Fathers

When my mom found out I was flying to Florida, she protested about me coming alone. It is a risk to travel, but I was realizing that in the middle of everything, I have not felt anxious. Ordinarily I’m rather an anxious sort—been biting my nails for forty years. In fact, in some ways, this strange time in my life seems to be even restful. It’s as if my emotions, like my body (and my brain, unfortunately), are in slow mo. The nail-biting is gone. I’ve been wondering about this.

Last week I spent a day on the shore of Lake Huron at a debriefing for a group of young people who had come back from a month in the Middle East. Some of them were graduating from college and moving on to job searches. They seemed pretty calm about it. I thought about my own transition from college to the various jobs that followed: nanny, research assistant, refugee camp worker, teacher. Looking back, it seems to have been a natural progression, and I don’t remember stressing out about it. But as I’ve gotten older, it seems to be harder to face uncertainty. Maybe it’s one of those hormonal things they warned me about. Usually it raises my blood pressure just to decide what to do about dinner when there are unexpected guests. (I know of at least one other person like this). But I am not anxious right now.

Ironically, I find that with all the uncertainties of cancer, this one thing is restful: at least the treatment plan itself is charted. Once I accepted back in March that I needed to come to Canada for the yearlong treatment, I no longer had any major decisions to make. The next year of my life is planned, and I’m not going anywhere. I am realizing now that for me this is a gift from God and freeing.  It allows me to think about other things, work at other things, invest in other things, and not waste energy worrying about my future. I think this is what God wants for me right now, an unplanned, unexpected, forced sabbatical. A time of rest. I am just supposed to take one step at a time, one day at a time. Ordinarily I’m not very good at this, really, so I guess he’s giving me practice.

This is something every good Father does, every good teacher, or coach or counselor: he takes you from where you are just to the next step.  That’s all he’s holding out to you. Think how restful this is. All you have in front of you is the very next step. And it’s a Father that is holding out a very strong and very loving hand, saying, “Come on. You can do this. I will help you. Come.”

Because sometimes we get mixed up about what our faith is. 

Instead of thinking of it as a Person we love, we start treating it as a religion, or a “to do” list. We measure ourselves and other people by the things we have to do. We also start thinking of truth as a list of things to believe in.  But truth is not a list of doctrines. Truth is a Person. Jesus said, “I am the way, the truth, and the Life, and no one enters into relationship with the Father without entering a relationship with me.” Truth is a Person. When we give ourselves to Jesus, we enter into a relationship with Him, and He puts us into relationship with everyone else that is in love with Him. And there is no list of things that have to be done or beliefs that have to be held. It’s all whether we belong to Jesus or not. And he calls every one of us to the next step of obedience, the next step of faith, just the very next step. And my step isn’t my sister’s. And my sister’s isn’t mine. Because there is no list, just obedience and this excellent Father doing his job.

 This is restful.  I can relax in this. Because it’s not a religion to follow, but a Father, a Husband to belong to. And I know how good that can be.