Most churches are uncomfortable with the melancholy. This has been a source of pain and confusion for Kimberly, and a spiritual stumbling block. The church’s unmitigated focus on an optimistic perspective (which it confuses with faith) seems dishonest and feels oppressive to her. This came up a few days ago and I responded, “It’s really only the churches in this country which are so upbeat. The American culture has won the church over. It is not as though Christians started reading their Bibles and said, “Oh, look at this! We are all supposed to be positive thinkers with permanent smiles.” If an American had written the Beatitudes, they would start out, “Blessed are the poor rich in spirit: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are those who mourn are cheerful: for they shall be comforted need no comfort.”
Yes, you can mourn in church… briefly, over something big, with repeated claims of steadfast faith, but if you don’t feel better soon because of our sympathy, we take offense. How quickly does God expect you to get over your grief? The benefits from the beatitudes seem to be scheduled for the next life. After all, when do the poor “inherit the earth” and the persecuted receive a great “reward in heaven”? It appears the sorrowing find full and lasting consolation only at the resurrection. Jesus does not see the melancholy as spiritually weak or faith-less, but as blessed. Instead of a condition to avoid or get past, sadness is a door into spiritual blessing. Perhaps instead of avoiding or trying to fix the mournful, we might learn something from them, something about what it means to love a broken world.
Delayed by confusion, Anne at last flung herself from her seat just as the ski lift lurched into its ascent. The five foot drop stunned her, and so a kindly hand helped her into a small lodge to recover. Unfortunately, the kerosene stove inside increased her nausea. But as she lay there, a whiff of fresh, pine-scented air brushed her face. It trickled in through the cracked windows just enough to keep her from smothering under the acrid fumes. She called it “a thin ribbon of grace.”
Berly and I read this Lamott story weeks ago, but Sunday stumbled across her retelling it in a Youtube interview, and this time the phrase popped. When I am lost and broken and sick to my soul, I want God to fling open the windows of grace, but what I get is barely enough to keep me coherent, like a drowning man who is chucked under his chin just enough to keep his nose above this moment’s wave and then dropped again… like a malnourished child fed a few crumbs above a starvation diet. Survival grace. For those of us wishing for life to end, this frayed ribbon of grace seems less like love and more like torture. Why is God so tightfisted with His goodness as though He’s worried He’ll run short or we’ll fritter it away? What present consolation can we suck from the ending “happily ever after” if life’s story is “miserable until death.”
But Anne’s phrase whispered across my thoughts, enticing. Is it enough, this thin ribbon? I want a bank full of grace to draw on for my needs, but I am only given enough for this moment… sometimes barely enough. It’s true that I haven’t drowned yet, but every time the finger holding up my chin drops away, I’m sure the next wave will take me under. After all, I’ve been left spluttering for air many times. It’s a fact that I haven’t starved, but this is my last bowl of soup, and the cupboards are bare. Living hand-to-mouth is so precarious, so uncertain, so constricting, whether the shortage is literally financial and physical or the deficit lies deeper still, a hole in the heart.
In the desert the Israelites were completely dependent on God, and in spite of dining on a daily miracle, hunger was always just one day off, for forty years running. A thousand winters later, not much has changed for the children of God as they prove in their principal prayer: “give us this day our daily bread.” What is this addiction God has for pocket change allowances? Surely He doesn’t make us suffer needlessly. If He is truly a loving God, he must think this arrangement is a real windfall for us.
But as Berly points out, many of God’s children are jobless and friendless, homeless and hungry; some die agonizing deaths. We are not promised health or happiness or even sanity. Exactly what does it mean to claim that His grace is sufficient if it is not even sufficient to keep us breathing? From somewhere the thought drifted into my mind–His grace is sufficient for our hearts, the one thing that matters above all to us. In spite of life’s miserable suffering, we cannot deny that our hearts have not only survived, but grown. We are blossoming into the ones God created us to be. We have faced into our fears and discovered new strength, challenged shame and found love. We opened our hearts, and truth came in with insight, wisdom, and freedom.
But we are still tormented by depression. Something seems very wrong with our chosen path when we end up here. If we follow God as best we know how, should we not find peace, joy, rest, and fulfillment? Isn’t that what grace looks like? We want a life plan that works, that makes us feel good, accomplished, confident, whole, and if that’s the goal, our plan is clearly broken. But we tried other popular strategies, and they gutted our souls. Perhaps we’ve been measuring grace by the wrong scale. If our personal growth is the better gauge, then God has been truly lavish towards us, and if it comes to us through pain, we will welcome it gratefully. He sends a thin ribbon of consolation to keep our hearts from breaking, but his grace is not limited to this meager thread. His grace towards us has proven to be a river, not a ribbon, even if we cannot feel it or understand it.
