FACE THE FACTS – Chapter One

God speaks to Joshua and he doesn’t pull any punches. Moses is Dead … talk about blunt ! We don=t like the bad news. Maybe you have noticed - bad news does not send an engraved invitation. Bad news comes suddenly - unexpectedly. When life shakes you up it slaps you in the face and it=s the last thing you expect. .

God speaks to Joshua. Moses is dead - now it’s your turn. Think about it. Moses was one of the big guys. God had spoken to Moses in person on the top of Mount Sinai. Joshua had watched as Moses hand delivered the 10 commandments, still smoking from the hand of God. He had watched Moses deal with all the annoying whining grumbling people as he paid the price for being their leader. He watched Moses stretch his rod out and part Red Sea. It was Cecil B. Demille, in real Technicolor and real life. Joshua had big shoes, rather sandals, to fill. Joshua was in over his head.

Face the Facts: Bad news is bad news …

We don’t like the news that shatters our plans and dashes our dreams. I did not like hearing I had an incurable disease. Immediately, I wanted a second opinion. There must be some mistake. Shortly after diagnosis, I was gathering information, searching online, educating myself on what I was facing. I received a large manila envelope from one of the PD research/support groups. It was stuffed full of more information than I ever wanted or needed.

The first thing to fall out of the envelope was a royal blue business sized card with bright yellow letters – with the words I AM NOT RETARDED emblazoned on the front. The back of the card explained that the carrier of the card was not retarded but rather had Parkinson’s Disease. I could use this card to let people know that I may have trouble with my words but be patient it just takes me longer. So the good news is that I am not retarded - the not so good news is I just look and act retarded. I had to face it. I had/have an incurable disease. I didn’t like it ...I don=t like it … it was not … is not good news.

There were frightening financial realities to face. We had a plan for getting the kids through college and preparing for retirement. Over the years, my wife Brenda has worked as a home care nurse providing care especially for pediatric cases. She is amazingly gifted as a care giver and considers it a ministry. She loves “her children” as her own The plan was that as soon as our nest was empty, or maybe even during the last few high school years, we would begin to work on our nest egg. I would continue as a full time pastor and my wife would work full time as a nurse. This would help the kids through school and help us invest in retirement so we could buy a house and settle in . . . hopefully near family and grand children.

The problem was that God did not check in with my broker. Possibly because he knew I didn’t have a broker. I had no input in the matter and received no notice of the unwelcome nemesis. I made no sense to me or anypne else I knew. Our plan was clearly a good plan. It was almost like God didn’t get it. After all we had “sacrificed” to live in a church owned parsonage our whole life. (I wish I could write another book about the blessings of raising kids in a parsonage … yes you heard/read me right!) Hadn’t we given our over 20% of our income to God’s work in the church, missions, and various building projects and special needs. We kind of deserved at least a say in the deal.

Lest you think that “facing the facts” is a formula for feeling groovy in five easy steps, when life turns bad … this was certainly not my experience. Facing the facts, the hard realities of life, is a decision but also an arduous never ending process. The salesman with the bad breath, this courier of bad news: whom I will introduce shortly, was banging on the front door … and I was not about to answer.

Michael J. Fox’s books, “Lucky Man” and “The Diary of an Incurable Optimist” have been an invaluable help in writing this book. Upon being diagnosed with PD the neurologist told him he had at least ten good years of production before he would need to step back and retire. I was 49 years old and kind of accepted the ten more years of production thing, in an “I’ll deal with all that 10 years from now” sort of way. I was not about to consider that in two years, the lay leadership would be doing most of my work in the church and that in four years I would be on disability.

