"Why, LORD, do you stand far off? Why do you hide yourself in times of trouble?" -Psalm 10:1
I think I need to lament. I think I need to take a look at all the difficulties that this summer has presented to me, and just feel them for a bit. Often time we skip over the lamenting phase because we are so eager to discover the "lesson" God is teaching us so we can have a powerful story to share with our Christian friends. Or we mask our sorrow with other emotions until the mask actually begins to feel real and we no longer feel the need to lament. We do these things because, obviously, it sucks to be sad. It's uncomfortable. We urgently search for the quickest route away from sadness and anger, because those emotions aren't fun to feel. But if there's one thing I've learned from this summer of peaks and valleys, it's that Christianity allows us the space to just feel. God sees and honors pretty much every emotion a human can feel throughout the entirety of Scripture, so we shouldn't run from our emotions. I am choosing not to run from them now.
Support raising has been really, really, really hard. It's been weird answering the "how's support raising going" question with, "honestly, it's super hard and it's not going too well." Not the answer most people expect, lol. When I first felt that God wanted me to serve refugees in the Middle East, I never imagined it would be this difficult for that to become a reality. I mean, if the Creator of the ENTIRE universe wants you to do something, you'd think it would happen quickly and smoothly, right?! Lol, nope. This journey has been everything BUT smooth.
Since I'm trying to learn how to lament, here are a few things that have been hard when it comes to support raising: It is hard to depend completely on others for money. It is hard to put in so much work for weeks and still not see numbers rise. It is hard to receive a "no." It is hard when appointments are cancelled. It is hard when you are ignored. It is hard when the difficulty of the process causes you to question your calling. It is hard going in and out of believing that God will provide. It is hard when there are hundreds of other things happening in your household.
"BUT Go-" ....no, but nothing. Can some things just be hard?! lol
I know that there are a thousand things that can be said to speak light into this situation. And I've heard most of them, and they are helpful. But sometimes, solidarity is more important than words of encouragement. Your boy just needs some solidarity! Because honestly, support raising has been a pretty lonely season of my life. There aren't many people that understand what it's like to do this. And I don't live next door to all my closest friends anymore (RIP college). So yeah, it has been a difficult season. And no, of course it hasn't been all bad. This season has been full of ups and downs. Maybe my next blog post will be about the good stuff. But I'm tired of pretending not to be sad, and pretending things aren't hard. So this blog post is about the sad and hard things.
I don't know what God is trying to teach me through all of this, and I'm not going to stress myself out trying to figure out what it is. Maybe it isn't anything. There isn't always a lesson. Some things just happen. I'm just going to feel this right now, and also let God know how I feel. I'm going to lament. But I'm not going to quit. I'm going to keep working as hard as I can, and whatever happens is God's will. I still love God, even though I will admit I'm pretty frustrated with God right now. But hey, that's how relationships work sometimes.