Tag: pain

Who Else?

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I’ve spent a lot of time in school. Like most people, I was required to assimilate and regurgitate  information. I’ve learned arithmetic, the parts of speech, capitals, countries, continents, and species of flora. Buried in my brain is The Periodic Table, multiplication tables, and the chemical formula for table salt. I can still recite the first few lines of the prologue to The Canterbury Tales in Middle English: “Whan that aprill with his shoures soote, the droghte of march hath perced to the roote…” Oh, the trauma!

I’m naturally curious so learning is enjoyable. Even though I’m an anxious student when it comes to grades, I do find pleasure in exploring new ideas and perspectives. The human experience is broad and varied, and I want to understand it more fully.

Getting more personal, I want to know why I do what I do (and don’t do). Where I come from and why I am the way I am. My DNA says I’m a blend of Dutch, English, German, Scottish, and Norse (in that order). I’m Enneagram Type 5, wing 6. Myers-Briggs pegs me as INTJ. My top five Strengthsfinder characteristics are Input, Intellection, Learner, Achiever, and Responsibility. More than one spiritual gift assessment has suggested I have the gifts of teaching, administration, and pastoral care. And for the rest of my life, I think I’ll struggle with perfectionism, anger, and remembering names.

All these things are data offering insight into me. Anecdotal evidence generally confirms my assessed proclivities, propensities, priorities, and personality. Much of it has been helpful in my development. I have matured, even though at times I don’t feel any different than my 16-year old self. Now 51, I’m taking stock and finding there are times when I’m a bit too smug about the categories and lists and mantras I’ve collected to neatly define my identity, clarify my “issues,” and predict my behavioral response.

Frankly, I feel squashed beneath all the charts, graphs, types, and profiles. While such things have been quite helpful, my heart is yearning for more mystery. Rather than settle into pathways prescribed by what I think I know about me, I’m drawn to release myself more fully to God. Over the past few months, I’ve been inviting His presence to help me listen, discern, embrace, and respond to my experience of Him. I’m asking for a deeper trust that fuels a desire to risk moving beyond the false comfort of self-knowledge to submitting myself to the One who knew me before I saw light.

Thomas Merton said, “What is the use of knowing our weakness if we do not implore God to sustain us with His power?” (Thoughts in Solitude, p.48) I know a lot about me. And for too long I’ve focused on what’s broken. Paid too much attention to the “lies” of my shadow self, trying to correct through self-diagnosis. At times I found it easier to commiserate over failures than to lament and repent. 

I want a deeper faith. A greater love. More trust that Jesus can direct my life better than I can. To slow my chase after knowledge and respond to God’s invitation to dwell with Him in those places that confuse, confound, frustrate, and irritate me. Places that defy analysis, categories, and predictable outcomes.

As I pray for fortitude and courage to that end, I’m remembering the Apostle Peter. In a moment when many of those following Jesus were turning away, the Lord asked Peter if he, too, was going to leave. Peter replied (I imagine with passion): “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life.” (John 6:68, ESV)

Indeed, who else but Jesus.

A Converted Caravan

Chris De Man1 Comment

The photos shuffling on the display of my computer are of the Gros Ventre Wilderness near Jackson, Wyoming. During the summer of 2018, my youngest son and I, along with a handful of other fathers and their sons, set-out into that remote part of the American West for an 8-day adventure of vigorous hiking.

While the mountainous vistas are worth every step, such trips are not without tense moments and uncertainty. Weather, terrain, injury, illness, and mental fortitude are ever-present variables. During our 24-hour drive to the trailhead, our group pondered some important questions: Would the trail be navigable? Would there be good places to camp near a potable water source? Would the snow pack cause us to re-route and lengthen our hike or send us bushwhacking? What do we do if a bear eats our food, and did we bring the bear spray?

Our concerns were not unfounded. We encountered snow. We detoured. But there were no bears. More serious and unexpected, however, was our encounter with illness. As the days passed, one of our teammates became weak and exceptionally tired, struggling more and more with the rigor of uphill climbs. To assist, we lightened his load by dispersing items in his pack among the group. This continued until he walked packless, clutching only a small bottle of water. Still, his body wearied toward delirium and heat stroke. We stopped and rested often. Fully spent on our final day, our sweat-drenched friend groaned as he sat hunched over a scraggly Western Pine, and wept. We wept, too. And prayed. As we baked in an arid, sun-soaked valley, miles from our exit, a new dimension was demanded from our fraternity.