Face the Facts: You need help …

In retrospect, I had been slowing down for a number of years. Weekly sermons which typically involved six to eight hours of preparation, now took 12 – 20 hours. My meetings with the 10 lay pastors, who provide practical care within the congregation , would normally meet every 6 weeks. These meetings were happening perhaps twice a year. For many years I had prepared a daily devotional follow up to the weekly sermon, hoping I guess that if my people had no idea what I was saying … maybe it would make more sense in print. Somehow I just didn’t seem to be able to continue that on a weekly basis. There were times I was plagued with guilt because I was just too exhausted to visit a parishioner in the hospital. I needed to face up to the reality that I needed help.

Letting go of that which I loved so much … allowing others to fill in and make up for my deficiency was heart wrenching. So many people were so responsive to the ministry needs of the church. The church where I served as pastor for 14 years was planning a $1,000,000 expansion. During the two years before my retirement, the building committee met without me. Nominations, elections, finances, Christian education … most of the functions of the church were cared for by volunteers with my two secretaries basically acting as a pastor in planning and facilitating the activities of the church. Sunday mornings, I would preach in the early service, sleep during Sunday School, then preach in the 11 am service. There were times when I ask our youth/associate pastor, to take over in the middle of the service while I took a 7 minute nap before preaching. There was weight loss, as I lost 15 pounds which at one point was 137 pounds. Pastoral ministry became more and more difficult.

Any effectiveness as a pastor and leader were clearly diminished.

I didn’t like it … and it sounds like it in a journal entry late one night:

May 15, 2002

I don't want to be like this the rest of my life. I don't want my wife to have to live with this stinking blank stare spaced out look. I don't want people calling the house wondering if I'm able to answer the phone. I want to visit all day Saturday. I want to go early to church, talk to people come preach two services and talk to some more people. I want to be part of realizing that we messed up the building program and there's a much better way to do it. I don't want to keep telling people that I am too impaired to do their weddings, baptisms, and if they die they need to make other arrangements. I want to keep harassing with District licensed ministers on the credentials board. I'm not the sure if I like seeing them squirm or am deeply concerned about the leadership of the church. Probably both. I want to stay out late with some with nutty people without feeling that will be a wreck on Sunday because of it. I am so tired stupid voice software won't work. I don't want to be someone different... I want to be myself. It is that too much to ask?

No

Parkinson’s Disease significantly impairs the function of the frontal lobe of the brain. The frontal lobe has an administrative function, prioritizing and filtering out that which is unimportant. Parkinsonian people tend to be overwhelmed and unable to focus in an ADD kind of way.

June 20, 2003 (Sitting in my office at the church)

This is what happens when my mind goes hyper. My mind has just jumped in the last one or two minutes from going to Sam’s, going to the bank, going to the driving range, going fishing, going to the wake, talking to Louise, working on Colossians, working on the cycle of victorious living diagram, meeting with Gary, going swimming, working out, taking the digital recorder back, fixing supper. What do I do to short-circuit my head from this mind blitz?

This is not like me. It is why I feel lonely or mixed up sometimes. I keep missing myself... but I am really still there. When I’m writing ... that’s the real me. When I’m goofing off ... that’s the real me. When I cried... I guess that was the real me... just didn’t know it. When I preach... it’s not a persona... it’s the real me (but God’s words). So when I miss myself I just need to remember I’m still there... for the most part I’m still pretty visible. When I am trying to help people... it’s the real me... but only when I’m not trying to fix the whole world. When I am walking in puddles with Andrew... there I am... and I think it is a real Andrew as well. When hugging my wife, marveling at Jonathan’s talent or admiring Christina as a gift from God ... I am most myself. When I ask for help from friends... sometimes too often... I hope it’s the real me, not manipulating, not overly dependent... hoping to be a help to them as well.

Anyway this whole weird situation is interesting, exciting, hopeful, terrible, strange and the working of God continues in and through the whole thing.

Many who read this book (excuse the delusions of an un-published wanna-be author) will have stories of parental abuse as a child, the lingering pain as an adult victim of divorce, teachers who are not fair, an employer who has thrown them away like a used rag, friends who destroyed their reputation, a pastor who betrayed their confidence, a diagnosis that is overwhelming. None of this is good news. The fact remains … and I seldom if ever use this word but … duh … bad news, by definition, is bad.

