Raggedy String

A few weeks ago, my niece asked if I would buy a bracelet to support women in Kenya. It is a simple twine bracelet with a single heart bead. The card attached said:

“Tie this bracelet on and pray for girls so far away.
Share their story from your heart.
When the bracelet naturally falls off one day
You will know you’ve done your part.”

http://www.mercyhousekenya.org/blog/2014/2/27/love-mercy-prayer-bracelet.html

I love the simplicity of it and the visual reminder to pray for the most vulnerable people group in the world: girls.

 

I have been wearing it and praying for a while now, and the twine has become raggedy and frayed. Yesterday morning as I was putting on my brand new Easter outfit (which, by the way, matched the dresses of the two beautiful girls who are living here right now), I suddenly realized how simple and unattractive that frayed piece of twine around my wrist looked.

 

It crossed my mind to cut it off, but I remembered what its purpose was and I didn’t want to. But I was going to be singing at the front of the church and I didn’t want anyone to notice that imperfect little string. As I looked all over for the earrings I wanted to wear (and never did find), I came across my beautiful, sparkly butterfly bracelet in a basket in the kitchen. (What, you don’t keep your jewelry in random baskets around the house?). I slipped it on my wrist and immediately noticed the contrast between the bracelets.

 

One wrist was decorated in sparkles and jewels, the other had a worn out piece of string. One called attention to the fact that I was coordinated and special. The other looked cheap and dirty and glaringly out of place. I quickly moved the pretty bracelet to the wrist with the string to cover it up. “There,” I thought, “I can keep the bracelet on that really matters but cover it up with the distracting, sparkly one so no one notices.” And I did. And they didn’t.

 

But as I took off the butterfly bracelet last night to put it away, it made me sad. I thought of all the precious lives the twine bracelet represents – those women who have endured trauma and are carrying new life into a dangerous world, the trafficked little girls, the families who live in fear and shame – and I was ashamed of myself for wanting them covered up and hidden away.

 

It’s what we do, isn’t it? We cover the simple, frayed things that define us and put on a sparkly, coordinated identity for the world to see. But all the shimmer and glitter in the world can’t remove the reality of broken lives.

 

I thought about my precious girls and the message that I was inadvertently sending them; that whatever is cheap and dirty and raggedy about us must be hidden away behind sparkles and matching outfits. That it’s best not to bother other people with the harsh realities of a violent world. That good church people can’t handle a frayed, tattered person in their midst.

It’s wrong. I look at my girls and I see where they’ve been and what’s been taken from them. But mostly I see where they’re headed. I see the beautiful women they are becoming and the joy and peace that will surround them. I see princesses being set free.

 

I have to be careful to live with my feet planted in both realities. Yes, they will be free and whole and happy someday. But there are some ugly days in the meantime. Days when the lies they’ve been told shout in their heads. Days they rebel against me and everyone around them. Days their pain and confusion bursts out in unpredictable ways. And at those times I have to choose not to let my fear of what the “good people” think keep me from letting them be themselves.

 

I never, ever want to send the message that what you’re going through needs to be hidden away because your trauma is less important than what people think of us. I don’t want to teach them how to hide all the ugly things; I want them to see how God can transform ugly into beauty. And the truth is (I know it because I am one), those good church people have their own raggedy strings too. The more we cover them up, the less we live and act like Jesus.

 

It makes me smile to think of the broken down people He chose to associate with. Women, poor people, diseased people, cheaters, people possessed by demons, marginalized, broken souls with no value to their society. And the only people He ever yelled at and called names? The good church people who were covering up their own dirty lives.

 

Don’t get me wrong, He didn’t let the broken people stay the way they were. “Go and sin no more,” he said to the sexually immoral and dishonest. And when the religious leaders swallowed their pride to seek His truth, he welcomed them too and invited them to live in truth. The people at my house (me included) are going to look and act a bit raggedy sometimes. We’re not apologizing for that. But at the same time, we want you to know that we’re on our way to someplace better.

 

My bracelet will eventually fall off and my girls will eventually move away. While I have them, I pray they will hear the truth that sets them free and know they are loved. And the rest of us? Let’s get honest and not be ashamed to wear our raggedy strings as we sing songs of resurrection and hope.