Recently I found myself rehearsing in my mind something I had said to a friend.
"Just remember, this time right now, no matter the outcome of today and
tomorrow, this experience is a gift from God and He wants you to enjoy it."
The reality of life? I am not living these words. I worry, I fuss, I complain and close my hands and more intentionally my heart to the grace that God is extending to me daily.
Often times when we pray for friends we ask that God would give them grace. I remember specific times in my life when I felt like I was living on a cloud of grace. When Jon-Eric Hope, one of my teammates while I was living in Taiwan, died unexpectedly, I remember specifically realizing that God's grace was surrounding us almost tangibly. I knew it was because people around the world were praying for us.
Today I know that people are praying for us. We are daily reminded through letters and cards in the mail and phone calls from many places. Sunday after Ian had his muscle biopsy there was a reunion in our area that brought several families from PA. We were looking forward to seeing everyone and having our hearts encouraged. We awoke Sunday morning and Ian realized he was feeling too sick to go. We're still not quite sure what was going on but maybe a side effect from the antibiotic or the pain medicine he was taking. My disappointment in not being able to go was enough to bring on a bout of self-pity. After nursing my 'wound' for a bit I walked into the room where Ian was resting and realized he had called in on the phone line to listen to the River Brethren service in Lancaster. The first thing I heard was Brother Mark Forry saying, "And Father bless Ian Bennett and his wife Ruth in Iowa..." In that moment God's grace broke through the wall of self-pity I'd built and helped me to realize that while it is ok to miss something good it is not ok to allow Satan to use self-pity to destroy my day.
What does it mean to accept each day as a gift from God? What does it mean to experience grace? Is grace something we can't control? It pours into our lives or is withheld at God's whim? I know that grace is a gift extended even to the most hardened heart. I also believe that we can turn away from grace just as we can turn away from God's gift of Salvation. "'Through many dangers, toils and snares I have already come, 'tis grace has brought me safe thus far, and grace will lead me home." It is the very essence of grace that keeps me alive and experiencing life. What does it mean to turn away with a closed heart to the grace God is extending to me? What does it mean to be as a child standing under thick, heavy, clouds of rain with head back, arms extended and little hands wide open experiencing every drop of refreshment as if life depended on it?
What does it mean to close my heart to grace and lock it shut with the padlock of despair? Even in that moment it is God's grace that is giving me the ability to close my heart. I can't get away from grace. And since I can't, what does it mean to accept it? To see life, and the struggle as beautiful? To taste joy and disappointment both seasoned with grace? "My grace is sufficient for
thee: for my strength is made perfect in weakness. (Physical weakness is what we struggle with most right now. Ian doesn't have the daily strength we somehow think he should have.) Most gladly therefore
will I rather glory in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may
rest upon me."
On the way home from the doctors appointment on Thursday Ian said that it is odd to feel like he is graduating from highschool all over again. We all know what it's like to be asked a million times if we know what we want to do when we graduate. I told Ian maybe it's like having a mid-life crisis? It's hard to know what to do with our lives right now. We thought we knew where, and what, and how God wanted us to serve Him. Maybe some of that vision is being changed but most likely it is simply being refined. It is hard to know what to do right now. Maybe that is where grace comes in. Living with the power of Christ resting upon our lives. Living this moment accepting every drop of grace that God is showering on us.
The muscle biopsy was directional but not definitive. The doctors are still hesitating to make a final diagnosis until several more test results come back. We may have a better idea what is going on in a week or so. In the mean time we live, we laugh, we step, we breathe and struggle to make God central, to find rest in Him, to experience life as a gift, and to hold our hands and hearts open to His showers of grace.
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