Denial is not Faith

The first response when life shakes you up is – face the facts. Don’t deny reality. Denial is not a response of faith. Faith is not wishful thinking but rather a foundation upon which you can base your response to the crises of life. Christians have been accused of hiding their heads in the sand. In no way is Christian faith some sort of spiritualized denial mechanism.

You might say that faith is a crutch for there are times of weakness when we really need lean hard on the love of God and the care of his people. We need to stand upon that which is solid and dependable. But again, faith does not entail pretending that the crisis does not exist. Bill was always fantastic. He was retired and well into his senior years but he was one upbeat guy. Every week I would ask Bill how he was doing. The response was always “fantastic”. One Sunday, after being away a couple weeks, I didn’t see Bill and asked if he was O.K. … “Oh hadn’t you heard Bill’s dead”. Apparently he had terminal cancer and was not fantastic after all. Faith is not denial. Denial tends to be sub conscious, an involuntary response. The premise of this book is that the response to crises can be on purpose rather than involuntary. Denial takes several forms.

Initial Denial

There are times when the news is so bad that denial is necessary as a first step in coping with unthinkable bad news. My son Ryan as a sophomore in high school had been having headaches and dizzy spells at school. We took him to the doctor who immediately ordered an MRI. It was on a Friday afternoon that my wife walked through the back door of our the church parsonage with an MRI film. She was white as a sheet and nearly paralyzed with fear. The MRI revealed a large white mass the size of a softball on the right frontal lobe of his brain. We took him to the emergency room and after waiting five hours the neurologist on call said he was busy and would see him in five days.

We were frightened. We knew it was serious. But in spite of what we “knew” … he still went to the New York Mets games the next day at Shea Stadium. How stupid could we be? The facts were so overwhelming that we were unable to act as though we believed it. I had been diagnosed with PD a few months earlier, there was conflict and criticism in the church concerning a building project, we could not assimilate a brain tumor on top of everything else. He even went to school on Monday morning.

The good news is that I took the MRI to Columbia Presbyterian Hospital and my neurologists in the Movement Disorder Center dropped everything to call Sloane Kettering on the other side of Manhattan. Making like a New York cab driver I madly transported the MRI across town. The surgeon said get him down here immediately. By that afternoon my son was in intensive care at Cornell-Weir Hospital for Special Surgery. On Thursday, Dr. Souedane a world class pediatric surgeon performed the operation. I will never forget the feelings of fear, dread, and hope as my son was taken away from us and rolled through the doors … understanding that anything could happen and knowing that the news is not always good.

The tumor was fully removed, uninvolved with the brain, and totally benign with no trace of cancer. We are so thankful for the doctors, surgeons and staff of these amazing medical centers. Ryan missed his last two years of high school basketball but was able to play two years of college ball. It was a gift from God and he is now a social worker in Boston with plans for seminary in the near future.

The first natural response to trauma is denial. In an interesting way it is the first step in facing the facts. It is that time in which the facts are “known” but we act as though they are not real. In this sense, initial denial is a helpful tool as a step toward facing reality.

Denial becomes a negative response when it continues beyond the initial state of shock. There is a type of pseudo-Christian response which ignores the seriousness of bad news and tragic circumstances. The attitude is that God is still on the throne and everything is going to be OK. Ultimately everything will be OK for the Christian. Later I will introduce you to an important tenet of the faith, “Cheer Up … someday you’re gonna die”. By faith we believe in eternal life.

The reality of heaven does not, however, guarantee that I will be healed of my disease in this life. I will attempt to leave you puzzling over the whys and wherefores of healing/non-healing in a page or two. Jesus does not teach that the life of a disciple is a life without suffering, pain, disease, and persecution. Living by faith is not denying the suffering but rather living out the life of hope and faith even if the suffering is not miraculously removed.

