Sometimes I wonder, if this is how love feels, what would His anger feel like? Life seems an insurmountable pile of trials thrown together like dirty laundry, and you will never complete it all. If suffering is to be our food for the rest of life, are we willing? Oh, to skip back to the naïveté of childhood, before I realized the weight of this life.
How do you roll the crushing boulder off your broken frame? What could possibly give me leverage in this mire? I keep counting blessings, as if to make a rope ladder up from the pit out of these gifts numbered. But it is slogging work, to push away the dross of each day to hunt for the few jewels. Life is hard, times are bad, and it seems too much to bear.
Guilt piles up heavy as well. Every time the dark thoughts collide inside, more wounds are created, in me, in these children, in my husband who so tenderly supports and comforts me. How can I keep doing this to the ones I love? If it were up to self-control, if I could fix these broken places myself, I would have, a thousand times over. The problem is, I can only rely on the One stronger than I to heal me, and instinct makes me push Him away, as He seems, too, the source of my pain. By His allowing it feels as though He gives His consent. How can He not rise as my shield and make the sun shine upon my soul for a season? Does He really think I am strong enough to survive all of this?
Today I am to be at a women's conference, but I cannot drive, I cannot think, and I cannot be in a group of women - anathema to an introvert's bleeding heart. It would be like walking back into the fire the day you get out of the hospital with your old burns still weeping. I cannot make myself participate.
Oh, how I beg for deliverance.
Grace.
Peace.
Healing.
When will my Lord hear and comfort me?
Plead my cause, O Lord, with them that strive with me: fight against them that fight against me. Take hold of shield and buckler, and stand up for mine help. Draw out also the spear, and stop the way against them that persecute me: say unto my soul, I am thy salvation. (Psalm 35:1-3)
Here is the joy. Here in this moment, this place, this space. And fear is a thief, a joy-monger, launching into the moment to devour the gifts at your feet. You may think fear is not the enemy when it's just soaring in the periphery of your vision. It only takes one glide for it to dive into the present and scare off the kids and birds and leave you alone with it's devious face, it's cackle of triumph.
I hold a turquoise cross tight in my grip, bending it's soft form between thumb and forefinger. I do this because the ache in my hand keeps me present in the moment, instead of soaring off with fear for wings. For emotions are as fickle as the April weather here in Wisconsin, and fear could drop me from a thousand feet high and crush me on the pavement far below. Choosing this moment, with whatever it contains, sometimes isn't so attractive. Last night, in a group, I didn't want to be present. But I grabbed my cross from my purse, and the bite into my palm forced me to stay nailed to my chair, body and spirit. That cross keeps me on the ground instead of floating off into the tornado of grief above me.
I think of the Savior lugging His heavy cross up the hill at Golgatha, Place of the Skull. Did the bite of the slivers into his shoulders striped from beating keep Him on the ground, keep His mind from wandering too far into the future? Was it mindfulness of the weight of the moment that kept Him going that last day? I follow the path, with my small cross in my hand, and the snaking line His cross ground into the dust is sometimes hard to find. I only know it's on the ground, not in the sky, and so I pin myself to moments and find the path now and then, and this is how you get from one place to another. From one emotion to the next. From pain to glory.
My friend Ann wrote today what she wished the Church knew about mental health. It was salve for wounds worn dry and dirty from the rub of shame, guilt, disgust. I am perhaps even more saddened by the death of Rick Warren's son Matthew than the general Christian public, having so closely walked that dark path he found himself upon just a week ago. Everyone seems to be talking about it - and I'm thankful for that. Part of me also wonders - what about the thousands upon thousands who have silently slipped away without notice? Did anyone hear their earlier cries for help? Did anyone acknowledge and validate their pain and offer to walk with them through the experience?
