Willingly

A faraway friend and I were texting the other day, as we often do, about our lives and our families. She asked how our daughter on a mission is doing and I told her the sad news that she most likely will not be able to go to her original assignment due to travel and visa restrictions. Her daughter is in a similar situation.

So I just posed the question, not mad at all, just so curious. Why do you think God assigned them to these distant missions if He knew from the beginning they might never make it there, that they would end up serving in the states? Why didn’t he just say that from the start and not get their hopes up only to be smashed? Really not upset, honestly just wondering.

I loved our ensuing conversation. She said if her daughter had just been called to where she is serving right now, that would’ve been just fine. I just think it’s so disappointing to anticipate something that is now unlikely to work out, why even suggest it in the first place? But maybe there’s a lesson in this for us and our kids that we will need desperately moving forward.

She offered that maybe they and we need to learn to simply surrender our will to God. Maybe we need to tell him we will live and serve wherever and however he wants us to.

She shared a tender story that changed her forever, in which she told God from that point on she was all in, that he had her will. And she is rock solid on that promise.

I told her I don’t know that I’m there yet.

I told her I’m scared. As we all are I imagine. What will he do with me if I let him have full charge over my life and my future? What will happen if I let him take the reins? I’ve seen what he’s done with others, and I don’t feel strong or courageous enough for any of that. It’s easier and safer to just keep things as temperate as possible and to stay at the helm to avert potential threats. As if.

Do I trust him? I dug deep, desperate to know. Of course I do, I told myself. Mostly.

I’ve been reading about a group of people in Biblical times setting “forth into the sea, commending themselves unto the Lord their God.” When they were buried in the deep there was no water that could hurt them, their vessels being “tight like unto a dish….The wind did never cease,…and thus they were driven forth; and no monster of the sea could break them, neither whale could mar them; and they did have light continually, whether it was above the water or under the water.”

I love this visual of a journey similar to ours, where we are dashed upon the seas of life, trials seemingly as big as whales, winds of troubles never ceasing, duration unknown. And yet I love the idea of what being “tight” could mean for me, confident, prepared, trusting. That “they did have light continually, whether it was above the water or under the water” helps me retain hope that even when it feels like we’re drowning in our sadness, our overwhelm, our confusion, our adversities, there is never any water so black or heavy that it can sink us if we stay focused on the light that is consistently available and accessible and always more powerful than dark.

As I read and think about the strength these and so many other faithful people have had over the years, I can’t help but love my friend even more. She is these people personified, someone like us in today’s world but who is fiercely loyal to her God and trusting of his plan for her life.

There have been times when I’ve let go, when I’ve acquiesced to doing it his way. Rarely do his ideas make sense, but so far they’ve been easy enough to agree with: marry young, have kids, move around the country, buy a farm, say yes to uncomfortable opportunities, be ok with a diagnosis whatever it means. But what about the rest? I haven’t been able to get the phrase, “commending themselves unto the Lord their God,” out of my head. Am I there, am I ready to immerse myself in his will? I feel like I’m a little kid who, after splashing around in the shallow waters, now hesitantly stands teetering on the edge of the deep end while my dad patiently waits to catch me.

I pleaded silently in my heart and admitted the absolute truth of it, “I’m scared. What will happen if I let go, if if I do give my will to You? Where will I be then, will I be able to handle what You have in mind? I’m not that kind of person. I’m so weak.”

A peaceful, loving thought immediately warmed my heart. I wouldn’t be left alone. Phrases I’d heard—even taught—so many times flooded into my mind. “I will not leave you comfortless: I will come to you. I will go before you and be your rearward; and I will be in your midst. I will go before your face. I will be on your right hand and on your left, and my Spirit shall be in your hearts, and mine angels round about you, to bear you up.” So many, I was overwhelmed with the rush of them all. I had forgotten to remember that I have and will never be left alone no matter what storms beset me.

