Full Disclosure.
Life has been eating my lunch. I’ve been one breath away from a breakdown as circumstances and needs with Benjamin have escalated…. and the rest of life didn’t stop to accommodate! I’ve seen the roughest edges and lowest lows within myself in the last weeks. It hasn’t been pretty.
Finally, last week, time stopped just long enough for me to ugly cry and write an unfiltered letter to God. I didn’t write it to publish but to clean it out of myself. But since wiping away the mascara smears, scooping up the baby, and carrying on with life, I’ve not been able to shake the feeling that I should share my very personal letter here.
Maybe it’s because there’s something healing about not publicly not being ok. If I don’t have to be ok, you don’t have to be ok. We call all be not-ok together, and try to turn each other toward the God that says, “You’re not ok, but I AM.”
I’m ok-er than I was when I wrote this. At least right now. But you don’t have to be. He IS.
A Letter to God
If I’m honest, I think a part of me feels betrayed - by Benjamin and by You. Everything was fine. It was beautiful. Sure, there was a list of normal hard things in our lives. But it seemed like everything was fine until, one morning, it wasn’t anymore. Until Benjamin lost control, and I subsequently did too.
I don’t do well without having a sense of control. In some ways, it’s a strength of how You made me. To bring order, rhythm, security and possibility. Currently, I’m walking in the weak side of it and breaking down internally. Dread, anger, hopelessness and even depression are vying to replace joy, hope, opportunity and adventure.
I can’t fix Benjamin. I can’t routine him, discipline him, adjust him, treat him, or follow any kind of step by step to “make him better”. But You say he’s not broken. You say he’s just Benjamin.
I don’t want it to be this way. I don’t want it to be hard. I don’t want him to struggle. I want him to be free.
I don’t want parenting to be so hard, restricted or full of caveats.
I don’t want him to be a victim to his chemical wiring. I don’t want him to live in fear and on the edge of traumatic burnout.
I want his central nervous system to work the way You designed it to work. I want his neural pathways to be washed clean and made straight by living water, filling them with supernatural power, insight and giftings. I want him to be blessed.
I think, in my mind, he is cursed and not blessed. But, Jesus, you became the curse for him. You finished it off and sealed the deal. Even if it’s not yet, it’s coming.
But he’s 3. Let the little guy be free. Let him sleep in peace, play with freedom and delight in the world You created for him to live in. Why can’t he just do that?
I know there’s brokenness in the world. This is just a part of it. But I’m angry about it. Benjamin is innocent, made to be pure and made with great potential. I know Your Word says You can use this for good. It says You are Lord and will work all things out - even this - for good. For Benjamin, for me, for Chris, for us all. But I wish it wasn’t this way. I wish You would show us Your kindness in the way I think is kind.
You are God, and I am not.
Your ways are not my way.
Your thoughts are higher than my thoughts.
I just cannot make my own thoughts stop - or the anxiety that accompanies them.
So I come stand before You with a broken heart and spiraling mind. I’m just here, inching near to You with angry footsteps and toes tempted to test the waters of bitterness and resentment.
Your Word says if I draw near to You, You will draw near to me.
Will You still draw near when my edges are so sharp and ragged?
Will I be able to know Your presence when I bear such strife within myself?
Will I be able to know You’re near if the miracles I want, the life I have scripted doesn’t unfold before my very eyes?
Over and over again, life has not worked out like I thought it would.
But You’ve always been God. You’ve always been good.
Today, You are still God. You are still good.
Tomorrow you will be too. And throughout all of eternity, just as You have always been.
My lifetime is like a quick breeze blown by, a droplet in eternity’s waterfall.
Help me to see how big and wide and high and deep the love of God is. Help me to see the miracles and blessings swirling around me. Help me to see what is rather than what isn’t yet. Help me to put my hope back in You. This life is not about the outcomes. It’s about walking with You. It’s futile to put my hope in anything else.
So I return my dreams, my children, our longings, needs, desires... I return it all into Your holy, holding hands. They are big enough. You are big enough.
Hold me now.
Amen.