Any denial of the difficult realities of life is a denial of the adequacy of Christ in whom we place our faith. Jesus is the cornerstone of our faith. He did not come to live among us, so that we could escape real life. He came; calling us as His followers to get all wrapped up in realities of a world full of sin, oppression, and injustice... seeking to save those who are lost.

When you lose your job... face the facts. When you are stricken with illness don't act as though it doesn't exist. When you fail... Afess@ up... face the music... suffer the embarrassment. When you sin, don't pretend it's a mistake, confess the sin. There's no way to deal with the things that shake your life until you look them straight in the eye. (pink slips, diagnoses, rejection, and other trials certainly must have eyes ... They find us so readily)

There are other less than positive responses to the trials of life.

Complaint

It was a father/son moment. I had picked Dave up from school and we went to enjoy pizza and the normal parental prying session. Why do parents have to get so personal! Anyway, we ordered our pizza, waited as patiently as possible for a lively junior higher and a busy pastor. (Neither one of us waits well) We kept looking toward the kitchen door with anticipation.

The pizza finally arrived, saying a very few brief words of thanks, I suspended my prying and we dug in. If anticipation is half of the enjoyment … we were missing half the fun. The pizza was cold with barely a brushing of tomato sauce and just a little bit too tough for my 50 year old teeth.

Being in an assertive mood, I called the waiter over and pointed out the injustice of having trusted such a fine institution to provide a quality product and to receive instead that which was so far below reasonable expectations. The waiter was all apologies and quickly returned to the kitchen. Ten minutes later we received our pizza, hot and steaming, with too MUCH sauce. Topping it all off, the waiter said, the manager says the pizza is free today.

It was a very cool deal that my son was able to see me at my courageous best. I stood up for my rights and that poor waiter never had a chance. My son was seriously impressed about the free pizza we enjoyed.

Not long after we were in a restaurant with the family. It hadn’t been 5 minutes after receiving our meals that Dave, followed my stalwart example saying, this spaghetti is terrible, tell the waitress we want free spaghetti.

We live in a complaining society. We deserve a break today. We deserve to be treated well. If we are inconvenienced, ignored, or even if fate deals us a bad hand someone needs to hear about it. When life shakes you up, the “path of least resistance” response is complaint. If we take an objective step back and consider the value of complaint, there is little benefit.

Henri Nouwen, in The Return of the Prodigal Son, had an insightful perspective on the nature of complaint:

One thing I am sure. Complaining is self-perpetuating and counterproductive. Whenever I express my complaints in the hope of evoking pity and receiving the satisfaction I so much desire, the result is always the opposite of what I tried to get. A complainer is hard to live with, and very few people know how to respond to the complaints made by a self-rejecting person. The tragedy is that often, the complaint, once expressed, leads to that which is most feared: further rejection.

I may still send my cold pizza back, but the salient point is that, complaint is not a response of faith and maturity. Complaint is wishful petulant thinking … wishing in a self focused way that I should never have to face the pain, trials, and loss of living in a world where pain, disease, ignorance, and sin are a reality. Chapter Four will focus on the faith decision to “live your faith”, as an alternative to complaint, escape, blame etc. but for now … the focus is upon complaint as a negative response to the crises of life.

Self Pity

Another memory… let me know if you are getting tired of my family stories. I received a call from my daughter’s elementary school. Christina was in 4th grade at the time, was apparently hurt in the play ground and the nurse was asking me to come and get her. Being busy in the office, I said I could get there in half hour or so, to which the nurse responded; “you need to come right now!” Of course I left right away, still having no details of the problem.

Apparently a two inch branch of a tree had tipped into the playground where the kids were pulling it back, sitting on it, and going for a ride upon it’s release. Christine was waiting her turn when another child pulled the branch back while she was in front of it. The branch was released and my daughter went on a completely unexpected, very painful and frightening ride. The branch caught her in the mouth, splitting her lip, driving her four front teeth into her mouth, and tearing the palate. It was a sight no parent should ever have to see.

