Darkness

Darkness.  The absence of Light, of Hope.  A shadow of evil, pain, sorrow.  Darkness comes in many shapes and forms.  What is darkness in your life?  The unfathomable shooting in Newtown, CT?  The senseless death of a high school  friend?  We try to comprehend it all.  We ask, “Where is God?” 

In my life, darkness has been infertility.  Over four years we have waited, hoped, prayed.  Cried.  I have reached a point where I need to talk about it.  For me and for you.  Infertility has a stigma that we shouldn’t talk about it.  I think that’s wrong.  I’m not planning on sharing the details with the World Wide Web (you are welcome to call me if you’d like talk about it), but I think it’s important to share my heart on the topic. 

I am not going to lie to you.  I have been angry with God.  I have doubted His goodness.  I have bargained with Him and flat out ignored Him.  I asked, “Where is God?”  My head knew that He was there, but I did not desire Him.  My head knew that He alone was peace for my soul…but my hurting heart wanted nothing to do with Him.  I busied myself with Masters work and just about anything else to numb myself from what I knew was Him speaking to me.  It has been a dark, dry, and difficult journey. 

So, where was God?  He was there all along…I did not want to find Him.  Could this be true for the darkness of other situations in our world too?

Psalm 130 “Help, God- the bottom has fallen out of my life!  Master, hear my cry for help!  Listen hard!  Open your ears!  Listen to my cries for mercy.”  (The Message translation)

I love quoting authors because so often I feel that they put words to the emotions that I am unable to express.  I stumbled across this gem from Eugene Peterson on Sunday.  It’s from his book, A Long Obedience in the Same Direction.  “By setting the anguish out in the open and voicing it as a prayer, the psalm (130) gives dignity to our suffering.  It does not look on suffering as something slightly embarrassing that must be hushed up and locked in a closet (where it finally becomes a skeleton) because this sort of thing shouldn’t happen to a real person of faith.  And it doesn’t treat it as a puzzle that must be explained, and therefore turn it over to theologians or philosophers to work out an answer.  Suffering is set squarely, openly, passionately before God.  It is acknowledged and expressed.  It is described and lived.” 

This is me setting my suffering out in the open.  I don’t want it to become a skeleton in my closet.  I don’t need anyone to rationalize it for me.  I just want to open it up to the One who knows every detail, understands my emotion, and longs for me to turn and run into His arms.  I am living it- not dying because of it.  Please don’t feel sorry or say, “It will all happen in the right time”.  Just pray…and mean it.

Next? Gratefulness.