When I survey each decade of my life, my 40s will, unquestionably, be all about parenting. Whether I did it poorly or well remains to be seen once they attempt to launch post-graduation. Our first attempt at a “launch” is just around the corner with our oldest at the close of next school year, and preparations and plans are currently underway. I certainly hope the mission isn’t scrubbed multiple times for various reasons, though, with kids, few things work perfectly the first time every time. “Flexibility is key,” someone told me prior to parenting, and I have found, for the most part, they were right.
I’d say our experience has been unique with three adopted kiddos and no biological, but I have nothing else personally to which to compare it. Our experience has been our experience, and so there it is. They’ve willingly come “home” after school at the end of each day for the last several years and they still call us “mom” and “dad” despite having a history prior to us, so we must be doing something right, though I often feel I’m doing it wrong. Parenting has been the one thing I’ve earnestly attempted in my life at which I’ve felt I haven’t excelled, though, I admit and have learned, results aren’t entirely up to you.
Nonetheless, there are moments you may permit that you must be doing something right. One of those moments is when they willingly make a decision to accept your faith as their own. This bears even greater significance for an adoptive parent since, again, they have a history prior to you and are clearly aware of it. For each of them to make such a choice is to align themselves further with you and your influence upon them as parents. The meaningfulness behind such a choice can’t be overstated.
This evening, our youngest, Calib, will be baptized here at Pine Cove family camp at Crier Creek, a place he, like us, has grown to cherish after seven summers. He made his own decision to follow the very day my grandfather passed away, and we all agreed to make it even more special by immersing him here. Each day, he has reminded us with an eager smile how many days are left until then, and now the day is here.
I have the privilege as his adoptive father to baptize him, as I did our oldest. The scriptural imagery of being adopted into the fold by a Heavenly Father doesn’t escape me. I’m about as imperfect a father as it gets, but how fortunate I am that they each grasped the meaning behind it and allowed the unique creation of a family and spiritual memory.
“I have no greater joy than to hear that my children are walking in the truth,” said John in his third epistle to his “spiritual” children. But it’s an easy fit for parents.
Let’s be clear: This kid knows how to drive me crazy, and I often find my patience tested. He knows this, and so do I. But today, he is most excited about one thing, and that is being baptized by his dad.
Offer me riches or fame to give it up if you like, but I’ll pass. The memory, much more valuable, will last a lot longer — into eternity, in fact.
We all remember this common slogan as the smartphone gradually infiltrated every aspect of our lives less than two decades ago, as if to suggest it, or the apps for which it served as a vehicle, could provide answers to almost any of our problems.
Equally prevalent, or so it would seem from the abundance of pharmaceutical commercials targeting specific demographics in between your favorite shows, is the suggestion that “there’s a pill for that.”
I personally don’t hold fast to such an idea, but I am more of a believer than I once was when it comes to the condition of ADHD, which afflicts our youngest. After we tackled the problem with behavioral techniques and strategies, it was evident after a grade level or two that he simply needed help we couldn’t provide in order to get him successfully through the school day. So, we took the medicinal plunge, and the results were clear and immediate. We were pleased to witness a calm and poised version of himself as he found the ability to maintain focus as academic success was soon to follow.
Most early pediatric drugs assume liquid form and are typically tasty and easy to swallow. Pills in any shape or form, however, are a challenge for children, as any parent could tell you as their own come of age. It’s not uncommon for capsules to travel swiftly back up little throats for no other reason than the fear or sensation of choking. Swallowing a tablet is a learned skill. Some grow into adulthood still uncomfortable with the effort.
Our son recently graduated to the pill form of his medication, and pinpointing the correct dosage during the transition was its own special problem, requiring a brief time away from school till the doctor got it right. He simply couldn’t help functioning as a classroom distraction without it, much to his teachers’ consternation, though we, and they, would gladly refer to him at least as a “happy” mess. Once the dosage puzzle was solved, he returned, and all seemed right once again with the world.
Until it wasn’t, that is. Not too terribly long after, we began to notice inconsistencies with the medication, which he routinely took before school. Periodically, his teachers informed us of the same, tired behavioral issues in class, none of which were major but nonetheless required addressing. We called the doctor and waited for a follow-up to discuss alternatives. In the meantime, I made sure to observe our son taking his pill each morning just to be sure. And sure enough, I watched him ingest it and move on with the morning.
Kids are crafty, however. Our son, I discovered, craftier still. Transferring his laundry from the washer to the dryer one afternoon, I observed what appeared to be a few empty capsule shells that bore a striking resemblance to the size and shape of his pills. I resolved to watch him like a hawk thereafter and check above and beneath his tongue, baffled at how he could possibly fool me while I observed him swallowing it each morning. I didn’t have to wait long for an answer.
Another morning, another pill. Seated at the table after finishing his breakfast sandwich, he places it in his mouth and swallows it with the juice I provided. I ask if he got it down, and he nods. For only a moment I turn in the opposite direction but then quickly pivot my attention back, catching him in the act of slipping his fingers up to his lower lip in a surreptitious attempt to remove the pill and discard it in a secret corner elsewhere in the house. The little sneak had been hiding them randomly in his cheek rather than swallowing, which explained the medication’s bizarre inconsistency. Mystery solved.
“Fool me twice . . .,” as the saying goes. I wouldn’t be shamed again. Having had no success with threats of consequences or demands up to that point, I impatiently relinquished command of the ensuing drama as mom took a turn and sat down directly across from him at the breakfast table to ensure gently that he got the job done. “But it’s hard!” was the incessant, tortured refrain as he objected with each failed swallow, risking us all, including his older sister, to be tardy to each of our morning destinations.
Mom’s time managing the situation came to an end as her job required her to get herself on the road and to the office. As she exited, our son motioned me to the now empty chair opposite his. We weren’t finished and he simply wanted me to stay with him as he suffered through it.
I resolved to try a different, more patient approach and reasoned with him. It wasn’t as if the pill was larger than anything else he’d downed before; quite the contrary. By his own admission, he was afraid of choking, and despite gulp after endless gulp, the pill remained because he was still telling the pill with his tongue to remain exactly where it was. “Don’t be afraid. You’re not going to choke.” After 30 long minutes, my reassurances finally made headway, and down it went, his expression at long last relaxing. I pried both under tongue and around cheeks “like a dentist,” he later described to mom, ensuring there was nowhere else to hide, and off he went to school. Eight hours later I would pick him up and hear him proudly share that his teachers praised him as the best behaved student in class that day. I inquired to him as to why he thought that might be, and his knowing smirk gave him away as he remembered the difficult but necessary ordeal of the morning. Sometimes, you just have to swallow that pill.
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Hematidrosis, it’s called, a very rare medical condition in which one sweats drops of blood. It seems only fitting, then, that the gospel of Luke, ostensibly the only physician of the bunch, would be the one both to observe and document this phenomenon in his account of Christ’s agonized prayer in the Garden of Gethsemane. “Father, if you are willing, take this cup from me,” he says, as we are allowed a unique glimpse into his humanity, asking, as many of us often do, that God simply remove a difficulty from our lives rather than, more nobly, provide us with the strength and fortitude to endure it. Even Jesus, it appears, had a moment when he just wanted God to remove the problem. Forget how I might grow spiritually from this experience; just be the doting father that you are and take this pain away, dad.
I think had my son exhibited symptoms of hematidrosis that morning at the breakfast table, I would most certainly have ceased altogether from sheer alarm that the intense stress was causing him an actual physiological loss of blood. Christ had no such luck, however. His “pill” was his to swallow and his alone. And his Father stood by to hear his request while retaining the requirement.
I find it curious that Christ chose the image of a cup to describe what awaited him. His was a challenge to ingest, to consume something inside of himself, not merely outside of him, as in a temporal passing from one moment to the next, quickly forgotten as the next moment arrives. Though we would argue theologically that God never changes, his trial would alter things both without and within. It had to if we were to receive redemption ourselves.
God, his Father, was with him, however, even as he himself was prophesied as Immanuel — God with us — while he lived and acted in the here and now.
Presently, I have found myself struggling with the reality of “God with us,” especially when it’s the only answer you receive to your trouble, great or small as it may be. It can feel like a cheap non-answer until you understand and grasp that Christ himself in the garden didn’t get a better deal either.
I and my wife have dealt with a unique parenting challenge for much longer than we would prefer, and I’ve lost count of the number of times my faith has faltered just for the fact that the problem remains and an easy solution fails to present itself. I just want to feel better. I want God to swoop in and fix it, just as instantaneously as baptismal waters fashion a “new creation” after one rises from the surface. But the change has yet to come, and we remain years now into the cup still before us with no promise of a favorable end, or an end at all.
When my son pointed me to the empty chair in front of him, however, God used the “inconvenient” situation to teach me a thing or two. Though he continued to complain and struggle, his gesture communicated, “If I really must do this, then at least just be here with me while I endure it.” As I sat down, I shifted my own approach and told him not to be afraid, knowing, as his father, he had nothing really to be afraid of. Once he chose to believe me, it wasn’t long thereafter that the pill slid comfortably down his throat and began the work of change.
I have to imagine it’s little different with our often unwanted, divinely-ordained circumstances. I am admittedly afraid at times of what is or is not to come, and my imagination casts no shortage of worst-case scenarios. But as I sat there reassuring him of what he knew he needed to do, my mind casted no shortage of scriptural reminders of “fear not” and “I am with you.” The reminders themselves, no doubt, were evidence of his presence even then.
One of my favorite songs of my youth bears more meaning to me 30 years later. A gentle tune titled “Higher Ways,” by Steven Curtis Chapman, the lyrics tell of the singer’s wish to understand God’s higher purpose in circumstances both great and small and the hope of one day, on the other side, learning of the elusive bigger picture. It finishes:
But until I’m with you I’ll be here with a heart that is true and a soul that’s resting on your higher ways.
Simple solutions and quick answers can be hard to come by in the kingdom of God. We all want it, but we seldom get it. Maturity and trust within a relationship are the goal; not merely my comfort and ease. There is no app or pill for it. But God help me to remember that there is a prayer for it.
This is how M. Scott Peck begins his acclaimed book, The Road Less Traveled, and I would argue it may be one of the best openings to any nonfiction work past or present. It’s neither poetic nor eloquent, as you might expect of a bestseller. It is, however, inspired, and many readers, myself included, have found their attention arrested by its simple truth due, no doubt, to considering the difficulties in their own lives, be they great or small. Anyone who reads these few elementary words can relate, and so anyone reads on.
As I punch these letters out on my smartphone, I find myself in an unplanned, forced exile away from home due to exposure to that irritating illness we’ve all become familiar with over the last few years. My first venture into the blogosphere found me in identical circumstances, perhaps fertile ground for written thoughts. In any case, I’m not yet showing signs of infection, but I don’t want to risk it for others in my family should it start to present itself. There is, after all, a family trip planned pre-Christmas, at this point just barely inside the 10-day window recommended for those exposed. So, dad is trying hard not to ruin the long-anticipated holiday party by getting everyone else sick.
Around, within, and beneath this misfortune are several others intertwined that led, in part, to this one. I have neither the space nor the interest in sharing it all here, but it brings to mind another brief remark, equally honest but measurably more eloquent: “When it rains, it pours.” Sometimes massive troubles can’t help but bring a friend, or two, or three, to your door. Regardless, they always rudely arrive, never having been offered an invitation.
At least one of these many troubles has lingered longer than the others, enough to feel like an eternity, ebbing and flowing in intensity from one day, week, month, year to the next. Each exhausting, unwelcome moment it reappears, it does so with seemingly greater force. Each time it arrives, a single question persistently comes to mind, both for the short and long-term: “How will this end?”
Oh, how I want it to end.
As time drags on and resolutions remain absent, the wish for a satisfying conclusion can easily give way to just an end — any end — good or bad. Let’s just get this over with, please.
If I also want God genuinely involved in my life, however — and this is a very hard truth to learn — I can’t have it both ways.
I have never been comfortable with tension. I’ve said so before, and it will likely be true until the day I die. I naturally expect that it is something to be avoided for the sake of peace. And I have expected that God looks favorably on my efforts to make peace. We are instructed as believers, after all, to seek peace and pursue it. But a verse I often overlook struck me this past Sunday, a verse that ought to alter my well-intentioned expectations.
“I did not come to bring peace, but a sword.”
While we regard him, among other things, as the “Prince of Peace,” his words are a stark reminder that he did not avoid tension. In fact, he created it where necessary. Christ was accepting of it in a way I simply am not. In short, while many things, he was also a troublemaker.
By extension, God himself is a troublemaker.
Plenty of things for which I have only myself to blame. Plenty. I acknowledge this. Same goes for others whose choices, good or evil, affect me. But, man, how God shows up in the middle of it to take the blame or credit from us. And how our impatience for resolution causes us to lose hope and misperceive that we’ve reached the bitter, unpleasant end to our trouble, failing to see that it’s just the trouble of the day.
“That which doesn’t kill me makes me stronger.”
It’s always struck me that such a staunch, unapologetic unbeliever as Nietzsche not simply coined this statement but that it has such authentic application to the life of a believer. I might make one slight alteration, however, exchanging “me” for “my faith.” I’m not going to pretend here that I’ve reached that goal in current troubles. That’s where hope comes in, which, ironically, is often based on faith bolstered by past troubles resolved.
So, for now, “Life is difficult.” I pray I can learn to exchange this statement in time for another: “Trust the Troublemaker.”
“Be joyful in hope, patient in affliction, faithful in prayer.” – Romans 12:12
He rose feebly from his elevating recliner and shuffled deliberately out the back door with the help of his walker, in spite of my insistence that my daughter and I could handle it. You don’t argue with your 91-year-old grandfather, however, especially one as headstrong as mine. While visiting my parents for a few days in the DFW area one summer, my oldest and I found a moment one afternoon to drive to my grandparents’ house and retrieve a lawnmower they no longer could use due, of course, to their age, and she and I were happy to load it ourselves into the van to transport it to my parents’ place a brief 5-minutes away; if not, that is, for his resolve first to teach me a thing or two.
As if my years of practical experience with this simple machine counted for naught, he scooted hastily out the back door and into the driveway, released his grip on the walker, grabbed the handlebar of the mower with his left hand, and with awkward elderly aggression repeatedly yanked the pullstring with his right in order to demonstrate for my benefit how to start the motor. I gave up on my insistence and resigned myself to the likelihood that my teenage daughter was about to suffer the indelible trauma of Papaw cranking a lawnmower and collapsing violently and fatally to the pavement from overexertion. To my surprise, it started, he survived, and I thanked him for the unnecessary lesson as he shuffled back inside.
I have little desire to live to 100, as many do. Maybe I’ll sing a different tune the closer it approaches, but from my vantage point on the timeline, old age is no picnic. We all think we want a long life, but what I suspect is what we actually want is to put off the reaper for as long as possible. Though we all have our beliefs about it, death is largely an unknown, and the unknown is a source of fear for us all, especially those of us with little faith. The Bard put it best: “But that the dread of something after death, the undiscovere’d country, from whose bourn no traveller returns, puzzles the will, and makes us rather bear those ills we have than fly to others that we know not of?”
In any event, my grandparents, now 93, find scant strength or energy to do much more than gingerly transition from one seat to another inside their modest home, and this very seldom. Trips outside of the house are rare, and for good reason. The world is built for a pace that often exhausts even me; how much more so for them, exceeding the capabilities of both their minds and bodies.
It would seem an accomplishment to have reached their age. The only fact as impressive might be the number of years they have been together: 75. Their marriage has nearly outlived the CDC’s researched average life expectancy of most Americans, which they plot at 78 years, give or take. A few months ago, they celebrated this milestone in their own quiet and understated way, satisfied with a fried chicken dinner with my parents, my wife and I, and our youngest. No gifts were requested or exchanged. There is nothing on God’s green earth nor among man’s manufactured creations they either want or need any longer other than a good meal and the company of family. They have both given and taken much of what one is able to of life and have exhausted their interest in the common wants and pursuits of younger men and women who have many years stretched ahead of them.
Our visit in celebration of their anniversary concluded on Saturday, and we left the following Sunday morning. My wife and I and our son began the 4-hour trek back to Houston, departing bright and early in order to pick up our daughters, who had spent the weekend at a church youth retreat. Timing ourselves to arrive at noon, we grabbed on the way out of town our son’s favorite sugar-saturated breakfast — donuts and chocolate milk — and were on our way.
Scarcely an hour into the drive, my wife’s phone rang. She answered familiarly, though I could only guess at who was on the other end. The comfortable greeting segued jarringly into an expressively ambiguous “What?!” as I wondered at both who might have died and who was thoughtful enough to share the tragic news. Instead, she turned to me and exclaimed with unabashed delight that our oldest was calling from church to tell us she was getting baptized that morning during the service. She had made a “confession of faith in Christ,” as we Baptists like to call it, and was performing her first act of obedience as a new Christian.
We all bear hopes for our children as they mature, some of them very specific and unique. For parents such as my wife and I, our Christian faith is an inseparable aspect of our identity, in no small part due to our parents’ influence, both of whom were ministers. The decision our oldest made that weekend remained at the top of our list of hopes for her and her siblings from day one, even more so as adoptive parents, considering we often feel as if we’re making up for lost time in their early upbringing. The relief, satisfaction, and joy of learning that they have independently embraced your faith, making it their own, cannot be understated. There are few decisions they will make in life that will have a greater impact on how they will choose both to see the world and to act upon it, a world that increasingly pushes faith to the margins or dismisses it altogether.
As ecstatic as we were to hear the news, we pled with her to wait until the following Sunday when we could attend along with her grandparents. Moreover, I asked her for the privilege of baptizing her myself, still technically a licensed minister, though I did not pursue it as a career as I once had planned. She gladly agreed, and we ended the call. Though the decision was her own, my wife and I in silence and welling tears took each other’s hand, a knowing gesture expressing a sense and gratitude that we are, after all, having an impact upon them.
Pre-baptism
Though the role of parenting never truly ends, Paul’s exhortation to his Roman readers centuries ago — “Be joyful in hope, patient in affliction, faithful in prayer” —seemed fitting for where we found ourselves up to the moment she shared the news. It’s an ideal verse for parenting in general, as it is for the life of faith. And as much as I could retrieve my college toolbox of rusty hermeneutical implements to plumb its meaning, I find ample clarity on the surface to see through to its depths.
“Be joyful in hope”
“Are you okay?”
I heard this question from my wife more times than I can count during the first year of our marriage. The fact is, I hail from a family whose emotions are generally subdued. We’d make great poker players, if only for our lack of facial ticks or cues (though I am told I have made a recent habit of talking to myself). Wearing one’s heart on one’s sleeve, as the expression goes, is just as risky emotionally as it is physiologically for my ilk. Not so with her kin. As couples do, we learned a few things about one another once we were under the same roof, one of many about how we do/don’t express our feelings. My answer to her question was typically that I was fine, which was true, but after a month or so of this, it left me with the impression that one of the implications of our marital vows was that I turn cartwheels across the living room if I were even moderately pleased in the moment.
While I am generally “fine,” it might surprise those with whom I’m acquainted that if there is a yin and yang in every relationship, it is I who bears the honorific of “sourpuss.” I lean towards the negative end of the spectrum in our partnership, though, perhaps, not to the extreme. With only moderate influence, my confidence may be sapped and feelings tipped easily to the pavement by the difficulty of the moment, especially when it regards the frequent ups and downs in the lives of one’s children. My wife, by contrast, is characteristically optimistic and positive about life and all that it presents. It is one of her many attractive qualities as well as a reason, I would argue, I often hear another loaded string of words from her that instantly elevates my anxiety: “I have an idea.” Such ideas as hers, furthermore, tend not to be small in stature and carry the expectation that I find a way happily to get on board. They are big and bold, and this, I believe, because she is “joyful in hope,” as Paul wrote. She generally expects the best of wherever she focuses her efforts, and even if such expectations are dashed, she merely picks herself up and moves on to the next idea.
While we both agreed to it and believe (on most days) we were called to it, parenting by way of adoption was one of these big ideas. If I had thought the 1-2 years of training was hard, I was in for a shock once the kids were placed. “They have no idea what they’re getting into,” my mother expressed to my siblings, each already in the thick of parenting for several years. Prior to parenting, the endpoint of my various “hopes” often landed at the end of the week, month, or year; in other words, at a distant point in the future. The phrase, “take it a day at a time,” however, took on startlingly new meaning with kids. The object of my hopes shrunk temporally — Let’s see if we can make it to bedtime without incident. Currently, we are finding ourselves in the thick of the teen and preteen years.
