The Bridge Haunts Me

There is something about this picture that haunts me. As I sit at my kitchen counter, reading and thinking about God, life and what I’m learning, this picture reminds me of something and I just can’t put my finger on it.

So many things in life are unsettled. If I even listed them I would open a door for worry, doubt and fear. I read something in Oswald Chambers this morning that is more understandable today than it was two months ago. “The life of faith is not a life of mounting up with wings, but a life of walking and not fainting.”

You don’t hear that a lot in church today do you? We don’t talk about the difficult walk of faith perhaps because it’s not all that marketable. When you nuzzle up to Elohim the definition of blessing, good and bad, value and peace changes.

We sing and say we want to “Know” God but as He makes His introduction more intimate many of us shy away. We like the idea of a “Club God” because it makes us feel as though we belong to something. But what happens when, as they did to Jesus, the culture turns on us? What happens to our walk when a deeper understanding means stepping outside the “Christian Norm” and onto a bridge that takes us somewhere but nowhere we really want to go.

Perhaps this picture haunts me because it defines my journey so accurately. There is no one else on the bridge with me. I cannot see where I am going, when this ends or how it ends. As I see myself crossing over I focus not on what’s below me, not on the waves crashing around me, and my mind fights the darkness of the clouds that try to slow me down. On the other side of that bridge is an island with a lighthouse perched on the rocky edge. Right now it’s all boarded up, broken down and deserted. But I have this sense that this will be my home for a time. Why?

I don’t know nor do I care to completely understand. I guess I’m tired of trying to figure out God. I guess I don’t feel the need to completely understand Him. Trust is a funny thing, it doesn’t just happen you have to know someone well enough to give that portion of your life over to them. When cancer steps into your life it’s like a freefall. Cancer almost forces you to let go. Just think what people would say if I even started to believe that cancer might be a blessing, a guide, a path to a greater understanding of God. Many will try to correct me. Many will cringe and use words and verses to try to bring my thoughts back to what they know and understand. But then again, most aren’t where I am right now. You can’t understand, nor should you, what cancer can do until you have it.

So for now I will look out the window and watch the sun come up on another day. I will ponder the things I have written but not over think any of it. Go have a good day and don’t be afraid of the bridge. You know what I’m gonna say don’t you. It’s a familiar line these days. “It’s not gonna kill yah.”

2 Comments

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  momtism March 18, 2010 at 10:13 pm

  Wow. That took me so many different places, and then back again to one common place. Although my journey has been Autism, I find so much of what you say about your journey with cancer lines up emotionally. I didn't ask for this in my life; didn't want it; am often frightened, exhausted & dizzied by where it has and is taking my life. But one thing I know from this section of the bridge is that. at some point, I had to stop, take a deep breath and make my peace with it. Making your peace with Autism or cancer or anything else that is life-changing, does not mean you are accepting it, that you welcome it or that you are not going to do everything in your power to survive it's toxicity. It means that you are going to quit letting it drag you by the hair. You're going to try to walk beside it and learn what you can from it along the road. It's still a formidable foe that forced it's way into your life without asking. But it's what it brings with it that you eventually cling to. And in being able to identify with the “blessings” that come along side, you are able (if at times only momentarily) to escape from the clutches of what delivered them to your door.
• 
  momtism March 19, 2010 at 12:13 am

  Wow. That took me so many different places, and then back again to one common place. Although my journey has been Autism, I find so much of what you say about your journey with cancer lines up emotionally. I didn't ask for this in my life; didn't want it; am often frightened, exhausted & dizzied by where it has and is taking my life. But one thing I know from this section of the bridge is that. at some point, I had to stop, take a deep breath and make my peace with it. Making your peace with Autism or cancer or anything else that is life-changing, does not mean you are accepting it, that you welcome it or that you are not going to do everything in your power to survive it's toxicity. It means that you are going to quit letting it drag you by the hair. You're going to try to walk beside it and learn what you can from it along the road. It's still a formidable foe that forced it's way into your life without asking. But it's what it brings with it that you eventually cling to. And in being able to identify with the “blessings” that come along side, you are able (if at times only momentarily) to escape from the clutches of what delivered them to your door.