It’s really not about the bras. Let’s make that clear! It’s about the hand of God reaching into the ordinary to make himself known to me. But bras are where it started and ended.
One of the most intimate of female needs was the catalyst to a work in my daughter, myself and my sister. Late in 2019 money was tight and unfortunately so were my bra bands. I had stopped exercising and started eating chocolate. A lot of chocolate. Folks, the math is easy here. My undergarments did not fit, I was very uncomfortable and there was no money to replace them. Now, I know! The easy solution is to exercise and stop eating chocolate, but at the time that was harder than it seems. Jesus and chocolate were a lifeline.
It’s the week between Christmas and New Year. Everyone is buttoning up the year. Top nine. Word of the year. What are you proud of this year? New vision. New words. And my year…. hadn’t been what I expected. It had been hallway/waiting room season 3.0. I had been standing still, letting God fight for me for twelve months. He said he’d go with me. He said he hadn’t forsaken me and he loved me. He saw me. But God had been quiet lately. Not silent, just quiet. In the waiting I could barely hear him whisper. And I couldn’t understand where he was and what he wanted from me. I felt adrift, unmoored. As though the lights had been turned off and I could barely see where my feet were, much less a place to take the next step in front of me. I’d held fast to the truth that though I didn’t know my future God was already there. And though I couldn’t see him or his hand at work, he knew exactly where I was and he promised to be with me.
While all of this was comforting and true, it didn’t change this sense that a season was ending, a new one starting and I had no clear direction. It almost felt like being abandoned. But after all he had done, the many times his hands and presence had been made real, I couldn’t believe that my Father has left me. He was just… quiet. My head knew he was right there, but my heart felt unseen and alone.
My personality thrives on planning and projecting into the future. No, no! Vision. I thrive on… vision. It doesn’t always need to be completely clear but vision is the very oxygen I breath. It’s a driving force like a freight train. Now imagine that the force that propels me is removed. Not for a little while, but for a looong while. And in its place God is asking for my quiet faithfulness, doing just the next right thing without the knowledge of what’s next. Long about the middle of December that became practically impossible.
This is where I saw God showing up to weave a little story. My children and I had a car conversation about needing to adjust our current expectations and learn to do without some things until we saw a change in our financial circumstances. Some of them weren’t getting it and I offered them the example of my very uncomfortable bras as an example of holding out a little longer even when it’s not what we want to do. It sunk in. They got the message (as much as I hated to deliver it) and we worked through what that would look like. My daughter had been quiet the whole conversation and I thought it was sadness. I later realized that God whispered a little something to her heart and she was sitting with it, “Do you see that need. You can do something about that. You can’t fix everything, but you can fix that thing.” The next day I find this cash and a note dropped on my nightstand and instantly regret mentioning the bras. I’m calling her into my room to give the money back to her and affirming her generosity. But she’s not having it! I had never seen her so resolute, so firm in her conviction. So, I paused, I prayed and I shared the situation with my family a few days later.
I end the story with the question: do I let her do this, or do I insist on giving it back?
My mom brain said that I could not allow my child to feel she needed to provide for me. That wasn’t healthy! But the Spirit was nudging, making me wonder if by giving the money back I was robbing her of something that he asked her to do. On hearing the details, the unanimous wisdom from my family was that the Spirit was moving in my daughter and I needed to let her do this, leaving the door open for the blessing she would receive from listening to the Spirit nudge her.
The first chance I get I’m out shopping for a bra at my normal store, but they are completely out of my size. I head to a new store and despite trying on more than a dozen I find nothing that fits properly. Ladies and gentleman, you know by this point I am done, done, done! There’s nothing more aggravating than an hour in a dressing room and leaving empty handed. I had committed to getting a bra so that my daughter could see the fruition of her obedience and sacrifice and I couldn’t seem to make that happen. God, why won’t you open the door to let me buy a stinking bra?! I thought you wanted me to obey and do that!?
My frustration about the bra shopping paralleled my frustration about life at that point. Nothing was going very well and no matter what I did I could not seem to change the direction of any situation. God was giving me micro steps and one inch of vision in front of me.
The next event was not too complex. I sat alone in the living room and sobbed. I was FRUSTRATED! Just done! I was grieving and my inner cries had no real words, just guttural sobs. Finally, taking a deep breath and wiping my eyes I felt the presence of Love but he still wasn’t speaking yet. I packed a bag for a visit with a friend and went to bed.
Returning home 24 hours later there was a package at my door. With two bras. My brand. They both fit perfectly.
The day I couldn’t find a single bra out of at least 20? That’s THE day God started whispering to my sister that she should buy me bras (who else but your sisters and your besties know your bra size!?), and it was clear he wasn’t going to allow me to buy them because he wanted to provide for me through means unseen. God was working and moving in the mundane (bra inventory) to leave room to do a divine work. Texting my sister, I sat and pondered a minute all the little details leading to me holding these undergarments. It’s just bras, right? Am I over spiritualizing daily life circumstances in my desperation to hear from God? I know it can happen, but not this time. It’s one of the most intimate of needs, bras, and there is no mistake that it was a very personal and intimate need that my Father God used to make completely clear to me that his hand is all over my life.
A whisper to my daughter’s heart, led to whispers in my sister’s heart, a divinely ordained failure in bra shopping, the perfect undergarments showing up on my door…
…all led to my ears ready to hear God shout with a resounding boom, “I.SEE. YOU. I see every little thing. The uncomfortable bras, the fears, the loneliness, all of it. I haven’t missed a thing. I’m here and I’ve got you and it won’t always feel like this.”
(Side note: Divorce doesn’t just happen to me. It happens to everyone around me. God is working in them through my divorce and the things that led to it. I need to leave room for him to do his work in them through the circumstances of my life.)