I will admit, though, that I have felt little joy in hope, as Paul encourages, even in the smaller day-to-day portions. The fact that he does encourage it, however, indicates that we have a choice. How hard a choice it is to make. We hope especially for big change and progress in our kids, but it is often slow in coming, if or when it does.
When I lowered and raised our oldest in the cold water that morning at church, I felt a hope fulfilled. It was easy to find joy in that moment, and, not to mention, to wish that I had chosen to be joyful in my hope until then. My mother was recently asked what advice she would offer her younger self given the opportunity. “Don’t worry so much.” Likewise with hope and the attitude we choose towards it. As much a high it was in that moment with her in the baptistry, there would be a down just around the corner, to be certain. Such is life with children.
“Be joyful in hope,” Paul says. Choose joy as you wait, as he segues into the manner in which we should do so under unfavorable circumstances.
“[be] patient in affliction”
He coasted into the oncoming lane, thinking the maneuver would allow him to avoid the car that had drifted into his just ahead. The other driver drifted back, however, and then once more as each responded in kind. They collided at the last second, too late to correct.
The police report took longer to read than the event itself, which was a theory, at best, since no witnesses were present. The drifting driver was drunk, and he would languish in the hospital for another week, his life ending ironically on the day my grandparents and mother were to celebrate when my uncle’s began. His life, however, ended instantly that night on the road.
I would never have the privilege of knowing my mother’s brother, who exists for me only in various stories and a few photographs. I’ve thought it odd that he should survive the many deadly perils of the Vietnam war as a marine only to meet his end at the hands of a careless driver once home, and this not long after his return. The best years of his life should have been yet to come, but it was not to be.
My mother had anticipated upon his return a relationship as adults better than that they had shared as children, which was often strained. My grandparents had to endure the tragedy of burying their child, a fate no parent would wish upon themselves or others. For each of them, the grief of the loss became what felt much like a physical affliction, lingering and painful, deep into the marrow. There would be no closure.
The “affliction” my grandparents were forced to endure patiently following his death was not for a hope that he would return to life but the absence of an answer to the overwhelming sorrow they would feel in their remaining days, months, and years. They would live in the unexpected reality of an unshared life with their only son. How does one ever overcome such an affliction?
I can’t imagine how one could ever arrive at peace after such a devastating loss. What good is patience if my child will never return in this life? One either wallows in bitterness, or allows the years and one’s faith to reward patience instead with one’s grief. I am happy to say they opted for the latter, finding other joys in life while preserving in gratitude the memory of their son.
I still have my children, and, hence, hope for my patience with the “afflictions,” if you will, that they bring home. If my grandparents were able to move past a grief that threatened to drown them, surely I can find the patience to deal with the day-to-day.
“[be] faithful in prayer.”
My grandparents’ home was modest by today’s standards, but it sufficed, and it was a safe and comfortable place we enjoyed visiting during our childhood. We learned to love and cherish what we saw and experienced there. The backyard garden full of vegetables, my grandfather’s workshop walls lined with all manner of tools, a batch of homemade chocolate chip cookies cooling on a sheet of wax paper in the kitchen — all became welcome and familiar sights as the years wore on. But it wasn’t only the daylight hours in their home that left an impression on me.
Rising in the middle of the night, a step or two was all it took to traverse from the guest bedroom for a quick trip to the bathroom. At the end of the short hallway was another bedroom, though used as such only when all three of us siblings were visiting. Without fail, if the time was right, I would catch a glimpse of our grandmother crouched on the floor, Bible spread in front of her, studying and praying. This, we learned, was her private routine each and every night. Well after midnight and into the earliest hours, she would rise from bed and take advantage of the stillness and silence to study and to pray for all those she cherished. I never learned how long she spent up in this posture before returning to bed, but what was certain is that she was faithful in this practice for all the times I spent in their home.
I wonder if this verse ever crossed my grandmother’s mind in the midst of her despair at losing her only son, a pain — an affliction — that would never fully be alleviated. There is no pill to swallow that would restore the loss. One learns to live with it and, in their case, lean on the words, even if it is a circumstance for which there will be no change. How one could chose to remain faithful in prayer rather than bitterness is beyond me, but she did, habitually rising for an intermission in slumber to pray.
I also wonder that the reason God has allowed her to live as long as she has is because he knows me and mine still require the faithful prayers of spiritual stalwarts such as her. God knows I allow myself far too many distractions to practice this discipline as well as her. Then again, it’s difficult to find many nowadays who do. I’m thankful, nonetheless, that I have one in my bloodline who has never failed to continue praying for me. I can only hope to live up to the example she has set.
Yes, hope. Seated behind each of these admonitions from Paul is, I believe hope. Without it, I have no motivation to be joyful, no cause to be patient with my troubles, no reason to pray faithfully. Hope is a foundational Christian virtue, and I find I need more than a heavy dose of it, especially with the bad news and negativity circling us daily in the world out there.
But it’s often more a choice rather than a feeling, especially for those of us not engaged in the conscious practice of choosing it. The more any attitude is chosen, the more readily it becomes our nature.
My grandmother had no hope of ever seeing her son again in this life after that fateful night. There was seemingly nothing left in which to hope for him and every reason to cease caring about a cruel and unfair world in which all your hopes, in her case for her child, evaporate in an instant. And yet, she somehow managed to continue to try and live out this verse day after day in the first and earliest hours of each and every day.
That, I realize, was because she learned not to center her hope in her child and his future but in the one to whom she was offering her prayer.
I admit to despairing from time to time over my inability to maintain good personal habits, in the behaviors my kids may or may not exhibit, or in the pitiful state of the world at large. But it occurs to me, considering my grandmother, that the reason may lie in the fact that my faith, my hope, may be misplaced. No wonder I remain disappointed.
My grandmother has never instructed me to rise in the middle of the night to pray. This has been her discipline, not mine. But, unbeknownst to her, I’ve observed it enough to admire it gratefully, not just in the knowledge that I have been and remain one of the subjects of her prayers, but in the example of unwavering hope such a secret practice she has unwittingly left as a legacy to me. It is joyful hope that prompts her to rise, patiently and selflessly sacrificing time that could be spent in sleep, faithfully offering her prayers. I’m not sure to this day she knew I was watching, but I was.
Would that I would learn to demonstrate hope through such steadfast discipline, and that my children, perhaps my grandchildren, would be left an example of hope that would likewise sustain them in the lives they have yet to lead.
I’ve lost count the number of times I’ve spoken these words to my son in response to his endless questions about the world he is still discovering at almost 9 years. While sometimes the questions are anxiety-driven (he has a deep need to know about what’s coming up), most often he is simply curious about the world. I appreciate his healthy curiosity, but it can be exhausting.
I’ve become comfortable, nonetheless, with not having all the answers to all the questions, perhaps because they are questions that, for me, are incidental or trivial and simply don’t keep me up at night. I don’t have an interest in knowing whether or not a Great Dane is a friendly dog (canines being his latest interest) or fudging an answer just to settle his wish for one. “I don’t know, buddy.”
Existentially, this drove a lot of searching in college, as it does for many, to find one’s own faith or meaning, no longer able to fall entirely back on your parents’ raison d’etre. The unsettled feeling prompted by the words “I don’t know” was enough to keep one intellectually searching for answers, even if it ultimately brought you back around to the same or a similar place. “I know enough.”
But parenting a kid from trauma, a kid who had other caregivers — maybe a number of them — before finally landing with you, can prompt such a crisis statement when left with the realization once in the deep end of the pool that “I don’t know” what to do, what will work, or how to move forward. As I remarked to someone recently, it’s not that the bar is set lower. The bar is in an entirely different location, somewhere over there beyond traditional parenting, where consequences, rewards, etc., may or may not matter in the least, precluding any leverage at all for correction. To say it’s exhausting is to use the word in its purest sense; it’s draining, both physically and emotionally, and hopelessness is right there waiting for you to join it in the depths.
There is nothing like this kind of parenting to inform you how we may take both too much credit and too much blame for the way they turn out. We do, of course, bear great responsibility, but much as well is out of our control with them, and some things are simply to be endured (or enjoyed) with prayer and hope.
My most basic but sincere prayer of late is nothing more than, “Please help. I don’t know what to do.” And I have to believe he answers, even if it’s just with an extra supply of patience or grace to handle a kid that neither knows nor cares any better. I want the problem to be solved, the difficulty to go away — we all do — but it occurred to me, with a little inner guidance, that there’s no growth without challenge, even if it comes in the form of a small person who didn’t begin with the same benefits as me. God help us all when we just don’t know.
Seven-elevens. I and my brother frequented corner gas stations named as such in our youth on a mission to purchase sour-powers, as they were called, or pop a few quarters in whatever video game cabinet, nestled at the back of the store, happened to be available at the time. Many a Saturday were spent biking with friends to one or another of these stations around town in between outdoor play to purge our pockets of coins offered by our parents. So, we exited the house and occupied ourselves elsewhere to while away a warm spring or summer afternoon. Good times.
My paternal grandfather, however, employed this chosen term in a very unique and wholly different way. “Seven-elevens,” by contrast, were, for him, a disparaging reference to contemporary church praise choruses as opposed to the old, traditional four-stanza hymns, to which he was most accustomed for decades during Sunday morning worship service until a younger crowd began to lead the proceedings. “Seven words, repeat it eleven times,” he shared in his brief and to-the-point manner. While such songs certainly have their place, and I wouldn’t begrudge their power to move and inspire, I find I’m cut from similar cloth as my grandfather and often miss and prefer the old hymns, if for no reasons other than their familiarity, having grown up routinely singing them in church, and since I can’t help but observe and appreciate the very meticulous, thoughtful care the songwriters placed in their deliberate choice and arrangement of words. There is as much theology to be gleaned from the verses as one might in a seminary course if you’re paying careful attention. While there are many I could name, “It is Well” is one of my personal favorites. Since we’re on the subject, I wouldn’t object to a four-part acapella harmony of said title at my funeral, though I hope we’re years away from arranging such a somber performance.
