On Cloaks and Freedom

This is probably going to be a rant. Probably. Absolutely. Fair warning for the sensitive of eyes and ears.

I was on a prayer call early this morning and I listened as the people shared their requests and their concerns. I listened as they talked about their needs and their hopes. And I heard the leader read the scripture for Palm Sunday from Mark and, maybe because I was still in the midst of sleepiness, I heard her almost shout, "they took off their cloaks." Mark 11:7-8 doesn't say that part. It just says the people put their cloaks on the colt for Jesus to sit on and on the road for the colt to tread upon. But I heard, "they took off their cloaks."

As we end the Lenten season and approach the cross, legit, take off your cloaks.

Some of us have cloaks that we use to keep us warm and protect us from the frozen tundras in which we live.

Some of us use cloaks to hide us, to keep secret our true intentions, to cover us from being seen and sussed out.

Some cloaks come with daggers (hey, Marvel fans) and we don't know if they're good things or bad.

Some of us use our cloaks like masks... just to keep folk from seeing who we really are.

It's spring. Let God protect you. You don't have to control things, let go of the deception, let the world see your whole you. Take off your cloak.

Lay it on the borrowed colt. Let Jesus sit on it. Lay it on the road. Let the colt walk on it. Take it off. Devalue it. Leave it behind.

And, like, this is the holy page so I'm almost sure y'all are all like "I have no cloak." I mean, okay but we all have cloaks.

The tragedy and trauma that keeps you mad at the world and ready to snap on everyone who says the wrong thing in the wrong way? Issa cloak.

The insecurity that has you in competition with those you should be mentoring? Issa cloak.

All of those struggles that you've had that have kept you fighting for your whole life and have you believing you'll have to fight for the rest of you life? Issa cloak.

The words you hear echoing in your soul that keep you from believing that you have a place in the world and are capable of achieving your goals? Issa cloak.

That hurt that makes you believe "I love you" is a means of manipulation and not a declaration of relationship and an intention of action and keeps you from believing you can be loved? Issa cloak.

How you believe that if you keep talking you'll say the right thing or if you keep trying you'll do the right thing and they'll value you and appreciate you and see you even though you can't really say that you value yourself enough to walk away from what devalues you? Issa cloak.

The need to prove yourself so perfect and righteous that you do not need grace at all and so you have none to extend to anyone else so you see every mistake as an opportunity to destroy and every accident as purposeful harm? Issa cloak.

Those wounds that you won't admit exist so they can't heal that keep you responding in pettiness and keep you from trusting the people around you? Issa cloak.

That fear of hearing yourself, of listening to your own words that keeps you silent, keeps you from declaring what you need and what you want, that keeps you in perpetual longing and questioning why God does for everyone but you? Issa cloak.

Speaking about who and what other folk are and are not as though you, yourself, are capable of making another human being, out of the need to control the actions and theology of people you don't even know and blaming it on Jesus is a cloak.

Confusing pastor for God, gatekeeping the cross, demanding people follow you and only you, showing up to declare yourself good and holy - or demanding your pastor do so - as though ordination and anointing make you something other than human? Issa cloak.

Spending all your time doing it all, doing everything for everyone because if you let someone else do it, it'll be flawed, imperfect, and any flaw or imperfection will mean you're unworthy to be and do what you're already being and doing so you don't get rest and stay stressed? Issa cloak.

Your disdain of silence because you believe it'll be followed by blows or, worse, it signals abandonment and neglect so you surround yourself with empty vessels saying empty words just so you can feel you're not alone even though you still feel lonely? Issa cloak.

That guardedness, that wall, that attitude, that force field, that shield you carry to keep people from getting close to you because you are sick and tired of being hurt by people you trusted and if you had just been your own protection no one would've ever hurt you and so no one will ever get close enough to you to show you they can love you? Issa cloak.

Holding on to those grudges - and calling it memories - of how folk acted and what they did, using them as an excuse to never again like, trust, believe any other person in the same position because that one time you were wrong? Issa cloak.

Staying silent because they might take your words and use them to hurt you is a cloak.

Only reading this because of the disclaimer about potential controversy is a cloak.

Take it off.

Lay it on the back of an ass.

Put it in the street.

Pick up something lighter, a palm, a branch, a praise.

Follow Jesus.

And leave your cloak behind.

Don't go back and get it.

Don't worry about what happened to it.

Don't pick it up and dust it off.

Don't demand recompense for the dirt and grime and colt poop that it accumulated.

Take it off.

Lay it at the feet of Jesus.

And leave it there.

And, like, it sounds so easy. Just remove the thing and move on with life. Y'all have heard me say "God does God things." Y'all have heard me explain exactly what that means. THIS is a God thing. YOU are a God thing. We all are. Everything we are, all of who we are supposed to be, what we're supposed to do is a God thing. Those cloaks? They're not of God. Those cloaks? They're debris accumulated through living. Those cloaks? They're the dust of life that keeps you from coming and going in peace. Wash your feet. Dust em off. Take off the cloaks.

It's a matter of letting it go. It's a matter of willingly leaving behind those things that keep us burdened, basic, and bound. You can't know freedom if you don't leave Egypt... in your mind, heart, and with your feet. Let God deal with Pharoah. Take of the cloak and move on. Be who God says you are. (And there's a whole Barthian thing that's absolutely Biblical about how we know who we are only because God spoke and we can see who Jesus is but, like, we can only do that if we take off the cloaks.) Leave behind the dirt, the trash, the trauma, the pains, the wounds, the angst, the anxiety, the problematic pettiness that you call personality, the self-righteousness, self-proclaimed holiness, self-aggrandizement, self-loathing and just be the human being God created you to be: flawed, sinful, wonderfully made, and loved.

Take off the cloak.

And, then, on Maundy Thursday when you're remembering everything that God has brought you through: grieve the cloak. Remember what created it. Remember how finely it was embroidered, how neatly it was sewn, remember how great you thought it was and how you believed you needed it. Wash your own feet. Remember that you came from that and you don't have to stay there. Remember the weight of the cloak on you and those you love. Remember how much lighter the palm is, how much lighter the praise is, and grieve the cloak. Rejoice in the deliverance, stay awake and pray, mourn over the loss, and rejoice in the Resurrection. Call a therapist and make an appointment for Easter Tuesday. And grieve the cloak.

But today?

Take off the cloak.

And give it to Jesus. It never did what you thought it was doing anyway. All it did was separate you from who God made you to be. Take it off. Leave it behind. Breathe through it. Grieve it. Don't pick it back up.

They took off their cloaks and laid them on the colt where Jesus sat, they laid them on the road where the colt would walk. They picked up branches they cut from the field and they exhaled and took in deep breaths and shouted, "Hosannah! Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord" because they had no cloaks to keep them from breathing, to keep them from shouting, to keep them from praising, to keep them from being.

Take the cloak off... and see how deeply and truly God loves you, that always means always, forever means forever, nothing means nothing, everyone means everyone, the whole world means you, too.

Take off your cloak.

#GoToTherapy #PalmSundayMusings #LetsGetFree #SpringCleaning #PutItDown #NeedlessThings #LetItGo #PrayerCallPonderings