My bride and I recently celebrated our 25th wedding anniversary and I have to admit it wasn’t what I expected our 25th wedding anniversary might look like. I guess I’m a hopeless romantic and thought that we would go out somewhere for dinner, enjoy great conversation over good food, and spend the evening together reminiscing about the past or maybe dreaming about the future but that’s not what happened…You see, life didn’t stop because we have spent 25 years together. If anything, our 25 years have woven together a complexity of events and circumstances that have left me scratching my head and questioning not only the path we’re on, but God’s very presence on said path. “Why did I spend all of years on a vocation I no longer work?” “Did I miss my calling?” and even the “unthinkable” question… “Is God even here?”
aren’t uncommon as the narratives of the years play over and over in my head. To be honest, looking back over the events, and even worse, the people I thought to be trustworthy who proved otherwise, it’s really hard not to be cynical and jaded.
Now, I need to push pause at this point in the narrative so I can address what I sense are some strong feelings that the paragraph above is likely invoking in some – I know it certainly invokes them as I write. For example, some might be feeling prompted to use their gift of prophetic exhortation and declare that I shouldn’t feel jaded and cynical. If that is you, please know I understand, but here’s the thing, I do. So please, fight the temptation to offer up what should or should not be and simply sit with me in the tension for a moment (I’m going somewhere with this, I promise). Perhaps you’re feeling saddened at the circumstances and are sensing the call of God to remind me that God knows the plans that He has for us, plans for welfare and not evil, to give us a future and hope (Jeremiah 29:11). If that is you, please be careful not to remove Jeremiah 29:11 from Jeremiah 29:1-10. (For those who aren’t as familiar Jeremiah 29:1-10, it basically says that the people of Israel will be stuck in captivity in Babylon for 70 years so they might as well make it their home because they aren’t going back to the promised land in their lifetime – So yeah, God has a plan but is anyone really willing to wait the rest of their lives to see it play out. Most, I dare say, are not).
So, while some may look at these life circumstances and respond with the advice noted above, my heart and mind are drawn to the truth found in the story of John the Baptist as he struggled with life in prison: Now when John heard in prison about the deeds of the Christ, he sent word by his disciples and said to him, “Are you the one who is to come, or shall we look for another?” – Matthew 11:2-3 (ESV)
Did you catch that? If not, go back and read it again…John the Baptist is in prison and is having a crisis of faith because of his circumstances! This is John the Baptist, not John Q Public. This is the same John the Baptist who stood in the middle of the Jordan River and Baptized Jesus; the same John who watched the heavens open up and the Spirit of God descend on Jesus as a dove; and the same man who heard the voice of God say, and I quote, “THIS is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased.” This is the same John the Baptist who told his disciples that “(Jesus) must increase and I must decrease.” This same John is experiencing a life that he never envisioned and he’s now questioning the path he is on – even questioning whether God is with him. And friends, THAT is what I find so encouraging in the middle of my story….that when things don’t make sense and things aren’t going like I thought they would or should; when my children’s independence rears up in disrespect to their mom and I, when there’s more month at the end of the money, when people who have done evil to me or to people I dearly love are getting away with it, I can go to God with my struggles, with my doubts and disillusions, and cry out from my soul, “Are you really you!?! Do you even care!?!”
And God, who, unthreatened by the passionate audacity of the question, answers back from the midst of the storm: “Go and tell John what you hear and see: the blind receive their sight and the lame walk, lepers are cleansed and the deaf hear, and the dead are raised up, and the poor have good news preached to them. And blessed is the one who is not offended by me.” Matthew 11:4-6 (ESV)
The complexity of events hasn’t eased. It hasn’t gone away and it doesn’t look like it’s going to change anytime soon. But, even if life isn’t going like I think it should, or maybe life isn’t going like you think it should, we can see God working in me and you and the lives of others. As I stop and look in my life, I see people who couldn’t see God when we first met, are starting to see Him working in their world, people who wouldn’t walk with God before are bravely starting to inch closer to Him, and the good news is being shared in areas that I would have NEVER been allowed to enter had I used my pastoral gifts inside the four walls of a religious institution. So, perhaps God is doing something good in the midst of the chaos and rather than wallow in the view of the circumstances, the best plan might be to simply not be offended by the circumstances. And Jesus answered (John’s Discples)….”And blessed is the one who is not offended by me.” – Matthew 11:6 (ESV)