I’m A Mess. Vulnerable Honesty Opens Pathways.

I’m a Mess.

I know you are hoping this will be a post filled with maybe four or five simple techniques of ‘how-to’s’ that will make your next writing project soar. For those tools, go to the  hope*writers Instagram. You will find it is a great place to get help in that arena. 

Instead, I am talking about being a mess in ways that might very well affect what you deposit on your canvas or type on your screen. Remember, as I have mentioned before, your input affects your output.

Yes, I’m a Mess. 😒  

I am taking the words “I’m a mess” from Psalm 40 (The Message Version).

“And me? I’m a mess. I’m nothing and have nothing

    make something of me.”                 

Psalm 40:17a MSG

As you begin reading Psalm 40, you see that David is willing to confess he is not in a good place. 

I waited and waited and waited for God.

    At last he looked; finally he listened.

He lifted me out of the ditch,

    pulled me from deep mud.

He stood me up on a solid rock

    to make sure I wouldn’t slip. 

Psalm 40:1-2 MSG

David is honest about his hopeless condition—the man feels stuck in deep mud—, and calls out to his BEST FRIEND. What is your honest emotional response when everything is closing in around you, and you feel STUCK IN THE MUD? When these words came out, they were not mere repetitions of previous prayers he had learned. David is boldly engaging with God, the Creator, pouring out his struggles in these verses, while at the same time talking to God like you would talk to another person.

Result of Crying Out

What is the result of David’s vulnerable interaction with the Most High? Is he struck down for appearing irreverent? We are talking about the Creator of the universe. Even in the Jewish culture, it was only through sacrifices that you were able to plead for his forgiveness. Yet, this is God’s response.

He taught me how to sing the latest God-song,

    a praise-song to our God.

More and more people are seeing this:

    they enter the mystery,

    abandoning themselves to God.

Psalm 40:3 MSG

Do you hear this response through the ears of a creative with an open heart? Imagine yourself receiving from God the latest God-song in your genre. Even if it’s not music! (This blog is not). After that sinks in, open your being to a worship that flows in a way that causes people to abandon themselves to God. 

Be still and allow yourself to receive.

So How Does This Happen?

I thought I’m a Mess.

This didn’t happen with a snap of the fingers. As you read through the scriptures, David lives out of the relationship he has with God. This is a daily activity of something he needs, not just a once a week Sabbath attendance. At times, because David was human, he slipped into the mire, the mud and was a mess, but he knew the temple sacrifices could not connect him with God. God asked for more.    

 Doing something for you, bringing something to you—

    that’s not what you’re after.

Being religious, acting pious—

    that’s not what you’re asking for.

You’ve opened my ears

    so I can listen.

Psalm 40:6 MSG

Creatives, Artists, and Friends, admitting that “I’m a mess” to God declares who is in charge of you and your creativity. David was the king who, with all of his faults, was also said to be a man after God’s own heart. In Acts 13:22, David was described as:

“He’s a man whose heart beats to my (God’s) heart…” 

Yet multiple times he cried out in emotional pain because he could not handle life when barriers arose, and he could not feel God’s heart. Was it God who had moved? I think not.

I’m a Mess-

God wants to share this same love to and through us. He delights in pouring His God-song into all of His creatives, whomever they may be, and through whatever gifts He chooses to give them. As we are walking into the new “new normal” of mask-less life and actual face-to-face encounters, what is God saying to you as to how you are to create the God-song you received?

David humbly stated he was poor and in need. Can you identify with these emotions? Are you a mess? If your answer is “YES,” you are in good company. Contemplate David’s words:

 But as for me, I am poor and needy;

    may the Lord think of me.

You are my help and my deliverer;

 you are my God, do not delay.   

Psalm 40 :17 New International Version

In this humble prayer to God, you will: