I read Psalm 88 last week, and while I'm certain I've read it before, it really struck me how utterly depressing it is. Often in Psalms, the psalmist will start out voicing to God his struggles, and then finish up with how his problems got resolved. Not so with this one; there is no resolution, just pure trials and feeling abandoned by God on top of the rest of his struggles. I won't paste it on the blog, read it on your own if you like, or just take my word for it. What struck me is when you compare them to the familiar verses in new testament the James 1:2 Count it all joy, my brothers, when you meet trials of various kinds,3 for you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness.4 And let steadfastness have its full effect, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing.
That sounds much better, doesn't it? With the struggles, the trials, when our response isn't bitterness, but trust, we actually benefit from our struggles. What believer doesn't want steadfastness? Who doesn't want to be perfect and complete? I want to lack nothing! This is encouraging to me, on a number of levels. Yesterday while speaking at church, I likened myself to an ox, pulling a plow. This particular ox, God saw fit to bless me with a love of the feel of the strain of the harness. I like to work, and to a certain extent, I kind of don't even really care what work it is, as long as it feels like it has a purpose. When I say work, I don't mean necessarily the paying kind of work or the job kind of work, but I mean just doing what is before me, whether it is the work of an elder in my church, the work of a husband to Herself, or as doing the work around my house. It just gives me a sense of accomplishment.
The problem comes when I feel the trials become more or different than expected. I'm just pulling the plow around the field, happy as can be, without any expectation that my work should be anything more than work. I have no expectation that it should be all fun and games. But then bam! Something heavy gets dropped onto my plow. Sometimes if turn my big fuzzy ox head just right, I can see what it is that gets dropped onto my plow. Sometimes when I see what it is, it makes it easier to pull: Oh, I'm pulling that for Herself, the Beautiful Brynn, or That's OK, son, I can carry that to for you, or Oh, that's ok, I'm ok with pulling that for my brother/sister. Other times it's just confusing, here are a few examples: Really, a sinus infection? Oh, I didn't really realize that strep throat was what I needed right now. Seriously, TWELVE bee stings? But really, there isn't much difference in the stressors or the trials that we encounter, it is only our attitude towards them. If we see a trial and embrace it for the benefit of our walk with Christ, we don't turn bitter about it and we grow from it. If we see a trial and fear and loathe it, then we get no benefit from it at all, and it is just suffering for suffering's sake, which anyone will tell you that is just plain miserable.
So the culmination and the point of all this is this: You CAN'T do it, you CAN'T pull the plow on your own when these extra loads get dropped on you, despite your willingness to accept the trials. At times, you lean into the harness so hard and you feel like the traces will snap even if you don't, but you aren't going anywhere at all, and you are tired, so exhausted. So what do you do? Here's what I have learned when you feel something else dropped on whatever you are already carrying and you are overwhelmed with confusion and indecision: You lift your big hairy head and you let out the loudest and longest bellow you can muster from your lungs for help from the Master of the Field. On this one you can trust me, just skip right over the master of the plough (whoever it is behind you lashing you and yelling at you), and go straight to the top, the one that has the master plan for what gets planted and what gets harvested. And then you just try to keep moving. Pump those legs in the direction you are meant to go even though you feel you can't, you know you can't budge the load, and you do it because you know this is the direction you are meant to go.
It hurts, God knows it hurts. I'm not saying it doesn't hurt, and I'm not saying it won't continue to hurt, but what you get out of it is two things: Number one, the Master of the Field is faithful to reply to your hurting call. In my own life, He doesn't just show up with a wand and "wish" all my problems away, but sometime after (always seems like a long time) I bellow out my cry for help I feel the hand of the Master on my flank, kind of pushing, kind of prodding, but mostly just using the pressure letting me know that He is there, and its going to be alright, that he gave me this load because it is good for me and its good for the overarching plan he has for the field. The reason you keep pumping your legs in a forward direction is because it is way harder to start again after you've stopped. Number two is by the time you've noticed that you aren't really stuck anymore and that you are actually moving, you are a different and better person, more perfect and your faith is more complete. And those two things combined make it all worth it.
Until the next time when you have to do it all over again. Hey, suck it up, Buttercup, I never said plowing was easy...