We rushed her to an oral surgeon with a gruff, insensitive dentist chair side manner, which was more than annoying. I held her hand as he pulled the teeth forward, pushed them in place, and stitched up the palate all the while telling my nine year old not to cry because it wasn’t his fault she was injured. He was a grouchy old guy, which was the bad news … his being a good surgeon was the good news. We picked up pain medication and went home to wait on her hand and foot and help her recover the best we could.

Just about this time one of my sons came home, threw down his back pack saying … this was the worst day of my life! He began to tell his sad story of forgotten homework or unfair teachers or whatever was the crisis of the day … he was looking for some sympathy for his angst of his day when he saw his sister. Her face was swollen and bruised, she was obviously being pampered within an inch of her life … his countenance fell. Clearly his sister had sucked every ounce of available pity from the hearts of her family. Seeing there was no pity left to be had, he left his back pack and trudged wearily up to his room. It seemed like he was the only invite to his pity party that day.

What is it about a pity party that we enjoy so much? Pity, like complaint is another “path of least resistance” response to crises. Pity is the opposite of compassion. Compassion says, I feel your pain, how can I help. Pity says, I feel my pain, how can you help me. Self pity is an open invitation to a party that no one really wants to attend but they can’t refuse. The RSVP is not an option; it is not received in the mail but rather delivered in person.

Again, like complaint, pity is not a response of faith. Faith is facing the facts, part of which is the living through pain, inconvenience, injustice, or sorrow that accompany the crises of life. Self pity turns us inward as a negative, escapist, reactionary response to the insecurities of life. A faith response is pro-active, standing strong:

Stand firm then, with the belt of truth buckled around your waist, with the breastplate of righteousness in place, and with your feet fitted with the readiness that comes from the gospel of peace. In addition to all this, take up the shield of faith, with which you can extinguish all the flaming arrows of the evil one. Take the helmet of salvation and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God. Ephesians 6:14-17

As followers of Jesus Christ, we are not without resources. Pain and crisis do not alter the truth upon which we stand. The good news of the gospel is an ever present reality. The shield of a practical and personal faith remains as a shield against the attack of negativity and temptation. We are protected by the helmet of salvation so that when we are shaken by life we can respond on purpose in a pro-active way. We will look further at some of these issues when we discuss, Living Your Faith, as a purposeful practical life style decision. But for now: Tear up the invitation …

Panic

Another common and less than positive response is panic. We had a gang of young boys growing up in our town just outside of Boston. This was gang activity in the best sense of the word. These were the unenlightened days of the late 50’s so it was politically correct to play cops and robbers, cowboys and Indians, knights of the round table, NFL football but the thing we loved most was “raiding the girls”. The girls would be playing house or whatever other girly thing they happened to be doing and we would swoop in as marauding bandits, over turn their tea set, frighten their dolls and generally wreak havoc and misery upon their existence.

Well we were enjoying our raid this one particular day when the ground began to rumble and here comes Mr. LeBrun. He was big and we thought ugly and very mad ... steam from his ears ... froth from his mouth ... coming to save the girls and demolish the enemy. Well it was fight or flight time and knowing that fight was not an option I burst into all out flight mode. I began to run ... and lo and behold he starts chasing me ... did he not know my older brother was the ring leader of this nefarious plot? I Put my head down, ducked into a neighboring nursery and began running thru the trees. He was getting closer, I could feel his hot breath on my neck. He was just about to get me when I found myself spinning my legs in mid air ... not unlike Wiley Coyote in the Road Runner cartoon. I had run straight of the precipice of a sheer cliff and was sure I would fall to my death, landing flat on my back after a frightening fall of at least 4 - 5 feet. When things get tough the easiest thing to do is panic ... worry ourselves sick ... do something stupid ... take things in our own hands ... run off a cliff in fear.

