Wednesday, February 29, 2012

Life Is A Search For The Spiritual

Before we started this spiralling downward fall, I thought I reached out to people and extended my faith to them. I thought I was a spiritual being, someone that anyone could relate to and immediately would say, Oh I want what YOU have! Right now, you have changed my very existence. I was a good person, I loved God, I did good things, I certainly had, in my life, had a spiritual experience with Jesus, but my confidence, my peace, my security, was not solid and grounded as it is today. I remember the first time I actually said out loud, to another human being (someone from our community) my family is losing our home. It was as if energy shot out of my body and slapped the lady standing in front of me.  We had been working with the bank and at this point living in the hopes that a big job would come and save the day. The bank was working on a modification and during all this I still had some hope things would turn around. But, I had come to know, deep in my soul, it wouldn't. Somehow there was destiny, a predetermined plan, a purpose tied to all this. As I stood before this lady, broken myself, yet still having all the outward signs of status, again I said, "We are losing our home" She blurted out and crumbled before me, and said, "I am losing my husband and my marriage". At that moment I saw for the first time a glimpse into what power I had, what tremendous influence I could have, in my own story, if I was willing to share it.  I didn't know this lady intimately, just had been at events with her and had always felt she had snobbed me, been pretentious, but on this particular day, I felt a stirring to tell her, "Appearances are not always what they seem". So I hugged her and made plans to meet for coffee the next afternoon, where we would have time to talk and get to know each other. She had a beautiful home, actually married to a banker, a new SUV, beautiful kids, the perfect number of pets, the right vacations, the right handbags, everything "looked" all nice and tidy, but, things were not as they appeared. You see my own vulnerability had made an avenue for me to speak candidly to her, a comfort I would have never had, before our financial issues started. I sat there thinking, feeling very sad, how often had my clothes, my seemingly perfect "own" family, my Denali, my 6th Ave house, boat, gym membership, my handbags....well you get the point, kept me from making a new friend or being a help to someone in need. I had done alot with the homeless and indigent and  ministry type programs, but this new gift, this gift of "my" story, this gift of connecting to people, for lack of a better word, was just that-- a gift. As humans, whether we are in the throes of pain or in the disappointments of pleasure, we strive for an essence that is beyond the physical. It seems pain sends us in search of a greater power. Introspection, superstition, ceremony, and vow can all come as a result of pain. Out of my pain, a new journey had begun for me. I was reading a book on suffering by Ravi Zacharias and he said he just couldn't accept that God doesn't figure actively in suffering-- not that he just allows it, that He makes beauty out of ashes. And, He does make beauty out of ashes, but that has to be only part of the picture if it is not to distract from who God is. ALL-knowing, ALL-powerful, and ALL-loving, and somehow makes Him limited or weak. And then there's the other side to that, if He is all powerful and can keep me from suffering, but just chooses not to, He's not all knowing? Right? Well I certainly don't believe that. Ravi, pointed out in Exodus... first-- that it was God who led His children into this place of suffering. Second-- He (God) led them into suffering while they were being obedient to Him and were following Him as He commanded them.  Third-- He (God) ultimately gave them victory but it was not without personal cost. Fourth-- Moses built an alter and worshipped God saying.. The lord is my banner. I am human and have questioned this whole suffering thing myself, whined and belly ached, and legitimately so, these are life changing things, but until that day, it was as if something clicked, something lined up in the heavens, even before my mother carried me, and my purpose for my life came full circle, and I accepted somehow it came from His hand, and in my place of suffering and to the point of almost killing me spiritually and physically, I felt not in spite of my obedience to God, but because of it, I felt I experienced the victory of my life, the real miracle, reaching out to someone else and showing Him to them. Ravi goes on to say he feels God doesn't just allow our suffering into our lives, rather God intented that suffering must come to those He loves. As we sat in our home in Tallahassee after the Denali had been returned, and I was walking the kids to school. I was basically home with no ride. It was a very humiliating thing. I would have people pass me, people that I knew, as I would walk to pick things up from the store, but as I began to walk, I started out with a sense of anger and bitterness, but one morning I decided I would get up and make that early time a time of intimacy with the God. I would walk and pray and cry and cry some more. As those emotions began to spill out I could feel them replaced with a boldness that I didn't have before. So then as those people would pass me, I began waving and saying "good morning, beautiful day!" My mind began to become clear, my body began to respond and tone up, it was a good thing, losing that Denali! I found a positive in a very bad situation. Through not having that truck I also can see how a vehicle can control you entire life, how families live on the brink, not knowing if theirs cars will start and take them to work. Or how many take the city bus, a reality I knew nothing about. I certainly don't want to ever return there, but,  like I said above ~~ victory AIN'Tcheap, it cost you something,  I can truly say to the families in personal or financial crisis, I have been there. God may have intended my suffering, but He never abandoned or forsook me, and He always provided my needs. During this time, I was having alot of trouble with my stomach, and the type of foods I needed, as well as the ones Isabella needed, due to her sickness, was very expensive. I would come home and on my table would be food, not just the food, but the food already cooked! I would say just about everyday but Sundays. How does that happen? I can't tell you, I know it doesn't happen in the natural, it only happens in the supernatural, by a source higher than you and me. 2 Chronicles 20:15 affirms to me that ultimately the battle is not mine it is Gods. If God himself brought me to this desolate place He is here with me, and,  He is able to sustained me and provide my needs,  AS, indeed, He did. So as I lost many things along the way, I gained many, relationships being at the top, and a boldness in myself of who I am in Him, and what value we hold as human beings. And sharing who we are, not what we have.

1 comment:

  1. POWERFUL girl. U R on a roll into what God wants u t b. Keep seeking and u will find the great pearl...

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