Archive for the The Journey Category

Yesterday we experienced a great grief in our home. I heard my youngest son screaming from the backyard, “The ants are eating the toad! The ants are eating the toad!” and I knew immediately what had happened. Sometimes the toads in our yard(which my children love and adore) hide under some bricks at the back of the house in the heat of the day. I have explained to my young son that he must not disturb them, but he can’t help himself. His curiosity gets the better of him every time. I have explained to him that he should not lift the bricks because I don’t want him to injure them. Yesterday he ignored my warnings and inadvertently crushed one of the little warty beasts. My little one was devastated. My older son, who also has a tender heart, ran to see what had happened to his beloved friend, only to discover the painful truth; he was dead. Is there anything worse than discovering a creature you love not only dead, but being devoured by nature’s most efficient insects? I heard the wailing and my heart just broke. Both of my children went from the quiet of preparing for bed to devastation.

As I considered how to comfort my grieving children, I thought about the pain that has infected my own life over the years and my response to it. While the loss of a toad seems insignificant compared to other griefs, I distinctly remember the sickness and sadness I felt when I inadvertently killed several peepers while on a float trip as a child. I had collected the cute little creatures on the shore of the Bourbeuse River in the company of my family. My sweet Grandma saw my affection for the baby toads and gave me a tin can to keep them in. When we climbed back aboard the boat and began our trek down the river, I sat the can next to me on the seat where I could keep my new friends close. Sometime during the course of our journey I looked down to check on them and discovered that the heat of the sun had warmed the tin can and cooked the little creatures. I was horrified. I remember the torment I experienced as I considered that I had killed them. I felt not only sadness, but guilt. It was my fault that they died. The trip I had been wonderful up until that moment. I threw the can and its charred contents into the river and watched it float away. But the pain stayed with me.

This world offers up so many hurts. Like a sideshow carnival, we peruse the exhibits in a state of shock and horror, and consider how best to respond to such atrocities. Why would God allow the Siamese twins or the bearded lady? Why must the lions be kept in cages, only to pace back and forth and suffer at the hands of their captors? I would stand and watch the magician but his slight-of-hand is only an illusion–all lies! And so I want to run away from such things–and I do–except that running away doesn’t mean they don’t exist. So I am forced to find some way to handle the brutal realities of life.

Yesterday morning I tucked my heart into the word of God because I have learned that his words bring comfort and life when everything around me is death.

“For he has not despised or abhorred the affliction of the afflicted, and he has not hidden his face from him, but has heard, when he cried to him.” – Psalm 22:24

Every day I die a little death as I consider what foods to put into my body. I consider the starving hoards and the abundance of food in my pampered life. How can it be that I am struggling not to get fat while so many are hungry? I feel guilt when I consume ice cream when that same ice cream would delay the death of a child on the streets in Ecuador. Lest I sound melodramatic, food is a very constant battleground for me and I must keep it in its proper perspective. And yet I often find myself, much like my 7-year-old son, standing in a corner with balled up fists as I pound on my head and say, “I hate myself! I hate myself!” Because my lack of self-control is not always a purposeful attack. The natural delight God has given me in consuming healthful foods just sometimes takes an inadvertent turn down a dark and twisty path and ends up in a muddy pit full of venomous snakes.

Where do I turn when I have no one to blame but myself? What happens when I get what I deserve for the harm I have caused myself and others? No amount of self-torture will absolve the guilt, shame and pain. So what do I do?

Last weekend I had a conversation with a friend who has lived a long and painful life. He is afflicted with guilt and shame for the wounds he has caused to people he did not love well in his youth. He told me, “I don’t think I can ever be forgiven for what I did.” The grace of God seems incomprehensible to him and so he does not accept it. It’s too audacious, too intangible to even consider. And so he bumbles around in the dark, banging his knees against the sharp edges of his sorrow. It pains me to watch and so I look away. And then I pray. Because I know God is there and he is working, even when my prayers are not answered the way I want them to be.

