grief

Never Useless: laying aside harsh words for hard stories

/ bekaburnsblog / 1 Comment

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“In the years since our lives changed forever…”

It was a humble, short phrase, soaked with intention. The author was Katherine Wolf, survivor of a brain stem stroke that disabled her body, her speech, her face, and nearly claimed her life in her early twenties.

But she didn’t write, “In the years since my devastating stroke…” She didn’t even name what happened to her. She didn’t say “ruined.” Instead, she expressed the lasting impact of the stroke by using the phrase, “changed forever.” Katherine refused to turn her story over to be a narrative of only damage.

I wanted that same intention in how I frame what we’ve walked through, but I didn’t know how to get there. So, I started asking the Lord to give me His words for my story.

When I try to explain it, it goes like this:

(If you already know it, feel free to skip ahead.)

We studied for years and worked hard to pay for the flight training needed to prepare for an aviation ministry overseas. We sold our vehicles and belongings and moved our entire lives to Papua New Guinea to support missionaries working to translate the word of God into new languages. We studied the trade language for months to be able to live and function in the country. Then we got pregnant with our second baby. It was a brutal pregnancy filled with unrelenting nausea and vomiting that we could not get under control even with the prescription medications the doctors at our base were able to give me. We fought to handle it with IV fluids a few times a week and support from our co-workers to feed and care for our family while Cody continued in simulator training and working on the planes in the hangar.

Seventeen weeks into the pregnancy, our leadership and medical staff sent us back to the U.S. to receive more complex medical care. I was placed on a pump, constantly infusing nausea medication, then hospitalized for a cardiac arrhythmia that was contributing to how fatigued and weak I felt. I came home with a wearable defibrillator and an implanted heart monitor, then gave birth in the ICU. Shortly after we got the baby home, he began having eye tremors. We took him to the hospital and found that he had fluid compressing and leaking into his brain tissue, cysts in two parts of his brain, and another part that never formed at all. We delayed our return to Papua New Guinea and set up housing and interim work serving at the mission’s retirement home for the next year, which we spent getting frequent brains scans for the baby, trialing a medication to slow down the fluid, and seeing specialists. Each time we thought we were in the clear and could return to our home overseas, another issue came up with either Benaiah, Cody, or I that we had to address: surgery for a birth defect, surgery for ear infections, appendicitis, a tumor too deep to biopsy, speech delays, nervous system disorders, and then, daily migraines which forfeited Cody’s ability to renew his flight medical. Finally, we tried to go back to Papua New Guinea, in a mechanic role, to give whatever we had left, and two things happened. One, another evaluation revealed new delays with the recommendation for more support and early intervention for our child. Two, we felt an unexpected peace that there was something new the Lord had for us to press into: a ministry of comfort and encouragement to missionaries and ministry workers who are struggling.

People can ask me a simple question and sometimes I’ve wrestled that information into a straightforward answer, but sometimes it still unleashes a flood of emotion, frustration, and unexpected detail. Sometimes, I shut the topic down and pack all that untidiness away.

We can be like that with our stories.

Many of our lives take us on trajectories we never wanted or expected. I know the Lord had purpose in it. But I’ve struggled as we’ve made the pivot into this new and good thing before us. It meant letting go of trying to get back to our life in Papua New Guinea. It meant accepting that our lives had changed forever. And it was heart-breaking.

But reading Katherine’s words was a reminder that even our hardest stories are more than what has happened to us or what we’ve lost, and I wanted a way to talk and think about mine that reflected God’s unfaltering intentions and purposes, not just my heartache and confusion.

So I took some intentional time to put away distractions with the purpose of asking the Lord to meet me in the discomfort that I normally numb. I tried to breathe through many, many uncomfortable thoughts and just invite Jesus into those moments.

Comfort me, Lord. Give me your words for my story. Uproot anything that’s untrue. Plant your truth deep in its place.

For a few weeks I have been praying this, and I wanted to share a passage the Lord challenged me with as I sought Him in his word. Right smack in the middle of the powerhouse book of Philippians, Paul takes a moment to talk about Epaphroditus, a man who risked his life for the sake of Christ:

“Meanwhile, I thought I should send Epaphroditus back to you. He is a true brother, co-worker, and fellow soldier. And he was your messenger to help me in my need. I am sending him because he has been longing to see you, and he was very distressed that you heard he was ill. And he certainly was ill; in fact, he almost died. But God had mercy on him – and also on me, so that I would not have one sorrow after another. So I am all the more anxious to send him back to you, for I know you will be glad to see him, and then I will not be so worried about you. Welcome him in the Lord’s love and with great joy, and give him the honor that people like him deserve. For he risked his life for the work of Christ, and he was at the point of death while doing for me what you couldn’t do from far away.”

-Philippians 2:25-30

Here’s what I had never noticed before: Epaphroditus risked his life for the sake of Christ by getting sick.

Does this sound familiar?

My breath caught and I started to object, “But Lord, I didn’t stay to the point of death itself…”

Epaphroditus wanted to keep going. He wanted to give more than he had to give. He got sent back from something that was really important to him. He got sick. This was not his plan. His story is here for a reason. Do you want my words for your story? Look at how I describe his.

