Failure

     I am usually an introverted person.  I am not comfortable with this position of "my business" being on display for all the world to see.  Since that choice was taken out of my control, I jumped into writing this blog, thinking that if you know part of the story you should probably know the whole story.  But it is strange for me to write such personal things for the public to view, strangers and friends alike.

     I've really thought and prayed about what I should write about, and what direction this blog should take.  I concluded that if you are reading my posts, it's probably because you know me and my family and are interested in traveling this journey with me.  So I purposely write about who I am, where I am at, what I am feeling, and what God is doing in me.  I am in no position to teach or preach, nor do I have the expertise or training to do so.  Plus, you'd get bored and stop reading.  :)  I want this blog to be a public journal of a public journey, for those of you interested in coming along for the ride.

     So tonight I will write about something else intensely personal.  I haven't written about it earlier because it's hard for me to talk about.  But the subject keeps coming up, so I figure maybe one of you needs to hear what I've learned, and I'll take the risk and get uncomfortable and tell you about another piece of my journey.

     I've started reading a book called The Wounded Heart:  Hope for Adult Victims of Childhood Sexual Abuse, by Dan Allender.  I'm only on the second chapter, but I've already been amazed by what I've read.  I'm sure the book will come up again in future blogs.

     After starting the first chapter, I felt like an idiot.  I never viewed my husband as a victim of sexual abuse, in large part because he never viewed himself that way.  But just a few pages into this book, I could already identify several characteristics of his life that are common to abuse victims.  I can't believe that I never studied the subject before now!  And I think of myself as an intelligent person...  My stupidity amazes me.

     I began to think that perhaps God gave me ten years with this man to recognize who he truly is and help him get the healing he needed.  And I failed.  I didn't recognize the symptoms, even though it should have been obvious.  As a helpmate to an adult victim of childhood sexual abuse, I failed.  Miserably.

     And then I returned to church.  Our pastor was finishing the sermon series on sex.  And one text that he referenced was 1 Corinthians 13:

     Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud.  It does not 
     dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of
     wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects,
     always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. Love never fails.

     I was all those things for my husband.  The only fault I can find with myself from those verses is that I avoided the truth because the truth hurt.  The message I got that day was not the main point of the sermon, but it was what I needed to hear:  Love does not fail.  I did not fail my husband.

     To make sure I got the point, I received the same message later the same week.  I had not told anyone what I was feeling or thinking, not even my husband.  But one day during our phone call, he read to me something that he had written.  It included the text from 1 Corninthians 13.  He said that I had been all of those for him and added, "You did not fail me." 

     Really?  Almost the exact same message, twice in one week, from two different sources who had no idea what was going through my head.  I love it when God speaks like that.  When you just can't deny the "coincidence" of hearing exactly what you needed to hear in multiple ways.

     So, I got the message again this week.  I had a first meeting with a counselor, and before I had told her any of this, she said (you know what she said...), "You did not fail your husband."  Really?  I got the message before, so why are you still telling me now, God?  It's nice and all, but it doesn't seem necessary.

     I figure at this point, God's telling me to share the message.  Hence this blog post which feels so uncomfortable to write. 

     If you feel like a failure towards your spouse, child, parent, friend...  Evaluate yourself based on 1 Corinthians 13.  Have you truly loved?  If so, then you have not failed.

     If that's the message you need to hear, I pray you hear it multiple times, from multiple sources, just like I did.  And if I can have the honor of being one of those sources, it's worth the embarrassment and discomfort of sharing something so personal.

     Love does not fail.  Hold onto that truth with me.

His Letter

Here is a letter from my husband to our church, reposted here with his permission.

Dear Westport family:

The last few weeks I have sat and pondered how I could have let things get so out of control in my life. I have a lot of things I could blame: childhood trauma, help groups that didn’t “meet my needs”, a pastor who gave a quick fix without follow-up, but the truth is, I never let anyone know my heart. I couldn’t get the help I needed if I wasn’t honest! But I was afraid to be honest: afraid of losing my business and career; afraid of people judging me and pushing me away; afraid of losing my pride.

Sadly, I once told a youth group that sin is like bungee jumping – fun to jump from great heights without consequences. Now, looking back, I realize that sin ALWAYS has consequences. And, it really isn’t even fun to begin with.

