So yesterday we had guests over.
For some reason, the wife's usual negativity really, really hurt- worse than usual. In fact, I found myself on the verge of tears on more than one occasion.
For some other reason, I felt as if this were a failure on my part. I kept asking Christ, "Why aren't I doing better? Why am I actually doing worse? This is horrible. I have to pull myself together. This is a train wreck."
By the time I went to bed, I felt as if I were bruised, bleeding and battered on the inside. I felt as if I'd done nothing but let Him down; just one mistake after another. When I went to bed, I just started pouring out my distress.
The first thing He said to me was: "I empathize. I was insulted, scorned and deliberately misunderstood as well."
My first and overpowering instinct at this was to feel outraged on His behalf. I was all, "How can You even compare Your incredible anguish to my slight suffering?"
It actually took me a little while to get over the outrage so that I could accept the comfort He was offering me. I kept wanting to chide Him for making light of His own suffering, when all I had was a slightly bruised ego. And that should surely be good for me, right?
But He didn't see it that way. He didn't diminish my pain- He acknowledged it. It occurs to me now that something cannot be healed unless it is first recognized.
I thought about how I usually respond to her. I usually just push away what she is saying, which is in essence, to pretend. In a way, it is diminishing her. I am sort of saying, "What you say and what you are do not matter to me. I am impervious to you."
Whereas, if I respond honestly to her by giving voice and expression to my pain, that's giving both her and myself the gift of authenticity, at the very least. It doesn't resolve the situation, but it dignifies it with reality. And that surely is heading in the right direction.
Surely in the end, authenticity is more an act of love that false and impervious cheerfulness.
I'm still thinking this over. It a hard one to wrap one's mind around.
But still, I had to ask, why do I keep failing?
I do, too. A hundred times a day, I feel as if I have failed. I used to judge myself viciously for these things, just beat up on myself.
Two days into this whole process, I had done this for like the twentieth time, and I heard Him speak sternly to me for the first time ever. But it was still loving.
I don't think I've ever before experienced sternness and love both genuinely combined. It was actually incredibly relieving.
He said, "Enough. No more judging yourself. All judgements and the whole business of judging were given to me."
It was as though I were a child, and I had a stick and was using it to hit myself over the head. It was as though He said, "Surrender the stick! No more stick for you! Now let's start over."
Now I no longer beat myself up, but I still feel bad. Each time, I reach out to Him. It's wordless now. It's a swift process of yeilding back into Him. Immediately, I feel refreshed and relieved. But I do this about a hundred times a day.
When I asked Him why I had to do this so often, He replied, "Because you're human."
What a surprise, right? It made me laugh. Then He reminded me of how much I'd already grown.
I understand now, more and more, why John described Him as full of grace and truth.
I read this verse in the Bible, it says, "Who taught God? What school did He go to, to learn Justice?"
I thought about that. He didn't have to learn justice, because He is justice. The same with love and compassion and mercy. He didn't have to learn these things, because they flow out of who He is.
So, He doesn't run out. It doesn't tax Him. He loves the work of restoring and healing us.
