Saturday, September 3, 2011

Faithfulness

The following is a spoken word that I wrote about a year ago.  At that time, Justus was in the hospital hooked up to all kinds of crazy contraptions and I was surviving on fumes of adrenaline and anxiety.  I haven't posted it before this time because I was never sure I could handle the comments it may evoke.  It is as honest, unfluffy, and straightforward as I've ever been.  I'm still not sure I'm ready for how some of you may respond.  But I have a friend who has found herself in the same dark place and I am posting it for her and for anyone else who has ever questioned God and are willing to admit it.

Doubt
Amie Sexton  November 2010

If I stand here bare-boned in naked truth
I find that I'm asking where's the proof?
The apparent evidence lacking
has me back-tracking
to a place where doubt and skepticism take root.

What are the contradictions;
the implications?
Is it that or
is it simply a matter
of time, will, sovereignty
and other dimensions my eyes can’t see?

If I ask You to heal now and You don't
or You won't
are You less faithful for your hesitation?
Or do I judge You more faithful having endured the situation?
Dare I judge you at all?
Judge not lest judgement fall.

But what of this faith that moves mountains
or drives fountains up from rolling seas,
letting thousands cross on sandy ground
while I drown in my own sea of sand sinking quick?
Do tests of faith strengthen hope
or does hope deferred make the heart sick?

When Jesus prayed in dismay, "Let this cup pass from me"
was His obedience too great
or was His faith just too weak?
If I ask will I receive?
How can I believe, if I must submit
all the while admit that He answers as He pleases?
Or has He deceived us?

"Heresy!" cries the Pharisee.
You whose eyebrows are raised in disgrace
scowling face.
"How could she?  Why would she
say such a thing?
As though God is obligated to explain."

But these questions in my mind
long to be satisfied
and even this temptation to deny
doesn't surprise or compromise
the love He bestows since
He already knows the anxiety that lies inside of me
as I strive to walk the Gospel in the midst of this reality:

That pain remains the same
and the rain is unchanged
falling on the just and the unjust
but must I be crazy
to think that maybe
I could access special favor
having put my trust in this Savior?

If a father knows how to give good gifts to his own
and when his child asks for bread will not give him a stone
How much more does our Father in heaven,
the Father of lights, know how to give us...

Wait.
How does God define "good"?

Good is good, right?
A word with a definition,
a meaning that creates expectation,
the anticipation of something...well...good.

But is a child dying,
parents crying, trying to understand
what's coming from His hand good?

A million people in an earthquake
that shakes and breaks and devastates
their lives already in a precarious state;
is that good?

Cars crash, thieves dash
down dark alleyways
to easy escapes;
Innocent falling prey
to scams and schemes
Wall Street exploiting dreams
with its greed;
A child's soul bleeds under the invasion
of a pedophiles' touch.
It's all too much.
And sooner or later, we all will die
So, why shouldn't I cry
"GOD, IS THIS GOOD?!"



I am still in the process of answering some of my own questions and maybe someday I'll share that post with you as well.  But let's face it  --most of them will remain unresolved because only God and the understanding that will come in His presence someday can offer a complete answer.  As I shared with my precious, struggling friend: my faith may be a fragile, shaken thing at times but even when I question, doubt, curse, wander...He has never cast me away.  And that may be the greatest evidence of His faithfulness after all.