I write to you a broken man. I have lost my business, my career, and much more. Yet, I now embrace Philippians 3:7-8, counting all my losses as gains. The fact that this is bringing me closer to God, and the healing process I’m longing for, is far greater than my losses.

Thank you, Westport, for being the hands and feet of Christ. Jesus met with sinners and met people at their point of need. You’ve been the same for me and my family. You did not turn on me and push me away as I feared. You pulled me close, and reached out to my family. You put our needs above your natural human desire to move away from the ugliness of my sin.

The journey before me will be hard. But knowing who I walk with, I look forward to it. I want to leave you with the verses that have meant the world to me these past weeks: Hebrews 12:4-13, 1 Peter 5:7, 1 John 1:9 and Philippians 4:4-7.

Victory?

     Several of you have mentioned the lapse of time since my last blog.  There are several reasons for my silence.  One is that I tend to blog when I wake up in the middle of the night, and I’ve been sleeping better.  Another is that I haven’t been clear about what to write.  There are so many thoughts and ideas and questions swirling around in my head.  I tend to wait until I feel compelled to write about something, to wait until those thoughts gel into something more solid that I can’t get out of my head without writing it out.

     I’ve been lying in bed just now trying to read my Bible, and I can’t focus.  I can’t concentrate.  I just keep thinking about an issue that has been on my heart for about two weeks now.  So I guess it’s time to write it out.

     I’ve been hesitant to write about this subject because I am afraid it will come across as disrespectful or argumentative to some.  Please know that that is not my aim.  In this instance, can we agree to disagree respectfully without judging each other?  You are welcome to your beliefs; here are my mine.

     I feel like I’ve been bombarded with the message that victory is ours for the taking, if we just reach out in faith and grab it.  God will provide whatever you need, if you can just “faith” your way to receiving it.  Again, no offense, but I cannot accept that philosophy right now.  Frankly, I think it’s bull ****.  (I practiced cussing with my pastor this week.  Gotta get some more practice in where I can.  J)

     Christians fail.  Frequently.  And it’s not a reflection on the depth of our faith.  Innocent people suffer at the hands of nature and/or other people through no fault of their own.  Where was God’s protection when my husband was molested as a child?  Where was God’s protection when the tsunami struck Japan?  Where is the victory in being bankrupt and publicly humiliated?

     I do not believe God promises us victory in our lives.  I do not believe God promises to meet our every need.  I do not believe God promises to protect us from sickness, injustice, or tragedy.

     So why do I stick with him?

     Cuz he’s bigger than that.

     The God I believe in is so big, that it doesn’t matter if I win or lose.  My husband struggled with his addiction for close to twenty years.  I’d like to believe he was very close to a victory, finally.  But you know what?  To God, it doesn’t make that much difference.  Whether my husband failed or not, God can turn it into a victory for himself.  He’s that big.  He can take my worst failure and turn it into a victory for himself.

     We as Christians are taught to expect victory if we pray about it and have enough faith.  I think that is unfair to us.  I truly think that the idea that “the power to kick your bad habits is already in you” actually hindered me from seeking true help for my husband because I had such complete faith and confidence that God could take the addiction away.  Yeah, God is powerful enough to take away any addiction, and through the Holy Spirit his power dwells in us.  But there’s more to the story!  How do you access that power?  Are you saying the right prayers?  Are you even fighting the right battle?  Some “bad habits” need professional help to be healed, and many others may need help from a friend.  To teach “empowerment” alone is incomplete.  It was unfair to me as a young wife, and it is insulting to me now.

     Can’t we teach failure?  Say, “Hey, guys.  God is all-powerful, and he could take away your problems if he wanted.  But sometimes he doesn’t.  Sometimes he lets us fail.  We fall flat on our faces, get crushed in the dust.  But he’s still good.  He still loves us.  He’s got a greater purpose.  He can bring a victory for himself out of your failure.  So expect some failures in your life.  Expect some unanswered prayers.  Cuz they’re gonna come.  And it’s not because you don’t have enough faith to prevent them.”  It may not be a popular theology, but it sure seems a lot more real to me!

     I’ve taught several times on the verse Philippians 4:19:  “And my God will meet all your needs according to his glorious riches in Christ Jesus.”  But I’ve come to the conclusion that this verse is not a universal promise to everyone in all situations, but a specific promise to the church at Philippi, and/or a general principle about how God blesses generous givers.  Because I cannot reconcile this promise with the millions of people in the world without access to clean water.  If this promise does not apply to the need of children in India for clean water, then how can I attempt to claim it for my own financial “needs?” 

