This took place in my late forties after several years of illness.
With a brimming cupful of spiced
tea, I stretched out in my usual spot on our comfortable hide-a-bed. I pulled
my baby-duck yellow, fisherman knit afghan I’d knitted years ago over my weary
body. It comforted me. I picked up my Bible.
I was thirty chapters into the book of Job hoping to discover what
helped Job deal with all his losses—deaths of children, loss of wealth, having
a discouraging spouse, friends who preached unhelpful dogma to him, and finally
losing his health. One thing was
clear. Job wanted God to explain his
suffering. My mood fit Job’s
well-reasoned accusations fired at God who, according to the story, had allowed
the devil to take everything Job loved except his life. The difference between Job and me that
particular morning was that Job had more energy for the fight than I.
I don’t know how many days I began
the morning with Job, starting with my sense of Job’s companionship in physical
and emotional misery, and with his trying to make sense of it all. I was hoping to find some healing word in
this ancient sacred book, hoping Job’s story would open a window with some
fresh air of hope to dispel my confusion, discouragement and apathy.
For some thirty-three long chapters
I’d read Job’s protests about the unfairness of his suffering, and I was about
to give up finding anything inspiring. I resolutely struggled through the next
two chapters without finding anything supportive. Finally in chapter thirty-six some hopeful
words, “[God] is wooing you from the jaws of distress to a spacious place free
from restriction….”[1]
Whoa! What’s this? Although I had gone as far
as I had set myself to read that day, this scripture injected new hope and
vigor into my soul. It was enough to
keep me going into chapter thirty-seven.
It wasn’t just the words that struck me, but a permeating sense of
Presence. Past experience had taught me to believe that when I was gripped by a
passage of scripture, God was making the passage personal to me. Here God was saying to me, “Nancy,
I’m working to move you out of this prison of misery, to a place where you can
live your life fully!” I sat up
straight, shifted the book in my hands, when I read the words, “Then the Lord answered Job out of the storm.[2]” My heart started to race. I set my tea down so my shaking hands
wouldn’t drop the mug. I read the words again, “Then the Lord answered Job….
It’s difficult to explain just what was
happening inside me at that moment. For
thirty-seven chapters I’d been mired in Job’s suffering, his agonies, his
confusion, his frustration, his endless questions, monologues to his God who
seemed to be absent; and my heart was echoing his sentiments. It was as if my experience and Job’s
experience had become one. Then an
encounter, God showed up to answer Job’s questions! GOD showed up! God was aware of Job, had heard Job, cared
about Job, wanted to teach Job how to view his current difficulties, and for
Job it was as if he and God stood face to face! I’d put a lot of stock in theology and
spiritual practice, but it was the impact of my own sense of meeting God face
to face through this scripture, words infused with truth, that shifted my whole
perspective. If hope were a waterfall it
would have drenched me in that moment.
All the good I’d believed about God came back to me, all my wilted faith
flowered again. I didn’t know how
and I didn’t know when, but I knew in the depths of my soul that God was real,
personal and willing to be involved in my life.
I’d always known this, but it had faded, and now it came alive again.
Why did these words initiate such a
light-filled, transforming moment? I saw
in a blaze of spiritual insight that understanding
wasn’t what Job needed. What he needed
most and what I needed most was encounter,
to be acknowledged, responded to, to know we were known and valued by a God “in
whom we live and move and have our being,” as the ancient Greeks put it. My physical and emotional distress had been a
muffling agent to the presence of God in my life, and I needed the living God
to break through to me and remind me of my belonging and belovedness, that the
world still made sense, that my place in it and my relationship to God made
sense. What I needed was an epiphany, the manifest presence of God
to me in a way I could fully comprehend.
Job had his, and I was having mine!
What God goes on to say to Job in
the verses that followed didn’t matter at the time to me, the words just kept
reinforcing this direct encounter Job was having, and that I was having in that
moment. God directly speaking to me, making Presence felt and known in an
unmistakable serenity yet all my attention on alert status, my mind
experiencing a light-filled awareness, my chest filled with a luminous
spaciousness in a rare communion with Spirit, in Oneness with Wisdom and Love.
This entire experience was quiet and simple, nothing outwardly dramatic, and
yet everything changed within me.
As I continued I read Job’s words,
“My ears had heard of you but now my eyes have seen you,”[3] I
thought I knew just what he meant. Most
of my Christian life was spent living by faith, choosing to believe that the
Divine was with me, loved me and was involved in my life whether or not I saw
what I considered evidence of this. But
when, by grace, I experienced an epiphany, a manifestation of the presence of
God, I lived in a moment of clarity, of sight, of a reality that truly exists and
confirmed my faith. This was one of
those moments.
As I became more conscious of what
had happened through my reading, the hardness of my life as a chronic invalid
was softened by an even greater truth I needed to know again, the transcendent reality that the cosmos
is saturated with the love of God which is given freely to all who would draw
near, and that a meeting of God in the human heart is actually possible. And here, on the blue-plaid hide-a-bed, this
meeting was happening to me, in me.
In this fresh revelation, a
semi-transparent cloud settled over all that was painful, unpleasant, and sad,
over all my troubling unanswered questions, and grace lifted my heart to
worship, to love and adore this mysterious God. I sat, breathing freely, full breaths of
hushed life, companioned by the ancient Job and infused with the cosmic breath
of God; me, unexciting as a child’s milk spilled out on the table, bathrobe
clad, barefoot, alone in the moment, and still chronically ill. It didn’t matter.
Troubling questions would haunt me
later. Why don’t we have life-sustaining
revelations, manifestations of God each and every time we’re hurting, confused,
lost? Why are epiphanies so few and far
between? God came near to me and healed
me in my mind and soul that day, but not my body. Why was that?
If God can appear and put an end to mental distress, why doesn’t this
happen when asked…every time? What I
learned was that these questions must not be allowed to stop me from asking for
God’s help and remaining open and expectant.
God’s promise is that if we draw near, if we take the time and energy to
place ourselves in a receptive frame of mind, and do so for as long as it
takes, God will come near to us,[4]
and it will make all the difference.
Great story! This reminds me of a time when my then-husband was off in the Gulf War (Desert Storm). His letters had sounded more and more despondent, and I was worried about his mental state with everything he was experiencing over there.
ReplyDeleteThen one day, I flipped open a Bible, and ended up in Psalms. The first thing I saw was, "He will call upon me, and I will answer him."
"HE WILL CALL UPON ME."
"AND I WILL ANSWER HIM."
It was as if those words were written in forty-point bold print. They leapt from the page and into my head, and I felt that presence, that epiphany. It was like, "Holy crap, God is here ... and I haven't DUSTED!" :-)
In all seriousness, though, his next letter said that he had prayed or read the Bible a bit (I can't remember exactly) and that somehow, he felt better about things and as though he could go on.
It was an amazing moment in time. Thank you for sharing yours.
That is really good writing!
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