Suffering

I have struggled off and on with my relationship with God during the past year.  Before I began therapy, I had a rather distant, intellectual relationship with Him.  But I wanted more.  Little did I know what I was asking for.  Because the fruit of a closer relationship with my Father has been borne through deep emotional pain.

We fail to see the place of suffering in the broader scheme of things. We fail to see that suffering is an inevitable dimension of life. Because we have lost perspective, we fail to see the quest for maturity. To refuse suffering is to refuse personal growth.
Henri J. M. Nouwen

As I have experienced suffering, I have prayed fervently for relief.  I have been desperate—just the place God wanted me to be.  Stripped of all self-reliance, I could begin to truly rest in the love and will of my Father.  I am learning through the difficult times—those are the times when the still, small voice whispers loving words in my ear.  When I have been completely at my wit’s end, my Father has comforted me.  He has guided me when I felt like I could not take one more step.

But then I make it through that crisis, and I slide back into long-standing patterns of trusting myself.  That never turns out well.  The need for control is so great in my heart; I am in a tug-of-war with God.  I give it to him, only to take it back when life supports the mirage that there is any way that I can control even a single moment.

What are you afraid of? Let God act. Abandon yourself to Him. You will suffer, but you will suffer with love, peace and consolation. You will fight, but you can carry off the victory, and God Himself, after having fought with you, will crown you with His own hand. You will weep, but your tears will be sweet, and God Himself will come with satisfaction to dry them. You will not be free any longer to give yourself up to your tyrannic passions, but you will sacrifice your liberty freely, and you will enter into a new liberty unknown to the world, in which you will do nothing except for love.
Francois Fenelon

I feel impossibly stretched beyond my comfort zone.  As I abandon control one teensy piece at a time, I find a richness in experiences that the former me would have cringed at.  My worldly desires, preconceptions, and misplaced religiosity give way to the liberty of living truly loved.

Fondue Night Musings

Spend a lifetime of trying to fit into the mold prepared for you, and learn that you are appreciated more when you break that mold…

My son took care of my dog and complemented me on my appearance; my daughter danced with delight and gave me lots of big hugs; my husband cleaned up the kitchen.  And how did this all come about?  I made fondue for dinner.

I am queen of the house right now.  I can do no wrong, and all because I melted cheese in a pan and cubed a baguette.  Well, it was a little more work than that, but it certainly doesn’t seem to merit the attention that I’m receiving (not that I’m going to tell them that…). 

The reason why I’m so lauded is that I have told the family it was a near impossibility that I would make fondue for them, and then I surprised them with the coveted meal on an ordinary Wednesday night.  It’s so fun to be unpredictable, especially because I’m rather predictable.  Doing the unexpected throws them off, makes them think twice about who I am and what I might do.  That’s fun.  But what’s even more fun is seeing their pleasure at receiving a gift they thought was unattainable.

We get so used to the blessings we receive in a day, that sometimes the extraordinary has to occur to remind us what we have been given.  Meatloaf doesn’t get the same attention as fondue, but they are both nourishing and filling.  Having a meal to eat is a blessing, but the unexpected meal highlights the gift.

I do the same thing with God.  It’s easy to overlook the magnitude of blessings that march through my life on a daily basis, just because they always happen.  Or, like vegetable lasagna, they are blessings in disguise.

But the mold-breaking, appreciation-deserving, unpredictable gift of all time has got to be the gift of grace received at the cross and open tomb.  How unexpected!  How amazing!  To stop and remember that this act of love was done for me, with me on the mind of the Creator of the universe!  Just because He wants to have an intimate relationship with me!  Imagine, to have an intimate relationship with my Father was an impossibility because of my sin nature, so He did the unpredictable and sent a part of Himself—his own son—to show me His incredible love for me through His life and example.  Then he topped it all off by reconciling me to Him by dying and resurrecting Himself!

We get jaded to the miracle of the cross and the tomb, but today I am taking a moment to relish it.  

You yourselves are a case study of what he does.  At one time you all had your backs turned to God, thinking rebellious thoughts of him, giving him trouble every chance you got.  But now, by giving himself completely at the Cross, actually dying for you, Christ brought you over to God’s side and put your lives together, whole and holy in his presence.  You don’t walk away from a gift like that!  Col. 1:21-23(MSG)

Faith, Hope, and Love

 I’m in a holding pattern right now.    I’ve been working a lot recently; reading self-help books, concentrating on working through emotional issues, and journaling like crazy.  Working a little too much.  Last week, I exhausted myself, and decided to take a break from it all.

Giving myself a moment to relax and reflect has clarified a few things for me.  Mainly, that I have been trying too hard to heal.  So I’ve quit trying to get better.  I’m still working.  I’m working on relaxing.  I’m working on trusting.  I’m working on believing in faith for the things that I cannot currently believe in my own power.

I find it incomprehensible that I will ever be free of medication.  In my own power, I cannot believe that this can be true.  But recent revelations have shown my difficulties to be possibly less genetic than previously assumed.  Can I imagine a drug-free existence?  Not yet.  But in faith, I can.

