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Storms of Life

Monsoon season in Korea is not the time to visit if you want to enjoy your vacation. As we’re making plans for family to come this summer, we’re determined to avoid this time of year when water gushes from the sky nonstop and winds blow and beat against our wall to wall windows causing them to rattle like they’re going to explode. Our three story villa, which has an amazing view of the bay, unfortunately also gets the most aggressive winds during this time since we have nothing standing between us and the waters. Like so many of the older buildings on the island it wasn’t designed well, so when these storms come water seeps and sometimes pours in the windows, puddling on the floor. It’s a stressful two weeks of constantly mopping up water, trying to keep the wallpaper and the curtains from being damaged and making sure we don’t have too much humidity in the apartment so the mold doesn’t grow.

As much as we wish we could make monsoon season disappear, we can’t. Thankfully, because it comes every year without fail we can be somewhat prepared for it. But when storms of life hit, they rarely follow patterns or give any warning. One day everything is fine. We wake up to a great cup of coffee after a peaceful night’s sleep, look around our beautiful home and think, “Life’s really been good to me.” Everything seems secure in our world, so much so that we can’t imagine it being otherwise. Then a call comes, or a doctor’s visit reveals unwanted news, or we enter into a disastrous situation that drops from the sky– something that as one person put it “just gets shoved down our throats.”

When storms hit, those closest to us quit saying how well life is treating us. They often don’t know what to say or how to communicate their sorrow or even how to understand the reason why circumstances so earth shattering could come and destroy a life they thought was so impenetrable. The storm that has blown our world apart scares them as much as it hurts us, so they back away and try to buffet their minds from the reality that something similar could wipe out their world in a matter of seconds as well.

All this leaves us alone to digest our tragedy, to try to make sense of events so seemingly meaningless. There’s no amount of thinking, researching, back tracking or focusing on what we could or should have done to give us peace or wisdom in the midst of a storm. The world tells us that we’re destined to go through life’s hardships so we have to toughen up, face the reality of what’s happening and “make the best of it.” The only alternative is to yield to despair like Job’s wife was tempted to do and just give up and die.

But God has a better way. He reminds us, along with giving amazing real life examples, that storms are going to come (not may, might or could, but most definitely will). He says that there’s only one way to survive tragedies and losses and that’s not to man up or try to handle it ourselves but to build our house on the Rock, on Christ -- to anchor our hope so firmly in his finished work on the cross each day so that when the lightening unexpectedly flashes and threatens to destroy us we’re standing on the one foundation that can’t be moved or removed (Matt 7:24-27). When we take refuge in him, we experience what Paul did when he said, “We are perplexed, but not driven to despair. We are hunted down, but never abandoned by God. We get knocked down, but we are not destroyed” (2 Cor 4:8-9). We’re weather beaten but not destroyed by the storms of life because Christ is our Foundation, our Hope, our Deliverer. He promises that no matter how terrible the storm, how costly the destruction, it can’t separate us from his unshakable love and the promise that we’re his forever

Life can and often does change in the blink of an eye, and no one knows what will happen tomorrow (Js 4:14). If we live long enough, we’ll encounter huge storms, and they’ll likely be unexpected. One minute we’re here, the next we’re gone. One day we’re piling up wealth, the next our investments fail or we lose a job and everything we’ve worked for comes to nothing. One year we’re celebrating our marriage the next we discover our partner has found someone else and everything we’ve been living is a lie. One day we’re basking in our good health, the next we find we have only a short time to live. These scenarios are almost inconceivable because we often feel so secure, so alive, so blessed, so immovable in the hours just before the storm.

The option isn’t to make the storms go away. Like monsoon season in Korea, some are going to push their way into our lives no matter how vigilant we are in trying to prevent them. We can’t toughen up and weather them ourselves, since we’re just flesh and blood and honestly lacking the ability to control anything in the world. The only reasonable solution is to put our hope in Christ today and to trust him not only to get us through the hard times, but after we’ve made it through to deliver us from death and the grave. He promises that once we’ve surrendered our hearts to him, admitted our need of his saving work and transferred our trust from ourselves to his work that he’ll never fail us or forsake us. We may possibly die in one of life’s storms. But if we’re in Christ we don’t have to be afraid – even of death. "Can anything ever separate us from Christ’s love? Does it mean he no longer loves us if we have trouble or calamity, or are persecuted, or hungry, or destitute, or in danger, or threatened with death? (As the Scriptures say, “For your sake we are killed every day; we are being slaughtered like sheep) No, despite all these things, overwhelming victory is ours through Christ, who loved us. And I am convinced that nothing can ever separate us from God’s love. Neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither our fears for today nor our worries about tomorrow—not even the powers of hell can separate us from God’s love. No power in the sky above or in the earth below—indeed, nothing in all creation will ever be able to separate us from the love of God that is revealed in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Rm 8:35-39).