We - Aaron and I - refer to our time at Valleybrook Church as our time in the spiritual hospital. This church opened it's arms to us with incredible grace when we were most wounded. A pastor opened her door to welcome me into her office once a week just so I could talk about things I had never told anyone. They hosted a network of small group studies based on the Wounded Heart book by Dan Allender. Through this experience our eyes were open to a different kind of church - one where people walked like Jesus as much as they talked about Him, where you could come for sanctuary. Do you know why we call our worship spaces "sanctuaries" today? Because from the 4th to the 17th century, you could run to a church and be safe as long as you stayed within it's walls - safe from lawmakers and their police, anyone wishing to harm you, safety from legal prosecution and even the death penalty. Back then, if someone violated the Right of Sanctuary, hassling or hurting the fugitive in any way, the perpetrator went free, and the punisher took his penalty.
Life - and by extension, faith - is so much easier when you're soaring. Clear blue skies and a sweet summer breeze are what we Northerners think about and long for the better part of the year. But this type of weather rarely comes - and so it may be with the mind, too. For me, it is like the undertow of a river, or trying to carry something heavy through water. I remember that time back in 2011, when I was drowning, and a few who were soaring above noticed and joined me on the water. By the flapping of their wings beside me, I was comforted in the reminder that I, too, have wings, and someday would soar again. Since the healing that came to me last year, I've had long stretches of few symptoms - and yet, here I am in the middle of a relapse of sorts.
What you may not realize, when you see me bleeding all over the church floor, is that I've confessed each sin a thousand times if I've confessed it once. A thousand times I have not felt that relief of release that should accompany confession. My heart and soul were so torn by the break that came with childhood abuse that it still feels black and muddy and shameful. It is the weight of that millstone around my neck that I cannot break free from - yet. The time may be coming, but for now, I'm still bleeding and it's still a mess all over my church's floor, the floors of my home. Dragging around wounds everywhere you go messes life up all over again.
Is someone in your life struggling with mental health issues? Won't you be the one who sits down beside them, or takes them on a walk, or offers them a space in which to heal every now and then? Can your church be a hospital for the wounded? Are you willing to bind up wounds and bear the stink of surgery and the long, slow road to recovery?
When we say YES - personally and corporately as the Body of Christ - then, truly, we are the hands and feet of Jesus' love for His people. In Galatians 6, in a section of the Bible titled by English translators "Bear and Share the Burdens", God says it this way:
...let us not grow weary of doing good, for in due season we will reap, if we do not give up. So then, as we have opportunity, let us do good to everyone, and especially to those who are of the household of faith.
.................................................................
Still counting gifts...
2008 Snuggling my son
2009 A moment of pure joy in a rainstorm with my Aaron
2010 those caring, willing hands of my family
2011 the rescue and release that is confession comes for a moment
2012 a true conversation with my own mama
It is the eve of the Triduum, Maundy Thursday, and I am hungry, starving, ravenous for the Man of Sorrows in Gethsemane. I go first to my church, and it is holy and sacred there. I walk up with head bowed to receive communion, the Bread and the Chalice, and the women serving say it quiet in the dark sanctuary, "The body of Christ, broken for you, Genevieve. The blood of Christ shed for you, Genevieve." I eat and I drink, but I am still hungry, soul-hungry.
I emerge from the dark sanctuary to a glorious sunset that speaks of the holiness of this night. Two thousand years ago, Jewish followers of Christ preparing for Pentacost. Jesus, washing dirty feet, serving bread and wine, speaking of the mysteries of faith.
I go to another church. Recite the Creed, pray on my knees as they do here, take communion. They say again, "The body of Christ, broken for you. The blood of Christ shed for you." In silence at the end, the altar is cleared, the lights are dimmed to near darkness, and most go out in silence. I stay on knees aching and pray for deliverance, as He did that last night.
Good Friday comes, and work is hard and long, but the hunger in my soul remains. I go to another church, not mine, and sit in the dim sanctuary where the cross is now draped with black and the only light is that of the sunset coming through the stained glass windows. Tonight is about the Cross, the moment when Christ took the sins of the world upon His ravaged body and willing soul. A familiar hymn is sung, and I am still singing it still today...
Another church. I kneel again. Ask for the continual redemption He promises for our daily lives...so different from the solitary moment of salvation, when we choose to be followers, believers. What I need today is the power of the Holy Spirit who came to dwell in me at that moment of salvation - I need Him to help me resist and to turn away from sin and to count blessings instead of spewing cursing.Continue to work out my salvation with fear and trembling (Philippians 2:12). A friend's words whisper in my quiet mind, being confident of this very thing, that He who has begun a good work in you will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ (Phil. 1:6).
