The In-Between: It's Okay to Not Always Be Okay

            Sometimes it’s okay to not be okay.  Through the Covid-19 pandemic, I’ve seen others go through the same cycle I have gone through countless times during our infertility journey.  It starts with a trigger from the circumstance that drags up an uncomfortable emotion – often sadness, doubt, fear, or anger in varying degrees.  We don’t like to sit too long with any of these (whether they are coming from within or radiating from someone else), so we often try to fix them or eliminate them as quickly as possible.  If that doesn’t work, then we bury them deep down under layers and masks of self-deluded okay-ness and try to deny that they are even there.  Next, we feel guilty or ashamed (and those of us who follow Jesus also tend to think we must be really bad Christians) for feeling this way at all.  Finally, we either give way to despair or muster up all the manufactured faith, love, joy, and peace we can to try and make everything all better.  But we wake up the next morning, and it’s still not all better.

            The freeing truth is that there is a reason why we feel so unsettled when things aren’t the way we know they should be.  I first wrote about Lysa Terkeurst’s book It’s Not Supposed to Be This Way and her teaching through the “two gardens” in my post titled “Giver of Good Gifts,” and it is a message that has stuck with me over the past several months.  We are living in a sin-mangled space between the perfect Garden of Eden that is imprinted on our hearts and the hope of the new heaven and new earth that are to come.  A heart that is soft toward God is still bothered when things aren’t as they should be because it is aware that there is something far better!  Knowing this frees us up to let ourselves feel and name negative emotions and to find healing as we allow God to guide us through the various stages of grief over the devastating effects of sin.  He doesn’t want us to brush past our feelings or cover up the state of our hearts with forced or feigned joy and peace.  His Spirit will produce those things genuinely (and repeatedly as needed) as we walk with Him in transparent and surrendered dependence, even and especially when we don’t understand and don’t know how to deal with what’s going on in our circumstances.          

            One of the most debated questions in regard to our circumstances is why God allows bad things to happen in the first place, particularly to those who love Him and have believed in His Son.  We get that sin has consequences, and we can accept that fact more easily when we see a direct correlation between our own sin and our own consequence.  However, we really have a hard time stomaching horrible circumstances when we don’t have a specific personal sin (or the sin of another) to blame.  There are many reasons why God allows suffering and sorrow into our lives (see “When Life Isn't Fair” for a more extensive list), but the one that God brought to my attention recently was through another book – Adopted for Life: The Priority of Adoption for Christian Families & Churches by Russell D. Moore. 

In Chapter 2, Moore describes the adoption of his two boys from a Russian orphanage.  One of the chilling scenes he depicts is that of a nursery full of silent babies who no longer cried because they knew no one would come to meet their needs.  When he was finally able to take the boys home out of that terrible environment, the transition to a safe home proved to be unexpectedly difficult.  As wretched as the orphanage was, it was all that the boys had known in their short little lives.  Not comprehending the loving home that awaited them, they reached back in fear and confusion for the orphanage.  Later, Moore draws from those experiences to explain some truths about our own spiritual adoption: “But we get too comfortable with this orphanage universe.  We sit in our pews, or behind our pulpits, knowing that our children watch ‘Christian’ cartoons instead of slash films.  We vote for the right candidates and know all the right ‘worldview’ talking points.  And we’re content with the world we know, just adjusted a little for our identity as Christians.  That’s precisely why so many of us are so atrophied in our prayers, why our prayers rarely reach the level of ‘groanings too deep for words’ (Rom. 8:26).  We are too numbed to be as frustrated as the Spirit is with the way things are.”

While there is so much more I could share and discuss from that chapter, the main thing that impressed on my heart was that sometimes I need to suffer in order to remember where my true home is.  Sometimes I need to hurt in order to stop clinging to the things of this world so tightly and to long for my glorious eternal home with my loving Father.  I don’t want to live a comfortable and pain-free life that makes me content with this pit of sin and numb to its atrocities.  That is not to say that I should seek out pain and suffering, but that I can learn to endure it and even give thanks as it comes because it reminds me that this is not my forever home.   I have a good Father who is going to finalize my adoption and take me home one day. 

Until then, I need to allow the discord between what I know and what I see to drive me into His loving and understanding arms. He reminds me that there is coming a day when there will be no conflict between the two. He releases me to let the tears fall with the reassurance that He cries with me – even though we both know how the story ends. I need His Spirit to continually strengthen me and to teach me how to trust Him and navigate through this time between the two gardens. It may feel like it will never end, but His Word promises that this life is only a breath compared to what is to come – and then everything will finally, forever, and truly be more than okay.       

Passages to Read

Revelation 21:1-7

Isaiah 65:17-25

Romans 8:15-25

I did a new thing….

