Handfuls of Darkness

It's the tough times that tell us who we really are.  These days, I question who I really am.  Actually, no, that's not right.  I don't question--I witness, and it makes me want to turn away.

I had a good long run of rest over the last quarter of 2013.  That was a tremendous blessing, and one in which God granted me numerous, critical gifts:  assurance about where I am in my work, the discovery of a new artistic hobby, spiritual renewal and stability, and rich times of connection and reconnection with friends.

Things are harder now.  I've been working six days a week rather than five.  I've been getting sick, or feeling sick, more and more.  Good sleep has been harder to come by (though it could be a lot worse).  I'm easily irritated, and not very patient.  I even get grouchy at Mr. Squire at the end of these long days, and for no reason whatsoever.  Trivial inconveniences can set me off or put me in a grumpy mood.  I regress in mental age and gravitate toward my soft toys for comfort with even greater frequency than usual.  I am critical of almost everyone and everything around me--particularly with respect to the church--and I silently judge harshly in my heart, even if I say nothing aloud.

And in terms of perspective at work, I've always taken enormous pride in not getting sucked into the rat race of corporate law...but now I wonder if I haven't hopped onto the hamster wheel.  I still believe that I am acting in obedience in trust by moving ahead, doing what God has placed in front of me with excellence and with my whole heart.  But now that the cost is mounting, I look nervously around at my life and I really wonder:  is this right?  And I still think it is, but it's hard to really know.  That's the problem with not having a ten-year plan or overarching aspirational objective goal for the first time in twenty years, and with having faith that right now, God has chosen to reveal nothing about my future:  I just don't know what's going on.

And so, I stumble in the dark... feeling my way through the future, arms stretched straight ahead and fingers grasping for whatever hints they may find (but mostly finding only more handfuls of darkness), feet cautiously stepping forth... but all of this happening at a steady clip of 60 miles per hour.  That's a fast pace at which to move when you don't know what you're doing or where you're going--but here we are.

Thankfully, I still feel an overall sense of peace about this, though the cracks of doubt and anxiety are beginning to show.  I don't know what the future holds, and that frightens me.  And in the meantime, I feel that my life is moving too quickly, that I am being semi-buried under my responsibilities at work/home/life/church, and I get the sinking feeling sometimes that I am becoming someone I don't want to be.

Then again, as I learned in my Blackhawk sermon today (Eat this Book - first sermon in the Wisdom series), we don't always know why God is doing what he's doing.  He is working behind the curtain, and we don't get to see things from His vantage point.  All we can do is do our best to walk in obedience--and trust that He is working out the rest.  That's feeling like a more and more difficult goal, but I'm trying.