     God doesn’t promise to give us everything we need to live on this earth.  If he did, everyone everywhere would have all their basic needs met, and we know that is factually untrue.  So what does he promise us?  Everything we need for spiritual life.  Salvation, forgiveness, hope, the Holy Spirit, love, joy, peace…  Spiritual needs – yes.  Physical needs – no.  So expect to be needy at some point in your life, and know that God hasn’t abandoned you.  Know that it’s probably not due to your lack of faith or sinful behavior.  It’s just the way life goes, and God will walk beside you all the way.

     Isn’t that a much more comforting thought?  Maybe it’s just me…

     Protection is the more difficult issue.  How could a loving God with the power to prevent a child from being raped stand by and allow it to happen?  Why does God not step in and protect innocent and faithful people more often than he does?

     I don’t have a good answer for that one.  One thought is that God does not violate the free will of the perpetrator.  But is a criminal’s free will really more important than the wholeness of a child?  That’s tough to believe.  Even if it is true, that doesn’t explain natural disasters.  Of course, some biblical passages suggest that the earth is deteriorating as a result of sin.  But more to the issue on my heart - disasters fall on Christians and non-Christians alike.  So is it fair to tie the idea of God’s protection to faith?

     Again, can’t we teach people to expect injustice in their lives?  That when diseases or disasters come, God is still there and still loves us?  That God was watching when they were abused as children and even though he didn’t stop it from happening, he has a plan for healing and redeeming them now?  That God sometimes protects us from crime, disease, and disaster, and sometimes he doesn’t?

     I believe in a God who can protect, but sometimes chooses not to.  I believe in a God who is all-powerful, but who sometimes allows his people to be crushed.  I don’t know why he does not grant victory and protection in every situation, especially for his own followers who have put their faith in him, but that is the reality of the world we live in.  Is it not?

     I believe in a God powerful enough to take a chronic illness and use it for his glory.  I believe in God big enough to take the injustice of a child’s sexual abuse and twist it for good.  I believe in a God strong enough to take away an addiction, but who has a greater purpose in refusing to do so. 

     God is on my side, whether I am victorious or not.  If I go into battle against an addiction and fail, it does not mean that God has left me, or is not powerful, or that I just need to have more faith.  If I were to be swept away by a tsunami, it would not be a reflection on God’s goodness, faithfulness, justice, or love, nor would it be a reflection on my faith and experience of him.  God is on my side, whether I am protected from crime, disease, and natural disasters - or not.

     That’s the God I believe in.  That’s the world I live in. 

     Again, I mean no disrespect to anyone who disagrees with me.  Let my voice be one among many.  And let the loudest voice be God’s.

“How deserted lies the city, once so full of people!  How like a widow is she, who once was great among the nations!

“All her people groan as they search for bread; they barter their treasures for food to keep themselves alive.

“My eyes fail from weeping, I am in torment within, my heart is poured on the ground because my people are destroyed, because children and infants faint in the streets of the city.  They say to their mothers, ‘Where is bread and wine?’ as they faint like wounded men in the streets of the city, as their lives ebb away in their mothers’ arms.

“Young and old lie together in the dust of the streets; my young men and maidens have fallen by the sword.  You have slain them in the day of your anger; you have slaughtered them without pity.

“He pierced my heart with arrows from his quiver.  I became the laughingstock of all my people; they mock me in song all day long.  He has filled me with bitter herbs and sated me with gall.

“I remember my affliction and my wandering, the bitterness and the gall.  I well remember them, and my soul is downcast within me.  Yet this I call to mind and therefore I have hope:

“Because of the Lord’s great love we are not consumed, for his compassions never fail.  They are new every morning; great is your faithfulness.  I say to myself, ‘The Lord is my portion; therefore I will wait for him.’

“For men are not cast off by the Lord forever.  Though he brings grief, he will show compassion, so great is his unfailing love.  For he does not willingly bring affliction or grief to the children of men.”

Excerpts from Lamentations 1-3

Faith

If any of my non-Christian friends are still hanging with me, you might be wondering why I choose to have faith in God right now.  My life has been blown apart; how can I say that God is good?