I studied the words used to depict Epaphroditus:

True brother, co-worker, fellow soldier. Welcome him with love and great joy. Give the honor people like him deserve.

I sat quietly with this passage, and I felt a gentle question nudge my heart:

“What if I honor the very thing that fills you with shame?”

Epaphroditus never would have written these things about himself. Nor would I describe myself that way. But I’m writing down this wrestling because I don’t think I’m the only one carrying around a bitter accusation that what I tried to give to the Lord was lost. And I think He confronted me on this because He thinks differently than you or I.

Lost? What do you mean? You offered it to me. As you walk with me, what you lose, give up, or suffer, I count as an offering.

Epaphroditus was upset that the Philippian church even found out he had been sick. But God inspired Paul to write these glowing words about a man who was being sent home. A man whose service was affected and interrupted by an illness totally outside his control.

I get honoring great sacrifice when I see what it accomplished. When hardship happens and it gets in the way and erodes what I am able to give; when I see cost, but I can’t trace out how it could be worthwhile…other words come to mind.

What was all of that? Why did we train for years and leave everything to give our lives to the work of spreading the Gospel only to end up hospitalized and scrambling to figure out housing back in the United States?

How useless. What a waste.

Those are the painful words that have painted my disappointment with extra sting.

What are yours?

My aching friends, God doesn’t think the same way we do.

He didn’t just see Epaphroditus’ body, taken down by illness, falling short of all he may have wanted to accomplish. God saw his heart.

He sees yours and mine, too, even when we are spent and there’s so much more need beyond our reach. Even when it all falls apart and we’re trying to rally, but we’re limping and frustrated and filled with doubt. Even when, like Epaphroditus, we’d rather people not even know how desperate things got. Even when we’ve tried to do something good and it blows up in our face.

“…Man looks at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart.”

-1 Samuel 16:7

God doesn’t look at weakness or sickness with annoyance like you and I might. He’s not surprised when it disrupts our plans. He’s not stuck on how it’s holding us back. He tells us we can boast all the more gladly about our weakness, because it is in that weakness (not once we get past it) that his power rests on us and that we find His grace sufficient. The unexpected stuff that hits our lives is part of the course that He’s marked out for us, even and especially when it gets in the way of what we wanted to offer.

This week, as I’ve continued asking the Lord to give me His words for my story, I was reading Malachi chapter 3 and I came across this:

““Your words against me are harsh,” says the Lord.

Yet you ask, “What have we spoken against you?”

 You have said, “It is useless to serve God…” 

And again, I was challenged. When I say, “What a waste. How useless.” Not only are those NOT God’s words for anything my story has held, but while leaning on my own understanding, I am speaking harshly against Him. I’m looking at the short timeline and the visible things I can wrap my human brain around and declaring that since this didn’t turn out the way I hoped, it was a waste. But here’s the truth,

“So, my dear brothers and sisters, be strong and immovable. Always work enthusiastically for the Lord, for you know that nothing you do for the Lord is ever useless.”

-1 Corinthians 15:58

Why would Paul need to write that to the church at Corinth? Because life is full of trouble and ministry is hard. Sometimes, it feels useless. So we need the truth that it is never useless.

If you’re spent and hurting and fighting with the lie that it’s not worth it. I’m going to repeat it again. This is what God has to say. Here’s your sword, pick it up:

NOTHING YOU DO FOR THE LORD IS EVER USELESS.

NOTHING YOU’VE DONE FOR THE LORD WAS EVER A WASTE.

In this life you will have trouble. But take heart. He is using those troubles.

Sometimes, it’s not the satisfying moments when it all comes together, it’s the hollow ones when it all comes apart where we learn to treasure and be satisfied in Him. Sometimes, He’s doing something new we never saw coming. Sometimes, waiting feels like defeat, but it’s not.

“So let’s not get tired of doing what is good. At just the right time, we will reap a harvest of blessing if we don’t give up.”

-Galatians 6:9

Epaphroditus carried the letter of Philippians from Paul to the church of Philippi. Maybe he carried the weight of disappointment on that long trek back, too.

Why, Lord, when I came all this way, would you let me get that sick?

But in leaving his ministry in Rome behind, Epaphroditus served as the courier that made it possible for you and I to read the words, “I can do all things through Christ who gives me strength.”

We have Philippians because Epaphroditus carried it back when he was sent home unexpectedly.

Maybe you, too, are carrying a message that God has crafted to strengthen and encourage and comfort, out of the very disappointment that has left your heart heavy, and you yourself just haven’t laid eyes on it yet.

Can you imagine the look on Epaphroditus’ face when Paul’s description of him was read out loud to the whole church?

I bet that same shocked, humbled feeling would overcome our hearts if we got a good glimpse of the way the Lord sees us. And I imagine He would say:

When I speak about you with grace, joy, hope, and satisfaction. Don’t argue. Take it in. This is who you are because of my Son. Welcomed, loved, honored, upright. Whether you’re making headway or collapsing under duress. When you’re strong and when you’re weak. I love you. I have always loved you. And I’m looking for your heart, not for what you have to offer me.

