In the summer of 2022, I embarked on a quest to understand “blessing” in a more comprehensive way. I suspected that when my friends or I used or heard the word “blessed” or “blessing” we had only a partial picture of what it means. I started my research reading Divine Blessing: And the Fullness of Life in the Presence of Godby William R. Osborne. At the time, I wondered about the influence of the prosperity gospel in America — primarily, it’s the notion that you know God loves you because God gives you stuff – blessings – when you are obedient and faithful. It is more nuanced than that to be fair, but the idea that wealth and opportunity are evidence of God’s blessing is strongly emphasized in the prosperity gospel. It’s also conveniently rooted in the values of American culture. The American Dream is that with diligence, patience, and cleverness we can all have a family, a house with a yard and white picket fence, a dog, a car, good health, and time off for vacations. Success is just waiting for those who work for it.
The shadow side of all this is the assumption that if you are not wealthy, or healthy, or employed, or in a “nice” neighborhood, at worst, it is God’s punishment, and at best, it is the consequence of one’s own actions. Maybe it’s the parent’s fault, but even then it remains one’s own responsibility to overcome their past. Thus, if you haven’t yet been blessed by God with good things and opportunities, then there’s a reason and it’s probably that you need to work harder, be more faithful, more obedient, more clever.
Most people won’t admit they think this way. In fact, most people I know don’t think this way, but we do act this way. We feel safer, blessed, loved by God when we get the new job, when we get the healing and our project is approved. We feel abandoned by God when we get the diagnosis, when we miss the chance, when our vacation is canceled. We don’t believe the poor are cursed by God, but we also don’t get too close to them personally. In fact, we give generously to them. Well, we give to organizations that serve the poor. Their lives are messy and difficult and painful even to witness. We worry. What if they take advantage of me or what if they assume bad things about me? What if they need more than I can give? What if they aren’t doing anything wrong? We feel inadequate and confused and out of control, so we keep our distance and love them from afar.
For many, “blessing” is just the pretty Christian-veneer on consumerism and materialism, a way to give the American economy some kind of theological justification.
To be sure, there are passages in which God promises to bless the people with land and prosperity and family and security for their faithfulness to Him and obedience to His commands. But there are other Biblical passages that are far less transactional. William Osborne’s book, Divine Blessing, traces the meaning and use of the word and concept of blessing throughout the Bible. This was my starting place.
In his book, Osborne argues that from a biblical-theological perspective, God’s blessings are material AND spiritual AND relational AND present AND eschatological. He writes,
“Divine blessing in the Bible is always physical and spiritual because it is fixed upon the reality of the fullness of life in the presence of God.”
Blessing is everything that is needed to be fully alive in the presence of God. So God’s blessings can be food and land and family, but it is also God’s presence and teachings. To be blessed is more fully available now because of Jesus, and through the Holy Spirit, but it’s also still not something we can completely realize. The fullness of life in the presence of God is the gift and the goal of the God Who Blesses.
Blessing is everything that is needed to be fully alive in the presence of God.
The fulfillment of this life abundant is on its way. For now, we wait, in various degrees of comfort and dis-ease, to experience the fullness of life in God, in BOTH a physical and spiritual and present way. So as far as the Bible is concerned,
“The relationship between the spiritual blessings and the consummation of physical blessings is a matter of redemptive-historical timing.”
God waits and works toward this consummation because God is, and has always been, working to ensure that ALL people are blessed.
Blessing is not just something we receive from God, it is something we are (blessed) and something we do (bless others).
Primarily, what I learned is that blessing is really not about stuff or opportunity. If anything, the more stuff and opportunity people have, the more we risk losing connection to the Giver if we focus on the gift.
“So the question that contemporary Christians should ask when evaluating whether this thing or that circumstance is God’s blessing should be: Does this ‘blessing’ draw me closer to the triune God? Does this need being met bring me nearer to the giver, or is it a distraction?”
At the core, something is a blessing if it helps us connect more fully with God and with God’s Creation.
It is the essence of the God of the Bible to bless His Creation. I had assumed they were gold stars for good work. They aren’t. They are expressions of love to connect all of us to God. Blessings cannot be hoarded nor do they prove one’s righteousness. Blessing is all that God does to draws us deeper into life abundant in his presence.
So yes, the new car could be a blessing. But there could also be blessing in the diagnosis, and the job loss, and the friend who listened, and the hard labor, and the soft pillow, and the hope that tomorrow will be better.
“‘Blessed are those who are invited to the marriage supper of the Lamb.’ And he said to me, ‘These are the true words of God.’”
(Rev. 19:9)
Lately, I’ve been interested in truly understanding what the Bible means by “blessing.” As William R. Osborne explains, “True blessings, no matter the form, always lead us nearer to God, deepening our relationship with the divine giver.” So blessings may be material, spiritual, experienced in the present, or fully realized in the future, but, at their core, what makes something a blessing is that it draws us closer into relationship with the Giver, the One Who Blesses.
In my research, I came across Nancy Guthrie’s book, Blessed: Experiencing the Promise of the Book of Revelation. The book is a study of Revelation based on the seven blessings mentioned in the book. SEVEN blessings. Having essentially ignored and avoided Revelation my whole life, I only knew vaguely of its images of bloodshed, beasts, violence, judgment, and destruction. Where are the blessings in that? Perhaps the biblical idea of blessing is a far more complicated than one might have guessed.
Guthrie groups chapters 17-19 of Revelation with its blessing,
“‘Blessed are those who are invited to the marriage supper of the Lamb.’
And he said to me, ‘These are the true words of God.’” (Rev. 19:9)
The Context
Just to review, the context for this blessing, chapters 17-19 of Revelation, are about “the doom of Babylon.” John, the author of Revelation, is trying to describe what he saw in a vision – what was revealed to him about how the world is and will be from the perspective of the divine realm. John, however, only has earthly words and thoughts to describe what God has shown him. As a result, the descriptions are largely symbolic. In chapters 17-19, we’re supposed to feel hopeful about what happens to “the whore” and “the beast.”
In these chapters, John describes the world as Babylon. Babylon looks like a gorgeous, drunk woman in fine clothes and covered in jewels who sits upon a beast of seven heads and ten horns. The beast represents evil. Babylon isn’t just a city, but a representation of all economies, commerce, governmental power, racism, paternalism, sexism, abuse, injustice, etc. All world systems that promote excess and inequality in the world, prosperity at the cost of poverty, immorality, the celebration of human achievement and power apart from God, indulgence and addiction, all systems of greed and manipulation and oppression. In these chapters, John sees the gruesome and definitive end of Babylon and evil. While Revelation may be largely symbolic in its images, the destruction of “the whore” and “the beast” is not a symbolic end to these complex worldly systems and the evil those systems demand and perpetuate. John witnesses the complete end of evil and all those who support, prop up, benefit from, enable, and value those systems of injustice and immorality.
