We had a busy weekend. I spent my Saturday doing more laundry than I thought was possible in a day. I washed blankets and sheets until the hot water ran out! I spent time in both Karlena and Elijah’s room helping them clean and organize their spaces.

I don’t know about your kids, but clutter happens quickly in my home and things escalate and pretty soon there are piles everywhere and their rooms are a disaster. The aftermath of Christmas had exploded in their spaces and something needed to be done.

So we sorted and threw away and donated and found the floor again! It was a beautiful thing. I almost took a picture of it and then decided not to. It is easy for me to take a carefully crafted picture of how tidy my space or my life looks and share it with the world.

It is a lot harder to share those places that I would rather remain hidden.

Thus the reason for choosing to share a picture of our horrific “craft closet” space instead. The picture above doesn’t even do the full space justice. I couldn’t capture the entire mess in one shot. It is BAD.

This closet is a large walk-in closet that is in Elijah’s room. Last year we converted it into a craft space, a place where the kids could go and create and make a mess. It has the worst, oldest carpet in it…so I am the least worried about this area getting destroyed over other spaces in our home. But as you can see, things have gotten out of control in here.

I can, for the most part, close the door and ignore what is happening in here if I want. But the reality is unless I am willing to get in there and work through the mess….the clutter will remain.

Several weeks ago we had our new Pastor’s kids over to our house for a few hours. Their kids were hanging out with our kids and in preparation our kids had cleaned their rooms (as best as they were able) and I had straightened up the main living spaces that I thought might be seen. Again thinking that all those places we didn’t want “exposed” to our new neighbors/friends…we could easily hide away.

When our pastor came back to get his kids I said to Dominic “don’t take him on a tour of the entire house…especially not the basement.” I had this fear that he might do this and knew that I would be HORRIFIED if these people, who were new to our family, were allowed to see the real us.

Sure enough a full on tour ensued. Dominic said, “my wife told me not to do this, but….” All I could do was shake my head and laugh. Of course this was happening. You see I am THAT person. The one that wants to look like it is all good on the outside when inside my “mess” is out of control.

And exposing others to who I really am is risky. What if I am rejected. Isn’t that the age old fear? Putting ourselves out there and then being judged as not worthy?

But this weekend I was again reminded that community is SO important. And community with people who will love you in your mess, even more so. I need to be able to not be “fine” when I am not fine.

Life is HARD. I bet if you searched the pages of this blog you would find I said that very statement time and time again. It hasn’t gotten any easier. The Bible even promises that we will have trouble, why are we always so surprised by it?!

So knowing that this is going to be a world full of difficulties, how do we want to walk through this life? I personally need to be surrounded by people who will let me be real. Who will hold me accountable for those things that need to be addressed and will reassure me that my worth is more than my darkest closet secrets.

Of course there are things that I would rather you not know. Like the fact that I lost my temper this morning at my youngest son. He was being disrespectful and rude and it made me so angry. Instead of being an adult. Instead of pausing and praying for even a small measure of peace before I reacted I just did what I always do when I am faced with disrespect and I got mad.

It was an AWFUL way to start my morning and even worse, his. Fortunately I was able to pull it together before he had to go to school and I apologized to him. I told him that he was a lot like me. I told him that I HATED having to take responsibility for myself when I was wrong…especially when it came to disagreements with Dominic. I myself fought saying I was sorry and I told him that it was something that I too needed grace for and needed to be better at.

As he got out of the car to go to school I reminded him how much I loved him, but my heart hurt over the unnecessary damage that I caused only moments before. You see I will share the pretty Bible quotes and memes and do my best to be an encouragement to someone else, but the reality is my heart inside is yucky. I am in desperate need of a Savior every day. Every moment.

I know we all have these moments, these parenting “fails” and I am not going to wallow in self-pity over my mistakes. But it is important that we are willing to be honest about those areas where we struggle, to remain accountable to others and to praise God when we see small changes and victories that are a direct result of His work in our lives. I know that I have so much growing to do, but today I am willing and able to be more honest about my messes than I was even a few years ago. That is a praise!

We don’t have to be ashamed about those areas where we struggle. We can see them as opportunities for God to work in and through us.

My hope is that I can be an encouragement here, to show you that I don’t have it all together and while I am not super thrilled about sharing my messes with the world…I am committed to walking the road of transparency. God continues to use my junk and transform it into something beautiful.

It is incredible to me that God does this. That a holy, righteous, perfect God could use us in our messes to share His hope and light with a dark world. I have made so many mistakes in my life. And yet His unending grace and abounding love is available to me. I just am so so grateful – how can we not share that?!