Tip of My Iceberg

It was the end of an era that should have finished years ago.

John has been driving a 1999 Saturn sedan for years. It has held up well through more miles than we’d anticipated putting on it. A very basic model, with a stick shift and power nothing, there was very little that could ever go wrong with it.

Until it began to get ornery about starting. Like an old dog that just doesn’t want to move, John’s car fussed when it wanted to just sit.

We’d talked for years about trading it in for something that would have a workable air conditioner–I’m assuming old cars, like older people, get cold easier and would rather stay warm. Something more reliable, maybe with a few bells. No whistles.

Every time the discussion came up, another need presented itself. Like a wedding. Or many weddings.

John has gotten by. He hasn’t complained at all. He’s been rather proud that a car that isn’t even manufactured anymore still had what it took to get from point A to point B.

It became increasingly obvious that it wasn’t a good idea to keep driving it–particularly when late-night meetings required a dependable car to return home.

The decision was made; we traded it in. Another car now sits in the driveway, one with a warranty.

I’m not saying it was easy. Getting by had been fine. The decision to trade could wait for another month. Or six.

Holding on to the car became a badge of bravery. My husband’s clunker still moved.

It’s easy for me to hang onto things that I have no business hanging onto. Things God has never intended for me to grasp with clenched fists. I have messages in my head that have made a groove in my brain about lies from my story. Lies that tell me I’m not enough, or that I’m too much. That I’ll never be as good as someone else in the things I value, so why try?

Some things have kept me from trying. It has taken years to begin writing a novel, even though it’s been a dream since childhood. I have stories in my mind that play like movies, and finally committing them to written words has been an act of overcoming the lies.

I hesitate to speak up in meetings, often convinced that what I have to say will sound foolish. Not confident that I have anything of value to offer.

We all go through life with lies that plague us, untruths that keep us from trying, from moving forward. Failure isn’t an end game; it’s the reality that not everything we try works.

How else do we learn and grow?

In all this, God has been enough. He is slowly unclenching my fingers to release the lies and allow me to believe His truth. As His daughter, I’m cherished, celebrated, chosen. And deeply loved.

Those lies are like clunkers in my brain. Letting them go isn’t easy because they’ve been part of me for so long.

God in His kindness is making me a new model. Outwardly the same but living in freedom.

That’s worth trading in my clunkers.