When I was home after camp, my family was talking in our living room. We talk about all kinds of things from the ridiculous to the sublime. One thing that we talked about, however, was how, statistically speaking, our family’s existence is next to impossible. After everything that has happened, both emotional and physical, my parents should be divorced, battle lines should be clearly drawn, and at least one of us kids should be abusing some substance or another. Somehow, we’re still together.
I recently heard someone badmouth the idea of starting any day with the words, “If I can just get through today…” which I think come from some e-mail forward or a Chicken Soup for the Soul book. This person believed in the power of positive thinking, and he is not altogether wrong. But my family knows the power of those words:
The power of knowing that today is not very important in the scheme of things. That’s called, “perspective.”
The power of knowing that when things don’t get better, I get better at dealing with them. That’s not optimism; that’s called, “survival.”
The power of knowing that I am not called to be happy about every day as it comes. I figured out awhile ago that, “Take this cup from me,” are not the words of a smiling person. That’s called “realism.”
The power of knowing that, in truth, I am powerless. I can never be prepared. When I no longer have the ability to make everything OK, things are still OK. That’s called, “trust.”
The power of positive thinking only takes me so far. The power of perspective, the development of survival, and the acceptence of realism take me further, but aren’t everthing. The truth is, we don’t wish to be happy, because that would be a dishonest way of looking at the earth. Contentment rarely exists in the real world.
But trust lets us see how we are being carried. We will trust that something will happen, even if we don’t know how, yet. Although everything that I have done falls around me, although I am wounded, and although I may cry with pain, frustration and disappointment, I still stand. And only by the grace of God go I.
But we have this treasure in jars of clay to show that this all-surpassing power is from God and not from us. We are hard pressed on every side, but not crushed; perplexed, but not in despair; persecuted, but not abandoned; struck down, but not destroyed. — II Corinthians 4 by Paul of Tarsus
Sometimes the best map will not guide you
You can’t see what’s round the bend
Sometimes the road leads through dark places
Sometimes the darkness is your friend
Today these eyes scan bleached-out land
For the coming of the outbound stage
Pacing the cage
–“Pacing the Cage” by Bruce Cockburn