Why? Why? This is the question-word that has haunted me for years. And I realized after reading my friend’s blog post that the question that wells up from the bottom of my soul is “why me”?
Why can’t I keep my house in some semblance of order?
Why is it taking so long to recover from this physical exhaustion that has plagued me for almost 2 years?
Why do I have to believe that God created this world and the human body so intricately? It would be so much easier if I didn’t know.
Why, as a teenager, did I wonder what made people die for their faith? Why did I want to know what was missing in my own faith?
Why did I have to hear this man speak about how God’s shalom can be described in three parts – peace with God, peace with Man, and peace with Creation? And read a few books from here and learn how to personally work at being at peace with God and Man?
Why does Mike’s 15” pizza have to smell so good when it bakes but I can’t eat a bite?
Why do I have to care so much about creation and know so much about what is wrong with it? It would be so much easier to choose not to know about 5-legged frogs, estrogenic compounds, and dead-zones.
Why do I sometimes have to feel like, even though I have so much education, my sole purpose in life is to make meals, do laundry, and dishes?
Why do I believe that God can work in amazing ways to change hearts and lives when I don’t see it happening around me?
Do I believe wrongly?
It’s easy to feel sorry for myself because of my circumstance and what I know about the world. But then comes the “why them” which is equally as hard.
Why do I have to watch a friend die of cancer and have no energy to speak words or do anything for the family?
Why do I have to see the less-than-rosy side of adoption?
Why do I have to see someone dear to me unable to sleep for 7 years without prescription drugs, baffling doctors of all sorts, and battling exhaustion in the process?
Why do I have to see marriages that are struggling and people who don’t know what to do about?
Why do I think I see pain and sadness and loneliness in people all around me when they think that they are just fine?
Why do grandmas die suddenly, two days after a new grandchild?
Why do ex-husbands die and leave behind so many questions and so much pain?
Why do I see all this brokenness in the world, yet I can do nothing but care for myself and only the most basic needs of my family? How do I carry on? I know all of the academic answers….there is sin in the world, God is in control and has a plan, but you know what? IT SUCKS!! The road I have walked the past two years has been grueling – physically, mentally, and spiritually. I probably would not have chosen this road had I known the difficulties, but it has enabled me to be fluent in suffering (exactly what we all want, eh? :) ). Years ago, when I first crafted a series of Sunday school lessons on the 3-part shalom, I knew that there was suffering in the world. I had experienced some in the form of financial struggles, unplanned children, demanding advisors. I guess I just didn’t know it to this extent. I knew back then the same thing I know now, but to a different degree. God is the one who changes hearts and lives. It isn’t brilliant teaching or writing. It isn’t convincing words or more education. Not that those things don’t help, but if that were the only thing, goodness, Christians in North America would have life down pat. But they don’t.
So what to do? I have discovered I am a broken and sinful person, but yet God wants a relationship with me. I have learned to pray all over again. I have put one foot in front of the other each day, one day at a time. I have struggled many times to have hope. I have tried to reach out, to find friends, to take joy in the small victories. And as Meg discovered in “A Wrinkle in Time”, it’s all about love. I have to see the good in life and find love and hope otherwise I will shrivel into a life of cynicism which is really no life at all. I need to mourn my loneliness, my imperfections, my physical weakness, my feelings of inadequacy, and then move on, trusting that God can still use me to bring his Shalom to a hurting world.
My physical struggles will not last forever. Someday there won’t be as many dishes or as much laundry. I’ll, Lord willing, learn to keep house better. And in the meantime I can find comfort in the arms of my husband, who has loved me in the worst of times. I can hug my Rachel each night as I rock with her before bed. I can enjoy my girls and marvel at how much they love Mike and I and each other. How they find such joy in being silly and playing games. I can watch the muppets and learn to laugh more. I can find joy in making food that makes my body stronger. I can see and experience the pain in the world and know that the pain is exactly the reason for Christmas (ok, that sounds sappy!).
And I can ask the question “why not me?” God has enabled me to rise out of the trials, to be refined, to be pruned so that I can minister to a broken world, even while lying on the couch and in the mundane chores. He has enabled me to be a channel of His peace. To learn more about the depths of his love for me. To learn a bit about what it is to share in his suffering so that I may also share in his glory. I can let my girls teach me to find joy and how to love wholeheartedly. I have cried many tears of sorrow, but sometimes those mix with tears of joy. Even in a broken world, I am so blessed. So blessed. And as I share my story, I believe that healing will come for my body and my spirit. God is a god of love and relationships. I am not an island. I need people and, although it doesn’t always feel like it, people need me, too. I just have to wait with patience and more patience and even more patience and trust that the story that God is weaving in my life is beautiful. Absolutely beautiful.
