The other night I found myself leaning against a column at York railway station wondering why God would make someone as useless as I.
To properly illustrate where this (terrible) thought came from, I'll start about a week before that moment on a Sunday. I was out on the fell in Northumberland, running my first fell race in a long while. It was a ten miler and something I had been really looking forward to for weeks. I had even bought new shoes.
Well, I should have realised that everything would be iced over that day - it was bitterly cold, and new shoes wouldn't help my balance which was now inexpert since my time out. Within the first two miles I had fallen and ripped a hole in the knee of my (favourite) running tights. Four falls and perhaps five miles later I was limping home, upset that I couldn't now stage a comeback.
That Sunday I described myself as disaster prone. I made it to the finish with a bloodied and bruised knee and a sense of disappointment in myself.
The knee caused me trouble all week, hurting and preventing me from kneeling, but perhaps the label I gave myself caused me more pain. I let myself believe that that was who I was, someone who can't live up to her full potential because she will always fall over and slow herself down.
The upset on the train came from forgetting where I had put my tickets, I had remembered to pick up my outbound tickets for a week away as I was leaving, but had totally forgotten the return part. Already beating myself up about forgetting those tickets, I couldn't help feeling rather miserable when one of my connections down to Wales was cancelled, and I managed to worry and upset myself to the degree where I felt worthless and silly.
So I wondered why God would make me this way, why everything would keep going wrong, and whether I was just failing in all these things. Well, one thing I'm glad I did, I asked him!
In a time of silent prayer that weekend, I asked God why he would make someone like me, who seems to encounter difficulties and frustrations at every step. The answer was clear, God didn't make me like this, God is making me like this.
To explain, I felt that I was being reassured that I'm not the finished article, and this isn't all I'll ever be. So God continues to form me, he chips off a little here and there, adds something, changes an attitude. In all these difficulties, God is creating a more whole version of me, someone who can deal with a few bumps in the road when they come, who doesn't expect the path to be smooth and who can give thanks in small things when they go right.
His plans are bigger than mine, I'm just worried about travelling to Wales and back, he's taking me on a journey that will change me and make me more able to serve him.
I am reminded that these thoughts came to me in a similar way once, when I was at mass in Westminster Cathedral, that Cathedral is not finished, and no one quite knows how it will look when it is. Even in it's incompleteness, it is a beautiful place to worship. Likewise with myself, even though I am miles from perfect or adequate, I will worship the Lord in my heart because it is formed by God to be his temple.
