Tuesday, September 9, 2014

Winter Thief

For those of us from Michigan, Summer was an odd blip on the radar.  Don't get me wrong.  After a winter of digging out of 6 foot drifts and sub zero temps, people busted out their shorts at a tropical 50 degrees.  With only one or two days breaking into the 90's, it was simply odd.  Only 1 trip to the lake, sweaters at night, rain the entire weekend.


What winter did, was rob of us our right to complain.  Winter sprawled into our spring like a destructive vine that choked us of our time.  The result was a vacation diaspora, where we all just went anywhere this summer to find enough sun to suck the cold from our bones.  Yet we all said so little.  Who wants to be the guy who complains about only having a few hot days when you're surfing Amazon to find industrial strength adult snowpants for the coming winter?


Isn't that just like pain?  In the wide spread of personal trouble, we feel everything from sad to hopeless.  Frustrated to furious.  We want to scream - we want people to know that what we are feeling is hard, that it is real, and that we are in pain.


That is, until we hear someone else's story.


Like last year's creeping cold, nothing stalls us like hearing another's tale of misery.  Then the comparisons start.


"Well, at least I still have my marriage."


"I shouldn't complain - my kids still call me at least."


"I miss my job.  But, at least I didn't lose my job AND home."


At least, at least, at least.  And so we don't allow ourselves the comfort, nurture, or expression we need because, "at least."


I shake hands with people every Sunday morning who have probably had one "at least" that week.  What is scarier is that I shake hands with people who may have had 5 or 10.  Pinpoints of pain or fear that they can't talk about because they've compared it to the grand horror of someone else's situation.  They've been robbed of their chance to experience authenticity (and authentic healing) because it's simply just not "as bad as" what has happened to someone else.


There are two truths.  Five or ten little things can often feel like one big thing.  And any one of those things may feel heavy to you regardless of how it pales to another person.  Best yet, the second truth is quite simply this - the Christ that died for us wants to heal us of "big" and "little" things.  He is not measuring them to scale.  Because Christ cares about our things...all of our things.


"Are not two sparrows sold for a penny?  Yet not one of them will fall to the ground without your Father's care.  And even the very hairs of your head are all numbered.  So don't be afraid; you are worth more than many sparrows" (Matthew 10:29-31).


That is the promise of God.  Jesus says of his and OUR Father that we are worth more than a bird that receives the Father's care.  I'm going to guess that even your "little" things feel bigger than a half-penny bird.  It's been said that, "comparison is the thief of joy".  True.  And it's also the thief of healing.  So don't get robbed.  Take your things to the thing-healer.