Living in the Mystery

Ever find yourself facing a mystery?  Ever find yourself standing in a place that simply defies explanation?

I've stood in that place this Christmas.

It started over a week ago.  Our dog, much loved, fell ill.  At first, it appeared odd.  Then it became alarming.  She was showing every sign of having a blockage of the bowel, and with her history, that made sense.  Let's just say that if this was a crime scene, there was a clear motive.  Our dear dog has eaten enough weird stuff in her short life that a blockage did not surprise us.

We ruled out the more obvious culprits of the same symptoms.  We took x-rays.  The x-rays revealed a partial blockage of something that was possibly paper, possibly plastic, possibly cloth.  Further x-rays showed a slight shift in the blockage.  We waited, with the vet's advice and an emergency number where we could reach him in our pocket, hoping that she would be able to pass this on her own, but by Christmas Day, we had a very sick pup.  Our dog, who from the very back of the yard hears the cheese container being opened in the kitchen and comes running, had no interest in what was going on in the kitchen as many delightful foods were prepared.  Our dog, who cannot wait to greet us as we come in the door, barely lifted her head up when I came in.  Our dog, who is normally so full of life and fun, was feverish and listless and sad.  We used the emergency number.

So there I was, at 9:00 pm, on Christmas Day, with my housemate, the vet, and his wife in the clinic, holding onto a scared dog on a slippery metal table while the vet checked her over, chatting about the Lord as we waited for a tranquillizer to take effect, and praying that God would guide him as he operated on our dog.  Some things just feel so surreal. . . .

We left her in good hands and went home to wait for the phone call to tell us what craziness the vet had pulled from our dog's gut.  He called two hours later.

There was nothing in her gut.

Could she have passed it?  So there I was, at 11:30 pm on Christmas Day, with a dish towel wrapped around my face, and rubber gloves on my hands, going through our dog's deposits looking for foreign matter that wasn't there.  Some things just feel so surreal . . . . 

We saw it on the x-ray.  She showed all the symptoms.  She hadn't passed it.  But there was nothing there.

I spent hours that night researching on the Internet, reading veterinary articles that I had to go through three or four times to understand, tracing every symptom she had shown, following symptoms to any other conclusion they might have led to, wondering if we had missed something.   But nothing else made sense, either.  It all kept leading back to a bowel blockage -- a bowel blockage that didn't exist.  Even a few abnormalities in her bloodwork didn't fit anything else.  There were no other symtoms we had missed that could have indicated some other underlying disease masking as a bowel blockage.  Some things just feel so surreal. . . .

We picked up our pup on Boxing Day evening.  She has a 10" incision on her belly, with 21 staples holding it closed.  The night before, she had been on an operating table with every inch of her gut outside of her abdominal cavity.  But our girl is back with all her spunk.  She wants to eat.  She wants to play.  She wants to tear around like a crazy thing in the snow.  We're having a hard time keeping her quiet.  She is even "going" normally again.  You'd never know that she had spent a week in misery and several hours in the operating room undergoing major abdominal surgery.

Were we all wrong?  Did we miss something?  I'm not a vet.  I don't know how the puzzle pieces fit together.  I don't know if I have all the puzzle pieces.  But with my limited knowledge, it doesn't make sense.  And I find myself standing in a mystery in which I am not comfortable standing, not one bit.

I want my world to make sense.  I want it to be neat and logical.  I want symptoms to point to definite conclusions.  I can't troubleshoot the mystery.

And I hear a quiet voice inside me saying, Marianne, why can't you believe?  Why can't you just accept that God healed her?

Why?  I don't know.  Because I can't understand why God would heal a dog and allow people to die?  Because I find it hard to believe that the Almighty would bend his ear and hear the prayers of one of the least of his children on Christmas night? Or because to accept the truth that God healed our dog would be to acknowledge that when Jesus called me to follow him, he called me to live in a mystery that is so far outside of my control that life no longer feels safe . . . but is terrifyingly exciting and wondrous.  It's a mystery in which there are no guarantees but lots of surprises.  A mystery where sometimes dogs are healed and sometimes they aren't.  A world in which sometimes people are healed and sometimes they aren't, and I can't explain when or how or if or why.  I live in a mystery where the One who holds heaven and earth in his hand like so much dust really does stoop down far enough to hear my prayer.

