If you have spent time with me at all or seen me in photos, you have come to see that I love wearing vivid shades of lipstick. It’s like my trademark these days. I don’t have any clue how to wear or apply eye makeup so I avoid it completely, but lipstick is easy and my grandma always told me it would make bad days feel a little brighter, well at least on my face anyway. Since I am known for bold shades of red and pink, people often assume I have always been a girly girl, but this is not at all the case.
In 5th grade, I insisted on wearing only boys’ clothes and played EVERY sport offered at school whether I was good at it or not. There were no tutus and tights found on this gal. I spent most days playing tetherball and shooting hoops in the backyard with my dad. I wore a hairspray plastered ponytail every day to school and didn’t know eyebrows were not meant to touch each other until high school when certain mean girls told me so…noted.
So the fact that I currently want to take archery lessons really just proves I am going back to my “tomboy” roots. (And about that, I’m embracing my hair roots right now as well, so cest la vie!)
And if I can mention this here, I really think the very concept of gender norms is kind of annoying. I mean, why was I considered a tomboy if I was a girl who liked to be active and ride my bike and get lost in adventure seeking and never really enjoyed playing house? I am convinced we can be both delicate and strong without compromising either, but I digress, that blog is for another time…
At least now you will better appreciate how excited I was to recently discover that there is a place near my house that offers archery classes! My recent fascination with archery could be influenced by my obsession with the TV show Arrow but nonetheless I had an epiphany the other day that maybe God has wired me to be a bit of a she-warrior. And I am just beginning to see His required training for such a calling is NOT going to survive with only a little lipstick application. For those of you who don’t know, spiritual “boot camp” is rough. Just a heads up. It’s NOT pretty. It’s a dirty, rocky, uphill combination of crawling and running and desperately seeking rest in between tests.
But it is necessary.
The Lord reminded me this week that I can learn a lot from my interest in the bow and arrow skill. He taught me how a bow must be pulled back in order for the arrow to be sent into flight. In order to be purposeful in battle, the hand must carefully and strategically pull back the bow to set its course.
Maybe we are in a season where God is pulling you and me backward to propel us forward. Maybe like me, you feel like you have taken a few steps backwards but God is about to send you so far forward you couldn’t imagine it even if you tried. I am coming to find that God’s ways DO NOT MAKE SENSE to our flesh. But it makes perfect sense to the mind of Christ. Everything in the spiritual is counterintuitive to the physical. He knows what He is doing and to Him there is no forward and backward, failure and success. There is only His will and His way and His abounding love and patience with us to catch up to that truth!
What does being pulled back, what does “going back” mean to you today? Is going back a feeling of rejection, demotion, feeling set aside or ignored? Does going back literally mean going back to your past and addressing some wounds you thought had healed but you just moved forward with a limp, embracing it as your new normal?
I know one thing, going back is required in order to go forward when God is up to something BIG. He loves us too much to lead us where our hearts are not yet willing to go. Why would he place us in battle ill-prepared? Have you ever seen an archer who wildly sends arrows in the air with no skill and no thought? We must be trained and set right, lovingly aligned with the sight of our Father who sees up ahead what we do not yet see for ourselves.
God is not going to leave us lying here in the present with gaping open wounds. He is tending to us even now. The future requires health. Not perfection, by any means, but at least a form of newfound strength and recovery. Battle scars must be healed and tended to before stepping out into the battlefield again. This is a new battle. This is fresh ground. A specific strategy and advantage are being built up in us.
So embrace the Father’s hand on your bow, the arrow is being set. He is making us ready. Go back to the trenches dear. Rest. He will send you forth in victory. Trust Him and His hand.