Keep Going

  Today I'm taking part in the Your Secret Name read-along over at Marla's.  We're responding to chapters 12 and 13, which I must confess hit me hard.

 Last week I wrote about some of the consequences of broken relationships that we are currently experiencing.  Leaving our church has not been easy.  Compared to some of the other consequences I'm facing, that has been an easier one.  Like Kary, relationships have caused me pain.  Because of the pain, he withdrew, locking away his emotions.  Unable to stifle my emotions, I have simply stopped trusting.  Without trust, my world has become filled with fear.  When my husband is late, I begin to seriously wonder if he has finally had enough and left.  While hanging out with friends, I wonder how long it will be until they end our friendship.  When a small child attacks me in a store, I keep quiet for fear of getting in trouble. (Yes, that did happen.) Making new friends and maintaining current friendships drains me now because of all the fear.  It would be easier just to hide.

 I've tried hiding.  But my husband makes me go to church, reminding me of my marriage vows when I get particularly stubborn.  Before this season started, God blessed with me two amazing friends who live in my complex.  Though I've tried to run away and hide, these amazing friends won't let me.  Trust is something I struggle with, but less around them because of their transparency.  If they didn't like me, I'd know.  Still, I just want to crawl into a hole until Jesus comes back.  This is too hard for me.

 So this is where I am, this place of deep hurt and broken trust.  Trusting God is challenging too because it was obeying Him that got me into this mess. (Side note: It was Jacob's obedience to his mother that landed him in exile.  I wonder how he responded to that and how it affected their relationship.)  With all this fresh in my mind from chapter 12, I then read this:

 "God wanted to transform Jacob, but transformation is never easy and always involves pain."p.141

"As author Oswald Chambers wrote "Before God can use a man greatly, he must wound him deeply." Even though at times the hurt is excruciating, we simply must stay in the fight." p. 141

"In this final stage, many of us give up and go back to our Given Names.  Wrestling with God takes its toll, and even though we're only inches away from a new identity, we let it slip away once more." p. 142

Does this mean there is hope?  Given hope, I can keep going.  Perhaps if I think of this in terms of childbirth, this deep time of pain as transition, then I can make it through.  In transition, it is easy to panic.  That's the time when many labouring mamas start to get discouraged.  I can't do this, it is too hard.  But in reality, they are getting closer to meeting their little one with each new wave.  During this time of intensity,  a doula offers words of encouragement such as "Just keep breathing" "You're almost there!" "You are doing such a good job!"  Perhaps this is what I need to remind myself.  I want this new identity, to be birthed into the fullness of what God has planned for me.   Just like I longed for my babies to be OUT, now I long for that freedom.  And it is almost there, I just need to keep going, taking each day, each breath at a time.  That I can do.

Exile and Return

 I'm writing this post for Marla's read-along featuring Your Secret Name by Kary Oberbrunner.  This week we're covering chapters 10 and 11.

 "Exile is temporary."

 The opening sentence of chapter 10 reached out and grabbed me. While writing this, my eyes fill with tears and that uneasy feeling in the pit of my stomach returns.  Right now, I feel like I'm exile.  It's a nasty feeling.  In September we left our church.  We didn't want to leave, but a broken relationship within the church was tearing us apart.  We were plagued by grief and hurt, chased by bitterness and surrounded by isolation.  Not only were the negative circumstances playing havoc with my health, they were also causing tension within the church.  When our pastor commented that our church felt like a war zone, we decided to leave.  This didn't seem fair as we had tried to resolve the situation, but such tension could not bring glory to God.  So we left as honourably as we possibly could.

 Leaving was both good and hard.  My health slowly improved and I stopped dreading church.  We started attending a church where we have been able to heal.  Worshipping together again has been a blessing as my husband is no longer in charge of the sound board.  Our children really like this church, even our grumpy toddler.   We are very thankful for the healing that has occurred.

 But leaving is hard.  We've had to grieve the loss of relationships, of people we called family.  Among the hardest part is the feeling of failure, that the church is better off without me. During this season of hurt and exile, I have felt like my given name is "Problem".   God (and my husband) continue to whisper different names, ones that offer hope.  But can that hope, can God, be trusted? I struggle.

 I doubt a lot.  I doubt that God can use me, that He does indeed have good plans for me.  I doubt that He can bring about restoration and reconciliation.  Much like Jacob when he learned that Esau was approaching with 400 men, I cannot see peace ahead.  And to be very honest, I'm not sure if I want reconciliation or peace.  Not that I want war, I would just like to stay very far from conflict.  Unfortunately for me, the situation appears to be moving towards reconciliation.  I don't think I have the strength to walk through any more confrontations.

 It would be very easy to walk away, but not only have we committed to walking through this honourably, we also feel called to attend church in our neighbourhood. The church we were attending is the closest church to our house and right next door to the low-income housing complex we are building relationships in.  There are definite advantages to going back to our former church.  But to do this will require a lot of faith and trust.  I don't think I have much of that left.  Unlike Jacob, I don't have the ways and means to come up with alternative plans.  Instead I'm being forced to trust.  So now to wait and see that God really is good, that His plans for me, just like His plans for Jacob, are good.

 I could keep writing because chapter 10 resonated with me.  I think I could have highlighted every other sentence.  Perhaps I'll write again later.