In everyone's life, there are some very painful though graced moments when, it seems, God allows very difficult circumstances take over our lives - be they a severe sickness, an accident, a traumatic experience, a relationship breakdown, a loss of a spouse, partner or friend. When this happens our whole lives are hurled into chaos, our worst nightmare becomes a 24-hour-a-day reality, our whole life is brought into shatteringly sharp relief.
During these frightening times when we are in freefall, we can lose our self control, our self-confidence, even our faith in God. We worry about the present, we are frightened for our family, the people who depend on us, and we fear for our future, our career, our sense of ourselves. These are all natural feelings, legitimate worries. Family and friends sometimes appear (no hurt intended) like "Job's comforters", reminding us that maybe we had been working too hard, maybe we were under too much pressure, that it could have been worse, or that maybe this was an opportunity to reassess values, priorities, relationships.
Anxious about our new situation, we are reminded of the Scripture text: "You can be steward no longer!" We desperately look back over our lives for answers. Yes, we wish that some pages or chapters could be rewritten. We focus on wasted days, broken promises, gifts unused, resolutions unfulfilled, grace-filled calls yet unanswered. We recall friends taken from us in unexpected ways. Guilt and self-pity abound.
In our new brokenness of spirit, other scripture quotations spring to mind: "Stay awake! You do not know the day or the hour when the Master is coming .. . If today you hear his voice, harden not your hearts .. ." It is as if we have been plucked from the hectic pace of daily life where we used to call the shots. We are bundled into a new time of looking at life like a film in a cinema with no sound on. We listen to our hurts, our new brokenness and we have time to reflect, to pray, in the deepest recesses of the heart. As the world whirls by us, we become aware of a "frightening stillness" within. We have to learn a new skill - to enter the dark door and befriend this "frightening stillness". We deny it, ignore it, to our peril.
In the middle of our new devastating maze are the eternal questions: "Why is it that bad things happen to good people?" More cogently: "Why to me?" "Why now?" "What's going to happen to me now?" In our stillness, we listen to the beating of our hearts, the call from our newly broken bodies, and God.
We remember the footsteps of Jesus on the Mount of Olives, how he had to lean for support on the hard rock he found there. We remember Jesus's initial reluctance, his words: "Not my will, but yours be done." There are no simple answers, no quick solutions. We close our eyes in painful acceptance of God's mysterious will. We share Jesus's frustration when he was unable to alleviate his mother's pain on the way to Calvary when we experience the frustration of family and friends who come to visit. They so much want us to be well again, yet are helpless to do more than express their wishes, frustration or anger. "Being there for us" is little consolation for them.
The spirituality of the "Our Father", God's will being done in our lives, takes on a new, challenging meaning and life.
Reinhold Niebuhr composed a wonderfully powerful prayer that is very applicable when we are faced with these difficult times of our lives:
"God, grant me serenity to accept the things I cannot change,
Courage to change the things I can, and wisdom to know the difference,
Living one day at a time, enjoying one moment at a time
Accepting hardship as a pathway to peace,
Taking, as Jesus did, this sinful world as it is, not as I would have it,
Trusting that you will make all things right if I surrender to Your will
So that I may be reasonably happy in this life and supremely happy with you for ever in the next."
God bless all of you who have been reading this column over the years and who have been writing to me such supportive letters.
F Mac N