Showing up

Day 3 of our search for God in the public square…

How is suffering central to the truths God wants us to find? Is it just because suffering provides clarity — what matters and what does not? Or, is there more? What happens when we come to God with our pain, with our complaints, with all that weighs on us?

Nothing less than miracle, if we’ll allow it. More on that “if” in tomorrow’s post.

I staggered toward God. Seeing no place for me in the world, seeing no way out of the awful effects imposed on me by abuse, thinking myself ruined and leaking that ruin out on those I loved, I staggered into God’s presence, half crazed with despair and anger, and I both dared and begged God to respond. And I didn’t think God responded. In fact, my situation got worse. I had to meet its demands on my own. I had to get up and take charge. Just when I needed God to step up, God did not.

But then it dawned on me, and the dawning took my breath away. In those moments following the realization that things were even worse, in that very moment, I felt and was suddenly and massively empowered. I rose up! I met the demands! I confronted the worsening situation and threw its threat backwards! I did!

Yes, and altogether no. That wasn’t just me. Clearly not, and I knew it. Time stopped for me in that moment of realization. The clarity that suffering brings, ah! For sure, it laid bare just what was going on. I showed up to ask, and God showed up to answer! God provided that answer for and in me.

It is a profoundly humbling truth. God and me. God and you. God and us. It is rarely just God.

Reflection

How many times have you gotten through something and missed the realization that it wasn’t just you at play?

Prayer

Oh God, You are a subtle God! You are a marvelous God, a loving Parent, One who reaches down within us and shows us just how powerful we can be when we put our hands to work with You! Sharpen our eyes, Lord, to see! It is never just us. You are always HERE.