Archive for the The Journey Category

I thought I was safe. My heart was beating with the throbs of shattered hopes when my friend asked me what was wrong. I hesitated for a moment. It takes a lot of energy to expose a wound. There is a certain amount of trust involved. That is because we never really know how someone will respond to our pain. Will they blow us off with a pat solution to our problem? Or will they become uncomfortable and quickly excuse themselves?

But this was a good friend—a praying friend! Surely, they would say the right thing.

After all, I was in church. The sun was shining through the cross-shaped stained-glass window and the crowd was slowly retreating from the cavernous sanctuary. Yes, the service was over, but I was afraid to leave. I didn’t want to go back out into the world. The world can be such a horrible place. I just wanted to stay in that place of safety.

So I took a risk. I exposed my heart. I told of the disappointment and horrors of living in a broken/fallen world. The tears were like battering rams against my eyelids and I was ready for them to fall as I told my friend my troubles in halting sentences. I suppose they may have seemed small in the grand scheme of life, but at that moment they felt like giants lined up on the horizon. I suppose I simply needed a hug, a gesture of peace. Instead, I got a rebuke.

My friend told me I was going about things all wrong. I should have done this; not that. They asked me why my expectations were so high. Didn’t I know better?

I stood there dumbfounded while they admonished me. They went so far as to grab my shoulders and press their words into my body. Then they gave me a label I was not prepared for. They knew I had been hurt, and worse, they said the hurt was my fault.

I was shell shocked. Suddenly I went from being safe to absorbing the devastating impact of a wrecking ball.

Have you ever experienced this? Have you taken a risk and found rebuke? How did you respond? More importantly, did you ever recover?

The halls of friendship are littered with the bleached bones of broken relationships. One reaches a certain age and realizes how many have come and gone over the years. We linger over the memories. We console ourselves with the knowledge that we protected ourselves by walking away. But the pain lingers. Like a ghost or ghoul, they haunt us in our dreams. Sometimes with howls of regret.

The worst kind of scorn is silence.

But that is often how I choose to walk away. I do not say a word. I simply cease to speak. Because words are what caused the problem in the first place. I just want the pain to stop. So, I choose the door marked “Exit” because it’s easier.

My friend doesn’t even know what they did wrong. They think it was all a misunderstanding. But I know the truth.

But if I’m being honest, I know one cannot possibly understand the pain of another. One who has never struggled in marriage cannot understand one who has. Just as one who has never struggled with addiction can know the agonies of one who is addicted.

If I dig deeper, I can at least acknowledge how frustrating it is to watch a hurting friend suffer. My personal experience tells me humans are restless. We hurl “words of wisdom” at them because we don’t want to take the time to participate in their suffering. We don’t want to weep with those who weep. Weeping takes time and we are busy. We are pulled away by our own responsibilities and obligations. So we toss a few thoughts at them and hope they land well. Then we console ourselves at having been a “good friend”. We told them what they needed to hear. Sure, it may have landed wrong, but it was still the right thing to say. Wasn’t it?

We quote bible verses like Proverbs 27:6, “Faithful are the wounds of a friend, but the kisses of an enemy are deceitful.” So there!

Friendship over. No takebacks.

Years ago I had a treasured friend who walked out of my life without a word. We had plans for the weekend and she decided she had something more interesting to do so she bailed on me. I was sorely disappointed and told her she was rude. She never spoke to me again. She evaporated like morning mist. There’s a word for it now: Ghosting. I console myself with the knowledge that this is the true test of friendship. A real friend forgives. So how come I struggle to hold myself to the same standard?

I have judged my church friend through the lens of pain. I don’t trust her anymore. But why do I hold her to such a high standard? She is only human. Haven’t I done the same? Haven’t I offered advice to someone who didn’t want it or wasn’t prepared to receive what I had to say? Wasn’t I too in a hurry or unwilling to take time to weep with those who weep?

I don’t want to think about that. I want to believe I am the hero of this story. I am the perfect friend! But I am guilty too. We all are.