As all of these thoughts were rolling around in my head over the past couple weeks, a short conversation with a friend was born out of them.  That conversation sparked the first verse for a song.  Now, I’ve tried writing original songs before, but I have never been successful at getting more than a snippet here or there – a verse, an instrumental motif, etc.  This one came so easily.  Don’t get me wrong – it was still work, but I never felt stuck like I have at other times.  Sharing any type of personal art is a vulnerable thing, but I hope that what I wrote will encourage some of you as you walk through uncertainty and sorrow and draw your hearts near to the tender compassion and the firm, but gentle leading of God.     

The In-Between

Rev. 21

Verse 1

God, I know you’re here

God, I know you’re enough for me

So why this ache

That says this isn’t how it’s s’posed to be 

Pre-Chorus

In a world I wish were black and white 

All I can see is this hazy gray

Help me once again to see the day

Chorus

When all my tears will be dried up

And my sorrows fade from memory 

I’ll dance and sing, wrapped in your love,

In the light of your majesty

When the pain of this life is no more

And death’s death is our victory

All will be right, and new, and bright 

We’ll be with You for eternity

Help me trust through the in-between 

Verse 2

Lord, I know what’s true 

I know what you’ve done for me

Still I wrestle with

What I know and what I see  

Verse 3

And I know You’re good

That You command the wind and sea

Please take this fear

And clear away my heart’s debris 

Pre-Chorus

Chorus

Bridge

The discord of disappointment 

Wages war against my soul 

Yet, the fact I know that something’s wrong

Tells me this world is not my home

Chorus 2

Where all my tears will be dried up

And my sorrows fade from memory 

I’ll dance and sing, wrapped in your love,

In the light of your majesty 

When the pain of this life is no more

And death’s death is our victory

All will be right, and new, and bright

We’ll be with You for eternity

Help me trust through the in-between 

Let this home etched in my heart come quickly

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When the Moon Blocks the Sun

For the past several weeks (in the midst of moving), I've been mulling over Psalm 73.  In it, Asaph (the writer) wrestles with the goodness of God; specifically, he seeks to resolve the tension between what he knows to be true and his seemingly contradictory experiences.  The gist of the Psalm goes something like this: "God I know You are good to Your people, but I've gotten so tripped up by what I've seen.  So many people who do horrible, wicked things and have no regard for You or Your ways have trouble-free lives.  Yet, those who love You and seek to obey You can't catch a break from hardship.  What's up with that, God?  What's the point of doing right if it only leads to more heartache and struggle?"  Then, Asaph turns his eyes from other people to his God, and he sees that in the end, his lot is far better than that of the godless who will be destroyed violently, swiftly, and suddenly.  He admits that in the midst of his pain and jealousy, he was stupid and lacking in understanding.   Yet, God still guided and counseled him gently through all of that.  He concludes the Psalm by reiterating what he declared at the beginning, but this time with more personal conviction: "But as for me, the nearness of God is my good; I have made the Lord GOD my refuge, that I may tell of all Your works." 

Less than a week before we moved, I found out my thyroid levels were messed up again, and I had to have my Synthroid dosage increased again.  I went through another round of asking God the same questions Asaph asked and the same questions I know many others in the infertility community have asked:  I know I'm not anywhere near perfect, but why is this so hard for me when so many people who are not at all ready or fit to be parents can conceive a child instantly?  If teenage girls can get pregnant, why can't I see a positive pregnancy test?  If child abusers, drug addicts, and rapists can have children, why are my arms still empty?  If hundreds of thousands of unwanted babies are aborted each year in the U.S., why is the child I so desperately want still nothing more than a dream?  God, do You really have my good in mind if You are withholding what You say is a good gift and reward from me?  Like Asaph, my pain and bitterness clouded my understanding, and before I realized what was happening, I experienced another spiritual eclipse with the moon of my circumstances blocking out the sun of God's presence. 

The same God who guided and counseled Asaph in the midst of his pain-induced ignorance and senselessness guides and counsels me.  I've written so many times before that we have to align our perspective with God's perspective to find peace and understanding in the midst of difficult circumstances.  We have to fix our eyes on eternity instead of this temporary life.  I know this to be true, but I still have to choose it on a moment-by-moment basis.  I have to fix my eyes on Jesus and refuse to look away.  When the darkness falls around me, I have to remember that the Son has not changed or abandoned me.  He is still there, and it is only a short while before I will be able to see His glory clearly all around me again.  

The nearness of God IS my good.  That phrase leapt of the page the first time I read this Psalm, and it has lodged itself in my mind ever since.  I fall into the trap of thinking that "my good" equates to having a perfect marriage, a vibrant ministry, a great house, and children to call my own.  If those things don't fall into place, then how can I say that God is really good to me?  This type of thinking expects God to perform before we will accept Him as He is.  Yet, God accepts us and loves us without any regard for our performance.  Why do we assume that we can impose our own requirements on the God of the universe?

