Tuesday, October 8, 2024
(click here to listen to or read today’s scriptures)
Fearfully made
Guide me, Lord, along the everlasting way.
My best high school buddy Jim, now 75 as I soon will be, had lunch with me and we talked about death. Why not? We’re both interested. His sister is about to enter hospice.
“I’m not afraid of what comes after death, only death itself. And not even that, only the pain of dying.
“I expect life after death will be peaceful.”
Back at ya. Me too.
O Lord, you probe me and you know me. You know when I sit and when I stand, you understand all my thoughts from afar, because, truly, you have formed my inmost being.
We’ve had many decades of relationship, which we have been able to sustain with get togethers when we are in the same state. Jim was a counselor for many years in Ohio, and we didn’t see each other. But then he returned to Illinois, to Champaign, and we had many stories to share.
Jim worked with men and women who experienced multiple personalities. He has profound respect, even now, for his friends and clients who dealt with their inside stories, many of which could be traced back to childhood, often kept secret even from themselves.
For shame.
We both know how much we “over-think” our lives. Why is that, we wondered? Perhaps because we ourselves suffered abuse of some kind early in the 1950s (our childhood), which we gradually covered over with skin after skin, and now we think in order not to feel? I guess you could see this over-thinking as a sort of second personality: our monkey minds give us plenty to do, and for awhile we can stay away from the trouble of dealing with feelings, primal or otherwise.
Later we sometimes have revelations that move us along into healing. These are always blessing, even if the blessing is in disguise at first. Paul, for example, had one especially famous moment with Jesus that turned his life on a dime: his encounter with Jesus on the road to Damascus.
I did not immediately consult flesh and blood, nor did I go up to Jerusalem to speak with those who were Apostles before I was. No, instead I went to Arabia and then returned to Damascus. It was three years. Then I went up to Jerusalem and spoke to Peter … in time those I preached to glorified God because of me.
Well, there’s no consulting the DSMV (or VI if it is ever released). That psychiatrist’s bible helps and then hinders, because diagnosis can only be the beginning of healing. What if my diagnosis isn’t even in there? What do I do then? Settle?
I am sure Paul, like Jim and me, was an over-thinker.
What happens after you think about it and realize you are “over-thinking”?
Well, Paul learned to confess. In Romans 7 he poured out his remorse and helplessness. Throughout his difficult life Paul remained aligned with his one recourse:
Who can rescue me from this body of death? Thanks be to God, who delivers me through Jesus Christ our Lord!
Nearing his own death Jesus visited his good friends in Bethany, and Martha slaved in the kitchen while Mary washed Jesus’ feet with perfume and then sat looking up at him. In love she was.
Martha didn’t have time for love, too many loaves of bread to slice.
Tell her to help me, Lord! But Jesus said, “Oh, Martha, you are anxious and worried about many things. There is need of only one thing.”
Oh my goodness, oh my God! This has always been true and will be as true for Jim and me as it was for Martha, as it was for Paul. What’s the one thing? Don’t think too hard. Don’t overthink this! Instead find your way into and through confession, look for and find the heart of the Father, where I came from, where I’m going, painful passage or not. God made me and God is good.
And He always shows all of us the One Thing.
I give you thanks that I am fearfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well.
(Galatians 1, Psalm 139, Luke 11, Luke 10)
(posted at www.davesandel.net)
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