tethers

This is for you:

If any of you have been reading my blogs this past year, they have, quite frankly, been pretty sad. They are deflated, they are obviously written by someone hurting- by someone tethered. That word, tethered, has an interesting meaning:

“a cord, fixture, or flexible attachment that anchors something movable to a reference point which may be fixed or moving. There are a number of applications for tethers.”

The last part is what this is about. I have been tethered for a year and a half by pain, anger, sadness, longing, confusion, fear, anger, anger, anger, anger, anger. Many applications, one significant moment that caused them all. I was sexually assaulted. As much as part of me wants to write more on this, if you want to know more, I would love to have coffee (as soon as quarantine is over, sadly). That anchor had many tethers. Gradually, as I approach a year and 4 months since it happened, I have seen those tethers disappear. One by one, I have released them until one remained.

Longing.

It seems odd that it is the last one left, as it seems the least associated with what happened, but it is not longing in the traditional sense, it is the longing to tell. I have wanted to tell others, share my story with girls who need to hear it, tell my family members, my friends, but one person in particular I have wanted to tell- the one who was completely innocent in all of it, yet she would be the one to take my tether. So many more aside from the victim become victims after sexual assault: the family, the new girlfriend/boyfriend, the future kids. It is a burden that all of us will carry. It is a tether that will seem to never go away for those involved.

I have prayed for a year and four months for that tether of longing to be removed with no satisfaction. My faith waining, my anger growing at the injustice of it all, my heart aching, and my head, so consumed by the longing, dreaming. Even in my sleep, the tether remained.

“When the time is right, I, the Lord, will make it happen.”

Isaiah 60:22

Goosebumps ripple, even still, as I type that verse. I witnessed that scripture, that promise fulfilled two days ago. I got a message that changed everything. My anger turned into sympathy, my sadness turned into joy, and my hurt turned into a more distant memory. I had lost faith in God fulfilling his promise in Isaiah. I thought that I would never see that promise fulfilled even if he did manifest it. But I think that the Lord knew what I needed. I know the Lord knew what I needed. I needed to see good come from terrible evil. I needed to see a beautiful picture of his faithfulness. I needed to change my desire to loose the tether.

The hardest part about the conversation was the feeling that the weight that had been on my chest would be relieved by placing it on another’s. But that is not what happened.

“Reach out to those who are oppressed. Share their burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ.”

Galatians 6:2 MSG

With her bravery, her selflessness, my tethers had not been cut, they had been shared. Pain shared with Rebecca, anger shared with dad, sadness shared with mom, confusion shared with Lauren, longing to tell shared with Jake, and now, my fear was shared with her.

We are a family, one in Christ. God designed us for community because of the beautiful picture it creates of the trinity and us: my sin shared with the Son on the cross, my heart shared with the Spirit daily, and my eternity shared with God. A tether has many applications, not all are bad. Our tethers may never be loosed, but they will always be shared. Our tethers bind each of us under Christ, reminding us that we are loved, heard, seen, not only by Christ, but by each other.