Permission to Vote 'No'

I did not know pain like that existed within the human experience.  There's pain, and then there's kidney stone pain. The kind of pain where you-want-to-take-a-serrated-kitchen-knife-and-slice-your-own-guts-open-if-that's-what-it-takes-to-get-this-heinous-thing-out kind of pain.  I have never plead for the mercy of God more than when I had a kidney stone. People who haven't had a kidney stone would say, "Ohhhh, I've heard those are worse than childbirth." And people who have had a kidney stone and given birth to a child would say, "Ohhhh, those are worse than childbirth."

I never really did find such comments comforting or helpful at any point during my nine-day bonding experience with my kidney stone. I seriously thought at one point - if there was a way to inflict kidney stones on terrorists, those surely would be a far superior method to waterboarding or some such torture method.  If I were a spy captured by a foreign government and they somehow injected me with a kidney stone, I would divulge every state secret I ever knew in the blink of an eye, without question.

There were so many moments in the dark of night, when the pain would be the worst, and I would think, "God, why aren't you stopping this pain when I know you have the ability to do so? You're able but you're choosing not to. Why?" That is the very tension we feel around us all the time as human beings - why does a supposedly good God allow suffering when he is perfectly capable of stopping it? Or better yet, never allowing it to begin with?

So often as Christ-followers it seems as though we don't have permission to ask those kind of questions or raise those kind of doubts. It goes unspoken that our declarations of faith should begin and end with "[God's] will be done," with no other objections before or after. Keep a stiff upper lip and "consider it pure joy...when you encounter trials of many kinds..." (James 1:2).

But you know one of the things I find so comforting about Jesus? He voted "no" to his circumstances.  "Going a little farther, he fell with his face to the ground and prayed, “My Father, if it is possible, may this cup be taken from me" (Matthew 26:39a).

If it's possible.

If it's possible, I'd really like to avoid a kiss from my betrayer.

If it's possible, I'd really like to avoid being slapped and spit on by the chief priests and Sanhedrin.

If it's possible, I'd really like to avoid being flogged, with a crown of thorns then smashed on my head.

If it's possible, I'd really like to avoid having my hands and feet pierced with nails, my side sliced open with a sword, my mother left to watch me die.

If it's possible, I'd really like to avoid the cross.

If it's possible, may this cup be taken from me.

This picture of Jesus tells me I have permission to vote no to my circumstances.  I have permission to say out loud to God, "If it's possible, let this pain and suffering be taken from me, let it pass me by."  I can say those things to him and not feel the need to shrink in the process, to feel like some sort of fraudulent, wimpy Christian for admitting I would really like suffering to pass me by. If Jesus himself in his humanity could admit he wanted to avoid pain and suffering, then I should have no less permission to do the same.

God is big enough for those declarations. The God who was big enough to handle the vulnerable and honest expressions of his own heavenly Son in Gethsemane is the same God who is big enough to handle the objections of his very earthly daughter who is made from dust (Psalm 103:14). David instructs us in Psalm 62:8, "Trust in him at all times, you people; pour out your hearts to him, for God is our refuge." Have at it, David is saying.  Pour out your heart to God and hold nothing back.  Don't withhold your objections, your grief, your sadness, your sorrow.  He says similarly in Psalm 142:2, "I pour out before him my complaint; before him I tell my trouble." Pour it all out, and just when you think you're done pouring, pour some more.  God will not drown under the weight of your grievances. You will not leave him gasping for air.

 But -

There's always that pesky word, isn't there?

But while we have permission to vote no to our pain, our suffering, our trials, our tribulations, and while we have permission to say to God we would really prefer certain things not come to pass in our lives, our declarations cannot end on that note. They must not.

Jesus followed his sentence in the garden with, "If it's possible...Yet not as I will, but as you will."

Yet not as I will.

Quite possibly the five hardest words a believer will ever have to utter. As Christians, particularly in our moments of suffering and pain, we must narrow the amount of time which lapses between the words "If it's possible..." and "Yet not as I will."  The longer the space between those two statements, the greater the inclination toward disobedience and rationalization.  We must not allow our pain to eclipse our view of God and his character.  Some days that will feel like an all-out-war, a war it seems you are very much losing because your pain is shouting so very loud, discoloring and distorting all you know to be true.