All that remains after Babylon’s demise are those who have been faithful to Jesus. Those who held fast to Him and patiently endured, despite the persecution, loneliness, pain, suffering, messiness, awkwardness. The invitees are those who valued what Jesus valued, worked their work as best they could, and lived the Gospel truth. Those who spent their energy, money, and days living faithfully in Jesus are “blessed” and “invited to the marriage supper.”
The point is that by staying committed to Jesus in all the decisions we make, big and small, and through all the experiences forced upon us, we are prepared as a bride. We get ready for a world without sin and death by resisting Babylon and its temptations and staying faithful to Jesus’ way. Bit by bit, we let the truth that God loves us, blesses us, is with us and for us transform what we do and how we do it.
“Babylon” comes for us in many ways. And yet. We refuse to return evil for evil. We follow the way of the Lamb.
When we patiently endure and love anyways, we thwart corruption. When we grieve and suffer and struggle, we turn to God, crying out for help and trusting God to hold and eventually heal our pain and anger. We doggedly persist in gratitude and acts of generosity and kindness and forgiveness as we reject the lure of consumerism and pursue justice. We practice our faith in a million little ways, confident in joy and contentment, blessing others.
Or, at least, we try. Thankfully, the marriage is to the Lamb – the one who knows our limitations and weaknesses, has embodied them. The Lamb, slain for our sin and rising victorious over the death that evil brings, gifts us with grace. The bridegroom knows we falter and fail. We aren’t yet perfect. God knows it can feel impossible to resist evil. Sometimes, though, the hard part of faith isn’t doing what’s right but truly believing we are forgiven fully and loved completely just as we are.
We are prepared as a bride. We turn to our Lover again and again to do life together here and now. We repent, again and again. The blessing is that not only are we together now in this mess, but in the end, too, at the marriage. We trust the Lamb’s love and accept His grace, and so we are not swept away by the sins of the world around us or consumed by the sins we chose. We will be invited to supper and dressed for the wedding. Rev. 19:7c-8 (CEB) reads, “his bride has made herself ready. She was given fine, pure white linen to wear, for the fine linen is the saints’ acts of justice.” The bride is given the dress to wear. We will be deemed worthy to be known by the acts of justice that God’s own Spirit empowered us to do because our sins will have been washed away by the love of the Lamb. We will enter an intimacy that is now only glimpsed, rumored, tasted in moments. And it will be worth the wait and the work. Love and justice will be our new normal.
The Questions
Think about your roles and responsibilities. Parent. Spouse. Employee/Employer/Supervisor/Coworker. Purchaser. Owner. Neighbor. Member. Citizen. Friend. Consumer.
As you consider these realms of responsibility and influence, reflect on the following questions.
How do I come out of Babylon — to be in the world, but not of the world? In other words, as a ______________, how does the world urge me to believe/behave and how does Jesus?
What power do I have and how might it be used as an extension of the beast? How might I be unfaithful to Jesus as a _____________?
In the end, we are clothed with the righteous deeds of the saints. But the dress (the righteous deeds of the saints) is given to us. We are not saved because of our good deeds, but by the grace of Jesus. We love because Christ first loved us. As we trust in the truth of that Love, the Spirit empowers us to live abundantly – to do justice, love mercy, and walk humbly with God. How is Christ’s righteousness evident in my life/helping me live? How am I faithful to Jesus?
These Scripture passages came to my mind as I tried to answer these questions: Romans 12:1-2, Deuteronomy 15:10-11, Luke 9:23-24, Matthew 11:28
How is this a blessing?
If the Bible’s idea of blessing is everything that draws us to the Giver, what makes the struggle to be in the world, but not of the world, a blessing?
Tish Harrison Warren, “Faith, I’ve come to believe, is more craft than feeling. And prayer is our chief practice in the craft.” (8)
Prayer in the Night
When I say I have faith in God, is it a feeling I have toward God? Or a set of thoughts or beliefs about God? Or something else?
To be sure, there is an aspect of faith that is in the mind. What we think about the nature of God and life is part of faith. However, faith is lived or not. What we believe and how much we understand informs our experience of faith. It can even shape how we feel our faith. When we talk about faith as something we feel, I suppose we’re talking about our trust in God, or maybe, sometimes, even our hope. Perhaps belief is the faith we think, and trust is the faith we feel.
Sometimes I feel my faith in God and sometimes I don’t. For example, I know that God brings healing. Both Christian dogma and doctrine and my lived experience affirm this. I have faith in God’s desire and ability to heal and I believe in God’s healing work – both the miraculous and collaborative. It’s just sometimes God doesn’t heal us when we pray and ask for that very thing, in the name of Jesus. So even as I’m praying, sometimes I can’t muster the feeling of faith — the hope or trust that God’s answer to my prayer will be healing. I don’t “believe” a miracle is coming.
Some would say, then, that I don’t have enough faith. I don’t believe enough. But I do have faith that God does miracles, does heal. I believe God listens to us, loves us, cares about us. It’s why I pray at all.
from susannp4 on pixabay
But faith also has to reckon with the truth that sometimes God doesn’t work the miracle we ask for, and that God’s desire and ability to work miracles is not dependent on the amount of faith of the requesting party. There is not a faith deposit one must submit to qualify for a miracle or blessing from God.
There are many stories in the Gospels about faith and miracles. Peter is able to walk on water when Jesus calls him because he believes, but then begins to drown when he panics about the wind. Jesus calls him, “ye of little faith.” Enough faith to get out of the boat and walk a bit, but not enough to get to Jesus. Still, Peter is saved. There’s the man in the Gospel of Mark asking if Jesus could heal his child. When Jesus questions the man, he responds, “I believe. Help my unbelief,” and the child is healed. There’s the hemmoraging woman who has so much faith that she only needs to touch Jesus’ robe to be healed, and the Syrophoenician woman who has faith enough to compel Jesus to exorcise her demon-possessed daughter without being in the same town. But there’s also the water-into-wine at the wedding in Cana incident. The disciples believed in him after the miracle. Same is true for when Jesus calms the storm, feeds the 5,000, feeds the 4,000, and dies on a cross and is raised on the third day. That last one was even his miracle for the Pharisees and Sadducees, but they never do believe.
Faith is not just a set of beliefs or a worldview we think. Perhaps faith is also less a feeling of certainty in God’s trustworthiness or goodness and more about the actions we take, the choices we make, even when we don’t understand, even when we don’t feel hopeful? Was I really without faith when I doubted God’s existence but asked others to pray for me? Am I faithless when I ask a friend for help first, before turning to God in prayer? What if, instead, faith is a craft?
Come Thou fount of every blessing Tune my heart to sing Thy grace Streams of mercy never ceasing Call for songs of loudest praise
Growing up, I heard a lot about faith being a gift from God. It was very important to recognize that faith was created by God, came from God, and directs us back to God. Like a cosmic tractor beam that kept us tethered. This caused me no small amount of consternation when I couldn’t feel my faith — when I felt abandoned, wandering, or lost. Had I somehow been dislodged from tractor beam? How did I let go? Did God let go of me?