Last night I held my son as he sobbed into my shoulder. Then we sat down and I told him that we can go to Jesus with our pain over the death of the toad. And so we asked for God to help us heal and to give us peace. We grieved the death we didn’t mean to cause. We grieved the loss of a thing that caused us great joy. And we gave our sorrow to the one who is strong enough to take away not only our regret, but our guilt. I am thankful for a heavenly father who bore the weight of my guilt so that I wouldn’t have to. His love covers our sorrows. It covers our shame. It even covers the wounds we have yet to cause. And that is why I have hope, even when my heart is full of grief.

Have you ever faced an enemy so huge, so inconceivably ugly, and so unrelentingly stinky that you knew you had no chance of winning, and so you willingly threw yourself into his arms and let him squish you into a bloody pulp? If not, your weirder than me and should read another blog. Maybe one about zombies because they don’t have emotions – they only want brains. If you are still here, today you get to read about my recent experience with that pesky Octopus of Emotional Upheaval. He is the provocateur of the most disciplined person, and if not properly tamed, will destroy relationships, hard-fought-for goals, and finally, your sanity. He is one mother of a hell beast and only those properly equipped can effectively defeat him.

Let me be clear, he is defeatable! You just have to chop off his slimy tentacles one suction cup-infused strangle hold at a time. His plan has been perfected through the ages, and he is a master of reducing even the most disciplined person to insolvability with a flash of his foul tainted breath. His tactics are relentless. (*Disclaimer: I write from a Christian worldview). With all of that in mind, let me begin.

Exhaustion

We live in a fast paced world and people expect us to move, well, fast. The advent of email was stupendous until we all realized that our capability to send correspondence lightening fast increased our capacity for stress by about 1000%. This is where the Octopus of Emotional Upheaval(hereafter nicknamed Suck-o-pus) thrives. Suck-o-pus will rip through the paper thin walls of your calm demeanor, attach his tentacles to your calm, and suck the marrow right out of it. This can result in something as simple as a case of the crabbies to something entirely more sinister; rage.

Exhaustion is not entirely preventable but our response to it is crucial. I am personally guilty of not responding to my body when it cries for rest. After all, there is always one more dish to wash, one more lunch to pack and one more email to respond to. But that is when I must break out the sword of “Enough-is-enough.” Fortunately, I have learned that I can thwart Suck-o-pus by laying down my “perfect badge” and accepting my limitations. I am, after all, only one person. Rather than lash out at the unsuspecting guppies in my general vicinity, I find it best to lop off the tentacle of exhaustion by soaking in a hot bath or taking a nap. Suck-o-pus will throw up a lot of objections but that’s what doggie bags are for. I say sock it to Suck-o-pus! Just go to bed.

Physical Infirmity

Our bodies are fragile and oftentimes afflicted. Be it depression, the flu, or a chronic health issue, Suck-o-pus reaches out from his lair of misery and goes straight for the eyes. He figures if we are blinded by our pain we might naturally forget how to maintain our composure. He will even argue that we have every right to lash out at everyone around us. Gripe and Grimace are his horrible henchmen but we can eliminate their venom by remembering that we are not alone in our suffering.

Pain is a common human experience. Sometimes, as in the case of a simple headache, we can take some acetaminophen and wait for the pain to subside. Other times we must privately acknowledge our weakness and determine how best to not infect others with our negative feelings. Emotions in this regard can be raw. It is important to acknowledge them and give yourself time to grieve. Suck-o-pus would have you stay in that state forever but you must lop off that terrible tentacle with community. Call a trusted friend and share your hurt. Ask for prayer. In the absence of people grab your Bible and repeat the promises of God.

Deuteronomy 31:6 – Be strong and courageous. Do not fear or be in dread of them, for it is the Lord your God who goes with you. He will not leave you or forsake you.”

In this regard, never, ever let Suck-o-pus isolate you from people. Once he drags you into his lair you are done for!

