Saturday, April 11, 2009

Hopelessness Is Hopeless

I've tried DESPERATELY today to keep myself hidden in a world of escapism in order to keep my mind distracted from the reality of our financial abyss.

*I've watched a couple episodes of 'Lost' online in an attempt to catch up to Teighlor so we can watch together.
*I've watched (in quick, no commercials or boring details format) my DVR'd programs from the week, which include American Idol [performances and results], Dancing With The Stars [performances and results] and House.
*I had to be out of the house this morning for Kevin's visit with the kids, so I wasn't even home to wallow in this quagmire until almost noon.

It's now almost 7pm, and I remembered that no one had picked up the mail yet. Hoping against hope for a check that was supposed to be delivered to us YESTERDAY, I waited to see what Alec brought in. Who was I kidding??? OF COURSE that check WASN'T going to be there... that would be TOO MUCH to hope for.

I came home last night to find out that its 'sister' check [both from the same job-just different payments] also DIDN'T arrive in our mailbox while I was away escaping in California. You know things aren't going well when the 2 checks from the ONLY project in the job hopper don't come as promised. REALLY? Isn't that just like kicking a horse when it's already down???

I'm tired of this. I really believe that I have handled this current situation FAR better than our last go 'round. I've stayed positive. I've stayed faith-filled. I've continued to trust and just believe for the best.

So many OPPORTUNITIES have reared their heads over the past 3 weeks. They should keep me positive, right? Well, they have... kinda. The opportunities have been just enough to keep me hoping against hope, while waiting for one of them to actually land a PAYING job.

The problem is... hope doesn't pay the bills, and it doesn't keep the late notices and disconnection letters from rolling on in. Hope won't keep the water running through our pipes or the heat from being shut off. Hope won't put gas in the car and it won't buy food for our table. Hope won't keep the car from being repossessed or our home from going into default, which leads to foreclosure. Hope also won't pay child support or keep the State from tracking down another 'dead beat dad'.

Hope may have kept a smile on my face when I just couldn't see the light at end of the tunnel, but hope is like EVERYTHING else... there's only so much of it to go around. And when the 'hope tank' is emptied and there's no Hope Station in sight where I can refuel, this heart stops hoping... and stops caring.

I am truly, utterly, and desperately DEFEATED. I escaped my reality for 6 glorious days - hoping against hope, that SOMETHING would be different when I returned. I guess I hoped for the wrong thing. I should have hoped for 'better', not 'different'. I should have been more specific in my hope. So, for that, I DID get different, just not better... only worse.

Today, I can now say I've joined the ranks of the group of people who have, even in the smallest of ways, contemplated what it would be like to just not be here anymore. To take the chicken way out and just stop the craziness. Is my life bad enough to actually justify the "S" word? NO, of course not! I'm just being brutally honest with myself, and THIS is my forum to vomit forth that kind of honesty.

I just told my husband that if someone walked up to me right now and offered me a quick, painless, non-violent way to speed up my journey to heaven, I would consider my options. It is, without a doubt, the MOST selfish thought I've EVER had. And I know it, too.

I simply have nothing left in me to make me look forward to tomorrow. nothing at all. and that's tragic because I should. I simply don't care, nor do I want to even consider caring.

And I'm not even mad at God, nor have I discontinued believing in His sovereign care. I KNOW he loves me. I'm incredibly thankful for - and KNOW he is undeniably responsible for - the daily provision of food on our table and gas in our tank in the past few weeks - our 'just enough for today' manna. I KNOW he sees my heart right now and he's not judging me - he's filled with compassion for me and even understands my desperate hopelessness and heartache. I KNOW that he has every resource at his disposal and could rescue me tonight, in spite of my outlook [or what other Christians would judge as a "crisis of faith"]. There is NOTHING wrong with my faith in my God. I KNOW who he is, and I've experienced first-hand what he is capable of. I don't LACK faith in what God CAN do, my hope has just run dry for any kind of guarantee that I'm somehow owed, or deserve to expect, a rescue.

I am embracing the worst now and turning the corner on hoping to keep things. Without a tremendous, miraculous pay day, we've gone too long without paychecks to keep things from being repossessed and possibly foreclosed on. Not everything will happen on the same day or even in the same week, but it's coming. Right now our focus is simply on the hope of keeping things from getting shut off or disconnected. I should just cry and get it over with so I can move on emotionally, but today I feel dead inside [that's what hopelessness feels like], so the possibility of tears, or even anger, are foreign emotions to me right now.

When my husband TRIED to make me feel better, TRIED to revive my hope, I looked at him and just shook my head. Did you NOT hear my words? You don't try to make dead people feel better or try to revive their hope. They're dead! I don't want platitudes, nor do I need nice little Christianese sentences thrown my way. NOT TODAY, anyway.

Tomorrow, I may be resurrected... I may not. I haven't stopped believing in the miraculous. Really, I haven't. Today, I'm just buried... that's all.

6 comments:

  1. Jesus knew the plan. He was to be crucified and then resurrected. He knew the promise. Even the purpose. He knew Father as faithful.

    And yet, all scripture points to Him experiencing the heaviness of that time. He sweat blood. And eventually asked why He was forsaken. He was God! He knew the end from the beginning. And yet, in His humanity, He didn't.

