In my short life, (64 years), a small dot in the history of
the existence of mankind; I have found that most of my life has involved very
painful situations where I had, to let go. Often, I've envied people who seem
to breeze through life; nothing seems to faze them. Disappointments? “Who cares?”
“A better opportunity will come along.” Heartaches? “Tomorrow will be a better
day.” Being a perennial optimist seems like an ideal position from which to
face life’s challenges. Never matter that they are not the people I choose to
go to when I’ve been wounded. They are also not the people I go to when I want
to enlist people who will muster forces to tackle a cause that needs addressed.
They not only don’t seem to feel as deeply about the heartaches of life, they
are also not as deeply moved by the pain and suffering of others.
And so, I accept that I’m one of those people who care and
conversely, who grieves. And add into that, life is a serious of situations
where each person is kind of a helpless spectator watching people and places
change in ways they so seldom would have chosen. And so we suffer and rebirth
ourselves in intellectual and spiritual processes where the option of “letting
go,” is part of our growth and acknowledgment that acceptance of things is part
and parcel of faith, and hope in God, who we hope will support our efforts to
be strong and endure until the end.
Part of me finds solace in reading excerpts of what other
Christians in distant and not so distant past have to say about suffering and
learning to let go. For me, it as is I have all these friends bound by common
faith, struggles and experiences and from their thoughts, their growing faith
have shared insights and gained wisdom
to help me in my time, now, an aging woman in an end times world.
Most recently, I am facing the ensuring journey of letting
go of career. And hard on the heels of that, I will be facing losing my home. This
awareness is with me as I wake and as I sleep. I face it in pieces. Wrapping my
mind around a goodbye to the substance career gives to my life. An economic
bastion against which I rest, waiting for the next leg of the journey towards retirement
and impoverishment and the descent towards a lessening of strength of mind and
body.
Last week, facing gridlock on the freeway in Seattle at dead-on
five pm, I took the West Valley freeway and went to my home town Auburn to grab
a bite to eat and wait out the bumper to bumper. The fields, (in my era,
verdant green pastures) are now covered by light industry. The city streets, once
neighborhoods are riddled with mismatched commercial enterprises; some
prospering, some failing, a patchwork of a once small town now infested with “growth”.
I stopped by for a break at the City Park
where as a young child I spent many happy hours, playing in the wade pool,
playing on the swings, dreaming from the circular brick bandstand. The land was
still there. A few trees removed as being too large after some sixty years. The
wade pool? Paved over. The swings, gone, grass grown over the scars in the earth.
I looked around. These were not the only changes. Here and there homeless men
lay on the ground surrounded by their belongings, bags, and blankets and a pack
or two. Some of them never moved; another watches me with eyes nervously
assessing for risk.
And so, here I am on a Sunday afternoon, facing a short
workweek, and straightening the parts of my life I can control; closets,
laundry, an overgrown shrub or two. I am learning to let go…. Of children
seeking their own destinies; of grandchildren recreating their own values; of
careers where power is might and right and wrong become blurred by titles.
I hang on to my quiet times where I anchor my soul in
prayer and Biblical truth. There are many old hymns where Christ is called the
anchor of the soul. In my life, He is an anchor that keeps me out of the slough
of despair and keeps me ever hopeful that when all else fails; He is still
there; with comfort, with encouragement; with Words of peace in the middle of
my storm. He is there challenging me to ‘walk on water’ so to speak as I let go
of every earthly prop; career, money, family, strength and health. My mother,
at age 91 spoke to me of her fear facing death, “I’m scared,” she said. “I don’t
know what it’s going to be like.” For weeks, when I visited she shared this
fear. One visit to the nursing home where she stayed in the last few months of
her life, she told me with an air of a confidant, “I’m ready to go. I’m not afraid
anymore.” A few weeks later, she passed
to eternity in the night; waking to look on a world where there is no more
crying, ever.
Jesus, hiking in the hills prior to Gethsemane, faced his own agonizing “letting go” experience. Being pure and sinless, God in
man, He faced a cross where He bore the sins of the whole world. The cry from
His heart, “Father why have you forsaken me?” rang throughout history and time
severing the links between heaven, earth and hell. He knew what it was to face
things that were beyond imaginably horrible. He knew, and He knows, and He
cares.
That divine love has enabled millions before me to face the
letting go times of life with grace in the midst of fire; with peace in the midst
of storms; so with my hand in His, my heart ever seeking His face I will face
tomorrow.
This old song, typifies
my hope and my comfort. May you each find your own hope in being secure in His
love.
Bill and Gloria Gaither
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