It seems that in the moment, tragedy is all around me. Not in a way where I am experiencing it, but it seems that nearly everyone I talk to has received or is waiting on news that drastically changes your life. The kind of news that makes your heart and bones ache and you’re not sure how to make it stop.
I think as a community we are feeling this way. With the loss of Matthew, it is hard to put so many things into perspective. Questions circle because we can’t find the answers we need, and we are left with this utter pang inside our chests-one that will never heal, but, over time, will become something we cope with.
Last week, as my friend was grieving for Matthew’s parents, she told me her chest literally hurt because she didn’t know how to make her brain stop. I asked her if she put JOY (an essential oil from Young Living) on her heart yet.
Then, as I was doing the laundry, I got this little hymn we used to sing at Sunday School in my head: “I got the joy, joy, joy, joy down in my heart…I’ve got the love of Jesus down in my heart…I’ve got the peace that passes all understanding down in my heart.” I came back to her and said, “Along with the joy, you need the love of Jesus and the peace that passes all understanding, and that is my recipe for heartache.”
Please stay with me here because I’m about to get a little cheesy, but I truly do believe all of what I’m about to tell you.
I’ve been through some heartache: things that you can’t imagine, situations just like this, and just everyday life that sometimes grabs me by the toes and drags me. There are all kinds of different heartache, and all of them are valid in my book.
I used to live in the heartache because that’s all I knew how to do. It’s so easy to be consumed by the things that don’t turn out the way that we want them to. Sometimes you get smacked down, and just when you’re about to pick yourself up, you get smacked down again and you begin to question why it’s worth it to get back up again.
I don’t live that way anymore, though. Because quite literally, I applied these ideas to my life without even knowing that’s what I was doing.
Joy is more than happiness for me. It’s not a celebration or worship or something that comes because God has given me exactly what I’ve wanted. It actually looks quite different. For me, JOY is putting Jesus first, Others second, and Yourself third.
I am not a religious person. I do not attend church. And I know that will put up a wall to what I am about to say for many, but Jesus was the kindest man to ever walk to face of the Earth. For some, worshipping Jesus comes in singing songs and attending Bible studies. For me, worshipping Jesus comes in showing kindness, a listening ear, a non-judgemental heart and help to others. It’s forgiving people and showing them grace, just like he has shown us time and time again. Putting Jesus first, to me, means living the way he taught us to while we are on Earth.
Obviously, that extends out to others, which I think is where the internal celebration comes in. Whether I’m happy or I’m sad, I really like helping others. Sometimes I help to a point where people think I’m weird. But when I’m down, seeing that I can do something that helps another person really lifts my spirits. It’s meeting someone else exactly where they are without judgement and giving them what they need in that moment that brings new life into their hearts and then to my heart. When I get out of thinking about my pain or my thoughts or my life and think about other people, then the world seems to make sense again.
But you also can’t forget to take care of yourself. I used to think Jesus first, Others second, Yourself third meant that you put everyone ahead of yourself. And because there’s always someone to take care of, I became pretty dry on the inside because my needs weren’t being filled. But you can’t skip this piece. You have to show yourself the same kindness as you show others.
It seems to me that we always want to be somewhere or something that we are not. If we are sad, we feel we should be happy. If we are poor, we work really hard to be rich. If we are fat, we long to be skinny. If we are x then we want to be y. We do this over and over, creating a sort of discomfort, working to become someone or something we are not so that we don’t have to deal with the issues at hand. I’ve learned to give myself time to be happy, to be sad, to grieve, to think, to process so that when I come out on the other end, I am truly able to make the changes I want to make.
Have the love of Jesus down in your heart. When we think of Jesus’ love, some of us think of church…and for many, this can be a polarizing comparison…some of us think of Him giving up his life on the cross for us, some of us think about his healing, or how God knew the hairs on our head before we were even conceived. And I do believe that Jesus loves us in all of these ways-and many more ways that we cannot even begin to wrap our small little brains around. When I think about love, I automatically turn to this glowing feeling that I get when I see someone I am fond of; and I do believe that God loves us in the same way.
But there is also a love that runs deeper than what I feel when I see my kids or is completely different than what I feel when someone makes me a pie. 1 Corinthians 13 is what brings the definition of love to life for me.
“4 Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. 5 It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. 6 Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. 7 It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.”
I think this is what it means to have the love of Jesus down in your heart. It’s not always something where you think about how much Jesus loves your hair or how you’ve done something good, but to me, he has shown me patience, kindness and has no record of my wrongs. When I carry this type of love in my heart, when I actually receive it (because honestly, sometimes I build up walls to it), then my bucket is filled and I am able to give it to others.
How to get the Peace that Passes All Understanding. Like I said, I can get stuck in my own rollercoaster of thoughts. I used to think it was easier to dwell on the things that did not go the way I thought they should. And then one day, when I did go to church, I came across a passage from Philippians 4 that literally changed my life.
“8 Finally, brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things. 9 Whatever you have learned or received or heard from me, or seen in me—put it into practice. And the God of peace will be with you.”
If you’re anything like me, there’s not a whole lot that makes sense in this world. We all make things way more complicated than they need to be-sometimes we are the makers of those complications and sometimes we are victims of those complications. Why do things happen the way that they do? I don’t know. Why do people act like they do? I don’t know. Why am I going through this right now? I don’t know.
I was watching this movie, “The Eye in the Sky” at the Art Theater the other day. It’s based in Kenya where England and the United States are trying to weigh the consequences of going after known terrorists who are planning a suicide bombing and the impact their decision to bomb will have on a girl who has set up shop to sell her mother’s bread near the house.
Before they made their decision, I was thinking about how crazy the human race actually is. That there are people who will strap bombs on their bodies to kill other people just to make a statement. That there are governments who will literally dispense poisons onto people. That there are companies who aren’t concerned with how their product affects the world, but just what the bottom dollar means for their lifestyle.
How these are the things that occupy our minds when we have beautiful children in our yards playing with their hoola hoops. How we will take notice of the Illinois sunset when we are driving our kids home from practice, but we rarely sit there to just experience it’s full glory. I thought about how a community pulled behind a family when their hearts were so broken. Or how dogs greet us when we come home. I was thinking about how in every circumstance, even in the worst of circumstances, there is always some sort of beauty…yet we get stuck in the darkness of life.
The hardest thing for me to learn is how to be content in the face adversity. It’s one thing to see the beauty of things when you’re feeling good, and it’s a grownup thing to be able to see the “pure and lovely” when it’s even taking all your energy to breathe.
But that’s the peace that passes all understanding, I think. And some days it’s a real challenge. I think that’s where so many people I know are right now. How do we see the light when we are faced with this great darkness?
Well, my answer is this: Joy, the love of Jesus, and the peace that passes all understanding.
There’s so, so much that we cannot control in this world. I find myself just at the point where I’m not sure what I can control and what I just need to roll with because it’s all being worked out somewhere. And so, this little song I learned in Sunday School all those years ago, seems to have some answers when I don’t know where to find them.
