Wait (2 of ?)

I feel as if I have lost precious time. Time to be productive, to love my first born during her earliest, most impressionable age, to "be all that I can be". Depression is the most insidious thief I have ever known. It sneaks up on you and before you know it all the colors turn to gray-scale, the sky becomes a dark roof ever lowering, the air a suffocating liquid, life itself a shrinking black box. Get too mired in depression and you come to a point where you cannot even help yourself any more. When my left triceps and forearm are gone I have very little desire left to open that bottle and down the one thing that will help me. I'd rather just disappear into that black void and sleep (with obligatory nightmares) than lift my arm, my head, unscrew the bottle, down the pill and chase it with water. My peace has been stolen, my happiness, my joy, my faith in the steadfast God that I first fell in love with. I have been relearning it all.

My daily dependency on a pill to function has been an interesting starting point: "He humbled you and let you be hungry, and fed you with manna which you did not know, nor did your fathers know, that He might make you understand that man does not live by bread alone, but man lives by everything that proceeds out of the mouth of the LORD (Deut. 8:3)," "Blessed be the Lord, who daily bears our burden, The God who is our salvation (Ps. 68:19)," "Blessed is the man who listens to me, Watching daily at my gates, Waiting at my doorposts (Pr. 8:30)," "Give us this day our daily bread (Mt. 6:11)," "And He was saying to them all, “ If anyone wishes to come after Me, he must deny himself, and take up his cross daily and follow Me" (Lk. 9:23),"

I have a difficult time focusing on daily things. They are so monotonous, so repetitive, so boring. I want the finish line! The point to all of this! The goal! 

During that first year of marriage to Tim, hitting rock bottom, threatening suicide to simply end it all and go to heaven where I belong, the discipline of daily devotions became burdensome to me. I was so focused on doing, getting it done, toughing it out that I began resenting the commitment I had made to the Lord. But I had always been told that giving up regular Bible reading was a bad idea and sometimes even sinful. But I was so mad at God for putting me in the situation: calling me to be a nurse then pulling away, showing me the man to marry then allowing the deep darkness to have me, bringing an innocent child in the middle of all this, an unwanted child. So he gave me permission to rest. To stop doing,

I was allowed to be confused. To be hurt. To cry. To question my very faith.

To wait.

A verse mentioned as a side note in a sermon stuck with me. The setting is Jesus just described the taking of communion in confusing, gory terms making people think he was talking about cannibalism. Many of his followers left. Then he turned to those who had stayed and asked "Are you going to leave me too." " Simon Peter answered Him, “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have words of eternal life. We have believed and have come to know that You are the Holy One of God (Jn. 6:67-69).” Simon and the others were still confused. But that was okay. They were convinced that he was the Son of God and that he had the "words of eternal life". What are the other options? None! So, things are confusing. They didn't have the big picture. They had not taken communion with Jesus yet nor seen the parallels in his death, burial, and resurrection in the days afterward. But where else can we go? No one else has the Words of Life!

 Is that the point? Have I been so fixated on Doing that I have forgotten how to Be? Had my daily devotions in themselves become an idol? Was the action of doing what I was supposed to do distracting me from what I was really supposed to be doing? To rest in the Lord and meditate on who he is: Creator, Redeemer, Friend? Somehow, during this journey I have felt permission from the Lord to take a step back. To rest. To rely on the many verses I had memorized and meditate on them when they came to mind, but not force the issue on a regular basis.

There I go again, fixating on the point. The end. The purpose. The goal. I need to be more present, more here, grateful for the journey, the commute. How are we to ever say that there is one main point for whatever trial we have gone through? I find that concept demeaning and insensitive. Don't you?

For now, I am learning to wait.

Psalm 40 - A lament of David

I waited patiently for the Lord;
And He inclined to me and heard my cry.
² He brought me up out of the pit of destruction, out of the miry clay,
And He set my feet upon a rock making my footsteps firm.
³ He put a new song in my mouth, a song of praise to our God;
Many will see and fear
And will trust in the Lord.

⁴ How blessed is the man who has made the Lord his trust,
And has not turned to the proud, nor to those who lapse into falsehood.
⁵ Many, O Lord my God, are the wonders which You have done,
And Your thoughts toward us;
There is none to compare with You.
If I would declare and speak of them,
They would be too numerous to count.

⁶  Sacrifice and meal offering You have not desired;
My ears You have opened;
Burnt offering and sin offering You have not required.
⁷ Then I said, “Behold, I come;
In the scroll of the book it is written of me.
⁸  I delight to do Your will, O my God;
Your Law is within my heart.”

⁹ I have proclaimed glad tidings of righteousness in the great congregation;
Behold, I will not restrain my lips,
O Lord, You know.
¹⁰ I have not hidden Your righteousness within my heart;
I have spoken of Your faithfulness and Your salvation;
I have not concealed Your lovingkindness and Your truth from the great congregation.

¹¹ You, O Lord, will not withhold Your compassion from me;
Your lovingkindness and Your truth will continually preserve me.
¹² For evils beyond number have surrounded me;
My iniquities have overtaken me, so that I am not able to see;
They are more numerous than the hairs of my head,
And my heart has failed me.

¹³  Be pleased, O Lord, to deliver me;
Make haste, O Lord, to help me.
¹⁴ Let those be ashamed and humiliated together
Who seek my life to destroy it;
Let those be turned back and dishonored
Who delight in my hurt.
¹⁵ Let those be appalled because of their shame
Who say to me, “Aha, aha!”
¹⁶  Let all who seek You rejoice and be glad in You;
Let those who love Your salvation say continually,
“The Lord be magnified!”
¹⁷ Since I am afflicted and needy,
Let the Lord be mindful of me.
You are my help and my deliverer;
Do not delay, O my God.