After the Retreat

It occurred to me that there may be one or two people who had read my previous blog post who might be wondering what happened to me on the retreat. Some of it is very personal so I won’t share it here, but here’s what happened in the gentle little adventure from which I returned several weeks ago now…

The days leading up to it were incredibly dark and scary for me. It felt as if I was being led into some horrible place where all of my worst thoughts about God and myself were being collected together, and that there was no way back, only straight towards them. Dramatic, I know, but I am a very exciting and dramatic person, as you know.

When I arrived at the retreat centre I burst into tears and begged Housemate to either stay there with me or take me straight home again. She hugged me and laughed nervously (which is what she tends to do when I behave like a hysterical psycho), told me I was going to be OK, and left me. I cried a bit more and then fell asleep until it was time for dinner.

Later, I came up to my room and arranged two chairs so that I might imagine Jesus in the other one. It had been so long since I’d prayed, I figured I’d need some kind of visual help to remind me there was someone there listening. I tried to pray but it was as if I had been gagged. More than that though, God was not there. I didn’t want him there; I was terrified of him. I didn’t want him close enough to take anything away from me. I cried some more. In my tears, after a long time, I managed to say ‘God, I’m so tired’. I meant not just now, but after all those years and all the fighting and sadness. I felt a voice reply tenderly: ‘No wonder’ and a sense of arms around me and immediately I pushed it away. Getting close is dangerous. That’s how hearts get broken and things get taken away. It was 7:30pm and I went to bed, exhausted. I heard a voice somewhere in my head say ‘Come to me all who are weary, and I will give you rest’. I put it down to my imagination and slept for twelve and a half hours.

The next day, Good Friday, I had breakfast with a friendly South African couple. They asked why I was there and I told them I hadn’t been able to pray for a long time and I wanted to see if I could address that. They advised me to start with what came easily: one verse, a worship song; start with Jesus. This seemed good advice.

I went over for morning prayers in the chapel. I listened to the stuff about Jesus dying and felt numb. They blew out the candles, turned out the lights, turned on some annoying Christian music and told us to stay as long as we wished. I wanted to stay to see if I could pray there. Most people left straight away. One other person remained and I wanted her to go in case I cried again. She stayed, resolutely and noisily breathing through her nose. I prayed ‘Lord, please can she bugger off?’. The woman got up and left. I felt slightly encouraged. I addressed the problem of the horrible music and put on some sensible looking hymns instead. I listened to around 7 in a row, trying to feel something. Then a song came on I had never heard. I could tell by the chord sequences and the non-congregation-friendly (but very, very beautiful) melody, that it was an old one. It is called O Love That Will Not Let Me Go, and was being performed by Martyn Joseph with just an acoustic guitar. He sounded heart-broken. And the words were my prayer, though I wasn’t able to say them myself:

1.       O Love that wilt not let me go,

I rest my weary soul in thee;

I give thee back the life I owe,
That in thine ocean depths its flow
May richer, fuller be.

 

2.       O light that foll’west all my way,
I yield my flick’ring torch to thee;
My heart restores its borrowed ray,
That in thy sunshine’s blaze its day
May brighter, fairer be.

 

3.       O Joy that seekest me through pain,
I cannot close my heart to thee;
I trace the rainbow through the rain,
And feel the promise is not vain,
That morn shall tearless be.

 

4.       O Cross that liftest up my head,
I dare not ask to fly from thee;
I lay in dust life’s glory dead,
And from the ground there blossoms red
Life that shall endless be.

 

I went back to my room and downloaded the nearest version I could find (it’s this one here if you’d like to hear it) and listened to it over and over again. My soul was weary, and my torch was flickering. In particular, the lines ‘I cannot close my heart to thee’ and ‘I dare not ask to fly from thee’, felt like everything I was able to say at that point. I longed to move forward and towards him, but all I could manage was to say I could not, dare not, move away.

I tried again to pray. I tried writing, walking, talking out loud, waiting. I couldn’t get past that feeling that God was muffled and distant, and of me being too leaden to move and approach him. I read the whole of Mark’s gospel. Jesus seemed everso grumpy and impatient with his disciples to me. I started to read a book about Jesus. I tried to write out some of the things I want wanted to wrestle with God over. I felt very tired very quickly. I went to bed, deeply discouraged and surer than ever that God was either absent or unkind.

I woke up the next morning with a very heavy heart at the thought of another whole day with nothing on the agenda except failing to pray all day long. In desperation, I arranged to have a one to one chat with the lady warden of the retreat centre after breakfast. She had strikingly kind eyes. I tend to think it’s only terrible writers who attribute emotion to people’s eyes, but hers really were. So much so that I trusted her, even though she was a stranger and a Christian: a combination that usually guarantees distrust in me. She was also named Storm. What an improbably cool name for an apparently ordinary lady in a cardigan and pearl necklace.