This, my friends, is the hard road of sanctification...the red road of Gethsemane upon which we are slowly freed from the clutches of sin that so easy crowds in and crowds out...this depression, this spiritual battle, this day. It is redeemed already, yes - but sanctification, like salvation, is entered into by choice, and it is work. Sanctify: to set apart for sacred purpose, to free from sin, to purify.
To work out one's salvation is to be hungry, for we are never filled. It is to ache with emptiness, for we are not yet perfected. It is to count successes and to grieve failures, to be broken over and over again for the sins of self and the sins of the world. And yet...Jesus said it there, hanging bloodied on the Cross, to the thief who had no hope of a lifetime of sanctification: paradise. At the end, paradise. Free at last, free at last, thank God Almighty we will be free at last! (Martin Luther King, Jr.)
We process through the stations of the Cross, singing as we go: behold the wood of the Cross, on which hung the Savior of the world. As I bow in the dark church empty of Jesus, even the statue of Him carried out as it was to the tomb, my thoughts turn to His journey in those 3 days between death and resurrection. I am shattered with thankfulness. Filled with hope. Truly, all hope rests in the resurrection, the sunrise of Easter Sunday and the empty tomb. For what have I to fear if not death itself? As I fast in vigil tonight, it is with hope and an expectant soul:for sorrow may endure for a night, but joy comes in the morning.
I've been walking in the dark. Honing my night vision, spiritually. Psalm 51 has been a great comfort: Open my lips, Lord, and my mouth will declare Your praise. My sacrifice, O God, is a broken spirit. A broken and contrite heart You will not despise. I am reminded of a time such as this when repentance healed my broken heart, so broken it felt dead and silent inside me. I "turn my mind", words so similar to the definition of "repentance", the Hebrew word שׁוּבָה transliterated "shubah", meaning a return or a turning away from.
I remember, too, that I counted gifts then, wrote them down with paper and ink so they were there, indelible, monuments of God's faithfulness to bless me even in the dark night. And so, again, I pick up notebook, the one with pages and pages of the sins I've committed, the one I wrote my heart out in this past week. Spewing sadness. On top of the new page I tape the template for the tattoo I got on my wrist on Monday, covering up scars: Choose Life, from Deuteronomy 30 - the chapter of Scripture with the heading "The Offer of Life or Death". And then I begin again, at number 2,000, to number gifts. My therapist calls this "accumulating positives". Life hangs in the balance, and I choose to pile more on the side of Life and Joy than on Despair and Death.
The sunlight streams back into my soul, and I have 3 good days in a row. (I whisper this, as if hope may truly BE the thing with feathers that perches on the soul, and perhaps would will take wing if startled.) I have chosen the long, slow road of faith. There are quicker ways to peace, but none other that lasts for eternity. In the carbon black days of depression, I pray the fire in my brain is forming diamonds. For today, I simply give thanks for a good day. A reprieve, a relief, like the sigh as you lay head on pillow after a hard day's work, muscles melting and pain fading as you rest.
I strap on the yellow snowshoes given me by my love early in our marriage, because yellow always makes me smile. But today, my face is stuck in fear, grief, despair.
Night is falling, and I trek down the woods path through 4 foot drifts, floating atop, falling occasionally. I'm on a quest to find the big cottonwood, the one it would take 4 grown men to wrap their arms around. Trees like this don't just happen in Wisconsin. This tree is sacred.
I have the vague idea that if I could just sit there a while, my back against the solidness of that trunk, there would be peace for a few moments. I think, too, about staying there in the dark. Wonder if it would be easy to just go to sleep in the cold. My brain catches the thoughts in it's sieve and I turn them over in my mind and reject them. No precious stones there. I thank God for the cottonwood tree, pray that He will help me stand up and walk home. Choose life once more.
Darkness falls quickly in the woods. But I am smiling now. My breath comes hard and fast, I take off my mittens because the work has warmed all the places I felt dead inside. I pace my breathing. I take a chunk of snow in my bare hand and push it against forehead, the cold bringing my soul rushing back inside, ready for the walk home.