    You're right! He very much understands where you are today. It's part of the process. The part that makes you so dependent you don't even feel whole anymore. You're not. You're His. And He is guiding you through this darkness.

    I won't call this season "good", as the religious would like me to. It's drought. And heartbreak. And hopelessness. But God only promised us Himself as our portion. Which means that must be enough, right? If we could only fully grasp that. You're the closest to understanding that of anyone I know!!

    You're at your cross today.
    But there is promised resurrection of hope.

    It's coming...

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  2. I asked the Holy Spirit to shuffle my iPod, so that I might only sing the words He would have me sing. First song - You Are For Me by Kari Jobe. Second song - Healing Rain by Michael W. Smith. I immediately knew I should send it to you!

    Maybe you will worship to it tonight. Maybe you won't. But either way, I am calling down that healing rain upon you.

    P.S. If you do listen to it, put it on repeat - because it's kinda short.

    "Healing Rain Is Falling Down
    I'm Not Afraid"

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  3. A miracle!!!!!!!!!!!!! FOR YOU.

    I was sitting at my laptop, getting ready to post you a comment. I looked up at the screen to read a verse, and then looked down to find a small tag on my mouse pad. It wasn't there just a second ago!!! Seriously, I am astonished right now.

    It reads:
    Your greatness is measured by your gifts,
    not your possessions.

    *blink blink* I will save it for you.

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  4. Again, asked the Holy Spirit to guide me. This time as I opened the word, seemingly randomly. Ezekiel 37 - A Valley Of Dry Bones.

    1. The hand of the LORD was upon me, and he brought me out by the Spirit of the LORD and set me in the middle of a valley; it was full of bones.
    2. He led me back and forth among them, and I saw a great many bones on the floor of the valley, bones that were very dry.
    3. He asked me, "Son of man, can these bones live?" I said, "O Sovereign Lord, you alone know."
    4. Then he said to me, "Prophesy to these bones and say to them, 'Dry bones, hear the word of the Lord!
    5. This is what the Sovereign LORD says to these bones: I will make breath enter you, and you will come to life.
    6. I will attach tendons to you and make flesh come upon you and cover you with skin; I will put breath in you, and you will come to life. Then you will know that I am the Lord.' "
    7. So I prophesied as I was commanded. And as I was prophesying, there was a noise, a rattling sound, and the bones came together, bone to bone.
    8. I looked, and tendons and flesh appeared on them and skin covered them, but there was no breath in them.
    9. Then he said to me, "Prophesy to the breath; prophesy, son of man, and say to it, 'This is what the Sovereign LORD says: Come from the four winds, O breath, and breathe into these slain, that they may live.' "
    10. So I prophesied as he commanded me, and breath entered them; they came to life and stood up on their feet--a vast army.
    11. Then he said to me: "Son of man, these bones are the whole house of Israel. They say, 'Our bones are dried up and our hope is gone; we are cut off.'
    12. Therefore prophesy and say to them: 'This is what the Sovereign LORD says: O my people, I am going to open your graves and bring you up from them; I will bring you back to the land of Israel.
    13. Then you, my people, will know that I am the Lord, when I open your graves and bring you up from them.
    14. I will put my Spirit in you and you will live, and I will settle you in your own land. Then you will know that I the LORD have spoken, and I have done it, declares the Lord.' "

    Take a look at verse 3. God asks him what can be done about the dry bones. He doesn't say something like: "You can raise them Lord." He says: "O Sovereign LORD, You alone know the answer to that." There is nothing wrong with you acknowledging, out loud - to yourself and to others, that you don't know God's intentions in this. That He alone knows if He will rescue you. You can still have enough faith to prophecy over your dry bones, even in that place. Ezekiel did. And what does verse 11 address? Hope!

    I hope you find yourself in this passage. Not who someone says you should be in this moment. But who you are and how you feel, right now. Because people in the bible identified with all you feel today.

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  5. Love you. Goodnight.

    (And in 1 hour and 13 minutes ... HAPPY EASTER.)

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  6. Good Morning :)

    Thank you SO much for reading and commenting on my blog.

    For me, waiting is called infertility. Because I'm married. For you, waiting was called being single. Because you weren't married. But even the book addresses how they are the same! And so, I thank you for sharing that with me. And encourage you to share your story as often as this comes up between us. It's so nice to be able to say - Hauntie has been there. She really has been there. She knows this aching. Oh gosh, you don't know how comforting that is!!!!

    It totally warmed my heart, in the deepest of ways, to know you bought me a book! And I was equally touched by why you never gave it to me. Thank you for not wanting to cause me pain. But the truth is, as I uncovered in my blog, I'm already in pain. There's just not really a way to express it when life keeps moving forward. So may I have my book now? ;) THANK YOU, for giving me another opportunity for a healing day with Jesus.

    Some news, on this front. Got a text from Erin at 12:03am this morning. "Mckinley Danielle was born tonight at seven fifty three." Yesterday was also Irelyn's birthday, so they are exactly one year apart! What a blessing!!!!!!!! (I haven't heard from Erin, other than this, yet.)

    Love you.

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