The same can be said about therapy.  I can’t yet see a day when I don’t need it rather frequently.  But I believe in faith that there will come a day when I can say, “Once a month is good.”  And eventually, it will taper off to even less.  I believe this, even though I can’t see it.

Faith is the confidence that what we hope for will actually happen; it gives us assurance about things we cannot see.  Hebrews 11:1(NLT)

Sure, I’m familiar with this verse; I learned it as a child in Sunday school.  But what does a child know about faith?  I had faith that good things would happen to me and for me because I had no other reason to believe otherwise.  Faith is easy when trust has never been broken.   Yet I am called to have a child-like faith.  How can that be, when trust has been beat up, circumstances appear to be in opposition to the belief in a loving Father, and hope is diminished?

Father says, “Jump into my arms, and I will catch you.”  I look in the past and see times that I have been caught in strong arms, saved by grace.  I also see times that appear exactly the opposite.  I feel betrayed by life’s circumstances.

So how do I work on increasing my faith?  Well, it appears that I can’t.  I must allow faith to be built in me.  Looking for faith-building verses, I found this one:

But you, dear friends, carefully build yourselves up in this most holy faith by praying in the Holy Spirit, staying right at the center of God’s love, keeping your arms open and outstretched, ready for the mercy of our Master, Jesus Christ.  This is the unending life, the real life!   Jude 1:20, 21(The Message)

What can I do to increase my faith?  Pray, pray, pray.  And stay at the center of God’s love.  

 But don’t we all live at the center of God’s love already?  How can I move away from God’s love?  The answer is here:

I’m absolutely convinced that nothing—nothing living or dead, angelic or demonic, today or tomorrow, high or low, thinkable or unthinkable—absolutely nothing can get between us and God’s love because of the way that Jesus our Master has embraced us.  Romans 8:38, 39(The Message)

Staying at the center of God’s love is simple.  Accept it.  Keep your arms open and outstretched to receive the embrace that Jesus has ready for you!

 Is there really any difference between building faith and accepting love?  If I lived in the assurance that I am fully loved by the One True God, my faith would naturally increase in accordance.

Love never gives up, never loses faith, is always hopeful, and endures through every circumstance….Three things will last forever—faith, hope, and love—and the greatest of these is love.  I Cor. 13:7, 13

It always comes back to love.

An Unusual Celebration

Today will be my first “wrap-around” journal.  I went to therapy for the first time exactly one year ago today, went home and wrote my first journal.

I have been celebrating my year of therapy all week.  I bought myself a present.  I bought my therapist a present.  My daughter thinks I’ve finally taken the final step into lunacy.  “Mom, most people don’t celebrate things like that!”

But I beg to differ.  I am proud of my accomplishments.  It’s been a hard year, full of emotionally trying experiences, and I have survived.

Actually, I’ve done more than just survive.  I’ve grown and changed.  I’m more open with those close to me.  Proper medication has been found.  My spiritual life has grown and widened.  I’ve met new people that I never would have otherwise.  I got talked off my roof.  I’m alive.  I haven’t burnt or cut myself in over a month now (almost two!).  I want to live.  I want to help other people who struggle like me.  I can get out of bed even when I don’t feel so hot.  I can smile and laugh.  Things in my life are starting to make sense.  I can go out and do things without getting overcome with anxiety.  I don’t even need to take anxiety medication all the time anymore!  I am still working with my self-image, still have to remind myself that I’m a daughter of the King, but at least I don’t hate myself anymore.

When I first started therapy, I didn’t think that I would still be going every week after a year, but I don’t see that as a failure.  I am working every day to improve myself, but more importantly, I have learned that the majority of the healing comes from resting in the arms of my Father.  I can’t fix me; neither can my therapist or my husband or some self-help checklist. 

“I look up to the mountains—

Does my help come from there?

My help comes from the Lord,

Who made heaven and earth!”

Psalm 121:1&2

And that “help” isn’t just a helping hand.  When God helps, he takes over, takes the burden—as much as I’m willing to give over to Him.  When my load is heaviest, I am trying too hard.

 It seems paradoxical that the less I try, the better I get.  But that’s the thing about my Father.  When I was most ugly, he loved me.  He lives and loves contrary to what the world says we should do.  “This foolish plan of God is wiser than the wisest of human plans, and God’s weakness is stronger than the greatest of human strength.”  1 Cor. 1:25.  “Oh, how great are God’s riches and wisdom and knowledge!  How impossible it is for us to understand his decisions and his ways!”  Romans 11:33. 

So I give God the glory for what He has done in my life, for who I am and what I am becoming.  “For our present troubles are small and won’t last very long.  Yet they produce for us a glory that vastly outweighs them and will last forever!  So we don’t look at the troubles we can see now; rather, we fix our gaze on things that cannot be seen.  For the things we see now will soon be gone, but the things we cannot see will last forever.”  2 Cor. 4:17, 18