1 Corinthians 12:7-11 7 Now to each one the manifestation of the Spirit is given for the common good. 8 To one there is given through the Spirit a message of wisdom, to another a message of knowledge by means of the same Spirit, 9 to another faith by the same Spirit, to another gifts of healing by that one Spirit, 10 to another miraculous powers, to another prophecy, to another distinguishing between spirits, to another speaking in different kinds of tongues,[a] and to still another the interpretation of tongues.[b] 11 All these are the work of one and the same Spirit, and he distributes them to each one, just as he determines.
Ephesians 2:8-10 For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— 9 not by works, so that no one can boast. 10 For we are God’s handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.
The Apostle Paul writes about faith as a gift of God a couple times, but mostly to reiterate that faith is not something earned, deserved, or rooted in one’s ability. Paul’s “gift of faith” is to emphasize faith as something from God, empowered by the Spirit, and given in particular for the benefit of others. Paul understands the gifts of God’s Spirit are different based on the individual, but ultimately have their purpose in being useful for the building up of the unity of the community. In the passage from 1 Corinthians, one might be given faith, but one might given instead the ability to heal or to preach. It almost seems like maybe everyone doesn’t get the gift of faith, but in Ephesians it sounds more like faith is a gift from God for all who believe and choose to accept it. Faith brought grace, and with grace came salvation, and all these gifts given so that we might do good works.
So what kind of gift is faith?
from pexels on pixabay
Paul is pretty adamant that the gift of faith is unearned – something given by the Spirit as God sees fit. Paul, and others in the Bible, also are pretty consistent that gifts given by God are for the good of the community. But is faith like a necklace or a boat – something you either possess or you don’t? Or is it like an art project or a plot of land? Something to work on together with God to bring more beauty into the world, to tell the truth, to nurture joy, and to make hope more accessible to others.
If I consider my faithfulness in my marriage, it is a nearly constant feeling of love and belonging to my spouse. It is a general goodwill towards him, giving him the benefit of the doubt, choosing our unity over any desires or distractions that may try to pull us apart. This isn’t to say there aren’t issues on which we don’t agree or moments or days when the feeling of being enamored with the other is subsumed under situational feelings of frustration, betrayal, irritation, or disappointment. But the situational feelings pass. They are not the constant. When the storm blows by, what remains is our love and positive regard for one another, our commitment to work toward reconciliation and unity, to work together to be a better couple for our sakes and the sakes of our children and community. I’m no fool. This marriage is a gift from God. A blessing for me and for others.
But the faith in our marriage is not just what we think about each other or believe about marriage. Neither is it just a feeling of trust. It is the behaviors and choices we make, informed by our thoughts and feelings. Perhaps it is the same in having faith in God.
The gift of faith, then, is the relationship – the general positive regard and goodwill towards the other. The work of giving the other the benefit of the doubt, sharing one’s thoughts and dreams, patiently supporting the other even when you disagree. It’s treating the doubts and the questions and the sufferings and the uncertainties not as threats to the relationship, but as opportunities to turn back toward each other, to try again, to forgive together, to pick each other again. When I had my first miscarriage, I was devastated and I was very angry at God. I didn’t pray for a while. I gave Him the cold shoulder. Then, when I did pray, I only pleaded or yelled. But I knew, even then, that one day I wouldn’t feel like that anymore. I knew, even as I was furious and disappointed in God, pissed off and hurt, that it wouldn’t last. I screamed at God for 8 months before He ever said a peep back. He let me scream and be sad and blame Him. He loved me when I didn’t even like Him. I think, maybe, He had faith in me, in us.
God’s faith in me was enough until I was ready to work together again. We still work on our relationship. We do it for my sake, for Jesus’ sake, and for the sake of all the relationships in my life. I’m not sure there’s much difference between faith and life itself.
He said to them, ‘Is a lamp brought in to be put under the bushel basket, or under the bed, and not on the lamp stand? For there is nothing hidden, except to be disclosed; nor is anything secret, except to come to light. Let anyone with ears to hear listen!’ And he said to them, ‘Pay attention to what you hear; the measure you give will be the measure you get, and still more will be given you. For to those who have, more will be given; and from those who have nothing, even what they have will be taken away.’
oil lamp on ground by @Designer-Obst on Pixabay
These verses hit differently today.
The metaphor of a lamp and its light belonging on the lamp stand and not hidden could refer to the light of Christ – that is, faith – within us, but also it refers to any gifting from God. God gifts us with diverse talents, abilities, knowledge, skills, opportunities, relationships. It felt like this was a reminder that the parts of me that have felt hidden or placed on the back burner for a myriad of reasons will be brought to the forefront. What I feel has been subsumed under motherhood and a pandemic and aging is not meant to stay dormant and waiting, but will be disclosed, brought forth. This is both exciting and terrifying. I feel I have forgotten who I am. What are my gifts? What parts of me have been hidden that can now shine brightly? What does God want of me?
The second metaphor is usually a harder one to accept. Often, we picture Jesus as upending the ways of the world. Bringing down the rich or the haughty and lifting up the lowly or the poor. But here he says, ‘For to those who have, more will be given; and from those who have nothing, even what they have will be taken away.’ This sounds like blessing for the wealthy, and punishment for the unfortunate.
However, this maxim isn’t about wealth and blessings, but about Christ’s light within us. Mark places the two metaphors together because they are about the same thing. God’s gifts to us and our faith journey are not to be hidden within us, kept for ourselves. Keeping faith private, hoarding wealth, burying one’s talents, only using one’s abilities for one’s own pleasure is keeping the light hidden. Rather, the gifts of God given to us are to be used for others as well. The measure you give will be the measure you get, and still more. The more we use our faith, the more we share our blessings, the more we harness our talents for the community, the more God enables us to do. When we hide our true selves, we have nothing to give, and even the self we hide will be taken away.
Christian dogma proclaims that Jesus was fully human and fully divine. It is one of the great mysteries. How could Jesus be both, especially if we consider these conditions to be opposing, nearly contradictory, states of being? Perhaps we have an anemic understanding of humanity.
There is a vein of Christian thought that understands humanity as weakness. It is our humanity that bears and manifests the fallenness, brokenness, creatureliness, baseness, or as Calvin put it, complete depravity of our world and lived experiences. If there is anything bad, it is because of the human condition, the essence of humanity. Ironically, the secular world uses the word humanity to connote one’s ability to be compassionate, empathetic, and sacrificially helpful.
God is good, all the time. All the time, God is good. And we are bad, mostly.
And yet, God chose it, chose us, chose humanity, to be his home. The Spirit dwells within us. We bear the imago Dei, the image of God. Our breath is the very breath of God. We are empowered by the divine Spirit to be the hands and feet of Jesus in the world now. Perhaps the divine does not see our humanity as something to be overcome or a contradiction to eradicate or cover-up. Perhaps our humanity isn’t so terrible, if only we could see ourselves the way God sees us.