Disagreement with Loved Ones

You’ve been there. You want Chinese and your spouse wants Mexican. You’ve been craving crab Rangoon all week but he insists his need for salsa takes priority. Suck-o-pus thrives on these types of situations and will use his tenacious tentacles by way of your growling stomach to shoot verbal daggers at your loved one’s heart. Suddenly that date you had been looking forward to all week is in jeopardy. If Suck-o-pus gets his way, you’ll both be dragged into his lair of misery regardless of which option you choose.

I’ll be frank; I’m not the queen of compromise. My belly wants what it wants. But when I remember that frustration and anger can be felt—but not dealt—I am most effective at combating this terrible tentacle. The best weapon in this regard is love. When you feel that tentacle trying to wiggle through the chinks in your armor, think back to the days when you were willing to Walk 500 Miles to be with the love of your life. Remind yourself that love is patient, and kind, and definitely not rude. I Corinthians 13 is a whole arsenal of weapons at your disposal. And lest Suck-o-pus counter by saying your disagreement is far worse than a simple menu option, let me remind you that true love is displayed best by the willingness to lay down one’s life(and henceforth one’s will) for a friend. I have found I am only capable of chopping off this tentacle with the help of Jesus because he is gracious to remind me that is exactly why he was born in the first place—to save me from myself. When I consider that, I realize telling my husband he’s a Selfish Salsa Snob really should have no place in my vocabulary.

Unmet Expectations or Disappointment

So the promotion you were promised didn’t come through. Your favorite football team broke faith and left your city for warmer(but most decidedly drier) pastures. A traffic jam caused you to miss your child’s recital—the one you promised her you would attend and had planned to video tape. Suck-o-pus is ready with the Tempestuous Temper Tantrum of Terror. Seriously, the anger is so prurient you can feel your fist bashing through the window in order to throttle the closest available driver, no matter how innocent.

But wait. Before you allow Suck-o-pus to drag you away and poison you with relentless resentment, pull out your bevy of beautiful blessings. This is one time you can really have fun with Suck-o-pus. He hates nothing more than to be shamed by the memory of your first day on the job and how thankful you were to be employed after a long hiatus. He loathes the fact that you can use the money you would have spent on football tickets for that long overdue vacation with your spouse. He recoils with the knowledge that even though you missed the recital, you will have the pleasure of holding your child in your arms again—a blessing some parents will not experience this side of heaven. Laugh in Suck-o-pus’ face as you chop off another slithery appendage and remind him he is one big fat loser.

A Broken Heart

Suck-o-pus probably finds the most glee in suffocating his broken-hearted victims with sadness. This is one area where we have literally no control over our emotions. Anguish roils our skin like a second degree sunburn. No matter how we fight, the pain pricks and sears.

Suck-o-pus has seen many a victory in my life in this regard, and I have spent countless tears in his den of misery. There is a saying that “time heals all wounds” but I’m not sure that’s entirely true. At least not for me. There are some wounds that are incurable. Thus I find that when Suck-o-pus, that horrible Octopus of Emotional Upheaval, is wreaking the most havoc on my person, I find the fastest way to relief is through the person of Jesus. Say what you will about chocolate or alcohol or money, none of them have the healing hands of my Savior.

“When the righteous cry for help, the Lord hears and delivers them out of all their troubles. The Lord is near to the brokenhearted and saves the crushed in spirit.” – Psalm 34:17-18

Learning how to control our response to intense emotions is a decidedly difficult discipline. It requires a certain feistiness that feels rather irrational in the heat of the moment, but when mastered bears the sweet fruit of peace. Jesus is the author of peace and therefore I find that I can empower none of these weapons without his help. I just want to throw that out there. And while it’s been fun to write about Suck-o-pus, emotional upheaval is no joke. I believe God means our emotions for good, and I am thankful for his grace to cover the times I do not have the presence of mind to employ any defense against that marauding, menacing, monster.