And as the sun sets, and the woods turn entirely to shadow, the snow gray instead of white, I emerge from the woods onto the road and home. I have survived, walked through this temptation. I whisper words from the one Psalm that jumps like Living Water from the pages of an otherwise lifeless Bible:
Restore to me the joy of your salvation and grant me a willing spirit, to sustain me. Then I will teach transgressors your ways, and sinners will turn back to you. Save me from bloodguilt, O God, the God who saves me, and my tongue will sing of your righteousness. The sacrifice of God is a broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart. O God, YOU will not despise. (Psalm 51:12-17 exc.)
If you stand still too long, the detritus of life begins to cling. Before too long, you look down and you can't see yourself any longer; only the barnacles of everything that's pulling you under the surface. Try to tear it off, and you'll bleed out.
He asks us to abide: stay under. Trust Him for oxygen when sobs wrack. Trust Him for a relief from this insurmountable pain of life that will someday come. That day when tears are wiped away.
But this year I asked for less. Revisionist that I am (aren't we all?), I want to say I want less of this. Less pain, less work, less abiding. But that's not what I meant by less. I meant less of me. Is this what it feels like to be reduced, refined, re-envisioned? Scraping off barnacles with a sharp stone while I struggle to stay here in the searing moment, sit with the pain?
Death is easy - you don’t know you’re a ghost
The fee is taken out nice and slow
While you’re walking around with your cardboard crown
We think we are kings
Wisdom warned us but our flesh is strong
we’ll find our own way we’ll get along
Who knows what we need
But
life costs so much
Someone paid for the damage
the damage we’ve done
How else do you explain all these open graves we’ve got
I want to fly away, fly away. Get away. Be someone, someplace else. Get out of this old skin around bones that ache. All the world is gray but I know somewhere, sometime soon, the colors will bleed back in. Right? Tell me so. Make me believe.
The hornet is sleepy as he walks down the porch rail, too tired to fly in autumn's chill. Satan is growing tired as well. He shot that one fiery dart into my soul: the belief that I don't deserve my life and my husband and children deserve better. I lost sight of the fact that God set us up as a family and specifically gave me life, wants me to accomplish something with it, despite my mistakes and weaknesses. All Satan accomplished was to tear a hole in my heart with that dart, a hole for God to fill.
I picture him, battle weary and worn from beating his wings against Christ's back, as Christ kneels to wrap His covering over my wounds. The shields of other saints circle me with prayer as I lie broken on the battle field. The fire on his darts whistles and dies in a spiral of smoke because the Cross has already extinguished them - these fiery darts meant to drag us down, down to the pit of hell.
I picture Jesus, beaten and broken for me on that cross, the scarlet river of His perfect blood washing away each and every sin that Satan would accuse me of. Even that nagging belief that I am too disgraceful to stay living. Christ drank the cup for me, took the price for my sins on His back as He died for me so that I might live.
Should I then say I don't deserve to live? Who am I to determine that I am not the right mother or wife for my family? Didn't He write all the days of my life out before I was even conceived? (Psalm 119)
I drag myself up to a kneeling position. The blood pouring from my side has staunched it's flow, and I reinflate my empty lungs with the heavy breath of His grace. I look down at my armor - dropped because it was too heavy to carry with that wound in my side. That belief weighing down on me with every step: you don't deserve this, you don't deserve this, you don't deserve this. I rationalized that because all my righteousness is as filthy rags, and no one is perfect, no not one, he's right, Satan. I don't deserve this. (Isaiah 64:6 and Jeremiah 2:22)
But Grace shouts out to the contrary: UNDESERVED FAVOR. The Cross proclaims that it is ALREADY GIVEN. Who I am to take the bread of life, already baked, fresh and aromatic, and push it away, saying, You never should have given me the bread of life? He alone is sovereign and He alone is good, and it only from under His wings of salvation that I can say to Satan, This was given to me. I deserve it through Christ alone.