I’ve been wrestling with the humanity of Jesus. Doctrine demands that any questions, doubts, interpretations, and theologies of Jesus must hold these (and other) truths in tension: Jesus was completely human, Jesus was completely divine, Jesus did not sin, Jesus is good, Jesus is God the Son, and not the Father.
Keeping these doctrines in mind, I wonder about the times when Jesus didn’t want to work a miracle. Sometimes they’re called miracles and sometimes they’re called signs. Four times come to mind. Two of them are at the request of women.
Picture by Engin_Akyurt from Pixabay
The first is at a wedding in Cana, at the request of his mother. Jesus, his mother, and his disciples are guests at a wedding in Cana. His mother approaches Jesus and informs him the wine has run out. This would be an embarrassment for the unnamed bride and groom. Jesus responds, “Woman, what concern is that to you and to me? My hour has not yet come.” (John 2:4) Every time I hear these words I can barely get past the abruptness of calling one’s mother “woman,” as if she were not beloved but an annoying nag. Jesus sounds both dismissive or perhaps, anxious. Either way, he sets a boundary. Thus far in his ministry, he has been baptized and called a couple guys to follow him. He apparently does not believe he is ready to begin his work as healer, prophet, teacher, miracle-worker. He is fully in the moment and not prepared to do the timeless work for which he came.
Mary is a different woman now. She’s no longer the young virgin who said yes to an angel and began her divine adventure. She’s older now, wiser, too. She’s given birth a few times at this point, and doubtless dealt with her children’s shenanigans and disappointments and wounds and weirdness. She’s cooked thousands of meals, and done hundreds of loads of laundry. She’s witnessed death and miscarriage and betrayal. She knows finiteness and mortality more fully now. She knows what time it is. She knows who her son is and what he is capable of. She doesn’t address his tone or his concerns. She’s a mother and she doesn’t let him say no. She doesn’t respect his boundary, but, in a truly clever way, pushes him forward, pushes him out into his ministry. His Heavenly Father may have pushed him to the desert to be tempted after his baptism, but Jesus’ Mother pushes him to begin the work he was born to do.
Mary & Jesus statute at the Serra Retreat Center in Malibu, CA
Mary turns to the servants she brought with her and tells them, “Do whatever he tells you,” and walks away. Now that I think about it, this is just solid advice no matter what the situation. She doesn’t talk to Jesus, try to reason with him, or answer his question, or do anything to convince him to help. She just leaves him with some servants who are waiting to listen and obey. What else could he have done? Could he have really refused to help? He can refuse his mother. Sons do. But he cannot refuse the servants.
Miraculously, the water with which the servants fill the cleansing jars (per Jesus’ instructions) becomes the best wine. The wedding steward is impressed and complements the groom. The party can continue! The only ones who know a miracle has happened is Jesus, his disciples, the servants, and his mother. Because of the miracle, though, his disciples believed in him (John 2:11) Jesus works the miracle because his mother asked, the servants obeyed, and the disciples witnessed and believed. Everyone has a role.
Picture of bread and crumbs by Coffee-king from Pixabay.
The second time Jesus didn’t want to work a miracle for a woman was in Tyre. In Mark 7, the request is made by a Syrophoenician woman, and in Matthew 15, she’s called a Canaanite. The telling of the stories is slightly different. In Mark’s version, Jesus went “away” to Tyre and didn’t want anyone to know he was there. Jesus is tired and needs a break from his work. In Matthew’s version, Jesus is with his disciples and the woman is following them and calling out to him. In both versions, the woman is requesting an exorcism for her daughter who is tormented at her home. In both versions, Jesus refuses the miracle claiming, essentially, that he came for the children of Israel and that it wouldn’t be fair to them to help her. I’ll be honest, I don’t really get it. How could helping this Gentile woman’s demon-possessed daughter be unfair to the Jews? What is even more shocking about this exchange is the metaphor Jesus uses. He doesn’t say, “I came to teach and to heal the Jews and not the Gentiles, sorry I can’t help you.” No, he says, “‘let the children be fed first, for it is not fair to take the children’ food and throw it to the dogs.’” (Mark 7:27) So, in this metaphor, she’s a dog, and her request (for her suffering child) is akin to taking food from children. Jesus describes her as an animal trying to harm vulnerable children.
This is not just boundary-setting, but again rude and dismissive behavior. I don’t know how this woman didn’t just break down crying in tears or fly into a rage. She has a toughness and a confidence and a cleverness that all successful advocates have. She has a faith that can handle no.
Jesus looks very human here. I don’t mind the boundary-setting, but his words were harsh. Actually, maybe I do mind the boundary-setting. She asking for help. How can he say no? I kinda understand Mark’s version, where Jesus is just so tired. Everyone needs a break, even from work you love. He’s exhausted and annoyed, and so he’s rude and unkind. Does he sin? I don’t think so. I don’t think it’s a sin to be tired or annoyed, to not have the kindest way to say no and set a boundary.
The reality is, though his words and metaphor sound rude and unkind to me, they don’t seem to hurt her. In fact, she agrees with him, and then pushes him past his boundary. She responds, “yes, sir.” !!! She says yes. She acknowledges and respects his boundary. But then…then, she takes his metaphor and uses it against him. She takes his boundary and pushes him past it to make space for her and her daughter. She says, “Even the dogs under the table eat the children’s crumbs.” So she may be a dog in this metaphor, and the Jews may be the favored children, but Jesus’ miraculous healing of a demon-possessed girl without the laying on of hands is just a crumb that falls to the floor. She is asking for the impossible and calling it a dirty and insignificant crumb at the same time. I’ll be honest. Every time I read this story and I get to this moment I can only imagine that Jesus smiled. A knowing smile. An impressed smile. A delighted smile. Their exchange may seem crass to me, but I’m not a part of their relationship. They understand each other. And because of her, Jesus heals a Gentile without even being in her vicinity. His glory and power are revealed in truly magnificent and shocking strength and it is only this woman and her daughter who receive it. It isn’t the only time he heals a Gentile, but it is the only time he tries to refuse a miracle, and is outwitted by his own words.
Both Mary and this woman have a faith in Jesus that push him, that urge him forward in his ministry.
Statute of weeping angel at Serra Retreat Center, statute of one of the 12 stations of the cross is in the background
There are a couple other times when a sign or miracle is requested and Jesus refuses. The Gospels record a few times when either the Pharisees or scribes or Sadducees or crowds request a sign from Jesus. It doesn’t seem to be a specific request, just a general miracle request, something to prove Jesus’ power? Authority? Anointing? Whatever it is, Jesus refuses. Except, not really. He doesn’t give them the miracle they want. Instead he gives them the Sign of Jonah. In the moment, they are refused their request (unlike Mary and the Canaanite woman). They are given the final miracle of Jesus – his death and resurrection. This will be the true sign, answering all their questions and concerns. This will be their hope and redemption and freedom and healing, if only they will believe in it.
