Category: Understanding

#Uvalde, Texas, Bewilderment, Discernment, Emotions, Feelings, God's presence, Indecision, peace, Understanding

Elusive Understanding

kathymfindley
Photography by Andrew Charney on Unsplash

You may have noticed there have been no words coming from this blog in quite a while. No new posts. No graphics. No music. The reason is that inside me, there is nothing, and that has been my situation for several weeks. Part of the reason is that I was very sick for a while, hospitalized actually. In addition, I simply felt empty, without a creative spark that is usually so common for me.

Physically, I have felt unwell for a long time. Emotionally, I have felt the continued sting of isolation because getting Covid could be deadly for my immunocompromised body. Spiritually, I would have to say that the gun violence that has taken the lives of children and teachers in Uvalde has wounded my spirit and left me with so many unanswerable questions about faith and hope.

When all of those things rustle through my mind, it cannot help but reduce me into a silent kind of melancholia that affects my body, mind and spirit. It seems that this time, I can’t move past it. My husband asked me today if I am depressed. I answered, ”yes,” but honestly, I feel more sad than depressed. I don’t understand it this time. I can’t put my finger on the cause no matter how hard I have tried to figure it out.

The myth is that figuring out the root of depression or sadness will help one overcome it. Once you understand your depression and where it comes from, you can get beyond it. Also not necessarily true! Understanding is not a bad thing, but it is also not a cure-all.

These days, I simply cannot understand things—all things me! I recognize my sense of feeling empty, and I still have the ability to use reason and discernment to try to understand my feelings. But the truth is I don’t understand what’s going on in me. The internal web of my physical hurts, my emotional disturbance and my spiritual emptiness defy explanation and understanding. It’s complicated, outside of my ability to understand. So I have craved any flicker of light and life I could find.

I found it today, in a quote shared by a dear friend. This is the quote.

I didn’t need to understand the hypostatic unity of the Trinity; I just needed to turn my life over to whoever came up with redwood trees.
~ Anne Lamott

I can rest in that. I can find peace beyond my understanding. I can lean into the treasure of not being compelled to understand complicated things, even complicated things about myself. By the way, complicated things about myself may well be the most difficult things to understand, sometimes baffling and elusive. So Instead of the constant struggle to understand, I plan to turn my life over, again, to the One who created me to be complicated in the first place.

Thanks be to God for the ”peace that passes all understanding.” Amen.

Bewilderment, Confusion, Fear, peace, Understanding

In Bewilderment: Peace

kathymfindley

image
Watercolor art by Kathy Manis Findley

As we celebrate Eastertide with the death of Jesus behind us and his resurrection still in our hearts, the stories that led up to Easter remain in our memories. One of those stories tells of Jesus comforting his disciples. They were bewildered, confused, wanting to know what would happen next.

I can identify with those emotions as this time of distancing grows longer and the spread of the coronavirus continues to threaten. What will happen next? I don’t know about you, but I want an answer to that question. Like the disciples discussing their lives with Jesus in the fourteenth chapter of John’s Gospel, if an answer does come to us, we probably won’t quite understand it.

First Thomas has a pressing question for Jesus. “We don’t know where you are going,” Lord, “so how can we know the way?” The answer from Jesus wasn’t very clear or understandable to Thomas.

Jesus answered, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. If you really know me, you will know my Father as well. From now on, you do know him and have seen him.”
— John 14:6-7

Then Philip takes a shot at it, telling Jesus to show them the Father. That would be enough for them to feel comfortable about what was going on around them. But the answer Jesus offered did not clear up the conundrum very much.

Jesus answered: “Don’t you know me, Philip, even after I have been among you such a long time? Anyone who has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, ‘Show us the Father’? Don’t you believe that I am in the Father, and that the Father is in me?     — John 14:9-10

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Hands on their faces, the disciples seem bewildered and confused, even fearful.

Finally, Judas (not Judas Iscariot) asked Jesus why he would show himself to them and not to the world. Again, Jesus answered with what might have seemed like a platitude that did not provide much understanding at all.

Jesus replied, “Anyone who loves me will obey my teaching. My Father will love them, and we will come to them and make our home with them. Anyone who does not love me will not obey my teaching. These words you hear are not my own; they belong to the Father who sent me.
— John 14:23-24

We should remember that this entire conversation began with words of comfort from Jesus to his friends. He told them that day, as he tells us in this day, “Do not let your hearts be troubled.” As they began to end this time with Jesus, the disciples still did not fully understand. But finally Jesus speaks to them with a very clear and grace-filled word of comfort.

All this I have spoken while still with you. But the Advocate, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you all things and will remind you of everything I have said to you. Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid.    — John 14:25-27

In the end, that’s all we have that can guide us through uncertainty, confusion and fear. What Jesus left to his disciples, and what Jesus leaves to us, is something simple and pure: PEACE. 

I am not fully certain how this peace really works. I know only that sensing it in my soul is a miracle — every time. When my heart is troubled — PEACE. When I am confused and afraid — PEACE.

And that’s enough!

Thanks be to God. Amen.