“When they were encompassed about by many waters they did cry unto the Lord, and he did bring them forth again upon the top of the waters.” There were and always will be waters. That’s just the nature of our journey. But when our barges are tight, when our trust is secure, when we let him steer our journeys, we will be able to withstand the waves and the whales and the monsters of the seas and be assured that we will come “upon the top of the waters.”

Sleeplessness

Todd doesn’t usually do emergency call overnight these days, but he’s had more the past year, with a few the past couple of weeks.  Which I hate.  I stay up and read until I’m solidly tired, ever hopeful that I will just sail into morning without a break in sleep waves.  But almost never does that happen.  I usually find myself awake somewhere in the middle.  I’ve stopped looking at my phone to ascertain where we are because I already know.  It’s too early, it’s sleeping time, I would know if it were the right time to wake up.

And so there I am.  As I’m sure many of you my age and older are.  Then what?  I’ve tried a million different ways to trick myself into going back to sleep.  I’ve tried doing a monk-hypnotist-like chant, “Sleep, sleeeeep, sleeeeeep…”  I’ve tried praying for everyone I know.  I’ve tried just admitting I’m awake.  I’ve tried playing my quiet music on Pandora but all that does is tell me how many songs I’ve been awake through.

Finally I decided to write out the question in my journal.  “What can I do to go back to sleep?”  And I prayed.  Not really expecting an answer, but I figured why not, I pray about all sorts of specifically weird things.  It wasn’t at that exact time, but it wasn’t too many days later when the thought came to me as the answer: Breathe.  I considered that and remembered lying on my brown leather couch six years ago after my mastectomy recovering.  I was so desperate for some sort of pain relief that I did some deep breathing.  I’ve heard and read many variations, but the one I remember best is to breathe in for four counts, hold for four and release for four.  I know it’s deep if it involves my belly.  So I’ve tried focusing when I find myself awake, I quiet the clatter and chatter in my head and just breathe. In for four and so on.  I think if nothing else it relaxes me and helps me clear away my thoughts because it takes concentrated effort.  I don’t know how long before it works because at some point in the morning I wake up, unaware of my last breath, a lot like the surgery, where one moment I was counting and meeting the surgeons and the next I was awake with tubes coming out of my torso.  Surreal.

It occurred to me as I listened to at least an hour’s worth of instrumental music last night (because I was not breathing and focused), that this idea would be useful in so many scenarios, situations, and struggles we’re faced with in our awake times of the day.  Breathe.

I thought of a specific trial that had low-key (and occasionally intensely) plagued me for several years.  I had journaled about it copiously, and I’d prayed incessantly for resolution, understanding, and knowledge about how to deal with it.  I finally quit praying about it ever changing and decided instead to simply pray for the person involved.  For love.  I felt like I settled down and chose to just breathe through it, not knowing what the outcome would ever look like or expecting to ever feel peace.  

And I thought about how interesting it is that breathing slowly, mindfully, and deeply can have such a powerful resolute effect, a transformative power almost, carrying us from a state of worry and upset to a place of calm restfulness.

I realized just last night during my bout of wakefulness that this struggle, the turmoil, I’d been experiencing for all these years had somehow dissipated.  I was shocked actually.  But not in a jolting or even surprising way.  All my angst had faded and I realized I wasn’t bothered or concerned about it even a little bit anymore.  Something that had paralyzed me many times, that I had cried to Todd and God about even more, something that had caused me deep internal analysis and soul-searching, wasn’t even a problem at all anymore.  Bizarre, given the grief I’d felt for so long.

But just as our worries lead to restless nights where we toss and turn and fight sleep and wakefulness both, this struggle kept me from relaxing into my own restfulness of soul.  It was only when I let it go, when I tuned into what I could control and focused on my “breathing,” which to me meant loving and trusting, that I felt peace.  Just like my night sleep that transcends the issues of the day and the anxieties in my head, calm came once I finally gave up the fight and just trusted my breath.