I lost my USB drive holding my reflections on forgiveness, so my momentum on that topic has died, but here is a great quote from Stanley Hauerwas in The Peaceable Kingdom:
It is crucial that we understand that such a peaceableness is possible only if we are also a forgiven people. We must remember that our first task is not to forgive, but to learn to be the forgiven. Too often to be ready to forgive is a way of exerting control over another. We fear accepting forgiveness from another because such a gift makes us powerless—and we fear the loss of control involved. Yet we continue to pray, “Forgive our debts.” Only by learning to accept God’s forgiveness as we see it in the life and death of Jesus can we acquire the power that comes from learning to give up that control….
To be forgiven means that I must face the fact that my life actually lies in the hands of others. I must learn to trust them as I have learned to trust God….
But because we have learned to live as a forgiven people, as a people no longer in control, we also find we can become a whole people. Indeed the demand that we be holy is possible only because we find that we can rest within ourselves. When we exist as a forgiven people we are able to be at peace with our histories, so that now God’s life determines our whole way of being—our character. We no longer need to deny our past, or tell ourselves false stories, as now we can accept what we have been without the knowledge of our sin destroying us.
COSTLY SAVE
I am more productive just staying in bed than trying to multitask. When I try juggling tasks, I drop all of them, and one of them inevitably knocks over a vase. Unfortunately, I can’t even multi-think. I can’t keep two disparate ideas together in my head, however simple they are. The new thought drives out the old. I try to compensate with lists (which I forget to bring), notes scribbled on the back of used envelopes (which I inadvertently throw out), and pleas for Kimberly to remind me (a job she rarely accepts). I had a thumb drive with a to-do list that I cleverly kept on my key ring–can’t leave without it. But several times I almost left work with the drive (and my keys) still in the office computer, locking me out of both my building and my car at 2 a.m., so I took the USB drive off the key ring, and within a week I lost it.
Today I was working around the house and actually thought to keep a pair of reading glasses with me for small-print labels and dimly lit spaces. Hanging loosely around my neck they could easily get damaged, so I slid them to the top of my head (see, I’m planning!). As I was mowing, a tree branch knocked them off. I almost got down to retrieve them, but decided to grab them on my next pass. As I swung back by, I saw they lay in the cut grass, so I could just keep mowing and get them later. After three more passes I forgot and ran right over them. I found only a part of the mangled frame. I now know not to mow with glasses on my head… but next time I will forget I have them on my head or I’ll take them off for safe keeping and plop a book on them. This is why I buy $2 Walmart glasses. I have back-up plans for back-up plans… three or four levels of compensatory strategies.
It is a real disability–I’ve completely missed a couple days of irregularly scheduled work, wrecked our cars, and almost burned the house down. No amount of scolding or shaming on the part of others or planning and compensating on my part is going to fix it. When I clamp down on one thing, something else shakes loose. I’m grateful for a patient, understanding wife and a God who keeps an eye out for me. I still have my job and cars and house… and a supportive wife and caring God too!
My real back-up plan is God. I have to depend so much more on Him than many others do. His grace has such a bigger field of play in my life than in those whose lives are well-ordered. The penalty for not being able to take care of myself is that God takes care of me. Who could imagine a better arrangement? Happy frailties! (2 Cor. 12:9)
From Anne Lamott, Help, Thanks, Wow:
Human lives are hard, even those of health and privilege, and don’t make much sense. This is the message of the Book of Job: Any snappy explanation of suffering you come up with will be horseshit. God tells Job, who wants an explanation for all his troubles, ‘You wouldn’t understand.’
And we don’t understand a lot of things. But we learn that people are very disappointing, and that they break our hearts, and that very sweet people will be bullied, and that we will be called to survive unsurvivable losses, and that we will realize with enormous pain how much of our lives we’ve already wasted with obsessive work or pleasing people or dieting. We will see and read about deprivation and barbarity beyond our ability to understand, much less process. Side by side with all that, we will witness transformation, people finding out who they were born to be, before their parents pretzelized them into high achievers and addicts and charming, wired robots.
But where do we even start on the daily walk of restoration and awakening? We start where we are. We find God in our human lives, and that includes the suffering. I get thirsty people glasses of water, even if that thirsty person is just me.
