Cuts Like a Knife: Living Among Broken People

I've received a lot of cuts over the course of the 45 years I've walked on this earth.  Many of them were self-induced, like the time I pretended to be Superman in the back seat of my grandma's station wagon.  I had suspended my upper torso over the top of the front seat while dangling my legs over the top of the back seat, and then, with arms thrust out, I yelled, "Look!  It's a bird!  It's a plane!  No, it's--"  I didn't get the last part out.  Did I mention that my grandmother was driving at the time?  She hit the brakes, and I actually went airborne--for all of about two feet--until I landed face-first into the dash and split my forehead open.  That could be why I'm more of a Marvel comics fan these days, and perhaps why I'm addled enough to do what I do.

I've also tried high-jumping over a barbed wire fence (to escape an angry pit bull), attempted to carry a melted trash can that had jagged pieces of glass embedded in it, and caught my hand on an upturned corner of sheet metal as I tried to dunk a basketball.  I have the scars to prove it.

But the scars that hurt me the most are the ones you can't see.  They're the scars I've received from other's words and actions.

You know what I mean if you've ever:

- Been lied to or about by a close friend.
- Been belittled by someone you admired.
- Been betrayed by someone you love.
- Been the butt of jokes.
- Been picked on by a bully.

These and other experiences in my life have persuaded me that whoever wrote the song "Sticks and Stones" must have been a deaf hermit.  The words and actions of others hurt way more than physical blows, and they leave much deeper scars.

But here's the deal.  In each of all the scenarios I listed above, I have to say that I've also been on the giving end.  I've lied to or about close friends, belittled others, betrayed someone I love, made cutting jokes about others, and bullied yet more.

We're all broken people, and broken people have sharp edges.

I think that's why Jesus made forgiving one another such a high priority for his followers.  He knew that if we were going to stick together, odds were that we'd come into contact with the sharp edges of those around us, and we'd get cut.

I've seen people handle these kinds of cuts in different ways.  Some choose to avoid as much contact as they can.  They isolate themselves from others, placing themselves in a social bubble.  But man was not made to live alone, and such a tactic leads to an empty life.  German philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer likened these people to porcupines on a cold winter's night, who unable to huddle together because of their sharp quills, drifted apart and froze to death.

Still others choose to pick at the scabs, keeping the wounds fresh and bleeding.  Refusing to let the hurt the go, they nurse it, dwell on it, allow a root of bitterness to grow within them until their entire existence is consumed by nothing more than pain, anger, and hatred.  Such people are miserable, and, quite frankly, are miserable to be around.

There is a better way.  It is to allow God's grace to do more than simply wash us clean; it is to allow his grace to heal our cuts and to soften our edges.  When we realize the amazing depth of God's relentless love for us, that despite all the wrongs we have done to him, he offers us forgiveness, how can we not but forgive others?

The first step in releasing others from what they've done to us is to realize that in Christ Jesus, God has released us from what we've done to him.  In order for us to dispense grace, we must first receive it ourselves.

The next time I get cut, I'm going to do my best to apply God's grace and extend forgiveness to the one who inflicted it.  I think the church would be a much better example of God's love if we all tried the same.

Getting Real with God

Last night and this morning, I stared at the darkened ceiling and mulled over which was worse—bad dreams or insomnia.  There are many situations going on in our life and in our circle of family and friends that are tragic, decisions that are life-altering, outcomes that have the potential to push people on the edge of trust into the abyss of unbelief, and I have little or no control over them.  Usually I can quiet my mind by giving these things to God and trusting him to work according to his good will and relentless love for us.  I can sing “Lord, You Are More Precious than Silver” in my heart, feel his presence, approval, and delight, and get to sleep.  Not so much these past few days.

Before you ask, no, I’m not depressed.  I’m not having a crisis of faith. I’m not spiritually dry.  I’m simply troubled.  I’m troubled by a world where cancer prevails more often than not, where some parents have their children ripped away from them while others are free to abuse theirs, a place where good men and women seeking to serve God and others are often beat up by the very people they’re trying to serve, a place where commitment is cheap and relationships are disposable, a place where kindness and mercy are seen as weaknesses and where anger and contempt seem to be the prevailing sentiments of the day.  It’s a place where, as a wounded healer, I often feel powerless to make a difference and here lately wonder how much longer I’ll even have the opportunity to try.

Followers of Jesus will often try to hide from these nagging observations.  We try to hand out pat answers to ourselves and to those around us when tragedy strikes.  We turn the other way, focus on the good, look heavenward, and wait for better days.  We know that Christ wanted us to live the abundant life not just in the hereafter but in the here and now, but quite frankly, that can often seem like just so much wishful thinking, can’t it?

The psalmists were not a “pie in the sky, sweet by and by” lot like many of us modern day Christians try or pretend to be.  Of the 150 Psalms in the Bible, over a third of them are what we call “laments,” songs composed by those who found themselves in the crucible of tragic loss, overwhelming defeat, bitter betrayal, self-destructive behavior, and even imminent death.  Here is where we find such questions as:  “O Lord God of hosts, how long will you be angry with your people’s prayers?  You have fed them with the bread of tears and given them tears to drink in full measure.”  “Why, O Lord, do you stand far away?  Why do you hide yourself in times of trouble?”  “Lord, where is your steadfast love . . . ?”  “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”  As the writer of Psalm 137 rightly observes, sometimes our circumstances make it just downright difficult (impossible?) to sing the song of the Lord while in the midst of a world that makes no sense.

If I want to get real with God, I go to the Psalms.  I find comfort in the fact that it’s okay to express outrage, to have doubts, to call out God when things don’t make sense to me.  In the Psalms I see a God with big shoulders, a God who knows that in our finite knowledge and understanding, we’re just not going to be able to box up all the horrible junk that happens around us and to us into some neat, tidy, theological package and go about with dry cheeks and painted-on smiles.

We all know how disastrous it can be to yell at our fathers or at our bosses when we think they’ve dealt us an unfair hand.  Usually the consequences of such outbursts are quite painful.  Not so with God.  He simply weathers our rage, our finger-pointing, our limited understanding of his ways and his plans, and, if we allow him, he will draw near after we are spent to dry our tears with his gentle touch and wrap us in his tender embrace.  Most of the laments in the book of Psalms end with this kind of consolation and expression of hope.

We serve a God whose ways, quite honestly, often don’t make sense to us.  And that’s a good thing, because the greatest oddity about God to me is that irrespective of anything I have done or haven’t done, he has an undiminished love for me.  The most senseless act in the world was that while I was still his enemy, God laid down his Son’s life for the chance that I might turn to him and return his crazy love for me.

I don’t expect that the bad dreams or insomnia will go away overnight because I’ve read a few Psalms or reflected on God’s love for me.  I am a troubled soul living in troubling times.  But tonight I will once again sing “Lord, You Are More Precious than Silver” in my heart as I lay my head down on my pillow.  And despite what has come or will come, I will rest in the fact that I am his and he is mine. And though I don’t have all the answers, he does, and I will wait on him.