When I began this quest, I first answered a call from the Holy Spirit. Seeing my life in turmoil unexplained only added to the angst. In reflection, I had everything I wanted, yet, why was I restless and on edge? After a time of several months I distilled what I really wanted out of my life. It was a sense of well-being. And I put it specifically that way, well-being, as I wanted relief from not being comfortable in my own skin and in my own circumstances. Really, I had everything I wanted so the unexplained part of the equation was why was I so unhappy?
After a time of bible reading, prayer, meditation, conscious connected breathing, integrating past hurts into the present and listening to Abraham-Hicks Law of Attraction videos I came up with well-being as what I was looking for. But I also noticed I was treading down parallel roads with God and the Bible on one side and Law of Attraction secularism on the other. I knew I could not sustain such a dichotomy of ideas and way of life for much longer. What I saw for the first time in prayer was an answer to a Biblical promise. The first of many biblical promises that are kept by God! (Promises Made Promises Kept, July 26 Blog post) Seek and you shall find, knock and the door will be opened. I saw the Law of Attraction types really are talking about all the concepts as outlined in the Bible. They are purposely leaving out God so as not to put skeptics and non-believers off. But it was the Holy Spirit who called me, and it was the Bible that led me, and it was the sermons at Healing Place Church that inspired me so much I declared it was God I was to follow! None other than God, His Son Jesus and His Holy Spirit are the source people clamor for yet, are too afraid to call it by its true name. I call it Jesus. Most of it I don’t understand yet I still call it Jesus. My life took a radical turn for the better when I made a decision. The decision was to Get Off the Fence about God and claim it as my own. Claim it, pursue it, live it and revel in His love! There is nothing short of transformation and renewal in the wake of making that decision and commitment. Best decision I EVER made!
But I digress.
When I found myself in a prevailing grouchy, irritable, impatient and quick triggered disposition I thought to myself what is it I really want? My hobbies, work relationships, my relationship with my wife suddenly, it seemed, were not fun, satisfying, fulfilling or meaningful. I coined it as wanting a sense of well-being and I began to search for what that might mean and look like. I should have kept it at meaning and fulfillment as to what I was really looking for. Well-being is nice enough and ok yet that is not ultimately what I want. Happiness is certainly not what I am after as it is a certain dead end. How could I possibly overcome or face a challenge if I only wanted to remain happy? It isn’t possible nor should it be an end game to pursue. I think happiness comes and goes but what happens when it is gone? Then where would I be? What would become of me then if I am not happy?
In reflecting on well-being, I see it as desiring a degree of comfort and a degree of competence, but it is the comfort part of that duality that bothers me. I see comfort as something I have sought all my life and I see I have gone after it at all costs! Perhaps there was a time that comfort served its purpose, not that I want to be uncomfortable, but there come times when comfort as the end game becomes destructive and weak and soul crushing. Which is what brings me to grouchy, irritable and restless. If not caught in the beginning stages it would not be beyond me, left unchecked, to burn everything and everyone to the ground. Ask me how I know.
Years ago, I sought comfort in scrambling for security and stability when losing a business and marriage while providing for raising three young children. Comfort is good when under all that turmoil but now that the kids are grown and out of the house pursuing that comfort becomes a crutch that is unsatisfying and distasteful. I don’t wear that well. It morphed me into a weak, powerless, directionless pinball caroming this way and that. (John 3:8 NIV) Not a position of certainty nor one of clarity and purpose but one spent reacting to circumstances while bouncing around from one thing to the next. Get a grip!
If there is no course to point toward or no goal to aim at then comfort becomes a dead-end crutch that is …..wait for it……meaningless. If sin is to miss the mark, then what is it when I am not even aiming at anything at all? Doomed to be upended by some tragedy that is sure to come. Comfort is just a big sigh when faced with all the possibilities of another day. William Blake was talking about the pitfalls of comfort when he wrote; “Those who restrain desire do so because theirs is weak enough to be restrained. And being restrained it does by degrees become passive until at last it is nothing but a shadow of a desire”. (The Marriage of Heaven and Hell)
I began to see comfort and my comfortable life as worshipping an idol for it is put before everything else. Including dreams, passions and desires that are put at risk to being shelved by the allure of comfort. How pervasive and innocuous comfort is. For it lulled me to sleep and before you know it life has passed me by. I woke up when alerted to my grouchiness. I became afraid I was going to repeat past mistakes because I knew what they looked and felt like. Over the years then I see I did not change gears nor my perspective and awareness. I hadn’t moved my role from provider and stabilizer to a new role as my circumstances changed. When failing to fully step into a new role the actions that worked before just become bad habits because they no longer fit. If circumstances demand a new role what becomes of the man who does not accept, embrace or step into a new role?
When the Holy Spirit told me, “don’t say no” to an invitation to attend a Bible study little did I know how my life would change in such a meaningful and drastic manner. Today, in day 25 of a 30-day quest to find out what it means to live for God I see Jesus asking me to step into my power by using the spiritual gifts He has so graciously given. The gifts are to give power, meaning and action to change as the roles in life change. Nothing stays the same. New circumstances, new role and a new life is required that has Jesus as the number one! I need to step out of my own way and offer my life to Jesus as He is the giver, provider and advocate who works on my behalf. I defer to Him as creator, savior, redeemer and friend in all seriousness as the game changer in my perspective and awareness. By giving it all to Him gives meaning suddenly to who I am, who I want to be and who I want to become. Freedom really is what He brings as I am no longer a captive to my own limitations.
Have you seen those Chinese Tomb Guardians
Chinese Tomb Guardians, a poem by Robert Bly (excerpt)
Left at the closed door?
They stand with one knee raised and they,
Half stand, half dance, half rage.
They are hot tempered muscle bulgers,
Big knee’d brow bulgers,
And they stand for eternity at the half risen.
What do you have that can get past them?