I felt compelled to pray and ask God to humble me this week. This is a scary thing to do, I confess—not one I do often. But something I felt I needed. Sometimes we just need to be on the lookout for the hand of God or else it passes us by like another car on a busy highway.
Here are a few of the ways the Lord humbled me this week:
1) Creation: On Wednesday I commented to Brian that it seemed as though we hadn’t seen the sun in days. Ohio winters can sometimes be cold and gray for days on end—it’s like hiding under a blanket, biding your time in the darkness, knowing you need a breath of fresh air but having to wait for someone to seek you out before the cover can be lifted.
As I picked up my little boys from kindergarten, I sat in the pick-up line and watched as the clouds raced swiftly across the sky, allowing the sun to play peek-a-boo with the earth below. His Creation never fails to amaze me—the intricacy of a snowflake, the changing colors of a tree in fall, a spider’s web. But this day it was the light. Just the light. That I had said just that morning, “We haven’t seen the sun in days.”
And there it was.
Thank you, Lord.
2) A great win on the basketball court. Such joy and thankfulness.
3) A frustrating defeat on the basketball court. Don’t think too highly of myself.
4) An article someone sent my way: Someone sent me an article on chronic fatigue. MS takes many forms—one of the challenges is that it manifests differently in each individual. While many mark MS by its visible, physical markers like issues with walking, mine currently manifests primarily in the invisible, in particular fatigue.
This psychologist muses on a year of chronic fatigue, and I confess that at times I fear mine might be a lifetime of it (although I’m certain mine is not as constant or severe as he describes). This article came at a time when I needed to know I am not alone.
One part that hit home, in particular about always having been able to just push through without consequence, reads like this…
“Fatigue messes with identity. For 50 years I have done what I wanted to. I have been able to push (even over-extend) my body with little seeming consequences. Fatigue, on the other hand changes how you see yourself and how you relate to your loved ones. Once used to being the one to do things for others, you become the helped. When you feel 80 but you think you should feel like 50, it begins to change your sense of yourself and your place in life. At times I wondered if my career was about to be over. If you make your identity what you can do, fatigue will soon remind you that such an identity is certainly fragile and soon lost.” (from Musings of a Christian Psychologist: A Year of Living with (chronic) Fatigue)
5) Friendship: This week I experienced so many sweet encouragements from various friends. One dear friend was at a Christian conference and sent me this text message of encouragement…
“What we learned today—it is an honor to be trusted with pain, and it is to be cherished…because suffering always precedes multiplication. Praying you can learn to see MS as a true honor and high calling from the Lord (because I know that’s not the normal human reaction to it). And that we can rejoice because He has overcome. But before we can take heart that He overcomes, we will have trial in this world. “In this world you will have trouble, but take heart, I have overcome the world!”
6) Sleeplessness: Many nights I do not sleep well, and I find myself wide awake praying. Praying. Sometimes for hours. I saw a friend this week and she asked me if I was sleeping any better. I told her sometimes I think to myself, Really, God? Do you really need me up praying right now? Wouldn’t I be worth so much more rested in the morning?
And what she said was so humbling: “Man, He really has you in a state of dependence.”
What mercy.
***
What I learned this week as the Lord humbled me in so many gentle and sometimes challenging ways: “But as for me, it is good to be near God.” Psalm 73:28