I met with Storm, and of course, I began to cry immediately before we’d even begun. I told her I was here because I couldn’t pray, and that I couldn’t pray because I didn’t like God and didn’t trust him. She asked me to tell her about the god I didn’t like by starting at the beginning.

I told her a lot of my story and she told me a lot of truths about God in response. She asked me what I’d learned about Jesus in Mark’s gospel and laughed when I said he was grumpy – she said that showed he was fully human. She asked what else. I said I could see he was Lord. And I wanted him to be Lord: I wanted to live in a world where all of this chaos is looked over and looked after by someone. Someone powerful and someone who cares. The alternative is terrifying and I don’t want to entertain it.

Anyway, she said a lot of other things too. She listened to me in an unhurried way, she got angry about the right things and sad at the right points, and pointed me again and again to the authentic, living Jesus.

And I went for a walk and I sat on a log and I prayed. Not for a long time, and not about any of the angry things I had thought I was going to pray about.

But that’s because I was praying for probably the first time, to a different god. The one I saw in Jesus and not the punitive, greedy, spiteful god of my own making. The other things belonged to a different time and a different relationship.

I read some more, cried a little more, and slept a lot more. Then it was Easter morning. I had a cooked breakfast, went to the local church where they read out profound truths by rote and sang Alleluia like a yawn. And then I sat down again to talk to Storm. I told her I wanted to start again, like a baby, because that’s what I probably am spiritually. I wanted to learn what my own unique relationship with Jesus looked like. I wanted to learn about Jesus with fresh eyes. She told me that that’s when I would really grow, when my faith was really my own. I prayed and committed myself to God as if for the first time, but this time with hope for a new life. A new birth. A genuine trust in a gentle God. A God who loves me, individually, uniquely and unconditionally. A God who is kind. All new things for me really. The beginning of a new adventure.

He has sent me to bind up the broken hearted

Something amazing happened to me at church today. I hope I can put it into words. It requires a bit of a longish back story, so bear with me. I will start with the beginning of my day this morning.

Usually at church I am at the front playing an instrument of some kind. But today we had some people from All Nations College over to run the whole service, so I was one of the congregation. My heart was heavy knowing this because my experience is that when I am not having to concentrate on playing an instrument well, I think more about the words of songs and that often means I become upset and tearful. I dislike this partly because it makes me feel painfully conspicuous but also because they are invariably not tears of joy about the beauty of the Lord, but tears of sadness and heartache. As you read on, you will understand why I was so bloody miserable.

So, anticipating that this was fairly likely, I struggled to get out of bed and arrived about 10 minutes late. The only available seat I could see when I arrived was one next to someone who I think is thoroughly wonderful, so I was quite pleased. I sat down just in time for the kids’ slot.

The service this morning was about the first half of Isaiah 61, which contains the verse “They will be called oaks of righteousness, a planting of the LORD for the display of his splendour”. The girl had given each of us a leaf on which to write the name of someone we wanted to ask for God to make into an oak of righteousness. She said that an oak of righteousness is someone who is full of joy and love for God. Someone who is used by him. I tried to think of someone’s name but I could only think of my own. I was not full of those things. I wanted to be, but I’ve always felt I was doing something wrong or missing something. I felt decidedly un-oak-like, and a familiar sinking heart.

Then someone turned to me and said “I would like to put you on my leaf”. I couldn’t tell if he was just saying that as a way of avoiding small talk, or if he was joking or if he really meant it, so I took it cooly and said thank you. But inside I wondered “Did God just hear that heavy-hearted prayer and answer it straight away?” No, that sort of thing doesn’t happen to me. Swallow it down, look straight ahead. Don’t get emotional and embarrass everyone. He probably didn’t mean it anyway.

Then the sermon began. It was on the following passage:

The Spirit of the Sovereign Lord is on me,
because the Lord has anointed me
to proclaim good news to the poor.
He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted,
to proclaim freedom for the captives
and release from darkness for the prisoners,^[a]
2 to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favour
and the day of vengeance of our God,
to comfort all who mourn,
³     and provide for those who grieve in Zion—
to bestow on them a crown of beauty
instead of ashes,
the oil of joy
instead of mourning,
and a garment of praise
instead of a spirit of despair.
They will be called oaks of righteousness,
a planting of the Lord
for the display of his splendour.

