Why I Write

I needed this to come back to my attention, and it did - strange how that happens...

It is August 8, 2006.  I am typing badly.  I have poison ivy starting on my arm and have been to the doctor yesterday hoping to keep it from going full blown.  She is a doctor who is pretty okay with giving me medications for my symptoms and of the three things she prescribed for me I have chosen to take only the prednisone for now.  It upsets stomachs and maybe that is why I can’t sleep tonight.  Maybe it is also the headache, fever like heat in my body and scratchy throat.  Maybe it is the purring of the cat, snoring of the husband, humming of the computer in my bedroom.  Common things all add up and produce uncommon results. 

As I lay unable to sleep my thoughts went to this afternoon’s encounter with a friend who needed a ride to a job interview.  I was pondering “Freedom Village”, the place where we were, and once again I was thinking that this might be a good place to work.  They are trying to take everything an elderly person might need and put it under one umbrella – food, shelter, aesthetics, health care, recreation, social contact and help with meeting these needs at whatever level a person requires, from independence to total care.  Surely as a nurse, a caretaker, a cook, a good driver, a seamstress, a musician, a “handy” person, I should be able to find the perfectly satisfying job doing things for these people, yes?  I imagined myself walking into their HR office and asking for a chance to describe my “dream job” and just seeing if they wanted to buy me. 

This led to all kinds of reflection on my “dream job” and all the jobs I’ve had that didn’t measure up completely and why I am still searching.  At 55 I have to face the possibility that I could die without having discovered what God wants me to be doing now as the culmination of all he’s given me and taught me.  I could miss this thing for which I was created.  A sense of sadness and frustration and something like fear came over me which I can only remember feeling one other time.  And that time came up before me like a movie on a screen, because I have always regarded it as one of my pivotal moments.  I can’t remember exactly when I was “born again” or other important times you would think surely to be memorable, but I remember this experience with God.  It seemed one sided at the time too, but it was definitely attended by the Lord as well.  I wanted a child.  And in a very personal moment with God I realized and confessed to him that I just wanted this child because I wanted to share with someone who God was to me.  I wanted someone to mentor, to love and to influence not just for me but so that God could also have the joy of that person meeting their potential and loving Him.  It wasn’t a demand that I was making but a realization.  I realized why I wanted children but more importantly I realized why God might want children too.  It was a moment of identification, an “aha” moment.  It changed my idea of why God would value and love me, or Adam and Eve, or aborigines in New Guinea or anyone that he created.  God is a creator and he loves what he creates and desires to be in fellowship with his potentially most satisfying creation.  Wow.  I also gave it up and decided that if God didn’t want me to be a parent and hadn’t created me suitable for that purpose I would be unhappy pursuing it.  I wanted to accept whatever God’s wisdom knew was best for me and be at peace.

A few weeks later I was pregnant with my first child, after having tried for two years with no success.  Two passages of scripture became special to me as a result of this new turn in my life.  One said to trust in the Lord and lean not to my own understanding – to acknowledge him in all my ways and he would direct my path.  The other encouraged me to tell the Lord the desires of my heart because he delighted to give them to me.  The passages work together because only by acknowledging the Lord in every way can I be sure that the desires of my heart are true, God glorifying desires that he can give me. 

So next I pondered the job of being a parent.  Was it the “dream job”?  Yes, I really felt it was in so many ways (if you don’t count things like salary, job recognition, pension…).  But I had only Julie and Esther.  And was I able to accomplish what I told God I wanted to do with them?  I understand now that parenting is intensive in the first 18 or so years but it really never ends.  My parents are still influencing me so much!

 I started thinking about how I could continue to tell them about the reality of God because that is what it all boils down to in my mind.  Is God real or are we making him up in our minds?  I have dealt with this question time and time again, and I admit I toy with it from time to time – mostly when I see someone else heading down that path.  I know I can’t prove God to anyone and in fact I can’t even prove him to myself.  But God did give me the capacity to choose belief and act on it, and then he seizes the moment and begins to prove himself to me over a lifetime.  The earlier in life I choose to believe, the more fun I have with God. 