I broke with custom at a recent church service, however, and found myself struck poignantly by the opening verse of a familiar tune I’d heard many times before in recent years but never gave a second thought. It opens:
“When all I see is the battle, you see the victory.”
The song continues, themed around the belief that God will tackle our most daunting problems on our behalf, problems that feel insurmountable, providing reassurance for the present moment that things will work out in the end due to his patient yet direct involvement, if only we trust. I was instantly moved by these words as soon as they were sung. As I continued listening, I felt as if my soul reached out desperately to the hope the verses attempted to offer both to encouraged listeners and faithful participants, even finding myself fighting back tears that spoke of the hopelessness I had been feeling regarding parenting, notably one of our trio.
For those who have not yet started a family, there are more than a few loose ideas out there about the most ideal number of children to have. What’s most important to remember however, is that there is indisputably a dynamic that governs the relationships, and it changes and is inseparably related to the number of children in your brood. That being said, while there are many theories, three is often without question, I hear, considered the oddest and most challenging dynamic to manage. “It’s always two against one,” as a sage acquaintance summed it up for us.
I can’t say whether or not this is true, but I personally grew up in a three-kid household, as did my wife, and we are well aware of the noteworthy dynamics of birth order, though both strictly from the vantage point of the oldest in the bunch. I have no doubt this phenomenon plays into the relationships in our own household, often one or another lodging protests regarding alleged favoritism. One of our three, in particular, is most vocal with this grievance, with the added challenge of acting out deep, personal issues stemming from early trauma.
Though we’re only 5-6 years into the adoption experience, the road has been long and hard with our child, and the struggle with this trauma to raise a well-adjusted kid in spite of it wears on you in a way nothing else does. You lose count the number of times you feel like giving up, or at least easing up. If you’re not careful, you can cease to care the way you should, the emotional drain feeling meaningless and far too great to bear.
These concerns tossed and turned in my head that morning the verse was sung, and they were words I longed to hear and believe. Parenting of any given flavor, I have learned, is so unlike anything else one undertakes. It is a long and difficult process with no guarantees, especially with kids who had a rough start, even if you’re doing the best you can with the tools, skills, and resources at your disposal, be they plenty or few. You can easily feel outmatched, as I often do and did that morning, wishing for more than a share of divine assistance. It is, regrettably, never so easy as flipping a switch, pressing a button, or checking a box.
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I’ve remarked before that my wife and I have more than a bit of the achiever bent in each of us, which plays well into our firstborn birth order placement. This is manifested best in the pleasure we take in checklists; rather, I should say the delight we take in crossing out a task on our various to-do lists. There’s nothing quite like it for its simplicity and satisfaction.
Recently, we embarked on one of my ambitious wife’s many life goals to invest in real estate, specifically in the short-term vacation rental game. We have stayed in quite a few “Airbnb” homes over the years with both family and just the two of us, and we find the experience both pleasant and preferable to a hotel stay. While the cost can be slightly steeper than standard lodging, you’re offered more of an experience, many homes tailored to the community in which they are found.
Staying, however, is hardly identical to staging. Seated on the opposite side of a property experience is a mortgage, repairs, renovation, furnishing, and amenities — less to be enjoyed by you than by guests hopefully charmed by the photographs you’ve provided online of your special getaway. After a long year or two of searching, we found ours in the comfy, historic, and amiable town of Brenham, famed home of Blue Bell ice cream. After minor wrangling with the sellers over a month or so via our respective agents, we signed the papers, and the newly-renovated, 60s-era 3-bedroom 2-bath was ours. Check.
Supplies, maintenance, upgrades, and furnishings all make the list, and the expenses begin to mount. “You have to spend money to make money,” they say, and it’s true, though as of this writing, we remain in anticipation of the “making” part, only days since our project was made available for rent. In any event, the “to-do” list is as long as a CVS receipt and is frequently updated and altered. If you’ve watched any home-improvement show, you should be aware of those unforeseen and unwelcome problems that crop-up (cue dramatic background music and carefully edited clips of pained facial expressions), be it rotted flooring, corroded pipes in the walls, outdated electrical, termites, etc. We were fortunate not to have too many heart-stopping surprises, the flippers previous to us handling the majority of the big stuff, though first on our list was the outdated AC condenser, replaced by a genial, salt-of-the-earth local professional very well-connected to this humble town and who was a friendly and helpful first-contact, providing me additionally with the opportunity to use with frequency thereafter the saying, “I’ve got a guy.” Check.
You wouldn’t think it, but installing blinds on windows can take the better part of a day, though one can become a quick study of such a repetitive task. This was first on the list of personal jobs I could handle on my own around the place and considered essential since it “blinded” any potential peeping-toms from all that thereafter took place inside. Next came bedframe and box spring assembly in the bedrooms, unpacking mattresses, putting together anything that arrived in a box, and then moving the big stuff in a Uhaul on a designated Saturday. My lovely wife did an outstanding job of acquiring innumerable furnishings and appliances via auctions stationed at every corner of the sprawling metropolis of Houston, allowing us to purchase at bargain prices otherwise new items, given one’s willingness to sustain the chance of a minor ding here or there. Our favorite story among these was a new Ashley Furniture sleeper sofa that we acquired for a ridiculously low price, only to discover after we brought it home that it was missing two cushions — our mistake for failing to read the fine-print. No matter, however, as we discovered. After identifying and contacting the furniture retailer’s repair line, they asked only for the serial number and our mailing address and shipped replacements free-of-charge, in spite of the fact that we admittedly did not purchase it new in-store. They arrived in time for moving day, as we hauled everything up and into the new home. Check, check, check, all the way to our eventual listing of the property a full month later.
How rewarding it is to finish a job, to mark off a task, to bring closure to something through honest hard-work and effort. Study for the test, submit your answers, and get the “A”; turn the screw, one after another, and assemble the bedframe; think your thoughts, type the words, and post your blog. Check, check, check. The task may take time, but it’s straightforward and unequivocal: your will to work is likely the only thing standing between you and the satisfaction of completion.
This works best against things in life that have no clear will of their own. I failed to observe this until children came along. In this, I was woefully unprepared, in spite of training. It was rapidly apparent and unmistakable to me that one of the chief aspects that was going to make parenting so challenging was the fact that I couldn’t address them like a task on a to-do list. They have little wills and emotions of their own, perhaps more potent than you might imagine, driven sometimes by issues that they cannot fully understand or explain. The dryer doesn’t skitter away from you when you step into the laundry room, refusing to do its one and only chore by accepting the wet clothes. A nail doesn’t scream in pain, shedding bitter tears, screaming “No!” at you when you strike it with a hammer. No, these objects are indifferent to the job and allow you to edge ever closer to that “check,” as long as you move your own will. You and maybe the static, dispassionate laws of the physical universe and/or mother nature are your only obstacle.
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Bathtime was a traumatic experience both for our youngest and my wife and me soon after he arrived with his oldest sister. The first time, when they were simply paying us a visit for the weekend, he was too shy and uncertain of us to choose to resist with any measurable effort. Thereafter, once they moved in permanently, you would think it was pure primal torture for all involved. You wouldn’t expect a 2-year-old to be the cause of so much fear and uncertainty in a couple of seemingly mature and responsible adults, but it was as if we were coaxing him to step into a puddle of acid. Wiry and unmanageable as he could choose to be with his chunky toddler frame, we gave up and tried a wet, soapy rag outside of the bathtub, which proved just as Sisyphean of a task. We nearly resigned ourselves to the possibility that failure to properly bathe this child might do us in and disqualify us as adoptive parents, until we were offered the down-home advice from seasoned child-wranglers, “You just gotta do it.” So, we dug deep and, with time and tough-love, powered-through until getting our toddler clean was no longer an unpleasant chore for either party.
First successful bath
I could say that we eventually checked this challenge off of a list, but it didn’t feel quite so simple as that, not in the least. Here we were, two adults running headlong into the will of another, diminutive as he may be, and we initially couldn’t get it done. Enveloped protectively around this will were emotions, experiences, and fears, and suddenly a “simple” task felt like the delicate and dangerous art of brain surgery. We didn’t want to further damage this child, but it felt as if we were. The visceral resistance genuinely baffled us and was a job unworthy of placement on a casual, dispensable checklist.
Raising children, certainly adopted children, doesn’t transpire with an easy checklist. It didn’t take long at all for me to figure this out and feel a claustrophobic unease of realizing the job would stretch out in duration much further and was more complex than I anticipated. On the flip side, the brand of satisfaction one experiences where kids and “completion” of parenting jobs is involved is less a “check,” I find, than seamless movement past an obstacle. It’s more often just progress as you continue traveling past the next mile marker, and the next, etc.
And sometimes, maybe more frequently than we’d like, it’s also, “Didn’t we just pass this way?” or, “Are we going in circles?” More often than I’d like to admit, this is where I feel like we are with our child, whose challenges rolled through my head that morning in church as we sang of such battles that belong to God, whose confident perspective I wish I was more prone to seeing.
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As we left the morning doctor appointment, something I was able to mark off the day’s to-do list, our youngest fretted in the back seat, concerned that I would not return him to school in time for P.E., his favorite “class” of the day. Multiple times he questioned me, in spite of my assurances that we would arrive ahead of schedule. It gave me pause, prompting me to consider how often I feel hopeless in spite of received promises and reassurances offered by God regarding circumstances, in our case, seemingly endless frustrations with our child. I just want to be done and finished with it, to mark it off the list.
Instead, I hear, and have heard more than once, “My grace is sufficient for you . . .” Unwelcome words, I confess. But there you have it. Parenting, especially parenting with the additional challenges of adoption, is rarely a simple, emotionless daily task to be completed. It’s a slog sometimes, a battle, as the song mentions. The victory promised feels long in coming. Will it ever arrive?
I certainly hope it will. And that often may, in fact, be the sole “task” I need to place on the list, after all, each morning as the day begins again. In that respect, all that is left “to do” may be more simple and straightforward than I imagine, but nonetheless motivating. Maybe I can’t change my kid right now, but I can certainly try and, if all else fails, today pencil-in only “hope” at the top of the list.
“The happiest place on earth” is one of the most brilliant marketing slogans ever created.
It’s also a lie, as most advertising is.
Before the devoted Mouseketeers among you take offense, let me explain.