And so I rip it back from His lies, my life, this undeserved favor. It is mine. Not his to take. Given to me by the maker of the universe. If God wants to take me home through cancer, my heart problems, so be it. I will run the race I am given. But I will never again allow Satan to trick me into destroying my body and disappointing and grieving those who walk this sacred path with me. I will not ever again wield a weapon against myself.
I beg God that, whenever my ending comes, He will send a thousand stars of grace out into the sky for others to see. That the odor of the bread of life He so richly gave to us is mine until the last breath He grants me. That I can finish like the young warrior in the video below, and proclaim my heart will choose to say, "Lord, blessed be Your name!"
Theoretically speaking, if you take proper maintenance of a car, it could last forever. My husband is pushing this theoretical truth every day in a 1984 Honda Accord. This runner has had many visits to the mechanic, and just as many repairs in our own garage. You could skip the maintenance and just go repair-to-repair. However, most people are aware of the enormous amount of trouble they get into if they skip maintenance.
What is maintenance for life? I have loved Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs since I first read it. Maintenance probably covers the whole pyramid up until you hit self-actualization.
Yet suddenly a crisis is upon you. A crisis of faith, a crack in your marriage, a season of grief or depression, the death of someone so important to you there are threads of that person all through your life's tapestry, and now suddenly their scarlet cord is seen no more. Horrible memories that have stayed stuffed in a box for many, many years come spilling out of the past and into your present.
In health care, when we get a patient gasping on a gurney, blue-tinged with the effort to suck air into lungs, we do something called CPR. What about spiritual CPR? How do you react when the car finally grinds to a halt? You've probably had weeks of little warning signs that something's wrong, but you don't put your finger on it until the car won't go another foot. I do the same thing spiritually. It is out of my deepest crises that I cry loudest for God, long deepest for Him, feel distant and alone.
When that wheezing patient comes in on the ambulance gurney, both nurses and doctors rush to check a list of body functions that has also earned an acronym. ABC. Airway: does the person still have an opening for the Word to work? Breathing: has the person been breathing in Christ through the Bible? Circulation: is that Bible study apparent in the actions of the person?
Nurses see patients who can't breath for various reasons. But the response is always, always the same. ABC. If those are all intact - airway, breathing, circulation - then a slower process of determining the problem can take place. The patient isn't in imminent danger. Aaron's hands, pulling out pieces and spraying gas and diagnosing the problem with his Honda, he knows where to look. Circulation is the problem here. Gas gets to the engine but the distributor cap is worn out, so electricity is not circulating and keeping the engine going.
Response to spiritual crises can follow this same top-down approach to what has been broken in the Christian's life. When you face a crisis, some of which can be weathered without any more help beyond yourself and God, check your ABC's. Have I even been trying to connect with God? Am I reading His word? Does what I read make an impact in my life that is visible?
There are times when all you have to do is pick up the Bible and read about your problem. Or read a Psalm and weep and heal. Think back to all the previous repairs God has done in your life. It is here, in the broken place, that you need to remember the monuments of faith in your past. Remember when money was so short you didn't know if you could make it to next payday, and an unexpected check came in the mail and you survived? Remember when your child was sick and you begged for healing, and healing came? Remember being on your knees on the hard hospital floor, praying that your mother might go to Jesus peacefully and without physical pain, and she did? Remember when you bought a house and could barely make the payments and then they increased your insurance, and somehow, you don't know how, logically, the payments could still be made?
There are also times to pick up the phone and call for help. Parents and pastors are usually my first stops. Sometimes help comes from a source you would never expect. Yesterday, at church, I needed a little more space so I moved to the coffee shop where the message is broadcast live on a large-screen TV. I set my purse and notes down on a couch, thinking that would give me more personal space, and stepped out for a breath of fresh air. When I came back to my couch, there was a dear friend sitting there, right next to my little pile.
Spiritual crisis CPR:
Airway: do I still have a connection and desire for God?
Breathing: am I reading His word?
Circulation: am I allowing His word to refresh and build me?
