Saturday, September 27, 2014

A Time to Contemplate

Fisherman's Cottage by Harald Sohlberg

So teach us to number our days that we may get a heart of wisdom...Satisfy us in the morning with your steadfast love, that we may rejoice and be glad all our days...Let the favor of the Lord our God be upon us, and establish the work of our hands upon us; yes, establish the work of our hands! (Psalm 90:12, 14, 17)


In April 2012, I was diagnosed with musK myasthenia gravis, a neuro-muscular, auto immune disorder that greatly compromised the strength of my voluntary muscles. Without treatment, I would be feeling tired and weak all the time—seeing double, having difficulty keeping my eyelids up, swallowing, walking, holding my head, speaking, and breathing.  The first symptom of double vision manifested itself in November 2011, soon to be followed by others, one after another.  In the months prior to proper diagnosis and treatment, I was quite afraid, not knowing what to expect as the muscles of my body shut down one after another.

Since the medication kicked in, I have been able to function better, some days better than others. When I am feeling well, I forget (and let those around me forget) that I have this chronic illness, and that I am artificially propped up by steroids.  I did not want MG to define me, determined to live life as normally as I had been, adamant about not letting it limit me.

Lately, however, I am beginning to question the wisdom of it all.  Yes, MG does not define me, but like it or not, it is as much a part of who I am now as my age, ethnicity, marital status, etc. As a married woman, for example, my lifestyle is different from that of a single woman in many respects. As someone living with MG, why do I think I could live life like I used to? Or worse, live life like others who are in good health?  Instead of battling my new status, I need to learn to embrace it with grace.  It will hopefully cut down on the lament and the envy. 

It is in accepting the limits that this sickness has set on me that I can begin to live life fully within its constraints.  It will not be the life I used to have as I am no longer the physically healthy me. But I can become a better me by accepting and living within my new limitations.  There will be times I will disappoint those around me, especially myself, because we live in a world that values outward accomplishment and activity, both of which will now be much curtailed for me.

Living with MG happily allows me to lead a more contemplative life. The need to close my eyes throughout the day provides me with time to think and especially to pray.  Because of my limited energy, I am now forced to eliminate or restrict unnecessary activities and concerns.  To conserve the strength of my eyes, I learn to rely more on my ears--to listen to the Bible, to books like Middlemarch read by Juliet Stevenson, to sermons by Sinclair Ferguson and Tim Keller, and to the great music of Chopin, Rachmaninoff, and Schubert.  Though my voice may sound crackly and my words garbled at times, I can still laugh (though crookedly) and jibber-jabber with family and friends (maybe not for long nor with as much wit!).

And above all, the constant need to rest assures me of time alone with my God, to come to him for love, respite, comfort, and strength...to reach up to my Heavenly Father for his warm, loving embrace throughout the day!

I say, that sounds to me like a pretty full and special way to live!
 

Tuesday, September 9, 2014

It's all about me!

Painting by Harald Sohlberg

"Our selfishness knows no bounds.  In more or less naïve self-love we look upon everything in our environment with which we come in contact as our agencies, as things which exist for our sakes, something for us to make use of and utilize to our own advantage. We think and act as though everything, inanimate things, plants, animals, human beings, even our own souls, were created for the purpose of bringing gratification to our selfish desires.

And we make no exception of God.


As soon as we encounter him, we immediately look upon him as another means of gaining our own ends. Natural persons in their relation to God have this one purpose more or less consciously in mind: How can I, in the best way, make use of God for my own personal advantage? How can I make him serve me best now, in the future and throughout all eternity?


Natural persons look upon prayer, too, in this light. How can I make use of prayer to the greatest possible advantage for myself? This is the reason why the natural person seldom finds that it pays to pray regularly to God. It requires too much effort, takes too much time and is on the whole impractical, for the simple reason that one even forgets to pray.


But when the same person gets into trouble in one form or another and cannot help themselves or get help from anybody else, then they think that it might pay to pray to God. They then pray to him incessantly, often crying aloud in their distress.


And when God does not put himself at their disposal immediately and answer them, they are not only surprised, but disappointed and offended, deeply offended.


Why should there be a God, if he is not at the disposal of those who need him? That God should exist for any purpose then to satisfy people's selfish desires 
does not even occur to such people.

Many are they after an experience of this kind are forever done with prayer. When you cannot get what you ask for, and in times of great need even ask for imploringly, why should you pray?
"       

from Prayer by Ole Hallesby
 
The above passage by Norwegian theologian, Ole Hallesby, caused me to pause.  Throughout the day, how often do I consciously or unconsciously try to manipulate other people and things, let alone God, for my own personal advantage?  Even with such a lofty endeavor as praying, I often loom big, making God small.  Not your will, O Lord, but my will be done!

Monday, September 1, 2014

Pray Earnestly


Jean Francois Millet, The Gleaners, 1857

Then he said to his disciples, “The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few; therefore pray earnestly to the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into his harvest.” 
Matthew 9:37-38

I woke up this morning thinking of this verse and have been mulling over it since.  I am not so much dwelling on the part about the harvest being plentiful but that section on prayer.  Notice that Jesus  said "...therefore pray earnestly to the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into his harvest."   He did not say "...therefore go send out laborers into the harvest."  Don't you think, more often than not, that we go about our activities (especially supposedly Christian activities), planning on how things should get done, then carrying them out, and along the way quickly whispering a prayer, using it like a lucky charm so that the things we have planned will go well?  We are more inclined to plan, do and then maybe pray.  In complete reversal of what Jesus is teaching in this passage. Think about it, how many times have we heard this passage used as an endorsement to send out Christian workers, emphasizing on the sending and not even touching on the praying!

I wonder what it would be like if when I see a need or have a concern that I first pray earnestly to the Lord of the situation to send his help into the situation...to pray earnestly and patiently seek his will.  I have to admit that it would be quite hard for me to do.  Quite counter-intuitive.  But I can certainly start by praying earnestly for the Holy Spirit to work that mindset so taught by our Lord Jesus into my being.