Weeping Season

I should warn you this post is about some of my confusions regarding Christianity especially in concerns to the topic of suffering. You might not find it interesting if a) you are not a Christian or b) if you are the kind of Christian that doesn't like to wrestle with your faith, but Ii would encourage you to read it anyways because I like hearing from people who disagree with me. I am not sure at what stage in my life we knew each other. That is actually one of the things I love about social media. I never know when someone I have not spoken to in years is going to engage with me again and I love nothing more than hearing different perspectives. So, just to make sure we are all on the same page let me catch you up real quick. These days I am calling myself a Christian again after years of saying I was agnostic although I am not a very good Christian. I still have a lot of questions about my faith and I sometimes feel that if you are a Christian with questions then people question if you are really a Christian, but I think honesty is really important. Having explained all of that let us get to the questions on my mind right now:

There is a Hillsong song - As You Find Me - that has this line in it "Your love is too good to leave me here."

Whenever I hear it at my Church, which is often, my brain breaks into chaos.

What in the figurative fire monkeys does that even mean?

Places where Christians can find themselves for very long periods of time despite being loved by God:

• Unable to pay bills
• Jobless
• In a really draining job
• Homeless
• Hungry
• Depressed
• Anxious
• Dealing with an addiction
• Dealing with an eating disorder
• Struggling with a different mental illness
• Sick
• Lonely
• Dealing with insomnia
• Grieving the loss of a loved one
• Dealing with really difficult conflict 

Christians LOVE to talk about how God will provide.

Even the Bible talks about this stuff.

Matthew 6:26-34

26 Look at the birds of the air: they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they? 27 And which of you by being anxious can add a single hour to his span of life?[a] 28 And why are you anxious about clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow: they neither toil nor spin, 29 yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these. 30 But if God so clothes the grass of the field, which today is alive and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will he not much more clothe you, O you of little faith? 31 Therefore do not be anxious, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ 32 For the Gentiles seek after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them all. 33 But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you. 34 “Therefore do not be anxious about tomorrow, for tomorrow will be anxious for itself. Sufficient for the day is its own trouble.

Matthew 7: 9-11

9 Or which one of you, if his son asks him for bread, will give him a stone? 10 Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a serpent? 11 If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father who is in heaven give good things to those who ask him!

If the Bible says God will take care of us why are some people not being taken care of? The typical response to such questions is to talk about God's will and God's timing.

If you ask for something and you don't get it maybe it isn't his will, maybe he has something better for you, or maybe it is his will, but just not yet.

To the God's will point: what if the thing that someone is asking for is something that they were created to need like sleep, clean water, food, shelter, or community. Are you really trying to tell me that it is not God's will for needs to be fulfilled that HE CREATED. He could have built us as robots that do not need any fuel (emotional fuel like friendship or physical fuel like food) but he didn't.

To the God's timing point: it kind of makes sense to me. For example, back in the day before I fell in love I really disliked how people acted like single Christians should just be at peace as if they were not allowed to long for something else when the freaking beginning of the Bible says "18 Then the Lord God said, “It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him a helper fit for him.”" (Genesis 2:18). However, despite the fact that I felt that I was designed to be in a relationship did not mean that it was the time at that point. So if you are created with a need that has not yet been fulfilled what should you do?

Philippians 4:6-7

6 do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. 7 And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.

OK, great, but what about when it doesn't?

There are a few other bits of comfort that I have found in the bible, but they are not that helpful.

For one thing there is the whole go to heaven when we die stuff.

Revelation 21:1-4

21 Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more. 2 And I saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. 3 And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Behold, the dwelling place[a] of God is with man. He will dwell with them, and they will be his people,[b] and God himself will be with them as their God.[c] 4 He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away.”

However, I am 27 (almost 28) years old, and apparently the average life expectancy for a female in the United States is 81, which means, if Jesus does not come back soon, I may have to suffer for another 53 years before I go to heaven.

Then we have the idea that God is with us and also the idea that he will help us even if he does not remove a difficult situation.

Isaiah 41:10

fear not, for I am with you;
be not dismayed, for I am your God;
I will strengthen you, I will help you,
I will uphold you with my righteous right hand.

But if you can't tell that he is helping/ strengthening you and if you can't hear God's voice or understand the Bible very well (I won't be at all surprised if someone lets me know I have misunderstood all the verses I have quoted here I am a very stupid human being), then what comfort is it to know that God is with you especially if you have an unmet need as discussed above?

The only thing I have to cling to after all of this is the idea that maybe sometimes we just need to grieve.

I have been a part of 9 different churches over the course of 28 years spanning everything from Pentecostal to Calvinist and I have picked up this feeling that a lot of Christians really feel like they have some sort of holy obligation to be happy about everything. I don't really understand why. I mean sure, there are verses like Philippians 4:4 (which says: "4 Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, rejoice.") which kind of suggest that we always need to be thankful and trust the Lord. Thankfulness I guess I get because even if nothing else has been given to me by God - which is not so as I have my health, my husband, and my mom just for starters - at the very least he has given me salvation. I will probably never understand why sin (something it doesn't even seem to be possible to not do if you are not Jesus since apparently everyone else has sinned - see Romans 3:23 "For all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God.") deserves to be punished with death (see Romans 6:23 "For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord"), but I also would rather worship a God who makes no sense to me because he is bigger than my brain than one I made up so I could understand it even though my understanding of everything else is limited by my humanity. At any rate, I am thankful for the gift of salvation even though I wish Jesus did not have to die for it. However, my thankfulness is still not enough to make me feel capable of rejoicing in the midst of suffering and I don't understand why so many Christians act like it is not OK to admit that. Have you read Psalms? Are you aware of how dramatically sorrowful the author can get? I really relate to Psalm 25:16 it isn't the most dramatic, but in it the author talks about being lonely ("Turn to me and be gracious to me, for I am lonely and afflicted") and loneliness is something I feel all the time.

In addition to the Psalms as proof that it is apparently OK to not put on a fake smile all the time there is also Ecclesiastes 3:1-8

3 For everything there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven:
2 a time to be born, and a time to die;
a time to plant, and a time to pluck up what is planted;
3 a time to kill, and a time to heal;
a time to break down, and a time to build up;
4 a time to weep, and a time to laugh;
a time to mourn, and a time to dance;
5 a time to cast away stones, and a time to gather stones together;
a time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing;
6 a time to seek, and a time to lose;
a time to keep, and a time to cast away;
7 a time to tear, and a time to sew;
a time to keep silence, and a time to speak;
8 a time to love, and a time to hate;
a time for war, and a time for peace.

I guess I am just in my weeping season. I have no clue when it will end or how exactly to weather these storms, but maybe there is a purpose to weeping. Have you seen "Inside Out"? It is one of my favourite movies. Maybe I am asking you a question about how to have peace in Christ, or maybe I am showing you that it is OK to grieve. I have no idea.