Wednesday, April 24, 2013

Difficulties are not Punishments

How I wish I had known the language to express this simple idea to my mother before she died.

I have always suspected this; I knew that life brings difficulties and trials to everyone. But I had to learn this for myself. My poor mom always believed that a problem-free life was possible and desirable, and that somehow she was being punished when she had a difficult experience.

Because this was my mother's worldview, I of course absorbed it on some level. I think I believed it at one point in my life. But of course, with experience I have found that nobody gets through this life without problems. Nobody. The problems may be different, of course, but everyone has them. Princess Diana was a prime example. She was highborn, wealthy, beautiful, famous, had two darling boys, but was never happy. She cast about looking for happiness, but died tragically never having found it. (It didn't help that her husband was unfaithful. But still.)

But, Old Testament aside, God does not send us difficulties to punish us. Rather, he has set a world in motion, and the fallen state of it has given us problems to overcome. We have to work, labor to give birth, suffer the frailties of our human bodies, and we are affected by the mistakes and sins of others as well as our own.

We therefore must make it a priority to look for the good things we experience rather than dwell on the things that are imperfect or negative. Sometimes it feels as though there are no good things at all, but we can search among the weeds for the wildflowers. They are there.

Sunday, April 7, 2013

Grief

Grief is the unspeakable sorrow that results from a tragic experience.

We have kind of a weird relationship with grief. We really don't know how to deal with it or how to help someone else deal with it, despite the proliferation of so-called "grief counselors" today.

Most of the time, we think of grief in relation to a death, but we can grieve for other reasons.

I am grieving right now for unfulfilled dreams and expectations, and the spiritual death of a child. It is hard. I feel I have no one who can help me. I pray, but my expectations of succor and comfort are not met. I really don't even know what those expectations are. I grieve the non-appearance of a miracle that I desperately hoped for. I grieve for what I may not have done right earlier in my life. I grieve for people I know who are experience excruciating heartache, the uncertainty of job loss, and terminal illness. I grieve the loss of my youth and optimism. I feel grief for the diminishing strength of my physical body.

I know that grief is another of the refiner's fires, that without the bitter things in life, I cannot appreciate the sweet. But I have been tasting the bitter for a long time now. I don't find many sweet things these days.

Tomorrow morning, I will pull myself out of bed once again, find the things to be thankful for in the day, and I will seek to help others and fulfill my responsibilities.

But for now, I grieve.