Stephanie
6 comments:
Have you read "The Shack"? I didn't want to like it, because EVERYONE I knew seemed to be reading it, but there were some parts that really stuck with me. Things that maybe I already knew were true, but didn't really grasp the concepts until they were worded a certain way. Mostly the parts about God and his expectations for us. Something about your post reminded me of it.
I have read "the shack"....I am definitely learning/trying to figure out what God expects of me....not just in a theoretical way, but in the nitty gritty of everyday chores way...
The Shack suggests that God has no expectations of us. I know this is not completely biblical, BUT, it is also very freeing to realize what God DOES expect. It does not involve a clean house, or achievements, or perfection of any kind!
Just because the word "responsibility" is never used in scripture does not mean the concept is absent or not implied by God in His Word. God does expect something from us as His servants and does give us responsibilities. In 1 Peter 1:16 scripture tells us that God expects us to be holy as He is holy. We are expected to pick up whatever crosses we have in our lives and carry them for Christ’s sake. (Matthew 10:38) We are given the responsibility as Christians to live by faith. (Romans 1:17) We are expected to live by faith not by sight. (2 Corinthians 5:7)
"The Shack" would have us believe that nothing is required of those who have a relationship with God. God does expect us to love Him and rely upon Him for the strength and power to live out the responsibilities that He gives us as His children.
Having said that, now reread the parts from The Shack about the living relationship God wants with us, full of love and life and possibility, not ruled by fear and judgment. Defined by grace, not the law.
In reference to the Father, Son and Holy Spirit, the Holy Spirit (Sarayu) speaks saying, “I am a verb. I am that I am. I will be who I will be. I am a verb! I am alive, dynamic, ever active and moving. I am a being verb. And as my very essence is a verb, I am more attuned to verbs than nouns. Verbs such as confessing, repenting, living, loving, responding, growing, reaping, changing, sowing, running, dancing, singing, and on and on. Humans have a knack for taking a verb that is alive and full of grace and turning it into a dead noun or principle that reeks of rules: something growing and alive dies. Nouns exist because there is a created universe and physical reality, but if the universe is only a mass of nouns, it is dead. Unless “I am,” there are no verbs, and verbs are what make the universe alive.”
The Spirit goes on: “For something to move from death to life you must introduce something living and moving into the mix. To move from something that is only a noun to something dynamic and unpredictable, to something living and present tense, is to move from law to grace. May I give you a couple examples? Then let’s use your two words: responsibility and expectation. Before your words became nouns, they were first my words, nouns with movement and experience buried inside of them; the ability to respond and expectancy. My words are alive and dynamic---full of life and possibility; yours are dead, full of law and fear and judgment. That is why you won’t find the word responsibility in the Scriptures. Religion must use law to empower itself and control the people who they need in order to survive. I give you an ability to respond and your response is to be free to love and serve in every situation, and therefore each moment is different and unique and wonderful. Because I am your ability to respond, I have to be present in you. If I simply gave you a responsibility, I would not have to be with you at all. It would now be a task to perform, an obligation to be met, something to fail.”
“Let’s use the example of friendship and how removing the element of life from a noun can drastically alter a relationship. Mack (the name of the man in the book), if you and I are friends, there is an expectancy that exists with our relationship. When we see each other or are apart, there is expectancy of being together, of laughing and talking. That expectancy has no concrete definition; it is alive and dynamic and everything that emerges from our being together is a unique gift shared by no one else. But what happens if I change that expectancy to an expectation? Suddenly, law has entered into our relationship. You are now expected to perform in a way that meets my expectations. Our living friendship rapidly deteriorates into a dead thing with rules and requirements. It is no longer about you and me, but about what friends are supposed to do, or the responsibilities of a good friend.” Doesn’t the thought of expectancy sound exciting? God is here. That’s why we can live with a real sense of expectancy. That means that we live have an exciting future. That’s the heart of Christmas.
Thanks for your very honest letter Stephanie...
You and I are truly related in so many similar ways.
I too have many limits in my life, my body does not lend itself to high energy, it is a daily letting go of what I want, for what I have been given. I too struggle with accecptance of my reality of my circumstances. I know that I have been given much sensitivity to others who have physical and emotional limitations where I otherwise could not have understood how it feels for them to live on a daily basis.
I'm grateful that you have a tender and loving husband that takes time to "hear" how you feel and love you so deeply.
You are a great blessing in my life Stephanie.
I love you,
Aunt Val
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