High up on a rock
Looking out at the horizon
Watching as the storm rolls in
Wondering if my heart will survive it
As the waves crash all around me
And can't remember what it feels like to be free
You say, I've got you my baby
I've got you
It's quite the mess you're in
But it's nothing Love can't fix
So sit here upon my shoulders
And watch as it all unwinds
You are making me a mountain
Making me a mountain
That cannot be shaken
I know You're making me a mountain
Making me a mountain
That cannot be moved
~Trust, Kristene Mueller~
Excerpted from my Gratitude Journal, 710-723:
#710: a cardinal who flies by every morning, reminding me of my grandpa
#712: free tow home for the Honda - thanks, Mom!
#713: People who love my kids take them so I heal slow in those quiet golden hours
#715: Caleb wakes up HAPPY! (this is minor miracle)
Head knowledge is different than knowing something deep in your heart. The concept that echoes through every conversation I've had in the past few months is God's love. I believe that He died for me, which was an act of love. But I find the blackness of my own heart so hideous that it is hard to believe that He forgave that out of love. Perhaps this is why He seems so distant from me lately. How would you feel if you tried to give someone a gift and they rejected it, citing their unworthiness, then walking away from you? The ongoing acceptance of God's love in our broken lives is praise, worship, and thankfulness. That's what God wants me to be doing.
In the quagmire of guilt and shame, I am searching frantically for the rope to lift me out. I find it in Romans during devotions this morning, and exhale a long slow sigh I didn't know I was holding in.
For the Scripture says, "Everyone who believes in him will not be put to shame." 10:11
Jesus took me on an amazing journey in the past 2 weeks. After struggling, struggling, struggling with depression for months, trying this medication and that, I was suddenly plunged into the depths of the dark pit of my own past sins and Satan's wrenching grip. God felt so far away, like a satellite makes it's slow orbit around the earth - He, making His silent orbit around me a million miles away, just checking in those darkest hours of the night. Faith fit me like a clumsy second-hand coat and I couldn't find my battle armor. Faith is lost, and is carried away out of their mouth (Jeremiah 7:28b).
I hurt myself, people who care deeply about me, loving and respecting and believing, sometimes, I think, in the "writer Genevieve", not the real and battle-worn Genevieve standing before them. The cost of believing in little snippets of joy is that sometimes the darkest sorrows spin underneath beyond the glimpse of anyone but yourself. I should have reached out for help much sooner. I never want to forget that. My past sins seemed to surround me, drowning out hope. You summoned as if to a festival day my terrors on every side (Lamentations 2:22 exc.).
And so, dying on the vine, hope squashed and faith seeming nothing but mirage, I asked God for heaven instead of this bleak earth. Those people I hurt - they were crushed this time. I broke the trust of my caregivers at the hospital where they tried to titrate medications to bring me out of the fog of disillusionment and grief. As I saw what I had done - laid waste to every dream I've ever had, forever scarred those I love best, traded ashes again for beauty - I never wanted to do that again.
A dear pastor came and spoke Truth into my weary head, and I began to sense myself re-entering the war for my body. My soul claimed long ago by the blood of the Cross, Satan was there to steal my body and my story so that I could never touch another person with the power of my life redeemed. My pastor pleaded with me, Beloved, I urge you as sojourner and exile to abstain from the passions of the flesh, which wage war against your soul. (I Peter 2:12)
But warfare is infinitely more difficult than giving in to Satan. Therefore, my dear friends, as you have always obeyed—not only in my presence, but now much more in my absence—continue to work out your salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you to will and to act according to his good purpose. (Philipians 2:12-13)
I slipped again, and the pain was new for all surrounding me. In a solitary room, four green walls and a bed bolted to the floor with slots for restraints, without Bible or friend to comfort, just two red-eyed video cameras analyzing my every move, I praised God for His foresight as I had memorized Psalm 73:26 the night prior: My flesh and heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever.
I leaned on Deuteronomy 30:19-20a: I call heaven and earth to witness against you today, that I have set before you life and death, blessing and curse. Therefore choose life, that you and your offspring may live, loving the Lord your God, obeying his voice and holding fast to him, for he is your life and length of days. However mindless and mind-numbing those days in the solitary room were, me pacing around the bed, stretching, doing push-ups, even singing at the top of my lungs in the corner ampitheater squeezed tight into what felt like a more private space - God was at work.