There is a cost when we forgive someone.

We have to set aside our pain and say, “I choose to love you anyway.” Sometimes this feels like a little death. After all, we want justification for the wrong done. We want our friend to “pay a price” for hurting us. We want to exact our “pound of flesh.”

And this is when the gospel makes me really uncomfortable. I hurt God when I sin. Sometimes I am so twisted up in my sin that I can’t see the right side up. And that is why God intervened. He sent his son Jesus to bear the punishment—the full wrath of God—for the sin of world—including my sin. I hurt God and he took my punishment. He became the extracted “pound of flesh” that should have been my penance to give. This humbles me. He tells me that if I love him, I need to also love my neighbor as myself. That means I need to forgive my neighbor. This makes me very uncomfortable.

Grace often feels extremely unnatural. But somehow, we must accept it, and then give it as well.

Jesus said, “Blessed are the merciful, for they shall receive mercy.”

Come, come, whoever you are. Wonderer, worshipper, lover of leaving. It doesn’t matter. Ours is not a caravan of despair. Come, even if you have broken your vow. A thousand times. Come, yet again, come, come. -Rumi

It takes tremendous courage to forgive someone who has wounded us. Today my simple prayer is, “God, help me to forgive!”

“Our circumstances are not the window through which we understand His love, but rather we must view our circumstances through His love.” – Janet Linton (after the death of her baby 3 weeks before she was due to give birth)

Have you ever been crushed beneath the weight of your circumstances? Did you pray to God for help only to experience the brick wall of silence? Did you finally decide faith was a foolhardy enterprise for simpletons, and throw yours away like an old security blanket you had outgrown?

I recently learned the story of Leon Terblanche via a movie called, “Born to Win”. This semi-autobiographical account of his life details his earnest question: Where was God when terrible circumstances happened in his life?

As a young white boy living in South Africa, Leon was subjected to verbal and physical abuse by his family and then abandoned by his mother. A dark-skinned, African woman he called Mama, took Leon home and cared for him for a time and taught him about Jesus—even though caring for a white boy was inherently dangerous. Leon loved Mama and her son very much and was crushed when he was ripped away from them and returned to his real mother where the abuse continued. He cried to God to help him, but God did not answer. So, he grew up feeling disappointed and cynical about anything faith related.

As an adult, Leon became a teacher who worked with children with special needs. He married and had a daughter, but bitterness and resentment festered like an unhealed wound in his heart. He drank to mask the awful pain and his marriage suffered because of it.

I have often wondered why God allows evil and suffering. I am not alone. Leon’s gut-wrenching cry to God at a pivotal point in the movie caused my husband to say, “Do people really talk to God like that?”

I said, “Yep. It’s called ugly prayer.”

Have you ever ugly prayed? This usually involves clenches fists, sobs, and screaming. Did you know God hears and cares about your pain?

I have a several women friends who have been sexually assaulted. When they share their stories, I silently ask God, “Where were you? Why didn’t you stop it? Why didn’t you break down the door—like Superman—and throw those guys on their ear?” I have other friends who were betrayed and abandoned by their spouses. I know children of alcoholic parents, sisters and brothers of murdered family members, cancer survivors who watch friends with cancer die horrible deaths while they live with survivor’s guilt. If you hadn’t noticed, this world is seriously screwed up! And if you haven’t experienced excruciating pain yet, just wait—you will!

In the heat of human emotion, I tend to look at my present circumstance and think whatever bad thing happened was probably the worst thing that could happen. Conversely, I tend to think every good thing that happened was probably the best thing that could happen. I find as I age that these extremes are seriously short-sighted. Feelings—like circumstances—come and go. There is a whole world that exists outside of my experience, especially when I consider my neighbor who has MS, is on disability, and struggles to pay her bills.

My narrow perspective widens when I read the bible. This important historical narrative tells me human beings are immortal and created in the image of an immortal God. But while immortality holds a specific charm for some, it holds a notion of horror for others.

