Half a year from half a century.
I keep reminding myself that I'm not dead yet.
It's interesting the psychic wrestling match that goes on in one's noggin when you don't have any children or significant others to distract you with their lives... this is definitely a passage/season in my life.
I see pictures of myself and am somehow angry at how old I look, angry that I need reading glasses, angry at how my knee hurts going down stairs or how my back hurts getting out of bed. Perhaps the anger is just masked sadness; sadness that I'm going the way of my forefathers, sadness that I can no longer 'compete' for the affections of the maidens, accentuated by the death of my marriage? Sadness for the lost years?
Or maybe fear: fear of inadequacy, that lingering sense of 'good, but not good enough'? The stench of spiritual battle betrays the lies spoken to my soul... how much of my life have I surrendered as homage to that foul Deceiver?
I went to Southwells today for a burger and saw an old friend I last saw 25 years ago. Another old friend contacted me today on facebook... 29 years since we've seen each other.
Twenty-nine years... that's the age of my 'older' co-volunteers with YoungLife.
It is truly a lifetime, 29 years.
The guys in my Bible study talk about sending their children off to college; soon they will be talking about holding their grandkids. There's sadness there, too-- grieving the loss of a child I never had, a reminder perpetuated every year on Father's Day. Makes me want to go live in a cave.
I know that Jesus loves me, that the Father is faithful in His compassions for me. I am not complaining... more like confessing. I know what it is to go to sleep at night alone in a 3-bedroom home, concluding consciousness with, "Good night, Jesus," as I hug the body pillow on my daybed. Every night. That's just true.
I know that perhaps this passage, this transition in life will probably erupt into some kind of sunshiny day and that I may be just hormonal (or sub-hormonal), or maybe this is the family blessing of multi-generational depressive states I am passing through?
There is within me a dissatisfaction with the way things are... it was not so long ago I had mastered the art of contentment. Have I failed in my current discontent?
It's not pretty inside right now, but I'm 50 next winter.. I no longer have the energy to pretend that everything is 'just fine' right now, and I also acknowledge: I'm not dead yet... there is more life ahead of me.
So thank you, Jesus, for what I do have. Thank you that I still have my parents. Thank you that I have a handful of good friends who are trustworthy and can tolerate my funkiness.
I'm not dead yet; help me to live for You, Jesus. Help me to embrace the "abundant life" you promise us.
Speak to me words of sonship, Father... erase these childhood tapes of orphan-spirit.
Help me to experience Your Love, that I may love others well.
Good night, Jesus.
Jim
