God's Altar Cloth

I had a very wise friend who loved to knit. She would knit tea cozy's, afghans, dish clothes, blankets... you name it, she could probably knit it. I remember watching her in a daze-like state wondering how someone could be so swift and gentle with their hands... never ceasing the loop, pull, crossover maneuvers that resulted in a glorious pattern of wool. I guess my watching her distracted her from what she was doing and she missed a stitch. Carefully pulling her needle out from the row she was working on, she began to tug the line of wool and watch as the stitches slowly undid themselves, one by one. And when she had reached the place where the mistake had happened, she gracefully slipped her needle back in and continued on.

I was astonished that she could do such a thing. I was under the impression that when a mistake happened, you had to go all the way back to the beginning and start fresh. When I built up enough courage to ask her why this was not the case, her response threw me for a loop and I've never really forgotten it.

She told me about how knitting was like life - it is a series of choices and movements we make as a human being. We all have the same starting point - we are all just a mere knot on a stick... but it's where we go from there and how we dance our dance that determines what our blanket will eventually look like. Regardless of how hard we try, we will occasionally drop a stitch or force a new one where there shouldn't be and sometimes we can go back and fix it. Other times, our "extra" move simply means that we end up with an extra stitch - an extra loop, an extra step to take each time.

This all seemed okay and made sense but then I asked her why she chose to go back and try and fix her mistake rather than just leaving it be. Surely one extra stitch was not going to make a world of difference.

She told me that when she made the mistake, it was because she lost a stitch. A loop fell off the needle and was laying limp in between two knitted stitches... and this couldn't be.

Sometimes in life, we miss a step. We are in a hurry to get from A to B or we don't feel that it's a step of crucial importance, but when we think like this, we are wrong. If that dropped stitch were to just be left alone, it may be okay, but alternatively, it may cause our creation to fall apart - to be pulled and unraveled and become nothing more than a heap of kinked wool. We must go back and pick it up and carry on because if we aren't careful, we will drop more stitches and there will just be more damage in the end.

Funny how, years later, her words are only now starting to make sense.

There are days in which I wish I could drop the past and leave it be. Days that I wish I could just start a new education and carry on with my life rather than going back all those rows to pick up that lost stitch... it would mean I would have to undo so many stitches...

But what I have only now realized is that I can't leave those dropped loops hanging in the middle of my afghan... they require my attention so as to one day, truly have the most beautiful blanket to lay upon the altar of God.

I thought each stitch was independent of the stitch beside it, above it, rows beyond it... but it's not - they are all from the same pile of wool. The further I go on this journey of discernment and healing, the more I come to understand how the stitches from years ago are truly interconnected with the stitches I am stitching now. Kind of mind boggling, but oddly reassuring.

Ultimately, my goal is to knit the most elegant and incredibly awesome altar cloth with my pile of wool I was entrusted. And the reality is that in order to do so, it means going back and picking up those dropped stitches, and pulling them back into the fabric. Because if I don't, not only do I risk a catastrophic unraveling, but I risk a finished product that is truly not reflective of the gifts and dreams I was entrusted with at my baptism.

So, to those stitches who have been knit into my cloth recently, bear with me. Please remind me that you are still part of the wool and I will pick you up again when I get there. To those stitches who have been waiting patiently for our paths to cross, hang tight. They will some day soon. And to those stitches who were dropped along the way, take heart, cry out for I am coming back to pick you up and tie you into where you belong. You will not be lost for long, I am coming.