Matthew 1:5: Boaz fathered Obed by Ruth
April 17 is the feast day of Benedict Joseph Labre who was called “a patron saint for failures.” He was rejected as unsuitable by all the monastic orders to which he applied, several of them suspecting him of mental illness. He became a mendicant holy man, sleeping in corners of abandoned buildings, dressed in rags, covered in lice, living on alms, and eventually dying of malnutrition. It took another century for him to be sainted. This is somebody I can relate to… except for the sainthood, although considering his credentials, maybe I’d have a shot at that too! Many more of God’s followers look like bums than Hollywood stars. After all, it is the bitter life of the marginalized that drives them to grace. But there are exceptions like Boaz.
Boaz was rich and powerful, with lots of land and plenty of servants. He was also godly, generous, and humble. He had it all. The patron saint of bankers and CEOs, perhaps, except that he lived for the benefit of others. On top of all that, he had royalty in his veins as great-grandfather to King David and through him the King of Kings. It’s unusual for someone with such heavy credentials to welcome grace, for someone who has it all to realize they have nothing with which to recommend them to God. The more you have, the more you have to lose when you’re stripped down to nothing but your bare soul. Boaz had to admit he was no better than the likes of a dirty, tattered B. J. Labre.
Unlike caste in India or aristocracy in Europe, egalitarianism is the American way, but we have our own homegrown pecking order, and we know our place. We defer to those with more money, status, education, looks or what have you, and on the other side we expect to be treated better than “a common bum.” When people are smelly, unkempt, crude, or slow they get treated differently… I’m ashamed to say that I too react as though they are less deserving. Tragically, human hierarchy destroys grace, no matter where you rank yourself. Wonderfully, the gospel knocks off all the rungs of our social ladder. We are all penniless. We come to God with empty pockets.
At first glance, it seems sad that we are all bankrupt, until we realize that an empty account is the one prerequisite to receiving grace. When we come to the end of ourselves–our efforts, our pedigrees, our abilities–the gospel finally makes sense. If we are full of ourselves, we cannot be full of God. For those of us who feel we are near the bottom rung, there is no sweeter sound than the tintinnabulation of grace. I am on equal footing with Boaz, Bono, and Billy Graham. The canonized saints have nothing on me when it comes to the love of God. I am just as much His favorite. The more screwed up I am, the more He loves me. That’s amazing enough to make a pig sing the Hallelujah chorus!
For 5 months now my long-term depression has been worse than usual. The last two weeks have been especially black. Sometimes it hurts so much I find it hard to breathe. There are moments of being okay on the surface… when I snuggle with Kimberly or cuddle with our dog Mazie, but it is like gasping for air before getting sucked under again. At other times I can distract myself just enough to keep the wolves at bay… I’m not getting bitten, but I still hear the howls, so it is far from a place of peace or renewing energy. I’m not suicidal–life is miserable, not intolerable–but for years now I have wished for my life to end. I feel crippled, lost, broken.
My heart goes out to those of you who struggle as I do. May you find some touch of peace from God today.
Forgiveness 5: Sorting Out My Feelings
When I am insulted or slighted, abused or betrayed and the offender won’t discuss it, at least not honestly, I try to decipher her on my own so I can better shape my response. In every conflict I want to be as gracious as I’m able, starting with grace to myself so that I will have the resources to be gracious to the offender, genuinely gracious—out of freedom, not obligation. Self-acceptance, not shame or duty, is the soil from which true forgiveness springs. When I am wounded, it may take time to recover my own sense of grace (that is, to settle into God’s grace). It takes as long as it takes. It is crucial that I not sacrifice my own well-being by rushing to work through emotional issues. I do not nurse my hurt, but I should not belittle my hurt either. Neither of these is an honest and healthy approach. Doing a quick patch-up job is disrespectful of and harmful to myself as well as our relationship.
Again, my focus is on my own pain, not on blaming the other person, but since I have been hurt, I no longer feel safe with her. Until I have found some personal resolution, our relationship will also lack resolution. I may need a break from our usual level of interaction… whatever I need to stay emotionally safe long enough to work through my own stuff. I should tell her clearly that I am not punishing her, that this is about me and what I need and not an effort to manipulate her into feeling bad or changing her behavior. (And I need to be sure this is true.)
Ultimately I want to somehow get to the point that I feel no ill will towards her. Whether I reach this through exonerating her or through forgiving her is not crucial as long as I am respectful towards myself (my perspective and feelings) in the process. I may decide that this is primarily my own issue and not hers. I may determine that she is at fault, and that I will need to forgive her. I am not her final judge, so I may fault her wrongly, but forgiveness still works: it frees me from suffocating on my own anger and bile.
