Suffering Does Not Have to Destroy

Easter is over for this year, has been for awhile now. I've spent more than Easter's time slot on the subject of suffering and resurrection. But if I may, indulge me one more blog post. Suffering does not have to destroy us. Your suffering does not have to destroy you.

We are in far greater danger from the extremes to which we go to avoid our suffering. We run from our own deaths, we try to evade hard times. Rather than confronting our suffering, we are far more likely to go in search of an enemy to blame. Please consider that those things you most oppose - be it personalities or politics or even sports teams - these are distractions. They are also dead ends. Our lives will never improve through an obsessive focus on blaming and opposing others.

Instead, I would point you to Jesus. The losing God. The God who refused to say he was King even though he was one. Jesus, the guy who raised his friend from the dead (too late to avoid a scolding from his friends Martha and Mary perhaps) knowing that this would be the final straw and lead to his own death. Jesus, the guy who tried to tell us that death is far less scary when we sit in the hands of God than it is to live a life missing the point.

Don't miss the point, please. And, when you do, like me, miss the point - don't beat yourself up. Take a break from social media and maybe dig in the dirt or take a long walk or play an instrument or listen to a song that makes your heart sing. Make cookies with your grandchildren - if you don't have grandchildren, make cookies for someone. Invite a friend to sit on your patio and soak up the sun and a little encouragement. Say yes when your friend invites you to play bridge even if you have to rearrange your schedule. Love the ones you're with. This is truly, our one wild and precious life. Don't waste it worrying about whether or not your silly little sideboard might be stranded in the Panama Canal.

Large Loving

One day last week Norah and I went on a mission - takeout at Chik-Fil-A. For whatever reason, our car ride reminded her of the previous weekend when the two of us had left a family gathering to return to our house and she rode with me.

"Meme, tomorrow I was sad when you took me to your house," says Norah. (She meant a few days ago; she's still getting past, present and future straightened out in her head.)

"Why were you sad darling girl?" I ask.

"Because we left my sweetheart Christian with Mommy Meredith," she explains.

"But Mommy Meredith and Christian followed us to my house, we were only apart for 2 minutes." I reply.

"Oh Meme, it is just so sad to be apart from my sweetheart," she sighs and one little tear rolls down her cheek. I hope she brings me in my wheelchair to the awards ceremony when she wins an Oscar.

Wouldn't it be grand if we had the faith of children, who dare to believe that an enemy is just a friend in disguise - waiting to mature a teeny tiny bit?

Come Back, Sweetheart!

My grandchildren, like yours I am sure, are perfect. Last Sunday afternoon, as happens most Sundays because we are super lucky to have them in town, they were running through the house playing chase. Christian would tease, "Come catch me Norah Jane...." and off he would run.

Norah would follow on fast little feet with her arms spread wide, "Come back sweetheart!"

It is just the cutest thing to watch them play.

Last summer, when they were almost a year younger, they struggled to play. Christian did not particularly want to share anything - especially the toys but including the water hose. Norah would grow frustrated with this miserly mister and on occasion, express her frustration with a little love bite. Sometimes Christian would push or tackle Norah; once Norah squirted him with the hose. On and on it went until it didn't - now they are best buddies.

Regardless of the earlier instances of toddler tussles, these two kids love each other well and I think they, like young children everywhere, have such great instincts for loving like Paul suggested we love in Romans 12 - one of my favorite chapters in the whole bible. Earlier in the passage Paul encourages us to "be ye transformed" by the renewing of our minds, but the part my grandkids remind me of is further along when Paul encourages us in 12 verses using 30 instructions to love one another. He says it in various ways - "do not repay evil with evil, but overcome evil with good" is one of them.