If you’re willing to ask any parent who’s bought the slogan hook, line, and sinker, they would likely regale you with tales of bitter unhappiness in their ranks upon visiting one of the prohibitively expensive houses Walt built. My wife and I took a brief trip to the east coast version prior to parenthood and were witness to no shortage of tantrums and meltdowns. The kids in their charge were also challenging. In fact, they were the sole source of their parents’ grief. One indelible image burned into my memory took place at the Tomorrowland Speedway, where children have the opportunity to sit in the driver’s seat and practically demonstrate to mom and dad just how thoroughly unprepared they are to handle the family sedan. While my wife and I each waited in our designated spots for a repurposed riding mower with a paint job (I have no idea why we thought we wanted to do this in the first place), I was prevented from entering the vehicle due to a toddler with a death-grip on the steering wheel, mother’s arms wrapped tightly around his legs, awkwardly pulling him forcefully in the opposite direction, full-horizontal. Mom, of course, ultimately won this battle of wills, and I can only guess at what awaited him as they exited. My wife and I then hopped happily into our respective rides, pondering smugly how we would never tolerate such behavior in our own kids, if or when they arrived.
It had escaped my memory as I puttered along the guided track that my siblings and I had provided our own parents a decent share of frustration years before as children after they had saved scrupulously to bring us to this very magic, only to be met with timid reluctance to enjoy ourselves. The five of us were bunched together outside of the entrance to Big Thunder Mountain Railroad, my mother wondering what the hold-up was. The noise and speed of the coaster as it roared past paralyzed the three of us. My mother would later tell us she grew up a fearful child, and, by God, she wasn’t about to allow that to transpire with her own. We were boarding the literal crazy train whether we liked it or not. My younger sister’s tear ducts began gushing with anxiety as our fate was decided, and so, we marched into the snaking line as if dead men walking. We sat down, we coasted, and my sister continued wailing (it never stopped) as we exited. Once she was able to quell her sobs sufficiently to form intelligible words, she shared our joint sentiments through tears now transformed: “I want [sniff] to [sniff] ride it again!” Mom’s dogged determination paid off, though it wouldn’t be the last time a carefully-planned family vacation was met with momentary misery.
The further along I move in parenting, the more I come to believe that kids will never meet all of our expectations, not even when it comes to the “fun” we plan for them. Likewise, we can be a source of disappointment as parents if we aren’t paying attention. I don’t know when exactly it occurs, but we forget at some point along the way what it’s like to be a kid in a world constructed and managed by adults. I tend to believe the best parents keep this truth at the forefront of interactions with their children, and, consequently, that such kids stand the best chance of adapting well to adulthood.
I often forget this truth as a parent, however, as I’m sure some of you would echo for yourselves. The stress of a given moment can bring out the worst in all of us, and sometimes our kids may be the closest target, though they may clearly have a part in the resulting strain on our nerves. Vacations are an excellent opportunity to test such scenarios, and ours are no exception.
As I’ve mentioned in the past, my wife is a planner and organizer to the nth degree. She’s assembled massive, complex spreadsheets and itineraries both for work and home that would make your head spin. Another talent I regrettably don’t share is her ability to summon an inexhaustible supply of ideas to serve as the content of said spreadsheets and itineraries.
This year’s idea for our annual spring break family vacation had us abandoning what was swiftly becoming a Disney tradition after three years. A couple of the kiddos wanted a change, so my wife went to work researching and preparing, settling on an experience they would never enjoy at the balmy sea-level climate of Gulf Coast Texas. And so, packing an additional large suitcase to carry winter apparel, we left the sunny, crowded beaches of Galveston behind for the white but equally crowded slopes of Beech Mountain, North Carolina.
For those unaware, as we were, Beech Mountain rises to an elevation of 5,506 feet above sea-level. The average high in March sounds more like the average low for what passes in Houston as winter: 47 degrees. Access to the resort involves weaving deliberately in and out of a seemingly endless series of hairpin turns that will challenge otherwise eager travelers prone to carsickness. My wife, a characteristically nervous passenger, chose to maneuver the airport rental herself due, no doubt, to the fact that I’ve carelessly rear-ended one too many strangers in the last six-years, and nobody needs that complication miles from home in a vehicle that doesn’t belong to you.
As we made the twisting ascent, the sun hid itself behind the accumulating clouds as the temperature plummeted in the space of less than an hour from a moderately comfortable 50 degrees down to a bone-chilling single-digit. Green gave way to white as snow collected in the passing surroundings. By the time we reached the summit resort village of Beech Mountain and stepped out of the van with the intention of paying in advance for the following day’s access to the slopes, the gusty, frigid wind hit our faces like a hammer. Seconds was all it took for the muscles to feel the icy pain of cheeks frozen in place. The trip up and then down the snow-covered stairs to the resort booth for tickets proved fruitless as we learned we would have to make our purchases the following day. My wife’s spirits gradually fell with the temperature, as did our youngest’s as they gingerly made their way back on the slick steps to the van in the frozen air. “I wish we had gone to Disney!” he lamented.
Once back in the van, the plan had been to make our way to the Walmart in the nearby town of Boone for a curbside order of basic provisions and to grab a bite for dinner before returning to the mountain and settling in to the Airbnb. The roads and weather precluded the likelihood of making it out of town, or back, for that matter, so we altered the plan and attempted what should have been a brief drive to the house to wait it out and simply get off the roads and into shelter. My wife relinquished the wheel and allowed me behind it this time as we set out.
The short distance to the house lasted twice as long on the steep, slick neighborhood inclines and declines. We unwittingly passed it by due to the absence of posted numbers and had to shift in reverse, precariously backing up until facing the driveway. Ascending it without snow/ice-treaded tires was out of the question, so the van would remain at the base of the driveway, just out of the way of passing vehicles.
My wife’s visible but unjustified regret over planning what was shaping up to be a miserable family vacation was about to get worse. As she and the kids attempted to gain footing up the driveway followed by two flights of stairs to the front door, I began grabbing seven pieces of luggage, one at a time, up the same ascent. I stepped inside to a warmer climate, thankful for an escape from the bitter cold outside. After a few passing minutes, one of us, I don’t recall who, observed that the lights didn’t seem to be working. In fact, nothing requiring electricity seemed to be functioning.
No power. Wonderful.
The weather outside is frightful . . .
Now, here I must pause a moment to observe the state of attitudes among our party, which I have glossed-over until now. Needless to say, my sweet wife was on the verge of tears at this point. I was intensely stressed on her behalf but was doing my utmost to remain upbeat, but the strain of the effort was wearing my nerves thin. Our children were, for the most part, faring better, save one, who will remain nameless. This one, I regret to say, often has an irritating tendency to offer needless, sarcastic commentary during almost any circumstance, be it positive, negative, or otherwise neutral, merely, it would seem, for its own sake, or for the delight of simply being a drag. We’re really not sure after six years. In any event, there is a time when it’s tolerable, and there is a time when mom and dad’s patience can no longer bear it. This was one of those times.
After returning with another piece of luggage, I stepped across the threshold, but to my consternation, my feet found only a slippery surface on the wet linoleum. It took only a second as my legs flung clumsily into the open air, and like a circus clown, I fell flat on my behind with a “thud.” No laughter was heard from our brood. Cue, instead, yet another dry, sarcastic comment from said child about how amazing a vacation this was shaping up to be. As I regained my footing and rose to my height, my anger broke like a dam, having heard one too many such unhelpful comments over the last hour of the journey. Before I knew it, the brief but cutting words shot out of my mouth like a cannon, aimed squarely and unequivocally in our child’s direction.
And just like that, I had uttered bitter, divisive words to one of my children, words I’ve admonished the kids never themselves to say to anyone.
I’d like to say I immediately regretted it, but, we all know, this kind of anger doesn’t step aside easily, at least not immediately. I wanted to be angry. I nevertheless moved on to the next task, which was comforting my wife and then trying to solve the power problem. I stepped outside searching for a breaker/junction box but found no identifiable issue there. Unthinkingly neglecting to inform my wife of plan B and having left my phone in the house, I began walking up the street to neighboring residences, hoping to either acquire assistance or information. Again, the air was a brisk and breezy 9 degrees. Not until climbing to house number four did I encounter another “survivor,” who told me power was likely to return before the evening, in his experience. This didn’t fix the food problem, since we had no inclination to die driving off the edge of an icy mountain, but I did acquire his cell number to update me, or, I thought, to plead for rescue.
I made it back to the house, where I found my wife beside herself with worry. I had not, as I mentioned, shared with her where I was going, leaving only her imagination to toy with her as to why I had not returned from the base of the stairs or why I was not answering her literal calls into the woods surrounding. Wrapping my arms around her as she sobbed, afraid she had been left alone to face this debacle, I apologized, doing my best to reassure her. I don’t remember when, but not long after, the neighbor-stranger became a God-sent friend, and he graciously invited us via text to share the warmth of his fireplace along with a hot meal cooked with care on his gas stove, if we were so inclined. We gladly accepted, but did not make the climb until dad, anger subsided, chose to make amends.
Though my words were directed carelessly at one of our children, I realized I needed to apologize to each of them. I did so in turn, and it appeared to improve matters. We made our way to the home of our new friend in much better spirits. As he cooked and conversed with us, after no more than half an hour, the familiar electric hum of appliances was heard suddenly as light bulbs above burst back into bright existence. The day was saved, our bellies were full, and our temporary home, upon returning after a couple of hours, was now warm and inviting. We would all get a good-night’s sleep, only to have another adventure or two the following day. It would, at the end of it all, be a vacation to remember, with several more ups and downs we wouldn’t soon forget.
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Parents, we know, are expected to exercise patience with their kids, but some kids, I’ve observed, appear to hold fast to the conviction that it is their sworn, conscious duty to test the limits of their overseers. We have just such a child, and the effort to remain calm but firm often feels impossibly Herculean, even for someone like myself who, prior to kids, was known for longsuffering with difficult people, notably in the professional realm. Library patrons, however, are not one’s children, though they clearly may act like them, to which I can attest.
There are many days I wake up nervous and uncertain of whether the Doctor Jekyll or Mister Hyde version of our child will rise to meet the day, ready either to challenge the world at large or to cooperate with it. More often than I care to admit, it’s often the former, at least with us at home. My wife and I have searched and prayed for an answer as to why one would actively work to antagonize those closest to you rather than seek peace and pursue it, but we have yet to find a reason, other than the lingering scars of an unstable, painful past, of which we, regrettably, had no part.
