120. From where comes my help?

I lift up my eyes to the mountains—

    where does my help come from? Psalm 121:1

It is one of those days.  It feels like the earth is tilted and that if I am not careful I might slip and fall off the face of the earth.  I am tired, and the knot in the pit of my stomach has been there since I woke up, and will be there when I go to sleep. There is something that is keeping me from going running through the streets yelling, cause that I was I want to do.  Maybe it is God who keeps me in check?

          At lunch I talk with my friend, and realize the bind that I am put in. My faith in scripture is shaky at best – really I think it is a bunch of made up stories that have no moral or morals. And yet my faith in Christ is as strong as ever. A contradiction that is kind of mind numbing. 

          So verses that tell me that everything will be okay, are countered with the reality that no in fact, shitty things happen to good people.  I am a person, and shitty things can, have and will happen to me.

          So the game plan for the day is to gently put one foot in front of the other as I make my way to the hope that is tomorrow.  Yes, I know the clichés, when only have today, and I should squeeze as much enjoyment out of the day as I can.  But there is no hope today, and my victory will lay in the fact that I finished it.

          I am overwhelmed.  And I am kind of embarrassed by it.  At my age, I think I should have a better handle on things.  But I have so often felt overwhelmed in my life.  To be overwhelmed is to be tired, anxious, angry and depressed all at the same time. 

          And to be honest, I am tired of people.  I am tired of the sick shit we do to each other.  I am tired of how complicated we make things.  And while I can muster compassion, it is much more edgy than it is caring – but for today it will have to do.

          It would help, at least I think it would, if I had the kind of faith that I see in others.  At least some others.  I wish I could muster faith that all will work out as God intends.  I wish there was a plan that defies explanation.  But I don’t think there is.  I think God’s plan for my life is that I keep breathing long enough to see what tomorrow might bring.

But as I sit here, typing this, the spirit of God seems to come upon me.  Does God visit those who speak in profanity?  But there is not reassurance, but comfort.  Comfort that I am not broken, that my grief, which runs deep these days, ties me to others that have been lost this month, and those who loved them.  The sense, maybe it is a voice, feeling, thought, is that there has been some fucked up aspects of life that I have encountered over the last few weeks; and that to feel raw is to experience life.

          I am reminded that Jesus wept on a number of occasions.  I wonder if he, the lord of all, felt overwhelmed? 

          As I write this, my day is not over.  My kid will have the subway experience for dinner.  I will be out tracking down a man that teaches me just how fragile life is.  If we find him, and if he gets in my car, I will be able to smell him for a few days.  Plastic seat covers and febreeze only goes so far.

The struggle for me this day is not that God has abandoned me, although it feels that way.  The struggle is that I want life to be different.  And it is not.  My seeking for comfort is a thinly guised plea for God to give me what I want; as if I know how the universe should be organized.

          So today, my faith is trusting that what I have in my life right now, is what is supposed to be there.  My faith today is trudging from one foot to the next trusting that tomorrow will be brighter and give me a better perspective on my life.  My faith today, was going about my business, trusting that this is what I have been called to do.

          God has helped me; he has not carried me.  Maybe my strength has not come from him, but I think my encouragement has.  For he has partnered with me in my angst.

My help comes from the Lord,

    the Maker of heaven and earth.   Psalm 121:2

119. A Grief Observed II

John 15:10 – 12 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.

It has been a week since my last post.  Wanna and I talk daily, and life in Thailand is seeking a new rhythm.  Life is not returning to normal, it never will. With the death of Phoh Tah the course of many lives have irrevocably changed.  In many ways life shifts to fill the void left by his passing, and in many ways those vacancies will always remain.  There is no normal left to return to.

          Wanna is comfortably distracted by being the dutiful daughter, and the doting aunt.  Yes, it is strange to be home without her dad being there, but it will be here in Vancouver  that his absence will most likely be felt.  Again, life here cannot return to its usual rhythm.  It will be a phone call when he is not there to talk to, or in shopping and seeing something that she would think of sending back home to him, that his absence will be observed.

          Death is inconvenient.  Life is inconvenient.  And in the imposition and limitation by death there is value to be found.  Death limits our time on earth.  Its randomness imposes an unpredictability.  The lesson to be learned, if there is one, is that there are no ordinary moments.

          Each sunset, has its value not just in the inherent beauty, but because each is part of a limited edition.  It is my denial of all things unpleasant that keeps me from making the same realization about the look of love from Wanna.  Our limited number of years, should urge me to do what is important, the service that I am called to perform.  My prayer in this grief is that I do not lose this mindfulness.

          Of the teachings from Jesus that I hold value in, there is the Sermon on the Mount, and the Last Supper.  But it is the Last Supper that my thoughts turn to as I write.  The value of Jesus’ teaching is more than knowing that his mission is at an end.  The real work that he came to do would begin in a few hours.  During the meal he had time to give one final teaching, a summing up of his previous words.

          But the profoundness of the moment goes beyond this simple ending of his teachings.  On the night before his death, Jesus has to know that with his death, even with the resurrection, the life of the apostles will never be the same.  Like all of us, they will have to find a new rhythm.  Thus, he prepares them for life after his death.

          And maybe, just maybe, the most profound impact of the crucifixion is that life would never return to normal, that together, and individually, we would have to find a new rhythm.  A new way of being with God.  We know this is true, for in the New Covenant there are radical changes to our lives.

          One of the central teachings of that night was that Jesus needed to go, in order for the Holy Spirit to come. I think the finding of the new rhythm with God, has been that his character is more accurately experienced by us, through the Holy Spirit.

Grief is a strange thing.  We often talk about healing our grief.  Yet, really, I believe our grief is our healing.  It is in finding that new rhythm that we experience our loss and sadness.  Even if we come to find unrealized value in life, finding it, experiencing our healing, can only be done in the pain of our loss.  Yet, death and the subsequent grief are a might force.  I know people, who out of the ashes of debilitating grief, have new creations, it is as if they were resurrected into a new life.

          There are those that hold that grief naturally affirms life, but this is not true.  Grief is a process that takes different paths with different people.  For while there are many that respond to grief with love and kindness, there are those that respond in fear and anger.   As with all things, I think death and grief are just there, it us who give value and meaning to them.

          In this time after Easter, we are called upon to reflect the impact of his death and resurrection hold for us.  I think we can use this time to make peace with death, the death of others, and with our own.