It will be his most difficult sign. In the Garden of Gethsemane, Jesus will ask the Father to release him from the task. Is it his humanity or divinity that is grieving? What part of him is anxious about the suffering ahead? Is it not both?
God is good, all the time. Jesus is God – fully human and fully divine, and did not sin. In these excerpts from his life, then, Christlikeness is a fellowship of humanity and divinity that have space for grief, anxiety, being outwitted and influenced by others, setting boundaries, changing one’s mind, and, at times, being dismissive and sarcastic. As Christians, as we pursue Christlikeness, perhaps our humanity is not something we must overcome. Our humanity draws us closer to Jesus, or is how Jesus draws closer to us. It does not require destruction or evisceration. Our humanity is capable of holding the divine, collaborating with it, pushing it, challenging it, misunderstanding it, rejecting it, ignoring it. It may not be our best quality, but it’s the one God seems to like.
My husband & I finally got to watch the documentary, Free Solo, this past weekend. Before watching it, we knew the ending, just by reading the description.
From the National Geographic website, the documentary is, “a stunning, intimate and unflinching portrait of the free soloist climber Alex Honnold, as he prepares to achieve his lifelong dream: climbing the face of the world’s most famous rock … the 3,000ft El Capitan in Yosemite National Park … without a rope. Celebrated as one of the greatest athletic feats of any kind, Honnold’s climb set the ultimate standard: perfection or death. Succeeding in this challenge, Honnold enters his story in the annals of human achievement.”
He succeeds in this daring climb.
Nonetheless, I could feel my heart racing and my stomach gurgling as I watched the movie. I was sweaty and nervous for most of the movie.
Why? Why was it so thrilling and terrifying to watch?
John 4:46-53
46 Then Jesus came again to Cana in Galilee where he had changed the water into wine. Now there was a royal official whose son lay ill in Capernaum. 47 When he heard that Jesus had come from Judea to Galilee, he went and begged him to come down and heal his son, for he was at the point of death. 48 Then Jesus said to him, “Unless you see signs and wonders you will not believe.” 49 The official said to him, “Sir, come down before my little boy dies.” 50 Jesus said to him, “Go; your son will live.” The man believed the word that Jesus spoke to him and started on his way. 51 As he was going down, his slaves met him and told him that his child was alive. 52 So he asked them the hour when he began to recover, and they said to him, “Yesterday at one in the afternoon the fever left him.” 53 The father realized that this was the hour when Jesus had said to him, “Your son will live.” So he himself believed, along with his whole household.
My small group had studied and discussed this passage from the Gospel of John the day I watched Free Solo. We marveled at verse 50. The official wants Jesus to come with him and heal his son. Jesus does not go with him, but instead tells the official to go home. “Go; your son will live.” And the royal official believed Jesus. He believed Jesus’ word and acted on it.
In essence, Jesus told the official the end of the movie – his son would live. Believing this, the official was able to walk away from Jesus, to go back home where his son had been ill without the healer with him, because the healer’s word was enough.
Did his heart race as he walked? Was his stomach churning? Was he sweating and nervous? Or did knowing the ending meant he walked home in peace, confidence, comforted?
My mother is one of those people who reads the end of the book before starting it to reduce her anxiety. I’m one of those people who won’t read the end first, but will race through a story to get to the end, missing details and symbolism and the author’s creativity in my haste.
Does knowing death has no victory, justice is assured affect how you live now?
Apparently, knowing the ending does not reduce my anxiety or fears. I always thought that meant I didn’t have enough faith. But observing my reaction to watching the documentary made me question the idea that nervousness and fear exposed a lack of faith or belief. I know the future is coming, but I do not live in the future. I am here in the present, in this moment. Here, there is pain and injustice, setbacks, oppression, lies, death and disappointment. It is not that I don’t believe in the victory of Christ over sin and death, it is that I fear and loathe the pain and suffering on the way to that great and glorious truth. Knowing that the pain of contractions would end in, result in, make possible the birth of my children didn’t actually help in coping with the pain.
Believing Jesus is to believe what he says, even when terrified. We don’t always get to see the miracle and we don’t always get the miracle we want. Believing Jesus is about trusting love, and sometimes that feels scary, even if it isn’t.
On Sunday, April 18, 2021, I led worship and preached for First German United Methodist Church in Glendale, CA. It was a part of a series, in which each week was about a different book of the Bible. The week I preached was about Amos, one of the minor (or lesser) prophets in the Old Testament.
At 11:08 begins the reading of the Scripture passage that inspired my sermon.
At 19:35 is when the sermon begins and ends at 39:15.
Image: A distressed-looking stuffed blue denim fish on the ground. Special thanks to our puppy, Shadow, for being distracted long enough for me to snag this picture of his toy.
My small group recently finished Priscilla Schirer’s study of the book of Jonah, Navigating A Life Interrupted. I have not agreed with everything Priscilla offered, but overall, her study was informative and I appreciated her focus on connecting the story – the plot, characters, and dialog — in Jonah directly to our lives. How might this ancient story provide insight into one’s own situation in the 21st century? What does this story really tell us about the character of God?
The last week of the study was my favorite. Almost everyone remembers the story of Jonah and the big fish part, but that’s just one verse. And, as I discovered, the big fish played a vastly different role than I had thought. In fact, there were several things I thought I knew about this story that, through Priscilla’s work, encouraged a reexamination and led to new revelations.
The story begins with Jonah, a prophet of God, receiving instruction to go to prophesy to the Ninevites because their “evilness and wicked ways” had finally gotten on God’s nerves. I learned that the Ninevites were a major city in the growing Assyrian empire and dangerous enemies of Israel. I had thought Jonah didn’t want to go because they were Gentiles, or because they were wicked (as stated by God), or because he was busy. I mean, I’ve wanted to say no to doing the right thing just because I didn’t want to be inconvenienced. I didn’t realize that God’s call on Jonah was to go to enemy territory to tell them to repent or risk God’s destruction. I have a lot more compassion for Jonah now.
With this historical context, it would seem that Jonah’s behavior was rooted in fear. We discover later, though, that even here at the beginning of the story, Jonah is angry, and surprisingly, his anger is not toward the Ninevites, but toward God.
When Jonah flees, he takes a boat to Tarshish, which in his day was as close to the end of the world as one could get. The text indicates he’s not just disobeying a command from God, but trying to flee from “the presence of the Lord.” This is kinda shocking considering that, as a prophet of God, he would know you can’t flee the presence of the Lord. This begins to reveal a new layer to Jonah’s state of mind or personality. He is not just afraid of the task, or angry at God, he is panicked and attempts the impossible – to get away from the God of heaven and earth, the God who loves him.