The speaker reminded us that this was the passage that Jesus read out in the synagogue in Luke 4 where he follows it by saying “Today this scripture is fulfilled in your hearing.” A heart stopping moment in scripture and history. It tells us that Jesus fulfills this prophecy. But Jesus also says in John 14:12 “I tell you the truth, anyone who has faith in me will do what I have been doing. He will do even greater things than these, because I am going to the Father.” So Jesus passes on the baton to his people too. We are to carry on his kingdom work, and even do “greater things.” So Isaiah 61 is our ministry. It’s even my ministry.

A couple of weeks ago another preacher was talking about us being called to make disciples. He seemed to be saying that making disciples meant doing evangelism and teaching people about the Bible. This had been one of those weeks where I hadn’t been playing an instrument and instead got tearful and unhappy. Because you see, I USED to do those things. I used to work in ‘Christian ministry’. I felt really sure and secure that I was doing ‘God’s work’. Now, I’m not sure. I’m doing what I want to do. I’m doing something that makes me feel alive and something I feel good at but it’s not ‘making disciples’. I’m not telling my clients about Jesus. I’m not teaching them the Bible. Am I only doing God’s work and God’s will when I’m doing those things, or when I’m doing other ‘spiritual’ things like praying for clients, but not the actual nut and bolt work of counselling? I didn’t feel like this could be right. But I’ve had this horrible feeling since finishing Christian work that I’ve just been following my own path in spite of God. Not with him or for him. He must be so disappointed.

Then in that same church service we sung a song about making sacrifices for Jesus and I got even more unhappy. You see I USED to do that. When I first became a Christian I made big sacrifices that made me so unhappy I wished I was dead. And everywhere I went Christians applauded me and told me how wonderful it was that I loved Jesus so much that I would do that. And so I used to sing those songs about sacrifice feeling sure and secure that I was doing God’s will. But I also had begun to believe something really wrong because of the situation that I was ‘born’ into as a Christian. I thought that because people seemed so pleased that I was making sacrifices, then it must be a really good thing that I was so unhappy. It must please God for me to be so unhappy. Being so unhappy that you wish you were dead must be authentic Christianity. So I didn’t just make the original sacrifice (which I still believe was right) but I also sacrificed anything that had the whiff of happiness in it. I threw the baby of joy out with the bath water of appropriate sacrifice. I have been doing that my whole Christian life.

So I got upset in that recent church service because I’m not unhappy any more. I don’t wish I was dead. So, my skewed logic tells me, I must not be a real Christian any more. God must be so disappointed with me. I can’t sing those songs with any authenticity any more because I’ve discovered a way of living (still according to sound doctrine you understand) that doesn’t make me feel like my heart has been ripped out.

I was sad because I wasn’t unhappy enough.

Cut back to today’s sermon. The ministry being described in Isaiah 61 is a little broader than “tell people about Jesus and then do one to ones with them”. It includes things that I actually do. I help broken hearted people. I comfort those who mourn and grieve. Maybe… No. Could it be? Could it possibly be true that God called me to do that? That he made and equipped me for it? That it pleases him for me to do that? That this could be called God’s work for me? She mentioned that God prepares us for the ministry that he has for us. Our life stories tell the tales that he wants us to tell. I remembered earlier in the week a friend texting me to encourage me that I was doing good and fruitful work with clients and that I was being a good friend to her. She said that she believed it was because I knew what it was to be broken hearted that meant I was able to help others effectively (or words to that effect). It seemed to fit with what the speaker was saying. Could it be that God is and has been using me for his purposes by doing what I love and is not angry with me because I haven’t converted anyone…?

Then the next song was announced. It was one of those sacrificey songs that I used to like. It was about giving everything to Jesus.

And suddenly, I saw that idea in a totally new way for the very first time. 

I had always thought that giving everything to Jesus meant giving him anything good you had or felt until you were so unhappy that you wanted to die. Because that is what I thought made Christians applaud you, so that is what I thought made God pleased. And so I have felt that I must be displeasing him by daring to stay in a job that makes me happy, or in friendships that make me glad to be alive. I keep expecting him to rip them from my hands because I will no longer give them to him willingly. But maybe there’s another way you can give everything to Jesus.

Maybe you can use every good thing he gives you, for him to use for his will. 

Maybe that doesn’t mean you have to give good things up. Instead you can recognise them as good things and thank him for them. Rejoice in them. Use them for him. Give it all, for him. But still keep them.

It sounds so obvious now.

