Bitterness.

As would be evident to anyone reading my blog or talking to me for more than a few minutes, I have really been mired in self-pity and resentment towards God for a long time. I'm tired of living this way, and yet I have felt powerless to change. The idols just won't leap down from their pedestals.

Last month I wrote a paper reviewing the book How Long, O Lord?: Reflections on Suffering and Evil by D.A. Carson, and I found that a delicate balance is needed for me to understand my own life in light of what this book teaches. Perhaps the "suffering" of unwanted singleness is not on the same order as that of people who endure hunger, or persecution, or severe illness or disability. Yet it can produce the same effects. Carson writes: "Pain tends to make people better, or bitter. If we find it developing in us a pattern of bitterness, we are in desperate straits." (p.108)

And here is where I found myself, at the intersection of bitterness and self-pity. I found the book's chapter on Job to be particularly enlightening. "Job wants personal vindication by God himself. He wants God to appear and give an account of what He is doing." (p. 147). Similarly, when undergoing difficulty or trial, we often "assume that God owes us an explanation, that there cannot possibly be any good reason for God not to tell us everything we want to know immediately. [We] assume that God Almighty should be more interested in giving us explanations than in being worshiped and trusted." (p. 152-153).

So I found it humbling to read that "Job's greatest sin may not be something he said or did before the suffering started, but the rebellion he is displaying in the suffering." (p.149-150).

Mine too.

I don't know if the book and the paper just needed time to "marinate" a little bit in my heart, or if someone was really praying for me this week (thank you!). Maybe both. But suddenly this week, I feel as though a burden is starting to lift... as though I really can trust that whatever the future holds, God will be there, and it will be good; as though I really can loosen my death-grip on the dream of marriage and a biological family of my own.

Rather than demanding of God, "What are You going to do for me?"... it's going to be refreshing to ask Him, "What can I do for You?"

Oy.

Can we say overcommitted?

This fall has been an interesting exercise in time management for me. Travelling, 2 Bible studies and a prayer group, class, and oh yeah, work.

Now, just as the madness of The Holidays begins, I feel as though I'm entering a season of (relative) rest. Which means I might actually have time to blog again.

"Soon."