We don’t need to panic. We are not alone as our God is an ever present help in time of trouble. We are not alone as the family of God is a help and support. A loving God sends his Spirit to comfort, strengthen, and lead. We have a guide in the words of God and as we listen and seek the wisdom of an infinite God he will show us the next step to take when life shakes you up.

I am quite sure the next step taken in obedient response to the words of God will not be off a cliff. Then what we find is that our place of greatest fear and danger is most often the place of greatest blessing.

… our place of greatest fear and danger is most often the place of greatest blessing.

Bitterness

For the purposes of this book I am defining anger as the unavoidable human response on the feeling level. We will look at the feelings of anger in the next chapter. But here we will look at bitterness as a choice … choosing to nurse that feeling into bitterness. We are blessed with a beautiful back yard, a 1/3 acre lot with half of that covered with trees and flowers around a small in-ground pool that is used every day during the summer. There were two trees in our back yard that that apart from exhaling oxygen back into the atmosphere were of very little use. These trees crowded out the growth of the flowers, blocked the sunlight from the pool, and in the fall shed bushels of leaves to fill the pool and yard. I even think I heard those naked trees snickering as I raked the yard and dredged their leafy remnants out of the pool.

My wife is wiser than I and suggested we cut the trees down. It hardly seemed right environmentally but the more we thought about it the more it made sense. We cut down three trees the two leaf factories and an evergreen that was growing too close to the house for safety. This summer was the first without the trees. The flowers look better and healthier than ever, the pool was 10-15 degrees warmer, and I am looking out my back window in November having spent a total of 90 minutes raking leaves this fall.

We enjoyed the flowers, the sunlight and the warmth this summer but we noticed that those trees began to grow back. It was clear that in a very few years they would be blocking the sun and crowding out the flowers again. In response to their stubbornness we treated those tree stumps with defoliant. We did not want to nurture the growth of those trees blocking the light. They were an unwelcome presence in our yard.

Why would anyone cultivate and nurture anger? What is it that draws us to the perverse torture/pleasure of reliving and remembering the pain and injustice of life. Anger is a very real, powerful, and even healthy response to the inequity and iniquities of life. The feelings of anger, however, are like emotional stem cells. I will refrain from the ethical controversy surrounding stem cells as related to neurological disease, just to mentions that stem cells are cells in the early developmental stages that through the miraculous creative power of God (or mother nature, or the amazing creative force of skillions of years and blind chance … but I digress) these cells have the ability to morph into all the various cells that become a human body.

Feelings of anger can morph into bitterness and a self imposed self absorbed perspective that strangles the love, joy, and hopefulness out of life. Feelings of anger, as emotional/spiritual stem cells, in the petri dish of the human heart, soaking in self centeredness and revenge yield a rancor that is hard, cold, and faithless. This bitterness can consume every waking moment, poison every relationship, and skew every decision.

On the other hand, these same feelings in the petri dish of the same human heart saturated with grace, faith and forgiveness yields a gentle spirit and a compassionate heart. Henri Nouwen speaks of the wounded healer, reminding us that it is those who have been hurt most deeply that can care with the greatest compassion. And as Jesus explained to his disciples, as Mary Magdalene anointed his feet, He that has been forgiven much, loves much.

We will look more closely at the grace-full way that God’s grace turns pain and sorrow into in subsequent chapters but for now, face the facts, with an acceptance that does not cultivate anger into the cold angst of bitterness.

Blame

Blame is closely related to bitterness. Blame is the perverse consuming need to attach a name, personality, or institution to the cultivated anger which is bitterness. We have asked the question; “Why would we ever cultivate feelings of anger when they produce such bitterness?” In the same way we can ask the question; “Why would we ever focus so much on establishing blame when it produces an ever deepening bitterness.