At the end of the sermon the speaker prayed that we would see the scriptures. Not that we’d see the words on the page. Not that we’d understand what she’d explained, but that we’d see what’s really true. And God answered her prayers. I feel like my eyes have finally been opened to who God is and who I am in him. He is not an angry bully who wants me to be miserable and who hates it when I’m happy because I’m not sacrificing enough. He is a Father who designed me with giftings that he wants me to use for his kingdom, for his glory AND for my delight. He gives me good things because he is kind and generous and not because he wants to test whether I’m loyal enough to deny myself. No wonder I’ve been such a bitter, angry and unhappy Christian – I’ve been trying to love and worship such a horrible god! He must really love me to keep hold of me all this time…

And he’s shown me that I’m loved in my church. The thoroughly wonderful woman who I was sitting with came to find me outside when I left to cry privately. She just stood with me until I was able to say why, and then said that she understood, and that it was in fact true that God is not horrible. And then she stood with me while I had to wait in the coffee room after church because she knows how difficult I find that. And then two more friends did the same, for ages. And no-one made fun of me for finding it difficult to stand in a room on my own where people are having coffees, they just understood it and helped me with it.

And the man said he wanted to put my name on his leaf.

And when I have told friends that this is what God showed me today, they told me they have wanted me to understand this for a really long time, but I never seemed to get it.

Well, now I do. And it’s changed everything.

OddBabble: She’s a slow learner. But she gets there in the end.

In Defence of Lament

I have come to accept that I am one of life’s lamenters.

I have been thinking that maybe one of the outworkings of us being a body of Christ with many and varied parts and functions is that some of us are broadly called and inclined to rejoice and some are called and inclined to lament.

I used to spend a  lot of energy berating myself for being a lamenter, and this was in large part because it was seen by some others as being not very godly and not very Christian. Christians are joyful you see. Smile. Jesus loves you.

But my joy has often looked like this song. In fact when I first heard it, it made me go all funny because it was one of those rare and wonderful moments where you see yourself reflected in someone or something else, and you realise you are not the only one.

I was told once by someone that it was OK to be a lamenter for a while, but at some point you need to get past that and get to the joy bit. But that doesn’t make any sense to me because I feel I am one of those called to lament, and so the ‘joy bit’ just looks a little different. It’s not a cause to feel sorry for me – it’s not a lesser joy, it’s a different one.

I conclude that I am a lamenter partly because I have had things in my life which have given me cause to lament, but mostly because I have always been drawn to other lamenters. I love morbid films, sad books, miserable music and cynical people. I have chosen a career which leads me to spend my waking hours listening to people cry and I consider myself privileged to hear personal tragedies which are otherwise hidden and secret. I do this not out of a misplaced sense of martyrdom or duty, but because doing it makes me feel really alive and as if I am being who I was designed to be, which actually at times feels close to euphoric. I’ve never felt like that doing anything else. I often come home from work thinking how perverse this is – that I should get such life-giving satisfaction, essentially out of other people’s misery. But it’s not the fact that my clients are unhappy that gives me that feeling, it’s the knowledge that I have been a balm for them. That I’ve given comfort, relief, a deep, human connection, a containment. The knowledge that those things are really rare and precious gifts, and that I’m really good at giving them. It’s like being a kind of macabre Father Christmas every day of the year.

At the moment I am lamenting with a few friends. Even though they are not my own griefs (it’s not my friend, my babies, my husband, my illness) that have caused me to cry – I still grieve, and I mean genuinely grieve, with actual real, salty tears. It strikes me that there is something about this that is really wonderful. Not the things that have caused the grief – they are unfathomably awful and I wish with all of my heart that they had not happened and were not happening. But there is something wonderful in the fact that these griefs can be shared in a very real way. I don’t understand how it works, but something amazing happens when sorrow is shared because it somehow really is taken on by the hearer. In a very real way, burdens actually are shared. We feel better. What kind of weird alchemy makes that happen? I don’t understand it but I love the fact that it’s a reality. I love the fact that I can be a friend who doesn’t just watch pain happen to people who I love – I can be a friend who can square my own shoulder beneath the burden, even if it’s just one little corner of it, and carry it too.

And it strikes me too that just like the happy, infectious, joyful Christians, I too am made in the image of God.God is a lamenter. A great deal more of the Bible is about lament than it is about the smiley kind of joy. And if God was grinning all the time and not lamenting some of the time when he looked at this messed up world of ours, I would find it hard to worship him.

So I am embracing my role in the body of Christ and in the wider world. It’s an important and needed role, and I love it.

Like one who takes away a garment on a cold day, or like vinegar poured on soda, is one who sings songs to a heavy heart. Proverbs 25:20

 

OddBabble: Is grateful that being a lamenter does not stop her from being frickin’ hilarious most of the damn time.