When the unthinkable happens...
"I feel like this whole thing isn't supposed to be happening; it's almost unbelievable."
We may all be processing this new reality of uncertainty in different ways. If there is a loss of a job or economic security; the loss of an important event like a graduation, a wedding, a funeral or even church services; we may be grieving. Wisdom can be found as we come face to face with our own mortality.
So, in the face of this new reality, what is God teaching you?
This is a timely question asked by one of our regular contributors, Amanda Opelt. God has given Amanda such a great ability to communicate His truths. So, please listen with hearts open to what God is doing in your life right now, what He is teaching you in this season. And trust that the One Who has promised is faithful to fulfill His promise in your life.
Transcript Below:
--
Hello High Country! My name is Amanda Opelt and about a month or a month and a half ago, I wrote a blog for the Journey Magazine about relationships. And in the blog I criticized the fact that so many of our relationships now are happening online through social media and other digital spaces. I advocated for the importance of real time presence in one another’s lives, the depth of relationship that comes from sitting around kitchen tables together and in one another’s living rooms.
I don’t know about you but I feel like a month ago was like a million years ago. A lot has changed in a very short period of time and now we are hearing that social distancing is actually the very best way to love your neighbor.
There’s a lot of uncertainty and a lot we don’t know. We don’t know how long this will last. We don’t know the economic fallout of shutting society down for weeks and months on end. We don’t know how many people will contract the virus. And we don’t know how many people will lose their lives.
Control is an Illusion
Here’s a little bit about me. When it comes to risks or health issues, I absolutely love data and statistics. This is how I found out you are more likely to be killed by a donkey than you are to be killed in a plane crash. So for example, when my mom was diagnosed with cancer, I did tons of research to find out the statistical likelihood of a good outcome for her based on her diagnosis. When I was pregnant with my daughter, I read everything I could about the statistical likelihood that she would be born healthy and come to full term. When my sister was in the hospital last year, I read everything I could about her condition to try to find out the likelihood that she would get well and that she would come home to us.
The problem with data and statistics is that it is not always personal. And sometimes you find yourself to be in that smaller percentile: the 10% or the 5% or the .001%. And the unthinkable happens. The thing that wasn’t supposed to happen, happens. Life is suddenly and violently interrupted.
I don’t know about you but I feel like this whole isn’t supposed to be happening. It’s unbelievable. Life for so many of us has been severely interrupted. We’ve lost a lot. We’ve lost jobs. Many of you watching this have lost economic security. Seniors in high school are missing out on some of those important senior events. People have canceled weddings. People whose loved ones have died are unable to have funerals. We’ve lost church services and connections with friends. And that uncomfortable feeling you may be feeling right now might actually be grief, grief for what you’ve lost, grief for what we’ve lost. To name it as such I think is really important for us right now.
That other uncomfortable feeling you may be feeling right now is that you may be truly absorbing the fact that we are finite, that we aren’t in control of our futures, that our futures, as well planned out as they may be, are never promised to us. Control really is an illusion. It’s an illusion that we in a prosperous American society struggle with especially because our privilege has let us to believe that if we just make all the right decisions and we get all the right information, then we can control our outcomes. If we just go to the right college and get the right job – if we just marry the right person or buy the right house – if we eat all the kale and drink all the kombucha then we will have the healthy happy life that we hope for. But that’s now how life in this fallen world works.
Wisdom From Uncertainty
I think when our plans are interrupted, when we come face to face with our finiteness, there’s an invitation to wisdom in all of that. Psalms 90:12 says “teach us to number our days that we may gain a heart of wisdom.” I think when we do come face to face with our own mortality, we are able to step into a deeper level of wisdom as we go through that process, as we absorb that truth. I think the ability to re-imagine your life and re-invent your future after the catastrophe has happened is a skill for resilience. That creative process builds wisdom in us as we learn to live life open-handedly, and develop the keen kingdom vision to see what God may be doing when all of our plans are disrupted.
The process of gaining wisdom is a long and arduous one. I think in an era of instant information, we may believe that we can become wise by reading the right article or listening to the right podcast, or quickly scrolling through twitter. That’s not how wisdom works. Wisdom is a long and slow process, and it’s a painful one sometimes. It’s a chiseling. Gaining wisdom is like going through the refiner’s fire. There’s another verse in Proverbs, Proverbs 4:7 that says “get wisdom, at all cost.” Some translations even say “though it cost you all you have, gain wisdom.” Wisdom is costly. The process of wisdom is almost an unbecoming. It’s a process of unlearning and re-learning a new way of life. It’s an un-situating yourself from the future you thought you were entitled to and re-situating yourself in the future that God has for you.
I just don’t want to miss the invitation of wisdom in all of this. I believe that God has something significant to teach us in the midst of all this uncertainty and I for one don’t want to squander that, I don’t want to miss that. I want to listen for that.
Quality Presence
So going back to my blog post that just didn’t seem to age too well – what if we continue to practice quality presence in one another’s lives. As we connect online, which is the only way we can right now, what if rather than asking what Netflix show you are binging right now, or what takeout food you got that night (although that’s a good question because we want to support our local businesses as much as possible right now!) – what if we also asked each other what God is teaching you. What is the wisdom you are gaining? What are you learning that you are going to carry from this season into the next unplanned season of your life, as all of our lives are going to look different than we thought they would.
And what if the Journey magazine can serve as a repository of some of that wisdom, where we can share what we are learning. My prayer for you is that God would teach you to number your days, that you would gain a heart of wisdom, and that we would continue to bring quality of presence to one another’s lives, even in the midst of all of this uncertainty.