As my husband has taught several times to various groups of youth, God is the scale to measure goodness.  We can't weigh Him against other good things in order to draw comparisons.  He is the scale, the ruler,  the standard, the very definition and essence of goodness.  He just wants us to trust Him.  He is trustworthy because He is good and He does good.  The nearness of God is my good, and it is all I really need. He wants my heart, and He has already given me His.  There is no greater good than being near to God.  It's what we were made for.  All else in this life pales in comparison to knowing Him and walking with Him.

A Life Unexpected (Part 5)

“If we find ourselves with a desire that nothing in this world can satisfy, the most probable explanation is that we were made for another world.”

-C.S. Lewis

            Some of my sweetest memories are of sitting alone outside with God.  Several of these instances took place behind the chapel at Bible school.  The town was small and fairly still with the exception of the bustling of the students and the occasional mooing of cows in the distance.  As I enjoyed the various shapes of puffy clouds against the bright blue of the sky and examined the intricacies of all the different uncomfortable rocks on which I sat, I talked to God.  Unhurried and surrounded by comfortable silence, I told him whatever was on my heart and mind, I read some of His Word, and I thought about who He was as I drank in my surroundings.  Then, I would wait.  Sometimes, I could almost hear Him answer my frustrations and my questions in my heart.  Often, I already knew the answers, but I just needed to be reminded and reassured.  He was always so gentle and so patient, but direct. 

It was in one of these times that I told Him that He could do anything with my life.  In particular, I told Him that I would keep loving and serving Him even if that meant that my dreams of marriage never came true or that I would be living in some awful mud hut in a foreign land (just please, Lord, keep the snakes far away!).  I told Him I was willing and that I wanted to be obedient, and I meant it with every fiber of my being.  As crazy as it sounds, indescribable peace filled my heart, and fear had no more place.  As I have experienced different trials and allowed myself to drift away in doubt, discouragement, and fear, I have found that the quickest way back to that sweet place of peace, surrender, and fellowship is the way that I arrived there in the first place: by remembering who I am and whose I am.

Who I Am

           When trying to define myself, I am often tempted to list off describing qualities, such as: wife, babysitter, organizer, musician, etc.  In reality, these titles refer to my roles, jobs, behaviors, and hobbies and fall far short when it comes to determining who I really am.  If I found my identity in them, then I would be completely lost should they be changed or taken away.  Fortunately, my identity is much more stable, and God has told me what it is.  As a believer in Christ, I am:

And SO MUCH MORE!

This identity (or position) is at the core of every believer, and it cannot be lost.  Neither does it originate within the believer, but it is the gift Christ gives us of Himself.  We believers don’t always act in accordance with this identity, but that does not change the fact of who we are in Christ.  Paul understood this truth better than most.  He had an impressive earthly pedigree and resume, which he outlined briefly in Philippians 3:5, 6.  Continuing on in the passage, we see that he considered all of it to be a loss in comparison with knowing Christ and being found in Him.  Christ’s righteousness in him was far superior to any feeble righteousness that he could muster up on his own.  Paul’s earthly successes were garbage compared to the value of the life he could live in Christ.  He admitted that he was not complete and perfect in living out his identity in Christ, but he also knew that on this earth he was to press on in growing more like Christ and becoming in practice who he already was in his position.  This type of thinking is completely illogical to the world, which is why Paul also pointed to one very crucial aspect of the believer’s identity – that of being citizens of heaven.        

The fact that I am a citizen of heaven is one of the most encouraging truths to me in times of difficulty.  This life is not all there is, which gives me hope.  I was not made to fit into this world’s mold and to constantly chase after the ever-elusive goals of temporary self-fulfillment, success, pleasure, and happiness.  I was made for lasting joy, for meaningful worship, for deep fellowship, for liberating rest, and for eternity.  I was made to last and to be in a relationship with the one who always was, is, and will be.      

Whose I Am

            Understanding who we are is only part of the equation.  We must also understand whose we are.  I know I have touched on this in previous posts, but the answer to living a life unexpected really all boils down to this.  We are not our own.  We belong to Christ – to God.  He has not hidden His character from us.  In His Word, He has revealed that He is:

And, again, SO MUCH MORE!

            He loves us so much, and He does not find joy in our pain.  Many cultures in many ages have believed in gods who required blood sacrifices to cover the sins of man.  The one true God also required blood to cover sin, but He Himself came down and met the requirement that His character demanded.  He could have left us as lost causes to die and be separated from Him forever.  We deserve just that.  Instead, the Creator laid down His life to save us, though He knew many of us would turn our backs on Him, hate Him, and trample all over His sacrifice.  He could not give us a greater demonstration of His love.  We will suffer in this life, but only for a little while.  For those who have trusted in Christ, we know that we will have an eternity of the life that He offers, which far surpasses any short, self-pleasing life that we can dream up on this earth.  We get little tastes of that heavenly life when we take the time to worship Him for who He is and rest in the identity He has given to us.  For those who haven’t trusted in Christ, He wants you to come to Him.  He wants to have a relationship with you and to give you an identity and a purpose that are secure.  You weren’t made to go through this life alone.  We can trust Him to lead us through a life unexpected.