there or who she was but after a time she hugged me and smiled. I nodded, trying to say I would be all right. Then as I stood, I felt a bit of that peace I had experienced, just a bit, just enough to assure me that even though my prayer had had no words, God somehow heard it.
This would perhaps make a better story if I could say, “From that day forward I felt God’s presence and I decided to surrender all my fears over, and everything was so much better …,” but I’d be lying. You see I was, like so many, stubborn and stiff-necked. I would take steps forward but only very slowly; oftentimes without realizing they were God-directed until years later; I would call it a “gut feeling” or something dismissive like that. Eventually, over a few years, I became more and more hopeful and grateful as the children’s health improved, the seizures stopped and fears of a genetic disorder were put to rest.
The shift that had begun when I was four, that had lay dormant for years, that had stirred in unlikely ways and under painful circumstances slowly but steadily began to increase in its pace and scope. I moved from a rhetorical, angry questioning, “God, what are You doing?!”, to a place where the tone changed to pleading and longing, “God, what are You doing?” When the autism diagnosis came for our oldest and then, through incredible therapy and medical interventions he eventually recovered, I thought, “Maybe God is doing.” And when, for no apparent reason we felt compelled to move from Massachusetts to the Carolinas and I was faced with knowing practically no one, I finally started asking, “God, what should I do?” It was there that we connected to a church for the first time in our marriage and I began a rapid learning and growing process; it was like a wildfire that had smoldered for a long time had finally caught a good gust of holy wind. I moved into leadership roles and began to sense a call to ministry. My husband’s life was transformed before my eyes and we began pursuing the steps necessary for me to answer my call after our third son was born, healthy. There was seminary and my first appointment as a pastor; the many trials that all this entailed where at times seemingly insurmountable but the joys were tremendous as well. I finally went from planning what was next at the cost of the present to finding joy in the day at hand and waiting with excited expectation to see what God had next. Then, when the storms in my life came, which they did and continued to do, I finally started asking, “God, what are we going to do?” At last I realized that I was neither alone, nor a puppet; I was walking with God; the God who caught me inches from the ground when my parachutes failed and had patiently, persistently worked to reveal the truth that had always been there, that He had always been there.
Just like my four-year-old self, I am mesmerized by the Messiah in my midst and I wonder how I could have missed him all those years. I look back over it all today, from this point in my journey where I often feel like an unwelcomed prophet in the inner circle, where I often literally weep for the brokenness of the church, where I struggle to honor my call to be a wife, a mother, and a pastor, where the demands and struggles are endless and the resources and time seem scarce, and I realize that I could not be where I am and hold the hope that I have had I not come from and through so much pain and brokenness. There is such joy in confessing my brokenness to the broken; I know this is how God has worked all those things for good.
I admit I still often feel overwhelmed, unsure, confused, and life has not gotten miraculously easier for us. But now, when I feel myself filling with fear or doubt, I close my eyes and see a sepia Jesus come to life: The browns and beiges turn to crimson stains and his handsome face takes on the reality of one less remarkable, though badly beaten. His eyes close, then open, and he is no longer looking far way but right at me. His wounds heal before my eyes. His hand is upon my shoulder, his peace washes over me, and he knows that in my heart I still long to acknowledge he is there, even in places where people don’t talk about him. He is alive and at last, so am I.
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