They say you have to love the child you have, as they are, and not the child you hope to have. This can be tough when it feels there is so, so much in them that needs to change. With adoption, there is no guarantee that you will make an impression, especially if you were absent from a child’s most formative early years, as we were with ours. It’s hard to know how to approach parenting under the circumstances when it often appears that nothing is effective in the way that it should be. Some kids are that eager for a fight. I’ve consequently lost count of the number of times I have felt like giving up, like we’re simply biding our time until graduation, when the house may return to us and a consistent peace will reign once again.
But we don’t give up, though I often am compelled to. And we’re not called to. I’m reminded of the words of Paul to the Romans, as he closes his letter: “Be joyful in hope, patient in affliction, faithful in prayer.” Implied in these words is a truth about the life of faith, if not life in general. Behind the hope, patience, and faithfulness encouraged is an understanding that life will not be easy, no matter what’s before you. How much more so for those of us doing something we believe He’s called us to, even though we might feel we’re doing it all wrong or that there seems little evidence on a daily basis that He’s behind it?
Among those three, I struggle most with “joy.” It’s a chosen attitude, and I tend to allow the appearance of circumstances to drag me down, unlike my wife, who, to me, can find within her the capability to be endlessly positive — unless, that is, a spring break trip she has planned for the family is rapidly transforming into an episode of “Survivor.” We continue to plan them, nonetheless, which, I suppose, is good evidence that we aren’t giving up and continue to provide the kids with memories. Regardless of attitudes, struggles, or misfortune, or the appearance of little personal change among one’s charges, we press on, and we do best when joyful in hope, patient in affliction, faithful in prayer.
“Life is difficult.” That’s how M. Scott Peck opens his esteemed work The Road Less Traveled, and I love it, though I struggle, as we all do, to accept it. Truer words have never been spoken. We all want relief, ease, and convenience. You could make an argument that it’s the American way. But, no matter how many “just a touch of a button” solutions technology fashions for us, we’ll still have children to raise, as difficult as they may be, we’ll still lose our cool with them on occasion, and we’ll still have forgiveness to seek. God help each of us to choose joy, whether in the middle of family business at home or a spring break trip gone awry.
My jaw hit the floor. At best, I would have guessed a couple thousand, which would itself have been justifiable cause for celebration. But I had long forgotten about the copy of the will that had been sent to the library many months ago and had begun this particular day with no expectations whatsoever. A seemingly routine call would change everything.
“How much?!” My elevated tone must have implied insult on the other end of the call, which couldn’t have been further from the truth.
“Is that not enough?” the executor replied. After reassurances to the contrary, we shared a laugh and then commenced discussing the details of the late Mr. Lee’s bequest to the Clear Lake City-County Freeman Branch Library, which I had been managing for just over a year. I then would do my best to wait patiently for the check in the mail. In other professions, such as my wife’s chosen field of chemical engineering, cash like that is chump change, here and gone in the course of an afternoon. In a public library, it’s a windfall of serious capital. We had just won the lottery.
Nine years previously, I had trepidatiously begun my career as a public librarian at this branch, which was on the cusp of closing the doors to its third architectural iteration, circa 1970s, and reopening in a state-of-the-art facility almost four times larger directly across the parking lot. At the forefront of my mind was my uncertainty from the first day I was placed alone on the reference desk whether having earned the degree would prove time and money well-spent, or if I should have instead opted for choice number two — to be all I could be in the U.S. military. Had I selected the latter, which I nearly did, the following year would have further altered my fortunes in the service of my country after the tragic collapse of a pair of towers on home soil. It’s anyone’s guess where I might have found myself deployed and what fate would have awaited me in some remote corner of a world in conflict. As it would happen, I selected study over soldiering, and so I landed among books instead of a battlefield.
After a year as an entry-level librarian on the front line of public service at this branch in and around the Johnson Space Center community, I nearly threw in the towel and ventured to other less turbulent waters, so to speak, or so I thought. I knew not what to expect after taking a job working for the general populace, and I certainly didn’t expect to be treated so poorly and ungratefully by the everyday folks I was sincerely trying to help. More often than not, the interactions were admittedly positive, and I proved myself capable of pinning down the answers they sought. But it’s true that one bad apple can spoil the bunch, in this case the bunch being the collective patron interactions in a given day. A single, truly negative encounter is a pall over one’s work day if you allow it to be, as I did time and again. I’d had enough of this entitled crowd, and so I would roll the dice and see if I could find better patrons elsewhere.
I was still too green to understand that working directly with the public simply opens yourself to encounters with difficult people. It comes with the territory. Changing the scenery is no solution. They’ll find you. In almost 18 years in the profession, I’ve observed there are many long-time front-liners who remain nervous and perplexed about this reality and who continue searching in vain for a remedy that will never present itself outside of themselves.
In any event, I attempted an escape to another large municipal system and was offered a position. Upon arriving for a day of preliminaries and paperwork, I stepped unwittingly into a HR disaster. At least one of many new-hires was wise to the dysfunction and walked out within the first 15 minutes, expressing her disgust at having wasted a day of vacation for this. I, on the other hand, decided to stick it out. The situation did not improve. By the time the day was done, it was discovered that none of us were informed about documents we were required to bring with us, after repeated inquiries they still had not determined at which of the many branches each of us would be placed (an important detail when searching for a spot nearby to lay your head), and, oh, by the way (as we all were departing in the late afternoon on our long respective routes home), there is one more stop here in town we neglected to tell you about; you’ll have to use additional leave time from your present job in order to return and take care of it. As if this weren’t enough, I was provided one final disappointment — I was not being hired for the position for which I interviewed but a step and pay grade beneath it.
Now, I do believe in providence. The 8th chapter and 28th verse of Romans I often forget to apply duly to any and every circumstance. This was a rare moment when a prayer for direction earlier in the day when circumstances began to deteriorate returned an answer as clear as fine crystal. The inept crew at this particular HR department were hardly working for the good of those they called and, by all appearances, were under the impression they were paid instead to sabotage their employer by repelling new-hires. On the flip side, I left with the bittersweet certainty that I should stay put where I was, and I was fortunate to learn that I would be welcomed gratefully back to the branch in Clear Lake, two-week notice notwithstanding.
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How does one determine the will of God? Why, in that moment, did I interpret circumstances as an indication he wanted me to stay where I was? Why could it not, from an agnostic perspective, simply have been what it was on the face of it — an incompetent organization in desperate need of improved hiring practices?
I can’t imagine a scenario in which I could irrefutably prove to anyone that God was indeed guiding me that day. I am not a skilled apologist, I have learned, so I’ll make no attempt here. I do think, however, that if all of us were honest with ourselves, there is plenty that each of us accepts on faith, though the substance of that faith may differ. As for me, I have seen and experienced enough, especially while I was under my parents roof, that convinced me of a good God who is involved in the world, and it has informed and shaped my faith over the years. But I also don’t believe I had no choice in the matter; I wasn’t irresistibly compelled to believe, though it could be argued I would be foolish and stubborn not to. Choice, I find, is still left to us, though God may be sovereign. It is just a part of what it means, I think, to be created in his image.
Dostoyevsky may have said it best in his novel “The Brothers Karamazov,” suggesting that we may willfully apply our preconceptions when interpreting events, personal or not, particularly if one is a realist/unbeliever:
“The genuine realist, if he is an unbeliever, will always find strength and ability to disbelieve in the miraculous, and if he is confronted with a miracle as an irrefutable fact he would rather disbelieve his own senses than admit the fact. Even if he admits it, he admits it as a fact of nature till then unrecognized by him. Faith does not, in the realist, spring from the miracle but the miracle from faith. If the realist once believes, then he is bound by his very realism to admit the miraculous also.”
I wouldn’t say I encountered miracles as much as intervention that day. Nevertheless, it is left to us to choose an interpretation based on the substance of our faith. I could have proceeded with the move, I suppose. The truth was, I was running from a difficult situation in an attempt to make my own life more comfortable, or so I thought. There is value in facing challenges, though many of us are conditioned to interpret them as a sign to seek an easier, more convenient way.
While I believe God was making use of circumstances to influence my decision, there was another hard truth I needed to understand — running from a challenge may involve nothing more than running towards another. Life isn’t always best lived seeking one simple, convenient, and pleasant path after another. If it’s not the frustration of dealing with contentious patrons, it will undoubtedly be something else. And sometimes, one difficult choice, one turn, if you will, is all that’s needed to make a world of difference in your life or mine.
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John Lee Hancock, like me, grew up in the blue-collar, chemical refinery town of Texas City. I would venture to guess that our similarities end there, but I have found it curious that there isn’t a movie director in present-day Hollywood whose films I am almost guaranteed to appreciate more consistently than his. In any event, his film “The Highwaymen,” released in 2019 on Netflix, tells the story of the manhunt for notorious killers Bonnie and Clyde from the perspective of the former Texas Rangers commissioned to track them down. Leading the pursuit is Frank Hamer, played convincingly by Kevin Costner, with Woody Harrelson in the role of his partner, Maney Gault.
Midway through the plot, Hamer pays a visit to Clyde’s father in Dallas. Perhaps seeing little to gain from either in the investigation, the pair use the encounter instead to wax philosophic on the nature of choice and fate. “One turn on the trail,” each utters familiarly, suggesting the notion of a course in one’s life set and determined irrevocably once a pivotal choice is made. While the elder Barrow’s imploring for his son takes issue with the idea that the choice reveals one’s inherent, inescapable nature, Hamer illustratively applies the phrase to himself, describing a single moment chosen in his youth that, he believed, dramatically altered and fated his life’s profession. The choice, the one turn, changed everything.
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My wife and I were once good friends without a hint of attraction between us. I still believe friendships can evolve into some of the best marriages, but that’s a topic for another time. Over a decade ago, I don’t remember precisely when, she was in the process of purchasing her first home, and I happened to be the friend available to whom she first decided to show it. We turned into the neighborhood, down the street, and then parked alongside the curb in front of the house. She excitedly shared the details with me for a few minutes seated there in her sedan.
