Double Pensee

    Duty

Snow boots
sturdy and warm
wait for winter patiently
at the back of the hall closet
in the middle of June.

Good wife
sturdy and true
busy in trivial works
in the kingdom of hearth and home
wonders if it's been enough.

God Thoughts

There was a time when I knew what I knew, was sure of it, confident, happy, smug. Then, a puny piddling gnat sized nudge set me slightly off balance. I remember walking up the road with my oldest and talking about this spiritual vertigo. I couldn't even put it into sensible words. It was just a discontent, a feeling of something not quite right, bigger still, what if we have it all wrong? That must have been fifteen years ago, maybe longer and I tried to shrug it off and went on with church and life, but it never quite worked. Then, I began to hear about "emergent." I found a book by Dan Kimball and began to realize I wasn't alone in my discontent. Now years later, I still haven't come to a definite conclusion and I have changed in ways I'm not completely comfortable with. 

I question so many things and truth be told even question if God is real sometimes - all too often actually. I find myself begging Him, "please be real. I want you, Heaven, Jesus, Truth - I want it all to be real." So, I live in the limbo world of C. S. Lewis' words, When I don't believe (his word was love), I will act as though I believe. I pray God, let that be enough. Bring me out of this no man's land into green pastures of comfort and peace.                    
                           

Sorrow

Andrew Bonar, a minister of the Free Church of Scotland 1810-1892

"...how little impression our sorrow makes upon other men has often struck me, so that it is our Father's discipline for us personally; instead of thinking this sad, let me rather be pleased and glad that my Father takes this special, peculiar interest in me by myself."                                          

Bonar says that our sorrow makes little impression upon other men. That is true. We sympathize, try to empathize when someone we care about is hurting, but there is that niggling fear that makes us wants to run from the afflicted so we don't have to be reminded - next time might be my turn. So we console, take food, mouth platitudes and go home to our families, jobs, concerns... life goes on for us. 

         

Life is about loss; we can't escape it and sorrow, according to Bonar, is God's special gift. It doesn't feel much like a gift though. It hurts. I'd gladly refuse if I could. But, of course, one can't refuse. There is no choice in the matter at all. The lessons of sorrow, however, we do control. I can choose to ignore the pain, numb the pain, narcissisticly revel in the pain or work through the emotions of sorrow and grow. One thing I have learned is that sorrow is a private, internal process that others can't help with, only be patient with.

The part of his statement I question is, and I question this in many parts of my spiritual life, "Does God take this special, peculiar interest in me by myself." I don't mean to imply that God doesn't care but rather how hands-on is He? He doesn't personally need to make each dawn and dusk appear. He doesn't hand deliver each soul into a newly form embryo. He doesn't hold every tree, rock and thing literally in the grip of His hand. Does He then orchestrate each movement of my life?

I don't think He does, but that doesn't mean He isn't there to help and comfort me through each hurt. It doesn't mean that He doesn't have a way through it to make me a stronger person. Some people are comforted to think God "dots each i and crosses each t". Somehow, I am not. I like to think that he appreciates and is proud, just like a parent, that I am maturing and capable, though desiring His advice and help, not completely independent of Him. After all, I'm still His child and He, like a parent may, occasionally, need to intervene for my benefit. I am okay with that. 

I don't know. I'm still trying to figure out what I believe. Why does it have to be such a muddle to me?