“So we have stopped evaluating others from a human point of view. At one time we thought of Christ merely from a human point of view. How differently we know him now!“

-2 Corinthians 5:16

“For the eyes of the Lord run to and fro throughout the whole earth, to show Himself strong on behalf of those whose heart is loyal to Him...”

-2 Chronicles 16:9

When Hebrews 12 tells us to lay aside every weight, I think a good portion of it might be wrong descriptions of ourselves, and heavy, stinging versions of our stories that speak harshly of their author. Let’s not carry those around anymore. Life is heavy enough. But our God, full of grace and truth, has spoken new things over us, and He promises that there is a bigger story happening with the suffering and loss we can’t make sense of.

What if we took a deep breath of trust, moved into those dark, hurting places, held it all up to the Lord, and asked Him for His version? What if He’s gentle to us? What if He comforts us? What if He give us rest for our souls?

Lord,

I trust you, here and now, that this is the path you’ve marked out for me and you’re doing more with it than I could ever grasp. So, I will not call “loss” what you call “offering.” I trust how you describe me, even when I see all my issues, and I will take my stand behind the breastplate of your perfect righteousness, which has been applied to me in Christ, to extinguish every fiery dart of accusation my enemy would hurl at my heart, and every harsh word he would speak about my story.

I will not agree with him by speaking of you or of me in that way. Fill my heart instead with your truth, your words, and your peace.

“Unless the Lord had helped me, I would soon have settled in the silence of the grave. I cried out, “I am slipping!” but your unfailing love, O Lord, supported me. When doubts filled my mind, your comfort gave me renewed hope and cheer.”

-Psalm 94:17-19

““Each time He said, “My grace is all you need. My power works best in weakness.” So now I am glad to boast about my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ can work through me. That’s why I take pleasure in my weaknesses, and in the insults, hardships, persecutions, and troubles that I suffer for Christ. For when I am weak, then I am strong.”

-2 Corinthians 12:9-10

Acquainted with Grief: misty paths and solid ground

/ bekaburnsblog / 1 Comment

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“The Lord is close to the brokenhearted
    and saves those who are crushed in spirit.”

–Psalm 34:18

“What would you do if you were braver?”

“What would you choose if you knew everything would be okay?”

These have been my litmus test questions when I’m making an important decision.

Courage and trust are the values I want to live my life by.

Thirty-some days ago, we were camping as the year drew to a close, and we purposed to use the time to connect with each other, to slow down, to take in God’s Word, to get quiet, and to listen. We were surprised at what rose to the surface when we were still. We found that most of our good decisions come not from finding enough answers, but from learning to ask the right questions. And we discovered that for both of our hearts, the answers to

“What would do if you were braver?“

“What would you choose if you knew everything would be okay?”

…had changed.

Not that it’s up to us to lay out where we should go. I’ve assumed incorrectly so, so many times. But if it’s up to us to take action rather than only be acted upon, and we have the privilege to fight for the direction we want, it is worth noting that we really want to care for people.

And we want to care for people in an environment that suits the stillness, reflection, and quiet that most accommodates working through grief.

“A man of sorrows, acquainted with deepest grief.” Was a verse that came up in my heart when, again, this year, I was hit with some things. Again, I went through the cycle of shock, desperate positivity, disconnect, numbness, denial, fury, irritability and I recognized it.

This is grief. I am not new to this anymore. Grief and I are familiar.

And according to Isaiah 53:3, Grief and my Messiah are familiar, too. It’s part of why His heart is so soft and compassionate and patient with me.

And I know now that grief is something that can be moved through, lived through. It has changed me, but there is still beauty and life to be lived, and I will be able to enter into them on the other side of the mist, confusion, pain, and sorrow. Though grief is suffocating, and it can block you from seeing anything else, I know now that it can be moved through, acknowledged, and felt, one step at a time, until it is no longer ALL there is.

Grief will still be there, but there will be more. There will be new life.

In July 2023 I wrote this:

“I looked across the coffee shop at the only artwork on the wall with color. A picture of the mist in the jungle trees. I felt your nudge to go there. Metaphorically. Into the mist. Into the moments when I felt lost. Not just for other people, but for myself.

It represents the heat, the pressure, the moisture, the darkness, and the tangled paths of pain, suffering, and confusion. I am mostly out into the light now. And doing everything I can to not relive who I was in the depths.

… I don’t know. I DON’T KNOW what it means that you chose me out of all the pleading moms, begging you to rescue their babies, and you said yes. AND that you left me broken.

I have both “blessed be your name’s” here.

/Blessed be your name, when the sun’s shining down on me, when the world’s all as it should be, blessed be your name./

AND

/Blessed be your name, when the road’s marked with suffering, when there’s pain in the offering, blessed be your name./

I’ve had both before…but not at the same time.

SUCH blessing and SUCH brokenness.

Which will hold my attention?

Where you have answered or where you have said that your grace is sufficient?

Hope realized or the demand for more endurance?

I don’t speak of the events and experiences I walked through like somebody who lived a story that can be told…but as a clinical report. A timeline. A compounding list of my surprise, struggle, horror and angst.

