Beautiful Wreck

Seven or so years ago I was in a scary car accident on the 405 freeway. It was raining very hard and my car hydroplaned perpendicularly across five lanes of traffic. Thank God, I was okay and the passenger in the only car I hit was also okay. After the car was pulled out of the bushes and ditch (and was still drive-able), we drove side streets to a gas station near our house to look at the damage and decide where to drop it for repairs. When I saw the damage done to the front of the car I almost collapsed. All the pseudo-calm to handle the emergency dissolved and I sobbed hysterically. Seeing the extent of the accident, I realized how much worse it could have been and I felt intense gratitude that I didn't die.

This past week I felt like I was getting a glimpse at the mangling, ripping emotional and spiritual accident that occurred in my life within the last five years. Grief, post partum depression, young children (one who was extremely challenging), unhappiness in life circumstances, a fruitless church life... they all twisted and turned me, John and our marriage into a gory wreck. In the depths of that dark place, ugliness, sin and anger thrived and marred us even more. We have been walking away from the wreck for more than two years and slowly healing and rebuilding. We have felt God's hand through the love of our friends and new church family helping us to mend and renew. But recent events have turned me around to look again at that wreck I so want to leave behind.

Last weekend John shared our story at a men's retreat for our church. In preparing to talk about accountability, John was led back through those very difficult years and was able to see God's loving hand through it all. At a time when John felt alone, he can now see how God's church and people were there the entire time, like a safety net, keeping John from more sin and pain. John was deeply blessed by this view of God's work in his life and God's protection of him during a very vulnerable time. But for me, this was like looking back at the twisted metal of my car and seeing what might have been. The wounds of the last few years are reopened and I'm hurt again by the animosity and indifference that was in our marriage. I can see more clearly the sin that thrived when we were in that dark place and now I can see how much worse it could have been.

And it hurts.

I've been so tempted to be angry again. At myself. At John. At God. All the same questions come up again. Why me? Why us? Why did this have to happen? How can this be for our good? Does God really love me? Does God really want only good for me?

I turn to One Thousand Gifts again for Ann Voskamp's God-given, life-giving words.
"Surely, just as I have intended so it has happened, and just as I have planned so it will stand." (Is 14:24)
and
"See that I am God. See that I am in everything. See that I do everything. See that I have never stopped ordering my works, nor ever shall, eternally. See that I lead everything on to the conclusion I ordained for it before time began, by the same power, wisdom and love with which I made it. How can anything be amiss." (Julian of Norwich)
"...I won't shield God from my anguish by claiming He's not involved in the ache of this world and Satan prowls but he's a lion on a leash and the God who governs all can be shouted at when I bruise, and I can cry and I can howl and He embraces the David-hearts who pound hard on His heart with their grief and I can moan deep that He did this -- and He did. I feel Him hold me -- a flailing child tired in Father's arms.... I know all our days are struggle and warfare and that the spirit-to-spirit combat I endlessly wage with Satan is this ferocious thrash for joy. He sneers at all the things that seem to have gone hideously mad in this sin-drunk world, and I gasp to say God is good. The liar defiantly scrawls his graffiti across God's glory and I heave to enjoy God."(AV)

This moment of light and sight to John, for me, is a moment of darkness. I too easily turn toward the darkness of lacking, the lie that God is not there. And yet He whispers sweetly that if I had never seen the wreckage I would never have known His protective hand. Never seeing the bottom of that chasm, I would not rightly know my dependence on Him. Without the vision of God's word to properly see the things around us, I will only see the hole, the lack. God's word points me again to His goodness.

"Only the Word is the answer to rightly reading the world, because the Word has nail-scarred hands that cup our face close, wipe away the tears running down, has eyes to look deep into our brimming ached, and whisper, "I know. I know." The passion on the page is a Person, and the lens I wear of the Word is not abstract idea but they eyes of the God-Man who came and knows the pain." AV

And the God of all grace, who called you to his eternal glory in Christ, after you have suffered a little while, will himself restore you and make you strong, firm and steadfast. 1 Peter 5:10

Therefore, since we have a great high priest who has ascended into heaven, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold firmly to the faith we profess. For we do not have a high priest who is unable to empathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who has been tempted in every way, just as we are—yet he did not sin. Let us then approach God’s throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need. Hebrews 5:14-16