Residues and Reminders

Life is full of learning journeys through which we may sometimes come full-circle and return to a familiar place, but with a very different outlook.  We can learn both through life experiences and study, and if we're intentionally reflective, the two intertwine and inform each other.

In the last few years, I've been doing lots of intentional learning.  The more I read, the more I realise I'm barely scratching the surface, and that can be quite overwhelming.  It's reassuring to hear others—who are in even deeper, and whose expertise and experience I look up to—acknowledge something similar.  I guess anyone who thinks they've 'got it' has in some ways more to learn than the rest of us!

My first half of 2022 has been full on, with two overlapping MA units.  Things slow down from here, but it means I should be able to complete the course next summer.  There have been moments when it has felt impossible, but on the whole I've loved it.  It's a huge privilege, and I'm so thankful for a healthy mind to apply to study.

There's something I've noticed about life after depressive illness: it seems there are residues from the fog that can swirl back into my consciousness to dampen my hope.  When a discouragement hits, old feelings may creep in, and then it's all too easy to revisit some difficult interactions and the associated thoughts.  It takes a conscious choice not to linger there.  There's quite a difference between mental illness and ongoing awareness of vulnerabilities, but sometimes the load of life does seem a bit too heavy and I feel far too puny.

Not only in those moments, but especially then, I find myself longing for something beyond the here and now.  For freedom from the kind of heartache that comes with frustrations, misjudgments, and disconnects.  For a reality without war and loss, discord and competition, sickness and poverty, arrogance, fear and oppression.  For a world in which what really matters is taken care of.

This is where the reminders come in.  As a young Christian I looked forward to 'heaven' in a way that potentially disregarded this bit, as though things that are somehow won't matter.  As I've grown, and yes, through study, I've become dissatisfied with that.  The God of the Bible, and of my own experience, is very much present, and especially concerned for the suffering, the unseen, downtrodden, disregarded, and undervalued.  To live as though life in the here and now is to be 'got through' as painlessly as possible, because it's essentially all about going to an eternal bliss, seems unfaithful to God's own level of investment in creation.

The more I wrestle with theology—what we say of God, and the implications of that—the more compelled I am by the Christian story.  I'm constantly drawn to the mystery of God's very self born into humankind in Jesus, identifying with us in the messy realities of life, dying and rising to deal with all that has warped it and to re-identify us with God.  It gives me such hope to know that Jesus ascended to God the Father as the first one with a new, resurrection body, and so that the Holy Spirit would come to empower and teach us.  But/and I'm so desperate for the day when Jesus returns and God makes all things new, that sometimes all I can pray is, "come, Lord Jesus."

And so I return to a familiar place, and I do long for heaven: but as completion rather than escape.  I don't know what that looks like, or how all that is so wrong can be made right.  Somehow, though, I'm convinced that the struggles and formation of this life—and even those troubles that only seem to deteriorate and cause increasing sorrow—will be transformed into the glorious joy of everlasting life for those who acknowledge their utter need of God.  Then, what tends to be disregarded now will be seen for its full worth.

I've come full-circle, but I'm facing in a different direction.  It's less about earth or heaven, and so very much about Jesus.  His life has shown us that this bit really does matter.⬦

⬦ If you enjoy reading this blog, you can subscribe using the form in the side bar.  Or email me on ThereIsNoAlternative.blog@gmail.com and I'll sign you up. Your email address won't go anywhere else and I am not a prolific blogger! ⬦ Please feel free to share with others, whether on social media or one-to-one. ⬦