The day I chose life, when death was just another slice away, I sensed God knew my limitations, for He has promised that He is faithful, who will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you are able, but with the temptation will provide the way of escape also, so that you will be able to endure it. (I Corinthians 10:13)
He stepped in to lift me up and fight for me. I felt like we were still flying low, but I could feel the wind in my hair, feel the flutter of the eagle's wing feathers as we floated above the battle and looked down at the vast sea of sorrow I had thought was so large. Now so little from the vantage point on His back. Yes, He seemed far away, as though He were the satellite in meaningless orbit just glinting in on the darkness of my days, as it says in Isaiah 45, In a surge of anger I hid my face from you for a moment, but with everlasting kindness I will have compassion on you.
But hope was not far off on a distant shore over an uncrossable ocean of tears.
For the mountains may depart and the hills be removed, but my steadfast love shall not depart from you, and my covenant of peace shall not be removed,” says the LORD, who has compassion on you. “O afflicted one, storm-tossed and not comforted, behold, I will set your stones in antimony, and lay your foundations with sapphires. I will make your pinnacles of agate, your gates of carbuncles, and all your wall of precious stones. All your children shall be taught by the LORD, and great shall be the peace of your children. In righteousness you shall be established; you shall be far from oppression, for you shall not fear; and from terror, for it shall not come near you. If anyone stirs up strife, it is not from me; whoever stirs up strife with you shall fall because of you. Behold, I have created the smith who blows the fire of coals and produces a weapon for its purpose. I have also created the ravager to destroy; no weapon that is fashioned against you shall succeed, and you shall confute every tongue that rises against you in judgment. This is the heritage of the servants of the LORD and their vindication from me, declares the LORD. (Isaiah 54:10-17)
Torment fled from my nightmares, and terror from my flashbacks during the day. Turn to me and be saved, all the ends of the earth! For I am God, and there is no other. (Isaiah 45:22) I began to rest well again, enjoy my days, and smile. God gave me this verse on one of my last days in the hospital, as I prepared to move my new-found confidence back out into real life and beyond the cloistered walls of a monitored unit of the hospital. Restore our fortunes, O Lord...Those who sow in tears shall reap with shouts of joy! He who goes out weeping, bearing the seed for sowing, shall come home with shouts of joy, bringing his sheaves with him. (Psalm 126:4-6) Shouting for joy still sounds like a pipe dream but I do trust this God who once again showed up in my life in amazing ways.
It is well with my soul,
Thou has taught me to say...
To you, O Lord, I cry, and to the Lord I plead for mercy: What profit is there in my death, if I go down to the pit? Will the dust praise you? Will it tell of your faithfulness? Hear, O Lord, and be merciful to me! O Lord, be my helper!” (Psalm 30:9-12)
Excerpted from my gratitude journal, the weeks in the hospital, #312-541:
312. There is nothing in my room sharp enough to cut through skin
313. God only turns His face for a short time (Isaiah 54:8)
315. I am learning to ask for help.
317. I learned more about spiritual warfare now more than ever before
319. Being surrounded by the shields of faith of friends and family so fiery darts can't reach me.
322. What profit is there in my death? (Ps. 30:9-12)
324. A big bad biker dude borrowing my pink Bible to search for God
330. Scripture always ready on my tongue, even when I am a victim of the battle (thanks, Mama and God).
332. The gorgeous strawberry blond crowning the tired and lonely head of a teenager
335. The great, great God who stilled this anxious heart and fought for my life, sending terror far from me.
411. Souls won for Christ while I offer His words to them with my bleeding hands, spoon it into their chalk dry mouths and thirsty souls
537. Holding Mama's hand during my discharge planning meeting
538. Grandparents willing - nay, happy! - to help with my brood
539. Kristy always ready with a hand to hold and a prayer on her lips for me
540. The sweetest sentences I've ever read, from my Dad-in-law and Nate York
542. Sweet Sara picking me up with belly laughs and delight
My past was a blur and didn’t feel real, my present was a screaming siren of war and my hope was swallowed in the darkness. One thing I have learned is that Satan has little power over the believer. He can have his way with a person only under the jurisdiction of God. He can attack, tempt or torment only with a nod from the Almighty. God has given Satan a certain amount of freedom, but if God is always with you, then there is never a time where Satan is acting against you without God’s supervision. A lot of his damage is done with smoke and mirrors. He’s a creative liar who plays on your fears and emotions to manipulate you into a place where you are worthless and unable to produce. He wants to steal your story because he’s scared of the power it contains. In the vision that John wrote about in Revelations he says that he saw the believers defeating Satan with the blood of the Lamb and the word of their testimony. If Satan can’t undo the crucifixion, then his ultimate focus is to be on what he can do, He wants to get believers to a place where they are no longer heard. — Serena Woods
On Monday, I gave up. On Tuesday, God gave me the best day ever with my kids. On Tuesday night, I was admitted to the hospital. I re-engaged my will in this cosmic battle for my life. Life is dark, torment filled and fidgety. Pray for me, please. The battle rages on and I feel far, far away from God, with the claws of darkness so real and so close, digging in my back.
You go through seasons in this life, droughts and times of plenty, harvests and times to plow and plant. What I like about the concept of seasons is that you are never in one place for long. I don't want to be here long.
This season of my life has been a hard one. Sometimes it's a hailstorm, here and there a few tornadoes; when it's calm it's a famine, a drought, a desert. Yet down comes the manna, in the old friend who sits in a worn chair, her hands hard-working hands, sore hands, just like mine. Sore from the cancer, worn from the constant opening of those stiff fingers to offer the precious treasures, to say, "God, yes, you can have this, too." Weary from the living out of the constant task of giving and releasing and suffering that means treasure in heaven instead of on this earth.
It's easy to lose focus in the dust storm. As all the landmarks of your world are picked up by the dust devil and your eyes sting with tears, you look out on an alien landscape that looks like it can't be traversed. Not with the supplies you have on hand, not with the skills you possess, not all alone like you find yourself. Where are you, God? you cry out with the Psalmist, and you skip the hallelujah at the end of the Psalm and read right on into the next wrestling match with God in the beginning of the next chapter. Do you see what is happening? Do you care about what I am losing? Will you really sustain me?
You read that joy erases the memory of pain (John 16:21). Your friend's smile brings laughter bubbling to your lips, and even days later, as you look over the pictures you took of her, awkward, self-conscious dear one sitting in the sunny bedroom corner, it is joy that mounts victory in your heart and wilts the weed of helplessness that dust devil planted in your heart just hours ago.
The power of the Gospel is that, no matter what the landscape of your life, no matter what you lose or gain, weep for or laugh about, you no longer have to spend time or energy thinking about or trying to control what others think of you. Only one person matters. And He is the one who is lavishing joy, squashing sorrow, paving your way, and showing you the road that you - you, and no other - are to walk in. He is the one to whom you repent, He is the one who not only forgives but forgets and rebuilds, He is the one who whispers so deeply of love that the lying dust devil is drowned out. He is your map through the wilderness. Your lover when others wound. Your comfort when the world is comfortless. Your Father, your Friend, your Redeemer.
So crawl in. Crawl in to the redeeming love of Christ, be covered by His sacrifice and hidden in His grace. You don't have to take these darts to your soul. It is His shield that covers your soul. Have faith. Wield that shield. You carry His voice inside you where no dust devil can drown it out.
...be strong in the Lord and in his mighty power. Put on the full armor of God, so that you can take your stand against the devil’s schemes. For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms. Therefore put on the full armor of God, so that when the day of evil comes, you may be able to stand your ground, and after you have done everything, to stand. Stand firm then, with the belt of truth buckled around your waist, with the breastplate of righteousness in place, and with your feet fitted with the readiness that comes from the gospel of peace. In addition to all this, take up the shield of faith, with which you can extinguish all the flaming arrows of the evil one. Take the helmet of salvation and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God. And pray in the Spirit on all occasions with all kinds of prayers and requests. With this in mind, be alert and always keep on praying for all the Lord’s people. Pray also for me, that whenever I speak, words may be given me so that I will fearlessly make known the mystery of the gospel, for which I am an ambassador in chains. Pray that I may declare it fearlessly, as I should. (Ephesians 6:10-20)
