Hey, faithful readers! I jotted down notes for this article a couple of weeks ago when anxiety was running high and strength was running low. After a few hours of prayer, Bible study and “doing the next right thing,” (a tool I learned in Al Anon many years ago), the feelings subsided and I laid my jottings aside. But worries and fretting have lately been crowding out that which I know (the Lord will never leave me nor forsake me). Therefore, I’m placing fingers to keyboard and hoping to create some sense from my scribblings. I trust the following thoughts will comfort both my readers and myself (not necessarily in that order)!
Treading Deep Water
I made a careless driving mistake recently,
and as soon as it happened, I knew why. My mind was only partially on the road.
A good 80% of my mental machinations concerned current events and personal issues
which, while of great importance, are completely out of my power to control.
There’s no point in enumerating the cares
which distracted me that morning; we all have them. Whatever one’s point of
view, anyone who’s at all awake can see that the USA is fast becoming the “DSA”
(Divided States of America – I thought I made this term up, but a quick
internet search revealed that many have beaten me to the proverbial punch).
This and other “fret-ables” of my own (I think I coined this one – it means
things to fret over) managed to remove my attention from the road, causing a
close call.
The other driver responded with grace. Yes,
she honked (only as much as was necessary to alert me – she resisted the urge
to lean on the horn), but there was no tongue-lashing or middle-fingering. I
was so thankful for God’s protection and my fellow traveler’s kind reaction
that, when we ended up side by side at a light, I rolled down my window, thanked
her for her reasonable response, and apologized profusely.
“You’re fine!” she laughed. “We all make
mistakes!”
What I wanted to say was, “I’m sorry for my stupid blunder, but, you see, I’m carrying the weight of the world on my shoulders. You see, there’s this, this and this that are bothering me, and it’s just too much.”
But
that’s just the point, isn’t it? To quote a MercyMe song, “[we] were never meant to carry this beyond the cross.”
Look at it? Yes. Comfort the brokenhearted? Absolutely. Attack problems? You bet. But carry it? Not on
your life.
Let’s face it – there are challenges and messes
everywhere. Christ acknowledged this when He reminded
Martha that it was more important to commune with Him than to make a
perfect party. Later, He counseled Judas, “You always have the poor with you, but you will not always have me” (Matthew 26:11).
Did He mean we
should abandon our responsibilities and spend 24/7 with Bibles open and heads
in the sand?
God forbid.
I believe He was calling His followers to
counter one of two urges to which many of us fall prey. One is to try to
singlehandedly clean up all the muck that humanity in its sinfulness has
created. The other is to hide under the covers – sometimes literally – and hope
it will all go away.
Metaphor Madness: Deep Breathing
To illustrate the process of letting go a la
Thea, let’s revisit that morning two weeks ago when I didn’t want to get out of
bed. Here I’m going to switch to present tense, so my audience will hopefully
catch the immediacy of the moments which led to this article. Imagery alert: my
readers should beware if they’re metaphor intolerant, because my mind wandered
to a bunch of those literary devices on the morning in question. While it may fly
in the face of freshman English, I’m just going to roll with the disparate
thoughts God gave me at the time.
perceived safety of cotton and polyester.
Metaphor #1: Without warning, the familiar feeling
rises in my chest. That feeling of being sucked under with nowhere to go and no
way to breathe. I somehow manage to claw my way to the surface and, once there,
I inhale greedily, letting out all the bad stuff that’s been building up, replacing
it with oxygen-saturated air that refreshes and rejuvenates and is worth more
than the Crown Jewels.
I’m reminded of my doctor’s instructions on
how to properly use my asthma inhaler. After prescribing medication to combat
shortness of breath, he taught me steps to maximize intake of this life-sustaining product. I first exhale deeply, then depress the mechanism on the inhaler,
which releases particles into a middleman tube called the spacer. Then and only
then can I take a deep breath and hold it for ten seconds. Most of the time,
when I stick to the method and timetable he taught me, I can stay out of breathing
trouble.
That’s how I tend to my lungs pharmaceutically;
since I know they don’t function optimally on their own, it would be foolish to
reject a preventative strategy that can keep them at fullest capacity. Therefore,
I let the physician call the shots (pun intended and metaphor #2, for those who
are keeping track). This is his specialty and it’s my life he’s trying to
protect.
Interestingly,
this process in a way mirrors the work of the Holy Spirit in our lives. According
to Pastor David Guzik of Calvary Chapel in Santa Barbara, “in both the Hebrew and
Greek languages, the word for spirit (as in Holy Spirit) is the same word for breath or wind (this also happens to be true in Latin)
… In Genesis 1:1-2, it is the Spirit of God as the
breath/wind of God, blowing over the waters of the newly created earth. In Genesis 2:7, it is the Spirit of God as the
breath/wind of God, blowing life into newly created man. In Ezekiel 37:9-10, it is the Spirit of God as the
breath/wind of God, moving over the dry bones of Israel bringing them life and
strength” (https://enduringword.com/bible-commentary/acts-2/).