No one captures the themes of eternal life better than Peter Beagle (of “The Last Unicorn” fame). I recently picked up a book of short stories titled, “Immortal Unicorn” because it had his name on the cover. This collection of short stories addresses the beauty and terror of immortality. One such story titled, “Gilgamesh Recidivus” (P.D. Cacek) tells the tale of a man who tracks a unicorn through the barrens of Siberia to beg for death because—as it turns out—he is immortal. He has grown weary of the pain of watching the people he loves grow old and die.

Death is a significant part of the human experience, but the bible makes clear that human death is not the end of the story. The choices we make this side of death determine how we live on the other side of the door. God gives us the choice; life with Him in Heaven or an eternity of separation from Him. Some people relish the idea of an eternity without God. They think “no God” is a great thing. But “no God” also means none of the good gifts he gives to us. If God is the creator of everything “good”, what does eternity without Him look like? The bible is clear. It says when we choose to reject God we will live in a place of “weeping and gnashing of teeth.” Forever. And in that story, there is no unicorn to set us free.

God is the lover of our souls.

The thing that intrigues me about the gospel message is that not only is God present during our painful circumstances, He participates in them with us through the personhood of Jesus. He is not a monster! He is our savior! God recognizes that the most horrible thing that has happened to humankind is the curse of sin and the possibility of permanent separation from Him. His son, Jesus, extends his hands in hope that we will surrender our lives to Him and be saved from eternal death. He proved this way was true by allowing God to heap on Himself the sin of all humanity. Jesus took our punishment and died in our place on the cross. Three days later God raised him from the dead. The second half of the bible is eye-witness testimony to this fact.

The bible is a real “guts and glory” kind of book. From start to finish it explains the inception of humanity, where everything went sideways, and what God is doing to fix it for the best possible outcome—promoting His glory! One thing it is not, is boring.

Eventually Leon Terblanche’s daughter convinced him to go to church with her and he learned God was present during the worst moments of his life. Leon is now a pastor who offers this message of hope to people from Sedgefield, Western Cape, South Africa. When I reached out to him on Facebook to tell him thank you for sharing this message of hope, he asked me to make sure to share it with all of you.

Today, if the painful circumstances in your life make you question God’s character, I encourage you to read the bible. God is not defined by us. He is infinitely more than we can think or imagine. And incredibly, Dear Reader, He condescends to love you!

You can stream the movie, “Born to Win” online and I wholeheartedly encourage you to do so.

In conclusion, I want to share the words of Maltbie Babcock from the beautiful hymn.

“This is my Father’s world. Let me never forget. That though the wrong seems often so strong, God is the ruler yet. This is my Father’s world. The battle is not done. Jesus who died will be satisfied and earth and Heaven will be won.”  

“I never knew lonely could be so blue, I never knew lonely could tear you in two, I never loved someone like I love you, I never knew lonely til you.”  – Vince Gill

The stars come out when the sky grows dark. I forget this sometimes in the summer because the days are so long I don’t experience true darkness. I usually crawl into bed as dusk settles over the house and close my eyes as I prepare for the inevitabilities tomorrow will bring. But there are times when the sadness’s of the day are not ready to retire. My eyes won’t close, and I can’t find rest. There is an ache that defies definition—an ache that sets my mind to wandering for a remedy.

Jesus once said, “Sufficient for the day is its own trouble.” (Matthew 6:34) So what does one do when the trouble of the day doesn’t want to end?

No one wants to be lonely. Loneliness feels like a curse. If we aren’t lonely today, we fear that we will be lonely in the future. When we open our hearts to love other people, we open the door to the possibility of loneliness. Sometimes the people we love don’t love us back. Other times they love us for a while and then walk away. Worst of all, we may grow to an age where everyone we love has died. It is usually about this age that we discover sleep is no longer a friend. That is when we learn the true meaning of darkness. Then, not even the light from a picture window will brighten our hearts.