In blame, negative and/or hostile motives are assigned to the blamee, whoever or whatever that may be. In a self absorbed way, we foster a sense of, “my life and happiness are important” and he/she, they, God, (fill in the blank) has no right to disturb that. Can you see a pattern developing where a faith-less response turns us inward and away from the resources of God and toward the poverty of self sufficiency? Whereas, a faith response turns us away from the sink hole of self focus and toward the love, grace, and strength of God himself.

Did I mention, to let me know when you are tired of my personal stories? My son Jonathan is presently in Nairobi, Kenya for six months of volunteer service. He is teaching in the African Nazarene University, consulting with student government leaders and helping in any way he can.

We got a note just two weeks ago, “Hey Mom I am very sick. I don’t know what it is, but it’s bad.” That is not what you want to hear from a son on the other side of the world. He had fever, aching, nausea, loss of appetite and was expelling remnants of human ingestion from all directions. Our biggest fears were malaria which would be with him for the rest of his life and typhoid fever which could be 4-6 weeks of high fever, pain, and weakness. The good news was that it was neither of these diseases. The bad news was that he had an amoeba.

I googled amoeba disease and the first headline I saw was:

“6 die from brain-eating amoeba after swimming”

PHOENIX - It sounds like science fiction but it’s true: A killer amoeba living in lakes enters the body through the nose and attacks the brain where it feeds until you die . . .

These amoebae are one cell protozoa that are ingested in the drinking water especially in developing countries. They set up homestead in the digestive system for an incubation period and then reproduce and make their way to the liver, pancreas, kidney and brain. Fortunately the amoebae in question were of the less virulent strain and have been routinely treated with amoebacide medication.

If these invasive parasites were not eliminated they would have multiplied and affected the whole body. Bitterness is an invasive parasite that will reproduce and infect every area of life. By establishing blame, we setup a target upon which to direct our anger. The result is an environment for the unwelcome invader of bitterness to multiply and intensify. We do not face the facts, rather we spend our time and energy blaming rather than responding in faith. Purposely turning away from the blame game and turning toward a faith response is a necessary step in facing the realities of life with grace, strength, and resolve.

Henri Nouwen, speaks of the freedom and deliverance from the shackles of blame and bitterness”

Imagine your having no need at all to judge anybody. Imagine your having no desire to decide someone is a good or bad person. Imagine your being completely free from the feeling that you have to make up your mind about the morality of someone's behavior. Imagine that you could say: I am judging no one ! Henri Nouwen Here and Now

Not one of us is exempt from the shattering assault of the tragic and unjust events of life. People do not always smile at you. Good fortune does not always fill your life with sunlight. There are times when the darkness of pain, trial, suffering and injustice consume your existence. Facing the facts, living by faith involves an acceptance of the trials and suffering of life … not a pain free life but a deep rich abundant life. Accepting the facts is more than a passive endurance of pain but is also a decisive turning from a self absorbed obsession/pre-occupation with personal comfort, convenience and pleasure. It is as we accept and even embrace the reality of suffering that we come to know and understand God’s working in us.

It is in the real finite struggles of life that an infinite God reveals his love, grace, and power to us as well as to those around us. Skye Jethani quotes Dallas Willard, “We are not to try to get in a position to avoid trials. And we are not to ‘catastrophize’ and declare the ‘end of the world’ when things happen. Jethani goes on to say, “the trials of ordinary existence are the divine curricula for spiritual maturity. These are the laser beams God uses to put our old self, with it’s misappropriated desires, to death and then resurrect a new self with new desires focused on a more lasting joy. In other words although I really prefer comfort and a painless existence … that is neither my deepest need nor the way of greatest happiness. My greatest joy is in facing the trials with the empowerment, grace, inner strength and joy of a practical relationship with a personal God.

The first aspect of a faith response is … Face the Facts. With God’s help, grace, and strength we can indeed face the real world … through Christ who strengthens us.