This is not some kind of high falutin' love. It's not made out of the warm fuzzy feelings we feel when we break bread with people we agree with and with whom we share a common enemy. No! This is about loving our enemies. OUR ENEMIES! Just a few short months ago there were days when it felt like Norah and Christian were enemies. They both wanted to drink from the same sippy cup; they fought over the same dump trunk; they wailed over having to take turns squirting Uncle Scott/Daddy with the hose. These problems were not solved by buying more cups, trucks and hoses. They resolved as they learned what it means to love one another.

I pray that the world might one day see through child-like eyes because love toddler-sized is a beautiful thing.

Estrangement

For decades I was afraid of anger. I didn't mind a little righteous indignation on behalf of another person now and again, but I would go to great lengths to not get angry with the people I loved. I excused, ignored, justified and rationalized bad behavior so long as the naughty person was someone I loved. It was exhausting.

I did not know that love and anger are companions; I had rarely witnessed anger as a normal response to loving one another. When we were first married Pete would sometimes express normal and appropriate anger. It would totally freak me out. He learned over the years to deal with his anger in ways that did not scare me, which basically meant trying to figure out how to handle conflict in ways I could tolerate - which was really unfair to him. We're lucky, I suppose, that we survived my anger-phobia. Getting angry is part and parcel of intimacy and love. Paul certainly knew that when he wrote in the book of Ephesians, "Be angry but do not sin...Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ as forgiven you." (Ephesians 4 and 5 is a good read.)

Anger is an emotion that is beneficial so long as we learn how to use it for good and not evil. It serves as a signal that we need to pay attention to something. Maybe there is a threat - or perhaps, a perceived threat that is actually no threat at all. Maybe anger is trying to teach us something we need to learn about ourselves - like, hypothetically speaking, we need a good therapist to help us sort through why anger freaks us out. Anger gets our body ready for a response. Often anger is just a good cover for fear. Whatever. They are both trying to get our attention.

Denying anger is the way I tried to cope; I can tell you, it is a short term solution if you're uncertain how to proceed but a lousy long term strategy for caring about yourself and others. Virtuous living is a beautiful thing - but no where is it considered a virtue to numb yourself from feeling your feelings.

As I said yesterday, Jesus is not trying to break people up but he does offer us ways to see and be in the world that allows for authentic human expressions of all kinds. Are there any emotional barriers between you ad your own authentic living?

Family and Faith

In a very public Father's Day letter published in the New York Times Anna Quindlen once wrote, "We might as well have a universal support group: Adult Children of Parents." The gist of the letter was a bit of a commentary on the challenge every child faces: to wake up to the reality that they are individuals, not extensions of their parental units. Most of us do not have to hate our family to differentiate ourselves from them. But sometimes our families do hate us when we try.

Jesus knew this. In the gospel of Matthew, Jesus speaks of the gut-wrenching work of choosing for ourselves who we want to become. He compares and contrasts those who follow Jesus and those who don't - including a controversial passage that says that if we love our families more than Jesus we are unworthy. I suspect that Jesus and Anna Quindlen were making similar points. All families are complex webs of interconnection. From the smallest details (Duke's or Hellmann's?) to larger issues like politics, our family beliefs, customs and idiosyncratic ways are engrained in us. This is not a good versus bad thing; it is a complicated dance toward maturity and choosing for ourselves how we want to create the next generation of 'family.'

Following Jesus was a sure fire way to get you scratched from the holiday party back in the day. This idea of 'hating' your mother and father was not Jesus' idea; it was the reality for anyone who chose to follow Jesus at that time. Today, we understand this, right? How many families do you know that have survived unscathed their voting records in 2016 or their various positions on the Black Lives Matter movement?

Jesus is not trying to break people up. What he is saying is this: love me best. And, if that is true, then he promises us this: no matter the ups and downs of our relationships and life as a result of choosing him - whatever we lose for his sake, God will breathe new life into. We will lose if we love God with all our heart, mind, soul and strength because it will require us to jettison old habitual ways of believing, thinking and being. People won't like that. But God will love us and continue to breathe on our dry, dead bones.