Learning to Uncrochet

I learned how to crochet in 2007 after a friend moved to town who taught me the most basic stitches. With just a few sessions I decided to begin a blanket even though it would have been more prudent to start with something much smaller like a pot holder. I didn’t realize how much accuracy was necessary to make the desired blanket which I had planned to give as a gift. My friend warned me that I had to either measure or count the stitches before moving onto the next row, but in my novice mind I thought surely I could just “eyeball it” and it would be good enough.

After weeks of crocheting with the Mandy method, I had a very crooked blanket to say the least. I was told to undo all that was crooked and start over which for me meant starting from the very beginning. I would start off counting a few rows and then I went back to the Mandy method each time, but I would go a little further in my erroneousness until after 6 bolts of yarn, I had a trapezoid shaped blanket. So I humbled myself and undid all 6 bolts of yarn, knowing full well that people would know that I screwed up yet again. While I was pulling out all of the stitches, someone asked me what I was crocheting, and I told them I was actually “uncrocheting.” (Apparently uncrochet is not a word--but it should be) It was quite humbling to carry around a giant ball of yarn that continually became tangled when I tried to use it, but I eventually learned to count every stitch and recount it. I remember one time when a friend saw me trying to untangle the giant yarn ball and asked why I didn’t just throw it away and buy new yarn. It was a fair question, but I couldn’t imagine throwing away the yarn since I had paid for it and worked with it for so long and I couldn’t imagine giving up at this point, mostly because I am stubborn. (Someone just said “Amen!”) Nearly a year later, I finally finished my first crocheted and uncrocheted and crocheted blanket with the intended pattern and shape.

God taught me something beautiful through this very frustrating and tedious process. I have been learning just how crooked the thoughts are inside of my head that have been crocheted together. You pull one stitch and an entire row unravels! At times it seems like an overwhelming and tedious task that honestly I would like to just start all over again. It feels as though I’m spending more time unlearning and unbelieving the lies of the enemy and this world that have been crocheted into my life. Yet God does not leave me as I am or give up on me, instead He gave me the perfect pattern to follow through His Son, Jesus Christ. In John 13:15-16 Jesus said, ^“I have set you an example that you should do as I have done for you. I tell you the truth, no servant is greater than his master, nor is a messenger greater than the one who sent him.”

As we surrender our lives to El-Shaddai, He patiently unravels us strand by strand and twists us and stretches us and weaves each of us into something beautiful and useful for His Kingdom. He knows that we have stitch upon stitch and row upon row that are crooked, but He made us and purchased us and doesn’t just throw us away and get knew materials even though we are a tangled, giant mess. We are called to place ourselves, fully abandoned, into His hands so that we can uncrochet those areas of our lives where we don’t line up with His pattern. Paul said it this way in Romans 12:1 - 2 “Therefore, I urge you, brothers, in view of God's mercy, to offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God—this is your spiritual act of worship. Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God's will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will.”

Uncrocheted and crocheted by the King,

Mandy Wakefield