That hiking experience is not unlike the Christian life. The journey of faithful living is arduous, unpredictable, and shouldn’t be done alone. Yet in our current culture of rugged individualism, we might be lulled toward habits that isolate and behaviors that exacerbate a prideful disposition of, “I’ve got this!” And this individualism can seep into our spiritual practices. How? For me, I’m very content with quiet mornings of coffee, reading from Scripture and another book (or two), a bit of conversational prayer, and some writing. Just God and me and the stillness of the pre-dawn morning. While this solitary practice has merit, if I neglect to supplement my peace and quiet with face-to-face interactions, I’ll be spiritually under-developed and relationally malnourished.

Referring to the collective of professing Christians, Jamie Smith said, “Conversion is joining this caravan, not setting out alone.” (On The Road With Saint Augustine, 51) More importantly, Scripture commands us to make togetherness a priority. (Heb 10:24-25) It is in our gathering that we apply salve to wounds and reorient those who’ve strayed. We support and carry those who are weak. We encourage, edify, celebrate, and grieve — together.

In his book, Reaching Out, Henri Nouwen said: “The Church is not an institution forcing us to follow its rules. It is a community of people inviting us to still our hunger and thirst at its tables.” (88-89) From time to time, each of us will be desperate and tired, mustering our last bits of courage to take one more step. When those moments come, we need each other.

In my previous post I challenged us to consider our “doings” — our involvements, behaviors, and activities that determine who we are becoming. I’ve been meditating on my “doing” this past week as part of the Advent season. For the second week of Advent, I’m going to consider how my desire for introverted independence tugs me toward seclusion. I’ll be evaluating the balance of time alone with time in community.

How about you? Are you wandering alone? Are you regularly engaged with like-minded people of faith? Do you have friends who both challenge and support you? Do you consistently give of yourself and your resources for the good of others?

To finish the story, we made it out of the Gros Ventre. It required patience, humility, empathy, encouragement, and of course God’s kind providence. Looking back, it was a privilege to pace with our hurting friend during that intense and painful episode. He couldn’t have done it without us.

As people of faith, we’re members of a glorious caravan. We journey together. This day, let’s encourage one another to walk by faith, trusting the One who gives us hope through His birth, death, and resurrection — our traveling companion, Jesus Christ.

A Prayer Against Isolation
Friend and Brother, our Lord Jesus Christ,
Pioneer on the path to glory;
Invade my realm of detached independence,
amend my affections with desire for your people.

“And let us consider how we may spur one another on toward love and good deeds, not giving up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but encouraging one another—and all the more as you see the Day approaching.”
(Hebrews 10:24–25, NIV)

Sappy and Green

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I enjoy making new from old. dripping_tree_sap

Last summer in an unplanned flash of creativity, I crafted an outdoor iPod music station. I had a riot pairing my imagination with a stack of wood from weathered apple crates. Today, that music box stands erect, like a soldier at Buckingham Palace, ready to deliver play-listed tunes into the springtime green of our backyard.

Last week, as I unpacked my musical re-creation from it’s winter storage, my mind recalled a recent conversation with a friend. He and his wife are battling cancer — again. The situation is fragile. Emotions are volatile. The future uncertain. Questions ooze from every conversation. Predominant among them is: “Why is this happening, again?”

Life is seasonal. In my friend’s case, cyclical. The chapters of our living stack side-by-side and layer a story. Some of the chapters read with discouragement and despair in our pursuit of happiness. Others have plot lines wrapped around self-affirmation and high-minded morality. And some are penned while walking the slender path that’s illumined step-by-step with a sanctified glow.

We all wander and weave a journey that brings us to lung-burning climbs and leg-aching descents. None are immune from life’s frustrations and setbacks. Each of us cycle through joy and sorrow, breaking and building, closed doors and open.

Hindsight is the gift of reflection. A glimpse backward helps us piece together personal themes, the development of relationships, and circumstances that are more purpose driven than random. In our looking back, we see the progression of being torn down and built up. We see Someone at work.

For those who follow Jesus, our life is a steady plodding toward restoration. In every circumstance, our hope is immovably anchored in the surety of God’s plan of renewal. Deep within, we’re “ever full of sap and green.” * We’re alive and growing by the Spirit of grace.

As you page through your story today, be it joyous, painful, or commonplace, remember that every moment is an opportunity to worship. Believe that your life is not a fate-driven tragedy. A hopeless endeavor. A cycle of needless pain. We are all being broken down and built up. We are green, sappy, deeply loved people being transformed from the old and broken into fruit-bearing newness. In all things, may we be vibrant ambassadors who step with trust into the wonderful mystery of the story God is writing.

* “The righteous flourish like the palm tree and grow like a cedar in Lebanon. They are planted in the house of the Lord; they flourish in the courts of our God. They still bear fruit in old age; they are ever full of sap and green, to declare that the Lord is upright; he is my rock, and there is no unrighteousness in him.”
Psalm 92:12–15, ESV