A Spring of Joy

Overwhelmed is an understatement of my life lately, and struggling with my faith has been paralyzing. As I sit with friends (whether on the phone or on my couch) who want to hear my struggles, I find the sobs strangling. These ones who have ministered to me on the spiritual and emotional level, these are the ones who don’t offer answers. They are the ones who listen and understand. And it is because of them that I feel even more overwhelmed. Overwhelmed by people who love me no matter where I am.

And where have I been?

The best description is that I have been so discouraged, so emotionally spent, so physically battered, and so spiritually depleted that I have nothing left.

I have flatlined.

The problem is that in flatlining, I’m not the only one that suffers. My husband suffers. My children suffer. My parents suffer. My friendships suffer. Because, although I have had little to give over the past few years, I have nothing to give now.

So I place even more pressure on myself and constantly ask, “How do I do this?”

How do I live and love? And how do I laugh?

And then the asking turns to God and I say, “Where are You in this? What are You doing?”

The last few days I’ve spent a lot of time in bed. Between a cold/flu that hit on Saturday with a high fever and aches. Then I had an iron infusion on Monday. It left me with a minor migraine that has finally settled to a mild headache today. I’ve slept a lot, taken a lot of pain medicine, numbed my pain with movies and rested. But I’ve also read good books and listened to sermons online, because I know that even if I feel like I’ve flatlined, I can’t stop looking for life.

I look at Thomas, the doubting disciple. He gets a bad rap being remembered as The Doubter, if you ask me. Because, yes, while he doubted, his doubts led him to ask questions, questions that led him back to God. Questions that led him to make the strongest affirmation of faith in the New Testament. He SAW Jesus for Who He is, and He cried, “My Lord and My God!” Thomas the Doubter is Thomas the Believer.

And it was this weekend that God pulled out the paddles and jump started my heart, because I was struck with how I’m not really seeing or hearing. I’m not taking steps. I’m looking and asking, but I am blind to His works and my ears are deaf to His whispers. I’m asking, but I’m not reaching out and putting my hands into the scars and touching and seeing and hearing His voice.

And I realized:

If I’m so busy asking what God is doing, I tend to forget all God has done.

Today there was the warmth of my sweet girl curled on my lap in her pink satin jammies, yawning away her sleepies and patting my back. There were the kisses of my boys as they bounded out the door for school and the fingers signing “I love you” from car windows. There were the arms of my husband circling me before he grabbed his computer and readied for work. There were words I read, blurred by my tears, Words about Who God is mingled with my cries for me to see Him today.

I stopped asking what He was doing and only asked for Him.

And today I saw, heard and felt the touch of divinity in my life.