more thoughts on ‘but if not…’
Job said, “I cry to you and you do not answer me;
I stand, and you merely look at me.”
Then the Lord answered Job out of the whirlwind:
“Where were you when I laid the foundation of the earth?
Tell me, if you have understanding.
Who determined its measurements—
surely you know!
Or who stretched the line upon it?
On what were its bases sunk?
Who laid its cornerstone
when the morning stars sang together
and all the heavenly beings shouted for joy?
Or who shut in the sea with
when it burst out from the womb?”
—Job. 30.20, 38.4-8
We want answers.
God gives us presence,
but not answers.
Loving attention, gazing at us from within,
faithful companionship,
walking with us through this amazing Creation,
all of it fashioned in a love and wisdom
that we can’t comprehend,
with wild art and crazy beauty
and boundless love–
this Creation that holds us and births us
and cherishes us even in our mortal unravelings,
offers us delights in its steady hands,
even in our tragedies–
reverence that ours can’t even imitate,
purpose that the human mind can’t read
any better than the poetry of the time before time,
forgiveness, mercy and delight–
but not answers.
Beyond all suffering and pleasure,
reason and meaning,
our desperate clutch at making sense,
the love God gives us
doesn’t need to become any less
than perfect mystery.
No answer,
just God.
______________________
Steve Garnaas-Holmes
Unfolding Light
http://www.unfoldinglight.net
We tend to want what we want. Especially in our leaps of faith. I think most of us decide what we think we want before we take the leap of faith. I know for many years I had this vision of what life would be when I leap off the cliff. I had plans a – zz, and when things started going off track then I would try something new. I always had a new plan.
Over years of walking in faith, in which life was in NO WAY how I thought it should be, I came to a place in my healing where I asked the question, ‘What if my life never gets better? What if THIS is the life God wants for me. What if I die here in obscurity, in poverty, in pain, in a terrible relationship, with unresolved business, in hunger, never knowing my children, or doing anything very worthy as far as the world is concerned? What if this is my life? What if I never get to heal, hold my grandchildren, or help anyone else through tough times, or use what I have been through for good, or even eat good food again? What if never gets better?’
When I came to this question I was about 11 years into the journey. I had walked through 11 really bad years. I mean REALLY bad years. I had held onto my faith in this walk through year after year, always believing there was a reason. I had hit walls a few times, but always got back up. Always believed it would get better. Making very difficult choices towards healing, towards joy, living in thankfulness. Continuing to have hope during the darkness when the light within me was, sometimes, only a tiny flame trying to hold on during a wind storm of magnificent proportions.
Suddenly I came face to face with the horrible truth. All of these years it just kept being bad, getting badder. There was no movement in a better direction and suddenly I had to face this brutal truth. Maybe this was what I was supposed to be doing. Maybe this was it for me! Bam! In your face. What now? I had thought there was a glorious purpose for me. I had visualized standing on a world stage singing to many people and sharing my story. That was my vision. What if it was MY vision. It was a great vision…I had thought that God had placed those desires in my heart…but if not….what then? Could I accept it? Could I continue to praise? Could I bring God glory in the gray? Could I say, ‘not my will, but thine be done’?
And so a choice was upon me.
And as I lay there thinking of this most startling and horrid thought, the words of Job came to me, ‘though he slay me, still will I trust Him’ – Job 13:15. My obedience was all I was able to give to this God of such magnitude and mystery who I had experienced on this journey of grace and miracles. I wouldn’t trade this love, peace and joy for anything this world could offer me. Being uncomfortable, being hungry was a small price to pay. I would follow on, and die right there if that was God’s plan.
I began to understand what it means to ‘take up your cross daily’. To stop visualizing ‘better days’, but to find the grace to be in that particular moment and create my life each moment for God. Not in the future, but the right now. I began to understand why ‘mercies are new every morning’. I began to live, like Mother Teresa advised, ‘If you can’t feed one hundred, feed one’. I began to see, even more intensely, how important it is to live this moment. This moment is your life. We have no guarantee. Don’t wait. Don’t cling. Enter this moment and live it. It has changed me, and changed how I proceed, how I view success. How I experience my own belovedness. How I interact with the people who filter through my life every day. It lead me to begin the newsletter. It has lead me right here.
The hardest thing for me is to step out in faith without a plan. I want a plan. I have great plans! I have a wonderful imagination! I want ideas to try, and people to ask. I want to ‘make things happen’ – I can run myself in circles, stay busy doing nothing of value and make things look like I got it under control. I’m good at it! ha What I’m not so good at? Patience. Waiting. Resting. Letting go. I have learned I am free to choose – and I have decided to choose God.
I am currently living, once again, on the delicate limb of faith, hanging off a cliff with sharp rocks, raging water and hungry alligators down below me. It is a difficult, uncomfortable and exhausting place to be. I am living every moment with the choice of what I do in the space of ‘but if not…’
and, here I stand and I say, ‘give me grace for today, Lord. strengthen me in this moment and the next. My God is so big, I know there is only good from this love beyond my comprehension. Not my will. Move me out of the way. Help me let go. My God will deliver, but if not…I still will not stop my praise for my God who has poured out so much blessing on me. For all that’s been done for me! I am loved and I must pour out my love in return. Freely. I pour out my life as a puddle of praise and obedience. I have found this love that has healed my life and I am blessed beyond what I can ever comprehend! Blessed am I among women. In everything give thanks becaue everything is grace.
This is not the easy choice – but it the only choice which matters!
life: acoustic & amplified 