But somehow - somehow - even when we want to vote no to our circumstances, our yes must eventually rise up. It need not even be said with confidence; we can say it in weakness, with fear and trembling and timid faith, but faith nonetheless. God is no less put off by our feeble yes than he was by our pain-driven no.

So, cast your vote.

Jesus is big enough for your no.

And your yes.

Things for Which I'm Thankful

If I had Instagram, I suppose this would qualify as a #latergram. Thanksgiving has passed and we have now officially moved into the land of Christmas songs playing on the radio 24-7 without relief. My pastor encouraged us last week to jot down a list of things for which we're thankful, so before too much more time lapses and we get too far from Thanksgiving, I'd like to share a list of things for which I'm thankful.  

• My dad's support pillows for his knee while he was recovering from knee replacement, which were conveniently left on the bathroom floor. They made for great pillows while I laid on the bathroom floor in pain on Thursday afternoon.  
• A mother who is more than willing to violate the posted speed limit for the sake of her daughter.
• An emergency room less than 8 miles away. 
• An empty ER with no one else in line.    
• Joe Boxer sweatpants.  That was the best $4.80 I have ever spent at the thrift store.  While I was waiting for a CT scan, the tech asked me if I had any buckles or rivets on my pants that I would need to remove before we got started.  Dripping with sarcasm, I said, "No, I wore these pants today with an elastic band because I planned on this, ya know."
• Dilaudid painkiller straight into my body via IV.

And that's just the beginning of the list.

Y'all. Kidney stones are straight from the pit of hell.  It's like the Wicked Witch of the West and her legion of monkeys were unleashed on my insides - a hundred times over. Everybody's been saying that the pain from kidney stones are worse than childbirth.  If that's the case, then there are exactly 0.0 children in my future.  

I found myself alternating between the bathroom floor and the hallway Thursday afternoon, listening to everyone else in the house laugh and chat after Thanksgiving lunch.  Meanwhile, I was praying for the rapture. Either that, or a tranquilizer straight to my brain.  I finally couldn't hack the pain anymore, still not knowing what was happening to my body, and after losing my lunch several times, we abandoned the family festivities and headed for the ER to get some answers. 

Pretty much every night since last Thursday, from the hours of 6:00 pm to 2:00 am, I have wished I could either die or that I could slice my own side open and cut the stone out myself.  I have no idea what it is about the nighttime, but my body unleashes unimaginable pain that even painkillers can't seem to touch. I thought I had been through some pretty vicious doses of pain in the past related to my back, but this - this pain is in a category all its own. 

Do not, under any circumstances, ever put 'have a kidney stone' on your bucket list.  Instead, you should beg and plead with God that the angel of death would pass you by and that he would be merciful and spare you from ever experiencing kidney stones.   

I was reminded via Barnabas Piper's Twitter feed [quoting David Gibson] of how quickly gratitude can slip away from us if we do not pause to be grateful for the smallest of things : "If we are not grateful for the little things, it is only a very short step to no longer being grateful for anything. When we do not enjoy and savor and love and laugh and delight in the little things, then we are headed toward losing our delight in anything."

Since I don't want to lose delight in anything, I'm going to choose to delight in the little things. I'll continue my list:

• Timing. At least this didn't all happen the week before, which would have been during my largest work event of the year, a national conference where I worked over 65 hours in 5 days and was responsible for 100 different vendors.  Ain't nobody got time for a kidney stone in the midst of that.
• My parents newly-remodeled basement, which has provided ample room to pace and writhe in pain on plush carpeting.  
• Water. I've been drinking enough water to rival that of a woman who just found an oasis in the desert.  

Even in our great pain, there are still things for which we can be thankful. 

I'll keep telling myself that.

Please feel free to plead with the God of the heavens above on my behalf to throw some water on the Wicked Witch that has currently taken us residence in my guts otherwise known as a kidney stone.