It might seem strange to say that God loves Jonah, since once Jonah is on the boat headed to Tarshish, God sends a storm so strong that the boat nearly breaks apart and the mariners throw off all excess cargo. Why won’t God just let Jonah disobey? Why does God pursue Jonah and why does he do it by threatening his life? The storm is so violent it terrifies the sailors and they pray to their gods and cast lots to determine who among them caused the storm to be sent. Yet, Jonah is asleep. As someone who has suffered from depression, Jonah reads like a depressed man. His choices are not logical. His fear and anger have overwhelmed him and now he’s numb. He sleeps, unaware of the chaos around him. He’s utterly exhausted in his attempt to resist the truth about God or himself.
When the sailors cast lots, it falls on Jonah. Jonah admits the truth he’d been avoiding — he is fleeing his god, and that his god is the God, “the God of heaven, who made the sea and the dry land.” The sailors are even more terrified to learn the truth of the situation. Jonah has fled from God, fallen asleep to God’s pursuit, and feels suicidal. He tells the men to throw him into the sea. And yet, amazingly, despite the fear they have endured, despite the costs they have paid, the sailors continue to try to save Jonah’s life by rowing back to shore. They care more about his life than he does. Absolutely everyone on the boat expects that throwing Jonah overboard is a death sentence.
Of course, the storm gets worse. Jonah really does know His God very well. The sailors pray to God! They beg for their lives and beg to not be held guilty of killing Jonah. They call him innocent, and…is he? What sin did Jonah commit? I mean, he didn’t do what God told him to do, and I suppose that is sin, even though it wasn’t a commandment of the Torah. He has, through his actions, said no to God. Is that not allowed?
Ultimately, they throw him into the sea because they know now, like Jonah, that it will please God. And the storm stops. And the men believe in God and “offered a sacrifice to the Lord and made vows.”
So, a couple things here. This part of the story really does remind us that our choices affect others, even people we don’t know. It matters when we listen and we disobey. There’s no such thing as a sin that’s just between God and me. Additionally, apparently following the rules that have been written down isn’t enough. God still speaks and following His directions is expected. Required, even? Secondly, it is absolutely astounding how this mess leads the mariners to become believers in God. Every time Jonah talks about God to others, the others believe! These men come to understand that their lives are in the hands of the Creator God, a God powerful enough to make heaven and land and the sea and the storms and see and care about the actions of a single man. But there’s something deeply unsettling in this scene. God has sent the storm. God has caused this calamity. It is understandable that they were all afraid, even though, if you know the character of God, you know not to fear the calamity. The storm was a means to an end, not an end. But the men had to throw Jonah overboard. They had to do something they felt was morally wrong in order to please an angry God. Now, we know that God then calms the storm and sends the big fish, which actually saves Jonah from certain death. The sailors didn’t. Jonah didn’t. This poses complicated moral implications. The sailors exhausted all other options before sacrificing Jonah, but, in the end, sacrificed one man in the hope it would save many. Or, at least, that’s what it would have looked like from their standpoint. They would have seen an angry God, pursuing a disobedient man, and requiring his death for such an act. What Priscilla helped me see, what we can see from many centuries later, was a loving God, pursuing a frightened and angry man, and refusing to let him go.
I always thought the big fish was the punishment from God. Now, I understand the big fish is the second chance. Jonah is in the fish for three days and three nights before he finally talks to God. He finally repents – turns to God – but he does not apologize for running. His prayer (chapter 2) is almost exclusively other scripture verses. In utter despair, he turns to poetry. They speak of God as one who hears people in distress, who answers prayers, who casts people into the deep and restores life from the Pit. God is attributed as being the one to cast Jonah into he deep, and it is God’s waves that surround him. Jonah could only perceive the deep, the weeds, the loneliness. Jonah is deeply depressed. The belly of that fish is rock bottom and he spends 3 days and 3 nights there, waiting for death. Some argue he actually died. Hunger and thirst surely brings him to the brink, but then, “I remembered the Lord; and my prayer came to you, into your holy temple.” (v.7) Jonah had wanted to get away from the holy temple — the place on earth of God’s manifest presence — but he discovers in the belly of a fish, in the deep of the sea, at the thin space between life and death, his prayer reaches God. It goes all the way to the holy temple. He confesses “deliverance belongs to the Lord!” He repents. He remembers his life and its ending belong to God. Later, he will ask for death twice more, yet here, when death is so close, he confesses the truth of the power of God to deliver him (or anyone) from the darkness they are drowning in. For this, God then speaks to the big fish and Jonah is back on dry land. Even the desperate places belong to God.
Chapter three begins a lot like chapter one. God again tells Jonah to go to Nineveh, but this time, it’s not because “their wickedness has come up before me.” Instead, Jonah is to go and get the message from God for the Ninevites when he gets there. Uh oh. Now Jonah must travel deep into enemy territory to give a message that he has not yet received. This time, he is faithful. He goes. He enters the town and gives this message, “Forty days more, and Nineveh shall be overthrown!” And then Jonah witnesses the biggest revival in the history of humanity as every Ninevite repents. I find it hard to believe that’s all Jonah said, though Shirer does. I mean, how would the Ninevites know who to turn to or what needed to be repented? But Jonah doesn’t tell us more about the message because this story isn’t about the Ninevites or Jonah’s incredibly successful career as a prophet. This story is about the prophet and the God who loves him. The king of Nineveh proclaims a fast, a forsaking of their evil ways, and a call to prayer in the hope that God might not bring calamity. Indeed, God saw what they did – prayer, fasting, AND turning from “their evil ways and from the violence that is in their hands.” So God doesn’t destroy Nineveh.
Was Jonah a success or failure? According to his message, in 40 days, Nineveh will be destroyed, yet 40 days will pass and Nineveh will stand. He preached God’s word and, as a result, the Ninevites repented. Isn’t that why the 40-day delay? Isn’t it a success that Jonah’s message didn’t happen? Or did Jonah feel a failure? He proclaimed destruction to Israel’s foes, but destruction did not come.
In the final chapter, Jonah is pissed. He knew God would relent and forgive. He knew God’s true character as gracious, merciful, slow to anger, abounding in steadfast love, and ready to relent. God’s threats of punishment are not from an angry God that wants to punish and chastise but a God that wants to relent. God wants to celebrate restoration and reconciliation and right relationship. This pisses off Jonah so much that he asks God to kill him. Is there someone God could forgive that would make you want to end your relationship with God?
Jonah asks God to kill him. That God is who He is, and that God extended forgiveness to Jonah’s enemy, made Jonah suicidal. Death by act of God. How could an all-powerful deity, known for being loving and gracious, cause one of its own prophets to desire death? It seems knowing that God is slow to anger, kind and generous would be a relief, a joy, a delight, a cause for celebration, not a cause for vicious anger. Jonah is suicidal because God is God and Jonah cannot control who God loves. This was always the issue – we simply cannot control God and God has the tendency to love our enemies and us. It can feel like such a betrayal. Schirer noted that Jonah’s description of God in 4:2 echoes God’s self-description in Exodus 34:6-7. She claimed Jonah left out God’s description of himself as the God of Truth, but what I see missing in Jonah’s description of God is God’s faithfulness. Perhaps Jonah omitted the adjective faithful because he felt God wasn’t anymore.