It’s not enough to make light of it or excuse it and I can’t explain it. But my other hard experiences, in time, have all become good stories where I can see your faithfulness and I have finally, with some of them, come to terms with the rich context that they are for taking people on a journey with me to a truth that we both need.

The jungles hold that. And my soul needs it. To own my own story. To come to terms with what I have survived so that I can stand, firm and grounded and strong, on the other side of what I’ve overcome, instead of flinching, hunched and haunted – spirit broken.

And maybe part of the path to that wholeness, the first step toward those misty trees, is acknowledging that I have a broken spirit.

“The Lord hears his people when they call to him for help. He rescues them from all their troubles. The Lord is close to the brokenhearted; he rescues those whose spirits are crushed. The righteous person faces many troubles, but the Lord comes to the rescue each time.”

–Psalm 34:17-19

Welp. That hit a nerve.

Now I’m weeping in a coffeeshop.

This grief is so darn unpredictable. That a beautiful verse about your nearness and your rescue…unexpectedly hits on how “many troubles” are part of the plan for people who are doing their best to follow you – not a sign that we’re getting something wrong…or that it would let up if we just believed well.

The difficulty is training, not punishment.

Jen Wilkin hit on this concept in her Hebrews study, and it has become such a core truth for me. Such a mercy for me to hold on to. That you have something for me to learn through this. That it’s not happening because I did something wrong.

That it wasn’t wrong to want another baby.

That I didn’t screw everything up.

That it’s not my fault my family had to relocate and my husband had to lay aside flying.

That I couldn’t control what happened to me and that though I did my very best to plan for it…it wasn’t enough, and that was okay. Because you will rescue me.

Each.

Time.

One of our pastors challenged our church this week to steward people well by stewarding the truth well. He explained that valuing and caring for those relationships means letting them see that your life is a mess when it is – because You work in that truth, Lord, to support us, encourage us, care for us, and provide safety for others in knowing it is not just them who’s coming apart at the seams.

Man, do I know what it’s like to come apart. Not just to feel the pinch of something, the underlying hum of anxiety, or to race with all I’m trying to keep up with.

But to watch helplessly as it all unravels. To stare in horror as the unraveling reaches not just my plans, my home, my work, my relationships, but works its way to me. To watch it fall to the floor and go limp and know that I have no idea how to put this back together. We have not just lost a couple rows of stitching here. There is no stitch in time to save it anymore. We are down to heaps of thread that have no connection to each other. They must be entirely re-woven.

And the screams of “Why????”

Why would you let this happen when I’m trying to serve you? Wasn’t there anything good in it worth preserving? What are the people who are still on the field serving you getting right that I am missing? What am I too dense to understand? Where am I not listening to you that you had to tear it all down? Did you not have my attention already?

In your kindness, I have had a few close friends remind me that you entrusted Job with his difficulties, you singled him out from all the earth, because of your pleasure in him. Not because he was especially hard to teach, but because he had an especially rare heart for you.

And so it is with many who love you and walk with you. Their paths are tangled with unraveling, pain, loss, plot twists, shipwrecks, and snakebites.

“So then, since Christ suffered physical pain, you must arm yourselves with the same attitude He had, and be ready to suffer, too…Dear friends, don’t be surprised at the fiery trials you are going through , as if something strange were happening to you. Instead, be very glad – for these trials make you partners with Christ in his suffering, so that you will have the wonderful joy of seeing his glory…So if you are suffering in a manner that pleases God, keep on doing what is right, and trust your lives to the God who created you, for He will never fail you.”

–1 Peter 4:1, 12, 19

I have told you all this so that you may have peace in me. Here on earth you will have many trials and sorrows. But take heart, because I have overcome the world.”

–John 16:33

Oh Lord, Send forth your word and heal me.

Transform me by the renewing of my mind.

Teach me and help me to ruminate on these truths.

Light my way through the mist, as we revisit the dark places, as we press into the pain, as I seek to understand…maybe not what you have allowed, but you. Your heart for me. Your faithful character. The One who will never fail me.

The more I understand of you, the less I have to understand the path we have traversed. Yours was no cake-walk. I can entrust you with mine. I know you understand it.

Psalm 34:18: “He rescues those whose spirits are crushed.”

Crushed…like grapes. Pressed…like olives. A friend once told me that out of the crushing comes the wine and the oil you use to anoint the wounds of others. But WE are rescued out of the crushing. Lord this is my prayer. Rescue me, whose body was saved, but whose spirit is crushed. I need your work of rescue again, Son of David, have mercy on me. Let me be poor in spirit before you. That I may be blessed by your mercy.

Lead me to the forest, and help me to be brave and patient with the process of sorting through what is painful, of watching things not be in place while you are weaving me and the pieces of my life back together, with frail, delicate thread infused dually with the oil of your strength, and the sweetness of your comfort. A many-faceted, complex garment you are weaving. From a rag to scrub up the messes, to the softest of blankets to wrap around the ones lost in the midst of those messes. From a worker (Martha), to a lover (Mary).”

I prayed this prayer one and a half years ago. And here I am.

