This is nothing profound...but it's on my heart today:
We say we wish we could just see God, physically, but what if the path to seeing God is through pain?
We live in a therapeutic culture, perhaps you’ve heard. We think we have a right to not have to feel our pain. You get a headache, take a Tylenol. You get a heartache, take some TV, movies, new clothes, new technology, you fill in the blank.
Sometimes the only way to see God is to feel your pain. Let Him speak to you in your pain.
Truth be told, it doesn’t really make much sense to me. Those heart-ache cures, while temporary, DO numb the pain. Sometimes it feels like God doesn’t numb our pain. We turn to Him, but we still feel the hurt and heartache.
Perhaps the fault with our distraction medication is the same with medicine. Most often, if it is a real problem, Tylenol isn’t going to cure it. It’ll help lessen the pain, but you have to get to the root of the problem, or you’ll just be dependent on Tylenol for the rest of your life, and you’ll probably get sicker. Our distraction medication is the same – it’s doesn’t get to the root of the issue.
When someone is fighting cancer, it’s a painful process. Sometimes they get physically sicker from the side effects of the radiation. Sometimes I think God has to use His own version of radiation to cure our heart-illnesses. And the result is that it hurts. But it cures the problem, and in the end, it was worth the pain.
Somehow, we’ve got to learn to face our pain, or we’ll just keep walking around as sick people getting sicker, and probably infecting others around us too.
Friday, June 18
Tuesday, June 15
Which path are you on?
I'm on the path of healing. There's a difference, you see. I'm fighting my darkness, I'm engaging with it, I'm seeking help, I'm seeking understanding. I am not letting it rule my life.
I could be on the path of destruction, letting it overtake me. Not trying to deal with it, not trying to be free of it, giving up and saying "this is just how it's gonna be". And letting it ruin my life.
That's how it was for many years. Just trying to survive. Pretend it wasn't there, pretend that everything was Ok, that I was Ok. I've been on that path.
But I am not anymore.
At any point along the journey, the crossroad is available to me. But early on, I knew that the only way out of this was through it, not around it. It was too large to detour around. And so I keep going, fighting to stay the course, despite how the odds are against me, despite how difficult and exhausting and frustrating and disheartening the journey.
The true insight I want to convey is that it is a path, a journey, a process, not a one-time decision. It is not clear-cut, and I'm not always sure if I'm really moving forward. But every fight, every expression of my experiences, every validation of my pain, it is all a step forward toward healing. I just can't give up.
I could be on the path of destruction, letting it overtake me. Not trying to deal with it, not trying to be free of it, giving up and saying "this is just how it's gonna be". And letting it ruin my life.
That's how it was for many years. Just trying to survive. Pretend it wasn't there, pretend that everything was Ok, that I was Ok. I've been on that path.
But I am not anymore.
At any point along the journey, the crossroad is available to me. But early on, I knew that the only way out of this was through it, not around it. It was too large to detour around. And so I keep going, fighting to stay the course, despite how the odds are against me, despite how difficult and exhausting and frustrating and disheartening the journey.
The true insight I want to convey is that it is a path, a journey, a process, not a one-time decision. It is not clear-cut, and I'm not always sure if I'm really moving forward. But every fight, every expression of my experiences, every validation of my pain, it is all a step forward toward healing. I just can't give up.
Sunday, June 13
Security
I don't know what it is about writing. Words on a page. But so much more. There are boundaries with words, words define the inexplicable, they fence in the abstract and intangible, and create substance. There is something immaterial about words, and yet they themselves are the closest thing we have to connecting the immaterial with the material - for words are visual.
Perhaps that is why I find healing in expression of my soul. Yet I am tentative. For the intent of this blog is to edify, to somehow bring light and hope to the darkness others are facing. To bring from my darkness the light and hope I have found. I fear I will not succeed in such an endeavor, at least not tonight. For tonight, my darkness is profound.
Proceeding the worship service, it snagged me, overtook me, as if a thief had mugged me in my walk home from church. Before this point, freedom had come upon me, the longest bout I have experienced yet. It lasted so long, I had nearly come to believe that perhaps this journey was approaching its destination. And then, at the benediction, the tears welled up within me, and my soul was clouded yet again by the impenetrable darkness. I was thrust into utter despair. And I do not use that word lightly.
As the betrayals of my darkness surfaced, and came to light, it became apparent that I ached for freedom. I thought I wanted security, definition, closure, resolution -- but to my surprise, what I really desired was freedom. To burst from the bubble, to shatter the enclosures surrounding me, to breath the air of renewal and restoration.
During the worship, it seemed the Holy Spirit wanted me to see just how spectacular were the works of Christ - to give blind eyes sight, to bring words to the mute, to raise someone from the dead? These happened -- they are undeniable facts. Jesus, whose feet grew dusty from the soil of our earth, Jesus is different, new, alive. Jesus is Freedom. He wanted me to believe that there was so, so, so much more to this world around me. He enlivened me to believe in the impossible...and then thrust me into despair.