Surrendering to God

Our younger daughter called yesterday to ask if we’d pray that God would open certain doors for her. This was a deep desire of her heart, one that she'd had since she was in elementary school, and she wanted us to join with her in asking for God's blessing. Soon after, our older daughter who is studying in the states sent an urgent message asking for prayer about a job she’d applied for in college (along with 400 other applicants). She was hopeful that through the position she could fulfill a calling that's been her passion for years. We prayed intensely for both of them, but our requests that they get what they so desperately wanted were sidelined by the greater desire that they receive what God desperately wants for them, even if it's not what they envisioned.

  It’s easy to establish in our minds what looks like God’s blessings in our lives. We sit and visualize the details of what would make us the happiest, and if we’re realists, we mingle these pictures with our gifts and talents to come up with blessings that not only look as if they’re right but seem absolutely reasonable. In our thinking, it's inconceivable that these dreams wouldn’t or couldn’t be God’s will.

Over time, the stored mental images about our desires begin to shape and define not only how we live each day, but most importantly how we respond to God’s plans for our future. When we receive what we want, we’re happy, even ecstatic. But when God unveils gifts that don’t align with ideals that we ascertain as "the best", we can become bitter and discouraged, wondering what went wrong and if God genuinely cares about us.

Our sense of entitlement to dreams can become so ingrained in our worldview that we eventually have to make a choice over whether we're going to continue embracing our right to them or surrender our lives and all our circumstances to God. It may take years for us to come to this crossroads, as life may seemingly appear to spring forth unscathed from disappointment. But eventually, if we’re seeking God and living for him, there will be a point of divergence and disappointment. At this crossroads, we have to make a choice, and unfortunately for many of us it’s not an easy one.
    
For two months now, I’ve been wrestling with a blessing I was certain was God’s gift to me. When I got news that it was being taken away, I was struck numb at first and then filled with questions like: How could God let this happen to me? Why would he take something from me that he had initially called and gifted me to do? I called friends, wrote e-mails, sat for hours and tried to figure out what my next step would be while also praying that God would reveal what I could do to bring about change. I wanted him to move the mountain that stood in the way of what I was confident was his will for me.

With this determination, life became a blur of wrestling and striving with God over what I perceived to be my right to happiness – until I walked into the office of one of our senior professors, a godly man known for his kindness and wisdom. Sitting beneath a glass top table in his office was a white piece of copier paper with three simple words printed in bold: Surrender to God. When my eyes caught them, I knew this was God’s message to me and his answer to  my prayers and striving regarding my situation. The key wasn’t in knocking on more doors, trying to shove them open, or sending follow up e-mails trying to protest the injustice of my situation, but it was in surrender. 

For the next six weeks as I waited to hear about any turnaround in my position, those words stayed fixed at the forefront of my mind, helping to reign in opposing thoughts when I was tempted to fret and demand my way. Ironically, I’d been teaching The Lord's Prayer to the Korean students in my English classes during the semester. The focus of our talks was about desiring God’s Kingdom and his will over everything -- "Your Kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven" -- even if it meant suffering. In the middle of teaching this, he gave me the opportunity to demonstrate trust in what I was encouraging them to do, even though it wasn’t what I found even remotely appealing. As I sat staring at this gift he’d placed in my life, I wanted to trash it, even destroy it. It wasn’t what I'd asked for or what I thought was best for me at all, but at that moment it was God’s will.

I began to daily, sometimes hourly, surrender my dream which gave me new freedom to hold out my heart and hands and ask God what his plans and will were for me instead. With this mindset, I was able to begin releasing the burden of my demands for happiness and experience freedom. “Your will be done,” was my refrain, even when I didn’t feel it or sense any great longing for it. I didn't pray it because it felt good necessarily, but because I was and am convinced beyond doubt that God is exceedingly, abundantly good at every point in time and won’t give anything but gracious, loving gifts to his children (Ps 107:1, 136:1). I’m also convinced, by simple logic, that what he’s given me (as I walk by faith and trust in him) is his absolute best (Rm 8:28).

God’s greatest gifts sometimes come in packages that don’t look at all like what we’ve asked for. In fact,  his best sometimes comes in parcels of pain and suffering, disappointment and loss. But if he is good, which he is (Lk 18:18,19, 1 Jn 1:5), and if he wants only what’s best for us, which he does (Jas 1:7), and if he’s all powerful and able to accomplish all his purposes for our lives, which he is (Eph 3:20), then we can completely, without any reservation trust him with what he gives us (Prov 3:5-6).

God did turn around my situation and, for reasons I may never understand, gave me back the gift that was for a season taken from me. I'm continuing to pray for our daughters, though I truly have no idea how God will answer our requests. They’re both asking for good things from a human perspective.  But God in his wisdom and understanding sees the greater purpose behind every circumstance and is the only one who is able to fully discern if they are or aren't what's best for them. 

We're all learning together to embrace this truth, so that we can pray and wait in quiet trust that he’s going to work out all circumstances for our ultimate good and the glory of his name. The only alternative is to keep clinging desperately to our vision for life, which if it’s not God’s vision and his will then it’s an idol that will undoubtedly eat away at our faith and trust in him. It’s only as we give up our right to what we want that we’re able to experience the happiness and joy we’re meant to have. God is good and his will is perfect. As we rest in this truth and seek to build our lives around it instead of our own plans and demands then we’ll be truly satisfied no matter what his answer.