My heart is cooperating so well with the medication that I’ve been able to enjoy running. My tumor is out. I can feel my hands and feet again. There are things I am still wading through and waiting for, but I’m no longer huddled in a blanket crying and hoping my life will somehow thread back together again (most days). I feel strong and eager and ready to build something.

I cried out to the Lord and He answered me. Over the last year and a half, He gave me the courage to face down that misty forest. I walked in, and I hiked, and I hiked and I go back often to forage, to understand, and to plant. The forest and I are familiar now.

He is giving me firm footing. Less often do I wrestle with “Will I be abandoned? Will I have what I need?” More often now it is, “Lord, can I wait well for how you WILL take care of me in this? Can I keep YOU in focus instead of the unknowns? If I can do that, I can do this.”

Of course, I still want recognition and attention, but I also recognize the sour aftertaste they carry now. The glory of men. Yeck. It doesn’t satisfy. Oh, how my heart longs to be filled up and satisfied with His gaze, His attention, His love, His approval, of which there is plenty to fill me up and stuff me full so that I approach other people not out of hunger, but overflowing.

And here I am today.

Trying not to be distracted by a random lot of land in North Carolina. Trying to push it down and focus.  But full of desire and ideas for it. For how He might use it.

Cody and I prayed about it and went to take a look. I’m not sure what I expected would happen.

But as we walked across it, from corner to corner, it seemed to me to be a place for souls in pain to heal.

Oh Lord,

I return again and again to the soft blanket idea. Have you brought us out and back again, and through so many things, softening us with each hit that our enemy intended to jade us, and finally bringing us to the edge of our mist, to wrap us around people and be a vessel of your care and gentleness to them as they face their own forest?

As we look to you and depend on you, would you pour into us and into them? Would you be close to us all when our hearts are aching and our spirits are crushed? You are the only Healer who can do the tender work of restoring broken souls.

Amanda Williams, in “Godly Grief” writes:  “I don’t want to experience grief and suffering. I can’t solve them, can’t explain them away – I can only enter in, and honestly, I’d rather not. The only way to get to the other side of the mountains is to walk through them.”

Something has shifted, a little at time, with each pass through my own story, hunting for the markers of your faithfulness.  I no longer want to shrink back from grief and suffering. I want to enter in with people. I want to enter in for myself. I want to walk through to the other side of the mountains, so that we may finally breathe in that view. I am addicted to those, “There it is! We’re going to make it after all!!” moments, where the light warms the edges of that thick mist and we finally push out into the open, and we breathe freely, for we have traversed the fog and it cannot hold us anymore.

Ryan Miller writes:

“Chinese bamboo takes 5 years of being watered every day before it breaks through the ground, but in five months time, it will grow 90 feet in the air. Your breakthrough will look different than you think it will. And your job is not to control when breakthrough happens, your job is to faithfully water every single day and trust the Lord for the breakthrough, even in the wilderness seasons. Because God does his best work in the wilderness. And your goal is to take the manna and to take the quail day by day and to say “Heavenly Father, I trust you for the breakthrough, I’m just going to be faithful.”

Lord,

You are the God who gives the breakthrough. In your time and in your way, Lord, not in mine. You are the God who knows exactly what to expect, and who has laid the groundwork and set in motion the provision for all that is to come. I am surrounded before and behind, bubble-wrapped in your protection and love and not a thing can touch my life or go one centimeter further than you permit. You draw the line and make the waters recede and all the universe must heed your voice. Broken things can be built up again. There is nothing this life can hold that can ruin me. And the hardest things, you like to turn on their heads and redeem for beauty, for healing, for newness, and for strength.

We will carry our sorrows, but you will carry us with understanding of those sorrows and with a solid, leak-proof plan to guard all that we entrust to you, to bless us and give to us and rescue us and make much of yourself through our weaknesses before a watching world.

/This is my story. This is my song. Praising my savior all the day long./

-Fanny Crosby, Blessed Assurance

/I won’t be quiet, my God is alive, How could I keep it inside?/

-Elevation Worship, Praise

Man of Sorrows, acquainted with grief.

Mighty God. Wonderful Counselor.

You understand our pain.

And you have held me in mine.

And through fire, you have pressed into my heart some things that must be said.

Some truths that must be wielded as a shield against an enemy who loves to kick us while we’re down by hurling accusations at us and twisting your character. In the times when we most need to collapse, exhausted, banking only on your unfailing love and faithfulness, he loves to whisper suggestions that you might not be so loving, faithful, or interested after all.

Not everyone is in a place to hear it. But for those who are groping in the dark, I must speak.

Don’t listen to that. Listen to Him. Hold on for all you’re worth to His true words. He loves you. He wants you. He’s working in this. We don’t have to understand how. I know you feel lost. This isn’t over. This way, this way, you’re going to make it, press into the mist, keep limping, keep coming, He is worth it, He is worth it, He is worth it.”

For this has been my story.

And this will be my song.

Thank you, Jesus, for you have brought my broken spirit here, to a point where it wants to be poured out.

“Praise the Lord; praise God our savior! For each day He carries us in His arms.”