Now, at that moment, I had no idea about what the years ahead held for me and how this casual afternoon stop was as much about what was in store for me as for her. Had my future self spontaneously appeared in the back seat to drop unwelcome spoilers, I wouldn’t have bought a thing he was selling; I wouldn’t have been prepared to hear any of it:
“Let me tell you what’s about to go down, Jim. First, this house. Take a good look, because a lot is going to happen right here for you. Your name will eventually be on the title. Yes, you heard that right. You don’t know it yet, but this is also your first home, which leads me to my second surprise. The girl seated next to you is the one you’ve been after for so long. She’ll figure it out before you do, but once you recognize it, you’ll have difficulty imagining anyone else better suited for you. Cue wedding bells. Third, you two will start a family right here. Maybe that’s not surprising, but here’s the kicker — you’re going to forgo the baby stage and acquire three older kiddos in one blow. Oh, also, they will bear absolutely no resemblance to you whatsoever. I’ll just leave it at that. Fourth, that great big library you unsuccessfully tried to escape several years ago? They’re going to put you in charge of it. Yes, you. Moreover, you and the staff will be afforded rare but rewarding opportunities to make significant impacts on the community, impacts that will be publicized even outside of the city and state. Much of it will begin with a phone call you aren’t expecting about the generosity of a man you’ll never meet.”
I never for a second would have believed any of that. But it did, in fact, happen. And it might not have had I ignored how I was being directed and had instead effected my flight a few years previous.
Time and hindsight reinforce anyone’s faith, I find. The downside is, of course, the waiting. I feel as if I daily face doubt about the goodness of God while dealing with one irritating, sometimes disheartening, challenge after another, especially in this stage of life raising kids in the home. Assurance can be long in coming while buried in the grind. But when I pause to look back on that day and see all of the remarkable things that have followed because, I believe, I obediently chose to stay, how could I not believe in a good God?
We’re taught in Scripture that not one of us is beyond the grace of God; not even a single choice can alter that. However, time isn’t returned to us, which makes each choice more valuable as the minutes slip away. It’s the earliest turn that stands the best chance of affecting the greater share of all those that follow. And that’s good news for those who believe in a good God.
Carving broad lines into the dirt, he circled the tractor at the edge of the field his father farmed as a hired hand, straightened it out, and started anew. Plowing one endless furrow after another, Joel stole a longing glance at the cars speeding past on the adjacent road, each headed anywhere but here. Family duty held him firmly in the driver’s seat of the tractor’s cabin, though he would gladly relinquish it for a ride in the backseat of even the slowest vehicle escaping this dry and dusty patch of land outside of Dalhart. While he would later appreciate the work ethic instilled in him by his father, who expected him and his brothers to do their part by participating in the family trade as long as they remained under his roof, he derived no pleasure in farming and anticipated after graduation a life outside of such a town that offered few, if any, other means of making a living, even to this day.
Granted, there was nothing to discredit the modest, deliberately-paced community of Dalhart, so named for its establishment between Dallam and Hartley counties in the Texas Panhandle. Then again, there was nothing much to its credit either, in Joel’s opinion. Living in a small agrarian town suited men like his father, who had spent his entire life there, was devoted to his trade, and knew as much about the world outside of it as he wanted to and nothing more. In a way, Dalhart was a refuge from the busy, chaotic world beyond beyond its borders. Even my grandfather’s television, a veritable window in one’s living room opened to the wider world, was, as I recall in his later years, rarely tuned to anything other than golf or the weather; there was little else that captured or required his attention, and this by choice. I once asked him if he had ever considered living anywhere else, myself having recently arrived for a visit from the sprawling, noisy metropolis of Houston. “What?!” he exclaimed. “You’d have to be crazy to want to leave this place!”
My father shared no such sentiment, a fact that did not evade the attention of his own father. It isn’t a stretch to say that the numerous years David Johnson had spent working the land as a matter of necessity had become stitched inseparably into his very identity. To have a son who did not find equal meaning in this respectable form of labor was to suffer a personal affront. He was not an emotionally demonstrative man, however, though his departure from his childhood home as a teenager was contentious, to say the least. He made a rebellious escape of his own from a father with whom he didn’t see eye to eye and never once looked back in regret. Exiting the dust-bowl era, he found a way to make life work for him in spite of an unfinished formal education, eloping with his teenage bride, Zola Faye McBrayer, and focusing his life’s labor on tending the land. Five kids were to follow, Joel the fourth in line, preceded by Peggy, Nancy, and Steve, and trailed by Don.
Zola Faye’s fourth was an unplanned pregnancy. To make matters worse, conception was discovered following a procedure his mother had undergone known obstetrically as a “D and C,” which involves clearing tissue from the uterine lining. No viable pregnancy is biologically equipped to withstand such a procedure under the best of circumstances. Upon learning of the mistake, the doctor counseled abortion, convinced the fetus either would not survive or would be born unhealthy or severely disabled. Zola Faye refused. Defying the odds, the baby would be born to term, alive and healthy. She would give him the prophetic Biblical name “Joel,” meaning declaratively “Yahweh (the Lord) is God.” The improbable birth would be documented in medical literature. I would first hear this story many years later in a sermon delivered by my father, who shared of his mother’s conviction that it presaged a life determined for a special purpose or moment.
Whatever that purpose might be, this story would lend Joel a profound sense of God having miraculously intervened in his life long before he possessed a formed mind to perceive it. The words of Psalm 139 might as well had been penned by him, who, incidentally, was given the middle name “David” by his mother and father.
“Your eyes saw my unformed body; all the days were written in your book before one of them came to be.”
Central to this sense of meaning and purpose was the church, and for the Johnson household, attendance was routine and expected for all in the family. His father, David, arrived early every Sunday to open the doors of the First Baptist Church of Dalhart, his deaconly duties extending only insofar as gatekeeper and collector, namely offertory contributions and attendance numbers in Sunday School classes. Aside from this, he characteristically could be relied upon to shutter his eyes during the service not in meditation or prayer but in slumber. Yes, the pastoral message was important; he diligently brought his family each week, after all. It seems, however, he was simply a man who was at his best and most alert when moving, and a sermon afforded little opportunity for that. Zola Faye, by contrast, kept conscious and active attention, teaching the young married’s class, singing in the choir, and occasionally serving as pianist and, for several years, church secretary. As for Joel and his brothers and sisters, they were present and accounted for given the doors were open — Girls in Action, Royal Ambassadors, childrens and youth choir, Sunday evening church training, vacation Bible school, etc. Religious or not, one’s best social opportunities in a small town at that time were often provided by an engaged church, and the Johnsons’ extracurricular activities would imply it was practically a second home for them.
Growing up, Joel’s interests inclined toward literature. His oldest sibling, Peggy, unwittingly practicing for her eventual career in education, taught him to read before he ever set foot in a classroom. Once children’s stories were covered, he moved on to the family encyclopedia, an educational staple of many mid-20th century American homes. Further along than most by the time first grade began, he and another student were permitted in their reading class to occupy a corner of the classroom and lose themselves in any available story that seized their interest. He acquired a library card at the earliest opportunity and pored over every book on the shelves detailing the history of World War II and the Civil War. The daring adventures penned by Alistair MacLean were his favorite. When these were exhausted or unavailable, Readers Digest bound and abridged novels that amply lined his mother’s shelves would do. To this day, my father’s preferred posture is seated comfortably in a recliner with an open book. Conscious of it or not, he was building habits and forming values that would extend to his own children years later. My own career choice of librarianship undoubtedly began its formation during those early reading lessons decades ago between my aunt and father. For those of us led to believe we are the masters of our own fate, I would argue that nurture and influence stretch much further back into our familial past than we might imagine.
At 15, a friend loaned him “The Lord of the Rings” trilogy. “It’s a dangerous business,” Tolkien writes, “going out your door. You step onto the road, and if you don’t keep your feet, there’s no knowing where you might be swept off to.” Joel would spend hours discussing the volumes with his friend, enthralled not only at the exploits of the nine but, more importantly, moved by the spiritual themes undergirding the patient, expansive story, which, like many others he read, depicted places, real or imagined, dissimilar to the one he inhabited, fueling a desire to tread his own path into the unexplored world once given the opportunity. Something greater and deeper than the adventures he had read about continued to stir within, inspiring him soon to begin taking his first steps into a vocational life of faith.
Whether it was the stress of this call that weighed upon him or simple adolescent immaturity, Joel found himself during his senior year succumbing for a season, due to the influence of friends, to more than a passing interest in alcohol, a developing habit that he managed to conceal from his abstinent parents. Late in the academic year, he would pass evenings several times a week with friends overindulging. He didn’t relish the taste, but it did the job and did it well. Certain evenings passed out of memory entirely; the manner in which he made it home on these occasions were left a mystery.
There are few times in life that bear stronger potential to form both our best and worst habits than adolescence, and at his rate, alcoholism could thereafter have grasped and held him captive with relative ease if left unchecked. Had it succeeded, the story told here would read differently or, perhaps, not be read at all. To our great fortune, however, resourcefulness is one of God’s most enduring though often overlooked qualities. Every tool is at his disposal to shape our circumstances and character as he sees fit. He would recognize in due time what awaited him without an adjustment and would, thankfully, quit cold turkey. He would never touch another drop. The lessons learned would be put to good use, as they should for any seasoned minister. There is no shame in possessing a past, especially if it offers a personal education on the meaning of grace. And who better to comprehend and appreciate the lessons of one’s past in humility than those committed to professional ministry in the service of others, each with their own pasts? Christ saves us all from something.
Joel had spent abundant time pondering these and other spiritual matters for much of his brief life thus far, which led him eventually to consider whether it hinted at a call to a career focused wholly on God’s work. But to what, exactly? The works of Scripture, especially in the Old Testament, do not always describe the “call” of God in precisely the way many of us understand it today. Then, the Levites fulfilled the “professional” function, but primarily due to bloodline; it was a “default calling,” if you will. Many of those “called” who we read about were tasked with a very specific job in mind that did not necessarily carry a socially- or culturally-defined title that limited their role and responsibilities: be fruitful, build an ark, father a nation, lead my people, conquer, save my people, be anointed as king, rebuild the city, etc. All were called of God, but to an ordained task, not a defined title. I have met those who pursued a call in seminary who did not belong there, and I have known instructors who shared that observation. While there is no clear fault in following a call in the best way we know with the information we have, it’s wise to consider that we may limit God to think he can work with us only within the confines of professional ministry, though it most certainly has its place.