To me, Jonah is still severely depressed, suicidal, in a rage. It is fascinating, and scary, to me that God would use such an angry and mentally unwell man to reach an entire city. Shirer focuses a lot on Jonah as a disobedient man, struggling with a life interrupted by God’s plans. I see a man viscerally aware of his lack of control in his relationship with God and the immense power of God that it breaks him. Why does God not heal him?
God speaks again to Jonah, and asks a question. “Is it right for you to be angry?” Whew. That’ll stop you in your tracks. Jonah doesn’t answer. Instead, he goes outside the city and makes a place to sit and wait to see what will happen. What happens after people repent and God relents? What is Jonah expecting to see? If he’s so angry about God’s love for the Ninevites, why is he sticking around? Why not go home? Is he hoping they’ll fail? Is he waiting to see God bless them so he can use that as a new reason to justify his anger at God and doubt God’s faithfulness?
The rest of the story is about a strange interaction between God and Jonah. This is where a dramatic production of this would be particularly helpful.
God appoints a bush to give shade to Jonah, who is suffering in his booth. Jonah feels happy. Then God appoints a worm to attack the bush and sends a hot wind and the sun. Jonah feels faint and asks to die, again. He thinks, “It is better for me to die than to live.”
God again asks, “is it right for you to be angry (about the bush)?” This time, Jonah answers, yes. I am “angry enough to die.”
Angry enough to die over a bush?
Jonah doesn’t just feel angry, he feels justified in his anger. More than that, he feels a rage so intense he can’t imagine continuing to live.
God acts creatively and Jonah reacts emotionally. Jonah cannot think rationally.
Is Jonah angry about the bush? The bush was largely metaphorical, right. An object lesson that God gives and takes away. On the one hand, this seems to be a God who uses power over Creation without considering how Creation thinks or feels about that power or those choices. This is a deity to be feared, fickle, and frustrating. Why create humanity with such a desire for control and for wisdom only to deny control and wisdom to it?
On the other hand, isn’t it interesting that God responds to Jonah’s request for death with a question about anger? Do you hear God’s tone as one of contempt, weariness at the stupidity of mortals? Or do you hear God’s voice as tender, curious, concerned?
Tone matters a lot here. It can sound like God is chiding Jonah for being so emotional, implying he is petty or dimwitted. But what if God is love? What if, instead, we hear God’s final words to Jonah as patient, witnessing God coming alongside Jonah in his distress. God notes that Jonah was cared about the bush, even though he did nothing to create it or care for it. God knows Jonah cares, is capable of compassion, and that it upset Jonah when what he cared about (the bush) was no longer. He asks Jonah, then, if God should also care about the Ninevites and their animals? To God, all Creation is God’s creativity manifest and God’s responsibility. Aren’t God and Jonah the same in caring for Creation? In fact, God implies, what would it say about God if She didn’t care about some of the people She created and didn’t doggedly pursue their repentance and reconciliation?
That moment when you realize why you’re really upset and why it’s not a good reason.
The book ends there. God’s question hanging in the hot, humid air. What would it say about God if God didn’t love our enemies?
What impresses me about this exchange is something I learned from Shirer’s study. Shirer spends a lot of her study exploring the how’s and why’s of Jonah’s (and our) disobedience. For her, this story is about obedience to God. But this last chapter argues against that. If it were about obedience, then the story could end in chapter 3 when Jonah obeyed and God brought a great revival to the Ninevites! So why chapter 4? Why does it matter that Jonah is displeased? God can do whatever God wants, and we should trust that God is good all the time. God gives and takes away and it doesn’t matter what we think or feel, we don’t know the big picture. Except, God does care. The entirety of chapter 4 is God staying with Jonah in his depression. God listens to Jonah. God waits for Jonah. God asks if Jonah is justified in being angry and when Jonah refuses to answer, God comforts Jonah. God teaches Jonah. God sticks around. It’s not enough that Jonah obeyed. It’s not enough that Jonah did so well that an entire city was saved. God wants Jonah. God wants Jonah to see the bigger picture – that God’s love is for him and for others and that God’s love for others does not diminish God’s love for Jonah.
The question hangs in the air, should God love our enemies? We don’t hear how Jonah responds, but as Timothy Keller notes in The Prodigal Prophet, Jonah probably wrote the story or, at least, shared the story over and over until someone wrote it down. The question, then, is for all who hear the story. Should God not be concerned about __, that large region of Creation, that entire population, those “wicked” people? God cannot imagine forsaking them because they “do not know their right hand from their left.” How awful would it be if God simply destroyed people because they were confused by the corruption, chaos, and consequences of evil instead of finding a way to rescue them? How disheartening it would be if God only wanted our obedience and didn’t love us enough to pursue us until we understand and so be able to love more deeply.
Yesterday, I mailed a letter to an inmate at the prison in Corona, CA.
I did it as an act of faith, but I’ll be honest, I’m still not sure it was the right thing to do.
Image by Ngo Minh Tuan from Pixabay
Last year (2020, what a crazy year), it seemed like the failings of the criminal justice system kept popping up in my reading. I follow Sister Helen Prejean on Twitter, who was famously portrayed by Susan Sarandon in Dead Man Walking. She continues to fight against the death penalty and I have started following and supporting her efforts. I also follow the Equal Justice Initiative which fights against the death penalty and educates on the history of slavery and the injustices in the legal system. I saw more articles about it since it was an election year and there were district attorneys and propositions and judges on the ballot.
More than that, as I continued to participate in my small group’s Bible study, and finally did my own study of the book of Isaiah. I began to notice how frequently Scripture talks about caring for prisoners. It never says to care for the not guilty who have been wrongly convicted, or proclaim freedom to those whose sentences were unnecessarily punitive. Scripture repeatedly calls for care for the incarcerated and doesn’t seem to care whether their incarceration was justified or not. I thought maybe this was God telling me to care for the incarcerated, too.
But how? And, who? And why me? Most people I know are, at best, indifferent to criminals, and disgusted or outright hateful of them, at worst. I don’t know anybody in jail. I don’t know what they need or how a middle-class, cisgendered, Christian white mother could possibly help. When I searched the internet, I found recommendations for places to donate – help with bail so people didn’t have to be in jail awaiting their trials, help fund initiatives to outlaw the death penalty, help pay lawyers whose clients cannot afford the help they need because they are children or refugees or newly emancipated foster kids or just plain poor. There’s so many to choose from and I was instantly overwhelmed.