–Psalm 68:19

“I waited patiently for the Lord to help me,
    and he turned to me and heard my cry.
He lifted me out of the pit of despair,
    out of the mud and the mire.
He set my feet on solid ground
    and steadied me as I walked along.
He has given me a new song to sing,
    a hymn of praise to our God.
Many will see what he has done and be amazed.
    They will put their trust in the Lord.”

–Psalm 40:1-3

““His purpose was for the nations to seek after God and perhaps feel their way toward him and find him—though he is not far from any one of us. For in Him we live and move and exist…”

–Acts 17:27-28

Look Harder: a gentle first step when your eyes are cast down

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“Consider the ravens: They don’t sow or reap; they don’t have a storeroom or a barn; yet God feeds them. Aren’t you worth much more than the birds?”

–Luke 12:24

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I am in an ongoing learning process in my battle with worry, fear, and stress. This past two weeks, we had another round of overwhelm.

Cody went in for emergency surgery to deal with a sudden case of appendicitis and my doctor put in some orders for bloodwork and imaging to get a clearer picture of what’s going on with me. One thing she wanted was a brain MRI. I’m still not quite over the last time our family went through getting a brain MRI “just to rule something out.”

And so, these past two weeks have highlighted where I still struggle in this learning process, especially with waiting and with fear. One thing I have noticed in my reading is that God does not just say what NOT to do or think. He directs us in what TO do and think.

He doesn’t just say, “Don’t be afraid.”

He says, “Take courage, I am here.” (Matthew 14:27)

As I read through Luke 12 this week, the heading in my Bible caught my attention: “The Cure for Anxiety.”

The cure? Does anxiety have a cure? I have only ever seen management for anxiety in the medical field. Meds and processes and tools to lessen its effects. I’ve never had a patient tell me, “Oh, I used to have anxiety, but it’s cured.”

The title isn’t part of God’s inspired word, it was a section label added later. But after so many passages of Jesus dealing with the incurable: leprosy, years of bleeding, blindness, muteness, deafness, paralysis; I thought it was spot on, to take what he said about anxiety and call it the cure. Because “cure” is what He can do with things that men can only manage.

I live with the proof.

And so I looked past “Do not worry” and hunted for what Jesus said TO DO. Where is the Siloam pool He directs us to go wash in for this blindness? And He repeated it for me, so I wouldn’t miss it.

He didn’t just say, “Don’t worry.” He said, “Consider.”

Right! I thought. Fix my eyes on Jesus! That’s always the answer.

But no. Not exactly. Not this time. For weariness, He says “Consider Him who endured such hostility from sinners against Himself, lest you become weary and discouraged in your souls.” (Hebrews 12:3). For endurance, He says “We do this by keeping our eyes on Jesus, the champion who initiates and perfects our faith…” (Hebrews 12:2). But for anxiety, Christ himself, who held in his hands the ability to heal our torment, said to look at something else.

“Consider the ravens: They don’t sow or reap; they don’t have a storeroom or a barn; yet God feeds them.” (Luke 12:24)

“Consider how the wildflowers grow: They don’t labor or spin thread. Yet I tell you, not even Solomon in all his splendor was adorned like one of these.” (Luke 12:27)

I looked up this word that is translated “Consider” in Greek, and this is what I found:

It is the word katanoēsate (κατανοήσατε) – from kata: “down into,” and noeó: “think/understand/realize.” It means to take note of, consider carefully, make account of, or discern. Properly, “to think from up to down.” To understand fully, to consider closely. The word expresses real comprehending: considering attentively until reaching a clear and definite understanding.

There’s a scene in the animated movie The Lion King, where the wise baboon Rafiki promises Simba he can show him his father, then leads him to a pool and tells him to look into the water. Simba peers over the edge and then lets out a defeated sigh, “That’s not my father, it’s just my reflection.”

“No,” Rafiki grabs his head and points back at the water, “Look harder. He lives in you.”

It’s the best visual I can come up with for what “Consider” means here. “Look harder. Look more closely. Think from up to down until you understand more fully.”

Look harder at the birds and the wildflowers, at these “cures” for my thinking that my Heavenly Father has placed all around me, until I reach real comprehending of what they mean:

Birds don’t store up.

Wildflowers aren’t the result of someone’s carefully tended garden.

And yet look at them, thriving.

Next, Jesus asks two questions:

  1. “Aren’t you worth much more than the birds?” (Luke 12:24)
  2. “How much more will He do for you?” (Luke 12:28)

He says “Don’t worry.” And then He tells me what TO DO instead.

Think this: “Your Father knows that you need these things.” (Luke 12:30)

Do this: Seek His kingdom, give to the poor, and store up inexhaustible treasure in Heaven instead of frantically gathering and trying to hold onto what you can here on Earth. (Luke 12:31-34)

Because why would you store up something that’s going to be GIVEN to you?

This summer, we got to visit Melvin and Brenda, one of the awesome couples who has taught and mentored us over the last several years. I shared with them how it had felt to be so spent and so frightened that I went limp. How disappointed I was that I froze and ended up depending on the faith and the prayers of others; that I despaired for my son, while others kept hoping and asking that God would rescue him.

