Tag: lostness

Lost Time, [Regrets]

“The most important thing to remember about depression is this: you do not get the time back. It is not tacked on at the end of your life to make up for the disaster years. Whatever time is eaten by a depression is gone forever. The minutes that are ticking by as you experience the illness are minutes you will not know again.” 

— Andrew Solomon (The Noonday Demon: An Atlas of Depression)

I guess that is the strange futility of our depression.  All the time we use up so much time by being depressed and it is not, given back to us.  I have lost so much time due to my mental illness.  When I get to the end of my earthly life, I will see how many weeks I spent in paranoia, fear, and anxiety.  But on top of this, I have allowed depression to eat up months of my life.

To realize and know this loss is painful.  I have lost way too much time in mental hospitals, and treatment centers.  The halfway houses, and so many counseling sessions.  Life has been snatched away from me, and time continues to pursue me relentlessly.

I have lost so much.  I will never get it returned to me, in this lifetime.  It’s gone, wasted and blown away by the wind. There is so much I regret, so much has been lost.  This is one of the brutal aspects of mental illness.  It seems as if I have wasted and frittered away a good chunk of my life.

Paranoia and self-deception have cruelly taken from me a great deal. I’ve been told that back in the 30s and 40s of terrible plagues of locusts that attacked and devoured American farms.  The locust can quickly destroy trees, plants, and crops, and in this destruction, The prophet. sees a warning, and in this destruction of long ago, he discovers a wonderful promise of restoration.

“The Lord says, “I will give you back what you lost
    to the swarming locusts, the hopping locusts,
the stripping locusts, and the cutting locusts.
    It was I who sent this great destroying army against you.”

Joel 2:25, NLT

So much has been wasted by the plague.  It has been devoured and lost is to me completely. Dwelling on this terrible deficit can only drag me down further. A wasted life will take me to this grim and sad place.  However, I do not have to live in this desolation.

You see, we have been given another chance.  As sincere believers in the grace of God our lives are not to be considered wasted.  His Spirit has intervened, and what was lost has now been found.  Our ugly vacancies have been renewed and strengthened.  And His love for us redeems all our lostness.

Let Him be the Lord of your past.  Our life apart from Him has been savagely attacked.  It seems we have completely opened our lives to darkness.  Satan has cruelly tried to destroy us.  But the Father has made an infinite effort to bring us home. Hallelujah!

ybic, Bryan

 

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Wounded and Healed, [Self Awareness]

I have a dear friend, Pastor Jim F. I have known him for over 20 years.  He has a real gift for understanding relationships. It is a knack that he has. Recently he made this observation, it is worth considering.

“The unhealed wounded, wound. The healed wounded, heal.” 

 You might have to read it slow.   But it seems that regardless, pain is the atmosphere we live in.  We can adjust, a certain degree at least.  But this planet remains a dangerous place.  Yet, healing does happen.  And we can than avoid  afflicting our pain on others.  It is possible.

There is little complexity in being wounded.  It is a word, a comment an inconsiderate act.  It happens quick, and its usually is not very sophisticated at all.  Children riding the school bus pierce the hearts of their classmates with frequency.  Husbands, crush their wives, and wives harm their children’s hearts.  We are seldom unscathed by the poison of each other.  We have mastered the art of hurting, and then call it social intelligence.

As Broken Believers we don’t have a monopoly on wholeness.  It may have given us an awareness, and may even have some remorse.  But it’s like we have the flu, we are intensely contagious.  Everyone who draws close, or crosses my path is infected.  I can be the “Typhoid Mary” of the Spirit.  At times, I seem to sicken everyone I meet.

I must be healed. My own wounds from over the years have accumulated.  They have been exacerbated–  made worse over time.  They say that time heals all wounds.  That seems logical, and encouraging even, but it simply isn’t real.  Maybe in an unfocused way, but much of the major woundings become much more painful.  I hurt worse now than ever.