My faith in God, and more specifically, Jesus Christ, offers me hope, redemption, love, and comfort, at a time when others might have none.  You see the ugliness of my life; hopefully you also see the beauty of Jesus at work in the midst of it.

To be sure, there is much ugliness in the people of God.  We are still people, after all - imperfect, flawed people living in an imperfect, flawed world.  We fail.  We mess up.  There are times when our poor reflection of Christ makes him appear flawed and ugly.  For instance, how can a man devoted to Christ, like my husband, struggle with the things he struggled with?  If Christ is who he says he is, shouldn't my husband have been different?

I don't understand the ways of God.  To me, it would make much more sense to have healed my husband long ago, or even to allow him more time to continue the healing he had already started, instead of exposing him and causing so much pain for so many people.  It would make much more sense to have given him a different set of gifts and talents, so that he could have had a different path in life that would have been safer for him and less traumatic for others.  Either of those options would have been less ugly, right?

But God isn't in the business of making sense.  If we could fully understand who God is and why he does the things he does, would he be much of a god? 

Where does that leave us, then?  We have a God who doesn't make sense, and whose people are just about as flawed as the world around them.  Is Christianity worth it or the biggest scam of all time?

You have to decide for yourself.  But if the ugliness of my life weighs in your decision at all, I hope you will also consider the beauty of Christ and his church that is appearing in my life as well.

That beauty can be seen in my Westport friends who have offered compassion and restoration to my husband and who have brought my family meals and other gifts to help get us through this stressful time.  That beauty can be seen in my PFCN family who have been generous and supportive beyond the scope of any regular employer.  That beauty can be seen in friends from the gym who have every right to be angry, but instead have offered kindness and forgiveness.  That beauty can be seen in friends who have experienced similar issues stepping forward to offer counseling and companionship.  That beauty can be seen in people still struggling with similar issues step forward to get the help they need.

I often wonder how I, of all people, ended up in this place.  I am the "goodiest" of goody-two-shoes, and always have been.  I was always successful in school and was poised and equipped to lead a successful, flourishing life.  How did I end up the wife of a criminal and an addict?!  How can that possibly be me, walking down a long hall, and how can that possibly be my husband behind the glass?  But then I wonder if God has been preparing me for this my whole life.  Another woman might not have literally hundreds of people willing to pray for her.  Another woman might not be as secure in her own identity and faith, and fall hard into depression.  Basically, another woman might not have everything that Christ has supplied me with throughout my whole life, might not have what I have to cling to in the midst of this storm.

Is Christianity worth it?  You have to decide for yourself.  My answer is a resounding yes.  I will trust God when he doesn't make sense, for he has never left my side.  I will look to him to redeem the ugliness of my life, for he excels at bringing good out of bad, beauty from pain.  I will hold onto him, for he is bigger than this storm, and he knows the best path to make it through.  God is good, even when life is not. 

Sadness

Yesterday morning my son asked to watch Voltron on Netflix.  (Those of you who know him know that for some inexplicable reason, Voltron is his favorite show, and he can watch it over and over for hours on end.  Boys...)  I had to tell him that I cancelled our Netflix subscription, and he broke down and sobbed.  I just held him and wept, too.  We then discovered that Hulu has Voltron, so he bounced back from the loss pretty quickly. 

I, however, was overwhelmed with sadness all day and into this morning.  Not for the loss of Netflix, but for all the losses my son still has to face.  What will he do when I tell him we need to get rid of our dog?  Or that we have to move out of our house?  What if I have to tell him that he still can't see his dad when his birthday rolls around next month?  And I know the wounds are just beginning for him.  What about two years from now when his friends ask about his dad?  How can a six-year-old be asked to explain that his dad isn't allowed to meet his friends?  What about seven years from now when he will understand what it is his dad has done and struggle with such weighty issues in the middle of developing his own self-image and world view?  It's so unfair.  My heart breaks for him with each new loss, each new struggle that I realize lays on his path.

He is the joy of my life, however, and he truly lives up to the meaning of his name.  After spending the day with him, my heart is much lighter than it was yesterday.  We had an air-ball fight (if you've never played, you've got to try it - just throw air at each other and pretend to get hit - so much fun!), he beat me in a game of dominoes, and we had a Scooby-Doo marathon courtesy of the WB.  (Who needs Netflix anyway?)

