Wednesday, February 10, 2010

In the Sanctuary of Time

I have been thinking alot about this, yet I have neglected to write it down. So here goes. Its amazing to me how long it takes to be healed of some things. I'm not necessarily talking about a broken leg or anything physical like that. But emotional stuff, the baggage that you pick up whenever you break your leg if you will. Or maybe the effects of a relationship falling to pieces, or neglect or abuse or any number of things that happens to affect our souls. It doesn't even have to be that serious, it can be the little innocuous things that don't really hurt, but do affect us. What be it, it all takes time to recover from. I have been learning to love all that time that it does take. Yes, it's still frustrating whenever I realize that the things that I thought I was once recovered from is still gonna take a little more time. But its beautiful to me that God understands this process, and I think that he incites it more than we think. He's big enough to let us be hurt, He just seems to know better and He understands it as well. G.K. Chesterton said in his book 'Orthodoxy' something to the effect of choosing Gods and realizing that the one who truly cares it the one whos greatest strength is in his absolute display of weakness, becoming human. Empathizing with humanity enough to put himself in the position of one of us and then dying worse than most of us ever will. I think about Paul the apostle and looking at his life and realizing that it took him more than 10 years after he got saved to start preaching. What he was doing during that time I don't know but I think that because of that time he was a much healthier person to be preaching. He had had time to process through all the stupid things that he had done, and reconcile that stuff.
Yesterday I was talking to a good friend of mine about past friends of ours who are now going through rough patches. Questioning life, faith, whatever. And I have come to a point of realizing that their isn't a whole bunch of things that I can be proactive about to help them through those periods. It isn't worth trying to tell them that what I view as 'the truth' about their situation. I can't go up to them and say those perfect words that changes their world view entirely, because I have no clue what to say sometimes honestly. And talking to Lotte, who is from Germany, about her life at university, she says the same things. Sometimes, as much as we would not like it to be this way, there isn't a whole bunch that we can do for peoples situation except simply be there. To exist within their reality as a friend who cares. To be there for them as you watch everything fall to pieces. I know that this sounds a bit grim perhaps. But I think that its because it doesn't fit within our modern day paradigm very well, letting time and God have their way. Personally I see it as a beautiful prospect now. Their are things in my life that if I hadn't had the time to hash out I know I would be a completely different person, probably for the worse.
So in the end what I think I am saying is to relax and let God and time take their winding course. Enjoy the prospect of all the varying emotions that are inevitably bound to happen, anger to ecstasy. Read through Ecclesiastes and learn to enjoy the beauty inside of that book once you realize that life isn't always rainbows and butterflies. And be there for the friends in need, you don't need to talk, just hold them and let them know that you care no matter how long it takes.
-toast

No comments:

Post a Comment