It is getting closer to showtime and with that both my anxiety and excitement are accelerating. Just a few months ago, I didn’t really know if I was capable of doing Luz, but over the past few weeks I’ve started to see the answer to that question.
This morning I was blessed to talk with a couple of friends – both artists. Both of them are people who are supporting me and both are women I can help support too. And as I interacted with both, I voiced those familiar complaints about my physical ailments, my weaknesses, how difficult this is, how unprepared I am, etc. In those conversations the idea of hardship was ever-present. But in that hardship, in the confusion and the struggle we all admitted feeling, we found support in each other.
I use that word “support” and I can imagine it as movement. I can see it in the mirror when I am in the studio. My joints right now are struggling to support my weight. My muscles. My bones. They hurt. This 38-year-old body has a weight to be carried. But when I step into rehearsal, my skeleton is doing its best to hold me up. I forget that. My body is doing its best to bear the burdens. And so I think I need to stop being so critical of it and I need to stop feeling so entitled to a body that lacks for nothing.
The answer is that I am not ready for Luz, and I never will be. I am not capable, on my own, of doing this. In fact, I probably lack 90% of the “requirements” for such an endeavor. I am ill equipped, and from a logistical perspective, I haven’t had “what it takes” at any time in my life. That is the reality.
Despite that reality, I have this unreasonable belief that God will use my weakness. That the last will be first. That the things that are foolish will confound the wise.
I don’t have to meet the requirements. I don’t have to have “what it takes.” Support will prevent me from boasting in my own muscles, my bones, my abilities. Then the glory will certainly have to go to Someone else.