love and lament

I'm trying to learn what it means to face grief head-on, to not numb myself more than is acceptable, to grieve. I finally changed my phone wallpaper to a photo of me and Dad, something I didn't think I was ready to do for months. I didn't want the constant reminder... but it's not like I'm ever "reminded" anyway. It's always there, and I needed to just acknowledge the pain. 

I went to bed last night emotionally drained, close to falling apart, so so ready for a Sabbath. Just get some sleep and things will be better in the morning, I thought. Sleep is better than tears, right? Well, I woke up this morning and it hadn't gone away, the ache and the exhaustion on every level. I didn't want to get out of bed. I finally got up, made my coffee, and got dressed. I was gonna go somewhere to meet with God, have a good solid prayer and Bible reading time, maybe some journaling, but instead I collapsed back onto my bed. 

This week, my counselor asked how I was doing. I was ready to answer. I told her all about the things I'd learned since I last saw her (the last two blog posts, and more!). I talked for probably 5 or 10 minutes about things I'd been processing, conclusions I'd come too, lessons I'd learned. When I got to the end, she said that was great. And then she said, "So how have you actually been feeling?" I had no idea how to answer. It took us a long time of silence to just begin to answer the question. 

So this morning on my bed, I tried to just figure out how I was feeling. Not great. I felt like I should be asking people for help or prayer or company, but I'm not good at that, and then I felt bad for not doing it. Most of all, I wanted to fight for actually finding Jesus in the middle of this. I need people, but I need to know that I can lean on Jesus, actually and truly. 

I finally got up. I wanted to go play the piano, to play and sing some of the songs of worship and lament I've been collecting, but the practice rooms were locked. So I put in a podcast and went for a walk. It was a sermon I've listened to multiple times already. It was from Bridgetown Church, and it was preached on the same Sunday as Dad's memorial service. The topic is Unanswered Prayer and Lament. Here are a few of the quotations from John Mark Comer that stood out to me today: 

God is love. In the universe God has chosen to actualize, love is the highest value, and love demands freedom, it demands a choice. No free will, no love. It’s not that God can’t override human will, that His will is on an equal playing field with mine, or Satan’s, or whatever - not at all. He can, and He does at times. It’s that it’s so against His nature to override our freedom. No matter what you believe about God’s sovereignty, His kingdom is not a dictatorship. Satan is the one who controls, who’s manipulative, who dominates with brute force, who rapes. God is the one who influences, who romances, who woos, who draws, who invites you into relationship. God is love. But the world is a terrifyingly free, dangerous, beautiful place to call home. This freedom is at the heart of all that is right with the world, and sadly all that is wrong with it. 

If God always answered my prayers, His involvement in my life would be limited to my imagination and my insecurity.

If God were to answer every single one of our prayers right away, our relationship with Him would devolve into that of a debit card to an ATM machine, rather than that of a child to his or her father. And what God is after more than a ring is relationship. The main point of prayer isn't about getting what you want from God, it's about getting God Himself.  

Prayer isn't a place to be good, it's a place to be honest. Prayer is when you leak out of your soul with the edit button off and you vent it all to God and you pound the chest of your Father in love and confusion - that is prayer. 

The sermon ends with speaking to the main response to unanswered prayer: lament. Lament makes up 2/3 of the Psalms. Lament is honesty, complaint, confusion, and coming to God in the pain. He ended by reading out Psalm 13. 

How long, O Lord? Will you forget me forever? How long will you hide your face from me? How long must I wrestle with my thoughts, And day after day have sorrow in my heart?How long will my enemy triumph over me? 

Look on me and answer, Lord my God, Give light to my eyes, or I will sleep in death, And my enemy will say, "I have overcome him,"And my foes will rejoice when I fall.  

But I trust in your unfailing love;My heart rejoices in your salvation. I will sing the Lord's praise, For He has been good to me. 

He said that lament is coming to God in honesty, and that most often that process of coming to God will end in worship. I wasn't so sure. I took his challenge to write a lament of my own if needed. I sat down at the edge of the field where I had walked to as I listened, and wrote this:

Oh God, I have no prayer to pray.  

Everything is done, I didn't know to pray for a miracle before it was too late, and oh God it feels too late.  

How long must I wrestle with my heart and mind? 

What the heck, God?  

God?  

Father?  

I know you are good. I trust your unfailing love.  

But why does my soul feel alone and paralyzed? Why do I have to work so hard to believe you are with me? Everything is hard, why can't your presence be easy?
Show up, please Father. Be louder. Be clearer.  

But give me Yourself over immediate comfort, if one excludes the other. Give me Yourself over total peace, if the latter slows the former. Don't give me anything but Yourself and the fruit of You.  

I will trust You, Father who loves me.

And literally in the moments as I finished writing, a saw a group coming across the field, talking with each other. It was an acquaintance of mine, a growing friend whose mom I had met at a Preview Weekend when I worked for admissions last year. When her mom had come back to bring her two oldest to TWU last month, she was happy to see me and asked how my summer had been. We were in the middle of the cafeteria, but I told her anyway. She was heartbroken for me. She said she would be praying, and I knew she would. Today, her daughter walked into the field, and I said hi, and she introduced me to some of her siblings who were with her. She said her family was visiting. "Wait, is your mom here?" I asked, and she said yes. So I had lunch with their family (of 11!), and as we were clearing our dishes in the cafeteria, I told her mom that it was a gift from God that she came today. Moms know everything, and she knew that what I said was just a tip of the iceberg. And she gave me such a long, deep, stand-in-the-cafeteria-and-cry-together hug, and told me about how close heaven and earth are to each other, and how our loved ones are not far away.

God comes. He comes Himself, and He comes through people, and sometimes you can't tell which is which. My trust levels are rising and falling more frequently than waves of the sea, but I know He is with me. He loves me.