Late Night Revelations

I’ve just returned from a 2am walk taken because I desperately needed to talk some stuff out with my Father. I’m still hurting from my anger and frustration, but I’m feeling better, feeling more purposeful, saner, and as if I might actually be able to win through in Christ.

There is a struggle in my life I’ve kept in the shadows, revealing it 3 or 4 times a week to a recovery group. This struggle has lessoned and has little grip on me, thanks to the power of God through this program. Yet it does still have a grip. It grips my subconscious mind and jumps forward randomly, though it is easily parried by simply praising God for the way He is healing me from it. This works. It is a simple enough act of faith in the Father’s ability to save me from sin, and it works. Yet about once every 15 days it acts out as I sleep. It did again this night and I am so grotesquely sickened by it. I’ve had it! I’m so done waiting for this sickness to heal!

So, after lying in bed for 20 minutes or so, unable to sleep, I’ve taken my walk. As I walked I cried, I screamed inside, and I told God of my deep anger, my feeing of abandonment, and the hot hatred I feel for my failures. I’m sickened by my sickness! (Ha!) And not just this disease, but the many other things in my life which seem such utter failures: bad use of time, lack of energy, inability to finish projects, a never ending flow of new problems, etc. And I found myself furious at the idea that this illness might have had power over me this night because I had failed to ask God this same night to give me freedom from it, as if God’s saving power were dependent on my action, that it was held back and unavailable until I ask. How terrible that thought seems to me, even now! That God’s loving touch is withheld and never reaches down to hold me, unless I request it!? That seems as empty and heinous as a parent or spouse never expressing love to you unless you ask for it! “Your not worth the effort, but I’ll do something if you pester me enough.” And yet the scriptures say “You have not because you ask not.” Then I had a moment…

I was a block from my house approaching a large tree which from a distance, as it stood in the light of a yellow street light, looked as if it were covered in small, yellow orange fall leaves. It struck me hard and I felt a little awe and confusion at this vision of fall in the middle of spring. I didn’t know whether to welcome the vision, since I love fall, or hate it since I’m ready for summer. As I walked up under it, I was given another vision. The tree was not covered in small leaves as it had looked, but in lacy white blooms which now seemed, as I looked up, like snow! Another shift in season! I became awed at Gods generosity then, that he gives such beautiful and almost supernatural visions to us in our times of need. As I though this, a strong wind began to blow behind me and I turned in time to see a large mass of undropped fall leaves race off a nearby tree and fill the air with a swift dance of flight. The air buffeted the area for a while and I thought of God being the still small voice. I though of how loving He is to let me yell my hurt frustrations at Him. That is when I realized, quite suddenly I think though at first unclearly, that we NEED to tell Him our needs just as we need to tell those who hurt us unknowingly that they are doing so. We sometimes tend to just bear with the pain and frustration friends, family, and co-workers lay on us, thinking “if I just bear with this everything will work itself out” even when it goes on for weeks, months, and years. Bitterness and hurt create deep wounds which can poison our relationships with many others as well. The solution, as I’ve come to understand it, is to voice those hurts, not confrontationally, but respectfully and calmly, remembering that this person too may be suffering. And even if they do not change their behavior, we have at least expressed our need and been heard. (There is much more to be said about this, but I’m not here concerned with trying to do so.) I now think that when we have as big a father as God, whom we look up to for all our needs, we need to tell Him too about our needs, hurts, and desires, not because He doesn’t know, which of course He does, but because we NEED to tell Him! We need to be aware of our needs, to give ourselves time to look into ourselves and discover what is lacking, and then to ask this loving Daddy for His provision.

I’ve not been doing this. Much as I’ve also been so caught up in busyness and work that I’ve failed to see how much I’ve been missing my girlfriend, I’ve also failed to see my other feelings and needs. In failing to see and acknowledge them, they have festered inside me. And by the time I’ve finally let them fly, they’ve had a chance to get pretty bitter. So, my need is to look inside, recognize my needs, and tell my Father about them so that I can be free from the burden of my need. When I just assume He will meet them and don’t tell Him about them, I find no peace because I’m still holding on to them. And this is true even when I’m unaware I’m doing it, sometimes even more true. So, for my own good, I better start giving Him my stuff, because I’m not big enough to carry it all around.

Peace out ya’ll. (Oh yes, I am so very Jive. @:D )

Random thought: What if all medicine were made of the exact same stuff and it was our belief in what the stuff does that makes it do the right thing?