But that shouldn't surprise me.  Because it's Christmas.  I live in a mystery in which the God of the heavens did not consider his Godhead something to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the form of a servant, and being found in appearance as a baby.  Because he heard the cries of the smallest of his children, the One who made heavens and earth stooped down, way down, all the way down to a barn.  The Almighty entrusted himself into the inexperienced hands of a teenaged mom.  That seems pretty surreal, too . . . .

I'll be honest.  The mystery scares me.  But what if I refuse to enter it?  What if I insist on staying on ground where my logic can solve the problem, and my knowledge can explain all things?  What a blighted, narrow little world I would inhabit!  I would miss the wonder.  I would miss the majesty.  Oh, I would miss Jesus.  The mystery terrifies me, but I cannot bear to miss it.  God, I believe.  Help my unbelief.

I believe that on the evening of Christmas Day, God healed our dog.

More importantly, that evening, even before the vet called, as I held my dog on the table, he healed yet another part of this broken heart.

Define Necessity

Have you seen this picture yet?  It, or something similar, has been making its rounds on Facebook.

This picture breaks my heart.  And it makes me angry.

Because as I am scrolling through Facebook, I see some people posting a picture like this, and I see other people posting pictures of themselves at Occupy Wherever sites, claiming to be part of the world's 99% poor.

According to the government statistics, I am living in poverty.  Yup, me.  With clothes on my back, a car to drive, a family doctor and accessable medical care, three square meals a day, and even a cup of coffee a day.  I live in poverty.  "Someone" defined necessity and told me that I am living in poverty.

Poverty.  Wow.  That's a weighted word.  But here's how it's defined in Canada.  I got this from a Family Services of Toronto publication.

Ontario Deprivation Index  

Items necessary for a household to have a standard of living above the poverty level:

1. Being able to get dental care if needed.
2. Replace or repair broken electrical goods such as a stove or toaster. 
3. Being able to buy modest presents for family/friends at least once per year. 
4. Appropriate clothes for job interviews.
5. Having friends or family over for a meal at least once a month.
6. Fresh fruit and vegetables every day.
7. Being able to get around your community, either by car or bus pass.
8. Hobby or leisure activity.
9. Meat, fish or vegetarian equivalent at least every other day.
10. Having a home free of pests, such as cockroaches, bedbugs, mice.

Really?  That's the definition of necessity?  That's the definition of poverty?  I'm living in poverty if I can't get a root canal?  I'm living in poverty if I can't afford to have a hobby?!  And how do you define hobby anyway?  Is going to the library and getting books for free and reading considered a hobby?  Or do I have to play hockey to claim I have a hobby?  And what's a modest gift?  If I can't afford to buy my kid an iPad, but I can afford an iPod, is that modest?  If I can't manage to buy a Blackberry, but I can afford a pay-as-you-go phone that makes phonecalls and only makes phonecalls, is that modest?  Define necessity.   Do I really and truly live in poverty?  Does anyone in Canada?  I listen to what I am told about what I "need" to have in order to live above the poverty level, and then I look at the picture, and something just does not line up.

Look at those kids in the picture.  I wonder what they'd think of my characteristics of poverty.  I wonder if their list might not look something like this:

Items necessary for a household to have a standard of living above the poverty level:

1. Teeth.
2. A kerosene heater/cookstove.
3. Friends or family who aren't dead before the age of 35.
4. Something to wear.
5. Access to clean drinking water.
6. A meal a day.  
7. A community with a public latrine.
8. The opportunity to go to school or have some kind of way of supporting oneself.
9. Meat on special occasions like weddings.
10. A shelter with a roof that doesn't leak.

Somehow, poverty and poverty are not equal.  If I define poverty by my reality, what word does that leave for the truly poor?  I live in one of the richest countries in the world.  That's not just because 1% of its population are living above the poverty level.  It's because we all are, if you define poverty as, well, poverty.

Define necessity?  I think Paul does it rather well.

"But godliness with contentment is great gain.  

For we brought nothing into the world and we can take nothing out of it.  

But if we have food and clothing, with these we shall be content."

Living in poverty?  Me?  I don't think so.  I am, of all people, most richly blessed.