Convenient People

This blog post has been a long time coming. The fire in my belly has been brewing for some time but I was not recognizing it as a disease or something which needed to be purged from my soul until now.

See there are some people in our lives we give very long strings as well as very wide open doors with many times entrance without knocking and with working combinations to padlocks to the doors of our hearts which should have been changed a long time ago.

I have allowed Convenient People or those who have been in my life for a long time - to mistreat me and to take advantage of who I am not only in my persona but who I am in Christ.

See, when we allow others entrance into our life in a way which ignores insults, passive aggressive behavior, half insults with belated compliments, ignored visitations, forgotten birthdays but belated emails with half-hearted apologies or none at all we let the enemy of our soul steal a bit of our heart - piece by piece until our hearts are no longer broken but unrecognizable as a whole.

I am at a place in my life now past the Crossroad of Kindness. I am at a place now where I know where I stand. Does this mean I stop praying or allow a root of bitterness? No. Not at all.

This place allows a moat around the space where a pathway once existed. This place is flooded with my tears which drew pain deep into the space where love once dwelt. I am now allowed to put up a drawbridge because this is the safest place for my heart to reside. This place now is invaded with light where once it held expectations rooted in the deep rich earth which housed roots of relationship which I assumed had grown to be oaks of righteousness, and trees of life but had become moldy with shadows of regret.

In letting go, I cannot help but admit that these relationships now house nests empty of previous life, chrysalis of long ago fluttering joy and limbs which will never bud.

And so I grieve. I grieve on my knees. Some days on my face. Some days the tears will not stop as I conduct mundane daily tasks. I grieve when I work. When I rest. When I wake in the middle of the night to pray. The burden is great and I will not fail. I live for a day when tears will no longer exist and earthly rewards will be eternal.

And even still, the Convenient People carry on as though there were no agenda. She emailed you after she called even though she knew you were working. She called when she knew she had limited time to talk. She called after 9 months of no contact and says God told her to call you not knowing or caring that you cried for 8 months and 31 days just because you missed her. She did not care that 9 years went by when you thought of her every day. The Convenient People don't realize you wanted them to call you just because they cared. They don't care. Caring is not convenient.

Personally? Why do I care? Just because I want them to love me as much as I love them. Just because blood made them relatives but my love for them to know Jesus made me love them. I wanted them to call me because I feel I am worthy of love and to be in their lives not only because of time or history but because I am a cool person and worthy to be loved! That is why I cared about the Convenient People.

Convenient People will tell you that they want you to enjoy the time with your dying father because they do not want to share the hospital room with someone who convicts them. They don't want to fear death or that they are so far from Jesus that the very view of you from afar makes them uncomfortable in their own skin. This is not convenient for them!

They will tell you to enjoy the time you have with your father as if they are doing you a favor. This sounds generous but is just convenient - - for anyone but you. For you are longing for a day long ago when sneakers around your neck made you real mad as you seethed at your sister from 2 feet away. Then anger led to disgust as you were made to embrace. Soon anger led to laughter and before you knew it the sneakers you had snuck from her closet to wear and got caught no longer held the barrier between you both. The laughter said I am sorry and the anger between you dissipated and was soon forgotten. The wisdom of that today resounds.....

I long to fling those sneakers around each and every neck of the Convenient People in my path today. To be transformed to a simpler time when I was wanted, loved, forgiven, cussed at and then embraced.

Convenient People do not confront. They do not look you in the eye and tell you how awful you are. They sit in the shadows and make up lies. They make reasons which are logical only to them to avoid you as if you are a modern day Leper.

They live in deception and call it truth. They don't need you and make reasons for being so much better without you. And when they have to talk to you or tolerate a visit, they put on a gameface and you go home feeling the sting. Cause even though there has been nothing said about their disdain, you see something in their eyes which just does not compute. Eyes inconveniently become windows to the soul and often the Creator gives the gift of discernment to the victims of Convenient People.

However, you go on wondering what is wrong with you. You ask what is inconvenient about who you are. You know your worth in Christ, your value, the precious soul created to to great things. You become the voice for the voiceless and the rudder for the ship with no direction. Suddenly all the blows you received allow you to get up and fight back.

Today for no reason at all, I decided this was inconvenient for me. And so, Inconvenient People and you know who you are - these  out-dated, toxic, dead and dying relationships which have been convenient until now are no longer!

I am ending these relationships.  I will be fervent in prayer but you are no longer getting that piece of my heart which I reserved though it was inconvenient and painful and downright void of God.

Goodbye Convenient People. I will miss what I had hoped would have been. But I will not regret the moments God will give me to do something lasting for those people who though I may inconvenience at times - feel I am worth the inconveience!