“Look! I stand at the door and knock. If you hear my voice and open the door, I will come in, and we will share a meal together as friends” (Rev. 3:20NLT).
I had received a taste of God’s goodness and love in a simple miracle as a child. It awakened an appetite that became a deep craving for more of the reality of God, of His presence, power, and, most of all, love.
As I moved trough my teen years, like many of my peers, I was on a quest to define my own identity. Among a host of external forces eager to dictate who I should be, it seemed an unsurmountable task to define who I really was. The person I was evolving into was not the person I wanted to become, yet external and internal forces seemed determined to shape me into someone I did not like or want to become. In all this, more painful concerns of youth that demanded immediate attention compromised the hunger for God. Thus, my teen years were filled with much searching, self-doubting, and frustration over circumstances and pressures that seemed beyond my control.
Throughout this season, there remained that distant flickering memory of the encounter I had experienced as a child. The memory called to me, as if from a dark, distant place, like an invitation to something better than the fate I was tumbling into. While I hoped I could live a better life, the reality was that I was plunging uncontrollably into a place of depression, fear, and self-rejection, like someone hopelessly floundering in quicksand with no way of escaping. Yet the distant memory of the reality of God’s love offered reason for hope.
As I moved through the latter part of my teen years, I explored numerous paths, from Eastern religions to strict adherence of traditional Christian practices, searching for the reality of God. From time to time, I would sense that He was near, as if He were teasing me onward in my search. I didn’t understand then that it was the Holy Spirit drawing a discontented teenager toward the love of His Father in heaven.
This searching, however, eventually led to a dark time that gripped me with a persistent sense of being lost. It seemed the more I searched, the more I discovered how lost I really was. It felt like a hopeless entanglement in a bizarre, never-ending maze, a place of total disorientation where fear grows until it overwhelms and finally paralyzes. In a strange paradox, I was afraid of moving in any direction while at the same time afraid of not moving at all. I was fearful of the known and the unknown.
Yet despite the paralyzing fear, moving was the only feasible option. As the world closed in and I found myself drifting into isolation and despair, I still sensed there was a place of hope and safety. There had to be. From time to time, it seemed within reach, but what I was so desperate to grab hold of somehow always seemed to slip away. What was most frustrating was that I didn’t understand what it was I had actually let slip away and why it had happened. There was a destiny calling to me. I knew that my life had been cut out for something better!
BOTTOM LINE:
“I am the same, yesterday, today, and forever.” Those simple words of hope were like a distant whisper of truth, a memory of an enticing tidbit form God’s banquet table. These simple words continued to nudge me forward through the murky and turbulent season of youth.
merlin now: Perhaps you are thinking I’ve just dragged you through the above five post summary of Chapter One simply because I’m thinking we oldsters may not ever choose to meaningfully revisit the spiritual benchmarks from our childhood and youth. Hopefully, were we blessed with children, our mentoring encounters with their spiritual passages created the “maker-spaces” not only to assist them in transitioning from “milk” to “meat” as discussed in I Cor 3:1-3 & Hebrews 5:11-14, but also hopefully, in the realities of our present age & affliction, a clarifying, confirming & qualitative review of our personal historical spiritual foundational transitions….. Perhaps after reading the next post tomorrow, you’ll better understand
NEXT UP: One reader’s response to my Aug 22 most opened post ever, Scrolling Ourselves to Death….