I am thankful that I have him around to cheer me up.  I am thankful that sadness does not last forever, although it will be a too-frequent visitor for the next unknown length of our lives.  I am thankful that even with so many valid reasons to be sad, we have just as many reasons to be happy.  I pray that I am able to balance the sadness in my life with joy in a way that honors God and is healthy for me and my son.

"[The Lord] heals the brokenhearted and binds up their wounds."
Psalm 147:3

Manipulation

Another book I just finished reading is Boundaries, by Drs. Henry Cloud & John Townsend.  The tagline is "When to say yes, how to say no to take control of your life."  I think a better tagline for me would be "How to manipulate others by controlling yourself."

Manipulation has a very negative connotation.  And yet we need to be able to influence the behavior and personality choices of others, right?  To be clear, the book speaks against trying to manipulate people for selfish reasons and in unhealthy ways.  For the purposes of this blog, then, let's define manipulation as "motivating people to do what they should do for their own good."

I am the least manipulative of people.  I find myself saying "please" to my dog.  Sheesh.

I grew up in the Northwest, where open-mindedness is king.  We can agree to disagree and celebrate our diversity, but say that someone's behavior is wrong and you've become a bigot.  I didn't realize how much I was influenced by this philosophy until I was an adult.  I accept people as they are and don't try hard to change them, even when I believe they are harming themselves.  I can see now how big of a personality flaw this is for me.

So how can I change another person?  The answer provided in Boundaries is:  you can't change another person, so change yourself.

All my life, I've held to the philosophy of "you can't change another person, so pray that God will."  This concept of changing yourself in order to change someone else is revolutionary for me.  Basically it means saying, "I don't like what you're doing, and here's what I'm going to do about it."  In a close relationship, my action will most likely cause a reaction in the other person - in other words, they will change.  Of course, they may not change the way I want them to, but if needed, I can make another change in myself, which will probably lead to another reactive change in the other person.  Regardless of whether the other person's change is positive or not, I have made a positive move to control my own life.

Examples.  My son was not being still or focused during his homework tonight.  I was getting frustrated.  Since he was not changing his behavior after my verbal requests, I said that I was not going to do his homework with him until he could be still.  (He didn't change, so I did.)  Since he needed to finish his homework in order to do something fun that he had asked to do, after a little break he was able to be still and finish his homework.  (Motivation for a reactive change.  Manipulation accomplished.  Progress for me - yay!)

It's not always that simple, of course.  An ongoing issue in my marriage was that my husband is seemingly incapable of driving the speed limit.  Knowing how I felt about the issue was not motivation enough for him to change.  I was very frustrated that he wouldn't change; he was very frustrated that I kept bringing it up. 

How could I have changed myself?  I could have refused to ride with him.  I could have asked to get out of the car when I felt unsafe.  Either of those choices would have been difficult for me and would have raised a new set of issues.  (Are we really going to pay for gas for two cars to go to the same place?  How am I going to walk home from here in the rain?)  But I'm sure that my husband would have reacted to either of those choices.  I'm not sure how he would have reacted, but perhaps my actions would have been motivation enough for him to change.

An example from the book is a man from a rich family whose father always had strings attached to monetary gifts.  He resented his father's selfish manipulation of his life, so he began to say no to his father's requests.  Of course, the money stopped coming, and the man had to figure out how to live without that income.  But the requests stopped, too.  He achieved the change in his father he was hoping for, but at a cost to himself.

Changing myself in hopes of changing others is going to be costly.  It will create a new set of issues or hardships that need to be worked through.  I wonder about the present situation.  If I had been armed with these insights a year or two ago, I could have said, "I am not going to work my *** off for your business if you cannot stop putting it at risk."  This would have caused all kinds of hardships.  There would have been a financial impact on our business (and therefore our family) at a time when surviving the economic times was foremost on my mind.  There most definitely would have been a relational impact, and we would have had to share an explanation with family, friends, and employees for my "erratic" behavior.  But I can't help thinking that that would have been motivation enough for my husband to change himself.  And it surely would have been a better fallout than what we are facing now.

I wish I had read Boundaries at any point in my 20's.  I really think my life would be substantially different today.  If you haven't read it yet, buy it or check it out from the library soon.  It is definitely worth your time.

"Let a righteous man strike me - it is a kindness; let him rebuke me - it is oil on my head."
Psalm 141:5