ROOTED RENEGADE

We all hide from it. We all dodge it. We all try different things to escape it. We all do things to numb it. But why? Why is it so hard to face our reality instead of hiding from it? Well it all started in the garden with Adam and Eve. You see at first they felt no shame for being naked. They didn’t see their bodies or their reality as anything other than the will and purposeful act of God. The problem with us is that we nitpick at everything. It’s too hot, too cold, too wet, and too dry. Today it is raining too hard, snowing too much, the sun is blinding us, and so forth. We are too fat, too skinny, too tall and too short. We are too this and too that. Our outward realities on the surface are never quite enough to satisfy the disarray of our inward souls. So we nitpick away at everything we can see until there is nothing left but pure mocking the God of Creation – His weather, His design, His handiwork – as if He could have flaws.

The real issue is that we are a mess inside because we choose to turn away from our own realities and become emotionally detached from them. Those who have experienced complex trauma dissociate from the reality of their pain and pretend it didn’t exist as traumatically as it did in an attempt to try to live a life with some semblance of normal – whatever that may look like. They compare themselves to others on social media trying to find what looks like a good life and then mimics portions of it to escape the reality of what theirs was like. Why? Because let’s face it, who wants to come to terms with a life that was full of despair and brokenness? Hmmm. Pin that, as my counselor says, and we will come back to it! Some just emotionally disconnect from it and go on to live productive lives but are still tormented inside from the memories and pain. They experience physical discomfort because trauma gets stored in the body and won’t release until the emotional connection is made and that trauma is released through healing. On the flip side there are people who lived pretty good lives only to grow up miserable with themselves. Stuck in personal torment. How so? They have these seemingly happy lives on the outside. Money. Prestige. Facebook Fame. InstaFamous. Cars. Luxury. You know, all that stuff people scroll over and wish they had in their own lives. Yet they are VOID inside. Something is missing. Something real deep within their hearts. I will come back to that in a moment, but let it sink in. Imagine people like that in your head. Pin it.

Then there are those who are somewhere in the middle. Families with houses or apartments. Jobs and decent cars. Striving to make ends meet with soccer or football games in the middle of pandemic that the media keeps saying is coming to an end, but who knows for sure. Families who may have single parent households or two parent ones. Either way, they are doing what they can to survive in this world. Teaching their kids the best way they know how to grow up right, live right, act right, all that “good” stuff ya know. But they are tired. Worn out. Can’t seem to connect to their kids anymore because social media, games, etc. keep taking up all the room. Their jobs are stressful and everything seem to just keep piling up. What do they do? Where do they turn? The world is promising freedom yet nothing around them feels like “real freedom” because all they feel are more and more chains! Pin this too!

Let’s go back to Adam and Eve…the Garden…having no shame. What happened? Well in Genesis 1:1 “God created the heavens and the Earth”(a). Genesis goes on to say in the following verses 2-31 “GOD SAID” with the proceeding things that He created such as the light and darkness, the sky, dry land, waters, animals, stars, vegetation, etc. But my favorite was when GOD SAID in verse 26-27 “Then God said, “Let us make man in OUR IMAGE, according to our likeness…(27) So God created man in his own image; he created him in the image of God; he created them male and female”(b). God opened His mouth and we were formed in HIS IMAGE. He spoke and we were to be, yet after forming Adam from the dust and Eve from the rib, they still were giving choice. Why? Because they needed to accept their reality for what it was and not be forced. You see God is a Holy and righteous God who loves without fault or flaw. He doesn’t force himself on anyone and He certainly didn’t Adam and Eve. He only gave commandments that they were given a choice to follow. The same that children are given when it comes to parental guidelines. God does command us to obey them as a loving parent. In His holiness. But they didn’t because they couldn’t face their reality. Especially not when sin entered their lives through the deception of the serpent.

Genesis 3:1-7 The serpent posed a question to Eve that we are all familiar with “Did God really say ‘You can’t eat from any tree in the garden’?” and of course Eve explained herself to the serpent. Pause for a moment and think about how many times you have encountered a “serpent” and you stopped to explain God’s commands to it. How many times has someone come in your presence with gossip and you have engaged in it? How many times have you been in a situation that you knew was wrong, yet you justified it based on your “good intentions”? How many times have you been faced with a decision and instead of waiting to respond, you went ahead and made it the decision based on emotions and half information only to learn that the reason you needed to wait was because God had something better or to uphold to your integrity? Eve’s situation sound a little more familiar now? Eve knew what God had commanded so her response should have been based on her actual reality not what the serpent was trying to trick her into thinking. But she really wasn’t accepting of her reality, she was easily tricked into thinking that death was not really an option because in her natural sight, it was just a piece of fruit like everything else in the garden and the serpent knew that Eve was easily fooled.

Remember that pin up above I asked you to hold onto? The mirroring others lives? The void that is missing in some of those with prestige and money. What about the lack of real freedom? Deep inside of us we are all missing something. LOVE. The deep intimate love of the Father. The healing love of Yahweh. The kind that reaches into your wounds and removes the infection so the scar can form. The kind that looks at you and sees Jesus not all the things you have done wrong, your depression or anxiety, your past transgressions, but the Blood of Jesus. After all, it was the Blood of Jesus that purchased you on the cross and snatched the keys from the pit of hell on your behalf!!!! It is the kind of love that finds you in your garden by calling you out by name and says “Where are you?” because that kind of love never wants to leave you. Adam and Eve knew that kind of love but they hid because their reality was too much for them when they discovered shame. The serpent tricked them and deceived them and instead of facing it head on and coming to terms with their sin, they deflected and hid from their reality from the one person who loved them more than anything – YAHWEH. You see, He sought them out because He knew something was wrong. He didn’t leave them – He found them. They left themselves. Like we do when we want to hide from everything we are and everything we are not.

Think about that and pray about it. What are you hiding from? What are you trying to keep hidden? Because I promise you this…it really isn’t hidden from God. He sees you and is pursing you – because what is done in the dark always comes to the light. Just like He did with Adam and Eve, He is going to ask “Where are you?” (Gen. 3:9). What are you going to answer when He does?

Don’t keep hiding from your reality. One of the most beautiful things you can do is face it head on.

©2021 Grace 12 LLC Faythe Kadona