Today is the first day of Lent and I have been thinking about addictions...mine specifically, but ours as a human race in general... we are addicted to relief and we find it in a myriad of ways. It is strange to use this word addicted to describe myself... but it is true. I am addicted to relief... relief from the pain of living in this fallen world...
My heart aches...as I think about the tsunami victims and their families left behind...as I pray for my friend April, who will travel to India next week to devote herself to rescuing girls who are sold into the sex slave trade and as I pray for these young girls, their broken bodies and wounded souls...as I talk with family members of 9/11 victims as well as angry dissenters to our presence in Iraq...I know there are no easy answers.
My soul struggles...as I work with survivors of emotional, verbal, sexual, physical, and spiritual abuse in my private counseling practice...as I look at the faces of troubled couples whose marriages may end in divorce...as I see the life fading from the eyes of men and women who have given up on living and are simply breathing in and out, getting through the day...as I listen to the struggles of parents whose relationships with their teens are marked by a deafening silence...
And I am weary of grappling with my own realities...stories and memories that are often stirred, given the nature of my work...arguments with my own teenage children that come from my impatience and unwillingness to listen first...the awareness that at times I am a difficult wife... the sorrow of loss and change that pervade my life at this time...
and I want out...I want relief from the ache in my heart and the weariness in my soul... I want relief! I do not want to bear the pain any longer...I do not want to battle the doubts of God's goodness...I want to not feel... for just a few moments...
However, God calls me to worship him alone, therefore I cannot worship myself. I see nothing wrong with a glass of good wine, or meal, or a piece (or two, ok, four) of dark chocolate, of losing myself in a good book or film, or being transported from the present moment through music, or even a good run...in each of these cases it is not the 'what' but the 'why.'
Far too often, I am not seeing enjoyment in these God created pleasures. Instead, I am consuming them in order to escape the pain, in my refusal to admit that God has allowed this pain to exist, and like the Psalmist, like Job, I am to bring my complaints to him, not to hide in the latest form of relief. I am allowed, even encouraged to enjoy these pleasures for what they are, a gift in the of something good to eat, to engage my mind, or appeal to my senses... godly enjoyment would require me to be with/in/present to...not to check out. Relationship with a means of relief rarely includes people. Whereas enjoying pleasurable food or entertainment with another (even if it is just my acknowledgment of God being present in the midst of my moment of pain) does allow me to stay in a position of worship. I have to turn away from my addiction to relief and choose to be present...to engage.
Today begins Lent...a season of reflecting, of awareness and thus connectedness...a season that compels me to face myself and turn from my addiction to relief (manifest at times in the subtlest of forms) and turn towards Christ...Not to deny my desire for relief, but to join him in the Garden and pour out my pain and fear, my heartache and soul weariness to the Father, who surely will meet me there. That is the worship God desires of me...broken and contrite heart that screams for relief, honestly to him, rather than hide in the silence of self worship. If the Lenten season is to have meaning for me, I must face myself, I must come before God with my weary soul and seek rest in him rather than wandering in the wilderness that requires me to admit truths that I rather not name, to seek The Truth, and to surrender....
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