Since I work till 2 a.m., Kimberly and I keep different sleep schedules, even on the weekend. Being the only one awake late at night can be very lonely, and feeling a bit lost tonight, I flipped through some TV shows—a little basketball, a bit of news, the tale end of 48 Hours, a CSPAN symposium of legal experts pontificating on Dr. Seuss (the ethics of Whoville, surprisingly interesting)… channel-surfing to try to ride out my negative energy. I wandered into the kitchen, looking in the frig and cupboards for something to fill my soul. But I came up empty.
Then I took a desperate measure… I opened Anne Lamott. For me, reading without a smidgen of positive energy is like trying to get a plane off the runway at 30 mph. Apparently God puffed a tail-wind, a penny miracle to aid my shaky effort to break free of gravity. This one time my sputtering spirit settled into a quiet purr of reflection. My life seems to be more stagger and flop than gliding, but I’m grateful for tonight. May each of you find a little breeze of grace today.
Forgiveness 4: Seeking Understanding
When I get whacked by the blunt end of a relationship, I first need to assess the bruising and salve it with compassion. From this haven of acceptance and support, I can draw enough grace to respond in a healthier way to the bruiser. But before forgiveness is even an option, I need to piece the story together: why did he act that way? Easy forgiveness brushes aside this opportunity of better understanding. What are his heart sores and life hurdles? How did he see and experience our social fumble? We also need a better grasp of the relationship. Every interpersonal dynamic is involved here: truth-seeking, communication, perception, relational history, roles, expectations, and a hundred other facets. Forgiveness is only part of this complex relational feng shui, so if it is my only consideration, I turn a vivid social mosaic into a black/white toggle switch of blame.
Quick forgiveness looks so gracious, and long discussion seems so dramatic. Both of us may want a quick fix, and perhaps it’s the right choice for now, but we should remember that this tables the issue, it doesn’t resolve it. The same conflict will pop up again and again until we sort it out. Deferring until later may feel better in the short run, and may be a necessary strategic move, but it does not enrich our bond. And slowly over time little resentments will build up like barnacles on a boat or relational callouses will form to deaden the pain and with it the vibrant connection.
So I begin to unfold the map of who he is. I’m not looking for evidence to accuse him. I simply want to understand him, see things from his perspective. Since resolution requires mutuality, I share with him in turn my struggles, without implying fault. Just as my own heart hides when I am gruff and suspicious with it, he cannot be honest and forthcoming about his genuine feelings and thoughts if I don’t invite him with gentleness and love. I can accept him without approving of or excusing his behavior. He is precious regardless of what he does or doesn’t do. I want to know what he feels about our scrape and why he feels this way. If he is dismissive or defensive as I probe, then he’s not at a safe place with me. He may not even feel safe with himself because of the shaming voices in his head. When he closes the gate on this part of our relationship, I must honor it—I cannot force him to share. In response, I may also need to stake down a boundary marker to protect my heart. Perhaps a better time will come if I stay open and gracious.
DO YOU SPEAK RABBIT?
If we can break through into deeper mutual insight, we will then want to reflect also on our relationship. This will spark memories of past conflicts, a rich resource to ponder if we don’t use it as ammunition but as sutures. Why do we react to one another in this way in these situations? What are we feeling and thinking? Do we respond to others in similar ways? Why or why not? What patterns does this reveal about our interactions? Since honesty and openness depend on our sense of safety, the one issue we overlook at this point is blame. It may be that neither of us is guilty or both are guilty or that the problem lies in a completely different direction. But once we are sharing, the issue of fault and forgiveness often becomes moot.
Most churches are uncomfortable with the melancholy. This has been a source of pain and confusion for Kimberly, and a spiritual stumbling block. The church’s unmitigated focus on an optimistic perspective (which it confuses with faith) seems dishonest and feels oppressive to her. This came up a few days ago and I responded, “It’s really only the churches in this country which are so upbeat. The American culture has won the church over. It is not as though Christians started reading their Bibles and said, “Oh, look at this! We are all supposed to be positive thinkers with permanent smiles.” If an American had written the Beatitudes, they would start out, “Blessed are the 
Yes, you can mourn in church… briefly, over something big, with repeated claims of steadfast faith, but if you don’t feel better soon because of our sympathy, we take offense. How quickly does God expect you to get over your grief? The benefits from the beatitudes seem to be scheduled for the next life. After all, when do the poor “inherit the earth” and the persecuted receive a great “reward in heaven”? It appears the sorrowing find full and lasting consolation only at the resurrection. Jesus does not see the melancholy as spiritually weak or faith-less, but as blessed. Instead of a condition to avoid or get past, sadness is a door into spiritual blessing. Perhaps instead of avoiding or trying to fix the mournful, we might learn something from them, something about what it means to love a broken world.
Janathan Grace Reflections 