It befuddles me...and yet, as I wrestle with these stormy clouds upon my soul, I know what I am fighting for: Beauty and Truth. There are whispers of glory, if you listen hard enough, beneath the surface of the wind; something far more abundantly beautiful than even the most creative among us can comprehend. He fights within me, fights for faith to believe that what I long for really is possible, really does exist, and is worth waiting for.
And so I go on, longing, waiting, quiet in the stillness, aching. Hoping. Holding on, and waiting until the storm clouds dissipate at His command. For He commands the sun -- and the clouds. And I am His, embracing this gift He is giving me - the gift of discovering there is much, much more to this life than what our eyes can behold.
And that is what makes life worth living.
Perhaps that is why I find healing in expression of my soul. Yet I am tentative. For the intent of this blog is to edify, to somehow bring light and hope to the darkness others are facing. To bring from my darkness the light and hope I have found. I fear I will not succeed in such an endeavor, at least not tonight. For tonight, my darkness is profound.
Proceeding the worship service, it snagged me, overtook me, as if a thief had mugged me in my walk home from church. Before this point, freedom had come upon me, the longest bout I have experienced yet. It lasted so long, I had nearly come to believe that perhaps this journey was approaching its destination. And then, at the benediction, the tears welled up within me, and my soul was clouded yet again by the impenetrable darkness. I was thrust into utter despair. And I do not use that word lightly.
As the betrayals of my darkness surfaced, and came to light, it became apparent that I ached for freedom. I thought I wanted security, definition, closure, resolution -- but to my surprise, what I really desired was freedom. To burst from the bubble, to shatter the enclosures surrounding me, to breath the air of renewal and restoration.
During the worship, it seemed the Holy Spirit wanted me to see just how spectacular were the works of Christ - to give blind eyes sight, to bring words to the mute, to raise someone from the dead? These happened -- they are undeniable facts. Jesus, whose feet grew dusty from the soil of our earth, Jesus is different, new, alive. Jesus is Freedom. He wanted me to believe that there was so, so, so much more to this world around me. He enlivened me to believe in the impossible...and then thrust me into despair.
It befuddles me...and yet, as I wrestle with these stormy clouds upon my soul, I know what I am fighting for: Beauty and Truth. There are whispers of glory, if you listen hard enough, beneath the surface of the wind; something far more abundantly beautiful than even the most creative among us can comprehend. He fights within me, fights for faith to believe that what I long for really is possible, really does exist, and is worth waiting for.
And so I go on, longing, waiting, quiet in the stillness, aching. Hoping. Holding on, and waiting until the storm clouds dissipate at His command. For He commands the sun -- and the clouds. And I am His, embracing this gift He is giving me - the gift of discovering there is much, much more to this life than what our eyes can behold.
And that is what makes life worth living.
Tuesday, April 13
Introduction
People say I have a gift.
As is the case with most gifts, there are days I wish I didn't have it. Because generally speaking, when God gives you something, He expects you to use it. It's never just for our own pleasure or use -- it's to help others along in life too. That's an aspect of living life according to God's design, right?
Unfortunately, I'm realizing that God is refining this gift of mine, and the only way to do that is through pain, difficulty...heartache. Yeah. There are days I wish I didn't have the gift.
But I'm not going to be a Jonah about it.
What is this gift I'm so reluctant to accept stewardship over?
It is the ability to put words to the internal world and journeys of the soul.
It's funny, because this isn't something I've set out to obtain. It's sort of just who I am. I didn't even know that other people couldn't do that as much. But as people have mirrored back to me aspects of who God has made me to be, I am beginning to realize this is an important contribution I have to offer the world.
Hence this blog.
I am currently experiencing a "dark night of the soul". And the thought is that perhaps my reflections about this journey will somehow benefit others who may end up along the same path as I.
May His grace sustain, strengthen, and restore your soul to perfect peace in Jesus Christ. Amen.
As is the case with most gifts, there are days I wish I didn't have it. Because generally speaking, when God gives you something, He expects you to use it. It's never just for our own pleasure or use -- it's to help others along in life too. That's an aspect of living life according to God's design, right?
Unfortunately, I'm realizing that God is refining this gift of mine, and the only way to do that is through pain, difficulty...heartache. Yeah. There are days I wish I didn't have the gift.
But I'm not going to be a Jonah about it.
What is this gift I'm so reluctant to accept stewardship over?
It is the ability to put words to the internal world and journeys of the soul.
It's funny, because this isn't something I've set out to obtain. It's sort of just who I am. I didn't even know that other people couldn't do that as much. But as people have mirrored back to me aspects of who God has made me to be, I am beginning to realize this is an important contribution I have to offer the world.
Hence this blog.
I am currently experiencing a "dark night of the soul". And the thought is that perhaps my reflections about this journey will somehow benefit others who may end up along the same path as I.
May His grace sustain, strengthen, and restore your soul to perfect peace in Jesus Christ. Amen.
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