Struck Down, But Not Destroyed

It was Valentine's Day, 1951.Two brothers, Dick (11 years old) and Gary (7 years old), had just come home from a Cub Scout Party. The family farm was situated on the west shore of West Grand Traverse Bay, about five miles from town. The frigid February temperatures had just put a thin film of ice over the whole bay. The boys and a friend were excited about the new ice, and without saying a word to their parents they left the safety of the farmyard and headed across the road to the bay.

When the brother's dad discovered they had gone down to the bay he went running after them...but it was too late. Their dad nearly drowned that day. He searched desperately for the boys, repeatedly falling into the frigid water as the in the hole in the ice got larger and larger. But the three of them were gone. 

As their younger brother Ted grew up in their home, he heard many stories about the boys, about that horrible day, about loss. Though his parents endured by clinging to their faith in God and the community of their church, Ted learned what life looked like when it is scarred by grief.

Let's be honest: even those of us who have placed our hope and trust in God have our share of pain, grief and loss. 

Unexpected events can arise that shake us to the core and leave us wondering what happened. I suspect that every one of us could tell of events that have rocked our world. More than one follower of Christ has turned away from him because they could not regain their sense of stability following the pain or loss that came their way.

The Childlike Hunger of Grief

(I posted this a while ago, but in rereading it, its main point resonated with me again. Hopefully, it will with you as well.) 
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When I attended the National Writer's Series at the Opera House in Traverse City, I met Tom Perrotta, author of The Leftovers (among many other books).  The book is a certainly a dig at the Left Behind crowd (the leftovers are people who remain after a Rapture-like event), but that's just the backdrop for a story about grief.

     When I began reading, I thought this book would perhaps be a screed against the idiocy of Christians who believe in the Rapture. By the time I was done, the precipitating event has given way to a poignant story of the effect of cataclysmic loss on a small town.

     As the evening progressed, two main thoughts struck me.

     First, Mr. Perrotta and I are very different when it comes to our view of God, faith, religion, and social issues, though he was very tactful when talking about people and beliefs with whom he disagrees. He was careful to note that he used the Rapture scenario because it was in the culture's imagination thanks to the Left Behind series, and he decided to use it as a way to explore how communities respond to such massive upheaval.

     Second, grief unites us in spite of our differences, and (I suspect) with more meaningful bonds than happiness.  Let me explain.

    He writes the following about a daughter whose mother disappeared:

"For a long time after she left, Jill found herself overwhelmed by a childlike hunger for her mother's presence. She missed everything about the woman, even the things that used to drive her crazy - her off key singing, her insistence that whole-wheat pasta tasted just as good as the regular kind, her inability to follow the story line of even the simplest TV show. ..Spasms of wild longing would strike out of nowhere...leaving her dazed and weepy...She eventually stopped crying herself to sleep, stopped writing long, desperate letters asking her mother to please come home..."

On the next page:

"These days, the only time Jill consistently missed her mother was first thing in the morning, when she was still half-asleep, unreconciled to the new day. It just didn't feel right, coming down for breakfast and not finding her at the table in her fuzzy gray robe, no one to hug her and whisper 'Hey, sleepyhead...'"

A father whose son disappeared notes an unusual event:

"One night, my son came to me in a dream. You know how sometimes you see people in dreams, and it's not really them, but somehow it is them? Well, this wasn't like that.  This was my son, clear as day..."

    I get all three of those examples.  They resonate with me.  The "childlike hunger" for my dad's presence after he died; the desire to to hug him like Vincent hugs me now; the empty loneliness in the ordinary moments of life; the dreams that are both ethereal and real.  I've been there.

     If Tom had written a clever story about laughter while rafting down a river, I would have felt connected with him to some degree, but not like I did.  Good times are good - thus the label - but hard times are cohesive in ways good times aren't.  When I talked with him in the book signing line, I discovered we both have lost fathers.  Ahh, that explains it.  In spite of very different lives, we have shared the "childlike hunger" and the ordinary moments of loss, and the dreams.  

   I was thinking on the drive home that my best friendships have been forged through the furnace of grief and hardship.  The friends who never seem far away are the ones whose lives intertwined with mine when the going was tough.  Tim, who cried with me (and I with him) when our lives hit some rough spots; Clint, who gave a lot of money, time and friendship when my Dad died;  Don, who lost a brother to cancer and allowed me into his spiritual journey in the aftermath; Ben, who helped me through a breakdown before I walked with him through his tumor.... the list goes on.

     I wonder if that's why Jesus was "a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief" (Isaiah 53:3).  If we are looking for a God with whom to identify in the midst of life's struggles, we don't need a laughing Savior. We are not looking for the assurance that God understands our lives when we are at a party, or enjoying a sunrise, or enjoying a solid meal with friends.  A Jesus who was a "man of laughter, acquainted with happiness" would be good - and he certainly laughed and was happy - but if that was our primary memory of his life here, would we really turn to him when the bottom drops out?