I was wrist deep in the most beautiful batch of chocolate chip cookie dough you have ever seen. And when I say wrist deep, I mean that I was scooping spoonfuls into my mouth. No one was home to witness my transgression. In fact, no one ever need know about it. The problem was, I knew about it. And what started as a means to relax my grip on my regimented food plan, quickly devolved into a nightmare. What was I thinking? Had I lost my mind? I was several months into my journey to lose weight and I saw myself taking a hard turn, rolling my vehicle, and crashing over the cliff. So I did something brave and simultaneously very painful: I pitched the rest of the dough into the trash. And then I started to weep.

I am always one batch of chocolate chip cookie dough away from regaining all the weight. If I sound overly dramatic, I’m not. The choice is always there. I have happened across some really challenging days where I stopped and asked myself, why am I doing this? What is the purpose of this journey? That is why my motives are so important. Because when it comes down to it, when I want cookie dough, I’m going to eat it if I don’t have a very powerful reason not to.

Let me be clear, I’ve worked very hard to establish healthy habits. I eat lots of fresh vegetables, lean meats and fruits. Because I fill my body with healthy foods and I feel relatively good because of it, I’m not really tempted to gorge myself on White Castle. I don’t “crave” it. But when I’m hurting or frustrated or crabby, bring on the cookie dough! And that is when it is most important to be vigilant. I have to go back and remember why I began this journey in the first place. And the true reason is this: I loathed my sin.

I didn’t always loathe it. In fact, for most of my life I loved it quite a lot. I loved all of the processes around procuring certain foods, preparing them and devouring them. They were my sweet comforts and I refused to be parted from them. My addiction to food taps into my deepest insecurities, my deepest longings and my deepest fears. For these reasons I was willing to lie to myself, cheat myself and sacrifice lasting peace to continue on that path of destruction. This was my fatal flaw; I thought the grace of God was enough to cover my iniquity. Surely he knew I had no willpower to stop and he understood my weakness. I knew they he loved me, and I cherry picked Bible verses that told me so. I built a brick wall, brick-by-brick-by-brick, and said, “nothing can separate me from the love of God” but I avoided passages like Romans 6:1-4. That is why the very first passage I memorized to keep me accountable was this:

“Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal body, to make you obey its passions.” – Romans 6:12

Now maybe you are reading this and thinking that overeating, or eating foods that are not exactly healthy for your body is not exactly sin. To this I would quote Susanna Wesley.

“Whatever weakens your reasoning, impairs the tenderness of your conscience, obscures your sense of God, or takes away your relish for spiritual things, if anything increases the power and authority of the flesh over the spirit, that to you becomes sin, however good it is in itself.”

Food does all of that for me. And that is why I must be vigilant in my fight against the flesh.

I am sad that I only came to loathe my sin because of the terrible consequences of it. I allowed my flesh to take such complete control of my body until I was its absolute slave and (I perceived) hopelessly trapped. I sat at the bottom of that deep and dark well and mourned the wispy sunbeams that came in. There was a way out but I refused to see it. And now, I honestly don’t believe it is possible to break any addiction unless you cultivate an absolute hatred of it. Because that is what it takes to break free; hatred of sin and the humility to allow the grace of God to pour in and heal all of the brokenness that addiction leaves behind.

Today if you are reading this and you think there is no help or hope for your addiction, be encouraged! Taking on one’s own body is not an insurmountable task. Sometimes, as it was for me this morning, it is walking through one arduous moment after the next with only the grace of God to sustain me. But here is the wonderful news, his grace has always been more than enough. When we are willing to lay down our love of sin–to loathe it with every fiber of our being–He is faithful to pour his love into our hearts, and give us the strength to heal and overcome our flesh.

While we are on this earth we will always be fighting. I will probably always want to eat too much. But that is why I love Jesus. His tender mercies never fail. They are new every morning. Even when I eat cookie dough. Even when I despair. And with his help I keep a vigilant watch and continue to remind myself that I love Jesus completely, and completely loathe my sin.