Melvin told me I was not alone. There have been moments where he has gone limp, and that his rule for seasons like this is to have four good friends. Like the paralyzed man who couldn’t get himself to the feet of Jesus, but let himself be carried, lifted, and lowered by friends who were determined to get him to the place of help, we may face times where we know we need the Lord, but we are so bowled over by what we are going through, that we feel too weak to even carry ourselves to Him.

Melvin said those are the moments to invite four good friends, one for each corner of your mat, to carry you to the feet of Jesus, to intercede for you, to rip open the roof, and to beg Him to help you. And that, when you can walk again, it’s time to grab a corner of the mat and carry someone who can’t.

I think that’s one reason “consider the birds” and “consider the flowers” hit me differently this time. Because I know what it is to know God is right and good and able and that what I need is to fix my eyes on Jesus, and yet to be bowed down by so much pain and fear that I struggle to lift my eyes and meet his gaze.

And in those moments, the One who gently calls me to come to Him and find his rest, points to a simple first step when my eyes are cast down:

Are you so stressed and anxious that it’s hard to see me? Does it feel impossible to fix your gaze on me? Then look around you, at what you CAN see.

Wildflowers. Birds. Common. I’ve put them everywhere so you are never without the reminder.

See them? Good. Now look harder. Consider what they mean.

When you cannot see my face or understand my heart, look at how I care for the small things that are not near as valuable to me or as lasting as you are. This is what it means: I will absolutely care for you.

No matter what it looks like, when you’re going under, look again. Still don’t see your Father? Look harder.

“Then he said to his disciples, “Therefore I tell you, don’t worry about your life, what you will eat; or about the body, what you will wear. 23 For life is more than food and the body more than clothing. 24 Consider the ravens: They don’t sow or reap; they don’t have a storeroom or a barn; yet God feeds them. Aren’t you worth much more than the birds? 25 Can any of you add one moment to his life span[d] by worrying? 26 If then you’re not able to do even a little thing, why worry about the rest?

27 “Consider how the wildflowers grow: They don’t labor or spin thread. Yet I tell you, not even Solomon in all his splendor was adorned like one of these. 28 If that’s how God clothes the grass, which is in the field today and is thrown into the furnace tomorrow, how much more will he do for you—you of little faith? 29 Don’t strive for what you should eat and what you should drink, and don’t be anxious. 30 For the Gentile world eagerly seeks all these things, and your Father knows that you need them.

31 “But seek his kingdom, and these things will be provided for you. 32 Don’t be afraid, little flock, because your Father delights to give you the kingdom. 33 Sell your possessions and give to the poor. Make money-bags for yourselves that won’t grow old, an inexhaustible treasure in heaven, where no thief comes near and no moth destroys. 34 For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.”

–Luke 12:22-34

Here’s a song I wrote about considering the lilies:

God Plants: a prayer for releasing our baskets and our brokenness

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“She saw that he was a special baby and kept him hidden for three months. But when she could no longer hide him, she got a basket made of papyrus reeds and waterproofed it with tar and pitch. She put the baby in the basket and laid it among the reeds along the bank of the Nile River. The baby’s sister then stood at a distance, watching to see what would happen to him.”

–Exodus 2:2-4

—

March 15, 2023

Just going to pour out my heart here.

Today, I walked to the fridge, opened the door, looked at the bottle of Benaiah’s brain medication, and left it sitting there. This is Day #1 of NO DIAMOX for Benaiah. And he is all grins.

Praise Him.

Praise Him.

Praise Him.

Praise Him.

Lord Almighty, Thank you for restoring my little baby.

I was watching “Prince of Egypt” with Abi yesterday and the scene where Moses’ mother lays the baby in the basket and releases it to the Nile – with its waves, the crocodiles, the ships and nets and hazards, and then it finds its way to the calm riverbank with a bathing princess, ready to take him in and return him to his own mother’s arms. It had me breaking inside. THIS. THIS is what I felt with my baby. Releasing him into all these dangers I was helpless to protect him from. Pressed between the soldiers coming after him and the unknowns of pushing him out to sea. CSF shunting on one hand, Endoscopic third ventriculostomy and choroid plexus cauterization on the other, watching and waiting and begging for a med that never works to WORK, please God, WORK! Helplessly releasing my baby to His hands – I’ve done everything I can for him here, you have to protect him now.

I didn’t know what God had for him. But like Moses, I see that he is a special baby. And just as He shielded that little basket and swept it to safety, He held my baby with delicate care and dropped him back into my arms, healthy and whole, despite every odd. Despite hydrocephalus, despite arachnoid cysts, despite congenital malformation of the cerebellum, despite spina bifida, despite strabismus, despite nystagmus, despite weight loss and jaundice and tongue tie and lip tie, despite abnormalities on his abdominal ultrasound, despite birth defects, despite complications in surgery, despite plagiocephaly, ear infections, and fevers, he is okay.

He is okay.

Lord,

The river was turbulent and the dangers were many and the basket was handmade and it was out of my hands and my heart screamed “SAVE HIM,” and you heard my cry. The basket held – watertight – and you swept him into peaceful waters.

Lord. What will his life hold?

And why do I need counseling after a miracle?