I have has an ulcer on my tongue that won’t heal.  I have had it for the last 18 months.  It is painful, it wakes me up at night.  The sore rubs against my teeth and I start feeling like amputating my tongue to get some relief.  I am always aware of it, or so it seems.  My unhealed ulcerated tongue lowers me into reality.  On my heart there is another kind of ulcer.  Unkind words that have been spoken, hurtful things that have been done.

I guess I think it is both fitting and funny, for a preacher like me to be afflicted in this way.  I am being made aware that I speak words that sometimes harm and hurt.  Much of the things I say are simply normal, and maybe a bit boring.  But I can also speak venomous things.  And it is made worse because I carry the title of “pastor.”

We must be healed, we must be made whole.  We simply cannot continue to roll through people’s lives like we have for so long.  We must want to be healed, our hearts must be fixed, we are broken people.  If we are to bring healing, our own personal wholeness must first go to “the Great Physician.”  We cannot find strength in any other way.

ybic, Bryan

 

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(Lord, have mercy on us)

Humpty Dumpty Was an Optimist

 

Therefore, since we have been made right in God’s sight by faith, we have peace with God because of what Jesus Christ our Lord has done for us.

Because of our faith, Christ has brought us into this place of undeserved privilege where we now stand, and we confidently and joyfully look forward to sharing God’s glory.

Romans 5:1-2

 

Our smashing deliverance over our darkness is something God decided on, not us.  Because of our feeble faith, and our meager trust is transformed into a state of peace.  Our struggling faith elevates us.  Often it is really pathetic, malformed, ugly, and oh, so small.  But Jesus has been working “behind the scenes.”  He  delights in escorting us, His adopted brothers and sisters, into victory, with a Savior’s pride.  Trust me, there is no way we deserve this astonishing salvation, we didn’t earn this honor.  By no means.  Essentially, we are in a shattered heap.

It seems that everything is something, that  He has done for us.  The fact is Jesus far more than adequate.  He has done things that very easily exceed the bare minimum.  We stand, why?  Because He makes us stand.  And to be honest, everything, absolutely everything is something He has done.

If it was up to us, if we tried to make it happen, we would just sizzle out, and collapse in the darkness.  We are totally lost.  So many times, I’ve really tried.  But my darkness truly dissolves any hope that I might have.  I’m not only lost, I’m irrevocably lost.  I have lied, cheated and hoped it would not matter.  I am a colossal loser.   A pile of brokenness.  Why would His Son die, and than give me an  inheritance to take on His righteousness? ( The Bible can be “bizarre” sometimes.)

There is nothing I can bring.  I am much, much more evil than good.  I bring nothing but being a complete moral disaster.  I am a failure beyond any human redemption.  I have completely given up any sort of chance for personal salvation.

What does Jesus do with “losers” like me?  I will tell you what He does.  He redeems us.  He goes to the “slave market” and buys us, on the spot, right off the block!  According to Romans, through our stumbling faith we are simply given that which we could barely hope for.  Our meager faith gives us a billion and billions dollars of righteousness.  We transition from a devastating poverty to being Bill Gates’ heir.

The shock of this will take a lifetime to absorb.  We will try to adapt.  We have moved from a pathetic state of slavery, to being a child to the richest king of the entire universe.  It’s most unreal, like winning the Illinois lottery multiplied by a 1000.

Romans speaks of a new found confidence and joyousness that should come to those lifted out of the slave pit.  Our faith in what Jesus did for us brings us into this incredibly magnificent state.  The Book of Malachi describes the joy that calves of kicking up their hoofs on their release from the stall.  The imagery makes a direct connection to us who have been released from the darkness.

Simply put, He has done something for us that is beyond a dream.  The Parable of the Prodigal Son has now been “switched on.”  It illuminates us fully and describes every person on this planet.  We look at the parable and those 320 words take us apart, and then returns to instill life to us. This parable teaches every human being, of life’s realities.  He has done everything, and we have done nothing.  He now runs to us, and He will change us completely.