“O my God, I cry by day, but you do not answer, and by night, but I find no rest.” Psalm 22:2

I ponder loneliness when I stand in my front yard at 2:00am. The solitary whistle of the train as it rattles down the tracks reminds me I am not the only one awake, but I still feel alone. I look up into the heavens to find my favorite constellations. There is comfort in the sameness of the stars. I say, “There you are” and I smile. The stars never disappoint me. They don’t say unkind words. They don’t neglect or ignore me. The nature of their work is to shine light into the darkness and that is what they keep on doing. Sometimes they peek through fluffy clouds and other times they are completely obscured by rain. But I know they are there and their faithfulness comforts me. We all need something faithful to anchor our hearts to when we ache.

Have you ever stood in the wreckage of horrible circumstances and wondered what happened? Have you cursed the gods for allowing such all-encompassing annihilation? Have you cried, like Job, “He breaks me down on every side, and I am gone, and my hope has he pulled up like a tree” (Job 19:10)? The loneliness of those moments surpasses anything approaching manageable. These “unfixable and uncontrollable moments” (Zack Eswine) wring the sorrow from our brows. These moments solidify the knowledge that we truly have no control over the trajectory of our lives. We grasp for something—anything to steady us. We just need something solid to grasp. Something faithful—more faithful than even the stars.

“Righteousness shall be the belt of his waist, and faithfulness the belt of his loins.” Isaiah 11:5

Though we cannot see him with our eyes, He is real. Though we cannot smell Him with our nose, He exists. Though we cannot touch him with our hands, He is authentic. Jesus, the lamb of God who was sent to take away the sin of the world, is our faithful Savior. If we trust in Him, He will deliver us.

I have recently been learning from a friend what it means to follow Jesus. Yes, sometimes I forget. Pain has a way of obscuring the truth. Especially if I turn to religiosity and ritual rather than to the personhood of Christ. I collapse into the temptation to believe He is an uncaring monster who wishes me harm rather than a man who took my sin and was tortured to death so that I might enter the most joyful relationship known to mankind.

In His book, “Sensing Jesus”, Zack Eswine reminds me that “Jesus doesn’t see victory in this world the way I wish he would.” These words comfort me because they remind me that I am not God. I am not omniscient or omnipresent. I am just Margaret. And this comforts me because it takes all the pressure off performing tasks I don’t feel capable of completing. If I allow God to be God and myself to be me, I can just relax. I can throw up my hands and cry out in pain, “God, I can’t figure this out. I need you to help me.” Or I can simply weep. And in those moments of perplexing pain I have experienced the hand of grace as it catches me—not unlike a little bird with a broken wing—and whispers to me, “Margaret, I am here. You are precious in my sight. I love you and I will save you.”

Zack describes it this way. “There is a kind of power that Jesus gives. It goes where other kinds of power will not. It does what other kinds of power cannot.” But one cannot experience it until we fully surrender to Him. We must relinquish control of our lives. Besides, we don’t actually have control anyway. And if you think you do, just wait until the doctor says, “Stage 4 pancreatic cancer”.

I sat in the unrelenting loneliness of pain last week. I cried out to God and He answered me. On this occasion it was to remind me that I have an old pair of roller skates in the basement that I haven’t used in several years. I brushed off the dust and laced them up. Then I started to glide up and down the street in front of my house—just like I did when I was 12. We don’t have any sidewalks so I had to skate in the street. I waved at the cars that drove by and talked to the neighborhood children who were riding bikes and scooters. And I laughed at the looks of the people driving past as they gawked at me or simply smiled. Because how often does one see a 44 year old woman rolling around on white roller derby skates and waving her arms? I suppose some will think this is a strange response to pain but my loneliness definitely dissipated. I found laughter and happiness, but I also found deep joy. Because Jesus was roller skating with me. I can’t remember the last time I felt so happy and carefree.

“The afflicted shall eat and be satisfied; those who seek him shall praise the Lord! May your hearts live forever!” Psalm 22:26

Today if you are suffering from the loneliness pain and suffering brings, cast your cares on Him who cares for you. He is faithful.