I also found two sites that help inmates find penpals. Maybe I could do this? Everybody loves mail and I’m writer…sorta. But, I’m a really inconsistent letter writer. Heck, I’m an inconsistent friend in real-life. What would I say? I thought maybe God would tell me in time. So I promised to pray about it all through Advent 2020 and wait to listen to the Lord. Well, I waited and I prayed about it but only occasionally, and I still didn’t know for sure.
In January, we started studying Jonah and it seemed like maybe I needed to take the next step and stop being paralyzed by the lack of clarity on the plan or the incredible lack of experience or knowledge. I found the website writeaprisoner.com and began to explore how to become a prisoner’s penpal. Turns out, many prisons require real mail, not email, and a real address. I researched post office boxes, but they cost $129+ for the smallest size for a year. So I asked my church if I could use their address. They happily agreed and I panicked. They called it a ministry and I felt a weight on my heart. I don’t want to start a ministry. I don’t want accountability. I expect this to fail because I really don’t know what I’m doing. But I guess I know the why. I know God cares about our prisoners and I believe He wants me to care, too. Logically, becoming a penpal is the next right thing to do. How can I care if I don’t actually know anyone in jail? How can I help if I don’t learn what their needs are and what they want and how they think? How can I minister if I’m not in relationship with those who are dealing with these issues first-hand? So I wrote a letter. I limited my search to women about my age. There were several, but I kept coming back to one who is a mother of three. I didn’t get any divine revelation about whether she was the “right” one or confirmation that writing to her was what God wanted or what to say. She may not write back. Like I said, I expect this to fail. Maybe I should write to one of the other women. I don’t know.
I struggled to write the first letter. I decided to tell her the truth of why I was writing so she could make an informed decision about whether or not she wanted to write back. I felt nervous and insecure. Then, when I sealed the envelope and addressed it and put on the stamp, I felt oddly peaceful. It’s just a letter. She’s a woman like me. Maybe it will end here. Maybe it will lead to another letter. Maybe it will lead to friendship and maybe that friendship will be messy. Maybe it will be a blessing. I really don’t know. For now, it’s just a letter.
The Christmas cactus by our front door, before it blooms for the holidays.
How am I here again?
How I am wondering who I am and what my purpose is? Again.
Why am I so heavy again?
It’s an understatement to say this has been a tough year. 2020. It’s been a shitshow, but everyone knows that. And it’s true for everyone. I don’t think anyone who has survived this year has made it through without paying deep, heavy costs. Some costs will take years to be fully known or realized. Our wounds refuse to heal as relief continues to be something that only exists in the future. What good is this kind of hope?
It’s been hard for me, but I’m no fool. The difficulties I’ve born are not nearly as hard as it’s been for others. I know this, and I weep for this bitter injustice. Comparatively, I have had a blessed year. How the fuck have others survived this with less? I have enough. I have a safety net. I have a loving, safe husband and healthy, resilient children. The money and work opportunities that I have lost were not needed for the family. Just for me – my edification and enjoyment. So we didn’t suffer, just me. And I barely had time to register or grieve the loss because the time was filled and energy and creativity and innovation were needed elsewhere. Instead of a year in which the kids would gain more independence and I might go to work and serve my community, the kids would need me to be a full-time, unpaid teachers’ aid. I would pivot to guide them in all realms of their development – spiritual, physical, educational, mental, emotional, social, practical. It may take a village, but, like everyone else, the village couldn’t come within 6 feet. Besides, the village was suffering and I didn’t know what to do.
This year demanded resilience and innovation until all my coping mechanisms, talents, and expertise were depleted. It wouldn’t be until October that I finally admitted I was depressed. Again. And I couldn’t bear it and needed medication to keep going. Thankfully, the medication is working. Hallelujah. But the side effects are tiresome and I don’t know really understand why I’m depressed. My doctor claims its just the pandemic and this utterly insane election season. I disagree, but, to her point, the weekend after the election, I finally got my period again after not having it for two months. There’s a remote chance I’m more stressed by my culture and environment than I realize.
I’m gaining weight and it feels out of control. I’m trying my best but maybe I’m doing nothing. I am still. I just can’t tell if it’s because I am paralyzed or waiting in faith. I know this won’t last and for that, I am truly grateful. That is my hope and joy even if I don’t feel happy. Like a smile that doesn’t reach the eyes. I keep thinking about Psalm 147: 1-5.
Praise the Lord. Praise the Lord, my soul. I will praise the Lord all my life; I will sing praise to my God as long as I live. Do not put your trust in princes, in human beings, who cannot save. When their spirit departs, they return to the ground; on that very day their plans come to nothing. Blessed are those whose help is the God of Jacob, whose hope is in the Lord their God.
I don’t trust our princes. Relief will not be in a vaccine or a better stimulus package. Look, those would help immensely, but the damage is deeper than that. Hope is not in our republic or her people. We have shown ourselves to be our worst enemy.
Faith claims it is in God alone. His victory over death, despair, and dysfunction is secure. It is coming, but it is not here yet. It will manifest in relationship and through time. This is the third week of Advent and its theme of joy. I don’t feel joyful, but this is a journey toward joy. I move toward the One who Loves, whose salvation can actually bring wholeness. This is the week to celebrate that the Kingdom of God is here, even as it is not yet fully here. I’m having a hard time doing that. I am stuck in the not yet and can’t seem to take another step. My righteousness fails me.
I’m here again. Pretending to be a writer. Pretending to be a leader. Wondering if my life is important or meaningful at all. Knowing friends and family would say, of course, but wondering, in my heart, why? How do you know?
I am well loved. I am beloved. I am skilled. I am blessed. These are facts. My ability to survive this year as well as I have is because of these truths. God has provided enough even as much of what I value, enjoy, crave, and long for has been taken away. Perhaps temporarily, but maybe not. We can never go back. New life appears after the seed bursts and is crushed in the dark underground.
My first year of being a mother was the hardest year of my life. Everything became hyper-focused. My world felt small and lonely. I was in pain and overwhelmed with the responsibilities of caring for a whole new person and I had no idea what I was doing. I have never been so tired in my life. This year has felt a lot like that year. In fact, I’m pretty sure that year made this year survivable for me. A consummate planner, God has said repeatedly, “We’ll get there when we get there. Be here now.” It is absolutely maddening.
So often the hope I live in is the hope of my plans and expectations. I enjoy planning. Set a goal. Reach it. It is a familiar and satisfying rhythm. The constant changing restrictions have meant that even simple goals or hopes have had to be adjusted or abandoned altogether. It has exposed the shallowness of my hope and joy. Honestly, it is hard to feel joyful this season because I can’t make the season special. It is hard to be joyful in as much as joy is dependent on me. I am spent. But what if hope is in the Lord?
John 15: 10-12 says, “If you keep my commands, you will remain in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commands and remain in his love. I have told you this so that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete. My command is this: Love each other as I have loved you.”
I may not feel joy. I may not be filled with hope. But if I am loved, as I am, and remain in God’s love, keeping his commands and loving others, then His joy will come to me and it will be whole.
And just like that, I can breathe and take one more step.