     When we "bear each others burdens" (Galatians 6:2)  - when we weep with those who weep - we fulfill the law of Christ, which means we love God and others (Matthew 22:37).  And that's a good thing, even if it is best experienced in the midst of pain.

The Imprint of the Past

     
In my experience, there is a cycle to grief.  Something from the trauma of the loss gets embedded in us - in our heart, our head, our emotions, maybe even our physiology. I don't know exactly how to describe it, but I have noticed over the years that grief has left an imprint on my flesh as well as my spirit. My body remembers that something monumental happened on January 9, 2003, and it dutifully reminds me each year as the cycle of life unfolds.

Ten years ago today, my father died. 

     Reality shifted in a way I had never experienced before. Something in the world broke, not just in him but in me.  I have mended for ten years now, and much like broken bones can become stronger after they mend, there are parts of me that have matured in ways that could not have happened without that experience.  But for the past week I've been depressed, exhausted, on the verge of tears, unable to focus, using entertainment to get me through the evening on the way to a restless sleep.

     My body remembers. It commemorates that week in my life every year.  I have thought over the years that the world should have changed more when Dad died. Perhaps it did, and I didn't realize it. 

    A decade is a long time. 

     There are times I feel like I should be over it more than I am. Other times, I'm pretty sure that I'm always supposed to have a place deep inside that misses him. Somewhere between despondency and amnesia I have found a healthy place where I miss him gently, poignantly, during the moments when a good father ought to be missed. During weeks like this one, I am reminded that the once broken do not become the never broken. The broken become the repaired. Though they heal, they carry with them the history of their losses.  
      On rainy days, my surgically repaired knees hurt. I'm okay with that. The rainy days remind me that what I had been feeling every day has faded - not completely, but enough to make me grateful that broken is not the same as hopeless.
     On days like today, my heart hurts. I'm okay with that, too. These days reminds me that what I had been feeling every day has faded - not completely, but enough that I can recognize the gift of a father whose passing is worthy of my lingering grief.
   May his memory stay embedded in me, body and soul.

The Testimony of the Repaired

     “Deep calls unto deep,” said the writer of Psalm 42 as he was begging God for comfort in the midst of his despair. The word "deep" means "abyss." It can be a literal geographical location, but it can also be that place in one's heart where chaos and emptiness overwhelms.  One translation reads, “Hollow howlings hang in the air."

     There have been times when the deepest things in me cried out, too. Sometimes, God filled  the abyss Himself. Sometimes, He answered by connecting the hollow“deep” within me to the “deep” within others that was once hollow as well, but which He had filled.

     My experience has been this: God knows the best help for the despairing comes from those who understand. Jesus' presence on earth showed us that God understands human existence because God himself experienced life on earth.  In the same way, our experiences give us a window into the lives of others so that we have an opportunity to walk with them through hard times.  Practially speaking, this means God will match "deep" with "deep."  

• Recovery groups are headed up by people who have gone through (or are going through) the recovery process.
• Divorce Care class is headed by people who have experienced the pain of broken families.
• The best budgeting advice comes from people who had Ramen Noodles and water the whole way through college.
• The best marriage advice comes from people whose marriage has been through the fire.
• In the aftermath of my father’s death, I received the most comfort from others who were equally fatherless.

Seeing the Broken

"One day Peter and John were going up to the temple at the time of prayer—at three in the afternoon. Now a man crippled from birth was being carried to the temple gate called Beautiful, where he was put every day to beg from those going into the temple courts. When he saw Peter and John about to enter, he asked them for money. Peter looked straight at him, as did John. Then Peter said, "Look at us!" So the man gave them his attention, expecting to get something from them. 

Then Peter said, "Silver or gold I do not have, but what I have I give you. In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, walk." Taking him by the right hand, he helped him up, and instantly the man's feet and ankles became strong. He jumped to his feet and began to walk. Then he went with them into the temple courts, walking and jumping, and praising God. When all the people saw him walking and praising God, they recognized him as the same man who used to sit begging at the temple gate called Beautiful, and they were filled with wonder and amazement at what had happened to him."  - Acts 3

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We all know what is like to be crippled.

In this case, the disciples saw a man who was literally crippled, but there is more than one way to have your legs knocked out from under you. Sometimes it can be a very real physical infirmity; sometimes it is an emotional one – depression, anger, lust, greed, grief – that robs you of your ability to function. Sometimes it is addictions the break us. Sometimes other people do things to us that cripple us through abuse, heartache, broken families and failed relationships.

In the kingdom of God, we should never just walk past the broken, because Jesus didn’t walk by us. Peter and John, acting as representatives of Jesus, saw the man and helped him. Jesus wasn’t around in the same way he had been not so long before, but He had empowered others to carry on His work with His power.