seasons of our lives.

I don’t think I’ve ever felt more called to live into my age, experience or faith than I’ve been over these past months and weeks. I’m not one to shy away from sharing what I think when I feel like it really matters, but my convictions are burning up inside these days in a way that compels them to press outward–sometimes I feel like I’m hard to contain, and on the heels of that sentiment, I feel called to set thoughts and convictions free. The phrase, “For such a time as this,” comes to mind so often, and I wonder if I’ll ever stop living and feeling that sentiment so deeply (yet somehow, I suspect I won’t).

I know we don’t know the day or the hour that Jesus returns to earth, but I also know that as humans and believers, we can sense a quickening here that feels more tangible as time goes on. That quickening feels pertinent and worth recognition to me, because I want to be doing the things I’m called to do here on earth in preparation for what is to come. In the same ways that I want to be mentally, physically, spiritually and emotionally prepared for labor as we look toward the birth of our child, I want to be prepared to become more like Christ and to trust God more fully as the earth groans with its own labor pains.

The condition of the world does not always encourage me. In fact, without the hope of the Gospel, it could quickly feel like a very discouraging, despairing, unwelcoming place. I know that some people experience life this way, and it’s not surprising, when there are so many lies flying at us at every turn. When we can’t find our value in Christ alone, where do we place our hope? How do we anticipate a promising future without knowing who owns and holds it for us?

Stretching. It’s stretching to aim at growing in faith and living a life of hope. It’s stretching to put our trust in Jesus and to surrender a control we never actually had in the first place but believe should be ours. It’s stretching to realize that our old ways of doing things no longer fit with who we’re now called to be. In growing this baby, I’m learning so much about myself, but even more about God. I’m stretching from the inside out and the outside in. I’m having to rewrite what I understand about trust, or perhaps better put, I’m having to stand back while God rewrites my understanding of trust and its depth with Him.

I do love a good story, so the parallels here with this season of life we’re living are so helpful to me. So much in life makes better sense when there’s a visual aid. And I don’t think the stretching inside and that outside are mutually exclusive to one another, but rather they’re working together to draw things closer; delivery and deliverance both on the horizon in the direction my heart and body need to go for birth and life to be the end result.

Stretching can be painful, and in my experience these days, it ebbs and flows in waves of discomfort and reassurance, encouragement and challenge. As in preparation for a race, I know it’s of benefit to me to stretch now, and slowly, not hurriedly or all at once. Without this stretching, I can’t get where I’m going or where God’s calling me to move, so I’m once again uncurling my grip on what I can’t control in exchange for hope and trust in the One who knows the path set before me.

Surrender is both good and hard. I’m trying to be here for it and to willingly embrace it along the way.

MM