Because no mother should have to lay her 17 day old baby in a basket of wires and testing and specialists and hospitals and brain scans. And if she must, the basket and the baby may make it to safety, but she will not be okay.

Past the stage of not okay, I’m trusting that this makes for a strong mama. One that has practiced acknowledging how little control she has and releasing what she holds most precious in the whole world into your capable hands. One that knows she can trust you.

But in the aftermath, I do not feel strong. I feel like someone took a blender to my heart.

I told a few close friends the full story this last week, and I shared about a brutal moment. After all the results had come in at the children’s hospital and I’d called Cody to come – come right now. And I was curled up in a recliner staring and Cody walked in the door, scooped our new baby from his hospital crib and held him and grinned at him and bounced him and sang him a silly song.

Here’s the picture of that moment:

I remember it, because he was being what I so badly wanted to be for Benaiah.

I couldn’t look at my baby – tears would start spilling and it would be too hard to breathe. I wanted in that moment to cuddle him close and reassure him and tell him everything would be all right, but the world had just spun out of my control and I couldn’t make it okay for him and I was afraid that if I picked him up and took a good long look at him, I would scream. I was afraid I would give into the utterly devastated wail of my soul and it would frighten my baby instead of soothing him.

I once asked Cody, “How? How did you just swoop in and find that silly place and love him so well in that moment right after that news broke over us?”

Cody’s eyes misted over, “Beka…I didn’t know how much time we had left with him. I wanted to cherish him every moment of it.”

This last week, a close friend of mine was sharing some scary possibilities she’s facing for her baby – he has some persistent symptoms she’s afraid to get checked out. She told me, “I can’t do it! I can’t test him because I can’t face it if it’s bad news. I. will. die.”

“Yes,” I said, “A part of you will die. And then you call me.”

Because that part of me has died, too. When you push what you hold most precious out into the water in a handmade basket and it drifts away from the reach of your fingers, you will not be okay. That moment will wreck you and a piece of you will die. Surrender is a death. And in this life, our God will ask us for surrender.

But Lord, you are the resurrection and the life.

So, I bring that death to you. That churned up, bleeding heart. The fear and the heartache and the despair I felt. The layers of being so sick for so long and finally the nausea is over but I’m facing uncertainties with my heart arrhythmia and tons of tests are slotted for me and I just found out I have a dilated heart ventricle and I don’t know what that means for my future and I’m trying to heal post-partum and coughing all night long in the recliner at the children’s hospital because I’m also fighting the flu and trying to nurse and it’s not working and there’s a thousand wires coming from my baby’s head and his eyes won’t stop tremoring.

The moment the resident walked in and started listing things they’d found that they were hoping they’d rule out – after I’d been trying to convince myself all night long that what I saw on that scan could somehow be a variation of normal. I give you these moments that wrecked me, Lord, that are painful for me to revisit. That visit me unprompted.

I have never felt so helpless, so afraid, or so much dread as I have this year.

Heal me, Oh Lord, and I shall be healed. (Jeremiah 17:14)

Surrender is a death. But when I went limp, you held me. And when my baby swept out of my reach, you had him. And what you have allowed to break and die in me was not serving me. It was a pressure to strive for control that suffocated my spirit. What you plant in its place will breathe life and trust.

“The Spirit of God, who raised Jesus from the dead, lives in you. And just as God raised Christ Jesus from the dead, he will give life to your mortal bodies by this same Spirit living within you.”

–Romans 8:11

Every place in me that you’ve allowed brokenness to touch holds the promise of resurrection. You give and take away. And what you give is more than what you take away.

Oh Lord,

Teach me to leave time in our schedule for all that is happening underneath the surface in our family as we recover. Lord, give me patience for the time it takes to feel better and the process it is to work through things. Teach me to hold space for soul rest, and the labor it takes to enter into it.

I don’t want to be afraid of the things I am afraid of. I don’t want to be twisted up over the things you have allowed. All your ways are just and true. You are trustworthy. Start to smooth the knots in me, Lord.

I read today in Hosea that “Jezreel” means “God plants.” The very place of Israel’s downfall – the name that meant their doom, also prophesied restoration. Our God is a restorer – and we have his promise that what He gives and what He grows will outweigh the suffering that once overshadowed this place. If my heart is thoroughly churned up – may it be as fresh tilled soil: ready for the planting. Plant your truth deep and bring forth life, Lord. My prayer for this grief is “Jezreel” – God plants.

And to you who are reading this with tight throats and hearts in shreds, my prayer for your grief is “Jezreel” – God plants.

“And the Lord said, “Name the child Jezreel, for I am about to punish King Jehu’s dynasty to avenge the murders he committed at Jezreel. In fact, I will bring an end to Israel’s independence. I will break its military power in the Jezreel Valley…Yet the time will come when Israel’s people will be like the sands of the seashore – too many to count! Then, at the place where they were told, “You are not my people,” it will be said, “You are children of the living God.” Then the people of Judah and Israel will unite together. They will choose one leader for themselves, and they will return from exile together. What a day that will be – the day of Jezreel – when God will again plant his people in his land.”

–Hosea 1:4-5, 10-11