Strange New World

My world has shifted . . .

I have never experienced an actual earthquake, but I have gone through times when the world I thought I knew ceased to exist and I found myself in a strange new place that I did not know how to navigate.  It was like the ground had shaken underneath me, and I wasn't sure how to walk anymore.

The first time it happened was nearly 20 years ago.  My father had just been diagnosed with terminal cancer.  I was driving somewhere, and suddenly the thought crossed my mind that I was going to crash and die.  A second thought followed.  Don't be silly.  That kind of thing only happens to other people.  Followed by a third thought which struck me like a physical blow, so powerfully that I was nearly incapable of continuing to drive:  That's what you thought about cancer.

In that instant, the world I thought I knew ceased to exist.  My world was no longer a place where tragedy happened to "other people", but where tragedy happened to me.  It has taken years to learn to walk in that strange new world.  Life took on an urgency that it never used to have.  It is an ongoing process to learn to live as though today might be my last day, but to have the courage to love as though I have a lifetime ahead of me, even though I may not.

Disorientation . . .

Where am I?  Who am I?  What just happened there?  How do I move forward?  Why do I feel so lost?  It happens when I least expect it, in places where I least expect it.

Like driving down Highway 6 on a bright sunny summer day . . .
Or in a vet's clinic on Christmas night.

Marianne, why can't you just believe . . . ?

My life is all fire and spark and fight and grim determination.  I know nothing about willing submission.  I know nothing about resting in the hands of my God and looking up with trust into his face. 

So I wrestled and I pleaded with God for our dog.  I begged him to heal her.  I challenged him to heal her.  I cried and fought for her.  I did everything I knew to do to take care of her, and it was not enough.

I know about fighting.  I know all about the loud, in-your-face, toe-to-toe, eyeball-to-eyeball kind of power.  I know about looking for answers until you find them.  I get that.  I also know about being forced to surrender.   The stronger one wins.  The stronger one gets his way.  And I'm learning that with God, that's ok.  I'm always glad when he refuses to yield.    It is always a relief when he persists in taking my face in his hands, and asks me to look at him.  His hands are gentle.  I always see love.  I know that if God had allowed our dog to die that night, I would still be following him today.  I have no doubt about that.  I know that he is good, and that all that comes from his hand is goodness.

And still I fight.

But something happened that night.   My quest for answers was not enough.  My attempts to solve the problem got me nowhere.  In the end, I had to entrust our dog into the hands of someone who is bigger and stronger and knows a whole lot more about her inner workings than I do.

I expect power to be loud.  I expect the whirlwind, the fire, and the earthquake.  They terrify me, but that's what I expect.  I know how to deal with them.  But this?  This room in a vet clinic with quiet conversation?  This quiet, gentle moment?  This thing so simple it is hardly to be grasped?  There's nothing here to grab hold of, and yet, it just is, solid, and real and irrefutable.  Nothing but a still, small voice.  A whisper.  Marianne, stop fighting so.  Why can't you just believe?  You can trust this.  She's in good hands.  Let her go, and walk away.   It's going to be ok . . . .

So I did.  I chose to trust.  I left her in good hands.  I let her go.  I walked away.

And I watched as God did a miracle.

My world has shifted.  I'm not sure I know how to live without fighting.  I'm not sure I know how to live in a power that is so quiet and yet more powerful than anything I have ever known.  I'm not sure I know how to rest in the hands that hold me and not struggle.

But this is my new world.  I cannot go back.  I do not want to go back.  So I will need to learn . . .