How wise of our Lord to associate the lifesaving
work of the Holy Spirit to the life-preserving work of an ordinary medical procedure.
Similarly, I can nourish my spirit according
to the Great Physician’s orders. To paraphrase Rev. Dr.
Charles Stanley, when God tells me to do something, the wisest thing is for
me to do it when He says, how He says, for as long as He
says to do it. On a day-to-day basis, this means making regular deposits into my spiritual bank account (metaphor #3) through Bible reading, prayer, and
fellowshipping with other believers. It’s simple, really, but simple things are
not always easy.
This is all well and good, but I still can’t
shake the feeling of wanting to hide under the covers and opt out of the things
on my plate today.
Metaphor Madness: Digging Deep
That being the case, I may as well go deep (metaphor
#4). If my head’s going to hide, let it be hidden in the ultimate Hiding
Place (metaphor #5). If I’m going to bury myself beneath common cloth, let
me simultaneously burrow deep underneath heavenly
wings (metaphor #6) that never tire or give out.
I allow my troubled self to take refuge under
the covers and in the Lord’s arms. I shut out the world physically and, as best
I can, go deep. Only He and I inhabit this sheltered place. I will have to come
out some time, but not yet. Right now, it’s all too much. Right now, the best I
can do is hide away from the rack and ruin of this world that God never intended
for me to shoulder, let alone fix.
Quite simply, I pray. I remind myself of His promises.
I plumb the depths of His steadfastness.
I let myself go
deep.
I think of all that and it makes me cringe.
But then I think, well, that’s why I’m paying someone to cut my grass and trim
back the overgrowth when it gets out of control. It’s why I’m forking over cash
for my handyman to tackle the poison ivy; I’m highly sensitive and the allergic
reaction I get from even standing near the stuff isn’t worth the price I’ll pay
later in itching. That’s how I do my garden, such as it is, and that’s how I do
life, more often than not.
Some things I can tackle myself; other things
require linking up with someone more intrepid than I. Again, I can apply this
idea spiritually, as in Psalm 55:22: “Cast your burden on the Lord, and He will sustain you; He will never permit the
righteous to be moved.”
This whole gardening business is too much for
me, and I know it. Others love it and say they commune with God while playing
around in the dirt, and that’s fine for them. For me, it’s hot, filthy agony, and
I’d rather chew glass (metaphor #7 – this is getting ridiculous).
Nestled under my covers, I ponder that there
are different ways to garden. Trigger alert: metaphor on the horizon (oops,
that’s another one – don’t say I didn’t warn you). I emerge from the inner sanctum of my covers when God inspires me to send a few texts to loved ones, which I know
will buoy their spirits.
Isn’t that a form of gardening? My grass may
be too high and weeds may overshadow the flowers in my physical garden, but
hopefully when I die there will be lots of people whose spiritual gardens I tended
with love, and that investment will shine forth as much or more than tulips and
daisies which are (idiom alert, just to break up the monotony) here
today but gone tomorrow.
From my blanketed nook, I recall rescuing several plants recently. Literally. They had actually been put out with someone’s trash. These were beautiful, color-soaked Gerber daisies – healthy and vital – that somebody tossed out. It was as if the owner wanted to give them a fighting chance and thus placed them prominently, if ironically, atop a dilapidated trashcan, rather than just chucking them inside the receptacle.
Despite my aforementioned aversion to all
things landscaping, I brought the poor flowers home. Perhaps this was how
Christians in ancient Rome felt when they adopted unwanted babies left outside to die. Like me, they surely had better things to do
than dirty their hands with other people’s castoffs; then again, one man’s trash
– well, you know.
My sweet neighbor, Anita,
helped me plant the daisies with my grandson. It was still torture – after all,
it was gardening – but with Anita cheering me on and Luca wielding a
pint-sized spade, at least we got a few smiles out of the deal.
And the daisies remain alive – for the
moment.
When I complimented Anita on her green thumb,
she replied, “Oh, no – I just keep trying.”
Maybe that’s the secret. Green thumb or no, it’s
the trying that brings out the blooms.
Metaphor Madness: The Deep Dive (Last Metaphor
– I promise)
There will be tedium at times, as occurs with
any discipline. Puffing away on inhalers doesn’t make for an interesting
Saturday night, but it sure beats a weekend in the ER. A breathtaking garden
requires, in the words of my late friend, Cynthia (whose yard was truly a
showplace), “hours and hours of backbreaking work.”
This author hasn’t found any shortcuts to communing
with the Lord. Like any relationship, time must be committed in order for
thriving to occur. Diving into God’s word and dialoguing with Him demand
something of us. This will look different for every believer. Parents of young
children will have to work around their kids’ active hours to nurture their own
spiritual lives. Busy professionals may have to pray through lunch breaks.
One thing, though, is for certain. When we
work in tandem with the Lord, it’s like riding a bicycle built for two or paddling
a canoe with two people (I didn’t break my promise and squeeze in more metaphors
– the bike and canoe analogies are similes, so they don’t count 😊). The work is halved because two are sharing it. Most
importantly, one is steering and the other following.
Guess which role we’re supposed to have?