As best as Joel could surmise, just as many others do, his call should be pursued as a leader and shepherd of a congregation much like the one of which he’d long been a part, so he duly set out to obey prayerfully in the best way he saw fit. Consulting with his church’s pastor as well as select deacons in the body, he was approved and officially licensed into ministry. The duration of his first sermon barely gave listeners time enough to warm their seats after only seven minutes in the pulpit, but the brevity was no discouragement to him. Joel would continue in that direction.
At long last, graduation arrived. He summarily struck out on the road leading from town, blazing past furrowed fields over which he’d once driven. From here, there would be no stolen glances toward the tractors carving the dirt hours on end, though perhaps the metaphorical but fitting words of Christ, to whom he had pledged himself, echoed in his mind as he fixed his gaze forward and forged ahead.
“No one who puts his hand to the plow and looks back is fit for the kingdom of God.”
Just as the plow prepares the ground for the growth it will foster, Joel was unknowingly headed not yet into a life of career ministry but rather one of patient preparation for a task God had designed for him years later, a task which he would share with another. Her story began many miles southeast of the quiet farmlands spread across the Panhandle, nearer the noisy, steam-pluming refineries stretching along the lengthy coasts of the Gulf. Hers was a different hope for the future they would soon inhabit together.
January 2017. Earlier in the previous year, my wife and I took in two siblings and will, in a few weeks, adopt them as our own. It has been a long and laborious process up to this point. The adjustment to parenting is the only thing, for me, that has been more trying. From zero to two is an almost imperceptible change if you’re talking about the speed of a vehicle. If, however, you’re referring to the number of older children in your home versus only moments ago, no adjustment I’ve experienced in 40 years compares.
I’ve just begun to settle into the new routines, priority changes, loss of “me” time, etc., that parenting brings with it, not to mention the difficulties raising kids from trauma. If I’m honest with myself, I’m still not sold on the approaching adoption day and terrified that this is a mistake. There’s no turning back after that. Now we’re being asked to take in a third — their sister. While my wife’s answer was a resounding, knee-jerk “Yes!”, she dialed-back her open-hearted enthusiasm when it was clear I hadn’t yet arrived there with her. We would, instead, think about it. She would pray and hope earnestly that I would change my mind.
A month later, and the new year has barely begun, as has my day. Waking up to get myself ready for work, I answer a call from my wife, who has already begun her workday. The time to make a decision had come, our caseworker informed her. She needed an answer today.
I do not want to do this.
It’s been hard enough becoming an instant parent of two. More than once, I’ve felt like quitting. I can’t imagine taking on yet another, who, we learn, will bring her own set of challenges. In short, we would be the fifth primary caregivers in her brief seven years of life — a fact to which I can’t relate to any of my own life experiences.
Overwhelmed at the thought, I tell my wife I need some time. I call work to tell them I won’t be coming. Instead, I face the inevitable and prepare to wrestle with God.
I want an answer, and I’d like it to come unmistakably from Him.
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It’s long been easy for me to read the stories in Scripture, especially those in the early Old Testament books, as if God speaks to the key characters in direct, grandiose ways just as frequently as we might pick up the phone and text or call one another today. It takes only a few seamless moments to read many of these accounts as if one divine interaction follows the next, as routine or as common as walking from here to there. Such a belief can further lead to the self-critical idea that I don’t hear quite so often as that from God, and certainly not in such grand fashion, so I can hardly consider myself as intimate with Him as an Adam, a Noah, or a Moses.
Read-time is not real-time, however. Between punctuation, paragraphs, and chapters, especially in the Old Testament accounts, there is the undocumented drudgery of the day to day; there are actual days, months, years, sometimes decades or longer, between “burning bush” kinds of moments. Instead, there is the silence of God. I would argue, in fact, that we overlook the abundance of His silence in these characters’ stories. Granted, this doesn’t mean He wasn’t acting or speaking in these segues. The writers, inspired of God, only tell us what we most need to know. Yes, he may speak to me in many simple, quiet ways on a daily basis, if I’m attentive, but many of the monumental divine intercessions or pronouncements writ large in Scripture are fewer and farther between if you stretch them out into actual time.
This I find reassuring, and it adjusts my expectations of God. My faith in Him and confidence that He is ever-present to me shouldn’t depend on whether or not I experience frequent moments in which He parts the clouds for a special revelation. Many, many more times than we read, I am certain, Moses, for example, got up, went about his day, and eventually retired for the night, only to do the same the following day and the day after that. On almost all of those days, I am certain water acted like water does and neither parted across a sea nor sprang from a rock. It’s not exciting, but much of the time we spend in our lives isn’t. It’s simply life as it is.
Nevertheless, God is still present in the day-to-day routines, and it’s often in these periods that our faith is most tested. He will speak to us in the manner he chooses when he chooses to do so, or He may not. Sometimes, however, we hope and pray that He does so in such an intimate and direct way as we read in Scripture so that we are forever changed, our life altered.
Sometimes, He may give us just that, even when what He has to say may not be what we want to hear.
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I decide to change my surroundings and venture to a local park. I turn off my phone. Maybe a little dose of nature and evasion of distractions will persuade God that I’m serious, that I’m holding my calls for Him, so to speak.
I find a picnic table and sit down, read a few verses here and there, meditate, journal, say exactly what’s on my mind. I wait. I listen. I repeat.
Nothing.
After what feels like an eternity, I impatiently get up, move around, and take a walk. A few scattered times in my adulthood, I’ve imagined Christ by my side on one of my strolls, keeping pace with me, just being present, if for no other reason than to be a comfort, a reassurance in a world characteristically more chaotic than ordered. After a while, though, I sense it’s just me.
Dejected and impatient, I change direction and walk to the van. God may have nothing to say to me about this. What’s more likely is that I’m simply not very good at listening to Him. I shouldn’t expect Him to speak to me as He has in so many ways to my parents. I need to accept it, make a decision about this, and move on with life.
I get in, decide to clear my head, and just drive. I head south on the freeway. About 20 minutes in, I drift off the exit towards my childhood hometown. I’m soon coasting past old familiar places down the main thoroughfare. The car eventually makes a left turn, then another left. It stops along the curb behind a park where my siblings, neighborhood friends and I often played. I don’t know why I’ve come here.
Across the field in the park, I see our old backyard at my childhood home. The architecture hasn’t changed after 24 years, but the paint and landscaping have. Someone else calls it home now. I wonder what memories they’ve made there.
I get out of the car and stroll to a bench. I take nothing with me. Arms stretched across the back, I just sit and take it in. I stare at the back of the house across the short distance. I’m not sure I’m really listening for anything anymore. I relax, sit back, and remember what was, back when life was simpler and I was blissfully unaware.
After an hour or two, a little bored and unenlightened, I get up and head back to the car. I don’t know what I’ll do or where I’ll go from here, but it seems God doesn’t want to show up. I’ve invited Him, but He has no interest in offering even a meager shred of advice on how to proceed. Forget it, then. I’ll figure this out on my own. Maybe He did, after all, just wind this universe up at the beginning and casually amble away to pursue other interests, leaving us with the mess we’ve made.
I sit down and shut the door. Reaching for the ignition, I press the button and start the car.
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“It’s time.”
I’m 15 again, sitting on the floor of my empty room. My mother’s words echo as the tears start to flow. She sits down beside me and wraps her arms around me. I’m saying goodbye to my home once more, the only home I’ve ever known.
Then I hear Him.
“You left your home once at 15. Your family left with you. I brought you to this place specifically to remember that.
“This child is the fragile age of 7. By the time she makes her way to you, it will be her fourth departure in her brief life from places that only resemble a home. Her family is not with her. She doesn’t understand it all, can’t process it, and is otherwise alone. I’m giving you this opportunity to change her reality, to give her a home that’s truly a home, one that she will never have to leave again.
“It’s time — time for you to take a risk. Your parents had theirs, but this is uniquely yours. I’m not asking you to venture to the other side of the world; that was for them, not for you.
“I will not promise you that taking this child — these children — as your own will be easy. In fact, you know it won’t be. I will not even tell you how it all will end, whether it will seem worth it. It is, however, what I want you to do.”
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Scripture tells us that God is sovereign. If I believe this, then I know His purposes will be accomplished. Moreover, I believe He chooses to use us as vessels to do His work. With or without us, He will do what He says.
Nevertheless, I can’t help but wonder — what if my parents had said “no”? What if they had turned their backs to their call, though doubtless about what they had been told and who had spoken to them?
What if they stayed?
Would God, as with Jonah, have bore down on them to any and every corner of the earth to which they fled, using whatever means at His disposal to exhaust them until they obeyed, albeit reluctantly? Or would He have simply changed His mind, searched, and found another to finish the job, leaving them to puzzle in their final remaining years, filled with regret about what might have been?
Maybe, just maybe, after all, they had a choice even then, notwithstanding God’s sovereignty. I can’t search it out, and it isn’t long before I find I don’t want to. Of all for which I have to be grateful in my life, I’m relieved I do not have to linger or obsess on what would have been had they remained where they were. As with Frost’s less-traveled road, their choice to go has made all the difference.
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I’m back in my car, tears streaming down my face, just like the 15 year old about to leave his home on a journey not of his choosing. I now know what I have to do, but it doesn’t feel inevitable. I have to choose.
I’m afraid and uncertain. I feel inadequate, unprepared, and ill-equipped. My parents once felt this way as well, on the edge of a risk, but much greater than this. This time, however, I’m in the driver’s seat as I prepare to leave this place once again.
“Go from your country, your people, and your father’s household to the land I will show you.”
I think it is no accident that the story of Abram has found itself placed near the beginning of Scripture. It is a simple yet relatable story to which many thereafter found and still find themselves directed by God as an encouragement to take the first step. As one author put it in his own famed, world-building story, “It’s a dangerous business . . . going out your door. You step onto the road, and if you don’t keep your feet, there’s no knowing where you might be swept off to.”
Abram’s faith journey begins anew each time we receive a call from Him and choose to obey. The call isn’t the same for each of us, but He calls us each to something. Reflecting on this, I make my decision.
Time in a Bottle 