Tuesday's Trust - Changes that Matter ~ What is it about "No" that we don't Know?

Tuesday's Trust

Changes that Matter

~

What is it about "No" that we don't Know?

Just as your life is not the same after the death of your child, so too your spiritual life is not the same. It will be challenged. Every part of your life will be challenged, even your walk with God. Beliefs that you had will be changed.

Everything is impacted. Our relationships will change. Even our relationship with God will change as we walk through this Valley of the Shadow of Death.

God is showing me new things in His Word - His very Word that I have read and studied since a small child. Last night, He led me to a verse that shocked me. It is right in the thick of the New Testament but I don't think I really had ever "seen" it before.

Did you know that Jesus cried out to His Father with tears and loud cries ~ to the Father who IS the God of love, who loves His Child with every fiber of His being. And yet, as sweet and pure and deep as their relationship was, God answered His Own Son -- His Only Son's pleas with a heart-filled, love-filled, but surely a broken-hearted, "No."

During the days of Jesus' life on earth, He offered up prayers and petitions with loud cries and tears to the One who could save Him from death, and He was heard because of His reverent submission. Although He was a Son, He learned obedience from what He suffered, and once made perfect, He became the Source of eternal salvation for all who obey Him and was designated by God to be (our) High Priest.

~Hebrews 5:7-10 NIV

What do we do with that?!

What did each of us do when God heard our prayers, maybe even prayers our children might have prayed, but His answer was, "No"...

Can we believe this loving God still loves us and that He dearly loves our child? There is much hidden that will not be known now. How will this confusion about God and His ways, His purposes, His plans for our lives play out?

And yet when we urgently prayed for what is one of the MOST important things in our lives, the well-being of our child, the safety of our child, the very life of our child, God's answer was, "No" ???!!!

What now do we do with that? How are we to grapple with that in our relationship with Him today? How are we to understand that answer from our God of Love?

This scripture inspired the following poem:

What is it about "NO" that we don't Know?

Loud cries, tears poured out to One who could save...

Jesus was heard, but God's answer was, "No"?!

E'en though daily, each of us in love He does bathe,

God has a Master-plan only He does know.

Our prayers for our children, poured out in love,

Must have been heard by our God above.

Why His answer was "No," we won't understand

Until someday in Heav'n when before Him we'll stand.

Then we will see how each detail fits in

To God's plan of love that e'en covers each sin.

Jesus learned obedience through what He did suffer...

God didn't spare His Son ~ Why then should us, He buffer?

Jesus bowed in reverent submission.

Will we entrust our lives with "carte blanche" permission?

Jesus is our source now of eternal salvation...

Do we believe God can use life, death, e'en grief's stagnation?

May we entrust our hearts and souls to Him,

Knowing He acts in love, e'en at Great Cost to Him...

Cost that surely must have made Him suffer, mourn and weep

That He could deny His Son, His Only Son. His life,

His Own breath, His Own life-blood, His Own heart-beat...

That He might on this day come and rescue our child's life?

Pictures thanks to FotoSearch.com

Scripture: Hebrews 5:7-10 New International Version

Poem - What is it about "No" that we don't Know - Angie Bennett Prince - 12/20/10

Tuesday’s Trust - What Do You Do When You’re Terrified of Jesus? - by Tommy Prince

Tuesday’s Trust

What Do You Do When You’re Terrified of Jesus?

by

Tommy Prince

We can talk about trauma and being traumatized all day long, and those things are not to be minimized, and they must be walked through. But tell me,

What Do You Do When You’re Terrified of Jesus?

*******

Part of the “bereaved-parent tribal language” to describe the kind of life a person can expect to develop after the death of a child is described as a ‘New Normal’ life.

Now this much is what I KNOW:

Nothing in your life will ever be the same.

Every aspect of your life is affected by the death of your child.

Your emotional life intensifies.

Your physical life suffers.

Your mental functioning is called into question.

Your spiritual life is a total wreck.

Yet this is what I AM BEING TOLD:

To help cope and survive, I’m told I will develop a

“New Normal” life.


I’ll never forget the first time I heard this term, “new normal,” I was livid on the inside. I thought,

“There’s nothing ‘normal’ about anything I’m experiencing or will experience for the rest of my life! All I feel is devastation. What the hell is ‘normal’ about that? I can’t imagine the term ‘normal’ applying to any part of my life from this point on.”

The term "new abnormal," maybe.

The term "new normal," no.

Is a life filled with

· sadness,

· hypervigilance,

· irritability,

· fear, and

· uncontrollable bouts of crying

a “normal” life?

No, of course not! But now, I am told, it should be considered a "new normal" life?

To me the term ‘new normal’ is a polite way to say,

“Really, you’re screwed, but in several years you will develop—at best—a minimal level of functioning to cope with life. So, to encourage you and give you some sense of hope, we will call it a 'new normal.'”

But since I can’t come up with a better term right now that captures what I’m going through and where I’m headed, I will concede and use the bereaved tribal-language term of “New Normal.”

*******

Spiritual Trauma…

We talk about the irritability, fear, and uncontrollable bouts of crying being my “new normal,” but is this “new normal” also to include feeling terrorized by Jesus?

As I was journaling the other day, I realized I have not only been traumatized emotionally, physically and mentally but I have also been traumatized spiritually. By way of background, I wrote a post called I ASKED FOR BREAD AND GOT A STONE almost a year ago. Briefly this post was a description of what I went through as

I prayed to God intensely for months to watch over my daughter, only for her to … end up getting killed?!

Don’t think that won’t seriously mess you up.

Now, I find that a chill goes through me when I’m asked to pray for something or somebody. My insides just freeze up. I wouldn’t last three seconds in a Sunday school room or a Bible study where prayer requests are being taken.

I reluctantly must admit I mostly have been exposed to the ‘Consumer Benefits’ approach to evangelism and spirituality through the years. This approach basically says, “Come as you are, and look at all the things you can get—by saying this prayer, and tithing your money, etc.”

A “Consumer Benefits” approach to spirituality seems to include a delusion that one can use “sin management” to effectively run one’s life, and that one simply needs to just rub the side of the Jesus-Genie-Bible to get whatever one thinks one needs in life, and THAT should provide him/her the key to a successful spiritual life.

To begin to figure out how best to deal with my spiritual trauma, I find

o I cannot speak the tribal language of church and evangelism any more.

o I have not lost my faith or my trust in God.

o I have to question my assumptive beliefs and what I thought were truths.

There is some residual fallout from having gotten caught up in the “Consumer Benefits” philosophy of living the Christian life. While I struggle to find my bearings, right now

· I cannot approach my relationship with Jesus as I have before.

· I find it too terrifying to ask for ‘things’ or for ‘help.’

· I find that I can only ask for Him and Him alone.

For now, all I know is seeking Him-and-Him-alone is the only thing that gives me a modicum of comfort.

If seeking God-and-Him-alone is to be my “New Spiritual Normal,” I am fine with that.

Anything else terrifies me.

Thank you to my hubby for this post. May God use it to stir our hearts, and to direct our questions about who He is to Him...

picture: http://www.123rf.com/photo_4927989.html