So here are the choices.  We all believe something.  We can decide to not deal with God because the idea is too frustrating and hard to figure out and we can’t make sense of it. (Why are we praying if God knows what we want?  If God hears every prayer why does it make any difference if thousands of people are praying for you?  If God made the rules in the first place why did he decide that someone had to die to atone for sin?  Why did he decide not to actually talk to so many of us?  I could go on forever.)  But that still leaves a lot of big questions regarding origins, purpose, philosophy of life and when thoughts of death occur you can never quite dispel the possibility that you could be wrong about the whole thing and then what?  Ooops.   To my way of thinking, everyone who has not given their lives over to God, to Christ as Lord, is just deciding not to deal with him – yet.  And you really do have everything to lose. 

So the other alternative is to go ahead and believe.  Logically speaking, who would not like to believe that they were conceived and created with love, that they were valued, that there was a way to live in happiness despite circumstances, that there is help beyond our understanding, and hope that all things even though they be not good can be used for good ultimately.  And when life is over, the really good stuff is just beginning because you were not made for this life only – it was just your education and time of proving.  Wouldn’t it just be a much easier, happier choice?  (Please let’s not get into martyrs and persecution just yet.)

I think a lot of us don’t make this decision because we can’t prove God to people who are going to challenge us.  It makes us feel stupid to believe something we can’t prove.  But really have you ever asked a nonbeliever to prove what he believes?  Proof is way overrated. And we care way too much what other people think and way too little about what a Creator God would think and do if he were real.  If you decide to start believing and turn over to God the job of proving himself and be persistent and trusting, like a child, your education will begin.  And to those who are still just being pragmatic – you really have nothing to lose that you aren’t going to lose anyway. 

This is really what I wanted to plant in my children as a starting point.  And I wanted to help them open their eyes along the way and see every evidence that God sent them.  I wanted to help them put their fears in God’s hands – we all have fears.  I wanted to point out to them the physical and spiritual rewards that God passes out, and the natural penalties of ignoring his direction.  And I wanted them to see how delighted I was with them and that I thought God also felt that way. 

Did God give me other children besides Julie and Esther?  I have no doubt he gave me plenty of people to feed and listen to and encourage.  Maybe I was close enough to them that they would also value my story and my way of thinking and believing.  Maybe I should try to tell it to all of the children that God gave me to care about – to Elisha, Tiffany, Jasmine, Shantala, Tanya, Melanie, Jonathan, Christine, Jayson, Nikki, Sony, Todd, Sara, Jessie, Josh, Amy, Tim, Jess, Matt,  Johnny, Krystal, Cheryl, my nieces and nephews, my piano students, the sick children I took care of, the young girls I did Mary Kay with, the dear little children in my church… 

Not too long ago I had an interaction with a lady in the Unitarian Church.  She wanted my husband to come to their worship service and provide inspirational music for them.  It’s my understanding that they somewhat worship cultural achievement and the talents of men and aren’t really sure who to credit for these things.  I had already spent a lot of time thinking about what needed to be said to someone like this woman – a lady in her eighties, well dressed, wealthy appearing and comfortable with her spirituality – and suddenly I was telling God what I would say to her and asking to make the opportunity for me to do it.  I felt the same desire to tell her as I did many years ago to tell my unborn children about a wonderful God, a God who is sovereign, makes the decisions, and is a jealous God when it come to his creation and who they worship.  Again it is a moment of realization that the desire of my heart is to tell other people, like this woman, about this very real God that they can get to know, a God who is certainly big enough to figure out how to prove himself to a willing believer.  After all he is God – duh.  If he can’t bring his own creation to a knowledge of himself we are all worthless and he is not worth worshipping.  What he has used many times to prove himself to me has been the concept of family, the relationship of love between parents and children, husbands and wives.  What he uses to bring it home to you may be entirely different because he knows you, how you think and the quickest, most lasting way to your heart. 

It is now 4 am and I had better try to sleep and hope the Lord has somehow birthed in me a “dream job” to pursue.  I felt that I needed to write this night’s experience down rather than risk forgetting it.  It was a matter of obedience and trust in divine inspiration.  And God has proved a part of himself to me once again.